This is a transcript of Lex Fridman Podcast #427 with Neil Adams.
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Table of Contents
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The following is a conversation with Neil Adams, a legend in the sport of judo. He is a world champion, two-time Olympic silver medalist, five-time European champion, and often referred to as the voice of judo commentating all the major events, world championships and Olympic Games. Highlighting the drama, the triumph, the artistry of the sport of judo. Making fans like me feel the biggest wins, the biggest losses, the surprise turns of fortune, the dominance of champions coming to an end and new champions made. Always speaking from the heart. This is the Lex Friedman podcast. To support it please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here’s Neil Adams.
You are a five-time European champion, world champion two-time Olympic silver medalist. Let’s first go to the 1980 Olympics. Where was your mind? What was your preparation like? What was your strategy leading into that Olympics?
So building up to the ’80 Olympics was quite interesting because I was kind of coming through the weights and I was halfway in between the 71 kilos weight category and the higher weight category of 78 kilograms. And I got third place at the ’79 world championships, the weight below. Fought the whole year at the higher weight category, didn’t lose a contest. So I’d beaten everybody in the world. And then I had to make the decision as to whether to drop to the weight below because I was seeding in the weight below. It was a different seeding then. And so I decided to drop into the weight below because I was seeded in the top four. And as it happens, I think it was probably the worst decision I made.
Well because…
So was it a mistake? Yeah, because I didn’t have my diet sorted out. My nutrition was appalling and when I, it wasn’t as kind of readily available as it is now for the nutrition. And I would say that if anything lost me that final, other than the fact that I was fighting somebody was terrific. He was an excellent, brilliant athlete, but definitely didn’t help that my nutrition was not very good.
So people see the kindness, the warmth you have the charisma of the excitement, but there’s this big drive to win inside you. So what’s behind that? Can you just speak to that, that drive to win and how that contributed to your career?
And one of the things that’s in me is that I just all the way up to 40 years of age, so from 30 when I finished competition up to 40, I could still train with the best and I could still go with anybody. And then when 40 hit, kind of things started to fall off a little bit and I used to get either my hips or the legs and my knees. And I realized that I had to pick my practices and that rankled as well and I had to then just calm it down a little bit, otherwise I was going to be injured and I was going to be… It’s not a good thing when you getting older and you’ve still got the same competitive mind, but things change.
So judo kind of changed shape. It changed shape from this upright standing and having to know the technicalities of how to get a body that’s weighing 14 stone, or whatever it is, up into the air and using the momentum and the balance and the direction and the skill to do that and knowing how to do it and how to use movement. And then you get the wrestlers and the leg picks and the single leg, double legs. And by 1995 judo was bent over. And so it was the IOC that went to IJF, International Judo Federation. And they said, “You’ve got to change this, or we’re just going to have one wrestling style. It looks like wrestling with judo, with judo jackets on. “So you either change it or we are going to take one of you out.”
So rules always dictate development. They’ll always dictate which direction it goes. So if you introduce a rule that states that you cannot dive at the legs and just pick up, then you’ll have to do it standing up. And also it increases the possibility of defense with the hips. Because actually good defense, judo wise, standing up is with the hips as opposed to sticking your arms out and then sticking your backsides out there just to defend. All right, so if you attack me and I move my body in the wrong place, so I’m in the wrong place at the right time, so you don’t hit the right target. And then also I use my hips. So again, it’s a form of judo that was being lost. So now we’ve got it back.
But a great champion for me is somebody who does the right thing when they lose. So when you see them lose, that’s when you see the true them. And actually that was one of the biggest things that I had to really cope with. So when I lost that Olympic Games in Moscow and also the one in Los Angeles, the hardest thing is when the microphone’s in there and you’ve got to be respectful and nice and the hardest thing is to smile.
But actually some of the great champions, they’ll go, “That’s just one match.” I remember, we’ve got one great champion, Agbegnenou, she’s a five-time world champion, Olympic champion. She’s favorite as well to get this Olympic gold medal. French. What a great champion she is because she lost one of the matches. I mean, she’d come back and she’d given birth, come back after giving birth and everybody was going, “Well, will she…?” And then she lost one of the matches on the way through and she said, “Well, don’t be upset. It’s just one match. It’s just one contest. Next time I’m going to put it right.” And she did put it right and now she’s back up there and she won the world title back. So these are great champions for me.
Yes, it is tragic. And I do have sleepless nights.
But this is the incredible thing, is that once you start to ask you, once I see contests change direction when I’m commentating. So I can see somebody who’s in there just going forward trying to win. And that’s a difference to somebody who’s trying not to lose. And there’s two different ways there. So sometimes when you… When I was world champion then I had a period of time where every time I stepped out there I was really afraid of losing. And I think that that’s what happens later on in your competitive career.
The great champions managed to come through that. Teddy Renair is one of those, he puts it out there and he keeps beating them so they can’t take it away from them. It’s fantastic.
So if you can’t grip up, then you can’t gain the advantage, then they can throw you. So you have to decide. So I had a massive attack on him and we changed directions four or five times, and then I wasn’t going to let him go. But still when I was turning him there, I had to decide am I going to go all out for this? There has been occasions when I’ve released it, just if I’ve got a minute to go and just block out.
I caught his sleeve, immediately caught, and controlled him. And then he couldn’t start. So he said, “I needed to feel the difference.” So then I thought, “I better reciprocate this.” So we did the randori and I throw them a couple of times. He said, “I’m really glad we did that.” So then I said, “I need to feel the difference as well.” So we take the jackets off. So we took the jackets off and he was a nightmare. This guy was a nightmare. And like a monster. He was single legging me. And it was just totally different. So the jacket makes a massive difference. Huge difference to something. And people think it’s just the jacket that we’re wearing, but it isn’t. It’s our only tool actually.
I beat Brett Barron by an ippon. I armlocked him. I won my first match by ippon as well. And then Michel Nowak, I was fighting, of France. And I was lucky to win it. I was up, I scored on him. But I was starting to defend and just everything that I talked to you about, and then just about held on. And then I won. So him and I were talking some years afterwards and he said, “I was close, wasn’t I?” “Yeah, but not close enough.” I didn’t mean it, but I had to say it.
And we have an amazing marriage and we have an amazing family, and everything’s great. But I still wake up sometimes and I’ll say, “I’ve just dreamt it.” And it’s the same reoccurring dream where I’m trying to get somewhere and I’m trying to put it right. And I’ve got this chance of putting this Olympic final right. In this dream I’ve got a chance of doing it, but I can’t get there. And the traffic’s stopping me or something stops me. And then I wake up and I’m sweating. And you think, well after all this time that’s not possible. But it is. And it happens.
And also I went through obviously a later divorce. And that was difficult on my son, really difficult on Ashley. And then I think that some of that was the fact that I wasn’t drinking all the time, but I was drinking in excess at the wrong times. And I think that that’s what a lot of people do sometimes is that they use it for the wrong reasons. And I used to hear it, I hear it now all the time, and it’s that I need to knock the edge off, and I need to just forget, and you need to be in a fuzzy place for a while. And I had a lot of time in fuzzy place, and I needed to get rid of that. And I needed to clear my head.
That got progressively worse to the degree where it was trying to hide it, and trying to hide how much. And I was a functioning drunk. I think you could probably say that. And I was functioning, I was still training most days, crazily enough. I was training to mask it and cover it. And that was probably my savior, because I remember I said to my wife, I said to Niki, “If I’m a drunk then I’m the fittest drunk in the world.” She said, “Yeah, you probably are, actually.” I was in great condition for a drunk.
And so I remember they pulled me up in front of this board. And I looked down at these guys and half of them were people I didn’t want to be in that situation with. They’re not people that I respected and they’re not people that I trusted. So I said, “If you’re going to sack me, sack me. But I’ll promise you now that this is it. I’ll stop. I’m just going to stop. I’ve decided.” On the way back in the car I rang Niki up, my wife, and I said, “Whatever you hear…
And I think about anybody who is down all the time is to find the cause of what’s pushing you down. You know what I mean? And try and attack that. Somebody once said to me, they said, “Whatever you got, we’ve got something special.” We have a great life and I’ve had a great competition record. It could have been better, but it was great. But I’ve had success with my business and we’re still out there and we have great life. We travel all the world. There’s people out there that would live in your house at the drop of a hat, wherever you are. They drive your car no matter what car it is. Some people haven’t got a car. And whatever food you’re having and you’re moaning about food, somebody out there that would take that and gladly eat that. All right? So there’s always somebody worse off than you. And I think that we tend to sometimes look at the things that we haven’t got rather than the things we have got.
It’s by no means an absolute certainty that he’s going to win the Olympic gold medal. But he’s got to be one of the favorites, top favorite. No matter what happens now, Teddy Riner is the greatest winner, and if you asked the great Yamashita, he would say the same. There’s nobody that’s, and Yamashita was unbeaten in international competition. I trained with Yamashita a lot over a two-year period and got to know him quite well. And he was one of the greatest of all times. For me, he was one of the greatest Judo men. I’m talking about from a technical point of view, from a spectacular judo point of view, understanding the fundamental principles of how techniques work. Sometimes having different techniques that work for you. So if one doesn’t work and one particular direction doesn’t work, you can change the direction completely.
So I’d let you decide what was left and right. Okay? Because often what happens is we impart on people whether they’re going to be left or right when we start teaching. You get a lot of teachers do that all. And they’ll say, immediately, “What do you write with? Left or right hand?” And it’s no indicator actually as to how we do judo because I’m left-handed and I do more predominantly right-handed because I lead off my strongest hand. And actually most people do. So actually left and right is a bit of a trap sometimes when we’re teaching. Better to get, because we can go… My point was, is that a lot of people can go both flanks, so they’ll do something over this side and something over this side.
Teddy Riner just manages to turn it on the Korean. And that went really against the run of play, didn’t it? The Korean did better. But Teddy Riner is a winner. And he says, “Right, okay, let’s have more cheering.”
This is when World Championships was every other year. And this is Shozo Fujii and he was the greatest middleweight of all time and never got to participate in the Olympics because he lost the Japanese trials twice, in two Olympic possibilities. He had to qualify for Japan and then go to the Olympic Games and then do it there. Sometimes some of the best people in Japan can’t get outside of Japan. Look at the situation they had with Abe and then they had Maruyama. Maruyama and Abe were both the best. By far. In the under-66 kilos category. This is for the last Olympic Games. And they sent one to the world Championships one to the Olympic Games and they both won gold medals.
Then I went to one competition in the European Championships, which I won, and I was struggling all the way through it and got scored on three times in my first pool of fights, and I was devastated. I actually nearly lost the whole competition because I was more mortified about being scored on three times when I hadn’t been scored on for 2 1/2 years. I had this thing in my head about 2 1/2 years, and then all of a sudden I’m not unbeatable and you go… I almost lost it, completely lost it. Just so fortunate, couple of things went my way and just came out, and I scraped and scratched my way to the final and won the final well, all right? But that was my best match, but I almost lost it.
Because I had been to Japan in situation… I remember as a sixteen-year-old, I got such such a drumming from one of the Japanese guys, older students. And he had a gold tooth. And so he was Gold Tooth to me and he was my nightmare. And I remember kept coming out to fight him because he kept throwing me and I was crying and I was upset and I was like… And then that was another occasion where I got dragged away and I said, “No.” So I wanted to go back and fight him. And I went back to the same dojo every year to fight him. He was on my mind morning, noon, night. He was on my mind.
And again, you’re not the top and you’ve worked your way to the top of that. I think it is a frustration, but I think it’s that kind of hatred of losing and also being out of control. I think that the first Senior European Championships I fought Nevzorov, but he was only one of my contests. Then I had to fight a Frenchman for third place. But he totally out-gripped me. And I remember I was more upset though I won the contest, I was more upset that he totally out… He did out-grip me and I was more upset. And then I fought him a year later and out-gripped him. All right. So it was one of those, it was a learning process all the way through.
Click link to jump approximately to that part in the transcript:
- 0:00 – Introduction
- 1:46 – 1980 Olympics
- 19:09 – Judo explained
- 27:14 – Winning
- 45:28 – 1984 Olympics
- 54:29 – Lessons from losing
- 1:10:11 – Teddy Riner
- 1:29:46 – Training in Japan
- 1:45:25 – Jiu jitsu
- 1:56:33 – Training
- 2:19:52 – Advice for beginners
Introduction
Neil Adams
When we go to the dojos there, we all get thrown by people that never come out to be world champions. They’re just in the mix or they’re going through three years of university and then they go. We had a guy, we had a guy that came in. He was business guy, came in with his suitcase in his tie up like that. And he’s in his lunch hour. He’s in his lunch hour, right? So it’s got to be quick.
When we go to the dojos there, we all get thrown by people that never come out to be world champions. They’re just in the mix or they’re going through three years of university and then they go. We had a guy, we had a guy that came in. He was business guy, came in with his suitcase in his tie up like that. And he’s in his lunch hour. He’s in his lunch hour, right? So it’s got to be quick.
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Neil Adams
So he comes in and he goes through, he’s working his way through the whole of the British team. We’re all lined out, right? 10 minutes later, he’s tying his tie up like that. And back to work like that. Imagine him sitting behind his desk and his computer.
So he comes in and he goes through, he’s working his way through the whole of the British team. We’re all lined out, right? 10 minutes later, he’s tying his tie up like that. And back to work like that. Imagine him sitting behind his desk and his computer.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
Neil Adams
I’m glad he didn’t get out.
I’m glad he didn’t get out.
Lex Fridman
Who do you think wins, Yamashita?
Who do you think wins, Yamashita?
Neil Adams
I think Yamashita. But I…
I think Yamashita. But I…
Lex Fridman
Wait, you think Yamashita beats [inaudible 00:00:46]?
Wait, you think Yamashita beats [inaudible 00:00:46]?
Neil Adams
I think so.
I think so.
Lex Fridman
Strong words.
Strong words.
The following is a conversation with Neil Adams, a legend in the sport of judo. He is a world champion, two-time Olympic silver medalist, five-time European champion, and often referred to as the voice of judo commentating all the major events, world championships and Olympic Games. Highlighting the drama, the triumph, the artistry of the sport of judo. Making fans like me feel the biggest wins, the biggest losses, the surprise turns of fortune, the dominance of champions coming to an end and new champions made. Always speaking from the heart. This is the Lex Friedman podcast. To support it please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here’s Neil Adams.
1980 Olympics
You are a five-time European champion, world champion two-time Olympic silver medalist. Let’s first go to the 1980 Olympics. Where was your mind? What was your preparation like? What was your strategy leading into that Olympics?
Neil Adams
That was my first Olympic Games. So my preparation was a little bit different to how it was the ’84 and the ’88 Olympic Games. And I’d kind of done part of the preparation as well for ’76 Olympic Games. I wasn’t quite old enough for those, but I was first reserve. So in 1980 I’d had four years build up and I was hungry and I was one of these young athletes and I see them so often now that was developing and full of, I won’t say I was full of myself, but I was certainly confident of my ability and I wanted to conquer the world. And I’d had a couple of really tight matches with the current Olympic world champion. So I knew that there was a possibility that I could get there for the ’80 Olympics.
That was my first Olympic Games. So my preparation was a little bit different to how it was the ’84 and the ’88 Olympic Games. And I’d kind of done part of the preparation as well for ’76 Olympic Games. I wasn’t quite old enough for those, but I was first reserve. So in 1980 I’d had four years build up and I was hungry and I was one of these young athletes and I see them so often now that was developing and full of, I won’t say I was full of myself, but I was certainly confident of my ability and I wanted to conquer the world. And I’d had a couple of really tight matches with the current Olympic world champion. So I knew that there was a possibility that I could get there for the ’80 Olympics.
So building up to the ’80 Olympics was quite interesting because I was kind of coming through the weights and I was halfway in between the 71 kilos weight category and the higher weight category of 78 kilograms. And I got third place at the ’79 world championships, the weight below. Fought the whole year at the higher weight category, didn’t lose a contest. So I’d beaten everybody in the world. And then I had to make the decision as to whether to drop to the weight below because I was seeding in the weight below. It was a different seeding then. And so I decided to drop into the weight below because I was seeded in the top four. And as it happens, I think it was probably the worst decision I made.
Well because…
Lex Fridman
Well…
Well…
Neil Adams
Simply because, I mean, it was the only contest that I lost was the final of the Olympic Games in that year.
Simply because, I mean, it was the only contest that I lost was the final of the Olympic Games in that year.
Lex Fridman
So you’re a young kid, what? Like 19-20 at that time full of confidence, vigor. So the decision to cut weight, how hard was it for you to cut weight to the 71 kg division?
So you’re a young kid, what? Like 19-20 at that time full of confidence, vigor. So the decision to cut weight, how hard was it for you to cut weight to the 71 kg division?
Neil Adams
I’ve got to say that it was the hardest because as I was going up, it was 73, then it was 74 kilos, 75. So I was moving through the weight category. It wasn’t like I was stuck in the middle and then I dropped the odd time to compete. It was literally going up in weight by a kilo every month. And then by the time I came to a month or two before the Olympics, it was really hard. Fought the European Championships at the higher weight category and won that. And so everybody that was on the Olympic rostrum at the Olympic Games was my rostrum at the European championships.
I’ve got to say that it was the hardest because as I was going up, it was 73, then it was 74 kilos, 75. So I was moving through the weight category. It wasn’t like I was stuck in the middle and then I dropped the odd time to compete. It was literally going up in weight by a kilo every month. And then by the time I came to a month or two before the Olympics, it was really hard. Fought the European Championships at the higher weight category and won that. And so everybody that was on the Olympic rostrum at the Olympic Games was my rostrum at the European championships.
So was it a mistake? Yeah, because I didn’t have my diet sorted out. My nutrition was appalling and when I, it wasn’t as kind of readily available as it is now for the nutrition. And I would say that if anything lost me that final, other than the fact that I was fighting somebody was terrific. He was an excellent, brilliant athlete, but definitely didn’t help that my nutrition was not very good.
Lex Fridman
Okay, so you lost to Ezio Gamba. There’s probably a lot of that we could say about that particular match. Maybe let’s zoom in. What were your strengths and weaknesses, judo-wise in that Olympics? You said you haven’t really lost the match, you won the European Championship leading into it, but if you had weak spots, okay, you already said diet, but specifically on the mat in terms of judo.
Okay, so you lost to Ezio Gamba. There’s probably a lot of that we could say about that particular match. Maybe let’s zoom in. What were your strengths and weaknesses, judo-wise in that Olympics? You said you haven’t really lost the match, you won the European Championship leading into it, but if you had weak spots, okay, you already said diet, but specifically on the mat in terms of judo.
Neil Adams
I think that none of the fights lasted time going into the final. So I won fairly quickly and every match by ippon way before time.
I think that none of the fights lasted time going into the final. So I won fairly quickly and every match by ippon way before time.
Lex Fridman
Do you remember how you won the matches?
Do you remember how you won the matches?
Neil Adams
I won them by throw, a couple of throws for ippon and then an armlock for ippon. Semi-final was an armlock against the East German Kruger. And yeah, I was flying through.
I won them by throw, a couple of throws for ippon and then an armlock for ippon. Semi-final was an armlock against the East German Kruger. And yeah, I was flying through.
Lex Fridman
What were the throws? Do you remember?
What were the throws? Do you remember?
Neil Adams
Tai otoshi, uchi mata. My favorite kind of te-waza, my favorite throws. And then Juji-Gatame as well, which was a Juji-Gatame roll. Against an East German who I’d beaten before but always had a really tough match, but managed to beat him well.
Tai otoshi, uchi mata. My favorite kind of te-waza, my favorite throws. And then Juji-Gatame as well, which was a Juji-Gatame roll. Against an East German who I’d beaten before but always had a really tough match, but managed to beat him well.
Lex Fridman
So you had a beautiful exhibition of Japanese-type Judo in the first two matches. You threw people and then you also did the [inaudible 00:06:43], unbarred a person. Great. So going into the final, what are the weaknesses going into the final against the Italian?
So you had a beautiful exhibition of Japanese-type Judo in the first two matches. You threw people and then you also did the [inaudible 00:06:43], unbarred a person. Great. So going into the final, what are the weaknesses going into the final against the Italian?
Neil Adams
Like I say, taking nothing away from him as a great athlete and a brilliant Judo man and left, which wasn’t good for me. That was definite no, I hated fighting leftys, still do, but I’ll tell you why in a minute. I just did…
Like I say, taking nothing away from him as a great athlete and a brilliant Judo man and left, which wasn’t good for me. That was definite no, I hated fighting leftys, still do, but I’ll tell you why in a minute. I just did…
Lex Fridman
That’s great.
That’s great.
Neil Adams
It’s one of those. But I think as I went through the contest, we had an eight-hour break from the semi-final to the final. They took us back to the Olympic village, then we had to come back in and then we had to start a warmup again. So I kind of lost my momentum, I had to start again, and I just had a job to get going. I got halfway through, started to rescue a dying match, and I was kind of one step, half a step behind all the way through. So never really got into it.
It’s one of those. But I think as I went through the contest, we had an eight-hour break from the semi-final to the final. They took us back to the Olympic village, then we had to come back in and then we had to start a warmup again. So I kind of lost my momentum, I had to start again, and I just had a job to get going. I got halfway through, started to rescue a dying match, and I was kind of one step, half a step behind all the way through. So never really got into it.
Lex Fridman
So why do you hate fighting leftys? And leftys are, we should say, overrepresented in terms of the higher ranks of Judo. I don’t know why that is.
So why do you hate fighting leftys? And leftys are, we should say, overrepresented in terms of the higher ranks of Judo. I don’t know why that is.
Neil Adams
Well, the thing is about a lefty is a lefty will have more opportunity to fight rightys, right-handers. I mean 70% of the population are right-handers, 30% left. So they get to fight more right-handers and it’s just a fact that happens. So the thing that they hate is fighting left against left. They don’t like it left against left. Whereas a right-hander will go right against right, but the opposite is awkward would for me because just simply, I like to go onto the sleeve and then I like to dominate the grips, but the actual angle of the opponent wasn’t what I wanted, so I had to work hard, really hard against it.
Well, the thing is about a lefty is a lefty will have more opportunity to fight rightys, right-handers. I mean 70% of the population are right-handers, 30% left. So they get to fight more right-handers and it’s just a fact that happens. So the thing that they hate is fighting left against left. They don’t like it left against left. Whereas a right-hander will go right against right, but the opposite is awkward would for me because just simply, I like to go onto the sleeve and then I like to dominate the grips, but the actual angle of the opponent wasn’t what I wanted, so I had to work hard, really hard against it.
Lex Fridman
What happened in that match?
What happened in that match?
Neil Adams
It was a split decision in the end. And so to lose an Olympic final on a split decision is pretty, it’s something that’s still on my mind. And I think that it’s a strange one because I can still wake up, that one and four years later at the Olympics, I was silver medalist at the Olympics four years later as well. And yeah, it still haunts me.
It was a split decision in the end. And so to lose an Olympic final on a split decision is pretty, it’s something that’s still on my mind. And I think that it’s a strange one because I can still wake up, that one and four years later at the Olympics, I was silver medalist at the Olympics four years later as well. And yeah, it still haunts me.
Lex Fridman
Do you sometimes wake up and think like, “Eh, I should have eaten better” or maybe a specific grip that you’re like, “Ah, I shouldn’t have taken that grip.”?
Do you sometimes wake up and think like, “Eh, I should have eaten better” or maybe a specific grip that you’re like, “Ah, I shouldn’t have taken that grip.”?
Neil Adams
I do. I mean the diet side of it, its difficult to really admit that, isn’t it that you went to an Olympic Games and the one thing that you really sucked at, right, was one of the most important things now at world level sport. Where you’ve got the nutrition, we’ve got it, you would think that most people have got it sorted, but there’s still people making mistakes and still people that haven’t got it totally sorted.
I do. I mean the diet side of it, its difficult to really admit that, isn’t it that you went to an Olympic Games and the one thing that you really sucked at, right, was one of the most important things now at world level sport. Where you’ve got the nutrition, we’ve got it, you would think that most people have got it sorted, but there’s still people making mistakes and still people that haven’t got it totally sorted.
Lex Fridman
And then there’s people like Travis Stevens who I think doesn’t care. He’ll just have atrocious nutrition and he just makes it work. I think the way he spoke about it is you can’t always control nutrition, so it’s best to get good at having crappy nutrition.
And then there’s people like Travis Stevens who I think doesn’t care. He’ll just have atrocious nutrition and he just makes it work. I think the way he spoke about it is you can’t always control nutrition, so it’s best to get good at having crappy nutrition.
Neil Adams
That’s a good way of looking at it. I never, yeah, maybe that’s what I did.
That’s a good way of looking at it. I never, yeah, maybe that’s what I did.
Lex Fridman
Exactly, exactly. Do you remember what you were eating? Are we talking about candy or?
Exactly, exactly. Do you remember what you were eating? Are we talking about candy or?
Neil Adams
Yeah, well I got a sweet tooth, but it wasn’t really, I mean, I didn’t have a lot of money at that particular time either. So the diet wasn’t steak and good nutritional salads and things like that. I did what I thought was best without proper advice. And the crazy thing is that I had such good advice as well when it came to fitness training and things like that. We’re quite ahead of our time and we really had it nailed as far as the conditioning was concerned, the judo training as well was way in advance. I was a good trainer and I trained more than most. I can honestly say that. It probably got me away with a lot.
Yeah, well I got a sweet tooth, but it wasn’t really, I mean, I didn’t have a lot of money at that particular time either. So the diet wasn’t steak and good nutritional salads and things like that. I did what I thought was best without proper advice. And the crazy thing is that I had such good advice as well when it came to fitness training and things like that. We’re quite ahead of our time and we really had it nailed as far as the conditioning was concerned, the judo training as well was way in advance. I was a good trainer and I trained more than most. I can honestly say that. It probably got me away with a lot.
Lex Fridman
Where was your mind? So mental preparation going into that Olympics, you said you were confident, but is there some preparation aspect behind that confidence?
Where was your mind? So mental preparation going into that Olympics, you said you were confident, but is there some preparation aspect behind that confidence?
Neil Adams
I think in the early days I didn’t think I was going to lose. I never thought it was possible to lose. And I think that I went into every contest expecting to win. So when it didn’t quite go my way, I didn’t lose that many contests. So the only ones I lost were in the final of the world championships or in the final of the Olympic Games. I didn’t lose that many. I never lost a European title. I had seven golds at European championships, five at seniors, two at juniors under twenties. I never lost a final. And then I only lost two on a split decision. So I didn’t lose that many. And my attitude was that I wasn’t going to lose and couldn’t lose. So I was always surprised when I did, when something happened.
I think in the early days I didn’t think I was going to lose. I never thought it was possible to lose. And I think that I went into every contest expecting to win. So when it didn’t quite go my way, I didn’t lose that many contests. So the only ones I lost were in the final of the world championships or in the final of the Olympic Games. I didn’t lose that many. I never lost a European title. I had seven golds at European championships, five at seniors, two at juniors under twenties. I never lost a final. And then I only lost two on a split decision. So I didn’t lose that many. And my attitude was that I wasn’t going to lose and couldn’t lose. So I was always surprised when I did, when something happened.
Lex Fridman
In Neil Adams, A Life in Judo, written in 1986. You wrote, “Ever since I can remember I have wanted to win. It wasn’t the ordinary feeling that children have when they take part in their first primary school sack race on a grass track or even the keen determination of a young swimmer prepared to train early in the cold winter mornings in order to make it into the county side. With me, the desire to win was and still is as much a part of me as my arms and legs. In other words, it wasn’t something I learned as I grew older, but rather it was deeply rooted in me. Perhaps this competitive instinct is the greatest difference between my public image and the view from the inside.”
In Neil Adams, A Life in Judo, written in 1986. You wrote, “Ever since I can remember I have wanted to win. It wasn’t the ordinary feeling that children have when they take part in their first primary school sack race on a grass track or even the keen determination of a young swimmer prepared to train early in the cold winter mornings in order to make it into the county side. With me, the desire to win was and still is as much a part of me as my arms and legs. In other words, it wasn’t something I learned as I grew older, but rather it was deeply rooted in me. Perhaps this competitive instinct is the greatest difference between my public image and the view from the inside.”
So people see the kindness, the warmth you have the charisma of the excitement, but there’s this big drive to win inside you. So what’s behind that? Can you just speak to that, that drive to win and how that contributed to your career?
Neil Adams
Do you know when I look back now…
Do you know when I look back now…
Lex Fridman
This is a lot of years ago, we should say.
This is a lot of years ago, we should say.
Neil Adams
It is a lot of years ago.
It is a lot of years ago.
Lex Fridman
Is that true or were you just being poetic?
Is that true or were you just being poetic?
Neil Adams
It’s not far off. No. When I think about it now, I’d like to think that I’m a different person now. And since I’ve kind of calmed down, I see athletes now and I see them and their kind of arrogance, their walk, and it’s a strut and it’s a kind of a confidence, isn’t it? As we’re older and as I’ve become older, I’ve calmed down, but it doesn’t matter what I’m doing, it’s still that will to win. And I’m much better at masking it now if I don’t. But it still bothers me as much.
It’s not far off. No. When I think about it now, I’d like to think that I’m a different person now. And since I’ve kind of calmed down, I see athletes now and I see them and their kind of arrogance, their walk, and it’s a strut and it’s a kind of a confidence, isn’t it? As we’re older and as I’ve become older, I’ve calmed down, but it doesn’t matter what I’m doing, it’s still that will to win. And I’m much better at masking it now if I don’t. But it still bothers me as much.
Lex Fridman
You’re talking about like… I don’t know, even just stupid, silly things. Like I don’t know, a game of pool or something like this or just anything.
You’re talking about like… I don’t know, even just stupid, silly things. Like I don’t know, a game of pool or something like this or just anything.
Neil Adams
Yeah, I’m still trying to win. Like my son loves to… He loves to play me at bowls because I’m useless and I just can’t throw a straight bowl. So he loves playing me at that, but it bugs me that I’m not better and there are certain things that I do. It really bugs me when I’m not good at it. And I guess it’s one of the reasons that long after I’d finished competition judo, people still want to train with you. And even at an older age, even now if I do in a seminar or they’d still, “Do you still do? Do you want to still go? And can I feel it?”
Yeah, I’m still trying to win. Like my son loves to… He loves to play me at bowls because I’m useless and I just can’t throw a straight bowl. So he loves playing me at that, but it bugs me that I’m not better and there are certain things that I do. It really bugs me when I’m not good at it. And I guess it’s one of the reasons that long after I’d finished competition judo, people still want to train with you. And even at an older age, even now if I do in a seminar or they’d still, “Do you still do? Do you want to still go? And can I feel it?”
And one of the things that’s in me is that I just all the way up to 40 years of age, so from 30 when I finished competition up to 40, I could still train with the best and I could still go with anybody. And then when 40 hit, kind of things started to fall off a little bit and I used to get either my hips or the legs and my knees. And I realized that I had to pick my practices and that rankled as well and I had to then just calm it down a little bit, otherwise I was going to be injured and I was going to be… It’s not a good thing when you getting older and you’ve still got the same competitive mind, but things change.
Lex Fridman
So it’s still there. You get on the mat probably even now, right? You get on the mat with a world champion, you still the current world champion, there’s still a little part of you. Could I still toss this guy?
So it’s still there. You get on the mat probably even now, right? You get on the mat with a world champion, you still the current world champion, there’s still a little part of you. Could I still toss this guy?
Neil Adams
But you know…
But you know…
Lex Fridman
Kids these days are soft.
Kids these days are soft.
Neil Adams
Well, you know what, some of these athletes, I mean I give you a prime example, right? Is Ilias Iliadis. He is a monster, right? And of course you couldn’t because just at sixty-something you couldn’t, but you like to think that you could.
Well, you know what, some of these athletes, I mean I give you a prime example, right? Is Ilias Iliadis. He is a monster, right? And of course you couldn’t because just at sixty-something you couldn’t, but you like to think that you could.
Lex Fridman
You could, you never know. You got to find out.
You could, you never know. You got to find out.
Neil Adams
You know what you would do. What you can do is you can cause them problems and they feel it immediately. But you’d last a minute.
You know what you would do. What you can do is you can cause them problems and they feel it immediately. But you’d last a minute.
Lex Fridman
So you’ve trained with Ilias Iliadis, I’ve gotten a chance to train with him as well. He’s a really nice guy, really great.
So you’ve trained with Ilias Iliadis, I’ve gotten a chance to train with him as well. He’s a really nice guy, really great.
Neil Adams
Great guy. He trained with me. We were training together every hotel that we used to go into, we’d end up in the gym together and we’d train. And this one time he was in there and he just wanted somebody to grab and grip hold of. And so we ended up doing this kind of grappling in the middle, the people doing weight training and the different things watching these two mad men doing… I’m glad we weren’t on a mat at that particular time. But good fun.
Great guy. He trained with me. We were training together every hotel that we used to go into, we’d end up in the gym together and we’d train. And this one time he was in there and he just wanted somebody to grab and grip hold of. And so we ended up doing this kind of grappling in the middle, the people doing weight training and the different things watching these two mad men doing… I’m glad we weren’t on a mat at that particular time. But good fun.
Lex Fridman
What do you think about that guy? He like you achieved a lot of success when he was young.
What do you think about that guy? He like you achieved a lot of success when he was young.
Neil Adams
17, can you imagine that? 17, 18 years of age and he’s able to compete with the men. There’s not many men can do that. And it doesn’t happen very often. It happens later with the men and often they’re not physically as developed as they… So for me, for example, I fought Nevzorov who was world Olympic champion. He was the current world Olympic champion, and they sent me to the European Championship senior at 17 and that doesn’t happen very often. And I fought, I pulled Nevzorov, I fought Nevzorov and I had him really worried because he expected without a doubt, to come out, throw this kid and junior.
17, can you imagine that? 17, 18 years of age and he’s able to compete with the men. There’s not many men can do that. And it doesn’t happen very often. It happens later with the men and often they’re not physically as developed as they… So for me, for example, I fought Nevzorov who was world Olympic champion. He was the current world Olympic champion, and they sent me to the European Championship senior at 17 and that doesn’t happen very often. And I fought, I pulled Nevzorov, I fought Nevzorov and I had him really worried because he expected without a doubt, to come out, throw this kid and junior.
Lex Fridman
And he was thick and shredded. [inaudible 00:17:36] he’s a man.
And he was thick and shredded. [inaudible 00:17:36] he’s a man.
Neil Adams
He was shredded. There’s a picture of him in his judogi and his judogi is just cut and he looks the business. And there’s me in this baggy…
He was shredded. There’s a picture of him in his judogi and his judogi is just cut and he looks the business. And there’s me in this baggy…
Lex Fridman
Skinny kid.
Skinny kid.
Neil Adams
Skinny kid inside this baggy thing. And the thing was is that the more he tried and the harder he tried, and the more he panicked, the further it went away from him. And so of course he got the decision at the end and deservedly, but I worried him. And so for me that was a massive step forward because year later I was starting to fill out and two years later I was competing for the Olympic title.
Skinny kid inside this baggy thing. And the thing was is that the more he tried and the harder he tried, and the more he panicked, the further it went away from him. And so of course he got the decision at the end and deservedly, but I worried him. And so for me that was a massive step forward because year later I was starting to fill out and two years later I was competing for the Olympic title.
Lex Fridman
I don’t know if I remember, but Ilias Iliadis is interesting because even at 17 I feel like he was doing big throws, like literally lifting them with the hips.
I don’t know if I remember, but Ilias Iliadis is interesting because even at 17 I feel like he was doing big throws, like literally lifting them with the hips.
Neil Adams
Just rips them out the ground. And I was saying to Nikki, my wife, and she said, “What would you do now? It was different than the way you did then.” I never had any pickups. That’s not what we did. But you have a look at the young Ukrainians or the young Russians or the young Eastern Bloc Mongolians and they’re ripping people out the ground. I mean it’s just different style of judo and it just looks different. But now they’re starting to do traditional style judo as well.
Just rips them out the ground. And I was saying to Nikki, my wife, and she said, “What would you do now? It was different than the way you did then.” I never had any pickups. That’s not what we did. But you have a look at the young Ukrainians or the young Russians or the young Eastern Bloc Mongolians and they’re ripping people out the ground. I mean it’s just different style of judo and it just looks different. But now they’re starting to do traditional style judo as well.
Judo explained
Lex Fridman
So can you speak to that? What are the different styles of judo? So for you, you mentioned uchi mata, tai otoshi, these… How would you describe them? They’re like these effortless, less lifting off the ground and power and strength and more timing and position, movement, momentum, all this kind of stuff. That’s more traditionally associated with Japanese judo because for Japanese judo, the traditional judo, you’re supposed to throw people in a big way without much effort.
So can you speak to that? What are the different styles of judo? So for you, you mentioned uchi mata, tai otoshi, these… How would you describe them? They’re like these effortless, less lifting off the ground and power and strength and more timing and position, movement, momentum, all this kind of stuff. That’s more traditionally associated with Japanese judo because for Japanese judo, the traditional judo, you’re supposed to throw people in a big way without much effort.
Neil Adams
And of course, 1990 we saw the introduction of all these Eastern Bloc countries. There were so many more, I mean it was Soviet Union when I was competing. And then of course in 1990 everything changed. And then there were so many more of them out there, different countries, their wrestling styles were introduced into judo. Put a jacket on them and let’s get into judo.
And of course, 1990 we saw the introduction of all these Eastern Bloc countries. There were so many more, I mean it was Soviet Union when I was competing. And then of course in 1990 everything changed. And then there were so many more of them out there, different countries, their wrestling styles were introduced into judo. Put a jacket on them and let’s get into judo.
So judo kind of changed shape. It changed shape from this upright standing and having to know the technicalities of how to get a body that’s weighing 14 stone, or whatever it is, up into the air and using the momentum and the balance and the direction and the skill to do that and knowing how to do it and how to use movement. And then you get the wrestlers and the leg picks and the single leg, double legs. And by 1995 judo was bent over. And so it was the IOC that went to IJF, International Judo Federation. And they said, “You’ve got to change this, or we’re just going to have one wrestling style. It looks like wrestling with judo, with judo jackets on. “So you either change it or we are going to take one of you out.”
Lex Fridman
By the way, we should sort of clarify when we say people are bent over, that’s usually how you see freestyle wrestling. Wrestlers are more bent over to defend the legs and so on. And traditional judo people are more standing up because that’s the position for which you can do the big throws and all that kind of stuff. But I think the other case to make for banding leg grabs is a lot of people are using it for stalling and not for beautiful big throws and all that kind of stuff. So it’s not just to make it different from wrestling, it is also like you want to maximize the amount of epic throws and dynamic judo and exciting stuff to watch, right?
By the way, we should sort of clarify when we say people are bent over, that’s usually how you see freestyle wrestling. Wrestlers are more bent over to defend the legs and so on. And traditional judo people are more standing up because that’s the position for which you can do the big throws and all that kind of stuff. But I think the other case to make for banding leg grabs is a lot of people are using it for stalling and not for beautiful big throws and all that kind of stuff. So it’s not just to make it different from wrestling, it is also like you want to maximize the amount of epic throws and dynamic judo and exciting stuff to watch, right?
Neil Adams
Yeah. Win by judo, not by wrestling. And I think that the ones that were shouting about it were the wrestlers, right? Because they like to compete with both. They want to do both. They want to do their wrestling matches and then come into judo. So basically, I mean, what we’ve said is they learn to do judo and there’s nothing stopping you then from doing both, but not from the other way around. All right?
Yeah. Win by judo, not by wrestling. And I think that the ones that were shouting about it were the wrestlers, right? Because they like to compete with both. They want to do both. They want to do their wrestling matches and then come into judo. So basically, I mean, what we’ve said is they learn to do judo and there’s nothing stopping you then from doing both, but not from the other way around. All right?
