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April 16, 2009 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
01:37:50
1333 Hatred - A Convo - A Must Listen!

Refraining from action in the face of corruption.

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Let's read it. Ever since Sunday's show, I've felt an ever-increasing amount of hate and cynicism.
I really hate religion.
I really hate tolerance when it comes to irrational ideologies even more, since it just enables it.
But these are just abstract ideas.
It's the people I really hate.
I'm having a whole lot of trouble wanting to help a world full of people I hate, and even more trouble with cynicism about the world it can be.
It makes it really hard for me to respect new people I meet, and have enough patience with them to give them a chance.
I freeze under a flood of these strong emotions when they start saying...
It's like Wilson says on House, you know, like...
Why can't you just let these people believe what they want to believe?
Live and let live if it makes them feel better.
Or what's the harm in believing in God or anything about spiritual growth and religion is harmless and so on.
Of course Wilson's an enabler which on the show fits perfectly.
So people say these things, I'm overwhelmed and then I blank out or either I And either I enable them or say something that really expresses my intolerance of religion to them, usually the former, which is to become that which I hate most.
And of course they get all high and mighty after that.
I'm overwhelmed with these feelings even as I write, and I don't know if I'm just blanking out even now, forgetting one of the countless things I've been told before or not.
Maybe today's just an overwhelming day for me.
Why do you think this came up for you, and I think it's a great topic, but why do you think it came up for you after Sunday?
That Sunday when we talked about my hate for your roleplay character.
Oh, that Sunday show.
Sorry, I thought you meant a more recent one.
Okay, right. So when I was playing the relativist and so on, right?
Right. Right, okay.
Right. I mean, after having access to those feelings, I think they just...
Like, or talked about them for the first time in any...
At least in a more honest way, I started feeling them more and more.
Right, right. And since the new slogan is not Free Domain Radio feeding the hate, that...
But to me, there's obviously nothing wrong with what you're feeling, of course, right?
But it's obviously uncomfortable for you, right?
Or is it? Right. Or are you reveling in it?
I mean, I don't want to pre-guess.
Well, no. That's hard.
I think it's both.
Go on. Well...
I hate... I don't...
It's a barrier for me, and also, at the same time, it's...
I want to revel in it, I guess.
You're certainly not convincing me, so maybe you were convincing yourself, but what do you mean you want to revel in it, I guess?
Oh, the I guess part was the unconvinced.
Like, like, okay.
So, I mean, the reason that I'm asking this is, is that this is the conversation where you can let it all hang out, right?
Because if you're going to be tentative here, when we're talking about hatred, then we're spinning in slow, smoky circles, right?
I'm not trying to hold back.
I'm just trying to find the words.
Well, you won't be able to find the words without the feelings, right?
Because then you're describing rather than experiencing.
Oh. Okay.
So just tell me more about the hatred.
When does it come up?
Where does it sit in your body?
It sits in my chest, mostly.
Is it like a tightness or a heat, or what is the physical sensation?
It's a Tightness.
It's a heat. It's a...
It's like I want to just...
It's like a rage.
Right. Okay. Go on.
An intense anger.
It's just – there's a lot of cynicism to it, and I guess cynicism isn't exactly a feeling so much as an opinion about the world or whatever.
Yeah.
Okay, go on.
Just a lot of cynical thoughts.
It's hopeless. The world is...
I know when I say the world...
Every time I say that now, I think, oh great, I must be talking about myself.
Everyone I meet has some irrational ideology, whether it's atheism or statism or both, or that whole tolerance stance.
And Whenever I think I want to try and talk them out of it, I feel too much hate and anger at them to even want to do it.
Right.
And there's no way I can do it without running them over with the steamroller of – let me tell you what I really think.
Right. Right.
I don't want to end up like...
I've been watching so much House lately that maybe this is part of it, but I don't think so.
Well, it's probably not unrelated, but it probably is not causal, right?
Right. And just by the by, right, house is people's ambivalence about philosophy, right?
That's house, right?
Because it's like, you can have wisdom as long as you're a cripple.
You can see the truth of people's hypocrisies, but we're going to inflict a permanent physical pain on you, right?
Right. He's like a Jesus figure, right?
I mean... You can speak the truth, as people perceive Jesus to have done, and then we're going to nail you on a fucking cross, right?
The way I'd seen it is that honesty is misery.
Well, sure, but honesty is misery only because of other people, right?
But they project that onto physical pain on his part, right?
Right, right.
His ailment is the Wilsonian philosophy, right?
Right. But anyway, we won't get into a discussion of House.
So, there's a lot in what you said.
Is there more that you wanted to say, or do we want to start having a look at some of it in more detail?
Um... Other than this sort of despair and hopelessness that comes around it in regards to finding love, meeting new friends, forming functional relationships, that kind of thing.
It's like...
I feel like I've swung the other way from codependent to...
Isolated?
Isolated. Just pushing everybody away and rejecting everyone and...
Which, of course, is a false dichotomy because there's nothing but isolation and codependence, right?
Because all you're doing is managing and so on, right?
Right. It's the other side of the coin.
Yeah, yeah. Okay. Okay.
Anyway, go on. I think that's all I can add, at least right now.
Okay, okay. So, I mean, there's a lot in what it is that you're talking about.
I know there's some other people on the call.
I don't know if you guys wanted to add anything to that, to what is being said, or if I should just continue on.
You can just type in the chat window if you wanted to add anything.
Oh, and I don't think...
I forgot something.
I don't think I talked about how...
What I meant by reveling in the hate and the rage.
It's a good...
It's like...
It feels good.
You know? Like...
It's like a rush.
Or a...
It just feels good in a really bad way.
Go on. I don't know how to put that in words that make sense.
Show me on the doll where the good feeling turned bad.
Right? Go on. You know what I mean by like a rush of rage?
It just feels really good.
It's like you're all...
Like the kind of...
Feeling that comes with this false sense of maybe strength or high and mightiness or maybe that's a judgment about the thought more than or a judgment about the feeling.
But it just feels powerful.
Right, right, right.
Go on. And I want to unleash it.
But I know that if I do, or maybe I don't know, but if I do, I'm afraid that I'm going to offend and alienate myself from everyone.
Sure, sure. No, I understand.
I really do. Is there anything more you wanted to add to that?
Oh, no, that was it. Right.
Well, I mean, first of all, I completely sympathize, and I think I really do understand what you mean, because it's something that I wrestle with as well.
Not so much the hatred, but the anger.
So, I mean, I think we're in the same boat, right?
I mean, so I'm not going to pretend to have any kind of magical answers.
I'll just tell you some of the stuff that I work with, which I found to be somewhat helpful, and, you know, maybe it will be of use to, and maybe it won't, right?
I think the key thing, and the reason that I think it's important to do the call is that you are in danger of getting to the worst possible place, right?
Which is you don't have the comforts of conformity and you don't have the intimacy of authenticity, right?
Right. Because then it's like, well, this is a great fucking deal, right?
I had a life with some blind conformity, and now I don't have that, and I also don't have the other thing, right?
I don't even have the mirage that I thought was a lake, and I don't have a real lake.
I'm just stuck in the desert, right?
Right. Like you had said, truth equals virtue equals happiness, or reason equals virtue equals happiness.
So when I start to become more and more rational in my thinking and Try to live my values even more, I realize that I'm...
I start to see where I am and that doesn't make me happy.
Sure, sure. No, I really do understand.
And I'll clarify that a little bit because reason equals virtue equals happiness is often assumed, and quite rightly so, to mean the more rationally you act or the more people you convert to rationality or the more you yourself think rationally, The more you will be a good person and therefore the more you will be happy, right?
