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Sept. 13, 2009 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux

01:39:32

1452 Sunday Show 13 Sep 2009

Entrepreneurship, sports addictions, my daughter's strength, grad school experiences and personal breakthroughs!

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	Alright, I think, I do believe we are ready to roll.
	Well, thanks everybody.
	It is the 13th of September 2009.
	Time for E Old Sunday Show.
	And, you know, proud dad, update number 12 million.
	It's so cool today.
	Actually, Christine has been on a conference for a couple of days.
	So I've been, you know, Mr.
	Mom. And it's been fascinating because, you know, the last two days is the two days that Isabella has decided to stop having her second nap.
	So I guess, I don't know, she gets pretty hyper when she's around me, as you can imagine.
	So, we had lots of fun.
	I took her to the pool today, and we went for walks and stuff, and it was really nice.
	And she actually stood up without using her arms.
	She was against the couch, she had something in her hands, and she just leaned up against the couch and played with what was in her hand, without using any hands to hold onto the couch.
	That was pretty cool. But even more exciting, I sort of played this game with her, with Christina, where I sort of try and make her laugh.
	And she particularly likes it when she's in Christina's arms on the stairs.
	And so the last couple of days, for some reason, when I have her binky in her mouth and I sort of spit it at her at high speed, not at her, but by her at high speed, she really, really giggles.
	And so I pass the...
	The pacifier to her in my mouth.
	And then she paused, looked at it, and I guess wanted to laugh again.
	So she actually passed it back to me to do it again.
	And that happened a couple of times.
	That's the first time she's been really reciprocal in a very conscious way that way.
	So that was really cool.
	So it was a lot of fun.
	And I finally did finish a podcast.
	It's completely ridiculous how long it takes me to get a podcast on these days.
	I did finally finish a podcast on RTR at work, which comes with its own vat of baby oil for those intimate boardroom encounters.
	I hope that you'll enjoy it.
	I will post it This week, and I do have a couple of chatty casts that are in the queue, but I've been pretty busy on the old reproductive side.
	Well, not really the reproductive side.
	The effects of reproduction side.
	So, thank you for your patience.
	And that's really all I had to say, just because it's been a while since we've had a chance to chat in this kind of environment.
	So, if you all have stuff to say, feel free.
	Hey, Steph, I got a question for you.
	Why, surely? This has something to do with your background in IT. I'm interested in starting my own business with a friend of mine.
	It's going to be like a copy and print shop with a design component.
	But we're really worried about giving over a lot of control to an IT person.
	And I was wondering, in the professional world, how much control do IT people have over things like I guess pretty much they're setting up the entire network, so they're going to be able to see everything.
	How do you prevent them from screwing you and taking information and stuff like that?
	That's a good question. As a print shop with the design element, you have a lot of tech stuff floating around that you need to get done, right?
	The question is, how do you get an IT person who's not going to get all freaky trolley on you?
	That's the question, right? Yes, because I've actually had to deal with a good friend of mine who was an IT specialist in the past and he couldn't separate the professional from the friendship and what ended up happening is he took a lot of our information and I was hoping that maybe with your experience you could explain a little bit more about what I should do or point me in the right direction of where I should look to prevent that in the future.
	Yeah, I mean, it's a great question.
	I can give you a couple of tips that have been helpful for me, but, you know, obviously it's just nonsense opinions, but I can give you a couple of things, if you'd like, that I've used in the past, that kind of stuff.
	That would be very helpful.
	Sure, okay. Well, the first thing that I would suggest is, and this is all kinds of cliché, but I think that there's some truth in it, that You can get really brilliant IT people who have, you know, the social skills of your average leprosy bacillus, right?
	And so people who have really, really, like they've taken all the courses in the world, they've, you know, certified up the yin-yang and they have every conceivable acronym after there.
	Name, but of course that all comes at a cost, right?
	I mean, that all comes at a cost in terms of just basic social skills and all that kind of stuff.
	And that's not just true for IT, but for other things as well.
	So, if you look for a more well-rounded person, like if you look for a person, you know, I know this is shocking in the IT world, who maybe has played some team sports.
	Team sports can be really good in terms of...
	Helping to figure out people who've got some basic social skills.
	Because in team sports, you do have to deal with...
	I mean, you can't be a weird troll in a team sport for very long because people would just not...
	They'll just take their ball and go home, right?
	So I would say that...
	That is one way to do it.
	When you're doing the interview, look for social cues.
	Look for social skills. Look for grooming.
	Look for knowledge of occasional current events.
	Ask them a question out of entertainment tonight.
	If they give you that withering notes from the underground look, then maybe keep moving.
	Are they in touch with the world?
	Do they seem to have friends? Do they have a tan?
	Can they match their pants with their Klingon headdress?
	Whatever it is that you've got going on there.
	I would say those things are very helpful.
	It's not guaranteed, but it can be really helpful.
	You've known some of the trials that have been around FDR. They're pretty evident pretty early, at least once you get an eye for it.
	So I would really look for a more well-rounded individual who's got some social skills.
	That doesn't mean the person's going to work out, but it means that if it doesn't work out, then at least they're not going to be stuffing bananas up your tailpipe or something.
	That's not a metaphor. I just remember that from an Eddie Murphy movie.
	So that would be one suggestion that I would make.
	The other thing is, you know, you post what you want on the board, right?
	Maybe there's someone from the FDR community who can either work remotely and set you up, or who can bus it in, or who maybe is even close enough to work.
	And again, it's not like everyone at FDR is, you know, a guaranteed winner, although I think almost all of them are.
	Particularly people who have been around for a while, you're going to share those values.
	If you start talking about uneasiness about a certain thing and they have some idea of RTR, they're not going to look at you like, why are you telling me your feelings, Earthling?
	So, I would also say, you know, poke around and see if there's anyone in the community who you might be able to contract with.
	Because this kind of thing, it sounds like, I'm no expert in the print business, but it sounds like it's more of a setup than a long-time thing.
	You're not going to need someone in there full-time, 40 hours a week for your network.
	It may just be a setup thing.
	You may want to post it to see if there's anyone in the community who shares philosophical values and, you know, some emotional self-knowledge and so on, and that will minimize the chances of that kind of unnecessary conflict, if that makes any sense.
	Is that anything of use yet?
	Yes, definitely. One of the things, my business partner is actually the one who got me into FDR. So I think in terms of going into business together, we both understand that aspect and relationships as well as the whole anarcho-capitalism aspect.
	So yeah, I think it makes a lot of sense to look for somebody who shares our values with that.
	Sorry, you mentioned business plan.
	I just wanted to remind you that as an anarchist, your business plan should only be to buy vintage motorcycles, hair gel, machetes.
	That really should be your only business plan.
	There is no other business plan for an anarchist unless you're fronting for some even more violent organization.
	I just wanted to mention that. As an anarchist, that would be the only way to go.
	Well, we also budget for tattoos and chains.
	You forgot those, too. Well, I mean, why would we need to mention them?
	That's like having a business plan saying, we intend to breathe.
	You know, that's just taken up utterly and completely.
	And it's something that's been floating around in the community.
	I know that there's a lot of people who are doing entrepreneurial stuff, you know, because there's a question that floats around.
	It's like, now that I've been infected with this virus of philosophy, how do I live a life with integrity?
	And I think one of the ways that you can do that, to some degree the easiest, is to I think we're good to go.
	I'll talk about some of the challenges and insights, you know, sort of a brain trust of people who are kind of in the same challenge for the same reasons in a way.
	It's just something to think about. You might want to talk about it with your partner if you think it would be of utility to have that kind of thing.
	I would certainly be happy to sit in if that would be of use.
	I think so. I think part of the thing is it's been very difficult to imagine all of the stuff about capitalism when it was so abstract.
	But once you start actually working on a business and becoming an entrepreneur, then it makes a whole lot more sense to me at least.
	And you really see it right on.
	And it's easier for me now to debate a socialist, for example, because now I'm starting to understand more about the dynamic of customers and making people happy that way.
	So yeah, I think that would be a really great idea.
	Yeah, I agree with you.
	I think that the guy I talked to last week who was the Anaco communist, you just knew that he got all of his knowledge about factories and business owners from a book.
	And that to me is like doing a whole...
	Graduate course or even a whole degree on black studies and never actually talking to a black person.
	That to me was just kind of ridiculous.
	And it's the same thing. It's like, ah, you know, business owners are exploitive and they're ruling the workers with an iron fist and this and that.
	It's like, Jesus Christ, get your head out of Metropolis and get your head into the real world.
	Have you actually ever talked to a factory owner?
	Have you actually ever run a business?
	It is something that until you've done it, it's really, really tough to get the free market.
	And that's part of the beef I have with With some of the free market economists as well.
	It's one thing to read about it.
	It's a completely different kettle of fish to actually do it.
	You know what I liked about that conversation you had last week is the guy was basically using capitalism.
	He said at first that capitalism was invalid as a system, but then he said to get to his system, you need capitalism.
	So he's kind of... Well, you can't steal if nobody's producing, right?
	You can't steal if nobody's producing, right?
	And I think communists have accepted and understood, and even Marx accepted and understood, right?
	For Marx, the progress was tribalism, feudalism, capitalism, communism, right?
	And Marxists basically have accepted that Marxism as a system, communism as a system, has no incentive to create.
	There's no incentive to create.
	And they've accepted the historical realities of every goddamn centrally planned socialist, communist economy and the decay in entrepreneurship and the decay in the incentive to produce, to create, to take the risks that you have taken, that I have taken, or you are taking, that I have taken, that others have taken. And so they basically have accepted that communism isn't going to create wealth.