So rules always dictate development. They’ll always dictate which direction it goes. So if you introduce a rule that states that you cannot dive at the legs and just pick up, then you’ll have to do it standing up. And also it increases the possibility of defense with the hips. Because actually good defense, judo wise, standing up is with the hips as opposed to sticking your arms out and then sticking your backsides out there just to defend. All right, so if you attack me and I move my body in the wrong place, so I’m in the wrong place at the right time, so you don’t hit the right target. And then also I use my hips. So again, it’s a form of judo that was being lost. So now we’ve got it back.
Lex Fridman
So let’s go there. Let’s speak about judo as if we’re talking to a group of five-year-olds. So what is judo? What are some defining characteristics of judo as a sport, as a way, as a martial arts, a way of life, all that kind of stuff?
So let’s go there. Let’s speak about judo as if we’re talking to a group of five-year-olds. So what is judo? What are some defining characteristics of judo as a sport, as a way, as a martial arts, a way of life, all that kind of stuff?
Neil Adams
I think when you say it is a way of life, I mean I think the great advantage that we have in judo, my young grandson… So I got two little boys that are three and a half years of age, love going to our dojo. They love it. So dojo was the first word that they used. It was one of the first. So when they come see us, so seeing my wife and I, it’s like dojo. It’s not grandma granddad, it’s dojo. So dojo. They take their shoes off going into the dojo. So they have respect for where they’re at. I think it has that kind of feeling that I tried to build my dojo with a feeling of reverence. It’s kind of almost peaceful. I’m not a religious person, but I like going to old churches because when I go into an old church, it doesn’t matter what the religion within the church, but there’s a reverence in there.
I think when you say it is a way of life, I mean I think the great advantage that we have in judo, my young grandson… So I got two little boys that are three and a half years of age, love going to our dojo. They love it. So dojo was the first word that they used. It was one of the first. So when they come see us, so seeing my wife and I, it’s like dojo. It’s not grandma granddad, it’s dojo. So dojo. They take their shoes off going into the dojo. So they have respect for where they’re at. I think it has that kind of feeling that I tried to build my dojo with a feeling of reverence. It’s kind of almost peaceful. I’m not a religious person, but I like going to old churches because when I go into an old church, it doesn’t matter what the religion within the church, but there’s a reverence in there.
Lex Fridman
Reverence is a good word. It feels like a really special place no matter which dojo you go to, it’s just you bow and there’s a calmness before the storm of battle or whatever it is.
Reverence is a good word. It feels like a really special place no matter which dojo you go to, it’s just you bow and there’s a calmness before the storm of battle or whatever it is.
Neil Adams
Yeah, and respect.
Yeah, and respect.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, respect.
Yeah, respect.
Neil Adams
I mean, look at the respect. We were just talking about it just before we came on air. We were just saying that we very, very seldom do we have a situation where there is animosity other than them fighting. So I’m not saying that they don’t fight each other because sometimes it does turn into a brawl and at the end, two people bow off and show their respect. And one of the things, so a champion, I see people winning events and they’re good judokara, they’re excellent, they win world championships might even win the Olympic Games.
I mean, look at the respect. We were just talking about it just before we came on air. We were just saying that we very, very seldom do we have a situation where there is animosity other than them fighting. So I’m not saying that they don’t fight each other because sometimes it does turn into a brawl and at the end, two people bow off and show their respect. And one of the things, so a champion, I see people winning events and they’re good judokara, they’re excellent, they win world championships might even win the Olympic Games.
But a great champion for me is somebody who does the right thing when they lose. So when you see them lose, that’s when you see the true them. And actually that was one of the biggest things that I had to really cope with. So when I lost that Olympic Games in Moscow and also the one in Los Angeles, the hardest thing is when the microphone’s in there and you’ve got to be respectful and nice and the hardest thing is to smile.
But actually some of the great champions, they’ll go, “That’s just one match.” I remember, we’ve got one great champion, Agbegnenou, she’s a five-time world champion, Olympic champion. She’s favorite as well to get this Olympic gold medal. French. What a great champion she is because she lost one of the matches. I mean, she’d come back and she’d given birth, come back after giving birth and everybody was going, “Well, will she…?” And then she lost one of the matches on the way through and she said, “Well, don’t be upset. It’s just one match. It’s just one contest. Next time I’m going to put it right.” And she did put it right and now she’s back up there and she won the world title back. So these are great champions for me.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, I mean that’s the right way to see it. But it’s also tragic to lose the Olympic Games.
Yeah, I mean that’s the right way to see it. But it’s also tragic to lose the Olympic Games.
Neil Adams
Twice.
Twice.
Yes, it is tragic. And I do have sleepless nights.
Lex Fridman
I mean that’s the magic of the Olympic Games. Anything can happen. And your 1980 Olympics were very different from 1984, but if we just linger on ’80 and just what we’re talking about, how much you wanted to win, do you love winning or hate losing more?
I mean that’s the magic of the Olympic Games. Anything can happen. And your 1980 Olympics were very different from 1984, but if we just linger on ’80 and just what we’re talking about, how much you wanted to win, do you love winning or hate losing more?
Winning
Neil Adams
I hate losing more, but I love winning. When I won the world title the year later, and I had no doubt when I went into that day that I was going to be world champion. No doubt.
I hate losing more, but I love winning. When I won the world title the year later, and I had no doubt when I went into that day that I was going to be world champion. No doubt.
Lex Fridman
So you won the ’81 World Championship.
So you won the ’81 World Championship.
Neil Adams
At the higher weight.
At the higher weight.
Lex Fridman
At the 78.
At the 78.
Neil Adams
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
Kg. Actually, can we go there? What was going through your mind? You ended up arm barring a Japanese fighter. I talked to Jimmy Pedro, a friend of yours, somebody who said you were a mentor to him for many years, and he told me a bunch of different questions to ask you, but he said that was a really special time. That was a really special dominant run you had, and especially finishing with an arm bar against a Japanese player. So take me through that. What do you remember from that?
Kg. Actually, can we go there? What was going through your mind? You ended up arm barring a Japanese fighter. I talked to Jimmy Pedro, a friend of yours, somebody who said you were a mentor to him for many years, and he told me a bunch of different questions to ask you, but he said that was a really special time. That was a really special dominant run you had, and especially finishing with an arm bar against a Japanese player. So take me through that. What do you remember from that?
Neil Adams
I think that it was, so my weight was better. I didn’t have to lose weight. That was one thing. So the nutritional side wasn’t as important, but probably it still wasn’t as good as it could be. My nutrition. Although it was getting better and I was trying to eat the right things at the right time, but I still trained really well and I was so confident that going into that world championships that I could win it. I had no doubt in my mind that I was going to win. But obviously the corner of your mind, you’re thinking just don’t make mistakes.
I think that it was, so my weight was better. I didn’t have to lose weight. That was one thing. So the nutritional side wasn’t as important, but probably it still wasn’t as good as it could be. My nutrition. Although it was getting better and I was trying to eat the right things at the right time, but I still trained really well and I was so confident that going into that world championships that I could win it. I had no doubt in my mind that I was going to win. But obviously the corner of your mind, you’re thinking just don’t make mistakes.
But this is the incredible thing, is that once you start to ask you, once I see contests change direction when I’m commentating. So I can see somebody who’s in there just going forward trying to win. And that’s a difference to somebody who’s trying not to lose. And there’s two different ways there. So sometimes when you… When I was world champion then I had a period of time where every time I stepped out there I was really afraid of losing. And I think that that’s what happens later on in your competitive career.
The great champions managed to come through that. Teddy Renair is one of those, he puts it out there and he keeps beating them so they can’t take it away from them. It’s fantastic.
Lex Fridman
So stepping on the mat, every single encounter you’re trying to win, you’re looking for the grips with the intention to throw big, even when you’re ahead on points and all that kind of stuff.
So stepping on the mat, every single encounter you’re trying to win, you’re looking for the grips with the intention to throw big, even when you’re ahead on points and all that kind of stuff.
Neil Adams
That’s a really good point is that if you go ahead in a match and you look at the clock, it depends when you go ahead. So I sometimes…
That’s a really good point is that if you go ahead in a match and you look at the clock, it depends when you go ahead. So I sometimes…
Neil Adams
… match. And you look at the clock, it depends when you go ahead. So sometimes you can go ahead in the first minute, and you’ve still got three minutes to go. So I see the ones then that go into, “I don’t want to lose”, because they go into defensive mode. And then sometimes they can lose it on penalties or something can go wrong, and the other one comes on strong and then they can sneak the contest. And so it’s really difficult. But when I was coaching, I was trying to always encourage that positive attitude for the full four minutes, five minutes then.
… match. And you look at the clock, it depends when you go ahead. So sometimes you can go ahead in the first minute, and you’ve still got three minutes to go. So I see the ones then that go into, “I don’t want to lose”, because they go into defensive mode. And then sometimes they can lose it on penalties or something can go wrong, and the other one comes on strong and then they can sneak the contest. And so it’s really difficult. But when I was coaching, I was trying to always encourage that positive attitude for the full four minutes, five minutes then.
Lex Fridman
I’ve competed a lot in judo and jiu-jitsu. I’ve always hated that part of myself. When I’m up on points by a lot, you look at the clock and it’s what you do when you look at the clock, it’s a minute and a half, you’re really tired and you quit. You just defend. And I hated that part about myself. It’s like that-
I’ve competed a lot in judo and jiu-jitsu. I’ve always hated that part of myself. When I’m up on points by a lot, you look at the clock and it’s what you do when you look at the clock, it’s a minute and a half, you’re really tired and you quit. You just defend. And I hated that part about myself. It’s like that-
Neil Adams
It’s saying don’t do it. Yeah.
It’s saying don’t do it. Yeah.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Well as opposed to, in judo for a big throw, just keep going For the throw. In jiu-jitsu, it’s go for the submission, win in the real way, versus on points. I hated that part of myself. Mostly underneath that is cowardice induced by exhaustion.
Yeah. Well as opposed to, in judo for a big throw, just keep going For the throw. In jiu-jitsu, it’s go for the submission, win in the real way, versus on points. I hated that part of myself. Mostly underneath that is cowardice induced by exhaustion.
Neil Adams
Exhaustion is the one, isn’t it? But it is, isn’t it? It’s a mindset as well. So actually trying to get your mind positive all the way through. So if you listen, when I commentated now is I say I hope that they don’t change the mindset. And they are going forward all the time. And actually they’re then more difficult to catch. We had one just a couple of weeks ago, and he lost in the final second of the contest. He was the only one to score. He got penalized all the way up. Two seconds to go and stepped out of the area. But he went like that, thinking the bell was just going. And the bell went one second after he actually stepped out. So he got penalized, lost the match and lost all of the points for qualification. So that’s paying high price. That’s paying high price.
Exhaustion is the one, isn’t it? But it is, isn’t it? It’s a mindset as well. So actually trying to get your mind positive all the way through. So if you listen, when I commentated now is I say I hope that they don’t change the mindset. And they are going forward all the time. And actually they’re then more difficult to catch. We had one just a couple of weeks ago, and he lost in the final second of the contest. He was the only one to score. He got penalized all the way up. Two seconds to go and stepped out of the area. But he went like that, thinking the bell was just going. And the bell went one second after he actually stepped out. So he got penalized, lost the match and lost all of the points for qualification. So that’s paying high price. That’s paying high price.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. There’s a thin line between triumph and tragedy in those competitions. But especially at the Olympic games. So let’s just stick on ’81 World Championship. What did it feel like to win that world championship. And also getting an arm bar as a Japanese player? Jamie told me your arms were exhausted.
Yeah. There’s a thin line between triumph and tragedy in those competitions. But especially at the Olympic games. So let’s just stick on ’81 World Championship. What did it feel like to win that world championship. And also getting an arm bar as a Japanese player? Jamie told me your arms were exhausted.
Neil Adams
Yeah, the thing is sometimes when it’s competitive as well, hours is a different intensity to jiu-jitsu, where you can take time a little bit. Hours is, bang, it’s transitioning from standing down. You’ve got 10, 15 seconds to go in there. You go in a hundred percent. It’s a bit like running full out for 10 seconds. And then you’ve got to decide then, especially if they’re defending it, whether you let it go. Because when you get up and your forearms are blown, and you’ve got lactic acid in there, and you’ve still got to grip up, because remember ours is about gripping as well on the jacket.
Yeah, the thing is sometimes when it’s competitive as well, hours is a different intensity to jiu-jitsu, where you can take time a little bit. Hours is, bang, it’s transitioning from standing down. You’ve got 10, 15 seconds to go in there. You go in a hundred percent. It’s a bit like running full out for 10 seconds. And then you’ve got to decide then, especially if they’re defending it, whether you let it go. Because when you get up and your forearms are blown, and you’ve got lactic acid in there, and you’ve still got to grip up, because remember ours is about gripping as well on the jacket.
So if you can’t grip up, then you can’t gain the advantage, then they can throw you. So you have to decide. So I had a massive attack on him and we changed directions four or five times, and then I wasn’t going to let him go. But still when I was turning him there, I had to decide am I going to go all out for this? There has been occasions when I’ve released it, just if I’ve got a minute to go and just block out.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Correct. So what you’re saying on the feet, there is a change of direction of all different kinds of attempts and then you went to the ground. Do you remember that decision of like, okay, am I going to finish this?
Yeah. Correct. So what you’re saying on the feet, there is a change of direction of all different kinds of attempts and then you went to the ground. Do you remember that decision of like, okay, am I going to finish this?
Neil Adams
Yeah, I knew it. As soon as I climbed his back and then I thought he’s not going. I’m not going to let him up. So I was just changing-
Yeah, I knew it. As soon as I climbed his back and then I thought he’s not going. I’m not going to let him up. So I was just changing-
Lex Fridman
Little voice in your head.
Little voice in your head.
Neil Adams
Little something in my head was going, “Just stick on him.” And then it’s always about pressure on the arm. And of course he was like that, defending. He was almost total bridge trying to get out of it.
Little something in my head was going, “Just stick on him.” And then it’s always about pressure on the arm. And of course he was like that, defending. He was almost total bridge trying to get out of it.
Lex Fridman
Did it start in turtle and did you flip?
Did it start in turtle and did you flip?
Neil Adams
It started in turtle, because I did an attack, came back out of the attack and then he went on to his front. And then I was on his back. And then I started the whole [inaudible 00:34:41].
It started in turtle, because I did an attack, came back out of the attack and then he went on to his front. And then I was on his back. And then I started the whole [inaudible 00:34:41].
Lex Fridman
Saw the opening. You just went for it?
Saw the opening. You just went for it?
Neil Adams
It was an automatic transition. So the transitions are what we teach, because the ones that are quicker down with the transitions are the ones that catch it. That’s our newaza. Our groundwork is the transition from standing down to ground. We don’t have a situation where you can work your way in. You are in or you not in. You’re standing. So you’ve got to make sure that you’re in. And so I was just on his back like a leech and I never let him go.
It was an automatic transition. So the transitions are what we teach, because the ones that are quicker down with the transitions are the ones that catch it. That’s our newaza. Our groundwork is the transition from standing down to ground. We don’t have a situation where you can work your way in. You are in or you not in. You’re standing. So you’ve got to make sure that you’re in. And so I was just on his back like a leech and I never let him go.
Lex Fridman
So that’s where the arm bars, that’s where the attacks on the ground, which is called newaza, happens is in the transition. At that level, at that high world-class level?
So that’s where the arm bars, that’s where the attacks on the ground, which is called newaza, happens is in the transition. At that level, at that high world-class level?
Neil Adams
Yeah, he was no mug either. I think he just got third place in All Japan Championships, which is all weight categories. So he wasn’t a mug. He was strong. And I’d fought him once before and I knew he was a lefty as well, which was really awkward for me.
Yeah, he was no mug either. I think he just got third place in All Japan Championships, which is all weight categories. So he wasn’t a mug. He was strong. And I’d fought him once before and I knew he was a lefty as well, which was really awkward for me.
Lex Fridman
Did it feel good?
Did it feel good?
Neil Adams
Better for me than him. It did. It felt amazing. Because it was almost like all these things, disappointments and everything had come to this one point where I was at last champion of the world. It’s everything I said as a kid that I had no idea how difficult it was going to be. So as a kid, as a fourteen-year-old kid, I remember saying, “I’m going to be world champion. I’m going to be the best in the world.” I had no idea how difficult that was going to be.
Better for me than him. It did. It felt amazing. Because it was almost like all these things, disappointments and everything had come to this one point where I was at last champion of the world. It’s everything I said as a kid that I had no idea how difficult it was going to be. So as a kid, as a fourteen-year-old kid, I remember saying, “I’m going to be world champion. I’m going to be the best in the world.” I had no idea how difficult that was going to be.
Lex Fridman
Well there’s wisdom to that. There’s power and stupidity of youth.
Well there’s wisdom to that. There’s power and stupidity of youth.
Neil Adams
I like that. It is.
I like that. It is.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Just I’m going to be a world champ. I’m going to win this without knowing how hard it is. And then once you go after it, you’re trapped. You’re going to have to do the work.
Yeah. Just I’m going to be a world champ. I’m going to win this without knowing how hard it is. And then once you go after it, you’re trapped. You’re going to have to do the work.
Neil Adams
Yeah, well you see it a lot with parents as well, don’t you? Parents, “Our little Johnny, he’s amazing. And he’s this, that and the other.” And they have no idea what’s out there. I remember the very first time I stepped out, 1974, into the European cadets. And I remember that we were fighting, I only ever fought in Great Britain. I was unbeaten in the juniors, kids. And went out there and there were these different fighters out there that were treating me with total disdain. And I remember thinking, “How dare they?” And I realized when I came back from that event, there’s other people out there. And there are different levels. Majority of people are just not informed as to what’s out there and the different levels that there are out there.
Yeah, well you see it a lot with parents as well, don’t you? Parents, “Our little Johnny, he’s amazing. And he’s this, that and the other.” And they have no idea what’s out there. I remember the very first time I stepped out, 1974, into the European cadets. And I remember that we were fighting, I only ever fought in Great Britain. I was unbeaten in the juniors, kids. And went out there and there were these different fighters out there that were treating me with total disdain. And I remember thinking, “How dare they?” And I realized when I came back from that event, there’s other people out there. And there are different levels. Majority of people are just not informed as to what’s out there and the different levels that there are out there.
Lex Fridman
Do you remember a certain opponent that for the first time you felt like, “Holy shit.” Somebody just gripped you up and you’re like, “There’s another level to this game.”
Do you remember a certain opponent that for the first time you felt like, “Holy shit.” Somebody just gripped you up and you’re like, “There’s another level to this game.”
Neil Adams
Ezio was one of them. And I fought him and I beat him in the European championships. I beat two times, and then lost him in the Olympic games two months after I’d beaten him in the European championship.
Ezio was one of them. And I fought him and I beat him in the European championships. I beat two times, and then lost him in the Olympic games two months after I’d beaten him in the European championship.
Lex Fridman
Oh wow.
Oh wow.
Neil Adams
Yeah. So that made it even more difficult.
Yeah. So that made it even more difficult.
Lex Fridman
So that’s literally your nemesis there. Wow.
So that’s literally your nemesis there. Wow.
Neil Adams
So that made it more difficult. And so Ezio was one. And I remember getting hold of Nishida of Japan. And he had me going up and down. And I thought, “Wow, this guy is amazing.” And first time I had ever fought Japanese in a major tournament. And I felt the danger. I always talk about the danger when we go out to Japan to train. I could go probably months without getting thrown in training here in Europe. And go to Japan and everybody’s thrown you. And that’s difficult to accept. And the reason that kind of danger and that kind of feeling of danger is something that puts a real edge on. And so that was the first time. When I got hold of Nishida, “I thought, oh my god. This guy.” It didn’t matter which way he was turning, like that you’d be stretched out. And I thought, “I want to do this.” And then I ended up fighting him again in Japan.
So that made it more difficult. And so Ezio was one. And I remember getting hold of Nishida of Japan. And he had me going up and down. And I thought, “Wow, this guy is amazing.” And first time I had ever fought Japanese in a major tournament. And I felt the danger. I always talk about the danger when we go out to Japan to train. I could go probably months without getting thrown in training here in Europe. And go to Japan and everybody’s thrown you. And that’s difficult to accept. And the reason that kind of danger and that kind of feeling of danger is something that puts a real edge on. And so that was the first time. When I got hold of Nishida, “I thought, oh my god. This guy.” It didn’t matter which way he was turning, like that you’d be stretched out. And I thought, “I want to do this.” And then I ended up fighting him again in Japan.
Lex Fridman
So that feeling of danger is really interesting. I’ve did randori with a lot of world-class people from different parts of the world including Ilias Iliadis. And there’s certain parts, like Eastern European judo, you feel like you’re screwed the whole way through. The gripping. You really feel it in the gripping.
So that feeling of danger is really interesting. I’ve did randori with a lot of world-class people from different parts of the world including Ilias Iliadis. And there’s certain parts, like Eastern European judo, you feel like you’re screwed the whole way through. The gripping. You really feel it in the gripping.
Neil Adams
It’s the gripping that does it.
It’s the gripping that does it.
Lex Fridman
But with really good Japanese style, judoka, it’s a terrifying calmness, or at least the experiences that I’ve had. You don’t really feel it in the gripping, you just feel like anywhere you step you’re getting thrown. It’s a different-
But with really good Japanese style, judoka, it’s a terrifying calmness, or at least the experiences that I’ve had. You don’t really feel it in the gripping, you just feel like anywhere you step you’re getting thrown. It’s a different-
Neil Adams
It’s a different thing, isn’t it?
It’s a different thing, isn’t it?
Lex Fridman
It’s a different thing.
It’s a different thing.
Neil Adams
So I mean mine was a mixture. I liked it to be a mixture because the gripping is definitely the key point. So if you get a high level guys that are gripping up, and I always used to put this to the referees when we were doing referee seminars when we first started them. And I’d say, “How many?” Because they would referee to their understanding of the match. So they were penalizing for certain grips that were… So as an ex-athlete, high level I would say, have you ever gripped up with high level? All right, because if you haven’t, you need to do it. Because then you’ll understand why they do certain things with the grips. Because these guys, when somebody grips you and you know you’re going to go. When Iliadis puts his arm over your back, all right. And you know you’re going to go up and over. You know you’re going to go over. That’s it.
So I mean mine was a mixture. I liked it to be a mixture because the gripping is definitely the key point. So if you get a high level guys that are gripping up, and I always used to put this to the referees when we were doing referee seminars when we first started them. And I’d say, “How many?” Because they would referee to their understanding of the match. So they were penalizing for certain grips that were… So as an ex-athlete, high level I would say, have you ever gripped up with high level? All right, because if you haven’t, you need to do it. Because then you’ll understand why they do certain things with the grips. Because these guys, when somebody grips you and you know you’re going to go. When Iliadis puts his arm over your back, all right. And you know you’re going to go up and over. You know you’re going to go over. That’s it.
Lex Fridman
It’s a cool feeling. It’s like whenever-
It’s a cool feeling. It’s like whenever-
Neil Adams
Not for me.
Not for me.
Lex Fridman
I understand. Because it feels way more powerful than it should. It’s weird. I don’t know. You want to attribute it to strength and all that kind of stuff. People say you have immense upper body strength, but it’s probably something else. It’s technique. It’s some kind of weird-
I understand. Because it feels way more powerful than it should. It’s weird. I don’t know. You want to attribute it to strength and all that kind of stuff. People say you have immense upper body strength, but it’s probably something else. It’s technique. It’s some kind of weird-
Neil Adams
It’s mix of everything.
It’s mix of everything.
Lex Fridman
Just something hardened through lots of battles and randori and that kind of stuff. But it’s cool that humans are able to generate that kind of power. It’s cool.
Just something hardened through lots of battles and randori and that kind of stuff. But it’s cool that humans are able to generate that kind of power. It’s cool.
Neil Adams
When I was ’84 Olympics, but I’m just going to go there now just quickly, but we had a freestyle wrestler. He’s American actually, but he had the English nationality. Noel Loban, his name is. And he competed for Great Britain. He got third place at the Olympics in ’84. We were training at Budokai and he was training. He came to do some judo, and put jacket on. And of course he was training with some of the lower levels and he was really handling himself well. When we did randori, so he did some randori with me, and I immediately thought, “I got to catch you. I got to stop single leg and double leg.” Because he was really quick. So strong as well, 90 something kilos. He’s a big guy.
When I was ’84 Olympics, but I’m just going to go there now just quickly, but we had a freestyle wrestler. He’s American actually, but he had the English nationality. Noel Loban, his name is. And he competed for Great Britain. He got third place at the Olympics in ’84. We were training at Budokai and he was training. He came to do some judo, and put jacket on. And of course he was training with some of the lower levels and he was really handling himself well. When we did randori, so he did some randori with me, and I immediately thought, “I got to catch you. I got to stop single leg and double leg.” Because he was really quick. So strong as well, 90 something kilos. He’s a big guy.
I caught his sleeve, immediately caught, and controlled him. And then he couldn’t start. So he said, “I needed to feel the difference.” So then I thought, “I better reciprocate this.” So we did the randori and I throw them a couple of times. He said, “I’m really glad we did that.” So then I said, “I need to feel the difference as well.” So we take the jackets off. So we took the jackets off and he was a nightmare. This guy was a nightmare. And like a monster. He was single legging me. And it was just totally different. So the jacket makes a massive difference. Huge difference to something. And people think it’s just the jacket that we’re wearing, but it isn’t. It’s our only tool actually.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, and it’s a way of establishing control over another body. And it’s a whole art form and a science. And I don’t even know if you understand it really. You understand it subconsciously through time, because there’s so much involved. Because pulling on one part of the jacket pulls other parts of the jacket and the physics of that is probably insane to understand.
Yeah, and it’s a way of establishing control over another body. And it’s a whole art form and a science. And I don’t even know if you understand it really. You understand it subconsciously through time, because there’s so much involved. Because pulling on one part of the jacket pulls other parts of the jacket and the physics of that is probably insane to understand.
Neil Adams
It’s absolutely insane. And then they change the rules for a little while and they changed the rules so that certain grips were not allowed. They only allowed certain amount of time. And there were a lot of penalties from it. And then they had some of the ex-fighters into the referee commission. And so we were pushing for just let them grip. Because that’s our game. That’s what makes us different. So they were on about Teddy Riner. Teddy Riner comes out, takes his sleeve, big arm over the top and then he throws people. So they were saying, “Yeah, but stop…” You can’t stop him doing it. This guy is six foot nine and he is built like Garth. And not only that, he’s skillful as well. And he’s got that mentality of a winner. He has got that mentality of a winner there. He just wins important matches.
It’s absolutely insane. And then they change the rules for a little while and they changed the rules so that certain grips were not allowed. They only allowed certain amount of time. And there were a lot of penalties from it. And then they had some of the ex-fighters into the referee commission. And so we were pushing for just let them grip. Because that’s our game. That’s what makes us different. So they were on about Teddy Riner. Teddy Riner comes out, takes his sleeve, big arm over the top and then he throws people. So they were saying, “Yeah, but stop…” You can’t stop him doing it. This guy is six foot nine and he is built like Garth. And not only that, he’s skillful as well. And he’s got that mentality of a winner. He has got that mentality of a winner there. He just wins important matches.
Lex Fridman
And he goes over the top of the grip. Where’s that land now in terms of rules over the top? Because those are some of the most epic awesome types of grips. Just over the top, just big grab.
And he goes over the top of the grip. Where’s that land now in terms of rules over the top? Because those are some of the most epic awesome types of grips. Just over the top, just big grab.
Neil Adams
Yeah, well as long as they throw from it. So they can take any grip as long as you move them and then catch them, action-reaction really. As long as you catch them on the move, then you can do it.
Yeah, well as long as they throw from it. So they can take any grip as long as you move them and then catch them, action-reaction really. As long as you catch them on the move, then you can do it.
Lex Fridman
So as long as you’re not using it to stall or that kind of stuff.
So as long as you’re not using it to stall or that kind of stuff.
Neil Adams
Yeah, you can’t block out. So for example, if I’ve got a dominant grip on you, and I just block out and I just stop you attacking me. So then what? I get you three penalties, get you off and you haven’t done an attack. So you’ve got to stop that. You can’t have that.
Yeah, you can’t block out. So for example, if I’ve got a dominant grip on you, and I just block out and I just stop you attacking me. So then what? I get you three penalties, get you off and you haven’t done an attack. So you’ve got to stop that. You can’t have that.
1984 Olympics
Lex Fridman
Yeah, definitely. You were the favorite to win the 1984 Olympics, but you got silver. I watched that match several times. You probably have it playing in your head. So there is a nice change of direction by your opponent, German Frank Wieneke.
Yeah, definitely. You were the favorite to win the 1984 Olympics, but you got silver. I watched that match several times. You probably have it playing in your head. So there is a nice change of direction by your opponent, German Frank Wieneke.
Neil Adams
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
It was a fake right uchi mata? And then to a left drops seoi-nage. How did that loss feel?
It was a fake right uchi mata? And then to a left drops seoi-nage. How did that loss feel?
Neil Adams
Devastating is not enough really. Because the strange thing is coming into that Olympics, I was tired. Really tired. So my mental state wasn’t the best. Wasn’t certainly the same as it was coming into the previous. And I remember thinking, “I just need to get this over with, and then I’m going to have a break .and just have a rest.” And that’s totally the wrong attitude. It’s just not good for going into an Olympic games. And so I was coming in there with a different mindset. And I remember every match that I had, I was winning well, but I was winning with a struggle. I’d fought Nowak, of France, who was one of the strongest physically. That was in the quarterfinals.
Devastating is not enough really. Because the strange thing is coming into that Olympics, I was tired. Really tired. So my mental state wasn’t the best. Wasn’t certainly the same as it was coming into the previous. And I remember thinking, “I just need to get this over with, and then I’m going to have a break .and just have a rest.” And that’s totally the wrong attitude. It’s just not good for going into an Olympic games. And so I was coming in there with a different mindset. And I remember every match that I had, I was winning well, but I was winning with a struggle. I’d fought Nowak, of France, who was one of the strongest physically. That was in the quarterfinals.
I beat Brett Barron by an ippon. I armlocked him. I won my first match by ippon as well. And then Michel Nowak, I was fighting, of France. And I was lucky to win it. I was up, I scored on him. But I was starting to defend and just everything that I talked to you about, and then just about held on. And then I won. So him and I were talking some years afterwards and he said, “I was close, wasn’t I?” “Yeah, but not close enough.” I didn’t mean it, but I had to say it.
Lex Fridman
Of course. Of course.
Of course. Of course.
Neil Adams
And no, he was right. And it was one of those. So it’s through to the semi-final. I fought Lescak, and I fought him in the semi-final of the Worlds as well. I’d never gone time with him. I’d always beaten him fairly easily by ippon. And that went time. So I was just glad to get it done. And I was in the final then against Frank Wieneke of Germany. And I’d beaten Wieneke before, but he was just a young German coming through. And when I started the final, and I started all my techniques just that little bit off. Nothing was coordinated. I can’t really explain why it was just a little bit off. I see it so often now with a lot of the guys that are going for second, third Olympic games. And I see their technique just not quite there and they’re struggling. And I know what they’re going through and I empathize with them.
And no, he was right. And it was one of those. So it’s through to the semi-final. I fought Lescak, and I fought him in the semi-final of the Worlds as well. I’d never gone time with him. I’d always beaten him fairly easily by ippon. And that went time. So I was just glad to get it done. And I was in the final then against Frank Wieneke of Germany. And I’d beaten Wieneke before, but he was just a young German coming through. And when I started the final, and I started all my techniques just that little bit off. Nothing was coordinated. I can’t really explain why it was just a little bit off. I see it so often now with a lot of the guys that are going for second, third Olympic games. And I see their technique just not quite there and they’re struggling. And I know what they’re going through and I empathize with them.
Lex Fridman
Well it felt like you were dominating that final.
Well it felt like you were dominating that final.
Neil Adams
I dominated it, yeah. I was winning. And actually if it’d gone another minute and a half, it would’ve been all over and I would’ve been Olympic champion. And it would’ve been done. He wouldn’t have batted an eyelid. Because he would’ve fought me really, really well. And we talked about it afterwards. And he said, “It was just a good day for me.” And he knows. He was very respectful. This guy is very respectful.
I dominated it, yeah. I was winning. And actually if it’d gone another minute and a half, it would’ve been all over and I would’ve been Olympic champion. And it would’ve been done. He wouldn’t have batted an eyelid. Because he would’ve fought me really, really well. And we talked about it afterwards. And he said, “It was just a good day for me.” And he knows. He was very respectful. This guy is very respectful.
Lex Fridman
He was surprised almost. Not almost. He was very surprised and celebrating like a surprise [inaudible 00:49:19].
He was surprised almost. Not almost. He was very surprised and celebrating like a surprise [inaudible 00:49:19].
Neil Adams
Jumping up and down. And you can look at that, can’t you go, well it wasn’t ippon. But would I have got it back? I don’t know. I think that actually taking the pressure off, because that was another thing as well. Pressure of being favorite. And I see that with a lot of them. And the great champions, the ones that keep coming through, Krpalek. There’s a guy. He can look very ordinary and then comes to the big tournament and he’ll win it.
Jumping up and down. And you can look at that, can’t you go, well it wasn’t ippon. But would I have got it back? I don’t know. I think that actually taking the pressure off, because that was another thing as well. Pressure of being favorite. And I see that with a lot of them. And the great champions, the ones that keep coming through, Krpalek. There’s a guy. He can look very ordinary and then comes to the big tournament and he’ll win it.
Lex Fridman
The tragedy of the Olympic games. You were the favorite. And just like that split moment, you lost it.
The tragedy of the Olympic games. You were the favorite. And just like that split moment, you lost it.
Neil Adams
Split moment. Devastating. And lived it, probably not every day, but Niki, my wife will tell you that woken up in sweats. And I think they contributed as well, because I had a period of my life after where I was drinking too much. And I think when I look back, led into that dark period in my life. And I never ever, ever did it go through my mind anything else. But it definitely affected me. And I was on a downward spiral in a lot of different ways.
Split moment. Devastating. And lived it, probably not every day, but Niki, my wife will tell you that woken up in sweats. And I think they contributed as well, because I had a period of my life after where I was drinking too much. And I think when I look back, led into that dark period in my life. And I never ever, ever did it go through my mind anything else. But it definitely affected me. And I was on a downward spiral in a lot of different ways.
And we have an amazing marriage and we have an amazing family, and everything’s great. But I still wake up sometimes and I’ll say, “I’ve just dreamt it.” And it’s the same reoccurring dream where I’m trying to get somewhere and I’m trying to put it right. And I’ve got this chance of putting this Olympic final right. In this dream I’ve got a chance of doing it, but I can’t get there. And the traffic’s stopping me or something stops me. And then I wake up and I’m sweating. And you think, well after all this time that’s not possible. But it is. And it happens.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, in the match itself, there’s that feeling, for me just watching it. You’re going for throws, you’re almost getting there with the throws and it’s almost like he’s going for a crappy uchi mata. And then you’re blocking it. And all of a sudden… That’s the beauty of the Olympics, he finds it in himself to switch, against a favorite, against the great British judoka, just finds the perfect drop seoi-nage.
Yeah, in the match itself, there’s that feeling, for me just watching it. You’re going for throws, you’re almost getting there with the throws and it’s almost like he’s going for a crappy uchi mata. And then you’re blocking it. And all of a sudden… That’s the beauty of the Olympics, he finds it in himself to switch, against a favorite, against the great British judoka, just finds the perfect drop seoi-nage.
Neil Adams
Well his team doctor and coach, he came up to me afterwards and said, “I’m just really sorry.” And that’s all they said is, “I’m just really sorry.” They were sorry because the obvious sadness about that. And I went actually, was it three weeks later? The German open? So he had to compete in the German open three weeks later. So I went over to fight him and beat him in the final of the German open. And it didn’t do anything for me. Because it was a much tighter match. He was a lot closer, he had a lot more confidence coming in. So he fought me a lot differently. And then it was me pulling it back and just managing to win in the final. And I thought, “Well it appeased nothing.” Didn’t do anything.
Well his team doctor and coach, he came up to me afterwards and said, “I’m just really sorry.” And that’s all they said is, “I’m just really sorry.” They were sorry because the obvious sadness about that. And I went actually, was it three weeks later? The German open? So he had to compete in the German open three weeks later. So I went over to fight him and beat him in the final of the German open. And it didn’t do anything for me. Because it was a much tighter match. He was a lot closer, he had a lot more confidence coming in. So he fought me a lot differently. And then it was me pulling it back and just managing to win in the final. And I thought, “Well it appeased nothing.” Didn’t do anything.
Lex Fridman
When you give your whole life to judo and your love of winning, it’s crazy how much the Olympic games mean.
When you give your whole life to judo and your love of winning, it’s crazy how much the Olympic games mean.
Neil Adams
It means so much. And I’ve got to say this, and this is honestly, that if I’d have won that Olympic games and it had to change my life into a different direction, which I probably would’ve not competed in the ’88 Olympic games then, all right, so if it had changed my life and then I didn’t meet my wife, and I didn’t have my family that I’ve got now, I wouldn’t swap what I’ve got now for anything.
It means so much. And I’ve got to say this, and this is honestly, that if I’d have won that Olympic games and it had to change my life into a different direction, which I probably would’ve not competed in the ’88 Olympic games then, all right, so if it had changed my life and then I didn’t meet my wife, and I didn’t have my family that I’ve got now, I wouldn’t swap what I’ve got now for anything.
Lex Fridman
Well, part of the demons that you’ve gotten to know, because of those losses as part of probably the central reason that made you the man you are, a legend of the sport. You could have been not that. Because an gold is just an Olympic gold.
Well, part of the demons that you’ve gotten to know, because of those losses as part of probably the central reason that made you the man you are, a legend of the sport. You could have been not that. Because an gold is just an Olympic gold.
Neil Adams
Yeah. And it is, isn’t it? And I think that there’s a lot of Olympic champions and world champions that win and then are forgotten. And I said to Niki, my wife, I said, “I don’t want to be forgotten and I want to be remembered. So if I’m going to do anything, anything I do, if I’m going to do commentary or whatever it is, coaching, I want to do coaching to a high level. And I want to commentate at a high level.” I remember the first commentary I ever did. It was terrible. And I just thought, “I’ve got to do better than this.” And I thought I need to do it well, and I’ve got to do it professionally.
Yeah. And it is, isn’t it? And I think that there’s a lot of Olympic champions and world champions that win and then are forgotten. And I said to Niki, my wife, I said, “I don’t want to be forgotten and I want to be remembered. So if I’m going to do anything, anything I do, if I’m going to do commentary or whatever it is, coaching, I want to do coaching to a high level. And I want to commentate at a high level.” I remember the first commentary I ever did. It was terrible. And I just thought, “I’ve got to do better than this.” And I thought I need to do it well, and I’ve got to do it professionally.
Lessons from losing
Lex Fridman
In the book A Game of Throws, you have a chapter titled Lessons in Losing. What are some of the lessons here? What are some of the deeper lessons you’ve pulled out of losing?
In the book A Game of Throws, you have a chapter titled Lessons in Losing. What are some of the lessons here? What are some of the deeper lessons you’ve pulled out of losing?
Neil Adams
I think great champions are made up of the people that handle it in the right way. And you could say, “Well, I don’t like losing.” And you could throw your dummy out the pram and you can be a bad loser in front of everybody. And actually people pick up on that very, very quickly. You know what it’s like in broadcasting, right?