But the proposition includes itself.
And what I mean by that is that reason means knowing the limits of reason, right?
Like if I think, well, birds are carbon-based, I'm carbon-based, birds can fly, therefore I can fly.
Well, there's a limit to, even though that syllogism exists, It has some technical potential validity to it.
You don't want to run off a cliff with, you know, flapping your arms wildly, right?
So when we look at the world, it is rational to accept the limits of reason.
Reason can never be inflicted on anyone, right?
Right, you can't make them reason...
Well, you can't make them want to reason.
Right. I mean, you can put a gun to someone's head and force them to go through Aristotle's logic or something, right?
But you can't make them want to reason.
Right. It's free will.
It's applying their...
They have to willfully compare their thoughts to an abstract objective standard.
Well, yeah, but that's not how you and I and everyone else started, right?
You have to be just kind of crazy stupid for a reason, right?
Like, even though you know you're walking off a cliff, even though you know you're throwing yourself into a pit of fire, you just want it so badly that nothing can stop you.
Because it's irrational to be rational in an irrational world, in a way, right?
Right, that makes sense.
So... This yearning, burning desire that we have for the truth at all costs, for the truth despite discomfort, despite attack, despite hostility, despite cynicism, despite snarkiness, despite undermining, despite fogging from people around us, the burning desire that we have for the truth has to be there.
And we simply can't create that in someone, right?
Like you can take a guy and you can, you know, I don't know, pay him $1,000 to run 100 yards, right?
And he'll run a hundred yards if he can, or maybe you'll, you know, threaten to strangle his cat if he doesn't and he'll do it too, right?
So you can make someone run a hundred yards, right?
Right. But you cannot make someone want to be an Olympic sprinter.
Like, you can make them go through the motions, and we see this in debates, right?
With me, with others, right?
That you may get certain concessions, you may get little bits, but it's like pushing a helium balloon into water.
As long as you hold it down, fine.
You let it go, it pops up again, right?
Right, they just fall back into their normal mode of thinking.
Or non-thinking, right?
Or non-thinking. Right, so...
I mean, it's taken three years of my working through this.
I mean, you've reasoned with me a ton, and I agreed.
I accepted your reasoning, and it just kind of went back, you know, like a helium balloon there.
And then I did my best to keep going and keep reasoning with me, you know, please.
It's even hard for the person who wants reason to be rational.
Right. Right, because we think that reason means UPB and debating, right?
Or whatever, right?
Whether it's UPB or some other theory.
But whatever's rational, we think, well...
Reason equals virtue equals happiness.
Therefore, I'm going to understand abstract arguments logically, and I'm going to bring those logical arguments to other people, right?
Right. And I watch you...
And I think maybe this is a source of some of my...
This may be a source of a thought that goes through my head.
When I watch you in your approach to these people, you...
You reach out to them in a way where you explain things from their viewpoint, and you draw them in, you've got the sense of humor thing going, you've got them laughing, and you're going to have a lot more success that way than you will if I unleash all my hatred and cynicism,
because I'm not going to get anywhere With the way I'm feeling when I talk to these people.
Let's not go to that yet because that's all an argument from effect, right?
Which is, you know, should I do this or what would be more effective?
Like we can't do an argument from effect because an argument from effect will have no effect on your emotions, right?
Like you don't say to your anger, well, you see it's impractical for you to express yourself and your anger goes, oh, okay, poof and vanishes, right?
Right. Doesn't work that way, right?
No. And it's kind of good that it doesn't, right?
Because then you'd end up with stomach cancer or some horrible thing, right?
So let's just stay with processing the perspective of where we are and what it is that we're trying to do, right?
Because we want to live rationally.
And to try to do things which we can't do is irrational.
Right? So to say, well, I want to change the world.
Other than, I mean, I have it out there as a fun game.
But that's not my...
My happiness, your happiness, anybody's happiness cannot depend upon events outside of our control.
I mean, we all understand that if someone plans a picnic and it rains and he gets angry and shakes his fists at the clouds, that he's not mature and perhaps not even sane.
Right. Right. Right, because the weather is outside its control.
We can understand some disappointment, but not, you know, oh my god, this is a complete horror, right?
Right. And in the same, so a man who places his entire happiness on whether or not the weather is good or bad is clearly not in charge of his own thinking and not really in charge of his own body, right? Because this He's going to have all these expectations which he can't control.
He's going to be buffeted around like a pinball, right?
And so his, in a sense, his fight and flight mechanism, his cortisol production, all of the stuff that goes on is completely at the mercy of what apparently random events, right?
Right, like basing your happiness on success or failure.
Right, but you have more control over success or failure than you have over the weather, right?
Right. At least you have some influence over success.
Right. And so I think that that's the first thing to get, right?
Which is to take, you say, well, I don't even know if I want to help people.
But you can't help people.
I can't help people.
No one can help people.
Because we can't inhabit their heads and make them do anything.
Or we can't create the kind of crazy Lemmings off a cliff desire for truth that we all happen to have been happily infected by, though sometimes it feels like a curse, right?
Right. Right, like a doctor cannot help someone who will not take treatment, right?
Right. And we can't make anybody want to take the treatment.
And we're also ambivalent about the treatment, right?
Yeah. Right, because there are times we'd love to go back to the Matrix, right?
I've thought about it several times and it's like, well, I'm not going to be happy there either.
Right, but you'd like to go back to before you knew you wouldn't be happy going back, right?
True. I mean, I think we all have those thoughts, you know, look at the happy herd, right, and say, well, they're dumb, but they're, you know, at least there's a lot of them, right?
And they're in their commercials. Sorry?
Ignorance is bliss or...
Right. We have this fantasy.
I mean, of course it's not, right?
But we have this fantasy, right?
The same way that we have, as I mentioned the other day, this fantasy that, you know, some low-rent job will give us, you know, we'll be stress-free, right?
Oh, right. And nothing's more stressful than stacking shelves, right?
Nothing's more stressful than not knowing the truth, right?
Right. I mean, when you bring the truth to someone...
They get very anxious.
And that's the state that they live in, right?
Constant hostility and anxiety about the truth, right?
Everybody lives orbiting the sun called the truth.
And you either are on the dark side of the moon and fearful of sunrise, or you're on the bright side of the moon and cursing yourself for not having enough protection, right?
Exactly. Even if I come at them with the most sympathetic and You know, for their history, for...
Even the sympathy itself provokes defenses and anxiety or...
It's just...
There's no way to control.
Right. And I would say that that's because you don't have...
And I mean this with respect and sympathy, right?
But... But you don't have good motives when you're bringing the truth to people.
In my opinion. And again, I could be completely wrong at every level here, right?
This is just by my ambling thoughts.
And I'll tell you what I mean by that, and you can tell me if I'm full of the most utter nonsense or whatever, right?
Which is that you're stewing in a vat of your own filthy hatred and rage, right?
At the moment. I'm not saying permanently, but kind of at the moment, right?
Right. And I... Can guess that I probably wouldn't have good motives if I'm stewing in anger, hatred, and rage.
Well, what I mean is that, what are you luring people towards, right?
Look, because if you say, I have the truth, and I'm bringing you the truth, and you're, you know, sick with anger and contempt and all this and that, right?
Basically, what you're saying to people is, you know, join me on the dark side, right?
Right. I mean, you understand.
I've heard this before.
I'm sweaty, I'm nervous, I'm anxious, I'm hostile, I'm tense, I'm this, I'm that.
Want to get on board?
Yeah, and I've heard, I mean, we've talked about this before.