	And so that's why he said, well, you know, yeah, nobody's going to want to make factories.
	That's why we're going to inherit them from capitalism.
	And it's like, oh...
	And when people say that with a straight face, it's almost like you don't even know where to start.
	You know, it's like you're starting a debate with somebody and they say, I'm right because Keebler, the magic elf, tells me that I'm right.
	And it's like, I'm sort of at a loss, you know, at that kind of stuff.
	And I do, guys, I did get a little impatient.
	I hope it didn't come across too forcefully.
	I do get kind of impatient when people talk about...
	What I consider the initiation of the use of force, collectivizing everybody's property, and they don't think the goddamn thing through.
	That did cost hundreds of millions of lives in the 20th century.
	With that example in hand, I think it's worth thinking a little bit through, and that's why I used that convenience store thing.
	It's really different when you've been in the environment.
	How do you keep from getting frustrated?
	Because I've debated a couple of socialists, and it's not like they've ever really thought their positions through.
	They just recite the propaganda.
	And so it gets really frustrating when you're just trying to get them to see, hey, wait a minute, think about that.
	Where is the production going to come?
	Where are the new things going to come from if nobody has the incentive?
	And they don't even stop to think about it, and it's really frustrating.
	Well, you're assuming I don't get frustrated, right?
	That's not exactly the case.
	I certainly do get frustrated, for sure.
	But it's a little different for me, for two reasons.
	One is that I, for better or for worse, have a bit of authority.
	So I have the mic, it's my show, and I can cut them off.
	So it's not quite two guys in a bar kind of thing.
	And the other thing, too, that I think is a little bit different is that my level of frustration is like if you're in a debate with a socialist and it's just you two and he says all kinds of stupid stuff and I don't know.
	Jan Heldfeld, I haven't just wasted two hours, or an hour and a half, or an hour, or whatever it is, because I have presented my position, I've taken down someone else's arguments, and there are all these thousands and thousands of people who are going to end up seeing it and coming to their own conclusions.
	So for me, it's a net gain to have these debates, and that's why it's less frustrating for me.
	If I was just debating one-on-one, my eyes would roll so far in, they'd be like slot machines.
	And I just stop right away because, you know, that falls into the life's too short category, but I get to have an audience in perpetuity through the podcast.
	And so for me, it's a different environment to have those kinds of debates.
	If that makes any sense.
	Totally, yeah. Alright, well, if you can post it on the board, you know, maybe just post a topic and ask if there are any people in the entrepreneurial world.
	I mean, I can think of at least a dozen off the top of my head, and maybe we could set up a, you know, we start up monthly or bi-monthly or whatever, and just have a call and, you know, bring up specific issues or general questions or approaches.
	Because, I mean, I've had a bunch of conversations with people based on my entrepreneurial experience, which is not anything godlike, but I think is useful.
	And they sort of scattered, but I think it would be something that would be worth, I think, worth and very productive, not just for us, but for others to sort of get a view inside the boiler room.
	Yeah, I'll post it on the board later and just see if anybody's interested.
	Okay, thank you very much.
	You're very welcome, and best of luck.
	And, you know, if the calls, if nobody's interested, which I think there will be, do keep us posted.
	Excellent. Now, if anybody else has questions, I've noticed there's some people who haven't been around for a while, and I'm dying to ask how things are going, so I will, if you don't mind, but I want to keep it open to questions that people may have, or comments, or criticisms, or whatever be on your brains.
	If anybody else says anything, I do have one more thing to bring up.
	Please do. It's about organized sports.
	And it's...
	I guess it's just more venting of frustration about organized sports that I have, is that I just don't understand it.
	Like, for me, it's just a game.
	I enjoy playing the games, but I really don't enjoy watching them on TV because it's watching people you don't know playing a game and getting paid lots of money for the game.
	Sure, it's entertainment, but I think too many people take it way too far.
	And I'd like to maybe hear your thoughts on organized sports because I don't think of...
	I've listened to pretty much all the podcasts, and I don't think it's ever been covered before.
	Well, I mean, you will absolutely get a rant from me out of organized sports, but there are some aspects of it that appear to be physiological.
	In that people really do get a high when their team scores or wins.
	They actually do get an endorphin rush high of the body's natural opiates.
	So it is a kind of addiction.
	It's similar to gambling, right?
	In that gambling is throwing yourself on the vagaries of chance, although at least with gambling you have some skill involved in most gambling aspects.
	But in sports, It's really passive.
	You really are just sitting there throwing popcorn in the air and yelling at the TV or whatever.
	It is much less involved or engaged than gambling.
	But it has a very similar kind of stress and tension.
	When teams do badly, people actually feel bad.
	They get depressed. And when teams do well, they get literally natural opiates in their bodies, in their systems, and they feel a real high.
	And it is, to me, it's a pathetic thing.
	Now, I mean, I have enjoyed a couple of sports games in my life.
	Unfortunately, the first sports game I ever went to was a football game, which, after two hours, was nil-nil.
	And so that was my first taste, and I was like, I don't really get this at all.
	But I have enjoyed a couple of games that I've watched in my life.
	The Toronto one...
	I think it was 1993, I ran the world championship in baseball.
	I remember watching that game.
	I remember I had a really sore throat.
	I had a cold and a really sore throat.
	I wanted to go out and cheer with everyone but I could barely make a sound so I just went out and made armpit noises or something.
	There was that, and there was, I think, some Olympic game between Canada and the U.S. where a bunch of people that I knew at the time were getting together, and I kind of got into the spirit and so on.
	And when I was in business, we used to take clients to hockey games, and we had really, really good seats.
	And, you know, I thought it was interesting, too.
	But fundamentally, I get quite bored quite quickly of sports.
	It's, you know, it's just not that much fun for me to watch.
	You know, I don't mind watching some gymnastics, or, you know, I guess dance is a kind of sport, but...
	I think that it is always to me being indicative of something must be missing from someone's life if they need those kinds of highs and lows.
	There must be something that is not present in someone's life if they feel they need to throw themselves on the vagaries of chance In the same way, and of course it's a much more extreme example, in the same way that somebody who plays Russian roulette, where you spin the chamber with one bullet and pull the trigger, something must be missing from that person's life that they need that kind of stimulation to feel alive.
	I must say that I do find sports addiction to be, and for a lot of people it is a real addiction, I find it to be very, very sad.
	And I just remember, I think here in Toronto, there's a team called the Maple Leafs that play hockey, and they haven't won the Stanley Cup, which is like the national championship, since 1967.
	And I used to just occasionally tweak people that way.
	It's like, hey, I'm almost as old as the last time that Jamal won the Cup here.
	And people would literally get enraged.
	They'd talk about this Harold Ballard guy who came in and They would get really mad.
	He came in and he stopped spending money on the players and the fans should have just stopped going but they kept going and so he figured, well I don't have to spend money on the players because my fans will keep coming and he ripped us off and he blew our chances and now we have that kind of team.
	We don't have the money anymore to spend.
	People get really upset at this kind of stuff.
	And I just find it sad.
	I just find it's empty.
	It's silly.
	And of course, fundamentally, it's completely meaningless, right?
	I mean, I remember even as a kid, my brother and I used to go to see movies a little ways down the road.
	It's amazing. We would spend 10 pence, which I guess would be the equivalent of, I don't know, maybe 20 cents or a quarter.
	And we would get like two and a half hours of like shorts and movies and stuff and one of them would always be some sort of sports team, you know, like a sports game where the loser team gets together and they get whipped up by some different coach, you know, some coach who's not straight and narrow and then they ride to victory and so on.
	And to me it was always completely obvious, you know, like the red team is playing the blue team and we're really rooting for the red team.
	Why? Well, because we've been following the red team story.
	And of course it struck me even as a kid That if we were following the blue team story, we'd be rooting for the blue team.
	There's obviously no ethics in it and no morality, no good, bad, no right and wrong, no progress, no efficiency.
	It's just blind, idiot, dumb, addictive tribalism.
	And I think of the enormous amount of human energy, creativity, economic possibility that would be liberated if people just got off the goddamn couches and stopped watching all this stupid stuff.
	The amount of money that would be put back into the economy that would actually be productive rather than just Stupid consumption, I think, would be just great.
	The number of people who would get to do something productive with their lives rather than just bounce balls into hoops or into nets or, you know, throw pig skins around, you know, which is great.
	I love sports to play. I'm a sporty guy, but it has just struck me as a huge and destructive and parasitical waste.
	And as I talk about, there is one podcast very early in the series, I think it's in the 10s, called Sports in the State, which is that I remember when I was a kid in boarding school, sports was really drilled into us.
	And there is an old saying that the Battle of Waterloo was won on the fields of Eton.
	Eton is a sort of prep school, very high up, private school.
	And it's the idea that the relationship between sports and war is very close, right?
	So you raise good commanders in war through putting them into grueling, highly competitive and aggressive sports as children, and I think there's some real truth to that.
	And it does give you stupid blind loyalty to your team, which then translates into stupid blind loyalty to your government, so to speak.
	So that's my sort of brief, not so brief, I guess, but people didn't have too many questions.
	That's my brief thoughts on it.
	What do you guys think?
	I think sports is a colossal waste of time.
	And in a way, it's a fantasy almost like religion.
	Where they have, people have a faith in a team when there's no proof, there's nothing to back up that faith.
	I mean, I heard, I live in New York City and there's this rivalry between the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox, and they interview on the news, they interview the Yankees fans, and they're like, so what do you think of the game?