I think great champions are made up of the people that handle it in the right way. And you could say, “Well, I don’t like losing.” And you could throw your dummy out the pram and you can be a bad loser in front of everybody. And actually people pick up on that very, very quickly. You know what it’s like in broadcasting, right?
Lex Fridman
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Neil Adams
Somebody Has a bad word to say about somebody, but actually the ones that endear themselves to you are the ones that handle it in the right way, the correct way. It doesn’t mean that you’ve got to like it. I didn’t like it. And I thought that I handled it, certainly in later years, in the right way. And I like to see athletes do it in the right way. And I think it is a make or break situation. It’s not all the contests they win, it’s the one that they lose .and then how they pick themselves up and handle themselves after. So I think that is a big one for me.
Somebody Has a bad word to say about somebody, but actually the ones that endear themselves to you are the ones that handle it in the right way, the correct way. It doesn’t mean that you’ve got to like it. I didn’t like it. And I thought that I handled it, certainly in later years, in the right way. And I like to see athletes do it in the right way. And I think it is a make or break situation. It’s not all the contests they win, it’s the one that they lose .and then how they pick themselves up and handle themselves after. So I think that is a big one for me.
And also I went through obviously a later divorce. And that was difficult on my son, really difficult on Ashley. And then I think that some of that was the fact that I wasn’t drinking all the time, but I was drinking in excess at the wrong times. And I think that that’s what a lot of people do sometimes is that they use it for the wrong reasons. And I used to hear it, I hear it now all the time, and it’s that I need to knock the edge off, and I need to just forget, and you need to be in a fuzzy place for a while. And I had a lot of time in fuzzy place, and I needed to get rid of that. And I needed to clear my head.
Lex Fridman
Where was that place? Some of the lower points in your life that you’ve reached mentally?
Where was that place? Some of the lower points in your life that you’ve reached mentally?
Neil Adams
I think definitely the fact that my first marriage didn’t work. And it’s a mix of things between us. So that’s not where I wanted to be at the time. And the effects that it had on my son, and it took a long time for him then to come round and to trust me again, and to have belief. He always had belief in me, but to trust me again. I think that that was low. And I think that when I look back is that a lot of my bad decisions were when I was in that fuzzy haze. And that it got progressively worse.
I think definitely the fact that my first marriage didn’t work. And it’s a mix of things between us. So that’s not where I wanted to be at the time. And the effects that it had on my son, and it took a long time for him then to come round and to trust me again, and to have belief. He always had belief in me, but to trust me again. I think that that was low. And I think that when I look back is that a lot of my bad decisions were when I was in that fuzzy haze. And that it got progressively worse.
That got progressively worse to the degree where it was trying to hide it, and trying to hide how much. And I was a functioning drunk. I think you could probably say that. And I was functioning, I was still training most days, crazily enough. I was training to mask it and cover it. And that was probably my savior, because I remember I said to my wife, I said to Niki, “If I’m a drunk then I’m the fittest drunk in the world.” She said, “Yeah, you probably are, actually.” I was in great condition for a drunk.
Lex Fridman
So the fuzzy haze, where was your mind? Did you have periods of depression?
So the fuzzy haze, where was your mind? Did you have periods of depression?
Neil Adams
I had periods of depression. I can honestly say that my depression wasn’t that bad, although it’s like anything that gives you an up, it gives you an even bigger down, doesn’t it? And so I hated that feeling. And also hated myself for letting it happen. Because I have got this really, it’s a bizarre, I don’t know whether you can call it a power, but I have the ability to be able to say, “Stop.” And that’s what I did in the end. In the end, there was an incident when I was working for Belgium Judo. And there was an incident, it was Christmas, I tell you exactly the day, it was 20th of December. And me and a Belgian coach, we got absolutely hammered. But we were at the wrong place and he got noticed.
I had periods of depression. I can honestly say that my depression wasn’t that bad, although it’s like anything that gives you an up, it gives you an even bigger down, doesn’t it? And so I hated that feeling. And also hated myself for letting it happen. Because I have got this really, it’s a bizarre, I don’t know whether you can call it a power, but I have the ability to be able to say, “Stop.” And that’s what I did in the end. In the end, there was an incident when I was working for Belgium Judo. And there was an incident, it was Christmas, I tell you exactly the day, it was 20th of December. And me and a Belgian coach, we got absolutely hammered. But we were at the wrong place and he got noticed.
And so I remember they pulled me up in front of this board. And I looked down at these guys and half of them were people I didn’t want to be in that situation with. They’re not people that I respected and they’re not people that I trusted. So I said, “If you’re going to sack me, sack me. But I’ll promise you now that this is it. I’ll stop. I’m just going to stop. I’ve decided.” On the way back in the car I rang Niki up, my wife, and I said, “Whatever you hear…
Neil Adams
I rang Nikki up, my wife, and I said, “Whatever you hear now, whatever, I’m just going to stop.” That was it, stopped.
I rang Nikki up, my wife, and I said, “Whatever you hear now, whatever, I’m just going to stop.” That was it, stopped.
Lex Fridman
You just saw the moment and said, “Stop.”
You just saw the moment and said, “Stop.”
Neil Adams
Stop.
Stop.
Lex Fridman
So that fuzzy place, what advice could you give to people about how to overcome that dark place, the depression, whether it has to do with drinking or not.
So that fuzzy place, what advice could you give to people about how to overcome that dark place, the depression, whether it has to do with drinking or not.
Neil Adams
I think if it’s to do with drinking, all I can say is that the two days or a week into not drinking, you’ll feel different. It’ll make a physical difference and you’ll like that physical difference. And then from a mental perspective as well, because I think that you have a massive downer. And I think that that must be because of drugs as well because I had a situation with my brother, he was professional wrestling and the drugs was an element there. So I’d never touched a drug or even seen one in my life. But I’d let the alcohol side go too far and then decided never to do that. So then I guess I had people ringing me up saying, “How can we stop?” When they say, “Can I have a word? Can I discuss something with you?” And I know then what they want to discuss with me. And the thing is that I would say, if you stop, then feel the effects of it and it will make a difference to your everyday life. And that will make a massive difference.
I think if it’s to do with drinking, all I can say is that the two days or a week into not drinking, you’ll feel different. It’ll make a physical difference and you’ll like that physical difference. And then from a mental perspective as well, because I think that you have a massive downer. And I think that that must be because of drugs as well because I had a situation with my brother, he was professional wrestling and the drugs was an element there. So I’d never touched a drug or even seen one in my life. But I’d let the alcohol side go too far and then decided never to do that. So then I guess I had people ringing me up saying, “How can we stop?” When they say, “Can I have a word? Can I discuss something with you?” And I know then what they want to discuss with me. And the thing is that I would say, if you stop, then feel the effects of it and it will make a difference to your everyday life. And that will make a massive difference.
And I think about anybody who is down all the time is to find the cause of what’s pushing you down. You know what I mean? And try and attack that. Somebody once said to me, they said, “Whatever you got, we’ve got something special.” We have a great life and I’ve had a great competition record. It could have been better, but it was great. But I’ve had success with my business and we’re still out there and we have great life. We travel all the world. There’s people out there that would live in your house at the drop of a hat, wherever you are. They drive your car no matter what car it is. Some people haven’t got a car. And whatever food you’re having and you’re moaning about food, somebody out there that would take that and gladly eat that. All right? So there’s always somebody worse off than you. And I think that we tend to sometimes look at the things that we haven’t got rather than the things we have got.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, it’s a skill probably just to be grateful for the things you have. Exactly as you said. Sometimes the little things like food and cars and all that kind of stuff, just to have gratitude for. And family, all this kind of stuff. But it’s still, having talked to a bunch of Olympic athletes, when you give so much of your life to winning and then you lose, sometimes even when you win. But when you lose, at the very top, it’s a tough, tough, tough thing to go through.
Yeah, it’s a skill probably just to be grateful for the things you have. Exactly as you said. Sometimes the little things like food and cars and all that kind of stuff, just to have gratitude for. And family, all this kind of stuff. But it’s still, having talked to a bunch of Olympic athletes, when you give so much of your life to winning and then you lose, sometimes even when you win. But when you lose, at the very top, it’s a tough, tough, tough thing to go through.
Neil Adams
The most difficult thing I think for anybody is when they have to decide when to stop.
The most difficult thing I think for anybody is when they have to decide when to stop.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
Neil Adams
All of a sudden, and I see the ones that are going second Olympic games and then third Olympic and the ones that are there and they’re holding on and they’re in their 30s now, different to when they were 19 years of age, thirty-something is different to 19. What are you going to do afterwards? And then how do you become just a normal person? You’re never going to be a normal person, as such. But I think you’ve got to do normal things. I remember the first time that when I finished competition, I had good sponsors. This was 40 years ago, but I had two really good sponsorships, vitamin company and also a judogi company. And I had a car. Do you know, I had money. And I was going all over the world. I was successful. And then I stopped. And they took everything back. They took my car and they did it within two weeks as well. They stopped my funding. And the vitamin company said, “Thank you very much. It’s been a great. We’ve done well by you. Bye-bye.”
All of a sudden, and I see the ones that are going second Olympic games and then third Olympic and the ones that are there and they’re holding on and they’re in their 30s now, different to when they were 19 years of age, thirty-something is different to 19. What are you going to do afterwards? And then how do you become just a normal person? You’re never going to be a normal person, as such. But I think you’ve got to do normal things. I remember the first time that when I finished competition, I had good sponsors. This was 40 years ago, but I had two really good sponsorships, vitamin company and also a judogi company. And I had a car. Do you know, I had money. And I was going all over the world. I was successful. And then I stopped. And they took everything back. They took my car and they did it within two weeks as well. They stopped my funding. And the vitamin company said, “Thank you very much. It’s been a great. We’ve done well by you. Bye-bye.”
Lex Fridman
This was after your last Olympics?
This was after your last Olympics?
Neil Adams
’88 Olympics.
’88 Olympics.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, in ’88.
Yeah, in ’88.
Neil Adams
When that finished and then that was it. And then it’s right, okay. First time I had to go in there and buy a tracksuit and a pair of training shoes. Wow.
When that finished and then that was it. And then it’s right, okay. First time I had to go in there and buy a tracksuit and a pair of training shoes. Wow.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, those are difficult, sitting there in the evening by yourself.
Yeah, those are difficult, sitting there in the evening by yourself.
Neil Adams
So you go from seven days a week or six days a week going into the gym and you’re working out the dojo and then you don’t have to do it. And that’s why you get a lot of, when they finish competition, they finish that 30 to 40. Ilias is still doing it now. He’s still in there and he still, because he can, right? And it’s natural. And I did exactly the same. And then, like I say, you just get to an age and you just think, well, I just going to take a step back,
So you go from seven days a week or six days a week going into the gym and you’re working out the dojo and then you don’t have to do it. And that’s why you get a lot of, when they finish competition, they finish that 30 to 40. Ilias is still doing it now. He’s still in there and he still, because he can, right? And it’s natural. And I did exactly the same. And then, like I say, you just get to an age and you just think, well, I just going to take a step back,
Lex Fridman
Which is why there’s certain athletes like Ryoko Tani never stops. It just dominates for 14 years, probably one of the winning-est athletes in Judo. Seven-time world champ, two-time Olympic champ, medaled at five Olympics. So it’s always impressive when you…
Which is why there’s certain athletes like Ryoko Tani never stops. It just dominates for 14 years, probably one of the winning-est athletes in Judo. Seven-time world champ, two-time Olympic champ, medaled at five Olympics. So it’s always impressive when you…
Neil Adams
Never stopped.
Never stopped.
Lex Fridman
Never stopped. So that’s an option if you’re the greatest ever.
Never stopped. So that’s an option if you’re the greatest ever.
Neil Adams
It’d be interesting, wouldn’t it, just to see what they’re doing now. Because at some stage you have to get a normal…
It’d be interesting, wouldn’t it, just to see what they’re doing now. Because at some stage you have to get a normal…
Lex Fridman
You do have to stop.
You do have to stop.
Neil Adams
You have to stop at some stage. You have to decide what you’re going to do. It’s either into coaching, the Judo is either to coaching or if you’re not in coaching, then it’s into something to do with the media. And I was lucky that it was just by accident really with the commentary. Somebody said, “Would you do a voiceover?” So I did this voiceover and that was back in 1982, I did that.
You have to stop at some stage. You have to decide what you’re going to do. It’s either into coaching, the Judo is either to coaching or if you’re not in coaching, then it’s into something to do with the media. And I was lucky that it was just by accident really with the commentary. Somebody said, “Would you do a voiceover?” So I did this voiceover and that was back in 1982, I did that.
Lex Fridman
So you’ve been commentating since 1982.
So you’ve been commentating since 1982.
Neil Adams
I did some voiceovers, I wouldn’t call it commentating, but I did some voiceovers. We did some different European championships, world championship events. And I did the voiceovers for it. The way that it was done that it was more narration. And so it turned into, then somebody asked me to do an event and when you listen to the intonation of the voice and stuff like that, it wasn’t like it is now. I guess that’s just something that developed, because then it was coming from the heart. I started to get excited and just do my thing. And it was just me really. It’s just my style.
I did some voiceovers, I wouldn’t call it commentating, but I did some voiceovers. We did some different European championships, world championship events. And I did the voiceovers for it. The way that it was done that it was more narration. And so it turned into, then somebody asked me to do an event and when you listen to the intonation of the voice and stuff like that, it wasn’t like it is now. I guess that’s just something that developed, because then it was coming from the heart. I started to get excited and just do my thing. And it was just me really. It’s just my style.
Lex Fridman
Well, I’ve listened to your commentary from a while back. I don’t know if it’s the ’80s, but it’s still there.
Well, I’ve listened to your commentary from a while back. I don’t know if it’s the ’80s, but it’s still there.
Neil Adams
I think it’s timing as well, isn’t it? It’s like you get your timing a bit better and know when to go in, when to come out, when to say something, when not. I think that in the early days I tended to want to talk all the time and you don’t have to do that.
I think it’s timing as well, isn’t it? It’s like you get your timing a bit better and know when to go in, when to come out, when to say something, when not. I think that in the early days I tended to want to talk all the time and you don’t have to do that.
Lex Fridman
So knowing when to shut up.
So knowing when to shut up.
Neil Adams
That’s the key, isn’t it?
That’s the key, isn’t it?
Lex Fridman
Yeah, part of the drama is in the silence, building up to the setup and the throw and all that kind of stuff. But also you’re very good at, while radiating passion, being very precise and specific about the details of the throw and the setup and why something worked and didn’t.
Yeah, part of the drama is in the silence, building up to the setup and the throw and all that kind of stuff. But also you’re very good at, while radiating passion, being very precise and specific about the details of the throw and the setup and why something worked and didn’t.
Neil Adams
I think there’s two kinds of commentating. You can commentate what you see and then you commentate what people can’t see. And so if you’ve got somebody that is not really understanding of what’s happening in the inner part of the game, so it might be a technical thing or it might be the tactical part of the play here that’s going on. And if you can introduce that, as well, then you’ve got an advantage.
I think there’s two kinds of commentating. You can commentate what you see and then you commentate what people can’t see. And so if you’ve got somebody that is not really understanding of what’s happening in the inner part of the game, so it might be a technical thing or it might be the tactical part of the play here that’s going on. And if you can introduce that, as well, then you’ve got an advantage.
Lex Fridman
Quick pause. I need a bathroom break.=
Quick pause. I need a bathroom break.=
Neil Adams
Okay. Good stuff.
Okay. Good stuff.
Lex Fridman
So we just took a little break and went to Judotv.com, which is, I guess, an IGF website. IGF is the organization behind a lot of the big judo events in the world. And I just signed up, you should sign up, too. It’s great.
So we just took a little break and went to Judotv.com, which is, I guess, an IGF website. IGF is the organization behind a lot of the big judo events in the world. And I just signed up, you should sign up, too. It’s great.
Neil Adams
Absolutely, sign up. Cheaper the price, cheaper the price.
Absolutely, sign up. Cheaper the price, cheaper the price.
Lex Fridman
And you can watch basically any match from the Grand Slams and going back through history, I guess.
And you can watch basically any match from the Grand Slams and going back through history, I guess.
Neil Adams
Yeah, I’ve got to say Lex, I mean everybody. Still people saying to me, “We need more judo on television.” They’ve got judo on television every other week that they can access. All of the top people in all the top events and it costs $100 a year to access everything. And they can play all the videos. I mean we’ve just accessed this here, the Paris tournament, and we’re going to have a look at Teddy Riner. It’s cheap at the price.
Yeah, I’ve got to say Lex, I mean everybody. Still people saying to me, “We need more judo on television.” They’ve got judo on television every other week that they can access. All of the top people in all the top events and it costs $100 a year to access everything. And they can play all the videos. I mean we’ve just accessed this here, the Paris tournament, and we’re going to have a look at Teddy Riner. It’s cheap at the price.
Lex Fridman
We’re now in Paris Grand Slam 2024. Teddy Riner final. By the way, super cool. You click on the draw. You can just look at any of the matches. You can go at the bottom of the finals, you can go…
We’re now in Paris Grand Slam 2024. Teddy Riner final. By the way, super cool. You click on the draw. You can just look at any of the matches. You can go at the bottom of the finals, you can go…
Neil Adams
To anyone.
To anyone.
Teddy Riner
Lex Fridman
Any one of them. That’s so cool. That’s really well done. Really well done interface. Anyway, let me first ask the ridiculous big question. Who do you think is the greatest of all time? Is Teddy Riner in the running?
Any one of them. That’s so cool. That’s really well done. Really well done interface. Anyway, let me first ask the ridiculous big question. Who do you think is the greatest of all time? Is Teddy Riner in the running?
Neil Adams
He’s the greatest judo winner of all time. Of that, there’s no doubt. I think if you asked him whether he was the greatest judo man in the world of all time, he would say, “No, I’m not.” And he’s not the greatest judo man. There are people with more beautiful judo in some ways, although he’s got great technique. But he is the ultimate winner.
He’s the greatest judo winner of all time. Of that, there’s no doubt. I think if you asked him whether he was the greatest judo man in the world of all time, he would say, “No, I’m not.” And he’s not the greatest judo man. There are people with more beautiful judo in some ways, although he’s got great technique. But he is the ultimate winner.
Lex Fridman
10-time world champ, two-time gold medalist in the Olympics. I guess two-time bronze medalist. He’s going to Paris?
10-time world champ, two-time gold medalist in the Olympics. I guess two-time bronze medalist. He’s going to Paris?
Neil Adams
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
He’s going after it again. So he’s right here.
He’s going after it again. So he’s right here.
Neil Adams
He’s right there. This is just a couple of months ago. And then last week, last week he was out again and he won again.
He’s right there. This is just a couple of months ago. And then last week, last week he was out again and he won again.
Lex Fridman
You think he gets gold medal this time?
You think he gets gold medal this time?
Neil Adams
There’s people getting closer to him, right? He’s, obviously, age-wise and the amount of time that he’s been there, he’s obviously somebody that he’s starting not quite at his best as he was when he was younger. But like I say, he still puts it on the line. He lays it on the line every single time. And then not only does he lay it on the line, but he beats them all. And last week he just beat Saito who was a young up-and-coming Japanese fighter and he beat him in the final. It was close and he did well. There are certain people, the smaller ones, actually, not the taller ones because, like we were saying about the big arm over the top that he likes and the dominant grip that he likes, there are people that can give him a hard time. Now if at the Olympic Games he has two or three of those on the trot, it might work against him.
There’s people getting closer to him, right? He’s, obviously, age-wise and the amount of time that he’s been there, he’s obviously somebody that he’s starting not quite at his best as he was when he was younger. But like I say, he still puts it on the line. He lays it on the line every single time. And then not only does he lay it on the line, but he beats them all. And last week he just beat Saito who was a young up-and-coming Japanese fighter and he beat him in the final. It was close and he did well. There are certain people, the smaller ones, actually, not the taller ones because, like we were saying about the big arm over the top that he likes and the dominant grip that he likes, there are people that can give him a hard time. Now if at the Olympic Games he has two or three of those on the trot, it might work against him.
It’s by no means an absolute certainty that he’s going to win the Olympic gold medal. But he’s got to be one of the favorites, top favorite. No matter what happens now, Teddy Riner is the greatest winner, and if you asked the great Yamashita, he would say the same. There’s nobody that’s, and Yamashita was unbeaten in international competition. I trained with Yamashita a lot over a two-year period and got to know him quite well. And he was one of the greatest of all times. For me, he was one of the greatest Judo men. I’m talking about from a technical point of view, from a spectacular judo point of view, understanding the fundamental principles of how techniques work. Sometimes having different techniques that work for you. So if one doesn’t work and one particular direction doesn’t work, you can change the direction completely.
Lex Fridman
In case people don’t know, Yamashita has this legendary judoka heavyweight. Teddy Riner heavyweight, that’s plus 100 kg.
In case people don’t know, Yamashita has this legendary judoka heavyweight. Teddy Riner heavyweight, that’s plus 100 kg.
Neil Adams
He would’ve caused him all sorts of problems.
He would’ve caused him all sorts of problems.
Lex Fridman
Oh yeah, that’s cool. Who do you think wins? Yamashita?
Oh yeah, that’s cool. Who do you think wins? Yamashita?
Neil Adams
Yes, I think Yamashita.
Yes, I think Yamashita.
Lex Fridman
Whoa, whoa, whoa. You think Yamashita beats Teddy Riner?
Whoa, whoa, whoa. You think Yamashita beats Teddy Riner?
Neil Adams
I think so.
I think so.
Lex Fridman
Strong words. You think so. You think so. Yamashita is on the shorter side, right?
Strong words. You think so. You think so. Yamashita is on the shorter side, right?
Neil Adams
Yeah, and he finds it more difficult with shorter people. It would’ve been a very interesting confrontation. And I think if you asked Yamashita, he would probably say that Teddy Riner, he’s very gracious. He’s really gracious. It would be really good. It would’ve been an unbelievable matchup. And I’ve got to say this, that Teddy Riner is the greatest winner of all time.
Yeah, and he finds it more difficult with shorter people. It would’ve been a very interesting confrontation. And I think if you asked Yamashita, he would probably say that Teddy Riner, he’s very gracious. He’s really gracious. It would be really good. It would’ve been an unbelievable matchup. And I’ve got to say this, that Teddy Riner is the greatest winner of all time.
Lex Fridman
Competition wise. It’s interesting. Both of them, maybe you can correct me, but have this Osoto Gari, which is kind of trip that I never understood.
Competition wise. It’s interesting. Both of them, maybe you can correct me, but have this Osoto Gari, which is kind of trip that I never understood.
Neil Adams
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
It is a very tricky thing to do, right? It’s very easy to do maybe as a white belt. You roll in. You can understand. But to do it at the high, high, high level?
It is a very tricky thing to do, right? It’s very easy to do maybe as a white belt. You roll in. You can understand. But to do it at the high, high, high level?
Neil Adams
You see any of the top guys now, especially if they’re second time out. So they might catch somebody by surprise. They come out and they go, bang. And you go, “That was amazing.” But if they fought again 10 minutes later, you go, “You’re not going to catch me with that.” You’ve got a different situation here. And so it’s slightly different. But the best fighters adapt like that. And they’re able to see a situation, feel the situation, and they attack once and then go again and attack second, third time. And in the third time they make it work>
You see any of the top guys now, especially if they’re second time out. So they might catch somebody by surprise. They come out and they go, bang. And you go, “That was amazing.” But if they fought again 10 minutes later, you go, “You’re not going to catch me with that.” You’ve got a different situation here. And so it’s slightly different. But the best fighters adapt like that. And they’re able to see a situation, feel the situation, and they attack once and then go again and attack second, third time. And in the third time they make it work>
Lex Fridman
Both Yamashita and Teddy Riner with the Osoto Gari, they’ll just hit it over and over in the match.
Both Yamashita and Teddy Riner with the Osoto Gari, they’ll just hit it over and over in the match.
Neil Adams
Yeah, sometimes it’ll hit first time and it won’t go. And then you make a readjustment of the way in. It’s a little bit like, I mean, if you take a really easy way of understanding it is that if we’re shooting at a target and all of a sudden you start moving that target, it’s different hitting a moving target. But it’s also different hitting a moving target that’s trying to hit you as well. And that’s our game. So we are not only trying to throw a moving target, we’re trying to throw a moving target that’s trying to throw us. So it makes it even more difficult.
Yeah, sometimes it’ll hit first time and it won’t go. And then you make a readjustment of the way in. It’s a little bit like, I mean, if you take a really easy way of understanding it is that if we’re shooting at a target and all of a sudden you start moving that target, it’s different hitting a moving target. But it’s also different hitting a moving target that’s trying to hit you as well. And that’s our game. So we are not only trying to throw a moving target, we’re trying to throw a moving target that’s trying to throw us. So it makes it even more difficult.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, there’s a few folks who, you know what’s coming. It’s over and over and over it’s the same attack. Anyway, with this uchi mata it’s different. It’s different. There’s not many people like that where it’s the same attack. I mean there’s other attacks also, but they’ll just go after the same thing over and over and over.
Yeah, there’s a few folks who, you know what’s coming. It’s over and over and over it’s the same attack. Anyway, with this uchi mata it’s different. It’s different. There’s not many people like that where it’s the same attack. I mean there’s other attacks also, but they’ll just go after the same thing over and over and over.
Neil Adams
When I watch great athletes, most of them can throw over both flanks, not always going left and right, though our sport always, the cat are always demonstrated left and right. If you demonstrate, if you do something on one side, then can you demonstrate it on the other side? Right? Okay. So can you do it equally? No, but you’ll do it differently on the other side. So when I’m teaching, I don’t teach left and right. If I was teaching you to do a technique, first thing I’d do is say, “I need you to take the sleeve under lapel.” All right?
When I watch great athletes, most of them can throw over both flanks, not always going left and right, though our sport always, the cat are always demonstrated left and right. If you demonstrate, if you do something on one side, then can you demonstrate it on the other side? Right? Okay. So can you do it equally? No, but you’ll do it differently on the other side. So when I’m teaching, I don’t teach left and right. If I was teaching you to do a technique, first thing I’d do is say, “I need you to take the sleeve under lapel.” All right?
So I’d let you decide what was left and right. Okay? Because often what happens is we impart on people whether they’re going to be left or right when we start teaching. You get a lot of teachers do that all. And they’ll say, immediately, “What do you write with? Left or right hand?” And it’s no indicator actually as to how we do judo because I’m left-handed and I do more predominantly right-handed because I lead off my strongest hand. And actually most people do. So actually left and right is a bit of a trap sometimes when we’re teaching. Better to get, because we can go… My point was, is that a lot of people can go both flanks, so they’ll do something over this side and something over this side.
Lex Fridman
But anyway, he was one-sided?
But anyway, he was one-sided?
Neil Adams
He was one-sided, but he could switch it. So he had a seoi nage as well on the other side so he could switch it if he had to.
He was one-sided, but he could switch it. So he had a seoi nage as well on the other side so he could switch it if he had to.
Lex Fridman
Interesting. And by the way, your opponent in ’84, was he righty or lefty?
Interesting. And by the way, your opponent in ’84, was he righty or lefty?
Neil Adams
He was a righty.
He was a righty.
Lex Fridman
So that drop left seoi, where did that come from?
So that drop left seoi, where did that come from?
Neil Adams
Well, I mean again, he could have probably in other contests, he’d hit me with it several times and I’ve just stopped it. Just at the wrong place at the right time for him. Right place in the wrong time for me. Right?
Well, I mean again, he could have probably in other contests, he’d hit me with it several times and I’ve just stopped it. Just at the wrong place at the right time for him. Right place in the wrong time for me. Right?
Lex Fridman
That’s life. Yeah.
That’s life. Yeah.
Neil Adams
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
All right, let’s watch some Teddy Riner.
All right, let’s watch some Teddy Riner.
Neil Adams
This is final of Paris tournament. And this is against the Korean. The Korean had had a great day, actually.
This is final of Paris tournament. And this is against the Korean. The Korean had had a great day, actually.
Lex Fridman
Again, shorter.
Again, shorter.
Neil Adams
Again, shorter. So he does find that difficult. Have a look at Teddy Riner. Teddy Riner will try and catch the sleeve. He’s after the sleeve and then the right arm over the top. That’s the key point for Teddy Riner. And of course, what he has done, if he can’t always catch the big Osoto Gari over, his right-hand side, he’s been doing something to the opposite side.
Again, shorter. So he does find that difficult. Have a look at Teddy Riner. Teddy Riner will try and catch the sleeve. He’s after the sleeve and then the right arm over the top. That’s the key point for Teddy Riner. And of course, what he has done, if he can’t always catch the big Osoto Gari over, his right-hand side, he’s been doing something to the opposite side.
Lex Fridman
The Korean just went for a drop sail and Teddy Riner blocked with the hips.
The Korean just went for a drop sail and Teddy Riner blocked with the hips.
Neil Adams
A big boy has difficulty always against somebody smaller dropping with the seoi nages.
A big boy has difficulty always against somebody smaller dropping with the seoi nages.
Lex Fridman
Has Teddy Riner ever been thrown for ippon?
Has Teddy Riner ever been thrown for ippon?
Neil Adams
I’ve never seen his thrown ippon, but he was thrown last week for a nice technique and he’s being caught more and more.
I’ve never seen his thrown ippon, but he was thrown last week for a nice technique and he’s being caught more and more.
Lex Fridman
So it’s getting close.
So it’s getting close.
Neil Adams
And Tasoev, in the final of the world championships, they had a strange situation there where Tasoev was a technique down and then pulled off a counter. And they didn’t count it, but then they overruled it. Unfortunately, I was commentating at the time and I went for a score for Tasoev. Anyway, they overruled it and then they awarded a second gold medal to Tasoev.
And Tasoev, in the final of the world championships, they had a strange situation there where Tasoev was a technique down and then pulled off a counter. And they didn’t count it, but then they overruled it. Unfortunately, I was commentating at the time and I went for a score for Tasoev. Anyway, they overruled it and then they awarded a second gold medal to Tasoev.
Lex Fridman
What can you say about Tamerlan Bashaev who also gave him trouble?
What can you say about Tamerlan Bashaev who also gave him trouble?
Neil Adams
Yeah, Bashaev and Tasoev are the two that could possibly go to the Olympics. That was a close one there from Riner, that was closest that he’d actually been there.
Yeah, Bashaev and Tasoev are the two that could possibly go to the Olympics. That was a close one there from Riner, that was closest that he’d actually been there.
Lex Fridman
Oh, wow.
Oh, wow.
Neil Adams
Didn’t have the sleeve and he relies on the sleeve, greatly. Big support there in the French, in the crowd.
Didn’t have the sleeve and he relies on the sleeve, greatly. Big support there in the French, in the crowd.
Lex Fridman
And also maybe can you explain the penalties for stalling?
And also maybe can you explain the penalties for stalling?
Neil Adams
Yeah, so if they don’t attack, if they’ve got a grip and they’ve got sleeve, lapel, or they’ve got two hands on. If they’re too passive and they don’t attack. If they’ve got dominant sleeve grip, they don’t attack. That was quite close as well from the Koreans. So the Korean here, you can see, is having a real go. The penalties will come if they don’t attack at the right time. Step outside the yellow area, they’ll get penalized as well.
Yeah, so if they don’t attack, if they’ve got a grip and they’ve got sleeve, lapel, or they’ve got two hands on. If they’re too passive and they don’t attack. If they’ve got dominant sleeve grip, they don’t attack. That was quite close as well from the Koreans. So the Korean here, you can see, is having a real go. The penalties will come if they don’t attack at the right time. Step outside the yellow area, they’ll get penalized as well.
Lex Fridman
That’s dedication for…
That’s dedication for…
Neil Adams
Absolutely. I mean it was really close, wasn’t it? They nice little kouchi gari there from the Korean. And if they touch below the belt line with the arms, they’re not allowed to grab the legs. They’ve stopped grabbing the legs.
Absolutely. I mean it was really close, wasn’t it? They nice little kouchi gari there from the Korean. And if they touch below the belt line with the arms, they’re not allowed to grab the legs. They’ve stopped grabbing the legs.
Lex Fridman
Wow. The Koreans really going.
Wow. The Koreans really going.
Neil Adams
The Koreans having a real good go at it.
The Koreans having a real good go at it.
Lex Fridman
I guess every single person in that division is probably training for Teddy Riner, right?
I guess every single person in that division is probably training for Teddy Riner, right?
Neil Adams
You think that Teddy Riner has been there a long time and he’s got another guy here in the final of the Paris tournament. He’s got 18,000 people watching him. They’re all on Teddy Riner’s side. They want him to win. And the Korean’s out there on his own with his coach.
You think that Teddy Riner has been there a long time and he’s got another guy here in the final of the Paris tournament. He’s got 18,000 people watching him. They’re all on Teddy Riner’s side. They want him to win. And the Korean’s out there on his own with his coach.
Lex Fridman
But also the pressure on Teddy Riner.
But also the pressure on Teddy Riner.
Neil Adams
Amazing pressure. We interviewed him after this and he said, “I’ve got pressure. People go, well, is he going to do it at the Olympic Games? Can I do it in Paris?” He wanted to go to Paris. I mean really, the last Olympic Games should have been it, shouldn’t it? The last should have been the final one. But he’s gone, “No, I’ve got to do another four years.” Two penalties are on the board already for the Korean. That Korean is really having a great go on Teddy Riner.
Amazing pressure. We interviewed him after this and he said, “I’ve got pressure. People go, well, is he going to do it at the Olympic Games? Can I do it in Paris?” He wanted to go to Paris. I mean really, the last Olympic Games should have been it, shouldn’t it? The last should have been the final one. But he’s gone, “No, I’ve got to do another four years.” Two penalties are on the board already for the Korean. That Korean is really having a great go on Teddy Riner.
Lex Fridman
He’s got a bit of a lift on him. He’s going after it.
He’s got a bit of a lift on him. He’s going after it.
Neil Adams
He’s really going after it. It’s an amazing effort there from the Korean. And he’s getting some last minute information. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen his coach, stood next to him like that. But it’s amazing. He’s six foot six and he’s about four foot six. He’s a real pitch.
He’s really going after it. It’s an amazing effort there from the Korean. And he’s getting some last minute information. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen his coach, stood next to him like that. But it’s amazing. He’s six foot six and he’s about four foot six. He’s a real pitch.
Lex Fridman
Full of passion. I love it. He’s screaming.
Full of passion. I love it. He’s screaming.
Neil Adams
Golden score.
Golden score.
Lex Fridman
How does golden score work? Can you say?
How does golden score work? Can you say?
Neil Adams
So the golden score, if it goes without any point on the board from a throw or a hold down or arm lock strangle, then it goes into golden score. So two shidos on the board a piece, one more mistake now and it’s going to be all over. And that’s it.
So the golden score, if it goes without any point on the board from a throw or a hold down or arm lock strangle, then it goes into golden score. So two shidos on the board a piece, one more mistake now and it’s going to be all over. And that’s it.
Teddy Riner just manages to turn it on the Korean. And that went really against the run of play, didn’t it? The Korean did better. But Teddy Riner is a winner. And he says, “Right, okay, let’s have more cheering.”
Lex Fridman
Finds a way to score in the…
Finds a way to score in the…
Neil Adams
And I have to say, that even when he loses, he’s always graceful. He doesn’t like it, but he’s graceful.
And I have to say, that even when he loses, he’s always graceful. He doesn’t like it, but he’s graceful.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, there was so much love there. Celebration. It’s great. It’s great to see. It’s great that he’s doing it again, going after it. Chasing the gold medal again.
Yeah, there was so much love there. Celebration. It’s great. It’s great to see. It’s great that he’s doing it again, going after it. Chasing the gold medal again.
Neil Adams
Well, he’s chasing the gold medal. It’s going to be in Paris, which is going to be even more fantastic. He’s already the greatest. You said, “What has he got to do to be the greatest?” He’s already the greatest competitor Judo’s ever known. And that was even with the great Tani. Tani was amazing, as well.
Well, he’s chasing the gold medal. It’s going to be in Paris, which is going to be even more fantastic. He’s already the greatest. You said, “What has he got to do to be the greatest?” He’s already the greatest competitor Judo’s ever known. And that was even with the great Tani. Tani was amazing, as well.
Lex Fridman
Are you part of the commentating team for Paris?
Are you part of the commentating team for Paris?
Neil Adams
I’m part of the commentating team, but it won’t be for IJF because it’s independent broadcast.
I’m part of the commentating team, but it won’t be for IJF because it’s independent broadcast.
Lex Fridman
Have you ever had an athlete come up to you and ask, “Why’d you say that?” Or disagree with your commentary?
Have you ever had an athlete come up to you and ask, “Why’d you say that?” Or disagree with your commentary?
Neil Adams
I’ve got to say that 99.9% of everybody is so grateful that I’ve commentated their fights all the way through. They know if they’ve messed up. So if I say something and I’m never disparaging, really disparaging, but what I will say is, “It was a great throw by the other guy. Or it was a great match.” And if they made a mistake, so if they walk out, they know that I will say something that will mean something. Nobody really moans about it. I try and talk the truth, if I can.
I’ve got to say that 99.9% of everybody is so grateful that I’ve commentated their fights all the way through. They know if they’ve messed up. So if I say something and I’m never disparaging, really disparaging, but what I will say is, “It was a great throw by the other guy. Or it was a great match.” And if they made a mistake, so if they walk out, they know that I will say something that will mean something. Nobody really moans about it. I try and talk the truth, if I can.
Lex Fridman
So who else would you consider as some of the greats? So I personally, just because I love the seoi nage, Koga. So there’s the number of times you won the world championships and the Olympic Games, but there’s also how you won and how you wanted to fight and what you did. It’s not necessarily about getting gold medals, it’s about how you fought and how you represent the sport. There’s certain athletes, like Inoue and Iliadis, that are going after the big throws.
So who else would you consider as some of the greats? So I personally, just because I love the seoi nage, Koga. So there’s the number of times you won the world championships and the Olympic Games, but there’s also how you won and how you wanted to fight and what you did. It’s not necessarily about getting gold medals, it’s about how you fought and how you represent the sport. There’s certain athletes, like Inoue and Iliadis, that are going after the big throws.
Neil Adams
Only after they want to win by ippon. And I think that that’s the difference is they’re the ones that come out there and it’s a bit like when Tyson stepped out there, you knew what you were going to get. And if they went toe-to-toe, if Tyson had somebody going toe-to-toe, somebody was going to get knocked out. We got the same in Judo, when people go head-to-head and it’s an open match and I often talk about an open match, I say, “It’s an open match. They’re both trying to score. Somebody is going to get scored on. Somebody’s going to go.” And that makes it exciting. When they come out and they close up, then that’s not an exciting match.
Only after they want to win by ippon. And I think that that’s the difference is they’re the ones that come out there and it’s a bit like when Tyson stepped out there, you knew what you were going to get. And if they went toe-to-toe, if Tyson had somebody going toe-to-toe, somebody was going to get knocked out. We got the same in Judo, when people go head-to-head and it’s an open match and I often talk about an open match, I say, “It’s an open match. They’re both trying to score. Somebody is going to get scored on. Somebody’s going to go.” And that makes it exciting. When they come out and they close up, then that’s not an exciting match.
Lex Fridman
Is there a case for Ono? Shohei Ono, three-time world champ, two-time gold medalist?
Is there a case for Ono? Shohei Ono, three-time world champ, two-time gold medalist?
Neil Adams
I think that judo-wise, he’s got to be one of the greatest because he had such versatility. He could go right and he could go left. He could pick up. He could go to the ground as well. He won a lot of his earlier matches on the ground. I think his empathy and how he presents himself, sometimes he falls down. I think that hopefully that should come with tutoring and how to be a great champion after. It’s not just about what you do on the mat, but what you do off the mat as well.