Right, and we have, and we understand that in the abstract.
But my question is, then, what is your motive for For bringing the truth to people.
I'm not talking about the empirical truth that you're bringing in terms of your emotional state.
I'm talking about the abstract truth.
Why? Because you said, I don't know how I can help a world that I hate, right?
And of course you can't, right?
I mean, of course you can't, right?
But the question is, why do you want to?
What is driving the desire to communicate the truth?
Why open your mouth when people say things that are not true?
I mean, it's a pretty basic question, but it's something we just don't think of, right?
I mean, God knows I've had to think of it enough times, but it's an interesting question, right?
It's probably because I'm...
It's a feeling.
You're going to go into abstract land, right?
No, it's probably because I'm alone.
Sorry, go ahead. It's probably because I'm lonely.
I don't want to be alone.
It certainly could be that you're lonely, that you want to find like-minded souls and so on, right?
Right. I've told my therapist this, and she's like, well...
People need other people.
People are social beings.
Humans are social animals.
You know...
So for you...
I don't want to...
I get that your therapist is not necessarily able to help you at this level, right?
And maybe she can, maybe she can't, right?
But I'd rather not talk about what your therapist is saying.
Let's just focus on this, if that's alright with you.
Right. So...
What do you feel if someone says something that you disagree with or that you know is not true?
How do you feel if you don't say something?
It depends on where I am, but...
Well, you see, you've been stewing in this hatred for two weeks, so let's just talk about the last two weeks, right?
So people say stuff, I mean, the TV's on, and you pick up the newspaper, the radio's on, if someone says something at the work, I mean, it's constant, right?
It's a constant cacophony of foolishness that we live in, right?
Right, and it's whether it's on TV or certain people I talk to online, or...
Sorry, certain people you talk to online?
Yeah, like my therapist had suggested that I try the Match.com thing now that I'm trying to date again.
And I've basically ruled out everybody on that site.
And it's just sort of like a fit of cynicism and screw them all.
They're all crazy.
And I don't want any of it.
And that's what she suggested, that I'm being too intolerant.
And in acting class, my acting teacher will say things that just...
I kind of have to grit my teacher because he's trying to teach a class and I feel helpless there and kind of enraged and like, God, I just want to correct him, but I don't know how.
There's no way I can convey this amount of information to him.
What do you feel when you don't...
Why do you want to tell him X, Y, and Z? I mean, you don't want to date him, right?
Because he's wrong. Right.
So it's not about dating, right?
No. I mean, I'm not saying it's not related to dating, but dating is not the cause, because this happens in non-dating situations, right?
Right. It happens at work.
It happens in acting class.
And you know that you're not alone in this, right?
We all struggle with this.
We all struggle. I mean, it happens while watching TV shows and acting.
I know. Just the everything...
The storyline is just ridiculous.
I know. I know.
I watched this movie Eagle Eye the other night.
It just... Oh, with Sheila what?
Or whatever that is.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, Eagle Eye with the computer that's we the people or whatever and it gets all...
So, I mean, we understand, right?
You can't look at any drama without there being some ridiculous...
Stuff about business or the free market and you can't watch any cop show without the cops at least being long-suffering heroes of some kind.
You know, I mean, we all understand that, right?
Right. And we all struggle with it, right?
So don't feel isolated in this.
I think that's the important thing, first and foremost.
There is no easy answer and we all struggle with it.
So that's the first thing, right?
So just to normalize it relative to this, we're all in this, we're all swimming against the same tide.
Right. Right. I do, you do, everybody on this call does, everybody who's ever been interested in philosophy, right?
At least the tide we're swimming against isn't laced with hemlock or crucifixions, right?
So we'll consider that progress.
We're only dealing with stress, not with beheadings, right?
Right. And of course, what holds me back is the tidal wave.
You know, if I say anything, then...
Right. So you're in an impossible situation, right?
Because if you don't say something...
You're really stressed and tense.
And if you do say something, you fear it'll be a disaster, right?
Right. So I don't want you to go out of this call with, now I have to open my mouth every time, right?
Because that to me is not free.
What I want to do is to bring freedom to the situation.
And what that means is that you have a choice which is equally honorable and To say something or to not say something, but you're not being buffeted back and forth by the Scylla and Charybdis of fear, anxiety, rage, contempt, disgust, desire to correct, to make the world a better place.
You understand, you have no freedom in this moment.
All you're doing is self-managing, self-attacking, and have this unholy desire to correct slash smash people, right?
Yep. And I say this without a shred of criticism.
We're just trying to identify it.
But you don't have freedom.
You get very tense.
And when there's tension and anxiety, there is little to no freedom.
Yeah, not only that, I just blink out.
And I don't even know what to say.
So not only do I not know what to say, it's just...
And maybe I'm being shut off by my...
Many selves or something trying to prevent me from talking to these people, and...
I don't know.
Well, it's kind of like in a dream state, your body has all of this stuff to suppress movement, so you don't kick yourself awake, right?
So you're kind of in a mentally active state, but physically you become sort of inert, right?
Very. My whole brain shuts down.
Right, so why are you not free to say nothing?
Nothing. In other words, to accept the reality that just about everyone you're going to meet until you take the dirt nap with worms in your eyes, just about everyone you're going to meet is going to be wrong.
That we can accept as a statistical empirical reality, right?
There is no God's culture out there, right?
All right. Right, so again, just empirical, and I know we're not getting to the feelings, but we're just starting with the empirical facts.
Just about everyone you meet for the next 40 years is going to be propagandized into an empty, autonomous, intellectual shell of an excuse for non-thinking, right?
Right. Right, and it's not because they're dumb.
And it's not because they're bad, and it's not because they're malicious, and some may be, right?
But for the most part, they've never been exposed to the ideas.
And by the time they get exposed to the ideas, it may be too late for them.
They're already embedded with friends, family, kids, neighborhood, whatever, right?
Job. Right?
I mean, a tax lawyer is not going to quit and become a waiter in conformity with, right?
And he's not even going to want to examine the question of statelessness and whatever, right?
I mean, why bother, right?
It's going to be professional suicide.
And of the people who it's early enough, some of them may look forward and say, well, shit, I want to get a PhD.
There's no way I'm spending 10 years in higher academics battling everyone about things that they're wrong about, right?
Yeah, that'd be an endless battle.
Right, right.
So they may say, well, forget it, right?
And that's fine, you know, a fine relative too, right?
I mean, it's relatively fine, right?
I mean, that's the way it is. But that's just an empirical reality.
Some people may be in the right position.
They may have the right amount of intelligence.
They may have the right amount of curiosity.
They may be in the right place in life.
They may, they may, they may, right?
But they just don't have the desire, right?
Right? Somebody may have, like...
Sorry, somebody may have a beautiful singing voice, right?
Beautiful. But if they just don't want to be a singer, they're just not that interested in music, then it really doesn't matter that they have that capacity, right? In the same way that somebody who wants to be a singer...
But has, you know, a voice like a cat being dragged ass backwards through a bramble bush, doesn't matter that they want to be a singer, right?
Because they don't have the tool, they don't have the equipment, right?
Or somebody who's got a beautiful voice and wants to be a singer, but is tone deaf, right?
And that's something that's really almost impossible to train to the level that you would need to be a real singer, right?
Right. Yeah, and I've thought of that, or we've talked about that before, too.
Right, so the odds... So when you ask that question...
Sorry, so the odds of people, like-minded people running into you, are tiny.
I mean, to the point that to look for it is to walk around with a stone umbrella because you're afraid of an asteroid.
Basically. And that's...
It's about understanding the expectations because we shave against the world continually because...