	And the Yankees fans are like, well, the Yankees are going to win.
	Well, why are the Yankees going to win?
	It's just because they are. And it so much reminds me of these same arguments when it comes to talking about it to a religious person as you would when you talk to a hardcore sports fan.
	It's that they have faith in the team just because it's there and they don't have any real reason why they believe the way they do about their team.
	Right. My team is the same as my God.
	I think I mentioned this in that early podcast, but it's a memory that comes back to me from time to time.
	I was like five or six years old, and my team was Crystal Palace, and they were, I think, four divisions in England, if I remember rightly, and Crystal Palace was always like the bottom of the third division.
	They were just a crap team, and I don't think, I never went to watch them play.
	And there was some guy, some other kid was playing in my neighborhood, and he was from West Ham, the West Ham, whatever that district is, the West Ham team, which was a good team and doing well or whatever.
	Arsenal and Liverpool and West Ham were all the top soccer teams or football teams in England.
	And he came over and he's like, yeah, your team Crystal Palace sucks!
	You know, and he's one of these really aggressive, just jerky kids that I guess are around.
	Not really jerky kids, but children of jerky parents, right?
	What is it Dawkins says?
	There are no Muslim children.
	There are only children of Muslim parents.
	There are no jerky children. There are only children of jerky parents.
	And I do remember saying to him, and I know it sounds abominably precocious, but I do remember saying to him very clearly, I remember the day, I remember the weather, I remember the shadows on the lawn, I remember saying to him, but you're just born there, and I'm just born here!
	It's an accident! I don't think I even got the wording right, but I just remember that very, very clearly.
	And getting people to understand that is like getting a Christian to understand that he would be a Muslim if he were born in Syria.
	Right. Or a Rastafarian if you were born in Kingston town or whatever, right?
	Like it's just freaking coincidence that you happen to worship the guy who walks in water and not the guy who married a nine-year-old, right?
	So it's this coincidental aspect of things that is...
	It's such a fragile, ridiculous, and pathetic thing to base any sense of superiority on that it's exactly the kind of bigotry that goes on between the races or between the genders or between cultures or between countries.
	To turn the accidental into a virtue is the fundamental lie of the false self, in my opinion.
	Right, and it very much mirrors the state with the accident of birth as well.
	Just because I was born in New York, I'm a Yankees fan, and that was pretty much the only thing.
	It's just like I'm born in America, and therefore I'm an American.
	It's just the accident of birth.
	It means nothing. Yeah, like my gene pool just happened to be over this particular place when the umbilical cord let go and it's like, here I am.
	And it is a terrible thing to take pride.
	I mean, we understand that, you know, white pride is a pretty vile thing, right?
	To take pride in yourself for your gender or your sexual orientation or your race.
	We understand that that's a pretty pathetic and vile thing and it's led to a lot of destructiveness.
	But to take pride in your nationality is patriotism.
	It's not bigotry, you see. It's patriotism.
	But it's exactly the same as white pride.
	And even the team stuff, obviously, it's not quite as noxious.
	But, of course, it can erupt into violence in England quite considerably.
	It does, and overseas, when the British teams play overseas.
	But we see it very clearly when it comes to racism and sexism and homophobia and things like that.
	But we don't see it when it comes to these other things, which are all accidents of birth.
	But the reason that people cling to that stuff is that the alternative is to be who you actually are, right?
	The alternative is to be authentic, to be rational, to be evidence-based, to be philosophical, to mature into an authentic human being.
	And that is a very difficult and costly process, as we all know, who are going down that road, and I think it's everybody here.
	So it's just a lot easier to paint yourself blue and cheer like an idiot than to try and discover the truth about yourself and the world and to live with honor and integrity, right?
	I mean, that's why people take these fake shellac empty substitutes for having a soul.
	Right. I mean, for me...
	Oh, go ahead. Sorry. No, that's alright.
	You want to go on? No, go for it.
	Okay. I was just to sort of relate a slightly different personal experience as far as sports is concerned.
	It wasn't so much the arbitrariness of, I was born here, therefore I have to be a Yankees fan, right?
	Because I was born in Northern New Jersey as well.
	Right. But...
	It comes back to pretty much what Steph was saying about not being authentic, but what I remember, whenever I think of any sport, pretty much basketball, football, baseball, anything, it was always on television on Sunday, and my father could not be interrupted during a game.
	It was this harsh, you know, every single time, and Even thinking about it and remembering it right now is just ridiculous.
	For as long as I can remember that sort of reaction.
	I understand that.
	Neither of my parents were, at least I certainly don't know much about my dad, but my mom was certainly not interested in sports.
	The other thing I think that's important to remember is like, what other function does sports play?
	Well, the other function that sports plays is to humiliate children, right?
	I mean, the kids who are good at sports have, you know, some natural ability, of course, right?
	I mean, there is some natural ability that you need.
	But, you know, again, going with that sort of outliers idea, you just need a lot of practice to be good at sports.
	And who are the kids who get the most chance to practice?
	Well, it's the kids who have better parents, right?
	It's the kids who have more money.
	It's the kids whose households have enough structure to be organized to actually get the kids to practice and get the kids to do this or that.
	I was a long distance running club, track and field.
	I was a water polo swimmer, tennis club.
	I mean, I did lots and lots of sports, but I just willed that stuff.
	I mean, there was no structure.
	It was all complete chaos and madness in my house, but I just really wanted to do that stuff, and I just willed that stuff.
	I played soccer every Sunday for most of my teenage years for like two, two and a half hours.
	I mean, I was just really into...
	I played squash relentlessly and so on.
	So I just sort of willed that stuff.
	But most of the kids who have sort of chaotic or destructive or disruptive households or households where there's not good food or they're overweight or whatever, right?
	I mean, sports is a way...
	It's almost like it expands the class divide between the kids with more healthy families and the kids with less healthy families, elevating the kids who already have good families and lowering the kids even further who come from bad families.
	And I think that is something that's really tragic.
	Really tragic, the degree to which, you know, The last kid picked on the team is the kid with glasses or the fat kid or something like that.
	Oh, that stuff is just horrible.
	It's just horrible. And there is this consistent joke in every high school movie or TV show or whatever you'll see that the jocks are kind of dumb, but they rule the school.
	And who are the Dungeons and Dragons mathletes and the geeks and all that?
	I mean, they're obviously much smarter and most of them have a much better future ahead of them in many ways.
	But they're jokes, right?
	So, it's really, really primitive.
	To me, it just seems so face-painted, tribal, outback, Stone Age trash.
	That physical prowess and throwing and catching balls and stuff like that would be the mark for sexual selection or the mark of social status.
	How many times did you have to catch a football in your last business meeting, right?
	Whereas the people who develop social skills, who read, who learn how to use computers and so on, those people actually have a future in the business world, for the most part.
	And so it is really, really wretched the degree to which I think it widens the class divide.
	And of course, since the people who come from more functional backgrounds in many ways tend to rule the world, they have a great incentive to keep the lower classes down.
	And sports is a really, really good way of further humiliating those who've experienced too much humiliation already at home.
	Water polo is extremely demanding.
	Water polo was by far the most brutal sport, except for extreme long distance.
	Water polo was the most brutal sport I ever did.
	I did it for about two years, and then I just stopped, because it was just too brutal.
	I just wanted to mention that.
	If you're interested in water polo, it is a very, very tough sport, for sure.
	Did anybody else have any thoughts on the sports?
	Yeah, sorry, brutal in terms of fighting.
	Yeah, water polo is one of these games because the water is so consistently churned.
	You know, people will hoof you in the nuts.
	People will, you know, gouge you with their toenails.
	People will kick you in the stomach.
	I found it to be a really, it's the most violent game I ever played.
	And I played rugby, for heaven's sakes.
	And so I found it a really, really tough sport and just really wasn't that satisfying.
	So I just didn't really play it too long.
	Somebody wrote, spots seem like a self-esteem thing to many people.
	Many people I know put a huge amount of value in someone's ability to compete well in sports.
	There's a lot of competitiveness and a need-to-win mentality.
	That's my experience of playing sports with others.
	I've played for many years and I've been turned off it because so many people take competing in sports very, very seriously.
	Yeah, you know, that's interesting. I have a squash league.
	I haven't done it for the last couple of years for a variety of reasons, but I have a squash league and I was thinking of going to join it.
	They actually have a sign-up in a week or two.
	But, you know, I just...
	I really, really hate playing with those guys who, you know, they miss a shot and it's like, fuck!
	You know, they hit the wall with their racket and stuff like that.
	I just... That stuff just makes me too tense.
	I just... I love playing sports.
	And I even like competitive sports.
	But to me, the competition is around just excellence.
	It's not about winning. And I just can't play with those guys.
	Like, I couldn't play with the guys who, in golf, they would miss a shot and they'd just turn red and all.
	I just... That's... It's just no fun.
	And that just seems to me very childish.
	And so I just...
	I try not to...
	I'm still mulling it over.
	I might go out and give it a shot.
	But I much prefer playing with my wife than other people because we both just have a great deal of fun.
	I should do kendo. No, I've never done any martial arts at all, actually.
	Oh, I shouldn't say that, but it's not really a martial art.
	I did, gosh, what was it?
	Tai Chi? In theater school.
	So, you know, how gay was that?
	It was actually very relaxing, very nice, but no, I've never done any martial arts at all.
	That's the kind of thing, like, I'm not going to put, in a sport, I'm not going to put the well-being of my body in the hands of somebody who really wants to Get involved in hitting people as a sport.