I think that judo-wise, he’s got to be one of the greatest because he had such versatility. He could go right and he could go left. He could pick up. He could go to the ground as well. He won a lot of his earlier matches on the ground. I think his empathy and how he presents himself, sometimes he falls down. I think that hopefully that should come with tutoring and how to be a great champion after. It’s not just about what you do on the mat, but what you do off the mat as well.
Lex Fridman
To you a great champion is the whole package of how you present yourself when you lose? How you represent yourself just off the mat?
To you a great champion is the whole package of how you present yourself when you lose? How you represent yourself just off the mat?
Neil Adams
Yeah, I think it’s how you present yourself afterwards, how you are with people, how much you can help people. I mean, people, kids, and they look up to these great champions because they want to be like them. So the worst thing is when you get somebody that’s a bit of an ass and they’re not presenting themselves in the right way. So I like to see somebody presenting themselves in the right way. And I think that it’s something that can be taught. It’s something that normally comes with a little bit of experience and a little bit of age. I like to think that I’m a little bit different now than I was when I was 19. Not that I was bad, I just think I was just, I see it often now, just full of beans.
Yeah, I think it’s how you present yourself afterwards, how you are with people, how much you can help people. I mean, people, kids, and they look up to these great champions because they want to be like them. So the worst thing is when you get somebody that’s a bit of an ass and they’re not presenting themselves in the right way. So I like to see somebody presenting themselves in the right way. And I think that it’s something that can be taught. It’s something that normally comes with a little bit of experience and a little bit of age. I like to think that I’m a little bit different now than I was when I was 19. Not that I was bad, I just think I was just, I see it often now, just full of beans.
Lex Fridman
You’re a beautiful work in progress. What about Nomura, Tadahro Nomura, three-time gold medalist?
You’re a beautiful work in progress. What about Nomura, Tadahro Nomura, three-time gold medalist?
Neil Adams
Never lost an Olympic fight.
Never lost an Olympic fight.
Lex Fridman
There’s something there.
There’s something there.
Neil Adams
Yeah, nobody ever done that. You know what I mean? So that’s got to be, it has to stand. He took two years off in between every Olympic Games and came back, did the right amount of events to qualify for not only did he having to qualify, he had to qualify through Japan. Now Japan, remember, have got the greatest depth. So they got people coming through all the time. And then he had to win the Japanese trials. I mean we had a four-time world champion from Japan.
Yeah, nobody ever done that. You know what I mean? So that’s got to be, it has to stand. He took two years off in between every Olympic Games and came back, did the right amount of events to qualify for not only did he having to qualify, he had to qualify through Japan. Now Japan, remember, have got the greatest depth. So they got people coming through all the time. And then he had to win the Japanese trials. I mean we had a four-time world champion from Japan.
This is when World Championships was every other year. And this is Shozo Fujii and he was the greatest middleweight of all time and never got to participate in the Olympics because he lost the Japanese trials twice, in two Olympic possibilities. He had to qualify for Japan and then go to the Olympic Games and then do it there. Sometimes some of the best people in Japan can’t get outside of Japan. Look at the situation they had with Abe and then they had Maruyama. Maruyama and Abe were both the best. By far. In the under-66 kilos category. This is for the last Olympic Games. And they sent one to the world Championships one to the Olympic Games and they both won gold medals.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, that’s why the all Japan Championships is legendary, that there’s these battles with Dimash and all of them.
Yeah, that’s why the all Japan Championships is legendary, that there’s these battles with Dimash and all of them.
Neil Adams
Abe and Maruyama, they had trials in the Kodokan. It was 26 minutes, I think it was 26 minutes, it went. They were battling it out for 26 minutes.
Abe and Maruyama, they had trials in the Kodokan. It was 26 minutes, I think it was 26 minutes, it went. They were battling it out for 26 minutes.
Training in Japan
Lex Fridman
That’s great. If we can just go to, you’ve trained in Japan. What are those randoris like? What’s that training like?
That’s great. If we can just go to, you’ve trained in Japan. What are those randoris like? What’s that training like?
Neil Adams
I touched on the danger. That danger of being thrown, when you get hold of somebody or somebody gets hold of you. And I often reflect-
I touched on the danger. That danger of being thrown, when you get hold of somebody or somebody gets hold of you. And I often reflect-
Neil Adams
Hold of somebody or somebody gets hold of you. I often reflect, and I often talk about it when I’m commentating because I can see immediately… It’s easy, isn’t it? In the commentary chair, or if you’re in the coach’s chair and you don’t really understand totally, absolutely what’s going on when somebody’s being out-gripped. When they’re in danger of being thrown, if you are in danger of being thrown, the first thing you do is stick your backside out and defend by not being in the position they want you to be in. All right? So that’s danger. You feel the danger. So in Japan, that was the place I used to go to train because I felt the danger, and so my defenses would be heightened. One Olympic cycle, I went two years, two months without having a score on me in any competition.
Hold of somebody or somebody gets hold of you. I often reflect, and I often talk about it when I’m commentating because I can see immediately… It’s easy, isn’t it? In the commentary chair, or if you’re in the coach’s chair and you don’t really understand totally, absolutely what’s going on when somebody’s being out-gripped. When they’re in danger of being thrown, if you are in danger of being thrown, the first thing you do is stick your backside out and defend by not being in the position they want you to be in. All right? So that’s danger. You feel the danger. So in Japan, that was the place I used to go to train because I felt the danger, and so my defenses would be heightened. One Olympic cycle, I went two years, two months without having a score on me in any competition.
Then I went to one competition in the European Championships, which I won, and I was struggling all the way through it and got scored on three times in my first pool of fights, and I was devastated. I actually nearly lost the whole competition because I was more mortified about being scored on three times when I hadn’t been scored on for 2 1/2 years. I had this thing in my head about 2 1/2 years, and then all of a sudden I’m not unbeatable and you go… I almost lost it, completely lost it. Just so fortunate, couple of things went my way and just came out, and I scraped and scratched my way to the final and won the final well, all right? But that was my best match, but I almost lost it.
Lex Fridman
Well, what do you do with the fact that if you go to Japan and you’re getting, you’re saying danger, you’re probably getting-
Well, what do you do with the fact that if you go to Japan and you’re getting, you’re saying danger, you’re probably getting-
Neil Adams
Getting thrown.
Getting thrown.
Lex Fridman
Getting thrown in Japan. What does that do to your ego?
Getting thrown in Japan. What does that do to your ego?
Neil Adams
Well, again, that was a winning ego that had to adapt. I remember we went to the kasejo, which police dojo one time, and they created this groundwork competition because they wanted to see me do the jiu-ji, how I went in and-
Well, again, that was a winning ego that had to adapt. I remember we went to the kasejo, which police dojo one time, and they created this groundwork competition because they wanted to see me do the jiu-ji, how I went in and-
Lex Fridman
The arm bar.
The arm bar.
Neil Adams
Yeah, the arm bar, right? They wanted to see how I did it from underneath or over the top, and they just created this event.
Yeah, the arm bar, right? They wanted to see how I did it from underneath or over the top, and they just created this event.
Lex Fridman
Studied the creature.
Studied the creature.
Neil Adams
Yeah, they started it and then winner stays on competition was happening at the kasejo. So I did about seven, I think it was seven in, and then my coach came in and said, “No, it’s finished. That’s it now, it’s finished.” Suddenly we realized what was going on and I was going, “No, no, no, no, don’t stop it like that.” And it was one of those moments where the boot was on my foot, you could say, rather than the other side, the other way.
Yeah, they started it and then winner stays on competition was happening at the kasejo. So I did about seven, I think it was seven in, and then my coach came in and said, “No, it’s finished. That’s it now, it’s finished.” Suddenly we realized what was going on and I was going, “No, no, no, no, don’t stop it like that.” And it was one of those moments where the boot was on my foot, you could say, rather than the other side, the other way.
Because I had been to Japan in situation… I remember as a sixteen-year-old, I got such such a drumming from one of the Japanese guys, older students. And he had a gold tooth. And so he was Gold Tooth to me and he was my nightmare. And I remember kept coming out to fight him because he kept throwing me and I was crying and I was upset and I was like… And then that was another occasion where I got dragged away and I said, “No.” So I wanted to go back and fight him. And I went back to the same dojo every year to fight him. He was on my mind morning, noon, night. He was on my mind.
Lex Fridman
Gold Tooth was on your mind.
Gold Tooth was on your mind.
Neil Adams
Gold tooth was on my mind.
Gold tooth was on my mind.
Lex Fridman
Did you ever get him?
Did you ever get him?
Neil Adams
Two years later. Two years to me from 16 to 18 was totally different. 18 years of age I was pretty competitive with him. And it was like I was standing up with him. 19, he was in the groundwork competition.
Two years later. Two years to me from 16 to 18 was totally different. 18 years of age I was pretty competitive with him. And it was like I was standing up with him. 19, he was in the groundwork competition.
Lex Fridman
And that’s when the switch happened.
And that’s when the switch happened.
Neil Adams
Switch happened. Because I just, well, because I remember getting the arm lock and didn’t put it on immediately. I needed it to last. It had to last.
Switch happened. Because I just, well, because I remember getting the arm lock and didn’t put it on immediately. I needed it to last. It had to last.
Lex Fridman
Sure. It had to last.
Sure. It had to last.
Neil Adams
So I spread, the whole thing lasted as long as I could possibly get it. And it was a long memory as I was looking down at him.
So I spread, the whole thing lasted as long as I could possibly get it. And it was a long memory as I was looking down at him.
Lex Fridman
And now he has nightmares about you.
And now he has nightmares about you.
Neil Adams
Now he has-
Now he has-
Lex Fridman
I wonder what nickname he has for you.
I wonder what nickname he has for you.
Neil Adams
I don’t know, I’m hoping that he remembers me.
I don’t know, I’m hoping that he remembers me.
Lex Fridman
He has a photo of you.
He has a photo of you.
Neil Adams
Do you know what? He probably doesn’t say, just bat an eyelid, doesn’t say a thing about it.
Do you know what? He probably doesn’t say, just bat an eyelid, doesn’t say a thing about it.
Lex Fridman
I mean, can you just speak to that training with those folks? You said crying, just the frustration of being thrown. It’s such a beautiful part of the process of becoming great.
I mean, can you just speak to that training with those folks? You said crying, just the frustration of being thrown. It’s such a beautiful part of the process of becoming great.
Neil Adams
Yeah, I think it is just something that doesn’t happen at this level. We were talking about levels and then at this level it never happened. And then I went out in my first European cadet and all of a sudden I wasn’t this top guy. I was in the mix. And then I had to work myself to the top of that mix and then to the top of the next one because I went to the European Senior Championships.
Yeah, I think it is just something that doesn’t happen at this level. We were talking about levels and then at this level it never happened. And then I went out in my first European cadet and all of a sudden I wasn’t this top guy. I was in the mix. And then I had to work myself to the top of that mix and then to the top of the next one because I went to the European Senior Championships.
And again, you’re not the top and you’ve worked your way to the top of that. I think it is a frustration, but I think it’s that kind of hatred of losing and also being out of control. I think that the first Senior European Championships I fought Nevzorov, but he was only one of my contests. Then I had to fight a Frenchman for third place. But he totally out-gripped me. And I remember I was more upset though I won the contest, I was more upset that he totally out… He did out-grip me and I was more upset. And then I fought him a year later and out-gripped him. All right. So it was one of those, it was a learning process all the way through.
Lex Fridman
That frustration is like, whatever that does to your soul, the building up afterwards is what actually makes you better. It’s fascinating. And do you think there’s, in Japan, just killers there that the world doesn’t know about, that just-
That frustration is like, whatever that does to your soul, the building up afterwards is what actually makes you better. It’s fascinating. And do you think there’s, in Japan, just killers there that the world doesn’t know about, that just-
Neil Adams
Yeah, there’s world champions in the dojo. There’s people that never make it out. I remember we were training and everybody that goes to Japan, all my friends that have been world Olympic champions, they all know what I’m talking about. They know exactly what I’m saying, is that when we go to the dojos there, we all get thrown by people that never come out to be world champions. They’re just in the mix or they’re going through three years of university and then they go. We had a guy that came in, he was a business guy. He came in with his suitcase and his briefcase like that. He’s got his tie up like that. So he decides he’s going to come in and he gets changed and he’s in his lunch hour, he’s in his lunch hour, so it’s got to be quick. So he comes in and he goes through, he’s working his way through the whole of the British team. We’re all lined up. So he’s just working his way through the whole of the British team. And I knew it was my turn next.
Yeah, there’s world champions in the dojo. There’s people that never make it out. I remember we were training and everybody that goes to Japan, all my friends that have been world Olympic champions, they all know what I’m talking about. They know exactly what I’m saying, is that when we go to the dojos there, we all get thrown by people that never come out to be world champions. They’re just in the mix or they’re going through three years of university and then they go. We had a guy that came in, he was a business guy. He came in with his suitcase and his briefcase like that. He’s got his tie up like that. So he decides he’s going to come in and he gets changed and he’s in his lunch hour, he’s in his lunch hour, so it’s got to be quick. So he comes in and he goes through, he’s working his way through the whole of the British team. We’re all lined up. So he’s just working his way through the whole of the British team. And I knew it was my turn next.
Lex Fridman
In his lunch hour.
In his lunch hour.
Neil Adams
So I get hold of him and I throw him immediately. And then it was what we were talking about when it happens in the first few seconds of the practice. So then I had four minutes of him coming at me and I’m going up into the air and I’m twisting off. And then everybody’s laughing at the side of the mat or the whole British team. He’s gone through the whole British team and then 10 minutes later he’s tying his tie up like that. And back to work like that. Imagine him sitting behind his desk at his computer.
So I get hold of him and I throw him immediately. And then it was what we were talking about when it happens in the first few seconds of the practice. So then I had four minutes of him coming at me and I’m going up into the air and I’m twisting off. And then everybody’s laughing at the side of the mat or the whole British team. He’s gone through the whole British team and then 10 minutes later he’s tying his tie up like that. And back to work like that. Imagine him sitting behind his desk at his computer.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah.
Neil Adams
I’m glad he didn’t get out.
I’m glad he didn’t get out.
Lex Fridman
Hopefully he listens to this.
Hopefully he listens to this.
Neil Adams
Hopefully.
Hopefully.
Lex Fridman
Anybody else I didn’t mention as part of the greats that just kind of jumped-
Anybody else I didn’t mention as part of the greats that just kind of jumped-
Neil Adams
Kashiwazaki Sensei is my favorite of all favorites. He is what I would call a judo genius. I don’t know if you can get him up here. Can we get him up?
Kashiwazaki Sensei is my favorite of all favorites. He is what I would call a judo genius. I don’t know if you can get him up here. Can we get him up?
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Neil Adams
So go into 1981 World Championships and I’ll talk you through the great Kashiwazaki. He was one year in Great Britain and he was a guy that was so much a genius… So you want the final of the under 60, 65 kilograms. There. The one at the top. This is him. He’s two weight categories below my weight category that I won the World championships. Same year I won it. So I’m not sure if this is going to show his final of-
So go into 1981 World Championships and I’ll talk you through the great Kashiwazaki. He was one year in Great Britain and he was a guy that was so much a genius… So you want the final of the under 60, 65 kilograms. There. The one at the top. This is him. He’s two weight categories below my weight category that I won the World championships. Same year I won it. So I’m not sure if this is going to show his final of-
Lex Fridman
This is a highlight.
This is a highlight.
Neil Adams
Oh, watch this. This he did in the-
Oh, watch this. This he did in the-
Lex Fridman
What?
What?
Neil Adams
Final of the World-
Final of the World-
Lex Fridman
For people just listening, he did an incredible sacrifice throw.
For people just listening, he did an incredible sacrifice throw.
Neil Adams
And then he was on top for the newaza, and renowned for his groundwork and he was on top of… Against a really strong Romanian guy, so his transition was just phenomenal.
And then he was on top for the newaza, and renowned for his groundwork and he was on top of… Against a really strong Romanian guy, so his transition was just phenomenal.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, let me go back and look at that, what just happened?
Yeah, let me go back and look at that, what just happened?
Neil Adams
So he’s just showing you… So he does this koji thing just to create space and it’s his follow through into groundwork that is best of all. And then the Romanian, really strong, like I say, he’d gone all the way through to the final of the world championships, winning most by ippon I think, the Romanian. And he’s defending really, really well here. And you can see how persistent, he knows exactly what he wants. He’s just got to get his leg out. Now watch, he tied the arm up and then he’ll pull the top leg towards him and then he’ll push the bottom one off-
So he’s just showing you… So he does this koji thing just to create space and it’s his follow through into groundwork that is best of all. And then the Romanian, really strong, like I say, he’d gone all the way through to the final of the world championships, winning most by ippon I think, the Romanian. And he’s defending really, really well here. And you can see how persistent, he knows exactly what he wants. He’s just got to get his leg out. Now watch, he tied the arm up and then he’ll pull the top leg towards him and then he’ll push the bottom one off-
Lex Fridman
Always working.
Always working.
Neil Adams
With both feet. Always working, always working. Readjust the balance. Still one leg trapped. Final of the World Championships. Good referee because he’s refereeing something here that’s happening that’s going to decide as to whether, so he doesn’t call it to stand it up at all. Watch him pull the top one now and he’ll push the bottom one.
With both feet. Always working, always working. Readjust the balance. Still one leg trapped. Final of the World Championships. Good referee because he’s refereeing something here that’s happening that’s going to decide as to whether, so he doesn’t call it to stand it up at all. Watch him pull the top one now and he’ll push the bottom one.
Lex Fridman
There’s a calmness on his face, which is great to see.
There’s a calmness on his face, which is great to see.
Neil Adams
Calm. Pushes the bottom leg, leg out, job done. All finished. This is him again, watch this. This is another technique that he does.
Calm. Pushes the bottom leg, leg out, job done. All finished. This is him again, watch this. This is another technique that he does.
Lex Fridman
The sacrifice.
The sacrifice.
Neil Adams
And then just again, sacrifice directly in, directly into the newaza.
And then just again, sacrifice directly in, directly into the newaza.
Lex Fridman
Transition is everything, isn’t it?
Transition is everything, isn’t it?
Neil Adams
In judo.
In judo.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Well, in anything really, but judo it especially pays off.
Yeah. Well, in anything really, but judo it especially pays off.
Neil Adams
Yeah, I mean because we haven’t got that long. I mean we had more time here, they’ve just brought more time back. So we’ve got more time to transition in and to get the situation that we want and to get the attacking situation that we want. Because I remember I was teaching in America to some jiu-jitsu guys, and they were saying, “Oh, we’d never give you our back.” And I said, “With judo rules, certain situations it happens that when we try and do throws where we’re facing away from our opponent.” So for example, seonages, if they fail, then the back is there and that’s how we get the back. And it’s a different situation than going on your back in the guard situation. Totally different.
Yeah, I mean because we haven’t got that long. I mean we had more time here, they’ve just brought more time back. So we’ve got more time to transition in and to get the situation that we want and to get the attacking situation that we want. Because I remember I was teaching in America to some jiu-jitsu guys, and they were saying, “Oh, we’d never give you our back.” And I said, “With judo rules, certain situations it happens that when we try and do throws where we’re facing away from our opponent.” So for example, seonages, if they fail, then the back is there and that’s how we get the back. And it’s a different situation than going on your back in the guard situation. Totally different.
Lex Fridman
Well, Travis Stevens, I don’t know how familiar you are with his judo, but he’s a really interesting example. He competed at the highest level in Jiu-Jitsu as well. And his idea, he’s a big seonage guy, and he basically threw all of that away.
Well, Travis Stevens, I don’t know how familiar you are with his judo, but he’s a really interesting example. He competed at the highest level in Jiu-Jitsu as well. And his idea, he’s a big seonage guy, and he basically threw all of that away.
Neil Adams
In the jiu-jitsu ?
In the jiu-jitsu ?
Lex Fridman
In the jiu-jitsu . He took the sport from scratch for what it is. So he almost never did a standing seonages at all in jiu-jitsu.
In the jiu-jitsu . He took the sport from scratch for what it is. So he almost never did a standing seonages at all in jiu-jitsu.
Neil Adams
No, because it would leave his back all the time if it failed. But he wouldn’t have the same kind of grip on the Judo gi or the jiu-jitsu gi. A little bit different.
No, because it would leave his back all the time if it failed. But he wouldn’t have the same kind of grip on the Judo gi or the jiu-jitsu gi. A little bit different.
Lex Fridman
And so you have to kind of consider the sport, the art of it, and also the competitors, the styles and the culture of the sport. If you want to win, if winning is the most important thing, then like, “All right, well, let’s-“
And so you have to kind of consider the sport, the art of it, and also the competitors, the styles and the culture of the sport. If you want to win, if winning is the most important thing, then like, “All right, well, let’s-“
Neil Adams
But you learn the game, don’t you? And that’s what he did. He learned the game. And I think that is credit to him. And that’s why I was saying about wrestling, the wrestlers, I mean, good to learn the judo and for what it is and the mechanics and how it works. And then learn the wrestling. I mean, I do the commentary as well for the freestyle, and I will be at the Olympics for the freestyle and the Greco-Roman. And I love the freestyle, absolutely love it. But freestyle is freestyle. Judo is judo. I like to see people doing judo.
But you learn the game, don’t you? And that’s what he did. He learned the game. And I think that is credit to him. And that’s why I was saying about wrestling, the wrestlers, I mean, good to learn the judo and for what it is and the mechanics and how it works. And then learn the wrestling. I mean, I do the commentary as well for the freestyle, and I will be at the Olympics for the freestyle and the Greco-Roman. And I love the freestyle, absolutely love it. But freestyle is freestyle. Judo is judo. I like to see people doing judo.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, but there’s a rhyme to the whole combat thing. They’re all, I mean, the body mechanics, it’s all fascinating echoes of each other in interesting ways. The details are different, but there’s still two humans clashing.
Yeah, but there’s a rhyme to the whole combat thing. They’re all, I mean, the body mechanics, it’s all fascinating echoes of each other in interesting ways. The details are different, but there’s still two humans clashing.
Neil Adams
Yeah, we’ve got some amazing crossovers with people like the Mongolians that have come in, with the Georgians. The Georgians do massive pickups and different techniques. And if you ask the fighters whether grabbing the legs, a lot of them would say some of the wrestling styles, the Georgians and the Mongolians might say, “Yeah, I’d like to be able to take the legs.” But a lot of them just adapted. You get Iliadis, for example, he just adapted. So he thought, “Well, I’ll take my arm over the top and I’ll just rip them out the floor that way.” You know what I mean?
Yeah, we’ve got some amazing crossovers with people like the Mongolians that have come in, with the Georgians. The Georgians do massive pickups and different techniques. And if you ask the fighters whether grabbing the legs, a lot of them would say some of the wrestling styles, the Georgians and the Mongolians might say, “Yeah, I’d like to be able to take the legs.” But a lot of them just adapted. You get Iliadis, for example, he just adapted. So he thought, “Well, I’ll take my arm over the top and I’ll just rip them out the floor that way.” You know what I mean?
Lex Fridman
They’re still doing the big lifts, they’re still doing the big gripping, but they just don’t grab below the legs. It’s weird. They figured it out.
They’re still doing the big lifts, they’re still doing the big gripping, but they just don’t grab below the legs. It’s weird. They figured it out.
Neil Adams
And they figured it out like that.
And they figured it out like that.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, you would think it’d take a long time. No, it was like a month.
Yeah, you would think it’d take a long time. No, it was like a month.
Neil Adams
Yeah. No, exactly.
Yeah. No, exactly.
Jiu jitsu
Lex Fridman
The highest level, which is crazy. So you mentioned jiu-jitsu a little bit. What to you is an interesting difference between jiu-jitsu and judo that you’ve observed? Because you’re one of the greatest ever on the ground in judo. And so jiu-jitsu is primarily focused on similar type of stuff on the ground. So what to you is an interesting difference there?
The highest level, which is crazy. So you mentioned jiu-jitsu a little bit. What to you is an interesting difference between jiu-jitsu and judo that you’ve observed? Because you’re one of the greatest ever on the ground in judo. And so jiu-jitsu is primarily focused on similar type of stuff on the ground. So what to you is an interesting difference there?
Neil Adams
They’re a different approach, different timescale to them, and they have a different way in. So [inaudible 01:45:57] ours comes from a standing position directly in, we’ve got a timescale on it so we have to, like the catch, I always talk about the catch. Because in judo terms, if you don’t get the catch immediately, then the referee won’t see the transition in. And also the continuation from plan A, B, C, D if something builds. So we have to build it and we have to build it quickly. And I think in jiu-jitsu terms, you have more time to build.
They’re a different approach, different timescale to them, and they have a different way in. So [inaudible 01:45:57] ours comes from a standing position directly in, we’ve got a timescale on it so we have to, like the catch, I always talk about the catch. Because in judo terms, if you don’t get the catch immediately, then the referee won’t see the transition in. And also the continuation from plan A, B, C, D if something builds. So we have to build it and we have to build it quickly. And I think in jiu-jitsu terms, you have more time to build.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, there’s a kind of patience like, “Oh, if this doesn’t work out, I can try a different thing.” With Judo, there’s an urgency.
Yeah, there’s a kind of patience like, “Oh, if this doesn’t work out, I can try a different thing.” With Judo, there’s an urgency.
Neil Adams
There’s an urgency.
There’s an urgency.
Lex Fridman
And there’s a ref watching skeptically. So you better show that you’re making progress.
And there’s a ref watching skeptically. So you better show that you’re making progress.
Neil Adams
You’ve got to show the progression. And that’s why I always had a plan A, B, C. You see there with… That was 1981 there, the great Kashiwazaki had a progression. Everything was, he knew exactly where he had to be. It was feel. That wasn’t by accident, it was trained. And I think that that transition there and taking control of somebody’s mistake, so somebody might have made a mistake or not hit properly, or your defense has caused them to make a mistake and then you take advantage of it. And that is the difference.
You’ve got to show the progression. And that’s why I always had a plan A, B, C. You see there with… That was 1981 there, the great Kashiwazaki had a progression. Everything was, he knew exactly where he had to be. It was feel. That wasn’t by accident, it was trained. And I think that that transition there and taking control of somebody’s mistake, so somebody might have made a mistake or not hit properly, or your defense has caused them to make a mistake and then you take advantage of it. And that is the difference.
Lex Fridman
So one of the side effects of that, I don’t know with the chicken or the egg, but judo people on the ground are much more aggressive. So probably because of the urgency, but there’s an intention behind the progress you’re making. I think jiu-jitsu is more relaxed. There’s more a culture of just finding places to relax and think of different control and positions and take your time. And as a result, it’s much, much less exhausting. So you can go for much longer. It feels like judo is exhausting.
So one of the side effects of that, I don’t know with the chicken or the egg, but judo people on the ground are much more aggressive. So probably because of the urgency, but there’s an intention behind the progress you’re making. I think jiu-jitsu is more relaxed. There’s more a culture of just finding places to relax and think of different control and positions and take your time. And as a result, it’s much, much less exhausting. So you can go for much longer. It feels like judo is exhausting.
Neil Adams
It’s that ten second blast, isn’t it? It’s like doing sprints all the time. And that is really hard. And that’s a special kind of condition you need and you need to be able to catch it and know when to go and when not to go. And I think also, I was going to ask you, you think it’d make a difference, I mean, certain jiu-jitsu, you can’t just throw yourself on your back into the guard. You have to throw into the situation. You have got, I mean, I know Roger Gracie, he decided that he was going to learn judo. He saw the importance of being able to throw for the transition in, and so he came to the budokai and he was learning off Ray Stevens, and they were doing really a lot-
It’s that ten second blast, isn’t it? It’s like doing sprints all the time. And that is really hard. And that’s a special kind of condition you need and you need to be able to catch it and know when to go and when not to go. And I think also, I was going to ask you, you think it’d make a difference, I mean, certain jiu-jitsu, you can’t just throw yourself on your back into the guard. You have to throw into the situation. You have got, I mean, I know Roger Gracie, he decided that he was going to learn judo. He saw the importance of being able to throw for the transition in, and so he came to the budokai and he was learning off Ray Stevens, and they were doing really a lot-
Lex Fridman
Well, he’s a fascinating study because he does the most basic stuff and he does-
Well, he’s a fascinating study because he does the most basic stuff and he does-
Neil Adams
Does it well.
Does it well.
Lex Fridman
He did another level of wow, it’s like Yamashita, everyone knows what’s coming with Roger Gracie, but he just does it anyway. I guess the best people in the world. It’s crazy. He’s like, everybody in jiu-jitsu at White Belt learns the techniques he’s using, and he just does it.
He did another level of wow, it’s like Yamashita, everyone knows what’s coming with Roger Gracie, but he just does it anyway. I guess the best people in the world. It’s crazy. He’s like, everybody in jiu-jitsu at White Belt learns the techniques he’s using, and he just does it.
Neil Adams
Amazing, isn’t it? But he has about a thousand ways in.
Amazing, isn’t it? But he has about a thousand ways in.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, yeah. I mean, and the thousand ways there’s in the details, so it kind of might even look the same to people. But he finds a way to choke people. So he’s on top of them, mounted in a sort of judo pin position, and everyone knows what’s coming next against the best people in the world, and you should be able to defend it, but nobody can, it’s crazy.
Yeah, yeah. I mean, and the thousand ways there’s in the details, so it kind of might even look the same to people. But he finds a way to choke people. So he’s on top of them, mounted in a sort of judo pin position, and everyone knows what’s coming next against the best people in the world, and you should be able to defend it, but nobody can, it’s crazy.
Neil Adams
I think there’s the power element as well, that you don’t realize how when somebody’s directed in a particular way, then you have that kind of element of absolute power that you can only feel, like when Roger’s doing a technique, I think that you would only feel it if he did it on you, then you can feel it. It’s not something that happens… So tricks is one thing, but actually being able to do something really well from a power point of view. Like you say, he only does those few things, but he does them really, really, really well.
I think there’s the power element as well, that you don’t realize how when somebody’s directed in a particular way, then you have that kind of element of absolute power that you can only feel, like when Roger’s doing a technique, I think that you would only feel it if he did it on you, then you can feel it. It’s not something that happens… So tricks is one thing, but actually being able to do something really well from a power point of view. Like you say, he only does those few things, but he does them really, really, really well.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, I don’t know what that is about. Actually, judo pins is a very interesting case study as well, because people are able to feel so heavy. One of the things judoka are able to do is pin extremely well, and it makes you realize that it’s not about the weight, it’s about some kind of technique that makes people feel like they weigh a thousand pounds.
Yeah, I don’t know what that is about. Actually, judo pins is a very interesting case study as well, because people are able to feel so heavy. One of the things judoka are able to do is pin extremely well, and it makes you realize that it’s not about the weight, it’s about some kind of technique that makes people feel like they weigh a thousand pounds.
Neil Adams
It’s about weight distribution and change of balance. A lot of people don’t realize that there’s huge changes of balance on the ground. Massive. You know what it’s like. I mean, you’re a jiu-jitsu man. And the detail of the techniques is what really interests me. I mean, I’m always looking, small ideas. I’m always looking at the jiu-jitsu and it fascinates me. I would’ve done jiu-jitsu for sure, but I wouldn’t have forgotten the judo way in to the techniques. I mean, I think you’ve got to differentiate the two, but I would’ve loved the jiu-jitsu. I would’ve absolutely loved it, but it wasn’t as prominent then. Where the newaza came from, it came from a mistake, me getting beaten in a particular contest and I went, “I’m not going to be beaten again on the ground.” That’s how it happened.
It’s about weight distribution and change of balance. A lot of people don’t realize that there’s huge changes of balance on the ground. Massive. You know what it’s like. I mean, you’re a jiu-jitsu man. And the detail of the techniques is what really interests me. I mean, I’m always looking, small ideas. I’m always looking at the jiu-jitsu and it fascinates me. I would’ve done jiu-jitsu for sure, but I wouldn’t have forgotten the judo way in to the techniques. I mean, I think you’ve got to differentiate the two, but I would’ve loved the jiu-jitsu. I would’ve absolutely loved it, but it wasn’t as prominent then. Where the newaza came from, it came from a mistake, me getting beaten in a particular contest and I went, “I’m not going to be beaten again on the ground.” That’s how it happened.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Well, yeah, the story of your life is like a loss creates, the phoenix rises.
Yeah. Well, yeah, the story of your life is like a loss creates, the phoenix rises.
Neil Adams
It was 1978, and it wasn’t a mistake. It was a particular movement. And I was fighting weight up from my normal weight, but I stayed in the same position for one second too long, got caught and-
It was 1978, and it wasn’t a mistake. It was a particular movement. And I was fighting weight up from my normal weight, but I stayed in the same position for one second too long, got caught and-
Lex Fridman
Choked?
Choked?
Neil Adams
Sangaku, yeah. Triangle. Triangle, triangle.
Sangaku, yeah. Triangle. Triangle, triangle.
Lex Fridman
Wow.
Wow.
Neil Adams
And I said, I literally just the same as I said to you, when I said, “I’m not going to drink anymore,” I came off and I said, “I’m never going to get caught on the ground again.”
And I said, I literally just the same as I said to you, when I said, “I’m not going to drink anymore,” I came off and I said, “I’m never going to get caught on the ground again.”
Lex Fridman
Never lose on the ground ever.
Never lose on the ground ever.
Neil Adams
And I never lost in my whole competitive career again.
And I never lost in my whole competitive career again.
Lex Fridman
But yeah, I shouldn’t mention that there’s nothing like a pin from a judo person. And I don’t actually know if people in jiu-jitsu have made sense of that, loaded that in.
But yeah, I shouldn’t mention that there’s nothing like a pin from a judo person. And I don’t actually know if people in jiu-jitsu have made sense of that, loaded that in.
Neil Adams
But it’s not part of the game, is it? The pin? It’s submission.
But it’s not part of the game, is it? The pin? It’s submission.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, but control is part of the game, and nobody controls a human body the way judo people do on the ground. They have understood the science of control. And I think that control is extremely useful in jiu-jitsu as well, it’s just that people don’t… There’s so many other domains of exploration.
Yeah, but control is part of the game, and nobody controls a human body the way judo people do on the ground. They have understood the science of control. And I think that control is extremely useful in jiu-jitsu as well, it’s just that people don’t… There’s so many other domains of exploration.
Neil Adams
That’s interesting.
That’s interesting.
Lex Fridman
I mean, just especially when you apply jiu-jitsu to the fighting setting of mixed martial arts, that control, that side control, that pin control, is really, really, really important. But then you add punching to the thing and it becomes-
I mean, just especially when you apply jiu-jitsu to the fighting setting of mixed martial arts, that control, that side control, that pin control, is really, really, really important. But then you add punching to the thing and it becomes-
Neil Adams
Puts a whole different thing on it, doesn’t it?
Puts a whole different thing on it, doesn’t it?
Lex Fridman
I mean, there’s an alternate history where you would’ve been part of the early UFCs if time was a little different maybe a few years later, because your style of judo and jiu-jitsu and the transitions and the aggression, all of that would’ve worked really well in the early UFCs.
I mean, there’s an alternate history where you would’ve been part of the early UFCs if time was a little different maybe a few years later, because your style of judo and jiu-jitsu and the transitions and the aggression, all of that would’ve worked really well in the early UFCs.
Neil Adams
I’m sure I was being set up at one stage by one of the Graces, and that was when he was winning all the matches. But he came in with a couple of the cousins to one of my seminars, and he was one of the first ones, wasn’t he, that… That’s how I love to see the kind of UFC, because it was different martial arts, different skills. And he’d get close and he’d just choke them out or arm lock them or arm bar them. And that was brilliant for me. That was a revelation. That was how I saw it.
I’m sure I was being set up at one stage by one of the Graces, and that was when he was winning all the matches. But he came in with a couple of the cousins to one of my seminars, and he was one of the first ones, wasn’t he, that… That’s how I love to see the kind of UFC, because it was different martial arts, different skills. And he’d get close and he’d just choke them out or arm lock them or arm bar them. And that was brilliant for me. That was a revelation. That was how I saw it.
Lex Fridman
It’s a fascinating science experiment, which aspects of different martial arts work well and not, when they clash together. And it did turn out that Newaza worked-
It’s a fascinating science experiment, which aspects of different martial arts work well and not, when they clash together. And it did turn out that Newaza worked-
Neil Adams
Was the key. Yeah, it was the key, wasn’t it?
Was the key. Yeah, it was the key, wasn’t it?
Lex Fridman
Yeah, it was a big missing link in our conception of fighting. It’s the neutralizer of size, and a lot of other components. It just blew people’s mind. “Oh, okay. It’s not just about size. It’s not just about big guys swinging hands. It’s a lot of other components, and the groundwork is really, really important.” And of course, there’s a few judoka that succeeded in the UFC since then, which is always interesting how they adapt. When you take off the gi, how can you still throw people? How can you still do control? How can you still take advantage of the transition on the ground? Ronda Rousey is a good example of somebody that took advantage of that.
Yeah, it was a big missing link in our conception of fighting. It’s the neutralizer of size, and a lot of other components. It just blew people’s mind. “Oh, okay. It’s not just about size. It’s not just about big guys swinging hands. It’s a lot of other components, and the groundwork is really, really important.” And of course, there’s a few judoka that succeeded in the UFC since then, which is always interesting how they adapt. When you take off the gi, how can you still throw people? How can you still do control? How can you still take advantage of the transition on the ground? Ronda Rousey is a good example of somebody that took advantage of that.
Neil Adams
Yeah, I think one of the biggest things for the judoka is we’ve never… There’s no strikes, and I think that’s the biggest shock, if you wish, when you get one-
Yeah, I think one of the biggest things for the judoka is we’ve never… There’s no strikes, and I think that’s the biggest shock, if you wish, when you get one-
Lex Fridman
Yeah, punched in the face.
Yeah, punched in the face.
Neil Adams
You get punched in the face and you’re not used to that. That’s not what we’re used to.
You get punched in the face and you’re not used to that. That’s not what we’re used to.
Lex Fridman
Some people are able to get punched in the face better than others, for sure. Then again, there’s Ronda Rousey who doesn’t need to get punched in the face. She just gets in close, throws a person, arm bar right there.
Some people are able to get punched in the face better than others, for sure. Then again, there’s Ronda Rousey who doesn’t need to get punched in the face. She just gets in close, throws a person, arm bar right there.
Neil Adams
And Kayla-
And Kayla-
Lex Fridman
Kayla Harrison, that’s another incredible person. She could have probably been just winning Olympic gold medal after Olympic gold medal, but chose to-
Kayla Harrison, that’s another incredible person. She could have probably been just winning Olympic gold medal after Olympic gold medal, but chose to-
Neil Adams
Whatever she decides. I mean, Ronda as well, whatever they decided to do they’re great athletes. They hate losing. I don’t know anybody that hates losing more than those two. They don’t like it.
Whatever she decides. I mean, Ronda as well, whatever they decided to do they’re great athletes. They hate losing. I don’t know anybody that hates losing more than those two. They don’t like it.
Training
Lex Fridman
And Kayla Harrison, I don’t know anybody that works as hard as her. That’s a crazy, crazy, crazy work ethic. Well, let me ask you about training again, Jimmy Pedro said he learned a lot from you. He learned how to do a tight ocean, the arm bar Jujigatame, but he also learned from you training methodology. So what’s he talking about? He told me about this. What’s your approach to training throughout your career and as it developed?
And Kayla Harrison, I don’t know anybody that works as hard as her. That’s a crazy, crazy, crazy work ethic. Well, let me ask you about training again, Jimmy Pedro said he learned a lot from you. He learned how to do a tight ocean, the arm bar Jujigatame, but he also learned from you training methodology. So what’s he talking about? He told me about this. What’s your approach to training throughout your career and as it developed?