We expect the world to be rational, but you understand that to expect the world to be irrational is itself irrational.
And it is our punishment from the world for being rational that they want us to believe that they're rational so that we're constantly frustrated, right?
And that's just it.
If I think about, well, what happens if I decide To just not say anything, or what was the question exactly?
No, no, no. Forget the decision.
We're starting with the facts, because you can't make a good decision until you have the facts, right?
Should I go north or south?
Well, it depends which is the closest town, or whatever, if you're lost, right?
If you don't have the right facts, you can't make...
So, the first fact is that it's really rare, really, really rare for people to be into philosophy and to the degree that we all are and so on, right?
It's incredibly rare. I mean, it makes albinos look like, I don't know, chunky people in the South, right?
It's terrifying to me.
Basically, it's hell.
Well, no, no, no.
It's reality. Hell is a metaphor.
And it's reality, right?
The reality is, and we are empiricists first and foremost, because without empiricism, everything is imagination, right?
And empirically, I'm in a hellish reality.
No! You're going away from the facts.
We're just starting with the facts, right?
Because you're going from facts to interpretation.
This is the facts and therefore it's hell, right?
But I'm suggesting to you that it's hell because you're not accepting the facts.
And... You are going to keep the world in a hellish place because you're not accepting the facts.
I'm trying to get you to a place where you can have better and more productive contact with people.
You understand that I'm not trying to talk you into going and living in the woods, right?
I'm trying to get you to a place where you have a relaxed possibility of choosing to speak the truth or not, of knowing how to do it, In a way that is right.
In a way that may inspire people to be curious, right?
Rather than basically looking, you look like you've just swallowed half a kitten and don't look particularly relaxed and happy and you claim that you have the truth which leads to happiness, right?
Right. Right, so you can't assert anything positive in the world in the absence of choice, right?
We understand, right? Compulsion Compulsion is not quality.
Compulsion is the opposite of quality, right?
Voluntaryism is quality, right?
And if you're not free to interact or not interact with people as you see fit, according to your sense of the moment, in a relaxed and positive way, if you're not free to do that, you cannot have any kind of quality in your interactions.
And we understand that with regards to the state.
In the absence of choice, there is no quality.
We understand this with marriage.
In the absence of being able to choose your partner, there cannot be a good marriage.
And for you, Nate, in the absence of being able to choose with freedom whether to interact with someone based on the facts of reality, without that, you cannot have a quality relationship, in my mind, Fundamentally.
And you cannot find what it is that you're looking for in the world.
You have to be free to not interact in order for your interactions to be of quality at all.
Isn't that what we say about the state?
Give me the choice, right? That sounds...
Right? So, time to, you know, apply this to yourself.
Apply it to yourself. Apply it to yourself.
If you can't apply it to yourself, nobody will ever accept you applying it to anyone else or anything else, any other institution, right?
I feel really frustrated.
Go on. After you said that, I just felt really frustrated.
No, you said that, but what do you mean?
Do you feel frustrated because you're not living your values or is it something else completely?
I'm not saying you're not living your values.
I'm just trying to understand what it is that you're thinking.
That I don't know how not to...
I don't know how to not feel these things.
No, no, I understand that.
But see, you're going to solutions.
We're just trying to look at the problem.
You always want to jump over to the other side, right?
Okay, let's say this is true.
What do I do? Right? Well, fuck that, right?
Forget what you do. We're just looking at the problem.
We are circling the problem, right?
Okay. Like, if we don't have, like, you watch House, if you don't have the diagnosis, he often will just, like, do a negative diagnosis, just say, well, inject it with some shit and see what happens, right?
But that's not what we do, right?
Right. Because we don't have the person not dying, right?
So if you don't know what the illness is, there's no point saying, well, what do I prescribe?
What do I prescribe? What do I prescribe?
Right? We don't know.
Yet. But wherever you don't...
This is the touchstone.
This is the most important thing I want to get across to you.
And trust me, I'm trying equally to get this across to me these days, right?
But wherever you don't feel free, you are being irrational.
Right? This is wherever you...
Reason is freedom.
And wherever we feel constrained, constricted, We can't say this, we can't do that, I'm in an impossible situation, I'm gonna either blow up or I'm gonna choke on my own hatred or whatever.
Wherever we are not free, we are being irrational about something.
Even in, and especially in, an irrational world.
Right, so if you don't feel free to either speak up or not speak up, like I have to speak up because this guy's wrong, but if I speak up, disaster will follow.
That clearly is not free.
I'm sorry? And if I don't speak up, disaster will continue.
Right, right. So if I don't speak up, the world gets sicker and crazier, but if I do speak up, I'm going to get attacked, right?
Clearly that's not freedom, right?
Right. That's just being bullied by yourself, right?
And wherever we end up without freedom, we are without freedom because we are not being rational.
So instead of saying, well, how do I force myself to either speak up or not speak up and be relatively content?
Rather than trying to force yourself to do something, why not say, if I'm feeling this tense, I've got to be being irrational about something.
I wonder what I'm being irrational about.
Do you see the difference?
Well... Yeah, because right there you're just going with the assumption that if you're feeling this, then you must be irrational.
Therefore, work from there.
Right, work to find the irrationality.
So what is irrational about feeling that you have to speak up but you can't speak up?
I don't mean unproductive, I mean fundamentally irrational.
Let's say this is acting class and my teacher has just said something totally ridiculously wrong.
Right.
And I want to say something, but I can't say something.
Let me ask it another way, because I mean, this is too obtuse a question.
I apologize. It's not...
You would get it, but it would take a long time, and it would take me an equally long time sitting in your shoes, right?
So let me ask it another way.
Why do you want people to be rational?
Well, so that I'm not alone in my rationality. so that I'm not alone in my rationality.
Right. So it's for you, right?
Right. Right.
So it's not for them.
It's to alleviate your anxiety and fears of loneliness, right?
Right. Now let me give you a short metaphor here.
And I think you will...
I think you will get the point quicker than if I were to bore you with all this exposition.
So let's say that there's some doctor who lives in a town of zombies, right?
Right. And he's got a pill to cure them of being zombies, right?
Right. And he wants to cure them of being zombies because he's terrified because he knows they're going to attack him Right?
This sounds like my metaphor that I had come up with the other day.
Right.
So if you're the doctor and you have to get these zombies to take this medication, because you're terrified and you know that they're going to attack you because they've mauled you constantly, how are you going to get them to take this medication?
put it in the brains of somebody they eat Right. Kill someone.
Put it in the brains. Let's say that it has to be administered anally.
Oh, God. Right.
You've got to get it up their zombie asses.
That's really what I'm saying.
Do zombies sit down?
laughter laughter Well, that wouldn't work.
So you've got to wrestle it up the zombie asses, right?
right?
That's really what I'm saying.
So how is this doctor going to get these zombies to take this preparation H for heal?
Now, clearly, he can't run up to the zombies and try and jam a suppository up their asses, Right. Because they're going to attack him, right?
Right. So what's he going to do?
He can't blend it into their food because it doesn't work unless it, I don't know, pokes the prostate or something.
So then, well, you can't do anything then.
Well, it's a challenge, right?
Yeah.
I mean, if I were in that situation, I'd just give up.
Right, right. This is, of course, where you're at, right?
I mean, not giving up, but this is the despair, right?
Right. Right, right.
Okay, well, the first thing to recognize is that the zombies are much less likely to attack you if you're not shoving things up their ass, right?
Right. Right?
Like, for sure, if you go into a herd of zombies, you know, with your rubber gloves and some hopefully mildly lubricated suppositories, and they don't know what the hell you're doing, and you try and stuff stuff up their ass, they're gonna attack you, right?