	I'm just not going to do that, if that makes any sense.
	That to me is just too big a risk.
	I just don't think there are a lot of philosophers in martial arts.
	I think that there's that kind of myth about martial arts, that it's all philosophical and the whole point is to avoid fights.
	But the people I've known in martial arts tend to be pretty lunatic and really aggressive.
	I'm just not going to get involved in a sport with somebody like that, where the purpose is to throw or to hit me or whatever.
	I wish I'd gotten a chance to try fencing, though.
	I think that would have been a lot of fun, but never did.
	Yeah, my sports at the moment is pretty sad.
	I mean, it's walking, weightlifting, and I do 25 minutes on the bike machine every second day.
	That's just maintenance and health and all that kind of stuff, but I really haven't had much chance to do fencing.
	You know, when you get into philosophy, all sports seem kind of tame, right?
	I mean, there's no more extreme sport than philosophy, so it all just seems pretty tame to knock balls around when you're actually reforging your soul from the very grim depths of your history.
	It doesn't seem quite so exciting to do the sports thing anymore.
	Alright, well, I think we've milked that topic at least as much as I can.
	If you would like to If you'd like to bring up topics or comments, that would be most excellent.
	Oh, and I also might be debating with a professor who is a libertarian socialist, which I think will be a lot of fun.
	Hopefully we can do the webcam thing and I'll work with him beforehand to make sure he knows that the mute button is important.
	So hopefully we'll get that going soon.
	Do I remember correctly, you were saying something about having a chat with the mouse?
	Yeah, yeah. I've finished reading two more chapters of his book.
	I'll release those this week.
	So yeah, we're going to have a conversation this coming week.
	Cool. So that would be very interesting.
	I mean, I've chatted with him a few times, but nothing particularly important, just a lot of some technical stuff about his book.
	But I think that would be very interesting.
	All right, comments, questions, issues?
	Topic idea, Nietzsche. Yeah, I would really like this.
	There are so many topics I'd like to do, so many shows I'd like to do.
	But we have time. Of course, I am, as yet a young man, I am only 42, at least for another 10 days, 11 days.
	So, yeah, I would like to do Nietzsche.
	I would like to do Schopenhauer.
	I'd like to do, well, I mean, so many people I'd like to do.
	Spinoza, I'd love to do Spinoza.
	There's so many people I'd like to do.
	Now, there are some podcasts on Nietzsche.
	You can go through The Philosophysician to find them, so you can go and check those out if you like.
	Hi, Steph. Hello.
	Hello. Hi.
	I wanted to just chime in and just kind of mention the book, The Drama of the Gifted Child.
	Real quick. I've been thrown into therapy pretty intensely.
	What do you mean thrown into therapy?
	Did they kidnap you?
	Did they sack over your head or something?
	You will now be healed.
	I did. I did it to myself.
	Excellent. I don't know. I guess I would say that I'm entering a new phase of therapy.
	Right. And it's been really informative and exciting and very...
	It's a lot of thrashing about with emotions.
	And since I've been able to use the drama with that to enhance my therapy, it's really intensifying everything.
	Because it's like with the book, I'm unlocking a lot of knowledge on narcissism.
	And I think that was one of the biggest reasons why I had resistance to the book.
	It's such a small book, so it's not like a daunting book, but when you start reading it and you know that you have problems with narcissism, you're kind of calling yourself out, like right away.
	Right. So that was, it was just my experience and I finally was able to open the book and I was finally able to read it and listen and I'm just making really great progress in therapy, and I wanted to thank you.
	Oh, yeah. Well, be sure, if you get a chance, drop her a line.
	I'm sure she would appreciate hearing that as well.
	Yeah, Alice Miller is a fantastic, fantastic writer, for those who don't know.
	I think she's a psychologist, and alice-miller.com is her website.
	You can dip into any of her books and get...
	I get just amazing things out of it.
	You know, someone gave me...
	A woman I was dating at the time, many, many years ago, gave me a copy of the drama of The Gifted Child, and I completely misunderstood what she meant, because I thought it was about, if you're a gifted child, you're going to be a drama queen.
	And I can't really say that that may have been inapplicable, because I got offended, so it probably was applicable, but that's what I thought it was about.
	If you're a gifted child, you're going to be hysterical!
	And again, maybe that was not entirely out of the context of my life at the time, but...
	I just, you know, she's, she's a, she had like a warm bath massage in the brain, you know, she's very gentle, very perceptive.
	And I mean, she's got this bit of just things that, I mean, just blow my mind.
	And she's got this bit where she talks about, I think it's in drama.
	And she talks about Henry Moore.
	Is that right? Is that at the beginning of drama of a gifted child?
	The sculptor? Anyway, Henry Moore, he creates these sculptures where, you know, the women's feet and hips and so on are huge, and their heads and arms are tiny and small and so on.
	And at one point in his autobiography, and I think Alice Miller was the only person who picked up on this, she talks about how he used to have to rub oil into his mother's legs because I think she had arthritis or something like that.
	And she says, if you think about it, how would a woman look to a small boy rubbing ointment into his mother's legs?
	Well, the feet and the hips would be huge, and the head and the arms would be tiny.
	If you look at Henry Moore's sculptures, and you can find pictures of them online, I've never found them particularly attractive, but I'm really old school when it comes to sculpture.
	I'm like Michelangelo's David, and stuff like that works for me, and Blobby, Picasso, Henry Moore stuff just does not.
	So she just keys in on these things, and if you only read one thing of hers, and for heaven's sakes read as much as you can of hers, she has a chapter on Heinrich Heine, Who is a German writer, and I just found that to be exquisitely done.
	Her stuff on Poisonous Pedagogy is fantastic as well.
	Her stuff on Hitler is, I mean, you know, she really does try to get into evil, into the head of evil, and understand its origins, which is certainly something that I've tried in my own, you know, to varying degrees of success ways.
	But she is somebody who, you know, will regularly blow your mind to new heights from which you will never climb down.
	And I just can't recommend her enough as far as that goes.
	I mean, she's not a philosopher, and that holds all the strengths and weaknesses of that.
	So, you know, I mean, obviously there are some caveats, but she is a fantastic person to read just to get those goose bumpy prickles of insight about other people and then about yourself.
	And I think that is just fantastic, fantastic stuff to work on.
	Yeah, I posted a couple of links to a couple of articles.
	I'd like to write to her and ask her if I can read some articles of hers that are on the web.
	As podcasts, but we'll see if she'll add.
	I don't want to read her stuff without her permission, because it says not to, and I want to respect that.
	And she and DeMoss have been colleagues for quite some time, and so that's another reason why I put some additional credence in his work.
	Of course, I'm not competent to judge his scholarship, but he certainly has footnotes aplenty, and he's well-educated, so that works for me.
	But sorry... Speaking of narcissism, I ended up talking about myself while you were talking about your therapy, so would you like to get back to that, or is it too late?
	I guess that's fine, but there's one thing that I noticed that's majorly different when it comes to getting things intellectually and emotionally at the same time for the first time.
	It's just like a tidal wave of Like, oh my god, I remember that.
	I was there. Or, like, especially when I'm combing through memories, you can get a memory intellectually and you can get it emotionally.
	But when you get it at the same time, it's like you're revisiting the experience all over again.
	And you are becoming closer and closer to the person that you want to empathize with, that you want to kind of connect with.
	The person from your past.
	Yourself. I want to make sure I understand what you mean by that.
	If you could just explain it a bit more.
	Sure. I have particular memories of particular abuse and there would be moments when I would be able to explain exactly what happened in therapy without really having an emotional response.
	And then there would be times in therapy, maybe weeks later, where I would finally get the emotional aspect of it.
	But after reading the drama, like, after reading a little bit more each week, it was like, I got this ability to kind of, the way I describe it as superimposing one experience on top of another.
	Like, your present experience is That mimic the ones from your past.
	And instead of just being able to relate these current experiences to the ones that happened in your past, you can actually see them on top of one another, and you can see, like, say I'm having an issue with my mom.
	Like, I have an issue that reminded me of something that happened with my mom.
	I can, like, put both situations and experiences on top of one another in my mind, and I can differentiate And that helps me kind of like get it emotionally and intellectually at the same time.
	Right. No, I think I understand.
	The metaphor just popped into my head is it's the difference between looking up at the night sky and just seeing a bunch of stars, which are like our memories, versus looking up into the night sky and seeing constellations.
	Which is where they're joined together in shapes that make sense.
	And she's very, very big on the shattered self, or there's a Scheingold, I think, calls it the soul murder, where the fragmentation of the personality is the result of abuse.
	It's so fundamental that the person simply dissociates from dissociated state to dissociated state, and there's no joining between anything.
	Everything is momentary, so when they're really angry, they're enraged, and then they forget about it.
	In a sense, it's very childlike.
	Isabella bangs her head occasionally, and she'll cry, and then within a minute later, she can be smiling again.
	It's just because her brain is still developing and all that.
	But I think, I mean, I'm no psychologist, but Alice Miller seems to really, really focus on looking for the patterns, looking for the continuities, looking for the similarities in the present that have grown out of the past.
	And if you can't see those, you can't change the present, right?
	Because you are forever battling a current that you can't see.
	Yes, the patterns, yeah, they reveal the current.
	And yeah, exactly.
	So you can see the connection and And it's...
	I used to think it was like...
	I don't know.
	I just find it so very...
	It's amazing.
	It felt like... It felt a little magical in a way because you're feeling emotions that you weren't allowed to.
	And you feel them so naturally because they were there from the beginning.