Neil Adams
I always wanted to train harder than anybody else. I still train now every day. If I don’t train, do something, I do an hour of my physical work, and I still go on the mat a little bit. I’m 65 now. And so I’m not doing really heavy stuff on the mat, but I still like to train. And when I was 21, 20 up to 30, I was one of the best trainers. But Jimmy Pedro was one of the best trainers as well. He’s one of your dream athletes. When Jimmy Pedro steps through your door, and he was just a kid. He was just young when he stepped through my door, and I had a lot of full-time trainers, so I had up to 20 really good athletes that were training hard. And I only wanted hard trainers. Give me 10 that train hard rather than your one pre-Madonna that you’re skillful, the one that could do it. I wanted 10 or 20 really hard trainers because you can do so much with them. You can make champions, you can make them world champions. If you’ve got somebody that was a special talent and they wanted to work hard, then you had a special athlete.
I always wanted to train harder than anybody else. I still train now every day. If I don’t train, do something, I do an hour of my physical work, and I still go on the mat a little bit. I’m 65 now. And so I’m not doing really heavy stuff on the mat, but I still like to train. And when I was 21, 20 up to 30, I was one of the best trainers. But Jimmy Pedro was one of the best trainers as well. He’s one of your dream athletes. When Jimmy Pedro steps through your door, and he was just a kid. He was just young when he stepped through my door, and I had a lot of full-time trainers, so I had up to 20 really good athletes that were training hard. And I only wanted hard trainers. Give me 10 that train hard rather than your one pre-Madonna that you’re skillful, the one that could do it. I wanted 10 or 20 really hard trainers because you can do so much with them. You can make champions, you can make them world champions. If you’ve got somebody that was a special talent and they wanted to work hard, then you had a special athlete.
Lex Fridman
When you say hard trainers, what do you mean? Are these people that just every single day are able to just grind it out, do [inaudible 01:58:21], do the training, do the boring things, just keep coming back-
When you say hard trainers, what do you mean? Are these people that just every single day are able to just grind it out, do [inaudible 01:58:21], do the training, do the boring things, just keep coming back-
Neil Adams
Yeah, when the going gets tough. And I think that was him. He had a special mentality. And the thing is, you see when you’ve got him in your dojo, even when you’re tired, when somebody’s tired, what an example to the others. So he’d pull the other ones in as well. So I had somebody that when everybody was tired and everybody was sick of it, and everybody just wanted… And he’d still be there, so they had to do it. So that was for me, a win-win. So I had all the Americans, actually, I had Bobby Berland, and I had Michael Swain, and I had Ed Liddie, and I had them all coming to visit me at different times. Jimmy was there, they wanted to be the best. In the end we had such a great club atmosphere. They wanted to come for the hard work, and they knew that if they came, they were going to be dragged out and we were going to do physical training. And it was physical training like they hadn’t done before. But it wasn’t just the physical training, it was the judo and the skill side of it as well. And so I always had a great empathy with the U.S. team. Olympic team. So a lot of your Olympic medalists have been through with me. And so I’m proud of that because we had some great times and they’re still great mates now. And so in New York, in a couple of weeks time, I’m going to have, everybody is going to be there. They’re all coming in.
Yeah, when the going gets tough. And I think that was him. He had a special mentality. And the thing is, you see when you’ve got him in your dojo, even when you’re tired, when somebody’s tired, what an example to the others. So he’d pull the other ones in as well. So I had somebody that when everybody was tired and everybody was sick of it, and everybody just wanted… And he’d still be there, so they had to do it. So that was for me, a win-win. So I had all the Americans, actually, I had Bobby Berland, and I had Michael Swain, and I had Ed Liddie, and I had them all coming to visit me at different times. Jimmy was there, they wanted to be the best. In the end we had such a great club atmosphere. They wanted to come for the hard work, and they knew that if they came, they were going to be dragged out and we were going to do physical training. And it was physical training like they hadn’t done before. But it wasn’t just the physical training, it was the judo and the skill side of it as well. And so I always had a great empathy with the U.S. team. Olympic team. So a lot of your Olympic medalists have been through with me. And so I’m proud of that because we had some great times and they’re still great mates now. And so in New York, in a couple of weeks time, I’m going to have, everybody is going to be there. They’re all coming in.
Lex Fridman
All old friends.
All old friends.
Neil Adams
All old friends.
All old friends.
Lex Fridman
And new friends. So what’s.
And new friends. So what’s.
Lex Fridman
Old friends.
Old friends.
Neil Adams
All old friends.
All old friends.
Lex Fridman
And new friends. So what’s a tough week look like at your peak physical training, Randori? Is there days off? Are you training twice a day?
And new friends. So what’s a tough week look like at your peak physical training, Randori? Is there days off? Are you training twice a day?
Neil Adams
Twice a day. So we do the preparation training, we do the running, we do the weight training, we do the skills in the morning as well. The skills is, for me, one of the biggest advantages that any full-time trainers can have, because what happens is that with most clubs, you’re trying to fit everything into that hour and a half or two hours. You fit your skills, you fit your physical training and your sparring and everything’s in there, all grouped in. So the biggest advantages of having a full-time group is that you can split your skills and your skills lay your foundation. So the biggest advantage is being able to work specifically on things without having to worry about getting to do your Randori or your sparring, then you’ve got to go out for… You just do the skills.
Twice a day. So we do the preparation training, we do the running, we do the weight training, we do the skills in the morning as well. The skills is, for me, one of the biggest advantages that any full-time trainers can have, because what happens is that with most clubs, you’re trying to fit everything into that hour and a half or two hours. You fit your skills, you fit your physical training and your sparring and everything’s in there, all grouped in. So the biggest advantages of having a full-time group is that you can split your skills and your skills lay your foundation. So the biggest advantage is being able to work specifically on things without having to worry about getting to do your Randori or your sparring, then you’ve got to go out for… You just do the skills.
Lex Fridman
Well, when you talk about skills, say your specialty is a Tai otoshi, are we talking about Uchikomi, working with bands? Are you doing throws? Are you actually just having conversations about specific tiny details of throws? What does skills mean?
Well, when you talk about skills, say your specialty is a Tai otoshi, are we talking about Uchikomi, working with bands? Are you doing throws? Are you actually just having conversations about specific tiny details of throws? What does skills mean?
Neil Adams
All those things about doing your repetition practice, making sure the repetition is correct, there’s good repetition.
All those things about doing your repetition practice, making sure the repetition is correct, there’s good repetition.
Lex Fridman
So when we say good repetition, Uchikomi when you’re just fitting the throw versus doing the throw? Where do you land on the value of both?
So when we say good repetition, Uchikomi when you’re just fitting the throw versus doing the throw? Where do you land on the value of both?
Neil Adams
I’m getting it moving. So one of the biggest, most important things is getting it moving. If we do something static, again, it’s that static target. You need to get it moving. So you need to do a repetition and also you need to do a correct repetition because if you’re doing 100 repetitions that are not correct and repetitions under pressure, too much pressure, without somebody overseeing those skills to make sure that you correct the skills. Because if you’re doing a skill, if you’re doing it 99 times incorrectly, then repetition doesn’t make perfect. Repetition makes permanent, so you’re going to make it as perfect as you possibly can. So actually that skills group there is the most important thing. And what I used to do is oversee it. So I’d oversee it to make sure that it was done properly.
I’m getting it moving. So one of the biggest, most important things is getting it moving. If we do something static, again, it’s that static target. You need to get it moving. So you need to do a repetition and also you need to do a correct repetition because if you’re doing 100 repetitions that are not correct and repetitions under pressure, too much pressure, without somebody overseeing those skills to make sure that you correct the skills. Because if you’re doing a skill, if you’re doing it 99 times incorrectly, then repetition doesn’t make perfect. Repetition makes permanent, so you’re going to make it as perfect as you possibly can. So actually that skills group there is the most important thing. And what I used to do is oversee it. So I’d oversee it to make sure that it was done properly.
Lex Fridman
So you’re watching the footwork, you’re watching the gripping-
So you’re watching the footwork, you’re watching the gripping-
Neil Adams
Everything.
Everything.
Lex Fridman
…and then just constantly adjusting the people.
…and then just constantly adjusting the people.
Neil Adams
I’ll give you an example, Jimmy Pedro. Jimmy was one of the hardest when he was 19 years of age, he’s always asking me to practice always. So he’s always on me all the time. So I do groundwork with him could I put him on his back? No, I was all on him and he’ll tell you, but he just wouldn’t go. He was going to be great, without a doubt. So I wanted everybody on with him, everybody. So everybody went on with him. And so it only improved their game and it improved him. And then small technical things that have stayed with him that we were doing with the Juji Gatame that was passed on to Kayla and then gone on to Ronda and it’s all small things that I can see sometimes that it’s passed on.
I’ll give you an example, Jimmy Pedro. Jimmy was one of the hardest when he was 19 years of age, he’s always asking me to practice always. So he’s always on me all the time. So I do groundwork with him could I put him on his back? No, I was all on him and he’ll tell you, but he just wouldn’t go. He was going to be great, without a doubt. So I wanted everybody on with him, everybody. So everybody went on with him. And so it only improved their game and it improved him. And then small technical things that have stayed with him that we were doing with the Juji Gatame that was passed on to Kayla and then gone on to Ronda and it’s all small things that I can see sometimes that it’s passed on.
Lex Fridman
What about the Tai Otoshi? He said he learned a lot from you from that.
What about the Tai Otoshi? He said he learned a lot from you from that.
Neil Adams
And he does it differently.
And he does it differently.
Lex Fridman
And so I should mention that’s one of the trickier throw… I mean, I still don’t understand.
And so I should mention that’s one of the trickier throw… I mean, I still don’t understand.
Neil Adams
It is a tricky throw.
It is a tricky throw.
Lex Fridman
I don’t understand. So for people who don’t know, boy, how would you even explain it? It doesn’t make any sense. When you just look solo, the movement you make is quite simple, but how you get a person to be off balance, how you actually get them to be thrown. And when you do throw it successfully, it looks like a whipping motion that’s effortless. It makes no sense.
I don’t understand. So for people who don’t know, boy, how would you even explain it? It doesn’t make any sense. When you just look solo, the movement you make is quite simple, but how you get a person to be off balance, how you actually get them to be thrown. And when you do throw it successfully, it looks like a whipping motion that’s effortless. It makes no sense.
Neil Adams
It makes no sense other than every technique starts with the hands. So it’s what we call Kazushi and you’re pulling somebody off balance, getting them moving, pulling them off balance. Tai otoshi means body drop. So it’s basically two legs across your partner’s body. I’ve got my back to you and I’ve already pulled you off balance with my hands, and then I’m going to just flex my legs up just as you are coming onto my back. And then you’re going to go over if I coordinated all right. If it doesn’t get coordinated right, then you’re going to come right on my back and try to rip my arm off. So got get it right.
It makes no sense other than every technique starts with the hands. So it’s what we call Kazushi and you’re pulling somebody off balance, getting them moving, pulling them off balance. Tai otoshi means body drop. So it’s basically two legs across your partner’s body. I’ve got my back to you and I’ve already pulled you off balance with my hands, and then I’m going to just flex my legs up just as you are coming onto my back. And then you’re going to go over if I coordinated all right. If it doesn’t get coordinated right, then you’re going to come right on my back and try to rip my arm off. So got get it right.
Lex Fridman
If you can convert it into words, some secret ingredients that allowed you to pull it off at the highest levels, the Tai otoshi?
If you can convert it into words, some secret ingredients that allowed you to pull it off at the highest levels, the Tai otoshi?
Neil Adams
The hands start every technique. So getting the repetition right, first of all. So to get the repetition right, you need a good partner. Actually training your partner to react in the right way is just as important as learning the throw. Actually what happens is we could get a lesson of beginners, we teach the throw and then go, “Right, off you go.” And 90% of them will get it wrong because their partner’s not reacting in the right way. So half of it is to get the person to react as they should. So if I was doing it with you, you and I, first thing I’d teach you to do is to react the way I want you to react. And then I’d react the way that you want me to react. So then we’d have success with it rather than you leaning back in the wrong way or resisting or frightened going over. So actually, that’s why nine times out of 10, people get the technique wrong.
The hands start every technique. So getting the repetition right, first of all. So to get the repetition right, you need a good partner. Actually training your partner to react in the right way is just as important as learning the throw. Actually what happens is we could get a lesson of beginners, we teach the throw and then go, “Right, off you go.” And 90% of them will get it wrong because their partner’s not reacting in the right way. So half of it is to get the person to react as they should. So if I was doing it with you, you and I, first thing I’d teach you to do is to react the way I want you to react. And then I’d react the way that you want me to react. So then we’d have success with it rather than you leaning back in the wrong way or resisting or frightened going over. So actually, that’s why nine times out of 10, people get the technique wrong.
Lex Fridman
It’s actually fascinating to me because in the United States where I came up, I mean, the level of judo is not comparable to the level of judo in the rest of the world. Of course the Pedro Center is an exception to that.
It’s actually fascinating to me because in the United States where I came up, I mean, the level of judo is not comparable to the level of judo in the rest of the world. Of course the Pedro Center is an exception to that.
Neil Adams
Certain athletes, yeah.
Certain athletes, yeah.
Lex Fridman
It’s just certain athletes. When I trained recently with Jimmy Pedro, even the 16 year old kids are just all deadly, so it was terrifying. But I remember the Russian national team came through Philadelphia and one of the things that really impressed me is just how much easier judo was, training judo with them. They moved correctly. As the people getting thrown, every aspect of their body movement was correct in terms of it felt right to be throwing them, to be training with them. Everything about the gripping, about the position of their hips, about the shoulder, everything. It was fun. It was easy. And I always felt like I was learning. So I think all of that is loaded in, I guess, into proper training. So you’re developing through the throws, you’re developing the right technique.
It’s just certain athletes. When I trained recently with Jimmy Pedro, even the 16 year old kids are just all deadly, so it was terrifying. But I remember the Russian national team came through Philadelphia and one of the things that really impressed me is just how much easier judo was, training judo with them. They moved correctly. As the people getting thrown, every aspect of their body movement was correct in terms of it felt right to be throwing them, to be training with them. Everything about the gripping, about the position of their hips, about the shoulder, everything. It was fun. It was easy. And I always felt like I was learning. So I think all of that is loaded in, I guess, into proper training. So you’re developing through the throws, you’re developing the right technique.
Neil Adams
You got to develop. You have to develop between… I always had training partners that I trained with up to each Olympic games, we did the skills together and then we worked together in order to make techniques work. And we got it moving as quickly as we could. And one of the worst things that I see is, and I see a lot of YouTube stuff with them, coaches-
You got to develop. You have to develop between… I always had training partners that I trained with up to each Olympic games, we did the skills together and then we worked together in order to make techniques work. And we got it moving as quickly as we could. And one of the worst things that I see is, and I see a lot of YouTube stuff with them, coaches-
Lex Fridman
Here we go, got Neil Adams upset.
Here we go, got Neil Adams upset.
Neil Adams
Don’t even start me on that. Don’t even start me on that.
Don’t even start me on that. Don’t even start me on that.
Lex Fridman
What you-
What you-
Neil Adams
You’re laughing because you know what I’m talking about, right?
You’re laughing because you know what I’m talking about, right?
Lex Fridman
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I’m actually laughing because I’m enjoying you talking trash. But you’re talking about technique.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I’m actually laughing because I’m enjoying you talking trash. But you’re talking about technique.
Neil Adams
Yeah, well then the coaches and their clipboard guys with the clipboards and the stopwatches and they’ve got these kids running up and down the mat and then doing Uchikomi of something that’s technically incorrect 10 times and then running up and doing another 10 at the other side and actually mixing everything together. And it’s just a mess.
Yeah, well then the coaches and their clipboard guys with the clipboards and the stopwatches and they’ve got these kids running up and down the mat and then doing Uchikomi of something that’s technically incorrect 10 times and then running up and doing another 10 at the other side and actually mixing everything together. And it’s just a mess.
Lex Fridman
Technique is important.
Technique is important.
Neil Adams
Technical mess.
Technical mess.
Lex Fridman
That said, some of it is conditioning type stuff that you were doing. So what is the hardest type of physical conditioning you were doing?
That said, some of it is conditioning type stuff that you were doing. So what is the hardest type of physical conditioning you were doing?
Neil Adams
Probably ran too much when I was a kid. If I could go back now, I wouldn’t run as much. And I ran hard and I ran strong. And I remember doing London Marathon one time and I said, “I’m never going to do it again.” I said, “Never.” But I ran and the problem was when I did the London Marathon is I was trying to beat three hours.
Probably ran too much when I was a kid. If I could go back now, I wouldn’t run as much. And I ran hard and I ran strong. And I remember doing London Marathon one time and I said, “I’m never going to do it again.” I said, “Never.” But I ran and the problem was when I did the London Marathon is I was trying to beat three hours.
Lex Fridman
It’s that desire to win again.
It’s that desire to win again.
Neil Adams
It’s totally insane. It was insane. And I went out through half marathon in what I thought was a good time. Anyway, I got to 16-17 miles and totally blew it.
It’s totally insane. It was insane. And I went out through half marathon in what I thought was a good time. Anyway, I got to 16-17 miles and totally blew it.
Lex Fridman
So you went out too fast.
So you went out too fast.
Neil Adams
Yeah, I went out too fast.
Yeah, I went out too fast.
Lex Fridman
And then you just-
And then you just-
Neil Adams
I died.
I died.
Lex Fridman
…wanted to keep going.
…wanted to keep going.
Neil Adams
Absolutely. I died. I crossed the line. I remember seeing this bridge over there and the bridge, it was the finishing line over the bridge and I had to get there. It was the longest bridge I’ve ever, ever walked over and I walk, run. So I got over the bridge and I took one step over the line like that, and there was a guy over there and he was trying to rush everybody through. And he was going, “Come on, come on, come on. There’s people behind you?” “Get your hands off of me.” I said, “Get your hands off me now,” like that because we’re going to fall out. And I couldn’t move. I couldn’t move. I was white.
Absolutely. I died. I crossed the line. I remember seeing this bridge over there and the bridge, it was the finishing line over the bridge and I had to get there. It was the longest bridge I’ve ever, ever walked over and I walk, run. So I got over the bridge and I took one step over the line like that, and there was a guy over there and he was trying to rush everybody through. And he was going, “Come on, come on, come on. There’s people behind you?” “Get your hands off of me.” I said, “Get your hands off me now,” like that because we’re going to fall out. And I couldn’t move. I couldn’t move. I was white.
Lex Fridman
It’s amazing that you made it to the finish line though.
It’s amazing that you made it to the finish line though.
Neil Adams
I did. I got over there and Donald Duck passing me was a tell.
I did. I got over there and Donald Duck passing me was a tell.
Lex Fridman
Oh, there’s a person dressed as Donald Duck?
Oh, there’s a person dressed as Donald Duck?
Neil Adams
Donald Duck, yeah. But the thing was, I still crossed over 338. I crossed over 338, but I lost 38 minutes in the last four miles.
Donald Duck, yeah. But the thing was, I still crossed over 338. I crossed over 338, but I lost 38 minutes in the last four miles.
Lex Fridman
So that bridge, longest bridge ever.
So that bridge, longest bridge ever.
Neil Adams
The longest.
The longest.
Lex Fridman
So you regret the running, huh?
So you regret the running, huh?
Neil Adams
So anyway, I would do the running a little bit differently, but we ran hard. We did the weight training, we did good weight training. It was all conditioned. So I mean, it was never the same training all the time. So it was always, we’d have certain phases building up. It was scientifically done. It wasn’t just out there, run, weight training, judo, same judo all the time. It was always pretty scientific.
So anyway, I would do the running a little bit differently, but we ran hard. We did the weight training, we did good weight training. It was all conditioned. So I mean, it was never the same training all the time. So it was always, we’d have certain phases building up. It was scientifically done. It wasn’t just out there, run, weight training, judo, same judo all the time. It was always pretty scientific.
Lex Fridman
Good variety.
Good variety.
Neil Adams
It was a good variety. And it had build up and it had a speed phase and it had a power phase and it had a base condition.
It was a good variety. And it had build up and it had a speed phase and it had a power phase and it had a base condition.
Lex Fridman
What about the Randori? Was there a method to the madness there? How much Randori did you do?
What about the Randori? Was there a method to the madness there? How much Randori did you do?
Neil Adams
A lot. So the most important thing for me, I mean, I see now that there’s a lot of people out there that are not getting enough Randori. They’re not Randori-ing enough. And there’s a lot of sports science people and they’re running and they’re weight training and they’re doing it all to death. And there’s not enough judo. You have a look at some of the eastern block countries that are getting together, they’re having these mass camps and the Japanese, they have just massive people that they can do there. They’re doing probably 50-60 Randori’s a week.
A lot. So the most important thing for me, I mean, I see now that there’s a lot of people out there that are not getting enough Randori. They’re not Randori-ing enough. And there’s a lot of sports science people and they’re running and they’re weight training and they’re doing it all to death. And there’s not enough judo. You have a look at some of the eastern block countries that are getting together, they’re having these mass camps and the Japanese, they have just massive people that they can do there. They’re doing probably 50-60 Randori’s a week.
Lex Fridman
Wait, what?
Wait, what?
Neil Adams
50 or 60 a week.
50 or 60 a week.
Lex Fridman
Wow.
Wow.
Neil Adams
The average person is getting together… I mean, when I was doing Randori’s, when I went to Japan, it was just purely for 60 Randori’s a week.
The average person is getting together… I mean, when I was doing Randori’s, when I went to Japan, it was just purely for 60 Randori’s a week.
Lex Fridman
How much is each one? How long is it?
How much is each one? How long is it?
Neil Adams
So they were five minutes then, they’re four minutes now.
So they were five minutes then, they’re four minutes now.
Lex Fridman
That’s a lot, especially given the level of the competition there.
That’s a lot, especially given the level of the competition there.
Neil Adams
But you can do it in Japan because it’s fairly light. If they throw you, they throw you, you throw them.
But you can do it in Japan because it’s fairly light. If they throw you, they throw you, you throw them.
Lex Fridman
So there’s a level of you’re moving at a close to 100%, but the actual power in the force is not quite there.
So there’s a level of you’re moving at a close to 100%, but the actual power in the force is not quite there.
Neil Adams
Different in Korea. Korea was harder, it was more physical. So you couldn’t do 50 Randori’s in Korea. You’d die. So you’d do 30.
Different in Korea. Korea was harder, it was more physical. So you couldn’t do 50 Randori’s in Korea. You’d die. So you’d do 30.
Lex Fridman
50 Randori’s, wow.
50 Randori’s, wow.
Neil Adams
But you need the Randori. And so I chased the Randorers, so I chased them into training camps, I chased them all over my country. So I was getting 40 to 50 a week in my club. And then I would go to training camps and add more. And I honestly don’t think that they do enough now, a lot of countries.
But you need the Randori. And so I chased the Randorers, so I chased them into training camps, I chased them all over my country. So I was getting 40 to 50 a week in my club. And then I would go to training camps and add more. And I honestly don’t think that they do enough now, a lot of countries.
Lex Fridman
Somebody who doesn’t know Randori’s live training.
Somebody who doesn’t know Randori’s live training.
Neil Adams
Yeah, sparring.
Yeah, sparring.
Lex Fridman
Was there a few people you remember that were just really tough to go against? You mentioned Goldtooth, is there others like it?
Was there a few people you remember that were just really tough to go against? You mentioned Goldtooth, is there others like it?
Neil Adams
Goldtooth was pretty horrific.
Goldtooth was pretty horrific.
Lex Fridman
Well, you got him in the end.
Well, you got him in the end.
Neil Adams
I got him in the end.
I got him in the end.
Lex Fridman
I suppose I should say not just tough, but just good training partners that you like.
I suppose I should say not just tough, but just good training partners that you like.
Neil Adams
Great training partners. I remember Nishida and Nishida, I mentioned him earlier, said he was one of the best, I mean, he was just such a great technician. So I would go there to his dojo and he’d ask me to practice and he’d finish the practice and you know that he would always say, “Another one, we’ll do another one.” So you’d go, “Oh yeah,” because you had to make out that you weren’t that bothered that you had to do another one, so you’d do another one back to back. And then he’d go sometimes, “Let’s do another one.” So we’d end up doing 15 minutes with the same guy who could possibly throw you at any time. And that was hard. But I remember those particular guys and there were plenty of those.
Great training partners. I remember Nishida and Nishida, I mentioned him earlier, said he was one of the best, I mean, he was just such a great technician. So I would go there to his dojo and he’d ask me to practice and he’d finish the practice and you know that he would always say, “Another one, we’ll do another one.” So you’d go, “Oh yeah,” because you had to make out that you weren’t that bothered that you had to do another one, so you’d do another one back to back. And then he’d go sometimes, “Let’s do another one.” So we’d end up doing 15 minutes with the same guy who could possibly throw you at any time. And that was hard. But I remember those particular guys and there were plenty of those.
Lex Fridman
What do you do with the exhaustion that you’re feeling in those? How deep did you go in terms of-
What do you do with the exhaustion that you’re feeling in those? How deep did you go in terms of-
Neil Adams
You have to dig deep. And I think that that was the great thing about having certain European training camps were more physical. So I remember that we would have European training camps where you’d fight Germans and then the Dutch and then the French and then the Russian. You’d have all sorts different styles and people to fight and that was something then you’d have to dig in at a different place, come out of there.
You have to dig deep. And I think that that was the great thing about having certain European training camps were more physical. So I remember that we would have European training camps where you’d fight Germans and then the Dutch and then the French and then the Russian. You’d have all sorts different styles and people to fight and that was something then you’d have to dig in at a different place, come out of there.
Lex Fridman
Where do you go mentally? How many times have you gone there where you’re really in deep waters exhaustion wise in competition, actually?
Where do you go mentally? How many times have you gone there where you’re really in deep waters exhaustion wise in competition, actually?
Neil Adams
Competition, it’s happened. So sometimes you go past where your forearms are absolutely blown. I remember the final of Czech tournament that we had and fought a Frenchman in the final. And my forearms were so blown I couldn’t shake his hand. And then I remember they were solid, absolutely solid and they had lactic acid in them. And I remember I stood on the rostrum and they were giving me things and I couldn’t grip them properly. So I was saying, “Put it under my armpit or chin,” like that, trying to hold this and I couldn’t hold anything. So there are times when I really had to go really deep. I remember fighting two East Germans the same day, one of the competitions and the number one and the number two East Germans, and that was another day where I had to really dig deep.
Competition, it’s happened. So sometimes you go past where your forearms are absolutely blown. I remember the final of Czech tournament that we had and fought a Frenchman in the final. And my forearms were so blown I couldn’t shake his hand. And then I remember they were solid, absolutely solid and they had lactic acid in them. And I remember I stood on the rostrum and they were giving me things and I couldn’t grip them properly. So I was saying, “Put it under my armpit or chin,” like that, trying to hold this and I couldn’t hold anything. So there are times when I really had to go really deep. I remember fighting two East Germans the same day, one of the competitions and the number one and the number two East Germans, and that was another day where I had to really dig deep.
Lex Fridman
That’s the fascinating thing about some of these tournaments is if you go full distance on several matches in a row, what you’re seeing in the finals are two people that have fought a lot that day.
That’s the fascinating thing about some of these tournaments is if you go full distance on several matches in a row, what you’re seeing in the finals are two people that have fought a lot that day.
Neil Adams
And we have golden score now. So we see a lot of guys that are going into golden score and they’ve done one contest in four minutes and then they go another four minutes. And then we’ve had some go into a third four minutes, this is all back to back. It might be in the first round, it might be in the final. And we’ve got some now that are coming out and you can see the stats and the ones that win in golden score. So we got Japanese, Hashimoto, he’s the Japanese representative now instead of Ono, because Ono’s finished. So Hashimoto’s coming out. He was in a tournament last week.
And we have golden score now. So we see a lot of guys that are going into golden score and they’ve done one contest in four minutes and then they go another four minutes. And then we’ve had some go into a third four minutes, this is all back to back. It might be in the first round, it might be in the final. And we’ve got some now that are coming out and you can see the stats and the ones that win in golden score. So we got Japanese, Hashimoto, he’s the Japanese representative now instead of Ono, because Ono’s finished. So Hashimoto’s coming out. He was in a tournament last week.
Lex Fridman
Is he a good one to look up?
Is he a good one to look up?
Neil Adams
Yeah, just have a look at him. So Hashimoto’s in white here and there’s a great example there. Well, I’m glad we got onto that. So I mean, he has got great technique, Hashimoto.
Yeah, just have a look at him. So Hashimoto’s in white here and there’s a great example there. Well, I’m glad we got onto that. So I mean, he has got great technique, Hashimoto.
Lex Fridman
Effortless, effortless. Pay attention as we’re talking. Wow.
Effortless, effortless. Pay attention as we’re talking. Wow.
Neil Adams
Right, so you can see exactly what we’re talking about there, great timing. And again, sometimes he backs them up to the edge and then he’ll wait for them to come back in towards, they don’t want to step out to get a penalty.
Right, so you can see exactly what we’re talking about there, great timing. And again, sometimes he backs them up to the edge and then he’ll wait for them to come back in towards, they don’t want to step out to get a penalty.
Lex Fridman
I guess that’s a cross grip Tai otoshi or did I see that wrong?
I guess that’s a cross grip Tai otoshi or did I see that wrong?
Neil Adams
Yeah, cross grip, different grips. Oh, great examples there. Just what we were talking about.
Yeah, cross grip, different grips. Oh, great examples there. Just what we were talking about.
Lex Fridman
Making it look so easy. Wow.
Making it look so easy. Wow.
Neil Adams
So he’s going to be their representative at 73 kilograms. Look at him, back him up again and again, just catching him as he pushes back.
So he’s going to be their representative at 73 kilograms. Look at him, back him up again and again, just catching him as he pushes back.
Lex Fridman
So push, push, push, and then-
So push, push, push, and then-
Neil Adams
Yeah, action, reaction at it’s best there. And slight change of direction. He sometimes goes down onto his knee there, which is seoi otoshi. It turns from Tai otoshi, which is springing up, to seoi otoshi that’s going down.
Yeah, action, reaction at it’s best there. And slight change of direction. He sometimes goes down onto his knee there, which is seoi otoshi. It turns from Tai otoshi, which is springing up, to seoi otoshi that’s going down.
Lex Fridman
Oh, the title of the video is, Tai Otoshi is a Work of Art.
Oh, the title of the video is, Tai Otoshi is a Work of Art.
Neil Adams
This is him at his best, showing him doing what he does best. But he had to go three times into golden score last week and dig deep and lost one of them, I think.
This is him at his best, showing him doing what he does best. But he had to go three times into golden score last week and dig deep and lost one of them, I think.
Lex Fridman
But you’re still going at it. You’re talking about all those training sessions. Niki, your wonderful wife, told me that you were going all over from Target to Target looking for workout clothes because your luggage got lost because you had to get a workout in.
But you’re still going at it. You’re talking about all those training sessions. Niki, your wonderful wife, told me that you were going all over from Target to Target looking for workout clothes because your luggage got lost because you had to get a workout in.
Neil Adams
You know what? I realized that if I’m a miserable git, then she’ll get me into the gym. And the thing is that I’m better if I get in there for an hour and I just do something, at least 35-40 minutes cardio. And then I do some weights and more high repetitions. It’s not so much heavy weights now, but more functional stuff.
You know what? I realized that if I’m a miserable git, then she’ll get me into the gym. And the thing is that I’m better if I get in there for an hour and I just do something, at least 35-40 minutes cardio. And then I do some weights and more high repetitions. It’s not so much heavy weights now, but more functional stuff.
Lex Fridman
I mean, you travel all over the world for the commentary of these competitions. So is it sometimes a challenge to figure out how-
I mean, you travel all over the world for the commentary of these competitions. So is it sometimes a challenge to figure out how-
Neil Adams
Well during Covid then they closed all the gyms, but we were still going out. We were one of the first ones out. The judo were some of the first out, the competitions were behind closed doors, so we were in the hotel, the gym was closed, so we couldn’t use the gyms, so we had to look for other ways that we could work out. So most of the hotels that we were in were high-rise hotels. So we were in the steps, we were doing the steps right the way up. So I started it, and so I started off with me going up and then one or two of the others and the referees started to go up with me. So in the end, we’d have this trail of people going up the steps and down. And every place we went to, we had the steps. So that was an interesting situation. So we were sick of steps in the end.
Well during Covid then they closed all the gyms, but we were still going out. We were one of the first ones out. The judo were some of the first out, the competitions were behind closed doors, so we were in the hotel, the gym was closed, so we couldn’t use the gyms, so we had to look for other ways that we could work out. So most of the hotels that we were in were high-rise hotels. So we were in the steps, we were doing the steps right the way up. So I started it, and so I started off with me going up and then one or two of the others and the referees started to go up with me. So in the end, we’d have this trail of people going up the steps and down. And every place we went to, we had the steps. So that was an interesting situation. So we were sick of steps in the end.
Advice for beginners
Lex Fridman
What advice would you give to beginners, people starting out in judo, how to develop their game, how to find the beauty in the sport and the art of judo?
What advice would you give to beginners, people starting out in judo, how to develop their game, how to find the beauty in the sport and the art of judo?
Neil Adams
If you put 10 people in a room and said, “Right, get on with it,” you’d have mayhem. And I think that whatever sport you’re doing, you need good instruction, good teaching, and a good club atmosphere, somewhere that’s not so intense that winning is the only thing. And I think that if you look at 90% of the people that practice martial arts are doing it for pleasure. So they want to get pleasure. So you need a club that’s got a bit of a mixture. They’ve got a direction to go into competition if they want, and then the rest, it’s for fun and to enjoy it, but with really good instruction because with really good instruction and a good foundation and a good base, you get more enjoyment because you have more success. Let’s be honest, the more success we have with something, the more we like it.
If you put 10 people in a room and said, “Right, get on with it,” you’d have mayhem. And I think that whatever sport you’re doing, you need good instruction, good teaching, and a good club atmosphere, somewhere that’s not so intense that winning is the only thing. And I think that if you look at 90% of the people that practice martial arts are doing it for pleasure. So they want to get pleasure. So you need a club that’s got a bit of a mixture. They’ve got a direction to go into competition if they want, and then the rest, it’s for fun and to enjoy it, but with really good instruction because with really good instruction and a good foundation and a good base, you get more enjoyment because you have more success. Let’s be honest, the more success we have with something, the more we like it.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, and great technique is a way to really discover the beauty of the art. And so great teaching is really important there.
Yeah, and great technique is a way to really discover the beauty of the art. And so great teaching is really important there.
Neil Adams
Great teaching is so important.
Great teaching is so important.
Lex Fridman
What does it take to get from the early days when you started judo to world-class level?
What does it take to get from the early days when you started judo to world-class level?
Neil Adams
I think that with most, I mean, you do hear, don’t you? If somebody’s been doing judo for eight years and then they’re in… And I think it happened, one of the French, she went to the Olympic games in 2012 and she’d been doing judo for eight years, but then she started to lose. So she had a relative success early on. The Olympics was one of them. She got a silver medal, but then she went off the boil and then she came back and now she’s still competing and she’s been there for well over 13 years at the very top. So I think that any foundation, it’s like anything, if you lay a really solid foundation, it generally lasts longer.
I think that with most, I mean, you do hear, don’t you? If somebody’s been doing judo for eight years and then they’re in… And I think it happened, one of the French, she went to the Olympic games in 2012 and she’d been doing judo for eight years, but then she started to lose. So she had a relative success early on. The Olympics was one of them. She got a silver medal, but then she went off the boil and then she came back and now she’s still competing and she’s been there for well over 13 years at the very top. So I think that any foundation, it’s like anything, if you lay a really solid foundation, it generally lasts longer.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, but that foundation again, is that technique or what does it take to build that foundation?
Yeah, but that foundation again, is that technique or what does it take to build that foundation?
Neil Adams
I think technique, you get away with murder. With technique, you can get away with having bad condition, but I mean, you get found out in the end. But you can go out and you can win certain things by doing really nice technique. But I think if you’ve got the mixture, if you’ve got the whole package, then you can go the whole way.
I think technique, you get away with murder. With technique, you can get away with having bad condition, but I mean, you get found out in the end. But you can go out and you can win certain things by doing really nice technique. But I think if you’ve got the mixture, if you’ve got the whole package, then you can go the whole way.
Lex Fridman
So for people who somehow don’t know some of the greatest judo matches ever. You’ve done Grand Prix’s, you’ve done all of these events, Olympics, championship, everything. Just looking at the history of judo, what stands out to you? What events stand out to you? What are some good memories that pop to your head?
So for people who somehow don’t know some of the greatest judo matches ever. You’ve done Grand Prix’s, you’ve done all of these events, Olympics, championship, everything. Just looking at the history of judo, what stands out to you? What events stand out to you? What are some good memories that pop to your head?
Neil Adams
I think some of the Paris tournaments are amazing because the crowd, they’re there, they’re on the mat, they’re all judoka, they’re well-educated to the sport. Every time somebody twitches, they’re very biased towards their own, which you expect, but sometimes I haven’t been able to hear myself speak, and that’s very unusual. You’ve got the headphones on and you’re blocked out. Sometimes Teddy Riner’s been walking out there and the crowd are going crazy and they’re on their feet when somebody twitches and then you get the crowd silences. We had one of those last week. Everybody’s cheering their man and then bang, their man goes over.
I think some of the Paris tournaments are amazing because the crowd, they’re there, they’re on the mat, they’re all judoka, they’re well-educated to the sport. Every time somebody twitches, they’re very biased towards their own, which you expect, but sometimes I haven’t been able to hear myself speak, and that’s very unusual. You’ve got the headphones on and you’re blocked out. Sometimes Teddy Riner’s been walking out there and the crowd are going crazy and they’re on their feet when somebody twitches and then you get the crowd silences. We had one of those last week. Everybody’s cheering their man and then bang, their man goes over.
Lex Fridman
And then it’s silence.
And then it’s silence.
Neil Adams
Silence, nothing like that. And then of course, we were commentating, we would go, “That was a bit of a crowd silencer.” But that happens.
Silence, nothing like that. And then of course, we were commentating, we would go, “That was a bit of a crowd silencer.” But that happens.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, that is a surprising thing, at least it was to me, that Paris and France is really big on judo.
Yeah, that is a surprising thing, at least it was to me, that Paris and France is really big on judo.
Neil Adams
Massive. And there’s always surprises. Paris is great. In Japan for the Olympic games, the biggest surprise was Ono getting beaten in the team event. Now Ono is the greatest Judo man. Pound for pound, probably one of the best. And he won the Olympic title and then they went into the team event against France and Ono lost to a, He’s not run of the mill German, but the German, he wasn’t certainly Olympic title-esque and beat Ono, managed to throw him.
Massive. And there’s always surprises. Paris is great. In Japan for the Olympic games, the biggest surprise was Ono getting beaten in the team event. Now Ono is the greatest Judo man. Pound for pound, probably one of the best. And he won the Olympic title and then they went into the team event against France and Ono lost to a, He’s not run of the mill German, but the German, he wasn’t certainly Olympic title-esque and beat Ono, managed to throw him.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Well, the team stuff is fascinating, right?
Yeah. Well, the team stuff is fascinating, right?
Neil Adams
Yeah, it’s fascinating.
Yeah, it’s fascinating.
Lex Fridman
It changes the dynamics of the whole thing. And I mean, it’s funny you say Paris, it really makes it really big deal that this Olympics is being held in Paris.
It changes the dynamics of the whole thing. And I mean, it’s funny you say Paris, it really makes it really big deal that this Olympics is being held in Paris.