For sure. For sure.
Right? So, if you're afraid of zombie attacks, The worst thing to do is to try and, you know, wrestle them down and stick medication up where the sun don't shine, right?
Right. Okay.
So that much we're clear on, right?
So fear of attack should not lead you to want to wrestle them down and whatever, right?
Right. So...
The doctor...
As far as I can...
As far as I can ascertain, and I think the metaphor holds, but this is what I would say to the doctor, or if I were the doctor, this is what I would try to do.
Say, look, I can't cure the zombies, right?
Because the zombies have got to want to stick things up their own asses, right?
For sure, this is going to go be sliced out and put in a remix somewhere, but I would say, I mean, the zombies have to apply the medicine themselves, right?
Right. I can't lecture them, because...
They think I'm a zombie, there's some curse or whatever, right?
They think they're healthy and I'm a zombie or whatever, right?
Right. Right, so people who can't be reasoned with, which is, you know, in this case, most of humanity and zombies, people who can't be reasoned with can only learn through empirical evidence.
Do you see what I mean?
Like, for instance, someone could have some terrible car accident and the right arm has to get amputated, right?
But they wake up from the operation with phantom pains.
They can feel their arm, right?
Right. But you can't reason someone into believing that he has no arm, right?
If he feels that he has an arm.
So what would you do to get someone to understand that he has no arm?
Show them that they have no arm.
Yeah. Lift the covers.
Look, you've got no arm, right?
Right. Right? So people who you can't reason into stuff because they've got all the sensations of having an arm or whatever, they have to...
Or you'd say, you know, hey, try clapping, right?
Or, you know, something, right? So people who can't be reasoned with...
We'll only learn through empirical evidence, right?
For sure. So, if you can't reason with anyone, and I'm using the term very broadly here, but let's just keep it absolute so I don't have to keep putting it.
It's not everyone, but we'll just might as well be, right?
So, if you can't reason with anyone, how are you going to inspire them To want to reason themselves, right?
If you can't stick stuff up zombie asses, how are you going to get them to want to stick stuff up their own asses?
You have to show them evidence, right?
I'm trying to avoid, how do I do that in practice?
Well, but you, again, this is the only thing that I can think of, right?
Given that you can't ask God to send the dream of reason, right?
You have to give them evidence, and the evidence cannot be an argument, because you can't reason with them.
So the evidence that you provide to people cannot be an argument.
Right.
It can't be words.
It can't be a syllogism.
It can't be evidence like, well, the government debt is escalating and blah, blah, blah.
Right?
Right.
Because you can't reason people out of beliefs they have not been reasoned into, right?
Well, half the time they won't even look at the empirical evidence.
Absolutely, absolutely.
For sure, for sure, for sure.
But there is a kind of empirical evidence that cannot be contradicted.
Yeah, you've got to be reasoned with.
what's the only other thing that could be evidence in this area?
Reason equals virtue equals what?
Yeah.
Happiness. Right.
But... I feel hatred, cynicism, anger...
Anxiety, terror, horror.
Right. And all of this is because you desperately want the world to become a better place and for you to have good companions, right?
Right. And what you're doing is insane, right?
I mean, relative to your goals.
Right. First of all, you're not inspiring people with your own happiness.
Right. And I know there's no switch, right?
We're just looking at the logic, right?
Right. You're saying reason equals virtue equals happiness.
I'm tense and miserable.
Therefore, I'm not happy.
Therefore, I can't be acting virtuously.
Therefore, I can't be rational, right?
If you say reason equals virtue equals happiness, if you're not happy, and I don't mean you stub my toe or I'm sick or whatever, but, you know, fundamentally, if you're not happy, then...
You're irrational in some key area, right?
That would be the only logical conclusion.
Right, so... if you want to get zombies to manhandle themselves with suppositories, right, you...
you say, look, I don't have to eat human brains.
Look, I can walk out in the sunlight.
Hey, look, I can't pull my own finger off.
Hey, look, My skin isn't scaly and reptilian.
Hey, look! I don't smell like the 6,000 rotting hounds of hell.
Hey, look! I'm not going err and wandering around dungeons all day and night, right?
Hey, look! I'm out here in the sunlight.
I'm throwing a frisbee.
I'm, you know, and, and, and I used to be a zombie and I stuck something up my ass in him better.
That's the evidence that you bring to zombies you can't reason with and can't heal.
That makes a lot of sense.
And most zombies will be, well, zombies will have different reactions to that.
Some who are too far gone or believe they're too far gone will be hostile.
But so what? You know that going in.
You know that going in, right?
If you're going to go lion hunting, you know that the lion is dangerous, right?
You don't wander around in a banana hammock and get stunned when you're mauled, right?
Right. So again, we're just looking at the empirical facts, right?
When you go in as a healthy and happy human being, and obviously you've seen some evidence of that with me, you go in as a happy and healthy human being, Some people are going to be inspired.
Some people are going to be indifferent or feign indifference.
Some people are going to, you know, hate the very air you breathe, right?
Right. We know that going in, right?
That's the deal.
That's the bell curve, right?
So instead of trying to muscle the zombies down and apply a medicine that's going to cause them to attack you, which of course the reason you feel this despair and hatred is because which of course the reason you feel this despair and hatred is because you know that you're setting yourself up for an eternity disgusting, despairing battle, right?
You don't want to live under that tyranny of, I have to respond, but I can't respond, and the sweat, and the anxiety, and the stress, right?
You don't want to live like that fundamentally, right?
You want to say, I am going to be free.
I am free to respond or not to respond.
There is no crushing, atlas-shrugged weight of the world on my shoulders that if I don't act, the world is going to spiral and plummet into fascism and disaster and socialism and blah blah blah, right?
Because that's like...
It's a little too high-stakes poker for my taste.
And if it's not true, right? Whether you correct one acting teacher on one little thing...
It's not. It's not going to matter.
The world does not hinge on that, right?
Someone on the internet is wrong?
Yeah, yeah, but seriously, it doesn't matter.
And, see, the thing is, too, if you win, let's say that you have the fantasy, and we all have the fantasy, right?
You have the fantasy... Where, you know, maybe you get angry or maybe you get emphatic and you just crush the guy.
You get him to admit that he's wrong.
You win. You dance around with his, you know, jockstrap in the air, right?
And you've triumphed in the way that, yeah, we all have those fantasies, right?
That has never happened.
No, but let's say that it did.
Let's say that you got your fantasy and you won.
What happens the next week you go back?
There's something else wrong.
Oh, what's wrong?
What's wrong? What happens when he, who has experienced humiliation, come on, you've seen my case recently.
If I'm wrong, he's going to do the same thing to me.
No, not if you're wrong.
He's just going to do it to you anyway.
You've seen the debates that I've had over the years, right?
Right. I mean, in my view, I win, right?
And pretty decisively, right?
And does anyone change his or her mind?
No. No.
What happens next? Always.
They attack. Yeah.
They feel humiliated and they get angry and they start to undermine.
All you do is make enemies for life, right?
Part of the wisdom that I'm trying to develop, right?
But that's all that happens, right?
So you crush some person in a public arena.
Everyone applauds. Well, next week you go back, they're just going to fuck you up somehow, right?
Because it's all about leveling for them.
It's not about the truth. So even if you beat someone in an argument, it's just a cycle, right? They'll find some way to mess you up, right?
And it'll be some snide, untraceable whatever, right?
Stupid, annoying shit that people do, right?
Right. We know that, right?
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. So, if you have the happiness, then you have a good that other people, some people may want, right?