	They were your emotions.
	Like she talks about...
	She talks about the...
	The killing off of, like, the desires that children have of just wanting to either be useful or just to mimic their parents in a healthy way.
	And parents screw with that.
	They take that away from a child.
	They discard it off as being either selfish or silly.
	Like, there's a little excerpt in there about About a child wanting to partake in eating an ice cream cone that his parents were eating.
	They were just treating him like, oh, you really want that ice cream cone, don't you?
	Oh, it's a little too big for you.
	Oh, you're so sweet. You're so small.
	It's too cold for you, you know?
	It's just... Yeah, that's from Addison too, right?
	Yeah, I was that kid.
	I remember that. And it happens everywhere.
	Yes. It's just parents, they weren't allowed to, they weren't given the ice cream.
	Yeah, no, I think you're right.
	I think you're right. I'm continually trying to remind myself that Isabella is huge to Isabella.
	Like, she's tiny to me, right?
	But she's huge. Her passions, her thoughts, her feelings, well, not thoughts quite yet, but her feelings and her desires and her likes and her dislikes are huge to her, right?
	So if I feed her, you know, we try new food, and if I feed her something and she gives me that fine, misty spray of rejection, you know, it sprays it all over the place.
	That she really doesn't like it.
	And it's not like a cute little thing like, oh, you didn't like the food, right?
	She really doesn't like the food.
	She doesn't want to eat it. She has no power to go and get her own food.
	She's helpless because she has to just basically eat what we put in her mouth.
	And so to remember that that's really important to her and to try and enhance her sense of power at every opportunity, right?
	Because there's so much for her that is diminishing her sense of power, right?
	I mean, She can't control her bowels.
	She can't control...
	She can stand up and today she just stood for the first time without using her arms to hold on.
	But, you know, she can't climb stairs.
	She can't get in and out of her car seat.
	She can't leave the house.
	She can't open a door. So I'm really, really trying to enhance...
	Whatever I can do to help her feel more powerful, right?
	So I can give her something, like today she was playing on the kitchen floor, and she was pushing and pulling, The chair that we feed her in, her high chair.
	I mean, that had to be pretty cool.
	That'd be like you and I pushing and pulling a building, right?
	Because it literally is like five times higher than she is, right?
	And it's enormous to her, but she can pull it and push it back and forth.
	She's actually pretty strong. And part of me was like, well, if she tries to lift herself up, it might roll and she might fall.
	But I thought, but she's really enjoying what an amazing thing it must be for her who is struggling for every scrap of feeling of efficacy to be able to move something huge.
	It's fantastic and so to really encourage her to be able to do those things that grant her power, that grant her size, that grant her efficacy.
	That's one of the reasons why I started exercising her legs very early so that she could start walking early or she could start crawling early and that worked out very well.
	She's been way ahead on those things.
	Just to give her a sense of power and control Because, you know, she has to fight so hard to get those things.
	I really want to enhance that wherever possible.
	And yeah, I think a lot of parents do view their kids as small and cute and their feelings or passions as inconsequential.
	You know, the kid gets angry and, oh, he's just having a tantrum.
	As opposed to, that anger is very real for that child and very important.
	And children, I remember when I was in theater school, someone said, a teacher said, you know, we're doing one of our exercises, play like children do, play seriously.
	And I thought that was a wonderful statement, stuck with me for years.
	And that's, Isabella, it is play, but it's also very, very serious exploration.
	Christina was folding laundry the other day.
	Isabella grabbed clothes and started trying to help.
	I mean, she really wants to engage and get involved in the family.
	And you can look at that as cute and unhelpful, but I think it's a wonderful thing that she wants to help and get involved and to model what she does after her parents.
	Absolutely. I see that every day because I work at a grocery store.
	And The grocery store is just another example of everyday parents and children being in the same space but not being able to work together.
	Like most of the time, I don't see parents allowing the children to get involved in this really necessary experience.
	Anyway, So I'll be on my line, and the children will...
	The first thing the children do is want to help me.
	They want to get groceries out of the cart.
	They want to put it up on my counter.
	And when I realized that was the only...
	That was like, this is the only opportunity that I have in such an environment to be an enlightened witness to those desires and to that very...
	That ability that I have to, like, allow that around their parents.
	It's really difficult for me to watch when the parents don't take that seriously, when the kids want to help.
	Yeah, and then the parents will complain if the kids get bored and act up, right?
	It's like, you can't participate, but you can't be bored.
	It's like, well, you know, pick one, right?
	Yeah, it's so entirely frustrating, but...
	I'm coming to a point where, you know, it used to bother me more so.
	Like, I used to want to do something.
	I used to be really upset.
	But it's my opportunity to nurture their needs just for that five-minute interaction.
	Because I think they'll keep coming back and they'll remember that there is somebody who understands that is important.
	Yeah, I agree.
	I think those are really, really great things to see.
	And part of self-actualization is seeing more of the dysfunction in the world.
	My experience has been that when I was more dysfunctional, the world seemed normal.
	And as you become more authentic, you hang on to whatever scraps of wisdom you've developed.
	You develop empathy for yourself and others, then you see a different world than other people do, right?
	I mean, you just see a different world than other people do.
	And to me, it's the difference between a primitive person thinking that ghosts live in trees and a biologist looking at the multicellular, bark-skinned organism that a tree is.
	It is a different world that you look at when you become more functional.
	And people who are less functional, they don't see it.
	And they think you're crazy. And they think that you're just, oh, you see all these bad things and it's your projection or whatever.
	But as you become more functional, it's like if you become taller, everybody starts to look shorter.
	It's just natural, right?
	Yeah, I think that I've gained credibility at work because I came in a little bit knowing that the world is a little...
	It's like a lot different than me at this point because I'm in therapy and I'm intensely examining my relationships every day.
	So the people I work with, they were kind of weirded out by me at first, I think, because obviously for reasons I just explained, but because of the interactions I have with children, that's how I gain my credibility.
	Around them. And I see them treating children differently too.
	It's... I mean, I really think that one person can rub off on another like that.
	But when you can feel like all this dysfunction and look at a child and smile genuinely and enthusiastically and authentically, they pick up on it and their eyes start sparkling.
	And the ones that can't Are sadly on their way to being broken.
	I don't see too many of them, but when I do, it's sad.
	Well, but there's more than one exit off that highway, right?
	I mean, it's not just a one-time thing, right?
	It's not like, well, the kid who doesn't smile back when he's eight is doomed, right?
	I mean, there are lots of exits.
	I mean, I agree, the chance is less, but there are lots of exits.
	You never know, right? 20, 25, 30, 50, 90, right?
	There could be something that wakes that person up from their...
	You know, as Khan said, to wake people up from their dogmatic slumber.
	It's not an all-or-nothing, one-time proposition.
	I mean, I think there are moments that are very, very key, where it's one way or the other, but I don't think that's just one exit off the highway.
	Right, because I am not the world.
	Like, it's just one interaction they have with the lady at the grocery store.
	Yeah, but... Well, and also, it's part of the empathy, too.
	Sorry to interrupt, but if you think of somebody who may have smiled at you when you were that age and you were having a particularly rough day with your family, and you may not have smiled back, but you still found your exit off the highway, right?
	Oh, that's true. Definitely.
	Definitely. Yeah, because...
	I don't know. I think a child crying or throwing something at me would be my only reason not to continue engaging in a friendly way.
	And then why continue engaging?
	Because you probably know that they're attaining some kind of positivity from it.
	Right, right. So, yeah.
	But I think you and I had similar moms and the narcissism, I think that we can, or at least we had similar experiences through our mothers, so I just wanted to share that, the narcissism thing.
	No, I really appreciate that.
	I really do appreciate that.
	And again, we're just using these terms, you know, in an amateur sense, but what I sort of learned in my 20s, if this helps you at all, and, you know, one person's experience is, you know, impossible to replicate, but it's just what I sort of learned in my 20s.
	I've read a book, and I wish I could...
	It was one of the biggest books that influenced me as far as self-knowledge went, and I can't remember the title of it for the life of me.
	It had a disturbing painting on the cover.
	When Will It Stop? And it was really distorted and ugly and violent imagery.
	And it was about child abuse, and I'd never really particularly read about this topic in depth before.
	And this was in my mid-twenties, I think.
	And... The chapter that really got me in that book was when the writer, and it was a woman, the chapter was about war.
	And the writer, I'm going to paraphrase the argument, but the writer wrote that severe child abuse, significant child abuse, is worse than combat in war.
	Because if you come from a healthy background and you end up in war, The traumas are being inflicted upon a healthy, pre-existing personality and brain structure.
	Whereas if you go through significant trauma as a child, if you're abused as a child, that is actually forming your brain and your body and your personality.
	So it's not something that is...
	There's no original self that it's impacting on, like war on an adult, but it is actually being formed in the process of the harm that's being done to you.
	And that blew my mind.
	That's where my hair left, right?
	The whole top opened up and it just blew my mind because, I mean, I found it unarguable, right?
	I mean, it's not to say that all bad childhoods are worse than all combat experiences or whatever, but that basic principle that traumatic childhoods form the personality, distort the personality, change the brain structure, as we've seen from some of the research that people have posted on FDR, at least there's strong evidence for that.
	But that I had gone through an experience as a child worse in terms of its effects on the personality than war.
	My narcissism was optimism.
	My narcissism was minimizing my own experiences and maximizing the health of those around me.
	That was my sort of narcissistic preference.