Neil Adams
And they’ll be the team to beat, French team because they have the best balance of the weight categories. They have the best balance with their people that are world and Olympic champions and qualified men and women. So it’s three men, three women. They have the best balance out of anybody.
And they’ll be the team to beat, French team because they have the best balance of the weight categories. They have the best balance with their people that are world and Olympic champions and qualified men and women. So it’s three men, three women. They have the best balance out of anybody.
Lex Fridman
And an educated audience.
And an educated audience.
Neil Adams
Educated audience, home grounds.
Educated audience, home grounds.
Lex Fridman
It’s going to be awesome.
It’s going to be awesome.
Neil Adams
It’s going to be mad.
It’s going to be mad.
Lex Fridman
It’s going to be super fun.
It’s going to be super fun.
Neil Adams
It will be super fun.
It will be super fun.
Lex Fridman
Are you nervous?
Are you nervous?
Neil Adams
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
All right.
All right.
Neil Adams
Do you get nervous?
Do you get nervous?
Lex Fridman
I get nervous. I get nervous.
I get nervous. I get nervous.
Neil Adams
I do as well. I get really nervous.
I do as well. I get really nervous.
Lex Fridman
I’m nervous right now. But given, especially because it’s the Olympics and you want to celebrate people properly and it’s everything for them. And a lot of people, especially the finals matches, it’ll be watched millions of times, the highest of stakes, all of this.
I’m nervous right now. But given, especially because it’s the Olympics and you want to celebrate people properly and it’s everything for them. And a lot of people, especially the finals matches, it’ll be watched millions of times, the highest of stakes, all of this.
Neil Adams
Played over and over. And I find that with mine, I’m now a little bit more careful, so I’ll celebrate a massive throw and then have empathy to the one that’s been thrown because it’s not the best feeling in the world, especially in Olympic finals. Can you imagine that?
Played over and over. And I find that with mine, I’m now a little bit more careful, so I’ll celebrate a massive throw and then have empathy to the one that’s been thrown because it’s not the best feeling in the world, especially in Olympic finals. Can you imagine that?
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Neil Adams
Must be terrible.
Must be terrible.
Lex Fridman
Must be terrible.
Must be terrible.
Neil Adams
Just reflecting. So no, I have a bit of empathy there, and I try and say the right things because they always do come up to me and say, “You commentated my fights.”
Just reflecting. So no, I have a bit of empathy there, and I try and say the right things because they always do come up to me and say, “You commentated my fights.”
Lex Fridman
Yeah, you’re the voice of the biggest triumphs and the biggest tragedies for these athletes, for the world that watches and admires these athletes.
Yeah, you’re the voice of the biggest triumphs and the biggest tragedies for these athletes, for the world that watches and admires these athletes.
Neil Adams
No pressure.
No pressure.
Lex Fridman
You’re the voice. Don’t screw it up.
You’re the voice. Don’t screw it up.
Neil Adams
Don’t screw it up.
Don’t screw it up.
Lex Fridman
Your voice is in my head when I watch these. It’s just fascinating, it’s fascinating, but you’re a master of it. It’s a huge honor that you would talk with me. Thank you for everything you’ve done for the sport of judo, for the Olympics, for just sports in general, just celebrating greatness in all of its forms. Thank you for talking today. Keep going. I can’t wait to listen to you in Paris.
Your voice is in my head when I watch these. It’s just fascinating, it’s fascinating, but you’re a master of it. It’s a huge honor that you would talk with me. Thank you for everything you’ve done for the sport of judo, for the Olympics, for just sports in general, just celebrating greatness in all of its forms. Thank you for talking today. Keep going. I can’t wait to listen to you in Paris.
Neil Adams
Thank you for having me, and it’s just been an honor to be here with you.
Thank you for having me, and it’s just been an honor to be here with you.
Lex Fridman
Thanks for listening to this conversation with Neil Adams. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now let me leave you with some words from Miyamoto Musashi. There’s nothing outside of yourself that can ever enable you to get better, stronger, richer, quicker, or smarter. Everything is within, everything exists. Seek nothing outside of yourself. Thank you for listening and hope to see you next time.
Thanks for listening to this conversation with Neil Adams. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now let me leave you with some words from Miyamoto Musashi. There’s nothing outside of yourself that can ever enable you to get better, stronger, richer, quicker, or smarter. Everything is within, everything exists. Seek nothing outside of yourself. Thank you for listening and hope to see you next time.
Transcript for Edward Gibson: Human Language, Psycholinguistics, Syntax, Grammar & LLMs | Lex Fridman Podcast #426
This is a transcript of Lex Fridman Podcast #426 with Edward Gibson.
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It seemed just a bunch of hacks to me, it didn’t seem like a real theory of things in any way. And so I just thought this seemed like an interesting area where there wasn’t enough good work.
Now, we look at other languages like Japanese or Hindi, these are so-called verb final languages. Maybe a little more than 40%, maybe 45% of the world’s languages or more, 50% of the world’s languages are verb final. Those tend to be post positions. They have the same kinds of markers as we do in English but they put them after. Sorry, they put them first, the markers come first. You say instead of talk about a book, you say a book about, the opposite order there in Japanese or in Hindi. You do the opposite and the talk comes at the end. The verb will come at the end as well. Instead of Mary kicked the ball, it’s Mary ball kicked. And then if it’s Mary kicked the ball to John, it’s John to, the to, the marker there, the preposition, it’s a post position in these languages.
And so a fascinating thing to me is that within a language, this order aligns, it’s harmonic. And so it’s one or the other, it’s either verb initial or verb final. But then you’ll have prepositions, prepositions or post positions. And that’s across the languages that we can look at. We’ve got around a thousand languages for … There’s around 7,000 languages around on the earth right now. But we have information about say, word order on around a thousand of those pretty. Decent amount of information. And for those thousand which we know about, about 95% fit that pattern. It’s about half and half, half are verb initial like English and half are verb final like Japanese.
And it turns out that what we’re trying to do in a language is actually minimize those dependency links. It’s easier for me to say things if the words that are connecting for their meaning are close together. It’s easier for you in understanding if that’s also true. If they’re far away, it’s hard to produce that and it’s hard for you to understand. And the languages of the world, within a language and across languages fit that generalization. It turns out that having verbs initial and then having prepositions ends up making dependencies shorter. And having verbs final and having post positions ends up making dependencies shorter than if you cross them. If you cross them, you just end up … It’s possible, you can do it.
It’s unmarked in a way. But in the past tense, it’s just drank for everyone. There’s no morphology at all for past tense. There is morphology that’s marking past tense but it’s an irregular now. Drink to drank, it’s not even a regular word. In many verbs there’s an ED we add. Walk to walked, we add that to say it’s the past tense. I just happen to choose an irregular because the high frequency words tend to have irregulars in English for …
The most efficient … No, the most detailed color vocabulary would have over a million terms to distinguish all the different colors that we can see. But of course, we don’t have that. Somehow, it’s useful for English to have evolved in some way such that there’s 11 terms that people find useful to talk about, black, white, red, blue, green, yellow, purple, gray, pink. And I probably missed something there. There’s 11 that everyone knows and depending on your … But if you go to different cultures, especially the non-industrialized cultures, there’ll be many fewer. Some cultures will have only two, believe it or not. The Dani in Papua New Guinea have only two labels that the group uses for color, and those are roughly black and white. They are very, very dark and very, very light, which are roughly black and white. And you might think, “Oh, they’re dividing the whole color space into light and dark.”
Or something. And that’s not really true. They mostly only label the black and the white things. They just don’t talk about the colors for the other ones. And then there’s other groups … I’ve worked with a group called the Tsimane down in Bolivia in South America, and they have three words that everyone knows but there’s a few others that many people know. It’s depending on how you count, between three and seven words that the group knows, okay. And again, they’re black and white, everyone knows those. And red, that tends to be the third word that cultures bring in, if there’s a word. It’s always red, the third one. And then after that, it’s all bets are off about what they bring in. And so after that, they bring in a big blue-green group. They have one for that. And then different people have different words that they’ll use for other parts of the space.
Anyway, it’s probably related to what they want to talk … Not what they see because they see the same colors as we see. It’s not like they have a low color palette in the things they’re looking at. They’re looking at a lot of beautiful scenery okay, a lot of different colored flowers and berries and things. And so there’s lots of things of very bright colors but they just don’t label the color in those cases. We don’t know this but we think probably what’s going on here is why you label something is you need to talk to someone else about it. And why do I need to talk about a color? Well, if I have two things which are identical and I want you to give me the one that’s different, and the only way it varies is color, then I invent a word which tells you, “This is the one I want. I want the red sweater off the rack, not the green sweater.”
There’s two. And so those things will be identical because these are things we made and they’re dyed and there’s nothing different about them. And so in industrialized society, everything we’ve got is pretty much arbitrarily colored. But you go to a non-industrialized group, that’s not true. And so it’s not like they’re not interested in color. If you bring bright colored things to them, they like them just like we like them. Bright colors are great, they’re beautiful, but they just don’t need to talk about them, they don’t have to.
And so his idea was that maybe we can think about the complexity of a language by how complicated the rules are. And the rules will look like this. They will have a left-hand side and it’ll have a right-hand side. Something on the left-hand side will expand to the thing on the right-hand side. Say, we’ll start with an S, which is the root, which is a sentence, and then we’re going to expand to things like a noun phrase and a verb phrase is what he would say, for instance, okay. An S goes to an NP and a VP, is a phrase structure rule. And then we figure out what an NP is. An NP is a determiner and a noun, for instance. And a verb phrase is something else, is a verb and another noun phrase and another NP, for instance. Those are the rules of a very simple phrase, structure. And so he proposed phrase structure grammar as a way to cover human languages. And then he actually figured out that, “Well, depending on the formals, that- “
The place where Chomsky sort of devolved or went off from this is he also thought there was something called movement. And that’s where we disagree. That’s the place where I would say we disagree. I mean maybe we’ll get into that later. But the idea is… Do you want me to explain that now?
And he looked, if you look at English, you see that that’s true for all those modal verbs and for other kinds of auxiliary verbs. In English, you always do that. You always put an auxiliary verb at the front. And when he saw that, so if I say, “I can win this bet. Can I win this bet?” So I move a can to the front. So actually that’s a theory. I just gave you a theory there. He talks about it as movement. That word in the declarative is the root, is the default way to think about the sentence. And you move the auxiliary verb to the front. That’s a movement theory.
And he just thought that was just so obvious that it must be true, that there’s nothing more to say about that. This is how auxiliary verbs work in English. There’s a movement rule such that, to get from the declarative to the interrogative, you’re moving the auxiliary to the front. And it’s a little more complicated as soon as you go to simple present and simple past. Because if I say, “John slept,” you have to say, “Did John sleep?” Not. “Slept, John,” right? And so you have to somehow get an auxiliary verb. And I guess underlyingly, it’s like slept is… It’s a little more complicated than that, but that’s his idea. There’s a movement.
And so a different way to think about that, I mean, then he ended up showing later. So he proposed this theory of grammar, which has movement. There’s other places where he thought there’s movement, not just auxiliary verbs, but things like the passive in English and things like questions, WH questions, a bunch of places where he thought there’s also movement going on. And each one of those, he thinks there’s words, well, phrases and words are moving around from one structure to another, which he called deep structure to surface structure. I mean, there’s two different structures in his theory.
There’s a different way to think about this, which is there’s no movement at all. There’s a lexical copying rule such that the word will, or the word can, these auxiliary verbs, they just have two forms. And one of them is the declarative and one of them is interrogative. And you basically have the declarative one and oh, I form the interrogative, or I can form one from the other. It doesn’t matter which direction you go. And I just have a new entry which has the same meaning, which has a slightly different argument structure. Argument structure is just a fancy word for the ordering of the words.
And so if I say, it was, “The two dogs can or will enter the room,” there’s two forms of will. One is, will, declarative. And then, okay, I’ve got my subject to the left, it comes before me, and the verb comes after me in that one. And then the will, interrogative, it’s like, oh, I go first. Interrogative will is first, and then I have the subject immediately after and then the verb after that. And so you can just generate from one of those words another word with a slightly different argument structure with different ordering.
And so that is that a great advantage is, well Chomsky really famously, in 1971 showed that the movement story leads to learnability problems. It leads to problems for how language is learned. It’s really, really hard to figure out what the underlying structure of a language is if you have both phrase structure and movement. It’s really hard to figure out what came from what. There’s a lot of possibilities there. If you don’t have that problem, the learning problem gets a lot easier.
The non-movement story, it doesn’t have this. It’s much more bottom-up, you’re learning rules. You’re learning rules one by one, and oh, this word is connected to that word. Another advantage, it’s learnable. Another advantage of it is that it predicts that not all auxiliaries might move. It might depend on the word, and that turns out to be true. So there’s words that don’t really work as auxiliary. They work in declarative and not in interrogative. So I can say, I’ll give you the opposite first. I can say, ” Aren’t I invited to the party?” And that’s an interrogative form. But it’s not from, “I aren’t invited to the party.” There is no, “I aren’t.” So that’s interrogative only.
And then we also have forms like, ought. “I ought to do this.” And I guess some old British people can say…
So there’s something called context-sensitive as well, where you can have, this is just the formal language description. In a context-free grammar, you have one… This is a bunch of formal language theory we’re doing here.
A regular language is just more constrained, and so it doesn’t allow anything on the right. Basically it’s one very complicated rule is what a regular language is. And so it doesn’t have any… I just say the long distance dependencies, it doesn’t allow recursion, for instance. There’s no recursion. Yeah, recursion is where, which human languages have recursion, they have embedding. Well, it doesn’t allow center-embedded recursion, which human languages have, which is what…
So he proposed this multiple theories in ’57 and then ’65. They all have this framework though. It was phrase structure plus movement, different versions of the phrase structure and the movement in the ’57. These are the most famous original bits of Chomsky’s work. And then in ’71 is when he figured out that those lead to learning problems. That there’s cases where a kid could never figure out which set of rules was intended. And then he said, “Well, that means it’s innate.” It’s kind of interesting. He just really thought the movement was just so obviously true that he didn’t even entertain giving it up. It’s just, that’s obviously right.
And it was later where people figured out that there’s all these subtle ways in which things which look like generalizations aren’t generalizations across the category. They’re word specific and they kind of work, but they don’t work across various other words in the category. And so it’s easier to just think of these things as lexical copies. And I think he was very obsessed. I don’t know, I’m guessing. But he really wanted this story to be simple in some sense. And language is a little more complicated in some sense. He didn’t like words. He never talks about words. He likes to talk about combinations of words. And words are, you look up a dictionary, there’s 50 senses for a common word. The word take, will have 30 or 40 senses in it.
So there will be many different senses for common words. And he just doesn’t think about that, or he doesn’t think that’s language. I think he doesn’t think that’s language. He thinks that words are distinct from combinations of words. I think they’re the same. If you look at my brain in the scanner while I’m listening to a language I understand, and you compare, I can localize my language network in a few minutes, in like 15 minutes. And what you do is I listen to a language I know. I listen to maybe some language I don’t know, or I listen to muffled speech or I read sentences and I read non-words. I can do anything like this, anything that’s really like English and anything that’s not very like English. So I’ve got something like it, and not, that I control.
And the voxels, which is just the 3D pixels in my brain that are responding most is a language area. And that’s this left-lateralized area in my head. And wherever I look in that network, if you look for the combinations versus the words it’s everywhere.
The problem is the when. It’s measuring oxygen. And oxygen takes a little while to get to those cells, so it takes on the order of seconds. So I talk fast, I probably listen fast. And I can probably understand things really fast. So a lot of stuff happens in two seconds. And so to say that we know what’s going on, that the words right now in that network, our best guess is that whole network is doing something similar. But maybe different parts of that network are doing different things. And that’s probably the case. We just don’t have very good methods to figure that out at this moment.
And so it’s all thought experiments. It’s his own intuitions. So I just don’t think that’s the way to do things. That’s across the street, they’re across the street from us, difference between brain and cog-sci and linguistics. I mean, not all linguists, some of the linguists, depending on what you do, more speech-oriented, they do more quantitative stuff. But in the meaning words and well, it’s combinations of words, syntax, semantics, they tend not to do experiments and corpus analyses.
Let me give you an example. We have in any language, we have mostly local connections between words, but they’re abstract. The connections are abstracted between categories of words. And so you can always make things further apart if you add modification, for example, after a noun. So a noun in English comes before a verb, the subject noun comes before a verb, and then there’s an object after, for example.
So I can say, what I said before, “The dog entered the room,” or something like that. So I can modify dog. If I say something more about dog after it, then what I’m doing is indirectly I’m lengthening the dependence between dog and entered, by adding more stuff to it. So just make it explicit here, if I say, “The boy who the cat scratched, cried.” We’re going to have a mean cat here. And so what I’ve got here is, the boy cried, would be a very short, simple sentence. And I just told you something about the boy, and I told you it was the boy who the cat scratched.
So what’s interesting about that is that what I’m doing is nesting dependencies there. I’m putting one, I’ve got a subject connected to a verb there. And then I’m modifying that with a clause, another clause, which happens to have a subject and a verb relation. I’m trying to do that again on the second one. And what that does is it lengthens out the dependence, multiple dependence actually get lengthened out there. The dependencies get longer, on the outside ones get long, and even the ones in between get kind of long.
What’s fascinating is that that’s bad. That’s really horrendous in English. But that’s horrendous in any language. No matter what language you look at, if you do, just figure out some structure where I’m going to have some modification following some head, which is connected to some later head, and I do it again, it won’t be good. Guaranteed. 100% that will be uninterpretable in that language in the same way that was uninterpretable in English.
So that’s not necessarily the right explanation. I can go through reasons why that’s probably a good explanation. And it’s not really just about one of them. So probably it’s a pair of them or something of these dependents that you get along that drives you to be really confused in that case. And so what the behavioral consequence there, I mean, this is kind of methods, like how do we get at this? You could try to do experiments to get people to produce these things. They’re going to have a hard time producing them. You can try to do experiments to get them to understand them, and see how well they understand them. Can they understand them? Another method you can do is give people partial materials and ask them to complete them, those center embedded materials. And they’ll fail. So I’ve done that. I’ve done all these kinds of things.
If I give that to completion online somewhere, to a crowdsourcing platform and ask people to complete that, they will miss off a verb very regularly. Like half the time, maybe two-thirds of the time, they’ll just leave off one of those verb phrases. Even with that simple… So say, “The book, which the author who…” And they’ll say, “Was…” You need three verbs, I need three verbs. “Who I met, wrote, was good.” And they’ll give me two. They’ll say, “Who was famous was good.” Or something like that. They’ll just give me two. And that’ll happen about 60% of the time. So 40%, maybe 30%, they’ll do it correctly. Correctly, meaning they’ll do a three-verb phrase. I don’t know what’s correct or not. This is hard. It’s a hard task.
Spoken tasks are just more complicated to administer and analyze because people do weird things when they speak. And it’s harder to analyze what they do, but they generally point to the same kinds of things.
And so we just like, all right, there’s a root. And let’s say a sentence is, let’s go back to, “Two dogs entered the room.” So entered is the root. And entered has two dependents. It’s got dogs and it has room. And what he did is let’s scramble that order, that’s three things, the root and the head, and the two dependents, and into some random order, just random. And then just do that for all the dependents down the tree. So now look, do it for the, and whatever, there’s two in dogs and room. And it’s a very short sentence. When sentences get longer and you have more dependents, there’s more scrambling that’s possible. So, you could figure out one scrambling for that sentence.
He did this a hundred times for every sentence in every one of these texts, every corpus. And then he just compared the dependency lengths in those random scramblings to what actually happened, what the English or the French or the German was in original language or Chinese or what all these like 60 languages. And the dependency lengths are always shorter in the real language compared to this kind of a control.
And there’s another, it’s a little more rigid, his control. So the way I described it, you could have crossed dependencies. By scrambling that way, you could scramble in any way at all, languages don’t do that. They tend not to cross dependencies very much. So the dependency structure, they tend to keep things non-crossed. There’s a technical term they call that projective, but it’s just non-crossed is all that is, projective. And so if you just constrain the scrambling so that it only gives you projective, non-crossed, the same thing holds.
So still human languages are much shorter than this kind of a control. So what it means is that in every language, we’re trying to put things close, relative to this kind of a control. It doesn’t matter about the word order. Some of these are verb final. Some of them these are verb medial like English. And some are even verb initial, there are a few languages in the world which have VSO, word order verb, subject, object, languages. Haven’t talked about those. It’s like 10% of them.
I could have referred to the dogs as a Dalmatian and a poodle or something. I could have been more specific or less specific about what they are, and I could have been more abstract about the number. So I am trying to keep the meaning, which is this event, constant. And then how am I going to describe that to get that to you? It kind of depends on what you need to know and what I think you need to know. But let’s get control for all that stuff and I’m just choosing, but I’m doing something simpler than you’re doing, which is just forms, just words.
There’s this woman in my department, Fedorenko, and she’s done a lot of work on this question about what’s the connection between language and thought. And so she uses, I was referring earlier to MRI, fMRI, that’s her primary method. And so she has been really fascinated by this question about what language is. And so as I mentioned earlier, you can localize my language area or your language area in a few minutes, like 15 minutes. I can listen to language, listen to non-language or backward speech or something, and we’ll find areas left lateralized network in my head, which especially is very sensitive to language as opposed to whatever that control was.
You’ll find exactly the same network. And so this is about high level the comprehension of language in this case. Production’s a little harder to run the scanner, but the same thing happens in production. You get the same network, so production’s a little harder. You have to figure out how do you run a task in the network such that you’re doing some kind of production? And I can’t remember, they’ve done a bunch of different kinds of tasks there where you get people to produce things, figure out how to produce, and the same network goes on there exactly the same place.
You can’t talk to them, they don’t understand you. They can’t speak, they can’t write, they can’t read. But they can play chess, they can drive their cars, they can do all kinds of other stuff, do math. So math is not in the language area, for instance. You do arithmetic and stuff, that’s not in language area. It’s got symbols, so people confuse some kind of symbolic processing with language, and symbolic processing is not the same. So there are symbols and they have meaning, but it’s not language. It’s not a conventionalized language system, and so math isn’t there. And so they can do math. They do just as well as their control age matching controls and all these tasks. This is Rosemary Varley over in University College of London who has a bunch of patients who she’s shown this. So that sort of combination suggests that language isn’t necessary for thinking. It doesn’t mean you can’t think in language. You could think in language because language allows a lot of expression, but it’s just you don’t need it for thinking. It suggests that language is a separate system from-
You choose one of the three and then he opens one of the doors and it’s some junk prize. And then the question is, should you trade to get the other one? And the answer is, yes, you should trade because he knew which ones you could turn around, and so now the odds are two-thirds. And then if you just change that a little bit to the large language model, the large language model has seen that explanation so many times. If you change the story, it’s a little bit, but you make it sound like it’s the Monty Hall problem, but it’s not. You just say, “Oh, there’s three doors and one behind them is a good prize and there’s two bad doors. I happen to know it’s behind door number one. The good prize, the car is behind door number one, so I’m going to choose door number one.”
Monty Hall opens door number three and shows me nothing there. Should I trade for door number two, even though I know the good prize in door number one? And then the large language model say, “Yes, you should trade,” because it just goes through the forms that it’s seen before so many times on these cases where yes, you should trade because your odds have shifted from one in three now to two out of three to being that thing. It doesn’t have any way to remember that actually, you have 100% probability behind that door number one. You know that. That’s not part of the scheme that it’s seen hundreds and hundreds of times before. And so even if you try to explain to it that it’s wrong, that they can’t do that, it’ll just keep giving you back the problem.
Another issue you raised before was how do you measure distance? Is it words? It probably isn’t, is part of the problem, is that some words matter than more than others meaning nouns might matter. And then it maybe depends on which kind of noun. Is it a noun we’ve already introduced or a noun that’s already been mentioned? Is it a pronoun versus a name? All these things probably matter. So, probably the simplest thing to do is just like, oh, let’s forget about all that and just think about words or morphemes.
So, I’m dealing with abstraction over the right theory, which is just, let’s count words, it’s not right, but it’s close. Then maybe you’re right though. There’s some sort of an exponential or something to figure out the total so we can figure out a function for any given sentence in any given language. But it’s funny, people haven’t done that too much, which I do think is… I’m interested that you find that interesting. I really find that interesting and a lot of people haven’t found it interesting. I don’t know why I haven’t got people to want to work on that. I really like that too.
So, we didn’t know and we did an evaluation of a bunch of contracts. Actually, we just took a bunch of random contracts. I don’t know, there’s contracts and laws might not be exactly the same, but contracts are the things that most people have to deal with most of the time. That’s the most common thing that humans have, that adults in our industrialized society have to deal with a lot. That’s what we pulled and we didn’t know what was hard about them, but it turns out that the way they’re written is very center embedded. It has nested structures in them. So, it has low frequency words as well. That’s not surprising. Lots of texts have low… It does have surprising slightly lower frequency words than other kinds of control texts, even academic texts. Legalese is even worse. It is the worst that we were being able to find-
And so what we did, that’s what we did. We figured out, okay, just a bunch of contracts, had people… And we encoded them for a bunch of features. Another feature, one of them was center embedding. That is basically how often a clause would intervene between a subject and a verb, for example. That’s one center embedding of a clause, and turns out they’re massively center embedded. So, I think in random contracts and in random laws, I think you get about 70%, something like 70% of sentences have a center embedded clause, which is insanely high.
If you go to any other text, it’s down to 20% or something. It’s so much higher than any control you can think of, including, you think, people think, oh, technical, academic texts. No, people don’t write center embedded sentences in technical academic texts. They do a little bit, but it’s on the 20%, 30% realm as opposed to 70. So, there’s that and there’s low frequency words. Then people, oh, maybe it’s passive. People don’t like the passive. Passive for some reason, the passive voice in English has a bad rap, and I’m not really sure where that comes from. And there is a lot of passive, there’s much more passive voice in legalese than there is in other texts-
No, no, they’re much better than laypeople. So, they can much better recall, much better at understanding. But they have the same main effects as laypeople. Exactly the same. So, they also much prefer the non-center… So, we constructed non-center embedded versions of each of these. We constructed versions which have higher frequency words in those places. And we did, we un-passivized, we turned them into active versions. The passive/active made no difference. The words made a little difference. And the un-center embedding makes big differences in all the populations.
So then we asked lawyers, we thought, “Oh, maybe lawyers like this.” Lawyers don’t like this, they don’t like this. They don’t want to write like this. We asked them to rate materials which are with the same meaning, with un-center embedded and center embedded, and they much preferred the un-center embedded versions.
You’re going to need a lawyer to figure that out, I guess from the perspective of the individual. But then that could be the performative aspect. It could be as opposed to the incentive driven to be complicated. It could be performative to where, “We lawyers speak in this sophisticated way and you regular humans don’t understand it, so you need to hire a lawyer.” Yeah, I don’t know which one it is, but it’s suspicious. Suspicious that it’s hard to understand and that everybody’s eyes glaze over and they don’t read.
There’s extra words involved, typically. You may need a few extra words to refer to the things that you’re defining outside in some way. If you only use it in that one sentence, then there’s no reason to introduce extra terms. So, we might have a few more words, but it’ll be easier to understand. I have hope that now that maybe we can make legalese less convoluted in this way.
And so that assuming we both speak the same language, we both already speak English, whatever the language is, we speak that what is a way that I can say the language so that it’s most likely to get the signal that I want to you. And then the problem there in the communication is the noisy channel, is that I make… There’s a lot of noise in the system. I don’t speak perfectly. I make errors. That’s noise. There’s background noise, you know that.
So, that’s the noisy channel. And so that language, if it’s communication system, we are trying to optimize in some sense that the passing of the message from one side to the other. And so one idea is that maybe aspects of word order, for example, might’ve optimized in some way to make language a little more easy to be passed from speaker to listener. And so Shannon’s, the guy that did this stuff way back in the forties, it was very interesting.
Historically he was interested in working in linguistics. He was at MIT and this was his master’s thesis of all things. It’s crazy how much he did for his master’s thesis in 1948 I think, or ’49 something. And he wanted to keep working in language and it just wasn’t a popular communication as a reason source for what language was, wasn’t popular at the time. So, Chomsky was moving in there and he just wasn’t able to get a handle there, I think. And so he moved to [inaudible 02:06:04] and worked on communication from a mathematical point of view and did all kinds of amazing work. And so he’s just-
We can’t see how languages change or anything because we’ve got these snapshots of a few hundred or a few thousand languages. We can’t do the right kinds of modifications to test things experimentally. And so just take this with a grain of salt from here, this stuff. The dependency stuff, I’m much more solid on and here’s what the lengths are and here’s what’s hard, here’s what’s easy, and this is a reasonable structure. I think I’m pretty reasonable. Why does the word order look the way it does is, we’re now into shaky territory, but it’s kind of cool.
There are word order rules. And depending on the language, they’re more and less strict. So, you speak Russian, they’re less strict than English. English is very rigid word order rules. We order things in a very particular way. And so why do we do that? That’s probably not about communication. That’s probably about learning. Then we’re talking about learning. It’s probably easier to learn regular things, things which are very predictable and easy. So, that’s probably about learning is our guess because that can’t be about communication.
And so he’s like, “Oh, I guess it’s not learned. It’s innate.” And if you just throw out the movement and just think about that in a different way, then you get some messiness. But the messiness is human language, which it actually fits better. That messiness isn’t a problem. It’s actually, it’s a valuable asset of the theory. And so I think I don’t really see a reason to postulate much innate structure. And that’s kind of why I think these large language models are learning so well is because I think you can learn the form, the forms of human language from the input. I think that’s likely to be true.
There’s a lot of other interesting components here, features of this kind of argument. Some people get a stroke or something goes really wrong on the left side where the language area would be and that isn’t there. It’s not available. It develops just fine in the right. So, it’s not about the left. It goes to the left. This is a very interesting question. It’s like why are any of the brain areas the way that they are and how did they come to be that way? There’s these natural experiments which happen where people get these strange events in their brains at very young ages, which wipe out sections of their brain, and they behave totally normally and no one knows anything was wrong. And we find out later, because they happen to be accidentally scanned for some reason. It’s like what happened to your left hemisphere? It’s missing.
There’s not many people who have missed their whole left hemisphere, but they’ll be missing some other section of their left or their right. And they behave absolutely normally, you would never know. So, that’s a very interesting current research. This is another project that this person, Ev Fedorenko is working on. She’s got all these people contacting her because she’s scanned some people who have been missing sections. One person missed a section of her brain and was scanned in her lab, and she happened to be a writer for the New York Times.
And there was an article in New York Times just about the scanning procedure, about what might be learned by the general process of MRI and language, not necessarily language. And because she’s writing for the New York Times, then all these people started writing to her who also have similar kinds of deficits because they’ve been accidentally scanned for some reason and found out they’re missing some section. And they say they volunteer to be scanned.
It’s not like the industrialized cultures aren’t interesting, of course they are, but we want to look at non-industrialized cultures as well. And so I’ve worked with two, I’ve worked with the Tsimane, which are in Bolivia and Amazon, both in the Amazon in these cases. And there are so-called farmer-foragers, which is not hunter-gatherers, sort of one-up from hunter-gatherers in that they do a little bit of farming as well, a lot of hunting as well, but a little bit of farming. And the kind of farming they do is the kind of farming that I might do if I ever were to grow tomatoes or something in my backyard. So it’s not big field farming, it’s just farming for a family. A few things you do that. So that’s the kind of farming they do.
And the other group I’ve worked with are the Piraha, which are also in the Amazon and happened to be in Brazil. And that’s with a guy called Dan Everett, who was a linguist anthropologist who actually lived and worked in the, I mean, he was a missionary actually, initially back in the seventies working with trying to translate languages so they could teach them the Bible, teach them Christianity.
In the Amazon, that’s not the case. And so people can stay there for hundreds and hundreds and probably thousands of years, I guess. And so these groups, the Tsimane and the Piraha are both isolates in that. And I guess they’ve just lived there for ages and ages with minimal contact with other outside groups. So I mean, I’m interested in them because they are, in these cases, I’m interested in their words. I would love to study their syntax, their orders of words, but I’m mostly just interested in how languages are connected to their cultures in this way. And so, with the Piraha, they’re most interesting, I was working on number there, number information.
And so the basic idea is I think language is invented. This, what I get from the words here is that I think language is invented. We talked about color earlier. It’s the same idea. So that what you need to talk about with someone else is what you’re going to invent words for. And so we invent labels for colors, not that I can see, but the things I need to tell you about so that I can get objects from you or get you to give me the right objects. And I just don’t need a word for teal or a word for aquamarine in the Amazon jungle for the most part because I don’t have two things which differ on those colors. I just don’t have that. And so numbers are really another fascinating source of information here where you might naively, I certainly thought that all humans would have words for exact counting, and the Piraha don’t. Okay, so they don’t have any words for even one. There’s not a word for one in their language. And so there’s certainly not word for two, three or four. So that kind of blows people’s minds often.
And nothing’s changing in the set except for the number. And then I just ask you to label these things. And we just do this for a bunch of different people. And frankly, I did this task.
So it’s a little funny to do this task over and over. We did this with a guy called, Dan was our translator. He’s the only one who really speaks Piraha fluently. He’s a good bilingual for a bunch of languages, but also English and then a guy called Mike Frank was also a student with me down there, he and I did these things. So you do that and everyone does the same thing. We ask 10 people, and they all do exactly the same labeling for one up. And then we just do the same thing down on random order. Actually, we do some of them up, some of them down first, instead of one to 10, we do 10 down to one. I give them 10, 9, at 8, they start saying the word for some. And then when you get to four, everyone is saying the word for few, which we thought was one. So the context determined what that quantifier they used was. So it’s not a count word. They’re not count words, they’re just approximate words-
It was a very easy task to explain to them, because I did this with this guy, Mike Frank, and I’d be the experimenter telling him to do this and showing him to do this. And then we just, just do it what he did. You’ll copy him all we had to, I didn’t have to speak Piraha except for know what copy him. Do what he did is all we had to be able to say. And then they would do that just perfectly. And so we’d move it up. We’d do some sort of random number of items up to 10, and they basically do perfectly on that. They’d never get that wrong. I mean, that’s not a counting task that is just a match. You just put one against it doesn’t matter how many, I don’t need to know how many there are there to do that correctly. And they would make mistakes, but very, very few and no more than MIT undergrads, just going to say, these are low stakes. So you make mistakes.
So there’s much more value in knowing Spanish because they want to feed their families. And how do you feed your family? You learn Spanish so you can make money so you can get a job and do these things, and then you make money. And so they want Spanish things. And so Moseten is in danger and is dying, and that’s normal. Basically, the problem is that people, the reason we learn language is to communicate. We use it to make money and to do whatever it is to feed our families. If that’s not happening, then it won’t take off. It’s not like a game or something. This is something we, why is English so popular? It’s not because it’s an easy language to learn. Maybe it is, I don’t really know. But that’s not why it’s popular.
Click link to jump approximately to that part in the transcript:
- 0:00 – Introduction
- 1:13 – Human language
- 5:19 – Generalizations in language
- 11:06 – Dependency grammar
- 21:05 – Morphology
- 29:40 – Evolution of languages
- 33:00 – Noam Chomsky
- 1:17:06 – Thinking and language
- 1:30:36 – LLMs
- 1:43:35 – Center embedding
- 2:10:02 – Learning a new language
- 2:13:54 – Nature vs nurture
- 2:20:30 – Culture and language
- 2:34:58 – Universal language
- 2:39:21 – Language translation
- 2:42:36 – Animal communication
Introduction
Edward Gibson
Naively I certainly thought that all humans would have words for exact counting, and the Piraha don’t. Okay, so they don’t have any words for even one. There’s not a word for one in their language. And so there’s certainly not a word for two, three or four. And so that blows people’s minds often.
Naively I certainly thought that all humans would have words for exact counting, and the Piraha don’t. Okay, so they don’t have any words for even one. There’s not a word for one in their language. And so there’s certainly not a word for two, three or four. And so that blows people’s minds often.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, that’s blowing my mind.
Yeah, that’s blowing my mind.
Edward Gibson
That’s pretty weird, isn’t it?
That’s pretty weird, isn’t it?
Lex Fridman
How are you going to ask, “I want two of those.”
How are you going to ask, “I want two of those.”
Edward Gibson
You just don’t. And so that’s just not a thing you can possibly ask in Piraha. It’s not possible, there’s no words for that.
You just don’t. And so that’s just not a thing you can possibly ask in Piraha. It’s not possible, there’s no words for that.
Lex Fridman
The following is a conversation with Edward Gibson, or Ted, as everybody calls him. He’s a psycholinguistics professor at MIT. He heads the MIT language lab that investigates why human languages look the way they do, the relationship between cultural language and how people represent, process and learn language. Also, you should have a book titled Syntax: A Cognitive Approach, published by MIT Press coming out this fall so look out for that. This is the Lex Fridman podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here’s Edward Gibson. When did you first become fascinated with human language?
The following is a conversation with Edward Gibson, or Ted, as everybody calls him. He’s a psycholinguistics professor at MIT. He heads the MIT language lab that investigates why human languages look the way they do, the relationship between cultural language and how people represent, process and learn language. Also, you should have a book titled Syntax: A Cognitive Approach, published by MIT Press coming out this fall so look out for that. This is the Lex Fridman podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here’s Edward Gibson. When did you first become fascinated with human language?
Human language
Edward Gibson
As a kid in school, when we had to structure sentences and English grammar, I found that process interesting. I found it confusing as to what it was I was told to do. I didn’t understand what the theory was behind it, but I found it very interesting.
As a kid in school, when we had to structure sentences and English grammar, I found that process interesting. I found it confusing as to what it was I was told to do. I didn’t understand what the theory was behind it, but I found it very interesting.
Lex Fridman
When you look at grammar, you’re almost thinking about it like a puzzle, almost a mathematical puzzle.
When you look at grammar, you’re almost thinking about it like a puzzle, almost a mathematical puzzle.
Edward Gibson
Yeah, I think that’s right. I didn’t know I was going to work on this at all at that point. I was a math geek person, computer scientist, I really liked computer science. And then I found language as a neat puzzle to work on from an engineering perspective actually, that’s what I … After I finished my undergraduate degree, which was computer science and math in Canada in Queen’s University, I decided to go to grad school, as that’s what I always thought I would do. And I went to Cambridge where they had a master’s program in computational linguistics. And I hadn’t taken a single language class before. All I’d taken was CS, computer science, math classes pretty much mostly as an undergrad. And I just thought this was an interesting thing to do for a year, because it was a single year program. And then I ended up spending my whole life doing it.
Yeah, I think that’s right. I didn’t know I was going to work on this at all at that point. I was a math geek person, computer scientist, I really liked computer science. And then I found language as a neat puzzle to work on from an engineering perspective actually, that’s what I … After I finished my undergraduate degree, which was computer science and math in Canada in Queen’s University, I decided to go to grad school, as that’s what I always thought I would do. And I went to Cambridge where they had a master’s program in computational linguistics. And I hadn’t taken a single language class before. All I’d taken was CS, computer science, math classes pretty much mostly as an undergrad. And I just thought this was an interesting thing to do for a year, because it was a single year program. And then I ended up spending my whole life doing it.
Lex Fridman
Fundamentally, your journey through life was one of a mathematician and a computer scientist. And then you discovered the puzzle, the problem of language, and approached it from that angle to try to understand it from that angle, almost like a mathematician or maybe even an engineer.
Fundamentally, your journey through life was one of a mathematician and a computer scientist. And then you discovered the puzzle, the problem of language, and approached it from that angle to try to understand it from that angle, almost like a mathematician or maybe even an engineer.