If you're walking tall and happy in the sunlight, even if you're alone, if you're walking tall and happy in the sunlight, and there are some zombies who are sick of the dank, fetid, dark dungeons, some of them will...
We'll crawl out, right? But if you come rushing in to attack them with your cure, they'll simply get scared and attack or run, right?
Just given what I feel, like...
Even the zombie better forfeits this feeling because I'm walking happy along.
A zombie comes out and walks up next to me.
I'm going to feel...
Pretty freaked out. And...
Now you see, the zombie doesn't know that you're not a zombie.
Right? If you don't open your mouth, who's going to know?
Who's going to know you're an anarchist or an atheist?
So who's going to know?
You look like a zombie to them.
You're perfectly camouflaged, right?
I mean, the happiness is going to give it away, but there's nothing they can do about it.
They can't attack you for being happy.
They can try, right? But it's just too silly, right?
Too obvious. Right.
So you can be content in your happiness and walk among the zombies.
And if people come up to you and say, you know what?
I'm sick of being a zombie.
What do I do? Well, here's the things that I found helpful, right?
Give them a little bit. And see if they want any more, right?
I mean, the coach doesn't throw you on the parallel bars 30 feet above the ground, right, the first time you go out for the trapeze act, right?
Right. He's like, hey, you know, I'm going to paint the guy who's doing the parallel bars, right?
I'm going to paint these parallel bars, try and see if you can walk down them.
I'm going to paint them on the ground, see if you can walk back there and back, right?
Right. Right?
It's about giving a little bit.
If people are, you know, they say, oh, wow, this guy's happy.
I'd really like to be happier.
He must have something that he knows, right?
But don't, you know, sit down and lecture them for 14 hours, right?
Say, oh, yeah, well, I, you know, I'm skeptical about religion, to say the least, and I try to reason from first principles, right?
Or whatever, right? Just, you know, wait till people come to you, and then Give them a little bit and see if they're intrigued, right?
See if they're interested, see if they come back and say, wait a minute, are you an atheist?
Yes, I am. And that's it, right?
Rather than, yes, I'm an atheist, and here's why, and here's the arguments, and read these books, and listen to these podcasts, and here's three DVDs, and by the way, bend over, I've got some medicine for you, right?
Right, because you want to eliminate the people who don't have the desire to In the same way that you only get to coach, I don't know, 20 athletes in your life, right?
And you want to not waste your time coaching someone who's not going to go very far, right?
Right. Right?
So you will get to really interact with maybe 10 or 20 people for the rest of your life.
Really interact with.
And every time you spend stress to the max, right?
You're a sphincter in a diamond-crushing vice with someone who's not worth it, not going to, you know, all you're doing is you're not getting to the person you could really be interacting with.
And that person may be in that room and they see you there pale and sweaty and tense and they go like, "Wow, whatever that guy's got is probably not quite the right way to live because every time I see him he seems to be chewing his lower lip, right?" you're free to say nothing
in fact I would encourage it because you don't want to waste your time on people who aren't going to go the distance And you can't ever make them go the distance or want to or be interested or anything like that.
To get your truth.
You're not begging people to take the truth.
Yes.
Frankly, I think it's okay if they beg you a little.
You're saying that the feelings I feel when they say something fundamentally wrong or just like, oh no, another whack job.
Yeah, he's another whack job.
He's not worth my time.
Because I want to save myself for the marriage of true minds, right?
I'm not going to slut around with people.
I mean, this first occurred to me, oh man, it was like, I mean, this sounds ridiculous, but it was close to 20 years ago.
I was debating, I was debating, I was at dinner and I was debating some waiter who was like, 45 years old, which of course back to me was like, back then was like ancient, right?
But I was debating some waiter and, you know, I was on a date and I was really getting into it.
It was late and the waiter, and I was really getting into it.
And it suddenly sort of struck me as like, and nothing against being a waiter.
I mean, maybe you're a waiter and a total genius, right?
But it was like, but I don't even like this guy.
Why am I trying to help him?
And he's a waiter in his 40s.
It's not worth it.
Like I'd spend time arguing with my mom, right?
And then in my teens, late teens, I was like, I just gave up on political arguments because it's like, but she's crazy.
So even if I do convince her of something, all I'm going to convince other people who listen to her is that crazy people believe this.
Right?
So this waiter was uneducated, so let's say I convinced him of some value of the free market, right?
Right?
All the people would get when he talked about it is, uneducated waiters believe in the free market.
Would that be good or bad for the cause as a whole?
I never thought about it that way.
And again, you can be uneducated, you can be a waiter, you can be a stone genius, it's just that this guy wasn't that, right?
So I don't mean to be down on waiters or anything like that, but you understand what I'm saying, right?
Right. Like, you don't respect this acting teacher, right?
I mean, for his, maybe he's a good acting teacher, but for his political beliefs or whatever, right?
Philosophy. Right.
Right, so if you convince him of a shred of truth somewhere, all that's going to happen is other people of acuity, of wisdom, of maturity, are going to look at this guy, and they're going to say, well, he believes a lot of crazy shit, and he's an anarchist.
That's not good, right? People either get the whole hog or don't give it to them at all.
Because then they'll just have these little scrappy pieces of shit that are just going to discredit everything, right?
They're going to unite something which is true with something that's nonsense, right?
So let's say this guy's a socialist, but he's an agnostic and you convince him to be an atheist and he comes to that conclusion, but he doesn't ditch the socialism, then people are going to say, oh, so you could be a crazy socialist who's an atheist.
So clearly you can be a crazy atheist, right?
If it's not the methodology from top to bottom, if it's not the truth from first principles, it's worse than useless.
It's completely counterproductive.
And that's what I mean to say when you're free to shut the fuck up and take some acting lessons.
Because people have to earn the truth from you.
You're not out there trying to peddle it, right?
You're not like some 60-year-old hooker swinging her purse at 2 o'clock in the afternoon at Santa's parade.
You are in possession of a great secret.
You are in possession of a lottery ticket.
And you're willing to give it away.
You don't beg people to take a winning lottery ticket, right?
They've got to earn it.
Are you worth me spending any time on?
At all?
What are the consequences?
What is the evidence that you have done anything or shown any capacity to be worth spending time on?
You can be the best surgeon in the world.
Maybe the person's got to take antibiotics.
Before and after.
They've got to not eat before surgery or whatever, right?
And you get their chart and they say, well, I want surgery with you.
And you get their chart and they've never followed a single medical instruction in their life.
They constantly flout everything they're told to do.
They don't take antibiotics. They don't not eat, right?
Then you say, hey, you know what?
I'm going to save my surgery for somebody who gives a damn.
I'm not going to waste my time on this schmo because I'm not going to do him any good.
I'm just going to waste my time, get a hand cramp.
I'm going to save it for somebody who's willing to put the work in to get healthy.
Right, because then when something goes wrong with them, they'll just blame the surgery.
Of course they will, right? And then your reputation as a surgeon will go down, and therefore you'll get fewer quality patients.
You understand, right?
You have to be judicious.
You are in possession of a great and powerful secret, which, by the way, everyone knows, but let's not worry about that right now, right?
But you're in possession of a great and powerful secret.
And people got to earn that from you.
The best things are hidden.
The best way to hide something is in plain sight.
Right. So when you are happy and you are confident and people, you know, hey, you know, whatever, right?
They want to talk to you and they will go, what do you think of Obama?
It's like, well, what do you think of Obama?
And they're like, oh man, you know, I would name my firstborn after him.
He is the third coming or whatever, right?
It'd be like, oh. And they say, well, what do you think of Obama?