	And I mean, the reason that I did that is that I think, you know, in hindsight, the reason that I did that was that when you actually do start to process your own trauma and your own history, the coldness of some of the people around you becomes quite evident if they haven't processed or distinctly don't want to process anything bad that happened to them.
	The reason that you minimize your own history is because otherwise it will expose some of the coldness and re-inflict some trauma.
	The coldness of those around you, at least that was mine.
	My narcissism was a kind of minimization of my own pain and my own experiences and a maximization of the health of those around me.
	That was very tough to change.
	I think I put her to sleep.
	I'm very good at that now.
	I wanted to say how quickly I understood that, because obviously, I mean, I used to look at it like this was my, this was the use that the parent gave to the child was to be, to need nothing, to want for nothing.
	I mean, to want nothing, basically.
	But, I mean, instead of looking at it as a job to be the child that wants nothing, it's more like the child is the extension of the killed desires inside of the parent themselves as a child.
	Does that make any sense?
	Well, if I understand what you mean, you're saying that it could be possible that the parent is suppressing the desires of the child because the parent is suppressing his or her own desires formally, right?
	Right. Right, right.
	But it's one of those things, like I get that feeling that it may seem so simple to somebody, but to me it's so important because I finally get it.
	I get it in 3D, not just...
	I don't know. I sound silly.
	No, no, you don't sound silly at all.
	It is IMAX compared to watching it on a little nano, right?
	It really is.
	I can hear the difference in your voice, just in case that is of use to you.
	Oh, really? Yeah, I mean, when did you first drop by?
	Was it a year and a half ago? Is that right?
	Yeah, um... Yeah, about a year and a half ago.
	Yeah, and your speaking tone is much more relaxed.
	It's more measured. You're still doing a little bit of I sound silly or whatever when you're, I think, among people who really do get it and would never think that in a million years.
	But you are much more relaxed in your communication.
	I mean, you were a little frantic at the beginning, right, in terms of your communication?
	But, yeah, it's much more relaxed.
	It's much more communicative. It's much more clear, if that makes sense.
	That's awesome. Thank you so much for pointing that out.
	Oh, it's a privilege to see it.
	That rocks! It does.
	It, in fact, does rock significantly and conspicuously.
	I feel like I'm, like...
	I feel like I have more of a connection to the world.
	Even if, even really examining myself, and I'm really actually in the best relationship of my life with myself right now.
	Even though having, you know, I have difficulty in some areas, but I rely heavily on my therapy.
	And I mean, I had, I have to say, I've been in therapy since I was seven years old, but I never got it.
	Until FDR came into my life.
	Until I started interacting with you guys at FDR. Well, I mean, I think that's a huge honor for everybody who's interacted with you.
	It certainly is in the times that you and I have interacted.
	It's an immense privilege to see, you know, where you came from and where you are.
	And of course, you know, the anticipation of where you're going.
	I mean, it's a real honor.
	It's a real privilege. I mean, I get to see this a lot and it is...
	It's what keeps me going in the face of challenges and difficulties.
	It is just the amazing, amazing progress that people make when self-knowledge is combined with moral clarity, is combined with genuine empathy and curiosity and sympathy.
	I mean, it really is a nutrient to a very starved soil in our souls, and I think that's a wonderful thing to see.
	Yeah, I think.
	I could do a commercial for FDR, my before and after photos, honestly.
	I used to have horrible acne and it's all clearing up due to my emancipation from bullshit.
	Emancipation from bullshit.
	Yeah, no, that's a good way to put it, right?
	It's a good way to put it. Yeah.
	Thanks. Fantastic.
	And it's always a pleasure popping in and talking to you.
	Thank you for your time. Oh, thank you.
	I really appreciate it. You always bring up these fantastic topics and of course I'm perfectly delighted.
	To, you know, when I think of, you know, you are hiding in a corner of your original house, typing away, and your ex was sleeping and grumbling, and I mean, it's just worlds away.
	It is an amazing, amazing thing.
	And, you know, this is another thing.
	It takes time.
	It takes therapy.
	It takes reading. It takes journaling.
	It takes taking yourself seriously and being creative.
	You know, getting into safe relationships and environments.
	It takes all of those things and it takes a long time.
	I mean, 18 months is not a short slice of life.
	And so I just, you know, congratulations.
	It's perfectly magnificent to see the work that you're doing.
	Congratulations to your therapist.
	Congratulations in particular to you.
	And it's just fantastic and inspirational.
	It moves me more than I can say.
	So thank you. And thank you for the honesty and openness that you've brought to what we're doing here.
	So thank you. Thank you, Tim.
	All right. We have time for one more comment slash question slash revelation, whatever you like.
	Can I talk about little Eichmann's?
	I don't know.
	I'm not sure what you mean.
	Ward Churchill? Why do I think that's an academic who got in trouble over 9-11?
	Am I completely wrong about that?
	That's the guy? Yeah, I mean, I don't know enough about Ward Churchill.
	I'd have to sort of research it some more.
	He was mentioned, I think, on the Harry Brown show.
	I read some of his stuff and he was critical of US foreign policy and its effects on radical elements in the Islamic world and in other countries.
	And basically said, we're continuing the same pattern that brought us 9-11 by going around and baiting other countries rather than looking in the mirror and saying, what have we done to provoke this?
	Oh yeah, the little Eichmanns!
	Oh yes! Okay, the guy who's typing this, remember, tell me if I got this right or wrong, because I'm reaching deep down into the gunny sack of my memory system.
	But did he not say that some of the people in the towers...
	We brought about the planes that flew into them because they were little Eichmanns in terms of running the finances of the empire in the same way that Eichmann didn't drop any Zyklon B capsules into any Jewish showers, but that these people in the World Trade Center are running the finances of the empire which drives The wars and therefore they have some moral culpability because without them the Empire couldn't work and therefore they have some moral culpability and they're not entirely innocent in the resulting violence that comes back.
	Now tell me if this is way, way up the past.
	Is that what he meant? That's what he said, right?
	Yeah, and he obviously got in some real trouble for that and I think that I personally would not go to Eichmann as a metaphor for those people by any stretch of the imagination.
	I think that it's reaching too far, and I think entirely unjustly, and way too far, like a million miles too far.
	Because I think that Eichmann was high up in the Nazi population.
	Like Hess, high up in the Nazi regime.
	They had a stated policy of genocide.
	They were involved in open war against a variety of other countries.
	And Hitler was a chew-the-carpet complete lunatic.
	And so I think that you could not look at people running finances In the World Trade Center and say that they would be analogous to Eichmann in the Nazi regime.
	I mean, it's, you know, he signed documents, you know, people died, you know, he planned and was integral to the final solution, the Holocaust, the genocide against the Jews and the homosexuals and the atheists and others and so on.
	So, I just, you know, there aren't people in the World Trade Center signing death orders for 100,000 people.
	I just, I think that that's not a viable analogy or alternative.
	And I think it's alienating.
	I think what he's trying to get at, I think what he's trying to get at, yeah, little Eichmann's, but I still think it's too far.
	I think it's too far to go.
	That having been said, I think that if you are running...
	Finances for the Empire of the United States, you have to have some idea what's going on.
	I mean, you have to. Or if you don't, then ignorance of the results of your actions, when they're that obvious, are no excuse.
	Like if I sneeze and cause a hurricane in Jakarta, then...
	I mean, I can be excused for not feeling bad, but when you are running an empire that is being used to fund a war, when you're running an empire that's being used to put future generations into debt, when you're running an empire that's being used to fund covert, ghastly operations and extraordinary renditions all over the world,
	and your efforts are being put into maintaining that financial system and manipulating that financial system for profit, I think that it's important for people to get some sense of the effects of their actions in the long run.
	And that money doesn't magically come from nothing.
	And particularly with the fiat currency and all the stuff that is going on, I think we need to become aware of the effects of our actions.
	Does that mean that we use analogies like little Eichmann's?
	I don't think that's fair. I think that what we need to do is just continue to educate people.
	About the effects of status policies like fiat currency and wars and empires and imperialism and so on.
	And I think that will come about.
	I think putting the argument so far ahead in the metaphor sphere that it just turns people off I think discredits what you're trying to say.
	And I think that's a mistake.
	But it is my understanding, and it is not a very deep understanding by any stretch of the imagination, but it's my understanding that...
	I mean, this is the ironic and ghastly thing, right?
	They say the victors write the history, right?
	And if you look at the Nuremberg trials, there were a number of principles that, of course, have been completely reversed now that the Americans are certainly dipping their toes in that kind of empire and that kind of evil.
	Yeah. The first is that it was the people at the top who were prosecuted, not the soldiers.
	It was the people who gave the orders.
	The people at the very top who signed the policies, who provided the orders that resulted in breakages of the Geneva Convention, to say the least.
	It was those people who were prosecuted, not the rank and file.
	Now, of course, you see with the torture memos and Bush and Rumsfeld and all those guys, it is the rank and file who were punished and the people at the top get pensions and book tours and speaking contracts and so on.
	So that, of course, is completely reversed.
	So when they had won against the Germans, they let off the rank and file and they punished the German leaders.
	And now that they're doing some things that are not entirely off that spectrum, it's the rank and file who are punished and the leaders who get away scot-free.
	And that, of course, is one thing.
	The other thing is that at Nuremberg, you had to really work to prove that you didn't know something.
	And there was this general, and again, I'm no expert on this, and if you ever want to, there's a film with Spencer Tracy and a very young William Shatner called Judgment Nuremberg.
	It's well worth watching. And he has this conversation with a German couple, just average people, right?
	It's like, well, how could you not know?