Edward Gibson
As an engineer, I’d say … To be frank, I had taken an AI class, I guess it was ’83 or ’84, ’85, somewhere in there a long time ago. And there was a natural language section in there. And it didn’t impress me. I thought, “There must be more interesting things we can do.”
As an engineer, I’d say … To be frank, I had taken an AI class, I guess it was ’83 or ’84, ’85, somewhere in there a long time ago. And there was a natural language section in there. And it didn’t impress me. I thought, “There must be more interesting things we can do.”
It seemed just a bunch of hacks to me, it didn’t seem like a real theory of things in any way. And so I just thought this seemed like an interesting area where there wasn’t enough good work.
Lex Fridman
Did you ever come across the philosophy angle of logic? If you think about the 80s with AI, the expert systems where you try to maybe sidestep the poetry of language and some of the syntax and the grammar and all that stuff and go to the underlying meaning that language is trying to communicate and try to somehow compress that in a computer representable way? Did you ever come across that in your studies?
Did you ever come across the philosophy angle of logic? If you think about the 80s with AI, the expert systems where you try to maybe sidestep the poetry of language and some of the syntax and the grammar and all that stuff and go to the underlying meaning that language is trying to communicate and try to somehow compress that in a computer representable way? Did you ever come across that in your studies?
Edward Gibson
I probably did but I wasn’t as interested in it. I was trying to do the easier problems first, the ones I thought maybe were handleable, which seems like the syntax is easier, which is just the forms as opposed to the meaning. When you’re starting talking about the meaning, that’s a very hard problem and it still is a really, really hard problem. But the forms is easier. And so I thought at least figuring out the forms of human language, which sounds really hard but is actually maybe more attractable.
I probably did but I wasn’t as interested in it. I was trying to do the easier problems first, the ones I thought maybe were handleable, which seems like the syntax is easier, which is just the forms as opposed to the meaning. When you’re starting talking about the meaning, that’s a very hard problem and it still is a really, really hard problem. But the forms is easier. And so I thought at least figuring out the forms of human language, which sounds really hard but is actually maybe more attractable.
Lex Fridman
It’s interesting. You think there is a big divide, there’s a gap, there’s a distance between form and meaning, because that’s a question you have discussed a lot with LLMs because they’re damn good at form.
It’s interesting. You think there is a big divide, there’s a gap, there’s a distance between form and meaning, because that’s a question you have discussed a lot with LLMs because they’re damn good at form.
Edward Gibson
Yeah, I think that’s what they’re good at, is form. And that’s why they’re good, because they can do form, meanings are …
Yeah, I think that’s what they’re good at, is form. And that’s why they’re good, because they can do form, meanings are …
Lex Fridman
Do you think there’s … Oh, wow. It’s an open question.
Do you think there’s … Oh, wow. It’s an open question.
Edward Gibson
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
How close form and meaning are. We’ll discuss it but to me studying form, maybe it’s a romantic notion it gives you. Form is the shadow of the bigger meaning thing underlying language. Language is how we communicate ideas. We communicate with each other using language. In understanding the structure of that communication, I think you start to understand the structure of thought and the structure of meaning behind those thoughts and communication, to me. But to you, big gap.
How close form and meaning are. We’ll discuss it but to me studying form, maybe it’s a romantic notion it gives you. Form is the shadow of the bigger meaning thing underlying language. Language is how we communicate ideas. We communicate with each other using language. In understanding the structure of that communication, I think you start to understand the structure of thought and the structure of meaning behind those thoughts and communication, to me. But to you, big gap.
Generalizations in language
Edward Gibson
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
What do you find most beautiful about human language? Maybe the form of human language, the expression of human language.
What do you find most beautiful about human language? Maybe the form of human language, the expression of human language.
Edward Gibson
What I find beautiful about human language is some of the generalizations that happen across the human languages, within and across a language. Let me give you an example of something which I find remarkable, that is if a language, if it has a word order such that the verbs tend to come before their objects … English does that. The subject comes first in a simple sentence. I say the dog chased the cat, or Mary kicked the ball, the subject’s first and then after the subject there’s the verb and then we have objects. All these things come after in English. It’s generally a verb. And most of the stuff that we want to say comes after the subject, it’s the objects. There’s a lot of things we want to say they come after. And there’s a lot of languages like that. About 40% of the languages of the world look like that, they’re subject-verb-object languages. And then these languages tend to have prepositions, these little markers on the nouns that connect nouns to other nouns or nouns to verb. When I see a preposition like in or on or of or about, I say I talk about something, the something is the object of that preposition that we have. These little markers come also, just like verbs, they come before their nouns.
What I find beautiful about human language is some of the generalizations that happen across the human languages, within and across a language. Let me give you an example of something which I find remarkable, that is if a language, if it has a word order such that the verbs tend to come before their objects … English does that. The subject comes first in a simple sentence. I say the dog chased the cat, or Mary kicked the ball, the subject’s first and then after the subject there’s the verb and then we have objects. All these things come after in English. It’s generally a verb. And most of the stuff that we want to say comes after the subject, it’s the objects. There’s a lot of things we want to say they come after. And there’s a lot of languages like that. About 40% of the languages of the world look like that, they’re subject-verb-object languages. And then these languages tend to have prepositions, these little markers on the nouns that connect nouns to other nouns or nouns to verb. When I see a preposition like in or on or of or about, I say I talk about something, the something is the object of that preposition that we have. These little markers come also, just like verbs, they come before their nouns.
Now, we look at other languages like Japanese or Hindi, these are so-called verb final languages. Maybe a little more than 40%, maybe 45% of the world’s languages or more, 50% of the world’s languages are verb final. Those tend to be post positions. They have the same kinds of markers as we do in English but they put them after. Sorry, they put them first, the markers come first. You say instead of talk about a book, you say a book about, the opposite order there in Japanese or in Hindi. You do the opposite and the talk comes at the end. The verb will come at the end as well. Instead of Mary kicked the ball, it’s Mary ball kicked. And then if it’s Mary kicked the ball to John, it’s John to, the to, the marker there, the preposition, it’s a post position in these languages.
And so a fascinating thing to me is that within a language, this order aligns, it’s harmonic. And so it’s one or the other, it’s either verb initial or verb final. But then you’ll have prepositions, prepositions or post positions. And that’s across the languages that we can look at. We’ve got around a thousand languages for … There’s around 7,000 languages around on the earth right now. But we have information about say, word order on around a thousand of those pretty. Decent amount of information. And for those thousand which we know about, about 95% fit that pattern. It’s about half and half, half are verb initial like English and half are verb final like Japanese.
Lex Fridman
Just to clarify, verb initial is subject-verb-object.
Just to clarify, verb initial is subject-verb-object.
Edward Gibson
That’s correct.
That’s correct.
Lex Fridman
Verb final is still subject-object-verb.
Verb final is still subject-object-verb.
Edward Gibson
That’s correct. Yeah, the subject is generally first
That’s correct. Yeah, the subject is generally first
Lex Fridman
That’s so fascinating. I ate an apple, or I apple ate.
That’s so fascinating. I ate an apple, or I apple ate.
Edward Gibson
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
Okay. And it’s fascinating that there’s a pretty even division in the world amongst those, 45%.
Okay. And it’s fascinating that there’s a pretty even division in the world amongst those, 45%.
Edward Gibson
Yeah, it’s pretty even. And those two are the most common by far. Those two word orders, the subject tends to be first. There’s so many interesting things but the thing I find so fascinating is there are these generalizations within and across a language. And there’s actually a simple explanation I think, for a lot of that. And that is you’re trying to minimize dependencies between words. That’s basically the story I think, behind a lot of why word order looks the way it is, is we’re always connecting … What is a thing I’m telling you? I’m talking to you in sentences, you’re talking to me in sentences. These are sequences of words which are connected and the connections are dependencies between the words.
Yeah, it’s pretty even. And those two are the most common by far. Those two word orders, the subject tends to be first. There’s so many interesting things but the thing I find so fascinating is there are these generalizations within and across a language. And there’s actually a simple explanation I think, for a lot of that. And that is you’re trying to minimize dependencies between words. That’s basically the story I think, behind a lot of why word order looks the way it is, is we’re always connecting … What is a thing I’m telling you? I’m talking to you in sentences, you’re talking to me in sentences. These are sequences of words which are connected and the connections are dependencies between the words.
And it turns out that what we’re trying to do in a language is actually minimize those dependency links. It’s easier for me to say things if the words that are connecting for their meaning are close together. It’s easier for you in understanding if that’s also true. If they’re far away, it’s hard to produce that and it’s hard for you to understand. And the languages of the world, within a language and across languages fit that generalization. It turns out that having verbs initial and then having prepositions ends up making dependencies shorter. And having verbs final and having post positions ends up making dependencies shorter than if you cross them. If you cross them, you just end up … It’s possible, you can do it.
Lex Fridman
You mean within a language?
You mean within a language?
Edward Gibson
Within a language you can do it. It just ends up with longer dependencies than if you didn’t. And so languages tend to go that way, they call it harmonic. It was observed a long time ago without the explanation, by a guy called Joseph Greenberg, who’s a famous typologist from Stanford. He observed a lot of generalizations about how word order works, and these are some of the harmonic generalizations that he observed.
Within a language you can do it. It just ends up with longer dependencies than if you didn’t. And so languages tend to go that way, they call it harmonic. It was observed a long time ago without the explanation, by a guy called Joseph Greenberg, who’s a famous typologist from Stanford. He observed a lot of generalizations about how word order works, and these are some of the harmonic generalizations that he observed.
Lex Fridman
Harmonic generalizations about word order. There’s so many things I want to ask you. Okay, let me just some basics. You mentioned dependencies a few times. What do you mean by dependencies?
Harmonic generalizations about word order. There’s so many things I want to ask you. Okay, let me just some basics. You mentioned dependencies a few times. What do you mean by dependencies?
Dependency grammar
Edward Gibson
Well, what I mean is in language, there’s three components to the structure of language. One is the sounds. Cat is C, A and T in English. I’m not talking about that part. Then there’s two meaning parts, and those are the words. And you were talking about meaning earlier. Words have a form and they have a meaning associated with them. And so cat is a full form in English and it has a meaning associated with whatever a cat is. And then the combinations of words, that’s what I’ll call grammar or syntax, that’s when I have a combination like the cat or two cats, okay, where I take two different words there and put together and I get a compositional meaning from putting those two different words together. And so that’s the syntax. And in any sentence or utterance, whatever, I’m talking to you, you’re talking to me, we have a bunch of words and we’re putting them together in a sequence, it turns out they are connected, so that every word is connected to just one other word in that sentence. And so you end up with what’s called technically a tree, it’s a tree structure, where there’s a root of that utterance, of that sentence. And then there’s a bunch of dependents, like branches from that root that go down to the words. The words are the leaves in this metaphor for a tree.
Well, what I mean is in language, there’s three components to the structure of language. One is the sounds. Cat is C, A and T in English. I’m not talking about that part. Then there’s two meaning parts, and those are the words. And you were talking about meaning earlier. Words have a form and they have a meaning associated with them. And so cat is a full form in English and it has a meaning associated with whatever a cat is. And then the combinations of words, that’s what I’ll call grammar or syntax, that’s when I have a combination like the cat or two cats, okay, where I take two different words there and put together and I get a compositional meaning from putting those two different words together. And so that’s the syntax. And in any sentence or utterance, whatever, I’m talking to you, you’re talking to me, we have a bunch of words and we’re putting them together in a sequence, it turns out they are connected, so that every word is connected to just one other word in that sentence. And so you end up with what’s called technically a tree, it’s a tree structure, where there’s a root of that utterance, of that sentence. And then there’s a bunch of dependents, like branches from that root that go down to the words. The words are the leaves in this metaphor for a tree.
Lex Fridman
A tree is also a mathematical construct.
A tree is also a mathematical construct.
Edward Gibson
Yeah. It’s graph theoretical thing, exactly.
Yeah. It’s graph theoretical thing, exactly.
Lex Fridman
A graph theory thing. It’s fascinating that you can break down a sentence into a tree and then every word is hanging onto another, is depending on it.
A graph theory thing. It’s fascinating that you can break down a sentence into a tree and then every word is hanging onto another, is depending on it.
Edward Gibson
That’s right. All linguists will agree with that, no one …
That’s right. All linguists will agree with that, no one …
Lex Fridman
This is not a controversial …
This is not a controversial …
Edward Gibson
That is not controversial.
That is not controversial.
Lex Fridman
There’s nobody sitting here listening mad at you.
There’s nobody sitting here listening mad at you.
Edward Gibson
I do not think so, I don’t think so.
I do not think so, I don’t think so.
Lex Fridman
Okay. There’s no linguist sitting there mad at this.
Okay. There’s no linguist sitting there mad at this.
Edward Gibson
No. In every language, I think everyone agrees that all sentences are trees at some level.
No. In every language, I think everyone agrees that all sentences are trees at some level.
Lex Fridman
Can I pause on that?
Can I pause on that?
Edward Gibson
Sure.
Sure.
Lex Fridman
Because to me just as a layman, it is surprising that you can break down sentences in mostly all languages.
Because to me just as a layman, it is surprising that you can break down sentences in mostly all languages.
Edward Gibson
All languages, I think.
All languages, I think.
Lex Fridman
… into a tree.
… into a tree.
Edward Gibson
I think so. I’ve never heard of anyone disagreeing with that.
I think so. I’ve never heard of anyone disagreeing with that.
Lex Fridman
That’s weird.
That’s weird.
Edward Gibson
The details of the trees are what people disagree about.
The details of the trees are what people disagree about.
Lex Fridman
Well, okay. What’s at the root of a tree? How do you construct … How hard is it? What is the process of constructing a tree from a sentence?
Well, okay. What’s at the root of a tree? How do you construct … How hard is it? What is the process of constructing a tree from a sentence?
Edward Gibson
Well, this is where depending on what you’re … There’s different theoretical notions. I’m going to say the simplest thing, dependency grammar, a bunch of people invented this. Tesniere was the first French guy back in … The paper was published in 1959 but he was working on it in the 30s and stuff. And it goes back to philologist Panini was doing this in ancient India, okay. The simplest thing we can think of is that there’s just connections between the words to make the utterance. And so let’s just say two dogs entered a room okay, here’s a sentence. And so we’re connecting two and dogs together. There’s some dependency between those words to make some bigger meaning. And then we’re connecting dogs now to entered, and we connect a room somehow to entered. And so I’m going to connect to room and then room back to entered. That’s the tree. The root is entered, the thing is an entering event. That’s what we’re saying here. And the subject, which is whatever that dog is, two dogs it was, and the connection goes back to dogs, and that goes back to two. That’s my tree. It starts at entered, goes to dogs, down to two. And on the other side, after the verb, the object, it goes to room and then that goes back to the determiner or article, whatever you want to call that word. There’s a bunch of categories of words here we’re noticing. There are verbs. Those are these things that typically mark … They refer to events and states in the world. An d they’re nouns, which typically refer to people, places and things is what people say. But they can refer to events themselves as well. They’re marked by the category, the part of speech of a word is how it gets used in language. That’s how you decide what the category of a word is, not by the meaning but how it gets used.
Well, this is where depending on what you’re … There’s different theoretical notions. I’m going to say the simplest thing, dependency grammar, a bunch of people invented this. Tesniere was the first French guy back in … The paper was published in 1959 but he was working on it in the 30s and stuff. And it goes back to philologist Panini was doing this in ancient India, okay. The simplest thing we can think of is that there’s just connections between the words to make the utterance. And so let’s just say two dogs entered a room okay, here’s a sentence. And so we’re connecting two and dogs together. There’s some dependency between those words to make some bigger meaning. And then we’re connecting dogs now to entered, and we connect a room somehow to entered. And so I’m going to connect to room and then room back to entered. That’s the tree. The root is entered, the thing is an entering event. That’s what we’re saying here. And the subject, which is whatever that dog is, two dogs it was, and the connection goes back to dogs, and that goes back to two. That’s my tree. It starts at entered, goes to dogs, down to two. And on the other side, after the verb, the object, it goes to room and then that goes back to the determiner or article, whatever you want to call that word. There’s a bunch of categories of words here we’re noticing. There are verbs. Those are these things that typically mark … They refer to events and states in the world. An d they’re nouns, which typically refer to people, places and things is what people say. But they can refer to events themselves as well. They’re marked by the category, the part of speech of a word is how it gets used in language. That’s how you decide what the category of a word is, not by the meaning but how it gets used.
Lex Fridman
How it’s used. What’s usually the root? Is it going to be the verb that defines the event?
How it’s used. What’s usually the root? Is it going to be the verb that defines the event?
Edward Gibson
Usually, usually. Yes, yes. Yeah.
Usually, usually. Yes, yes. Yeah.
Lex Fridman
Okay.
Okay.
Edward Gibson
If I don’t say a verb, then there won’t be a verb. And so it’ll be something else.
If I don’t say a verb, then there won’t be a verb. And so it’ll be something else.
Lex Fridman
Are we talking about language that’s correct language? What if you’re doing poetry and messing with stuff, then rules go out the window.
Are we talking about language that’s correct language? What if you’re doing poetry and messing with stuff, then rules go out the window.
Edward Gibson
No. No, no, no, no. You’re constrained by whatever language you’re dealing with. Probably you have other constraints in poetry, such that you’re … Usually in poetry there’s multiple constraints that you want to … You want to usually convey multiple meanings is the idea. And maybe you have a rhythm or a rhyming structure as well. But you usually are constrained by the rules of your language for the most part. And so you don’t violate those too much. You can violate them somewhat but not too much. It has to be recognizable as your language. In English, I can’t say dogs two entered room a. I meant two dogs entered a room, and I can’t mess with the order of the articles and the nouns. You just can’t do that. In some languages, you can mess around with the order of words much more. You speak Russian, Russian has a much freer word order than English. And so in fact, you can move around words in … I told you that English has this subject-verb-object word order, so does Russian but Russian is much freer than English. And so you can actually mess around with a word order. Probably Russian poetry is going to be quite different from English poetry because the word order is much less constrained.
No. No, no, no, no. You’re constrained by whatever language you’re dealing with. Probably you have other constraints in poetry, such that you’re … Usually in poetry there’s multiple constraints that you want to … You want to usually convey multiple meanings is the idea. And maybe you have a rhythm or a rhyming structure as well. But you usually are constrained by the rules of your language for the most part. And so you don’t violate those too much. You can violate them somewhat but not too much. It has to be recognizable as your language. In English, I can’t say dogs two entered room a. I meant two dogs entered a room, and I can’t mess with the order of the articles and the nouns. You just can’t do that. In some languages, you can mess around with the order of words much more. You speak Russian, Russian has a much freer word order than English. And so in fact, you can move around words in … I told you that English has this subject-verb-object word order, so does Russian but Russian is much freer than English. And so you can actually mess around with a word order. Probably Russian poetry is going to be quite different from English poetry because the word order is much less constrained.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. There’s a much more extensive culture of poetry throughout the history of the last hundred years in Russia. And I always wondered why that is but it seems that there’s more flexibility in the way the language is used. You’re morphing the language easier by altering the words, altering the order of the words and messing with it.
Yeah. There’s a much more extensive culture of poetry throughout the history of the last hundred years in Russia. And I always wondered why that is but it seems that there’s more flexibility in the way the language is used. You’re morphing the language easier by altering the words, altering the order of the words and messing with it.
Edward Gibson
Well, you can just mess with different things in each language. And so in Russian you have case markers, which are these endings on the nouns, which tell you how each noun connects to the verb. We don’t have that in English. And so when I say Mary kissed John, I don’t know who the agent or the patient is, except by the order of the words. In Russian, you actually have a marker on the end. If you’re using a Russian name in each of those names, you’ll also say … It’ll be the nominative, which is marking the subject, or an accusative will mark the object. And you could put them in the reverse order. You could put accusative first. You could put the patient first and then the verb and then the subject. And that would be a perfectly good Russian sentence. And it would still … I could say John kissed Mary, meaning Mary kissed John, as long as I use the case markers in the right way, you can’t do that in English. And so
Well, you can just mess with different things in each language. And so in Russian you have case markers, which are these endings on the nouns, which tell you how each noun connects to the verb. We don’t have that in English. And so when I say Mary kissed John, I don’t know who the agent or the patient is, except by the order of the words. In Russian, you actually have a marker on the end. If you’re using a Russian name in each of those names, you’ll also say … It’ll be the nominative, which is marking the subject, or an accusative will mark the object. And you could put them in the reverse order. You could put accusative first. You could put the patient first and then the verb and then the subject. And that would be a perfectly good Russian sentence. And it would still … I could say John kissed Mary, meaning Mary kissed John, as long as I use the case markers in the right way, you can’t do that in English. And so
Lex Fridman
I love the terminology of agent and patient and the other ones you used. Those are linguistic terms, correct?
I love the terminology of agent and patient and the other ones you used. Those are linguistic terms, correct?
Edward Gibson
Those are for meaning, those are meaning. And subject and object are generally used for position. Subject is just the thing that comes before the verb and the object is the one that comes after the verb. The agent is the thing doing, that’s what that means. The subject is often the person doing the action, the thing.
Those are for meaning, those are meaning. And subject and object are generally used for position. Subject is just the thing that comes before the verb and the object is the one that comes after the verb. The agent is the thing doing, that’s what that means. The subject is often the person doing the action, the thing.
Lex Fridman
Okay, this is fascinating. How hard is it to form a tree in general? Is there a procedure to it? If you look at different languages, is it supposed to be a very natural … Is it automatable or is there some human genius involved in construction …
Okay, this is fascinating. How hard is it to form a tree in general? Is there a procedure to it? If you look at different languages, is it supposed to be a very natural … Is it automatable or is there some human genius involved in construction …
Edward Gibson
I think it’s pretty automatable at this point. People can figure out the words are. They can figure out the morphemes, technically morphemes are the minimal meaning units within a language, okay. And so when you say eats or drinks, it actually has two morphemes in English. There’s the root, which is the verb. And then there’s some ending on it which tells you that’s the third person singular.
I think it’s pretty automatable at this point. People can figure out the words are. They can figure out the morphemes, technically morphemes are the minimal meaning units within a language, okay. And so when you say eats or drinks, it actually has two morphemes in English. There’s the root, which is the verb. And then there’s some ending on it which tells you that’s the third person singular.
Lex Fridman
Can you say what morphemes are?
Can you say what morphemes are?
Edward Gibson
Morphemes are just the minimal meaning units within a language. And then a word is just the things we put spaces between in English and they have a little bit more, they have the morphology as well. They have the endings, this inflectional morphology on the endings on the roots.
Morphemes are just the minimal meaning units within a language. And then a word is just the things we put spaces between in English and they have a little bit more, they have the morphology as well. They have the endings, this inflectional morphology on the endings on the roots.
Lex Fridman
It modifies something about the word that adds additional meaning.
It modifies something about the word that adds additional meaning.
Edward Gibson
Yeah, yeah. And so we have a little bit of that in English, very little. You have much more in Russian, for instance. But we have a little bit in English, and so we have a little on the nouns, you can say it’s either singular or plural. And you can say same thing for verbs. Simple past tense for example, notice in English we say drinks. He drinks, but everyone else is, “I drink, you drink, we drink.”
Yeah, yeah. And so we have a little bit of that in English, very little. You have much more in Russian, for instance. But we have a little bit in English, and so we have a little on the nouns, you can say it’s either singular or plural. And you can say same thing for verbs. Simple past tense for example, notice in English we say drinks. He drinks, but everyone else is, “I drink, you drink, we drink.”
It’s unmarked in a way. But in the past tense, it’s just drank for everyone. There’s no morphology at all for past tense. There is morphology that’s marking past tense but it’s an irregular now. Drink to drank, it’s not even a regular word. In many verbs there’s an ED we add. Walk to walked, we add that to say it’s the past tense. I just happen to choose an irregular because the high frequency words tend to have irregulars in English for …
Lex Fridman
What’s an irregular?
What’s an irregular?
Edward Gibson
Irregular is just there isn’t a rule. Drink to drank is an irregular.
Irregular is just there isn’t a rule. Drink to drank is an irregular.
Lex Fridman
Drink, drank. Okay, okay. Versus walked.
Drink, drank. Okay, okay. Versus walked.
Edward Gibson
As opposed to walk, walked, talk, talked.
As opposed to walk, walked, talk, talked.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. And there’s a lot of irregulars in English.
Yeah. And there’s a lot of irregulars in English.
Edward Gibson
There’s a lot of irregulars in English. The frequent ones, the common words tend to be irregular. There’s many, many more low frequency words and those are regular ones.
There’s a lot of irregulars in English. The frequent ones, the common words tend to be irregular. There’s many, many more low frequency words and those are regular ones.
Lex Fridman
The evolution of the irregulars are fascinating because it’s essentially slang that’s sticky because breaking the rules. And then everybody uses it and doesn’t follow the rules and they say screw it to the rules. It’s fascinating. You said morphemes, lots of questions. Morphology is what, the study of morphemes?
The evolution of the irregulars are fascinating because it’s essentially slang that’s sticky because breaking the rules. And then everybody uses it and doesn’t follow the rules and they say screw it to the rules. It’s fascinating. You said morphemes, lots of questions. Morphology is what, the study of morphemes?
Morphology
Edward Gibson
Morphology is the connections between the morphemes onto the roots. In English, we mostly have suffixes. We have endings on the words, not very much but a little bit, as opposed to prefixes. Some words depending on your language can have mostly prefixes, mostly suffixes or both. And then several languages have things called infixes, where you have some general form for the root and you put stuff in the middle, you change the vowels, stuff like that.
Morphology is the connections between the morphemes onto the roots. In English, we mostly have suffixes. We have endings on the words, not very much but a little bit, as opposed to prefixes. Some words depending on your language can have mostly prefixes, mostly suffixes or both. And then several languages have things called infixes, where you have some general form for the root and you put stuff in the middle, you change the vowels, stuff like that.
Lex Fridman
That’s fascinating, that’s fascinating. In general, there’s what, two morphemes per word? One or two, or three.
That’s fascinating, that’s fascinating. In general, there’s what, two morphemes per word? One or two, or three.
Edward Gibson
Well, in English it’s one or two. In English, it tends to be one or two. There can be more. In other languages, a language like Finnish which has a very elaborate morphology, there may be 10 morphemes on the end of a root, okay. And so there may be millions of forms of a given word.
Well, in English it’s one or two. In English, it tends to be one or two. There can be more. In other languages, a language like Finnish which has a very elaborate morphology, there may be 10 morphemes on the end of a root, okay. And so there may be millions of forms of a given word.
Lex Fridman
Okay, okay. I’ll ask the same question over and over, just sometimes to understand things like morphemes, it’s nice to just ask the question, how do these kinds of things evolve? You have a great book studying how the cognitive processing, how language used for communication, so the mathematical notion of how effective language is for communication, what role that plays in the evolution of language. But just high level, how does a language evolve where English is two morphemes or one or two morphemes per word, and then Finnish has infinity per word. How does that happen? Is it just people …
Okay, okay. I’ll ask the same question over and over, just sometimes to understand things like morphemes, it’s nice to just ask the question, how do these kinds of things evolve? You have a great book studying how the cognitive processing, how language used for communication, so the mathematical notion of how effective language is for communication, what role that plays in the evolution of language. But just high level, how does a language evolve where English is two morphemes or one or two morphemes per word, and then Finnish has infinity per word. How does that happen? Is it just people …
Edward Gibson
That’s a really good question.
That’s a really good question.
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Edward Gibson
That’s a very good question, is why do languages have more morphology versus less morphology? And I don’t think we know the answer to this. I think there’s just a lot of good solutions to the problem of communication. I believe as you hinted, that language is an invented system by humans for communicating their ideas. And I think it comes down to we label things we want to talk about. Those are the morphemes and words, those are the things we want to talk about in the world. And we invent those things and then we put them together in ways that are easy for us to convey, to process. But that’s a naive view, and I don’t … I think it’s probably right, it’s naive and probably right.
That’s a very good question, is why do languages have more morphology versus less morphology? And I don’t think we know the answer to this. I think there’s just a lot of good solutions to the problem of communication. I believe as you hinted, that language is an invented system by humans for communicating their ideas. And I think it comes down to we label things we want to talk about. Those are the morphemes and words, those are the things we want to talk about in the world. And we invent those things and then we put them together in ways that are easy for us to convey, to process. But that’s a naive view, and I don’t … I think it’s probably right, it’s naive and probably right.
Lex Fridman
Well, I don’t know if it’s naive. I think it’s simple.
Well, I don’t know if it’s naive. I think it’s simple.
Edward Gibson
Simple, yeah. [inaudible 00:23:47].
Simple, yeah. [inaudible 00:23:47].
Lex Fridman
I think naive is an indication that’s incorrect somehow. It’s trivial, too simple. I think it could very well be correct. But it’s interesting how sticky … It feels like two people got together. It just feels like once you figure out certain aspects of a language that just becomes sticky and the tribe forms around that language, maybe the tribe forms first and then the language evolves. And then you just agree and you stick to whatever that is.
I think naive is an indication that’s incorrect somehow. It’s trivial, too simple. I think it could very well be correct. But it’s interesting how sticky … It feels like two people got together. It just feels like once you figure out certain aspects of a language that just becomes sticky and the tribe forms around that language, maybe the tribe forms first and then the language evolves. And then you just agree and you stick to whatever that is.
Edward Gibson
These are very interesting questions. We don’t know really about how even words get invented very much. Assuming they get invented, we don’t really know how that process works and how these things evolve. What we have is a current picture of few thousand languages, a few thousand instances. We don’t have any pictures of really how these things are evolving really. And then the evolution is massively confused by contact. As soon as one group runs into another … We are smart, humans are smart and they take on whatever’s useful in the other group. And so any contrast which you’re talking about which I find useful, I’m going to start using as well. I worked a little bit in specific areas of words, in number words and in color words. And in color words, in English we have around 11 words that everyone knows for colors. And many more if you happen to be interested in color for some reason or other, if you’re a fashion designer or an artist or something, you may have many, many more words. But we can see millions. If you have normal color vision, normal trichromatic color vision, you can see millions of distinctions in colors. We don’t have millions of words.
These are very interesting questions. We don’t know really about how even words get invented very much. Assuming they get invented, we don’t really know how that process works and how these things evolve. What we have is a current picture of few thousand languages, a few thousand instances. We don’t have any pictures of really how these things are evolving really. And then the evolution is massively confused by contact. As soon as one group runs into another … We are smart, humans are smart and they take on whatever’s useful in the other group. And so any contrast which you’re talking about which I find useful, I’m going to start using as well. I worked a little bit in specific areas of words, in number words and in color words. And in color words, in English we have around 11 words that everyone knows for colors. And many more if you happen to be interested in color for some reason or other, if you’re a fashion designer or an artist or something, you may have many, many more words. But we can see millions. If you have normal color vision, normal trichromatic color vision, you can see millions of distinctions in colors. We don’t have millions of words.
The most efficient … No, the most detailed color vocabulary would have over a million terms to distinguish all the different colors that we can see. But of course, we don’t have that. Somehow, it’s useful for English to have evolved in some way such that there’s 11 terms that people find useful to talk about, black, white, red, blue, green, yellow, purple, gray, pink. And I probably missed something there. There’s 11 that everyone knows and depending on your … But if you go to different cultures, especially the non-industrialized cultures, there’ll be many fewer. Some cultures will have only two, believe it or not. The Dani in Papua New Guinea have only two labels that the group uses for color, and those are roughly black and white. They are very, very dark and very, very light, which are roughly black and white. And you might think, “Oh, they’re dividing the whole color space into light and dark.”
Or something. And that’s not really true. They mostly only label the black and the white things. They just don’t talk about the colors for the other ones. And then there’s other groups … I’ve worked with a group called the Tsimane down in Bolivia in South America, and they have three words that everyone knows but there’s a few others that many people know. It’s depending on how you count, between three and seven words that the group knows, okay. And again, they’re black and white, everyone knows those. And red, that tends to be the third word that cultures bring in, if there’s a word. It’s always red, the third one. And then after that, it’s all bets are off about what they bring in. And so after that, they bring in a big blue-green group. They have one for that. And then different people have different words that they’ll use for other parts of the space.
Anyway, it’s probably related to what they want to talk … Not what they see because they see the same colors as we see. It’s not like they have a low color palette in the things they’re looking at. They’re looking at a lot of beautiful scenery okay, a lot of different colored flowers and berries and things. And so there’s lots of things of very bright colors but they just don’t label the color in those cases. We don’t know this but we think probably what’s going on here is why you label something is you need to talk to someone else about it. And why do I need to talk about a color? Well, if I have two things which are identical and I want you to give me the one that’s different, and the only way it varies is color, then I invent a word which tells you, “This is the one I want. I want the red sweater off the rack, not the green sweater.”
There’s two. And so those things will be identical because these are things we made and they’re dyed and there’s nothing different about them. And so in industrialized society, everything we’ve got is pretty much arbitrarily colored. But you go to a non-industrialized group, that’s not true. And so it’s not like they’re not interested in color. If you bring bright colored things to them, they like them just like we like them. Bright colors are great, they’re beautiful, but they just don’t need to talk about them, they don’t have to.
Lex Fridman
Probably color words is a good example of how language evolves from function, when you need to communicate the use of something, then you invent different variations. And basically you can imagine that the evolution of a language has to do with what the early tribe’s doing, what problems are facing them and they’re quickly figuring out how to efficiently communicate the solution to those problems, whether it’s aesthetic or functional, all that stuff, running away from a mammoth or whatever. But I think what you’re pointing to is that we don’t have data on the evolution of language because many languages have formed a long time ago, so you don’t get the chatter.
Probably color words is a good example of how language evolves from function, when you need to communicate the use of something, then you invent different variations. And basically you can imagine that the evolution of a language has to do with what the early tribe’s doing, what problems are facing them and they’re quickly figuring out how to efficiently communicate the solution to those problems, whether it’s aesthetic or functional, all that stuff, running away from a mammoth or whatever. But I think what you’re pointing to is that we don’t have data on the evolution of language because many languages have formed a long time ago, so you don’t get the chatter.
Evolution of languages
Edward Gibson
We have a little bit of old English to modern English because there was a writing system and we can see how old English looked. The word order changed for instance, in old English to middle English to modern English. And so we could see things like that. But most languages don’t even have a writing system. Of the 7,000, only a small subset of those have a writing system. And even if they have a writing system, it’s not a very modern writing system and so they don’t have it … For Mandarin, for Chinese, we have a lot of evidence for a long time, and for English, and not for much else. German a little bit but not for a whole lot of … Long-term language evolution, we don’t have a lot. We have snapshots, is what we’ve got of current languages.
We have a little bit of old English to modern English because there was a writing system and we can see how old English looked. The word order changed for instance, in old English to middle English to modern English. And so we could see things like that. But most languages don’t even have a writing system. Of the 7,000, only a small subset of those have a writing system. And even if they have a writing system, it’s not a very modern writing system and so they don’t have it … For Mandarin, for Chinese, we have a lot of evidence for a long time, and for English, and not for much else. German a little bit but not for a whole lot of … Long-term language evolution, we don’t have a lot. We have snapshots, is what we’ve got of current languages.
Lex Fridman
You get an inkling of that from the rapid communication on certain platforms. On Reddit, there’s different communities and they’ll come up with different slang, usually from my perspective, driven by a little bit of humor or maybe mockery or whatever, just talking shit in different kinds of ways. And you could see the evolution of language there because I think a lot of things on the internet, you don’t want to be the boring mainstream. You want to deviate from the proper way of talking. And so you get a lot of deviation, rapid deviation. Then when communities collide, you get … Just like you said, humans adapt to it. And you could see it through the lines of humor. It’s very difficult to study but you can imagine a hundred years from now, well, if there’s a new language born for example, we’ll get really high resolution data.
You get an inkling of that from the rapid communication on certain platforms. On Reddit, there’s different communities and they’ll come up with different slang, usually from my perspective, driven by a little bit of humor or maybe mockery or whatever, just talking shit in different kinds of ways. And you could see the evolution of language there because I think a lot of things on the internet, you don’t want to be the boring mainstream. You want to deviate from the proper way of talking. And so you get a lot of deviation, rapid deviation. Then when communities collide, you get … Just like you said, humans adapt to it. And you could see it through the lines of humor. It’s very difficult to study but you can imagine a hundred years from now, well, if there’s a new language born for example, we’ll get really high resolution data.
Edward Gibson
English is changing, English changes all the time. All languages change all the time. It was a famous result about the Queen’s English. If you look at the Queen’s vowels, the Queen’s English is supposed to be … Originally the proper way to talk was defined by whoever the queen talked or the king, whoever was in charge. And so if you look at how her vowels changed from when she first became queen in 1952 or ’53 when she was coronated, that’s Queen Elizabeth who died recently of course, until 50 years later, her vowels changed, her vowels shifted a lot. And so even in the sounds of British English, the way she was talking was changing. The vowels were changing slightly. That’s just in the sounds there was change. We’re all interested in what’s driving any of these changes. The word order of English changed a lot over a thousand years. It used to look like German. It used to be a verb final language with case marking. And it shifted to a vermedial language, a lot of contact, a lot of contact with French. And it became a vermedial language with no case marking. And so it became this verb initially thing.
English is changing, English changes all the time. All languages change all the time. It was a famous result about the Queen’s English. If you look at the Queen’s vowels, the Queen’s English is supposed to be … Originally the proper way to talk was defined by whoever the queen talked or the king, whoever was in charge. And so if you look at how her vowels changed from when she first became queen in 1952 or ’53 when she was coronated, that’s Queen Elizabeth who died recently of course, until 50 years later, her vowels changed, her vowels shifted a lot. And so even in the sounds of British English, the way she was talking was changing. The vowels were changing slightly. That’s just in the sounds there was change. We’re all interested in what’s driving any of these changes. The word order of English changed a lot over a thousand years. It used to look like German. It used to be a verb final language with case marking. And it shifted to a vermedial language, a lot of contact, a lot of contact with French. And it became a vermedial language with no case marking. And so it became this verb initially thing.
Lex Fridman
It’s evolving.
It’s evolving.
Edward Gibson
It totally evolved. It doesn’t evolve maybe very much in 20 years, is maybe what you’re talking about but over 50 and 100 years, things change a lot, I think.
It totally evolved. It doesn’t evolve maybe very much in 20 years, is maybe what you’re talking about but over 50 and 100 years, things change a lot, I think.
Lex Fridman
We’ll now have good data on it, which is great.
We’ll now have good data on it, which is great.
Noam Chomsky
Edward Gibson
That’s for sure. Yeah.
That’s for sure. Yeah.
Lex Fridman
Can you talk to what is syntax and what is grammar? You wrote a book on syntax.
Can you talk to what is syntax and what is grammar? You wrote a book on syntax.
Edward Gibson
I did. You were asking me before about how do I figure out what a dependency structure is? I’d say the dependency structures aren’t that hard generally, I think there’s a lot of agreement of what they are for almost any sentence in most languages. I think people will agree on a lot of that. There are other parameters in the mix, such that some people think there’s a more complicated grammar than just a dependency structure. Noam Chomsky, he’s the most famous linguist ever, and he is famous for proposing a slightly more complicated syntax. And so he invented phrase structure grammar. He’s well known for many, many things but in the 50s and early 60s but late 50s, he was basically figuring out what’s called formal language theory. And he figured out a framework for figuring out how complicated a certain type of language might be, so-called phrase structured grammars of language might be.