It's like, well, I I don't think you'd be very interested in my thoughts, but I have to get a drink, so if you'll excuse me.
Be judicious.
Be the good-looking woman, the best-looking woman in the bar.
You're not desperate for attention.
You're picking and choosing. Philosophy is much more about non-engagement than engagement.
In the same way that marriage is more about not dating than it is about dating.
Because you've already dated, you get married, right?
Right. Right, so you just think of yourself as the, you know, the best looking woman in a crowded bar.
Guys are going to be hitting on you, guys are going to be coming up to you or whatever, right?
And I know that, you know, it's not like everyone comes up to a philosopher and says, oh, how do I live?
tell me blah blah blah right but this is the this is the truth of the situation that you're the best looking woman in the bar and there's some guy that you really want to meet you Let me switch genders here.
It gets too confusing. You're the best looking stud muffet in the bar and there's some woman at the other end of the bar that you really want to meet but she's never going to approach you when you're talking to someone else.
Right? Your whole job is going to be to get people away from you.
Right? Right.
So that this woman can...
Because if you're engaged in conversation, you're going to have to be cool, you're going to have to be icy, you're going to have to give them cold Angelina Jolie, fuck you looks, right?
You're going to have to drive people away continually so that you can get this woman to come and talk to you, right?
I messed up the genders again, but I think you understand, right?
Yeah, I get it.
It makes sense.
And that's what I mean when I say not only are you free to not say anything, you're kind of obligated to not say anything.
If you want to do the world some good.
Unless somebody really, really, really wants to know.
That is kind of a relief.
Yeah. It's really bad.
It's really bad.
This is argument from a fact time.
It's really bad for you to speak up injudiciously.
It's really, really, really counterproductive.
So what about like writing articles?
Oh, that's great. Yeah, throw stuff out there, absolutely.
But that's not causing you stress, right?
Right, it's just the people that I encounter on a daily basis.
It's the people in your life, right? It's knowing that they're going to be 99.999% crazy and don't know it, right?
They're going to think that you're crazy.
But this is just the reality, right?
You've seen me do enough of this nonsense, right?
And you've certainly done enough of it yourself, as we all have, right?
Right.
That is the empirical reality of what we're dealing with.
And you do not want to waste your time on people who aren't going to go all the way.
You get 10 or 20 meaningful interactions with potential, with serious potential, between now and the time you're dead.
And you want to have those sooner rather than later.
And every time you're engaged with people who aren't worth your time, you're just postponing and minimizing the possibility of those real interactions.
Every time you're talking to some girl you're not interested in, the girl you are interested in is never going to approach you, so all you're doing is wasting time, delaying, and possibly even eliminating that potential.
Are you worth me telling you the truth?
That's the question you've got to ask yourself.
It's...
I'm trying to think of a metaphor to explain this better.
Well, you feel like the ugly woman in the bar trying to pick up the jock, right?
And you feel like you have to...
Pick this guy up, but he's not going to because of X, Y, whatever.
I mean, you feel kind of desperate, right?
Like an impossible situation.
Well, I feel like, you know, they're just going to reject me because of...
Right, but you feel an impossible situation because if, in this, like to get out of the metaphor, if they reject you, they reject the truth, the world goes to hell in a hand basket, your taxes are going to go up, you're going to end up in a fascist concentration camp, whatever.
I'm exaggerating, but you know what I mean, right?
Right. That's pretty much it.
Yeah, well... Then be smart, right?
Don't work harder, work smarter.
Recognize the reality that every time you invest in people who are not worth it, you are eliminating your possibility for happiness and effectiveness with people who really are worth it, and they are out there.
It's extremely rational in that what I was doing is not working since, and...
No, I learned this from Christina too, right?
Because Christina says, oh, I practice psychology, right?
That's all she says. That's all she says.
I'm a philosopher. That's what I say if people ask my neighbors or whatever, right?
Right. Nobody asks anything further in Very few people ever ask anything about Christina, right?
Because they're like, oh, psychologist?
She's going to reap my soul. Run!
Right? Right.
It's the fireman coming out among these tented savages, right?
But I was trying to think of this metaphor like...
Sorry to interrupt you, but just sorry.
No, go ahead. I'll remember my point.
Go on. I want my bike to ride upside down.
I really want my bike to ride upside down, but I'm going to have to ride it right side up in order for it to go anywhere.
Yeah, I think that's not a bad way of putting it.
And I've seen with Christina, she says, I practice psychology, and most people, they get kind of tense, right?
They don't want to ask any more about it.
When she said to me, I practice psychology, I lit up, right?
Right. I lit up.
I was like, wow, that is the coolest thing.
Do you see what I mean? If she'd spent all this time trying to get other people who weren't interested or frightened by or alienated by psychology to pursue self-knowledge or to be interested in psychology, she'd have been frazzled, exhausted, annoyed, and probably wouldn't have brought it up with me because it was so fraught with conflict, right?
Or she'd have brought it up with me like in an embarrassed and ashamed kind of way.
And then she wouldn't have looked like she had a lot of self-knowledge and confidence, right?
But she simply says, I practice psychology.
Most people run away, get nervous, change this object or whatever.
I was like, tell me more.
And so she did.
So, when I'm watching all these people doing everything wrong, saying everything wrong...
Don't be one of them.
Don't be one of them.
That's right. No, no.
No, no, don't be one of them.
Right, because if you're twisting yourself into knots about an acting class, you're one of the people doing things right.
Right. But sorry, come on.
But that's not a glib point, right?
Right. Because you're saying, well, they reject empiricism, they reject reason, the things they're doing aren't working, but they continue to do them.
And tell me how that doesn't describe you and me sometimes too, right?
You sometimes and me sometimes as well, right?
Well, I was trying to jump to the feelings.
I... That pop up for me, but I'm guessing the feelings are a result of the irrationality in my thought processes.
Yeah, yeah, because when we feel despair, hopelessness, anger, rage, right?
I mean, these are things when we're doing irrational things, right?
That's a great, that's a very helpful key.
Just assume that I'm doing something irrational or I'm thinking irrationally.
When you're feeling that negatively, right?
For sure. Right.
And just figure out what it is.
Right. Like, I mean, just so you know how new this knowledge is for me, right?
I mean, I think it was last Sunday's show, right?
A guy wanted to debate UPB or whatever it was, right?
And he started off with this criticism of the billion-dollar proposition, right?
And I said, well, there's a difference between putting down a cigarette and not having cancer, right?
You can choose to put down a cigarette, you can't choose to not have cancer, right?
And the guy said, unless you negotiate with the cancer.
Do you remember that? He actually said that?
Yeah, yeah, he said that. Something very similar to that.
I kind of remember the exact wording, right?
And what did I do? I chided him and I went on.
But he was clearly telling me I'm insane.
Yeah, well, not I'm insane, but he was clearly telling me this is, like, I can't concede a point.
And I'll pull any kind of thing out of my ass to not concede a point, right?
And he told me that right up front.
It was very, very clear.
And what did I do? Like an idiot, right?
Not like an idiot. An idiot, right?
And so I was just working it out this week, like, why...
Why I did that, why I didn't see these clear signs, right?
Or the guy, Laughing Man, or whatever his name was, right?
Guy uses the word rights all over the place, asking what they are, doesn't even know.
And do I say, well, you're not ready to debate because you're using terms that you don't understand, so, you know, let's do this another time, perhaps, in a couple of years when you're more studied up on this stuff.
No, I just keep plunging on.
Let's keep debating, right?
Like an idiot. And, you know, with compassion to myself and blah, blah, blah, right?