	And so on, right?
	The average German probably didn't know, but certainly higher up in the leadership level.
	To say, well, I had no idea that these concentration camps were going on.
	I had no idea that the prisoners of war were mistreated.
	I had no idea we tortured. I had no idea we broke the Geneva Convention.
	The default position was that you did know and you had to really prove that you didn't.
	And that, I think, is something that if we take as a principle that you're responsible for knowing the effects of the environment that you're in and the job that you have, Then, you know, I think people get off not being quite so unblemished when it comes to the financial manipulations that the empire needs to do what it does.
	So, I hope that that's some help, and I don't claim to be an expert on Nuremberg or Churchill or Germany, but those are things that I've sort of seen and read that may have some use.
	Education is key. Education is key.
	Education is key.
	Okay. I mean, the only people I really get angry at are the people who, you know, who have the values and then betray them, right?
	Who publicly state the values and then betray them, right?
	Those are the people I get angry at.
	The people who don't know, who genuinely don't know, to me, they're kind of in a state of nature.
	You know, it's like a puppy chewing your shoe, right?
	I mean, it's a state of nature.
	It's not moral or immoral.
	It is pre-knowledge, right?
	Any more than Isabella can be moral or immoral, right?
	And this is one of the reasons why people resist knowledge, is that with knowledge comes responsibility.
	With knowledge comes moral culpability.
	This is why people resist the spread of philosophy.
	Because once you know, then you're morally responsible.
	You can no longer go straight back into the gas bag fog of, I didn't know.
	And this is why people can be very hostile to things like UPB, to things of distinct and clear moral clarity.
	They can get very angry at it.
	Very angry. Right?
	I mean... The parents who are nice in public and hurt their kids terribly in private.
	Well, they know, because they have the ideals already, right?
	I mean, Whitney Houston sings about how great children are and how you should treat them like precious little gods, which is true.
	And then, what? Drug addictions?
	Bobby Brown? I mean, her kids are probably a mess.
	I don't know, right? But they have the values, and then they don't...
	Those are the people who, for better or worse, make me angry.
	Or the people who reject knowledge that is clear and obvious.
	But to me, the people who've never heard, taxation is force, and they've never heard of the empire, they don't know the 30 million people that the American empire has killed, they just don't know.
	Well, to me, they're not responsible.
	And how many people knew what in the World Trade Center?
	I mean, there's no way to know that. So I think that there's no way to make those kinds of judgments, if that makes any sense.
	It's why people are drawn back to the same nonsense sources that they always are.
	It's why people who are right-wing Republican people go to Fox all the time.
	It's why libertarians go to libertarian sites all the time.
	It is, you know, people, and it's a complete truism and nothing particularly insightful, but people have opinions and then they seek reinforcement of those opinions.
	And patriots do not like to look at the dark side of whatever country they're in.
	It's not going to pick on America, but it's just about every country.
	They just don't like to look at the other side.
	They don't like to look at that which undermines their belief system.
	Because for most people, and I mean, I count myself among this number for many years of my life, for most people, when, you know, the belief structure is not based on fundamental principles, reason, and evidence.
	And therefore, if any part of it comes down, the whole thing comes down.
	Like, why was I an objectivist ethicist for so long?
	Because, you know, if I really began to examine...
	And it was really only in my late 20s...
	No, it was actually my... It was in my mid-20s when I really began to start to look more critically at...
	But that was like eight years after I started reading.
	No. More.
	It doesn't matter. A long time.
	A long time before I started...
	Looking at it, because I sort of felt, well, if objective ethics falls down, then what happens, right?
	I mean, does the whole thing come crumbling?
	It was really scary to face that possibility.
	And so it is really hard, which is why I've tried to do as much work as possible to get people accelerated to a place of confidence in basic principles, ethics, virtue, reason, evidence, and so on.
	So that we can be critical without feeling like the whole house of cards is going to come down.
	That we can criticize, you know, propositions and arguments without feeling like we're going to just be blown into some postmodernist contradictory set of atoms.
	And, you know, I think with some degree of success.
	Oh yeah, guys, don't forget to donate.
	Yes, please, absolutely, and I really am sorry that my show production has dropped off a little.
	I have been entirely absorbed in a variety of things, so I do apologize for that.
	Oh, somebody said, can I ask a question, if I may?
	And then, what do you think?
	What do you think it could be, a fair balance between being a total quid pro quo individualist, always asking something in exchange for something, and being a total collectivist or socialist?
	That is a good question.
	Fair balance between a total quid pro quo individualist and being a total collectivist.
	Well, I mean, just off the top of my head, a brief response that I would give to that would be that the difference is love.
	The difference is love.
	You know, love requires deep knowledge of both self and other, right?
	You have to know yourself and you have to, you know, have overcome your barriers to basic virtues and honesty, integrity and so on, courage.
	You have to have deep knowledge of yourself and you have to have deep knowledge of another person.
	That takes time. That takes a long time and is an ever-growing and ever-deepening process.
	And so, you know, in my marriage, I don't...
	It's not... Quid pro quo, right?
	It's not, well, I did the dishes, and so you give me a foot rub or whatever, right?
	I mean, it is just do for the other, right?
	And it's not a debt that accumulates.
	It is a genuine pleasure.
	It is an ever-escalating generosity that is mutual.
	But that's love, right?
	And the problem with socialism is that you're supposed to have that kind of intimacy with everybody, which is completely impossible, right?
	And so I would say that the degree of intimacy is the degree where you drop the quid pro quo.
	And the degree of non-intimacy is where you would have more quid pro quo.
	Now, of course, where you get a lot of, you know, where you have a relationship even in business where quid pro quo works really well, then you can develop a more sort of friendly and relaxed.
	But, you know, that would be sort of my suggestion.
	Somebody said, Steph, how do you feel about grad school?
	I can't decide if I want to go after I get my bachelor's.
	I know you've done it. I was curious to any insights you might have.
	I loved grad school.
	I loved, I loved, I loved grad school.
	Completely and totally and utterly.
	And so I would, you know, if you can do it, I would strongly, strongly recommend it.
	I was there, all told, a year and a bit, a year and some.
	And I mean, as far as academics went, it was by far the best year of my entire education because it was so very largely self-directed.
	So if you have something that you want to study, if you have something that you want to work on, if you have something that you really want to, you have a yearning burning to prove, and I had this master's thesis that I've been thinking about for years that I really, really wanted to work on.
	It was just fantastic to I had a desk in the library.
	I had only a couple of hours of classes a week.
	I could just completely immerse myself in great philosophical works throughout history for, you know, 15, 16 months.
	I mean, it was just fantastic.
	I mean, you say, well, why can't you do that anyway?
	Well, it's tough, you know, you've got a job and commute and, you know, tired and, right?
	So, I would, you know, highly recommend grad school if...
	You can do something that's more self-directed.
	I hope that helps.
	It's not a bad idea to do grad school in a recession.
	It ups your marketability when you get out and differentiates you from the general BA hoard or BSC hoard or whatever you've got.
	It's not a bad place to hide out and learn about yourself.
	Plus, you know, you can get free therapy when you're in school.
	At least most schools will, most universities will give you free therapy.
	That is, I mean, that's a goldmine, I would suggest.
	So yeah, I highly recommend it.
	There have been two times in my life where I've really had a chance to take off and just work on something that I've really loved.
	And the one is grad school and the other is after the second sale of the business I co-founded.
	I took a year and a half, almost two years off, to work on fiction writing.
	And that was just fantastic.
	Yeah. I highly recommend it if you can be self-directed.
	At least that was my experience.
	And so I'm very, very, very glad that I did it.
	And I think, you know, did it help as far as FDR goes?
	It certainly did help as far as, you know, having some better grasp of philosophy and having a chance to really think through some of these issues.
	I don't think that anyone believes me because I have a master's.
	I certainly don't think I've ever said, well, I'm right because I have a master's.
	I think that's not the case.
	I don't think it hurts. You are very welcome.
	I hope that it helps.
	Now, it is, of course, different Um, uh, it is different, uh, in Canada because grad school, I mean, I did go into debt, uh, to go to grad school, uh, and I, but I, I worked for a year and a half, uh, to, to save up for grad school and I got into debt a little bit though.
	I was living ridiculously cheaply.
	That's the year that I lived with, uh, uh, five, five roommates in one house, beautiful house, four gay guys and a lesbian.
	It was just immaculate, spotless and, uh, and, uh, they had great music, but, uh, Alright, last question, last comment, last issue.
	Got a question. What do you say to the anxiety that comes about from knowing that there's always a small chance of being wrong, no matter how certain current conclusions seem, like contradictions I hate most of those I don't know about?
	Oh yeah, that's a great question too.
	What do you say to the anxiety that comes about from knowing that there's a small chance of being wrong?
	Well, the first is that I don't think you can ever get rid of that.
	I don't think I've ever said UPB is a done deal.
	Absolutely, completely, and finally it is the answer to ethics.
	I don't think I've ever said that.
	Certainly in the book I'm very tentative, and afterwards I've always said, well it seems to be doing well, I think it's a good proof, I think it's done, but I'm not going to say absolutely.
	So the first thing I would say is don't get rid of that anxiety, right?
	Don't view it as something that is fundamental to be erased.
	There's a book by Paul Johnson called Modern Times, and it's a huge book, though he is a fantastic writer, and it's really, really a good book to read.
	It's a history of the 20th century, and he is pretty libertarian, so it's really, really a good read.
