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Nov. 19, 2005 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux

15:23

0 An Introduction to Freedomain Radio

The central purpose and philosophy of this podcast series

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	Hello, my name is Stephan Molyneux, and I'm the host of Free Domain Radio.
	Thank you so much for taking the time to download and listen to this, which I guess is podcast zero.
	I'm actually standing at around podcast 187 at the moment.
	So what I thought would be worthwhile, based on some suggestions from listeners, would be to sort of bounce back through time and give a bit more of an introduction to a radio show or a podcast show, which has grown a little bit beyond what it was that I had originally intended.
	And so may well be worth an introduction.
	Now, the motto of Free Domain Radio is the logic of personal and political liberty.
	So of course we are going to examine and sort of figure out how much liberty can be derived, how much freedom can exist within your own personal life and also in your understanding of your political structure that surrounds you and, to some degree, tells you what to do.
	So we are very interested here in this conversation in figuring out the maximum liberty, concordant with happiness and satisfaction in relationships and all that kind of stuff, the maximum amount of freedom that we can have in our lives.
	Because it's certainly my belief that freedom leads to happiness, beneficial relationships, peace of mind, contentment, a sense of virtue and so on, self-esteem.
	And so we really focused on trying to figure out, both in the political arena and in the personal arena, what does it mean to have liberty, to have freedom in your life, to have freedom in your relationships, to be free to look at things like the government and foreign policy and domestic policy and currency policy and all that.
	To look at that from a point of view of clarity, of moral clarity, and also what does it mean within your romantic relationships, and your family relationships, and your acquaintanceships, and friends, and business relationships, what does it mean to have freedom?
	What is the right amount of freedom?
	To what degree should we conform to the desires of others?
	To what degree should we expect others to conform to our desires?
	What can we do to bring flexibility, freedom, liberty, and voluntarism into all of our relationships?
	And that's really the central goal behind this podcast series, to talk to you about that, to listen to your responses about that, to get everybody involved in a conversation about what I think is the greatest good in life, which is universal morality, which is beneficial, positive, loving, virtuous relationships.
	Which is a clear-eyed view of the world, of the state, of the political arena that we live in, and how we can bring that kind of freedom to bear on our own lives, to live happier lives, and more peaceful lives, and more serene lives, and more benevolent lives, and more beneficial lives.
	That's really the goal of this conversation, and I think it's a very exciting conversation.
	It definitely is a conversation in the Socratic tradition of curiosity about ethics and logic and morality and politics and so on.
	And it's a very open conversation.
	Participation is absolutely key.
	You can obviously send me all the emails that you want.
	I'm more than happy to read them.
	And there's a flourishing message board where you can post questions and ask other listeners about what's going on in the podcasts.
	So it very much is a dialogue.
	It's a group of us talking together about freedom and what it means in our own lives.
	All right, so that's the good stuff.
	What's the bad stuff?
	Well, the bad stuff is that the audio quality sometimes sucks a little bit, because I do some of these podcasts from my car.
	It's sort of a mixture.
	Some of them are articles that I've written, and some of them are responses to specific emails or queries from listeners.
	And some of them are what I call traffic jams, which is I'm driving to work, I have a particular topic, and I work it out for 30 or 35 minutes as I drive to work, which I actually find to be a very good way of getting topics across.
	It's more chatty.
	It's a little bit more spontaneous.
	I try and throw in a little bit of humor to the degree that I'm able to.
	And so there are times when things sound good.
	There are times when things sound bad.
	I don't have Now, flashy intro music.
	I don't have sound effects.
	I don't have sound engineers.
	It's just me engaging in a conversation with my listeners, and hopefully with you, about what it might mean to bring freedom to your life.
	Now, aside from the audio quality, there will be some other things that are going to be challenging about listening to this podcast series for you.
	I think challenging in a good way.
	At least, I hope it's in a good way.
	But challenging insofar as we all have preconceptions about the world that we live in.
	And as, of course, Socrates and the ancient philosophers found out, when you begin to question those preconceptions logically, some of them, or in some cases a lot of them, don't hold up to a lot of rational scrutiny.
	And that obviously creates challenges within our own lives.
	You may have your political beliefs challenged, You may have your beliefs about virtue challenged.
	You may have your beliefs about the good life challenged.
	You may have your beliefs about your parents challenged, or your lovers, or your friends.
	And I don't think that's a bad thing.
	I think that we can all take that.
	I think we're all pretty strong and robust people, and we can take those kinds of questions.
	I promise that I never harangue anybody.
	I promise that I'm never going to tell you what to do, because that would not exactly be In concordance with the idea of having a podcast about liberty.
	But I am going to ask some tough questions, and those tough questions sometimes come from me, they sometimes come from philosophers or historians, they sometimes come from listeners, and hopefully they'll sometimes come from you, because it is a participative conversation which we hope that you'll join in.