But I've had enough evidence of that, right, to know that that's where you stop and you say, wait a second, what just happened for you there?
Negotiating with cancer? You don't even know what rights are?
Right, you're not going to convince this guy.
Well, yeah. Now, I mean...
I think that it's been useful because I think it's given me some good idea for podcasts in terms of ideas, and I think it's been useful for people to see me debate with others and so on.
But enough is enough, right?
I mean, it's time to be more judicious because I'm trying not to lecture you, but I'm trying to give you knowledge that is freshly minted, or at least I think it's knowledge, but it's certainly freshly minted within me.
It's definitely something to...
Because when I... Like just a few minutes ago, or...
I don't exactly know what we were saying at the time, but I just felt suddenly a huge wave of relaxation over me.
Just like, okay, I've been doing it wrong, and it's definitely not going to work.
For the right reasons, with a genuine concern for your safety in the world and blah, blah, blah.
But go on.
Right. I have a goal, but my means of attaining that goal is working against the goal.
Therefore, I need to do it differently.
And you're free to say nothing if people aren't worth it. - Thank you.
Just that freedom to say nothing is...
Because it wasn't that.
Okay, I'll tell you what it was. It was the telling people that are crazy, trying to convince them of things, of these ideas, and giving them that truth, and then You know, now everybody who encounters them sees they're crazy, and they're going to think that that's the reason.
Right, right. And it's not being run by other people's unconscious, because crazy people want you to treat them like they're not crazy.
It's like Ron Pullen evolution.
Yeah, the reason, like, so with my debates, and it's not just the recent ones, but, you know, to take that example, right?
So the guy says, well, unless you negotiate with cancer, right?
What he's basically saying is, I'm wrong, but I want to just keep going anyway.
Or the guy who doesn't know what rights are, He's the one who wants to ignore it and continue like it didn't happen, right?
And I just fall into that, right?
Right, so it's just around keeping your self-conscious, keeping your integrity, keeping your sympathy and your understanding, and also it's keeping your care for the other person because it's actually not helpful or healthy to treat people who don't have knowledge as if they do, or to treat people who are defensive as if they're not.
It's actually bad for them, so it's a lack of compassion for the other person as well as for yourself.
So when I say I want to help these people, the best way I can help them is to not do anything.
You can't help anyone, right?
You can't stuff the suppositories up the zombies, right?
You can't help anyone.
So, even saying, I want to help, but I can't, like, this is irrelevant, right?
It's like saying, I'd love to move the moon with my mind, but I just don't feel that I can.
It's like, well, that last feeling is actually quite true, right?
Right. Right, so you can't help them, but what you can do is you can be happy and confident and at peace with yourself and work on that, and then those who are interested will ask, and those who are worth spending time with will keep asking.
Right. I mean, I have sort of a vague informal policy, but my mailbox is so full these days.
days.
It's like, if somebody really cares, they'll send another email, right?
You know, there's these scenes in movies, right?
Where the guy wants the coach to coach him, right?
Go away, kid.
Yeah, get lost, kid.
Go away. You bother me, right?
And it's only after the kid comes back 10 times or 20 times or 50 times that the coach agrees to coach him.
You understand? Yeah.
Right? The coach is now running up and down the street, madly banging on people's houses, saying, please, dear God, let me coach your children.
People are like, ooh, they're you, some creepy pedophile, right?
Yeah. Right, so rejection and non-engagement is the most core aspect of a burgeoning philosophy because we have so few people who have the innate capacity, drive, and desire to go the whole hog with philosophy that we have to say to people, go away, go away, go away, go away, right?
Because if they're going to be stopped, that's why the coach says to the kid, go, get lost, kid, right?
Because if the kid then just goes away, then clearly he's not hungry enough, right?
He's going to fail anyway.
So it's actually a kindness to tell the kid to go away ten times, right?
Because otherwise he's going to waste years of his life and not be a professional athlete anyway, right?
Right.
And then all that's going to happen is your reputation as a coach is going to suffer because you'll be coaching all these people who end up flunking out, right?
Well, he must be a bad coach. Well, he is, because he's not telling people to go away enough times.
That's basically how House gets the best doctors.
Right, right. I mean, the 13 of them or whatever, how many of there was, right?
They're all desperate for it, and he was telling them to get lost all the time, right?
That one guy went away.
He was there in the end. Yeah, yeah.
Actually, I think in the script, they didn't even know who was going to stay, right?
They were writing it on the fly.
They just hired a bunch of actors.
They didn't know who was going to be staying for the series.
Huh. The actors were auditioning in the same way the doctors were, is sort of what I'm saying.
Right. Anyway, look, I don't want to take up your work in the morning, but did we cover some useful stuff here?
I really want to open up that possibility of freedom and tell people to go away a lot, right?
I mean, it's really, really important.
I think that will do it.
I don't mean to say, you understand, right?
There's a metaphor. Don't say, get lost.
Get lost. You don't say on the bus, right?
But you know, if people really want to know, just give them a few drops.
Give them a little taste or whatever, right?
Oh yeah, you know, sometimes I listen to this philosophy podcast, Freedom in Radio.
You can check it out, right? But then the next week, the next time you see them, don't say, did you listen to any podcast?
Do you want me to load up your iPod for you?
I've got a few memorized. Here we go, right?
I bought you 12 books, right?
No, no, no, no. See if they bring it up.
Exactly. I think I've done that a couple of times.
Right, because you've got to just separate the wheat from the chaff, right?
Get to the people who are really going to go the whole hog, because those people we need, right?
We need those people.
Philosophy needs those people, right?
Nothing to do with us, right?
Reason and evidence and consistency need those people.
And if you're mucking about with people who aren't going to do it, you are doing no service to philosophy, no service to your life, and you're actually retarding the progress that you so desperately want to accelerate.
This is really helpful.
Good. To reverse the whole thing.
So now, not only do I not have to, but I shouldn't.
You absolutely shouldn't.
You absolutely shouldn't.
And I say this as a guy who falls into this pattern more often than I would like.
So, you know, we're right there in the trenches with your brother, right?
But we absolutely shouldn't.
Make them work for it a bit, because if they don't work for that, they're not going to work for anything.
Did you make Christina work for it?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.
I mean, I didn't, you know, I asked her questions about her belief system and if she felt uncomfortable about agnosticism or what she liked about it or, I mean, yeah, I asked and I didn't, oh, I'm an atheist and here's a lecture her or whatever, right?
But she was so engaged and interested that, you know, it wasn't possible to, right?
It wasn't a game or anything.
That makes sense. And people will, you know, people will sense that, right?
The coach who can tell people to get lost, in a way, is a coach that people want to have.
You'll be in demand, right?
I mean, it's not a game, but it has that effect, right?
Right. It doesn't quite work in acting, I don't think, where you just turn down Start turning down scripts and they'll watch you more.
Well, no, but of course an actor needs all that other stuff to have any kind of success.
But being rational, living with integrity and being happy does not require a $10 million budget and a union, right?
So I had to spend the last three years being a philosophy slut and then now I've got to be a prude.
No, you absolutely have to play hard to get.
It is important, right?
But do it, but not as a game, right?
There's no point, I don't know, the nastiest person in the room playing hard to get or the worst actor playing hard to get.
Be the best actor and play hard to get, right?
Right, right. I hope that helps anyway.
I think that your post was very honest and direct and I wanted to And I hope that you don't mind if this goes out as a regular podcast, although I know you did post in a Diamond Plus section.
Oh, no, that's fine.
That's perfectly fine.
Well, thanks so much, and I appreciate the call.
Thank you. I think it was very good. Thanks for the relief.
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