	And he talks about something at the very beginning, which is Einstein's test For his theory of relativity, the degree to which starlight is going to bend in a gravity well, which was tested in an eclipse somewhere in the early 20th century.
	And compared to the ideologies that were running rampant, right?
	Communism was in full swing and fascism was really gearing up.
	And compared to the ideologies that were running rampant, Einstein's tests and humility with regards to his own thesis were quite admirable and refreshing.
	It's one of the reasons he became a celebrity, at least in the secular world.
	Because he said, well, you know, this is the thesis, but the real test will be the starlight around this.
	And even if that's the case, it may not be entirely proven because it's like...
	He was tentative, and that is the mark, I think, of a good thinker.
	To be tentative, but not to be a push-upper.
	That is the challenge.
	So I'm tentative in putting forward, oh, I think I've done this, or oh, I think I've done that.
	But I'm firm when criticisms of what I've done are illogical, or invalid, or just plain weird and silly.
	I think I've done it, but I'm not going to say 100% certainty.
	So if people come up with good arguments against it, I'm like, well, I have to incorporate those or deal with those.
	There was a guy who said, why is it not UPB to eat fish every Friday?
	Well, it's a damn good question, right?
	But if people just come up with silly things, then I'm very resolute in pushing those back.
	So I would say the first thing is don't try and get rid of your anxiety about being wrong because that spurs you on to greater proofs and greater certainty and greater work.
	But the second thing I would say is the fundamental question, which I've mentioned a million times before, is you are compared to what?
	So yeah, there is a chance that I'm wrong.
	But compared to what? There's a chance that any specific conclusion, any specific argument, every specific piece of evidence could be incorrect.
	We rely on third-party reporting, as you remember from my Somali pirate thing.
	We rely on third-party reporting.
	We rely on the reports and integrity of others.
	We rely on statistics that we have not gathered.
	And ourselves, I validate ourselves, most of which, right?
	So yeah, absolutely.
	Every proposition, we may make a flaw in our argument, new evidence may arise that disproves our argument, or something like that.
	So any conclusion that we make can be wrong, and I think that trying to get rid of that anxiety would not be particularly healthy.
	But, philosophy can't be wrong.
	Because we only know something is wrong compared to philosophy, reason and evidence, the superstructure of the scientific method.
	And by that I just mean philosophy is bigger than science.
	Nothing bigger than philosophy, but philosophy is bigger than science.
	So, any equation can be incorrect, but mathematics is not incorrect, because we only know that an equation is incorrect relative to the discipline and logic of mathematics.
	So, Any scientific proposition may be incorrect.
	Any theory may be incorrect, but we only know it's incorrect because of the scientific method.
	The scientific method itself cannot be incorrect.
	Right, so those would be my two.
	One, keep that anxiety about everything that you put forward.
	Two, do not have anxiety about philosophy, because philosophy cannot be incorrect, because there would be no way to know philosophy was incorrect if philosophy was incorrect, because there would be nothing to compare any proposition to.
	I hope that makes some kind of sense, and I hope that helps you with that.
	It is a challenge, for sure.
	We want to know, but it's really, really tough to gain absolute certainty about anything except philosophy.
	Oh, he's saying it most comes from trying to advocate current conclusions to other people.
	Well, but advocating conclusions is not healthy, I think.
	To advocate a conclusion to someone is not healthy.
	That's why UPB doesn't just say murder, theft, rape, and violence as a whole is wrong and property rights are a right.
	That would not be a book on ethics.
	That would be just a statement of opinion or bigotry in a sense.
	So I would say that when you're advocating things with people, I think that you want to step them through the arguments from first principles.
	And if you don't respect them enough to step them through the argument from first principles, I would not debate them.
	You've seen this a million times with me.
	Just think of the recent Hellfeld debate.
	I start from first principles.
	What is the purpose of society?
	The purpose of society is either pragmatic for individuals, which means it's a free-for-all, or it's based on rational moral principles, in which case it's ethical and philosophical.
	You don't want to teach people conclusions.
	You want to teach people how to think.
	You want to teach people methodology.
	And if you teach people conclusions, then you're not actually teaching them anything.
	You're just giving them another bigotry.
	If you don't know the reason why, it's still bigotry, even if you're accidentally right.
	So, you know, like when you're teaching kids, you don't teach them the times table and that's it for math, right?
	I mean, they may need to know that stuff because it's helpful to memorize that, perhaps.
	At least I had to. But you want to teach kids how to think in terms of numbers, how to reason in terms of numbers when you're teaching them math so that they can go and do their own equations.
	Otherwise, you're just teaching them how to memorize equations, which is really not teaching them anything.
	He says, but yeah, if people are always informed to think for themselves and even encouraged to think of challenges, yes.
	Well, yeah, but this is the question.
	How much time do you want to spend talking to people who aren't interested in thinking for themselves?
	Right? This is a fundamental question to have.
	How much time do you want to spend talking to people who are openly resistant and hostile to thinking for themselves?
	Right? Because I'm telling you, if you're just teaching people conclusions, you're making the world a worse place, and you're just indulging yourself.
	It's got nothing to do with making the world a better place.
	The world becomes a better place when people think for themselves, not when people accept conclusions.
	So, I would just avoid conclusions, work with methodology, and that will also give you a good sense of who's worth talking to.
	Yeah, also you miss out on the joy of learning and working it out.
	That's very true. And you also miss out on the possibility of correction from others, right?
	You know, if all you're giving people is conclusions and they're giving you conclusions, you miss out on people correcting your thinking, right?
	I mean, I've got mind-blowingly fantastic questions from just about everybody at one time or another in this show.
	Just like things that just make me go like, oh shit, I'm totally wrong.
	Oh wait, no, I think I can save it.
	I think I can patch it. I think that by teaching people methodology, you are working with them.
	By teaching them conclusions, it's in a sense just trying to fill them with bigotry.
	So I would really, really recommend teaching them methodology so that they can use that methodology on you and help you improve your thinking as well.
	If you look at a debate or a conversation like, I have to win, and if a person comes up with a question I can't answer, that's bad.
	Look, if a person comes up with a question you can't answer, that's actually what makes it a conversation rather than just a one-sided lecture.
	So I would really, really recommend it being a two-way street as far as that goes.
	It is a full-time job.
	It is a full-time job, but the shortcuts just make it a waste of time.
	You say, well, I could teach people how to think, but that takes a long time, so I'll just teach them conclusions.
	Well, that doesn't make any sense, right?
	It's like, well, I could ship someone the iPod they ordered, but that takes a lot of time, so I'll just ship them the box so I don't have to waste time packing it.
	It's like, well, that just leads to problems, right?
	So, yes, teach people the methodology.
	That way you'll be very discriminating in who you spend your time with, right?
	This is so early. This is such early days in, you know, what is hopefully a kind of renaissance of philosophy, you know, after the postmodern biofest of the last 60 odd years.
	You know, there's a kind of renaissance that's going on here.
	It's very, very early, which means don't waste your time teaching people conclusions, but work on the methodology.
	And if you find that you only get to talk to five people a year, from that, that is way better than talking to 50 people a year and getting nowhere, right?
	That is just wasting time and making the world actually a worse place.
	Because then people think that philosophy is about conclusions, not about the process, not about the methodology.
	And if they think philosophy is about conclusions, you've discredited the name of philosophy.
	Yeah, and somebody's mentioned they will be manipulated by the powers that be if you give conclusions.
	Absolutely. You know, we all think, oh, you know, I'm a great guy for, you know, giving people ideas and giving them conclusions.
	But, you know, there's always going to be somebody else who's more charismatic, who's better spoken, who, you know, there'll be some girl who comes along who's really attractive, who they'll just nod because whatever, right?
	You know, they want to jump her bones or something.
	And so there's always going to be somebody out there who's a better speaker than you or me, who's more persuasive than you and me, who's, you know, more charismatic, who's funnier, who's, right?
	And the only defense against that is methodology.
	There's no defense against conclusions because somebody will always be better, right?
	I mean, look at Barack Obama. The man is a complete golden god genius of rhetoric.
	And, you know, look at what he's able to achieve by just spouting off empty conclusions and rhetoric.
	So the only defense against that is not to think, well, I'll be more charismatic, but methodology, methodology, methodology.
	All right. Well, I think we are dry on questions.
	I wanted to thank you all for adjusting your schedules for this.
	Superbly, superbly done.
	Thank you, everybody. I mean, I really do appreciate taking calls from people or taking questions from people who've been around for a while, because I feel like I'm not constantly circling back to ABC 123.
	So I really do appreciate that.
	So have yourselves a wonderful week.
	I will absolutely release some podcasts this week.
	I have some in the pipes.
	And I really do appreciate everybody's questions and feedback.
	Thank you to the callers.
	And thank you to everybody who's out there, whether you're on the show, in the chat room, in Skype, listening to this later.
	Thank you, thank you, thank you for the great honor of supporting Free Domain Radio, for the honesty and the openness and the great questions, the honor of giving me your questions.
	It is an incredible honor for me to be asked questions, and your judgment is sovereign.
	Never substitute anyone else's judgment for yours, mine, anybody's, except maybe Barack Obama's if he's really on a good speaking spree.
	But I really, really do appreciate the honor and the vulnerability that people show in asking questions.
	And I always, always want to try and do my best in answering them.
	But remember that these are just theories.
	These are just my thoughts. And, you know, your life, the rudder to your life is in your hands.
	And maybe there's a little wind that comes from FDR that is helpful.
	But it's your propulsion that will make things go.
	Thank you so much, everybody.
	Have yourselves an absolutely, absolutely delightful week.

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