	But there will be times when I'm going to be annoying, not because I'm trying to be annoying or provocative, but simply because I'm working out a logical analysis of a particular relationship within society or within one's personal life that might make you uncomfortable, but you're perfectly free to do with these ideas what it is that you want.
	You're perfectly free to reject them, you're perfectly free to say this is the best stuff ever, so I don't think that the discussion should be at all threatening.
	It may make you uncomfortable at times, but you're not made of glass, and it's well worth, I think, examining just about everything that we believe, because the rigor of a logical analysis of philosophy of sometimes the study of reality, the study of knowledge, the study of ethics, is a very powerful and liberating pursuit to have within your life.
	And it definitely will make you freer and it will make you happier.
	That's sort of the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, I guess you could say, of participating in this conversation.
	Now, in general, the podcasts are divided into three major categories, and the first is the theory.
	What does the theory of a logical and moral philosophy mean?
	Because if you don't have a theory down about how it is you're going to discuss the facts of relationships and existence and so on, then you're kind of just swinging wildly hoping to connect with something that's called truth, and I don't think that's very productive.
	So we talk a little bit about theory at the beginning, and some of that is just sort of me reading articles that I've written that have had some positive responses in this area of discussing ethics.
	We also discuss what that looks like in terms of social organizations, right?
	The science of human relationships, which is, to some degree, the study of political science.
	And, of course, I'm very interested, since I'm interested in pacifism, and I'm interested in freedom, and I'm interested in any non-coercive solution to whatever problems exist within human relationships.
	One of the first things that I do is talk about how society might exist in the absence of a central and coercive state monopoly, like a government.
	And that can be a challenge for people, right?
	You may never heard these theories before, but that's okay.
	I mean, you know, I'm just putting stuff out there, seeing what I can connect with that can minimize violence or coercion in human relations.
	Because I do believe that our political environment has a lot to do with how our personal relationships shape out, and vice versa.
	To me, there's a strong interweaving between the political and the personal, which is why both are sort of in the motto of the podcast.
	So, we do talk about politics, we talk about the state, we look at non-violent solutions to social problems, because one of the major problems with the state is that it tends to have a lot of enforcement involved with it, right?
	I mean, it tends to pass laws that if you don't obey, then you're going to get some sort of violent sanction applied against you, and the police are going to come and take you off to jail or whatever.
	And my major goal is to try and figure out ways that kind of interaction can be minimized.
	I mean, you can't eliminate it completely.
	I mean, there's things like self-defense and so on, which I'm perfectly comfortable with.
	But if there's ways that we can structure human relations that we can end up with more carrots and fewer sticks, more positive reinforcement, and less people sort of waving guns in each other's faces and telling them what to do, I think that's a good thing.
	I think that's definitely a goal worth striving towards.
	And to understand that in the political sphere, in terms of outward coercion, like people sort of waving guns around, is, I think, also to understand that in the personal sphere, in one's personal relationships, where sometimes manipulation or guilt or obligation and so on render us less free than I think we could be in our personal relationships, and render those personal relationships less satisfying and less rich thereby.
	It really is a large approach to take to the problem of freedom, but it certainly has been my life's work to understand this stuff and to try and communicate about it, so I think that it can be a very useful conversation to have, and can be very liberating for you.
	So, sort of the three major areas is theory, politics, and personal relationships.
	And the theory talks about, or touches upon, the political and personal relationships, and so I think that there's something here for you, if you're interested in politics, or if you're interested in the ways in which violence can be minimized in human affairs.
	And also, if you're just interested in improving the quality of your relationships, then I would say that there's something here for you as well.
	And I think that the two overlap enough that if you only have sort of one or the other, you might learn something about the other one.
	So I think that can be very useful and very helpful for you.
	Now, the general methodology for how we're going to approach these problems is pretty specific.
	I take an enormous amount from the scientific method of approaching problems, and this doesn't mean that there's going to be lots of equations and experiments for you to reproduce at home, but it does mean that we're going to need logic, And empirical evidence, like something that's happened in the world that can justify or not justify a particular position.
	So this is not a show about opinions.
	This is not a show about, I think you should or I think this or I think that, which may be a little bit different from some of the talk podcasts or talk radio that you're used to hearing.
	But we have a very strict, in a sense, methodology for how we determine truth from falsehood through these podcasts, which is you've got to have it logical.
	It's got to be logical.
	It's got to be sort of worked out from first premises in a way that's instructive and enjoyable and so on.
	And it also has to have some evidence.
	You can't sort of make assertions.
	You have to sort of have some evidence behind them.
	My particular training is in history and philosophy.
	So, I have a graduate degree in history, and I focus very much on the history of philosophy, so I can bring some facts, I guess, to bear on the opinions that I have, and then when people phone in or are sending me emails, then, you know, we ask for logic and evidence, because the last thing that you want to do when you're building a foundation of thought within your own mind is to not have a strict and objective methodology.
	for determining truth from falsehood, for determining what is accurate, and separating that from what is simply one's opinion, or what feels right, or what one's used to, and that sort of stuff.
	And like most of philosophy, of course, the major goal is to take the common sense, moral things that we all believe, like you shouldn't steal, you shouldn't kill, you shouldn't rape, you shouldn't lie, defraud people, and so on.
	All of these are sort of basic moral principles that we all believe in and live to the degree that we are able in our own lives.
	And a lot of philosophy has to do with extracting the general principles out of that.
	In the same way, like physics, right?
	You have a rock that falls from a cliff, you want to sort of look at that, extract the principles so that you can apply it to other things.
	Like the orbits of the Earth and the orbits of the Moon, which may not be as directly observable, but you can use the principles derived from very specific things to generalize about other things and come to pretty accurate conclusions thereby.
	That's the same sort of approach that we take, so you're not going to hear anything freaky like, theft is good and killing is good or anything like that.
	But the conclusions that come out of taking the principles from those common-sense moral axioms and then applying them in a wider sphere can sometimes be very surprising and can challenge a lot of the things that you may have learned throughout your own sort of state-sponsored education and so on.
	It also may cause you to have some interesting conversations with the people around you, so it might be worthwhile to send this link to other people if you're going to go through this process so that you don't end up having to explain a whole lot, you know.
	Obviously, I appreciate the extra listeners, but it also might make it more enjoyable for you to go through this process, because you'll be talking about the same kinds of things with the same kinds of understandings with people, so I think that would be good.
	Now, the last sort of thing I'll talk about before we get on with the podcast themselves is that the question has sort of come up, do you need to listen to these in sequence?
	Well, I think it's not a bad thing to listen to them in sequence.
	There is a general plan for the sequence of the podcast, so it probably is going to be worth it, and I do refer in podcasts to previous podcasts But that having been said, I mean, the whole thing is about freedom, right?
	Yeah, that's a suggested thing, but you can do what you want.
	There's certainly no particular harm in cherry-picking from the podcast and figuring out what is of interest to you.
	Certainly, it may be worthwhile for you to sort of take this podcast and then that podcast, have a look through the list and grab, you know, just to see if the way that we talk about these issues is something that resonates with you and works for you and is important enough for you to invest the time.
	Now, if you find that they are, then I would, without trying to nag you, I would sort of say maybe it would be beneficial to listen to them in sequence, because it is a pyramid building of knowledge that we're trying to do here.
	So I think that it may be worth doing that.
	Of course, it's completely up to you.
	Some people have cherry-picked and then have sent me emails saying, well, this isn't explained very well.
	I'm like, oh, go back three podcasts.
	I'm sort of building in on this.
	So feel free to do that as well.
	So I hope that you invest the time.
	Of course, a lot of time and energy has gone into the thoughts behind these podcasts.
	I think that they're kind of unique.
	At least, I haven't seen anything out there that's similar.
	And so I think that you have a one-of-a-kind opportunity here to get involved in a conversation about freedom and virtue and philosophy, which I think is just the most important thing in the world, the most important thing in your life, the thing that is going to bring you the greatest joy.
	It certainly has brought me the greatest joy in the world, and I just want to try and do whatever I can to share that with everybody else.
	So my enthusiasm is very high.
	And I hope that that translates into an enjoyable experience for you.
	So thank you so much again for taking the time to have a listen to this.
	I hope that you enjoy them.
	Please come and have a look at www.freedomainradio.com.
	You can join in on the boards, you can send me emails through the form mail, and there's lots of juicy stuff up there which can be helpful for you.
	And last but not least, there's a sort of financial note, right?
	I mean, I have sort of costs and so on, and I'm certainly happy to put these out there for free.
	If you find that you do really enjoy the podcast, and they have a really strong and beneficial effect for you, and you really get engaged in the conversation, and it has significant benefits for you, then there is a place that you can donate at www.freedomainradio.com.
	And of course, I would appreciate any opportunities that you take to do that with deep gratitude.
	It's a voluntary relationship.
	And, of course, freedom is around you having a sort of sense of how important and how beneficial the podcasts are for you.
	And then you can come and throw some cash my way if you feel that that's the right thing to do.
	So I certainly would appreciate any donations that you come up with.
	And that having been said, on with the podcast!
	Please have a listen.
	Please let me know what you think.
	I always look forward to hearing comments.
	And enjoy, enjoy, enjoy.

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