I did. You were asking me before about how do I figure out what a dependency structure is? I’d say the dependency structures aren’t that hard generally, I think there’s a lot of agreement of what they are for almost any sentence in most languages. I think people will agree on a lot of that. There are other parameters in the mix, such that some people think there’s a more complicated grammar than just a dependency structure. Noam Chomsky, he’s the most famous linguist ever, and he is famous for proposing a slightly more complicated syntax. And so he invented phrase structure grammar. He’s well known for many, many things but in the 50s and early 60s but late 50s, he was basically figuring out what’s called formal language theory. And he figured out a framework for figuring out how complicated a certain type of language might be, so-called phrase structured grammars of language might be.
And so his idea was that maybe we can think about the complexity of a language by how complicated the rules are. And the rules will look like this. They will have a left-hand side and it’ll have a right-hand side. Something on the left-hand side will expand to the thing on the right-hand side. Say, we’ll start with an S, which is the root, which is a sentence, and then we’re going to expand to things like a noun phrase and a verb phrase is what he would say, for instance, okay. An S goes to an NP and a VP, is a phrase structure rule. And then we figure out what an NP is. An NP is a determiner and a noun, for instance. And a verb phrase is something else, is a verb and another noun phrase and another NP, for instance. Those are the rules of a very simple phrase, structure. And so he proposed phrase structure grammar as a way to cover human languages. And then he actually figured out that, “Well, depending on the formals, that- “
Edward Gibson
… for human languages. And then he actually figured out that, well, depending on the formalization of those grammars, you might get more complicated or less complicated languages. He said, “Well, these are things called context-free languages that rule.” He thought human languages tend to be what he calls context-free languages. But there are simpler languages, which are so-called regular languages. And they have a more constrained form to the rules of the phrase structure of these particular rules. So he basically discovered and invented ways to describe the language. And those are phrase structure, a human language. And he was mostly interested in English initially in his work in the ’50s.
… for human languages. And then he actually figured out that, well, depending on the formalization of those grammars, you might get more complicated or less complicated languages. He said, “Well, these are things called context-free languages that rule.” He thought human languages tend to be what he calls context-free languages. But there are simpler languages, which are so-called regular languages. And they have a more constrained form to the rules of the phrase structure of these particular rules. So he basically discovered and invented ways to describe the language. And those are phrase structure, a human language. And he was mostly interested in English initially in his work in the ’50s.
Lex Fridman
So quick questions around all of this. So formal language theory is the big field of just studying language formally?
So quick questions around all of this. So formal language theory is the big field of just studying language formally?
Edward Gibson
Yes. And it doesn’t have to be human language there. We can have a computer languages, any kind of system which is generating some set of expressions in a language. And those could be the statements in a computer language, for example. It could be that, or it could be human language.
Yes. And it doesn’t have to be human language there. We can have a computer languages, any kind of system which is generating some set of expressions in a language. And those could be the statements in a computer language, for example. It could be that, or it could be human language.
Lex Fridman
So technically you can study programming languages?
So technically you can study programming languages?
Edward Gibson
Yes. And heavily studied using this formalism. There’s a big field of programming language within the formal language.
Yes. And heavily studied using this formalism. There’s a big field of programming language within the formal language.
Lex Fridman
And then phrase structure, grammar is this idea that you can break down language into this S NP VP type of thing?
And then phrase structure, grammar is this idea that you can break down language into this S NP VP type of thing?
Edward Gibson
Yeah. It’s a particular formalism for describing language. And Chomsky was the first one. He’s the one who figured that stuff out back in the ’50s. And that’s equivalent actually, the context-free grammar is actually, is equivalent in the sense that it generates the same sentences as a dependency grammar would. The dependency grammar is a little simpler in some way. You just have a root and it goes… We don’t have any of these, the rules are implicit, I guess. And we just have connections between words. The free structure grammar is a different way to think about the dependency grammar. It’s slightly more complicated, but it’s kind of the same in some ways.
Yeah. It’s a particular formalism for describing language. And Chomsky was the first one. He’s the one who figured that stuff out back in the ’50s. And that’s equivalent actually, the context-free grammar is actually, is equivalent in the sense that it generates the same sentences as a dependency grammar would. The dependency grammar is a little simpler in some way. You just have a root and it goes… We don’t have any of these, the rules are implicit, I guess. And we just have connections between words. The free structure grammar is a different way to think about the dependency grammar. It’s slightly more complicated, but it’s kind of the same in some ways.
Lex Fridman
To clarify, dependency grammar is the framework under which you see language and you make a case that this is a good way to describe language.
To clarify, dependency grammar is the framework under which you see language and you make a case that this is a good way to describe language.
Edward Gibson
That’s correct.
That’s correct.
Lex Fridman
And Noam Chomsky is watching this, is very upset right now, so let’s… Just kidding. Where’s the place of disagreement between phrase structure grammar and dependency grammar?
And Noam Chomsky is watching this, is very upset right now, so let’s… Just kidding. Where’s the place of disagreement between phrase structure grammar and dependency grammar?
Edward Gibson
They’re very close. So phrase structure grammar and dependency grammar aren’t that far apart. I like dependency grammar because it’s more perspicuous, it’s more transparent about representing the connections between the words. It’s just a little harder to see in phrase structure grammar.
They’re very close. So phrase structure grammar and dependency grammar aren’t that far apart. I like dependency grammar because it’s more perspicuous, it’s more transparent about representing the connections between the words. It’s just a little harder to see in phrase structure grammar.
The place where Chomsky sort of devolved or went off from this is he also thought there was something called movement. And that’s where we disagree. That’s the place where I would say we disagree. I mean maybe we’ll get into that later. But the idea is… Do you want me to explain that now?
Lex Fridman
I would love, can you explain movement?
I would love, can you explain movement?
Edward Gibson
Movement. Okay.
Movement. Okay.
Lex Fridman
You’re saying so many interesting things.
You’re saying so many interesting things.
Edward Gibson
Movement is, Chomsky basically sees English, and he says, “Okay.” I said, we had that sentence earlier. It was like, “Two dogs entered the room.” It’s changed it a little bit. Say, “Two dogs will enter the room.” And he notices that, hey, English, if I want to make a question, a yes/no question from that same sentence, I say, instead of, “Two dogs will enter the room.” I say, “Will two dogs enter the room?” Okay, there’s a different way to say the same idea. And it’s like, well, the auxiliary verb, that will thing, it’s at the front as opposed to in the middle.
Movement is, Chomsky basically sees English, and he says, “Okay.” I said, we had that sentence earlier. It was like, “Two dogs entered the room.” It’s changed it a little bit. Say, “Two dogs will enter the room.” And he notices that, hey, English, if I want to make a question, a yes/no question from that same sentence, I say, instead of, “Two dogs will enter the room.” I say, “Will two dogs enter the room?” Okay, there’s a different way to say the same idea. And it’s like, well, the auxiliary verb, that will thing, it’s at the front as opposed to in the middle.
And he looked, if you look at English, you see that that’s true for all those modal verbs and for other kinds of auxiliary verbs. In English, you always do that. You always put an auxiliary verb at the front. And when he saw that, so if I say, “I can win this bet. Can I win this bet?” So I move a can to the front. So actually that’s a theory. I just gave you a theory there. He talks about it as movement. That word in the declarative is the root, is the default way to think about the sentence. And you move the auxiliary verb to the front. That’s a movement theory.
And he just thought that was just so obvious that it must be true, that there’s nothing more to say about that. This is how auxiliary verbs work in English. There’s a movement rule such that, to get from the declarative to the interrogative, you’re moving the auxiliary to the front. And it’s a little more complicated as soon as you go to simple present and simple past. Because if I say, “John slept,” you have to say, “Did John sleep?” Not. “Slept, John,” right? And so you have to somehow get an auxiliary verb. And I guess underlyingly, it’s like slept is… It’s a little more complicated than that, but that’s his idea. There’s a movement.
And so a different way to think about that, I mean, then he ended up showing later. So he proposed this theory of grammar, which has movement. There’s other places where he thought there’s movement, not just auxiliary verbs, but things like the passive in English and things like questions, WH questions, a bunch of places where he thought there’s also movement going on. And each one of those, he thinks there’s words, well, phrases and words are moving around from one structure to another, which he called deep structure to surface structure. I mean, there’s two different structures in his theory.
There’s a different way to think about this, which is there’s no movement at all. There’s a lexical copying rule such that the word will, or the word can, these auxiliary verbs, they just have two forms. And one of them is the declarative and one of them is interrogative. And you basically have the declarative one and oh, I form the interrogative, or I can form one from the other. It doesn’t matter which direction you go. And I just have a new entry which has the same meaning, which has a slightly different argument structure. Argument structure is just a fancy word for the ordering of the words.
And so if I say, it was, “The two dogs can or will enter the room,” there’s two forms of will. One is, will, declarative. And then, okay, I’ve got my subject to the left, it comes before me, and the verb comes after me in that one. And then the will, interrogative, it’s like, oh, I go first. Interrogative will is first, and then I have the subject immediately after and then the verb after that. And so you can just generate from one of those words another word with a slightly different argument structure with different ordering.
Lex Fridman
And these are just lexical copies. They’re not necessarily moving from one to another?
And these are just lexical copies. They’re not necessarily moving from one to another?
Edward Gibson
There’s no movement.
There’s no movement.
Lex Fridman
There’s a romantic notion that you have one main way to use a word and then you could move it around, which is essentially what movement is implying?
There’s a romantic notion that you have one main way to use a word and then you could move it around, which is essentially what movement is implying?
Edward Gibson
But that’s the lexical copying is similar. So then we do lexical copying for that same idea that maybe the declarative is the source and then we can copy it. And so an advantage, there’s multiple advantages of the lexical copying story. It’s not my story. This is like Ivan Sag, linguist, a bunch of linguists have been proposing these stories as well, in tandem with the movement story. Ivan Sag died a while ago, but he was one of the proponents of the non-movement of the lexical copying story.
But that’s the lexical copying is similar. So then we do lexical copying for that same idea that maybe the declarative is the source and then we can copy it. And so an advantage, there’s multiple advantages of the lexical copying story. It’s not my story. This is like Ivan Sag, linguist, a bunch of linguists have been proposing these stories as well, in tandem with the movement story. Ivan Sag died a while ago, but he was one of the proponents of the non-movement of the lexical copying story.
And so that is that a great advantage is, well Chomsky really famously, in 1971 showed that the movement story leads to learnability problems. It leads to problems for how language is learned. It’s really, really hard to figure out what the underlying structure of a language is if you have both phrase structure and movement. It’s really hard to figure out what came from what. There’s a lot of possibilities there. If you don’t have that problem, the learning problem gets a lot easier.
Lex Fridman
Just say there’s lexical copies. When we say the learning problem, do you mean humans learning a new language?
Just say there’s lexical copies. When we say the learning problem, do you mean humans learning a new language?
Edward Gibson
Yeah, just learning English. So baby is lying around listening in the crib, listening to me talk. And how are they learning English? Or maybe it’s a two-year-old who’s learning interrogatives and stuff. How are they doing that? Are they doing it from… Are they figuring out? So Chomsky said it’s impossible to figure it out actually. He said it’s actually impossible, not hard, but impossible. And therefore that’s where universal grammar comes from, is that it has to be built in. And so what they’re learning is that there’s some built-in, movement is built in his story, is absolutely part of your language module. And then you’re just setting parameters. English is just a variant of the universal grammar. And you’re figuring out, oh, which orders does English do these things?
Yeah, just learning English. So baby is lying around listening in the crib, listening to me talk. And how are they learning English? Or maybe it’s a two-year-old who’s learning interrogatives and stuff. How are they doing that? Are they doing it from… Are they figuring out? So Chomsky said it’s impossible to figure it out actually. He said it’s actually impossible, not hard, but impossible. And therefore that’s where universal grammar comes from, is that it has to be built in. And so what they’re learning is that there’s some built-in, movement is built in his story, is absolutely part of your language module. And then you’re just setting parameters. English is just a variant of the universal grammar. And you’re figuring out, oh, which orders does English do these things?
The non-movement story, it doesn’t have this. It’s much more bottom-up, you’re learning rules. You’re learning rules one by one, and oh, this word is connected to that word. Another advantage, it’s learnable. Another advantage of it is that it predicts that not all auxiliaries might move. It might depend on the word, and that turns out to be true. So there’s words that don’t really work as auxiliary. They work in declarative and not in interrogative. So I can say, I’ll give you the opposite first. I can say, ” Aren’t I invited to the party?” And that’s an interrogative form. But it’s not from, “I aren’t invited to the party.” There is no, “I aren’t.” So that’s interrogative only.
And then we also have forms like, ought. “I ought to do this.” And I guess some old British people can say…
Lex Fridman
“Ought I?”
“Ought I?”
Edward Gibson
Exactly. It doesn’t sound right, does it? For me it sounds ridiculous. I don’t even think ought is great. But I mean, I totally recognize, “I ought to do it.” Ought is not too bad actually. I can say, “Ought to do this.” That sounds pretty good.
Exactly. It doesn’t sound right, does it? For me it sounds ridiculous. I don’t even think ought is great. But I mean, I totally recognize, “I ought to do it.” Ought is not too bad actually. I can say, “Ought to do this.” That sounds pretty good.
Lex Fridman
If I’m trying to sound sophisticated, maybe?
If I’m trying to sound sophisticated, maybe?
Edward Gibson
I don’t know. It just sounds completely odd to me.
I don’t know. It just sounds completely odd to me.
Lex Fridman
Ought I?
Ought I?
Edward Gibson
Anyway. So there are variants here. And a lot of these words just work in one versus the other. And that’s fine under the lexical copying story. It’s like, well, you just learn the usage, whatever the usage is, is what you do with this word. But it’s a little bit harder in the movement story. The movement story, that’s an advantage I think, of lexical copying. In all of these different places, there’s all these usage variants which make the movement story a little bit harder to work.
Anyway. So there are variants here. And a lot of these words just work in one versus the other. And that’s fine under the lexical copying story. It’s like, well, you just learn the usage, whatever the usage is, is what you do with this word. But it’s a little bit harder in the movement story. The movement story, that’s an advantage I think, of lexical copying. In all of these different places, there’s all these usage variants which make the movement story a little bit harder to work.
Lex Fridman
One of the main divisions here is the movement story versus the lexical copy story, that has to do about the auxiliary words and so on. But if you just rewind to the phrase structure grammar versus dependency grammar…
One of the main divisions here is the movement story versus the lexical copy story, that has to do about the auxiliary words and so on. But if you just rewind to the phrase structure grammar versus dependency grammar…
Edward Gibson
Those are equivalent in some sense in that for any dependency grammar, I can generate a phrase structure grammar, which generates exactly the same sentences. I just like the dependency grammar formalism because it makes something really salient. Which is the lengths of dependencies between words, which isn’t so obvious in the phrase structure. In the phrase structure, it’s just hard to see. It’s in there, it’s just very, very, it’s opaque.
Those are equivalent in some sense in that for any dependency grammar, I can generate a phrase structure grammar, which generates exactly the same sentences. I just like the dependency grammar formalism because it makes something really salient. Which is the lengths of dependencies between words, which isn’t so obvious in the phrase structure. In the phrase structure, it’s just hard to see. It’s in there, it’s just very, very, it’s opaque.
Lex Fridman
Technically, I think phrase structure grammar is mappable to dependency grammar.
Technically, I think phrase structure grammar is mappable to dependency grammar.
Edward Gibson
And vice versa.
And vice versa.
Lex Fridman
And vice versa. But there’s these little labels, S, NP, VP.
And vice versa. But there’s these little labels, S, NP, VP.
Edward Gibson
For a particular dependency grammar you can make a phrase structure grammar, which generates exactly those same sentences and vice versa. But there are many phrase structure grammars, which you can’t really make a dependency grammar. I mean, you can do a lot more in a phrase structure grammar. But you get many more of these extra nodes, basically. You can have more structure in there. And some people like that. And maybe there’s value to that. I don’t like it.
For a particular dependency grammar you can make a phrase structure grammar, which generates exactly those same sentences and vice versa. But there are many phrase structure grammars, which you can’t really make a dependency grammar. I mean, you can do a lot more in a phrase structure grammar. But you get many more of these extra nodes, basically. You can have more structure in there. And some people like that. And maybe there’s value to that. I don’t like it.
Lex Fridman
Well, for you, so would you clarify. So dependency grammar is just, well, one word depends on only one other word. And you form these trees, and that makes, it really puts priority on those dependencies, just like as a tree that you can then measure the distance of the dependency from one word to the other. They can then map to the cognitive processing of the sentences, how easy it is to understand and all that kind of stuff. So it just puts the focus on just the mathematical distance of dependence between words. So it’s just a different focus.
Well, for you, so would you clarify. So dependency grammar is just, well, one word depends on only one other word. And you form these trees, and that makes, it really puts priority on those dependencies, just like as a tree that you can then measure the distance of the dependency from one word to the other. They can then map to the cognitive processing of the sentences, how easy it is to understand and all that kind of stuff. So it just puts the focus on just the mathematical distance of dependence between words. So it’s just a different focus.
Edward Gibson
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
Lex Fridman
Just to continue on the thread of Chomsky because it’s really interesting. As you’re discussing disagreement to the degree there’s disagreement, you’re also telling the history of the study of language, which is really awesome. So you mentioned context-free versus regular. Does that distinction come into play for dependency grammars?
Just to continue on the thread of Chomsky because it’s really interesting. As you’re discussing disagreement to the degree there’s disagreement, you’re also telling the history of the study of language, which is really awesome. So you mentioned context-free versus regular. Does that distinction come into play for dependency grammars?
Edward Gibson
No, not at all. I mean, regular languages are too simple for human languages. It’s a part of the hierarchy. But human languages are, in the phrase structure world are definite. They’re at least context-free, maybe a little bit more, a little bit harder than that.
No, not at all. I mean, regular languages are too simple for human languages. It’s a part of the hierarchy. But human languages are, in the phrase structure world are definite. They’re at least context-free, maybe a little bit more, a little bit harder than that.
So there’s something called context-sensitive as well, where you can have, this is just the formal language description. In a context-free grammar, you have one… This is a bunch of formal language theory we’re doing here.
Lex Fridman
I love it.
I love it.
Edward Gibson
Okay, so you have a left-hand side category, and you’re expanding to anything on the right. That’s a context-free. So the idea is that that category on the left expands independent of context to those things, whatever they are on the right. It doesn’t matter what. And a context-sensitive says, okay, I actually have more than one thing on the left. I can tell you only in this context, maybe you have a left and a right context or just a left context or a right context. I have two or more stuff on the left tells you how to expand those things in that way. So it’s context-sensitive.
Okay, so you have a left-hand side category, and you’re expanding to anything on the right. That’s a context-free. So the idea is that that category on the left expands independent of context to those things, whatever they are on the right. It doesn’t matter what. And a context-sensitive says, okay, I actually have more than one thing on the left. I can tell you only in this context, maybe you have a left and a right context or just a left context or a right context. I have two or more stuff on the left tells you how to expand those things in that way. So it’s context-sensitive.
A regular language is just more constrained, and so it doesn’t allow anything on the right. Basically it’s one very complicated rule is what a regular language is. And so it doesn’t have any… I just say the long distance dependencies, it doesn’t allow recursion, for instance. There’s no recursion. Yeah, recursion is where, which human languages have recursion, they have embedding. Well, it doesn’t allow center-embedded recursion, which human languages have, which is what…
Lex Fridman
Center-embedded recursion, so within a sentence? Within a sentence?
Center-embedded recursion, so within a sentence? Within a sentence?
Edward Gibson
Yeah, within a sentence. So here we’re going to get to that, but the formal language stuff is a little aside. Chomsky wasn’t proposing it for human languages even. He was just pointing out that human languages are context-free. Because that was stuff we did for formal languages. And what he was most interested in was human language. And that’s the movement is where he set off on, I would say, a very interesting but wrong foot. I agree, it’s a very interesting history.
Yeah, within a sentence. So here we’re going to get to that, but the formal language stuff is a little aside. Chomsky wasn’t proposing it for human languages even. He was just pointing out that human languages are context-free. Because that was stuff we did for formal languages. And what he was most interested in was human language. And that’s the movement is where he set off on, I would say, a very interesting but wrong foot. I agree, it’s a very interesting history.
So he proposed this multiple theories in ’57 and then ’65. They all have this framework though. It was phrase structure plus movement, different versions of the phrase structure and the movement in the ’57. These are the most famous original bits of Chomsky’s work. And then in ’71 is when he figured out that those lead to learning problems. That there’s cases where a kid could never figure out which set of rules was intended. And then he said, “Well, that means it’s innate.” It’s kind of interesting. He just really thought the movement was just so obviously true that he didn’t even entertain giving it up. It’s just, that’s obviously right.
And it was later where people figured out that there’s all these subtle ways in which things which look like generalizations aren’t generalizations across the category. They’re word specific and they kind of work, but they don’t work across various other words in the category. And so it’s easier to just think of these things as lexical copies. And I think he was very obsessed. I don’t know, I’m guessing. But he really wanted this story to be simple in some sense. And language is a little more complicated in some sense. He didn’t like words. He never talks about words. He likes to talk about combinations of words. And words are, you look up a dictionary, there’s 50 senses for a common word. The word take, will have 30 or 40 senses in it.
So there will be many different senses for common words. And he just doesn’t think about that, or he doesn’t think that’s language. I think he doesn’t think that’s language. He thinks that words are distinct from combinations of words. I think they’re the same. If you look at my brain in the scanner while I’m listening to a language I understand, and you compare, I can localize my language network in a few minutes, in like 15 minutes. And what you do is I listen to a language I know. I listen to maybe some language I don’t know, or I listen to muffled speech or I read sentences and I read non-words. I can do anything like this, anything that’s really like English and anything that’s not very like English. So I’ve got something like it, and not, that I control.
And the voxels, which is just the 3D pixels in my brain that are responding most is a language area. And that’s this left-lateralized area in my head. And wherever I look in that network, if you look for the combinations versus the words it’s everywhere.
Lex Fridman
It’s the same.
It’s the same.
Edward Gibson
It’s the same.
It’s the same.
Lex Fridman
That’s fascinating.
That’s fascinating.
Edward Gibson
And so it’s hard to find. There are no areas that we know. I mean, it’s a little overstated right now. At this point, the technology isn’t great, it’s not bad. But we have the best way to figure out what’s going on in my brain when I’m listening or reading language is to use fMRI, functional magnetic resonance imaging. And that’s a very good localization method. So I can figure out where exactly these signals are coming from, pretty down to millimeters, cubic millimeters or smaller, very small. We can figure those out very well.
And so it’s hard to find. There are no areas that we know. I mean, it’s a little overstated right now. At this point, the technology isn’t great, it’s not bad. But we have the best way to figure out what’s going on in my brain when I’m listening or reading language is to use fMRI, functional magnetic resonance imaging. And that’s a very good localization method. So I can figure out where exactly these signals are coming from, pretty down to millimeters, cubic millimeters or smaller, very small. We can figure those out very well.
The problem is the when. It’s measuring oxygen. And oxygen takes a little while to get to those cells, so it takes on the order of seconds. So I talk fast, I probably listen fast. And I can probably understand things really fast. So a lot of stuff happens in two seconds. And so to say that we know what’s going on, that the words right now in that network, our best guess is that whole network is doing something similar. But maybe different parts of that network are doing different things. And that’s probably the case. We just don’t have very good methods to figure that out at this moment.
Lex Fridman
Since we’re kind of talking about the history of the study of language, what other interesting disagreements, and you’re both at MIT or were for a long time. What interesting disagreements there, tension of ideas are there, between you and Noam Chomsky? And we should say that Noam was in the linguistics department, and you’re, I guess for a time were affiliated there, but primarily brain and cognitive science department. Which is another way of studying language. You’ve been talking about fMRI. Is there something else interesting to bring to the surface about the disagreement between the two of you, or other people at this point?
Since we’re kind of talking about the history of the study of language, what other interesting disagreements, and you’re both at MIT or were for a long time. What interesting disagreements there, tension of ideas are there, between you and Noam Chomsky? And we should say that Noam was in the linguistics department, and you’re, I guess for a time were affiliated there, but primarily brain and cognitive science department. Which is another way of studying language. You’ve been talking about fMRI. Is there something else interesting to bring to the surface about the disagreement between the two of you, or other people at this point?
Edward Gibson
I mean, I’ve been at MIT for 31 years since 1993 and Chomsky’s been there much longer. So I met him, I knew him. I met him when I first got there, I guess. And we would interact every now and then. I’d say our biggest difference is our methods. And so that’s the biggest difference between me and Noam, is that I gather data from people. I do experiments with people and I gather corpus data, whatever corpus data is available, and we do quantitative methods to evaluate any kind of hypothesis we have. He just doesn’t do that. And so he has never once been associated with any experiment or corpus work ever.
I mean, I’ve been at MIT for 31 years since 1993 and Chomsky’s been there much longer. So I met him, I knew him. I met him when I first got there, I guess. And we would interact every now and then. I’d say our biggest difference is our methods. And so that’s the biggest difference between me and Noam, is that I gather data from people. I do experiments with people and I gather corpus data, whatever corpus data is available, and we do quantitative methods to evaluate any kind of hypothesis we have. He just doesn’t do that. And so he has never once been associated with any experiment or corpus work ever.
And so it’s all thought experiments. It’s his own intuitions. So I just don’t think that’s the way to do things. That’s across the street, they’re across the street from us, difference between brain and cog-sci and linguistics. I mean, not all linguists, some of the linguists, depending on what you do, more speech-oriented, they do more quantitative stuff. But in the meaning words and well, it’s combinations of words, syntax, semantics, they tend not to do experiments and corpus analyses.
Lex Fridman
On the linguistic side probably, well, but the method is a symptom of a bigger approach. Which is a psychology philosophy side on Noam. For you it’s more data-driven, almost like mathematical approach.
On the linguistic side probably, well, but the method is a symptom of a bigger approach. Which is a psychology philosophy side on Noam. For you it’s more data-driven, almost like mathematical approach.
Edward Gibson
Yeah, I mean, I’m a psychologist, so I would say we’re in psychology. Brain cognitive sciences is MIT’s old psychology department. It was a psychology department up until 1985, and it became the Brain and Cognitive Science Department. My training is math and computer science, but I’m a psychologist. I mean, I don’t know what I am.
Yeah, I mean, I’m a psychologist, so I would say we’re in psychology. Brain cognitive sciences is MIT’s old psychology department. It was a psychology department up until 1985, and it became the Brain and Cognitive Science Department. My training is math and computer science, but I’m a psychologist. I mean, I don’t know what I am.
Lex Fridman
So, data-driven psychologist, you are.
So, data-driven psychologist, you are.
Edward Gibson
I am what I am. But I’m happy to be called a linguist. I’m happy to be called a computer scientist. I’m happy to be called a psychologist, any of those things.
I am what I am. But I’m happy to be called a linguist. I’m happy to be called a computer scientist. I’m happy to be called a psychologist, any of those things.
Lex Fridman
But in the actual, like how that manifests itself outside of the methodology is these differences, these subtle differences about the movement story versus the lexical copy story.
But in the actual, like how that manifests itself outside of the methodology is these differences, these subtle differences about the movement story versus the lexical copy story.
Edward Gibson
Yeah. Those are theories.
Yeah. Those are theories.
Lex Fridman
Those are theories.
Those are theories.
Edward Gibson
So the theories are… But I think the reason we differ in part is because of how we evaluate the theories. And so I evaluate theories quantitatively and Noam doesn’t.
So the theories are… But I think the reason we differ in part is because of how we evaluate the theories. And so I evaluate theories quantitatively and Noam doesn’t.
Lex Fridman
Got it. Okay. Well, let’s explore the theories that you explore in your book. Let’s return to this dependency grammar framework of looking at language. What’s a good justification why the dependency grammar framework is a good way to explain language? What’s your intuition?
Got it. Okay. Well, let’s explore the theories that you explore in your book. Let’s return to this dependency grammar framework of looking at language. What’s a good justification why the dependency grammar framework is a good way to explain language? What’s your intuition?
Edward Gibson
The reason I like dependency grammar, as I’ve said before, is that it’s very transparent about its representation of distance between words. All it is is you’ve got a bunch of words you’re connecting together to make a sentence. And a really neat insight, which turns out to be true, is that the further apart the pair of words are that you’re connecting, the harder it is to do the production. The harder it is to do the comprehension. If it’s harder to produce, it’s harder to understand when the words are far apart. When they’re close together, it’s easy to produce and it’s easy to comprehend.
The reason I like dependency grammar, as I’ve said before, is that it’s very transparent about its representation of distance between words. All it is is you’ve got a bunch of words you’re connecting together to make a sentence. And a really neat insight, which turns out to be true, is that the further apart the pair of words are that you’re connecting, the harder it is to do the production. The harder it is to do the comprehension. If it’s harder to produce, it’s harder to understand when the words are far apart. When they’re close together, it’s easy to produce and it’s easy to comprehend.
Let me give you an example. We have in any language, we have mostly local connections between words, but they’re abstract. The connections are abstracted between categories of words. And so you can always make things further apart if you add modification, for example, after a noun. So a noun in English comes before a verb, the subject noun comes before a verb, and then there’s an object after, for example.
So I can say, what I said before, “The dog entered the room,” or something like that. So I can modify dog. If I say something more about dog after it, then what I’m doing is indirectly I’m lengthening the dependence between dog and entered, by adding more stuff to it. So just make it explicit here, if I say, “The boy who the cat scratched, cried.” We’re going to have a mean cat here. And so what I’ve got here is, the boy cried, would be a very short, simple sentence. And I just told you something about the boy, and I told you it was the boy who the cat scratched.
Lex Fridman
So the cry is connected to the boy. The cry at the end, it’s connected to the boy in the beginning.
So the cry is connected to the boy. The cry at the end, it’s connected to the boy in the beginning.
Edward Gibson
Right. And so I can do that. I can say that, that’s a perfectly fine English sentence. And I can say, “The cat, which the dog chased, ran away,” or something. I can do that. But it’s really hard now, I’ve got, whatever I have here, I have the boy who the cat. Now let’s say I try to modify cat. “The boy, who the cat, which the dog chased, scratched, ran away.” Oh my God, that’s hard, right? I’m just working that through in my head, how to produce, and it’s really very just horrendous to understand. It’s not so bad, at least I’ve got intonation there to mark the boundaries and stuff. But that’s really complicated. That’s sort of English in a way. I mean that follows the rules of English.
Right. And so I can do that. I can say that, that’s a perfectly fine English sentence. And I can say, “The cat, which the dog chased, ran away,” or something. I can do that. But it’s really hard now, I’ve got, whatever I have here, I have the boy who the cat. Now let’s say I try to modify cat. “The boy, who the cat, which the dog chased, scratched, ran away.” Oh my God, that’s hard, right? I’m just working that through in my head, how to produce, and it’s really very just horrendous to understand. It’s not so bad, at least I’ve got intonation there to mark the boundaries and stuff. But that’s really complicated. That’s sort of English in a way. I mean that follows the rules of English.
So what’s interesting about that is that what I’m doing is nesting dependencies there. I’m putting one, I’ve got a subject connected to a verb there. And then I’m modifying that with a clause, another clause, which happens to have a subject and a verb relation. I’m trying to do that again on the second one. And what that does is it lengthens out the dependence, multiple dependence actually get lengthened out there. The dependencies get longer, on the outside ones get long, and even the ones in between get kind of long.
What’s fascinating is that that’s bad. That’s really horrendous in English. But that’s horrendous in any language. No matter what language you look at, if you do, just figure out some structure where I’m going to have some modification following some head, which is connected to some later head, and I do it again, it won’t be good. Guaranteed. 100% that will be uninterpretable in that language in the same way that was uninterpretable in English.
Lex Fridman
Just to clarify, the distance of the dependencies is whenever the boy cried, there’s a dependence between two words and then you’re counting the number of what morphemes between them?
Just to clarify, the distance of the dependencies is whenever the boy cried, there’s a dependence between two words and then you’re counting the number of what morphemes between them?
Edward Gibson
That’s a good question. I just say words. Your words are morphemes between, we don’t know that. Actually that’s a very good question. What is the distance metric? But let’s just say it’s words. Sure.
That’s a good question. I just say words. Your words are morphemes between, we don’t know that. Actually that’s a very good question. What is the distance metric? But let’s just say it’s words. Sure.
Lex Fridman
Okay. And you’re saying the longer the distance of that dependence, no matter the language, except legalese.
Okay. And you’re saying the longer the distance of that dependence, no matter the language, except legalese.
Edward Gibson
Even legalese.
Even legalese.
Lex Fridman
Even legalese, okay we’ll talk about it. But that the people will be very upset that speak that language. Not upset, but they’ll either not understand it, or they’d be like, their brain will be working in overtime.
Even legalese, okay we’ll talk about it. But that the people will be very upset that speak that language. Not upset, but they’ll either not understand it, or they’d be like, their brain will be working in overtime.
Edward Gibson
They’ll have a hard time either producing or comprehending it. They might tell you that’s not their language. It’s sort of their language. They’ll agree with each of those pieces is part of their language, but somehow that combination will be very, very difficult to produce and understand.
They’ll have a hard time either producing or comprehending it. They might tell you that’s not their language. It’s sort of their language. They’ll agree with each of those pieces is part of their language, but somehow that combination will be very, very difficult to produce and understand.
Lex Fridman
Is that a chicken or the egg issue here?
Is that a chicken or the egg issue here?
Edward Gibson
Well, I’m giving you an explanation. Well, I mean I’m giving you two kinds of explanations. I’m telling you that center embedding, that’s nesting, those are the same. Those are synonyms for the same concept here. And the explanation for… Those are always hard, center embedding and nesting are always hard. And I gave you an explanation for why they might be hard, which is long distance connections. When you do center embedding, when you do nesting, you always have long distance connections between the dependents.
Well, I’m giving you an explanation. Well, I mean I’m giving you two kinds of explanations. I’m telling you that center embedding, that’s nesting, those are the same. Those are synonyms for the same concept here. And the explanation for… Those are always hard, center embedding and nesting are always hard. And I gave you an explanation for why they might be hard, which is long distance connections. When you do center embedding, when you do nesting, you always have long distance connections between the dependents.
So that’s not necessarily the right explanation. I can go through reasons why that’s probably a good explanation. And it’s not really just about one of them. So probably it’s a pair of them or something of these dependents that you get along that drives you to be really confused in that case. And so what the behavioral consequence there, I mean, this is kind of methods, like how do we get at this? You could try to do experiments to get people to produce these things. They’re going to have a hard time producing them. You can try to do experiments to get them to understand them, and see how well they understand them. Can they understand them? Another method you can do is give people partial materials and ask them to complete them, those center embedded materials. And they’ll fail. So I’ve done that. I’ve done all these kinds of things.
Lex Fridman
What do you mean? So center embedding, meaning you can take a normal sentence like, “The boy cried,” and inject a bunch of crap in the middle.
What do you mean? So center embedding, meaning you can take a normal sentence like, “The boy cried,” and inject a bunch of crap in the middle.
Edward Gibson
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
That separates the boy and the cried. Okay. That’s center embedding. And nesting is on top of that?
That separates the boy and the cried. Okay. That’s center embedding. And nesting is on top of that?
Edward Gibson
Same thing. No, no, nesting is the same thing. Center embedding, those are totally equivalent terms. I’m sorry, I sometimes use one and sometimes…
Same thing. No, no, nesting is the same thing. Center embedding, those are totally equivalent terms. I’m sorry, I sometimes use one and sometimes…
Lex Fridman
Got it, got it. Totally equivalent.
Got it, got it. Totally equivalent.
Edward Gibson
They don’t mean anything different.
They don’t mean anything different.
Lex Fridman
Got it. And then what you’re saying is there’s a bunch of different kinds of experiments you can do. I mean, I’d like the understanding one is like have more embedding, more center embedding, is it easier or harder to understand? But then you have to measure the level of understanding, I guess?
Got it. And then what you’re saying is there’s a bunch of different kinds of experiments you can do. I mean, I’d like the understanding one is like have more embedding, more center embedding, is it easier or harder to understand? But then you have to measure the level of understanding, I guess?
Edward Gibson
Yeah, you could. I mean there’s multiple ways to do that. I mean there’s the simplest way is just ask people how good does it sound? How natural does it sound? That’s a very blunt, but very good measure. It’s very reliable. People will do the same thing. And so it’s like, “I don’t know what it means exactly, but it’s doing something.” Such that we’re measuring something about the confusion, the difficulty associated with those.
Yeah, you could. I mean there’s multiple ways to do that. I mean there’s the simplest way is just ask people how good does it sound? How natural does it sound? That’s a very blunt, but very good measure. It’s very reliable. People will do the same thing. And so it’s like, “I don’t know what it means exactly, but it’s doing something.” Such that we’re measuring something about the confusion, the difficulty associated with those.
Lex Fridman
And those are giving you a signal. That’s why you can say they’re… Okay. What about the completion with the center embedding?
And those are giving you a signal. That’s why you can say they’re… Okay. What about the completion with the center embedding?
Edward Gibson
If you give them a partial sentence, say I say, “The book, which the author who,” and I ask you to now finish that off for me.
If you give them a partial sentence, say I say, “The book, which the author who,” and I ask you to now finish that off for me.
Lex Fridman
That breaks people’s brain.
That breaks people’s brain.
Edward Gibson
Yeah, yeah. But say it’s written in front of you and you can just have as much time as you want. Even though that one’s not too hard, right? So if I say, “It’s like the book, it’s like, oh, the book, which the author who I met wrote was good.” That’s a very simple completion for that.
Yeah, yeah. But say it’s written in front of you and you can just have as much time as you want. Even though that one’s not too hard, right? So if I say, “It’s like the book, it’s like, oh, the book, which the author who I met wrote was good.” That’s a very simple completion for that.
If I give that to completion online somewhere, to a crowdsourcing platform and ask people to complete that, they will miss off a verb very regularly. Like half the time, maybe two-thirds of the time, they’ll just leave off one of those verb phrases. Even with that simple… So say, “The book, which the author who…” And they’ll say, “Was…” You need three verbs, I need three verbs. “Who I met, wrote, was good.” And they’ll give me two. They’ll say, “Who was famous was good.” Or something like that. They’ll just give me two. And that’ll happen about 60% of the time. So 40%, maybe 30%, they’ll do it correctly. Correctly, meaning they’ll do a three-verb phrase. I don’t know what’s correct or not. This is hard. It’s a hard task.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, actually I’m struggling with it in my head.
Yeah, actually I’m struggling with it in my head.
Edward Gibson
Well, it’s easier written.
Well, it’s easier written.
Lex Fridman
When you stare at it, it’s easier?
When you stare at it, it’s easier?
Edward Gibson
If you look, it’s a little easier than listening is pretty tough. Because there’s no trace of it. You have to remember the words that I’m saying, which is very hard auditorily. We wouldn’t do it this way. You’d do it written, you can look at it and figure it out. It’s easier in many dimensions, in some ways, depending on the person. It’s easier to gather written data for… I mean most, I work in psycholinguistics, psychology of language and stuff. And so a lot of our work is based on written stuff because it’s so easy to gather data from people doing written kinds of tasks.
If you look, it’s a little easier than listening is pretty tough. Because there’s no trace of it. You have to remember the words that I’m saying, which is very hard auditorily. We wouldn’t do it this way. You’d do it written, you can look at it and figure it out. It’s easier in many dimensions, in some ways, depending on the person. It’s easier to gather written data for… I mean most, I work in psycholinguistics, psychology of language and stuff. And so a lot of our work is based on written stuff because it’s so easy to gather data from people doing written kinds of tasks.
Spoken tasks are just more complicated to administer and analyze because people do weird things when they speak. And it’s harder to analyze what they do, but they generally point to the same kinds of things.
Lex Fridman
So the universal theory of language by Ted Gibson is that you can form dependency, you can form trees for many sentences.
So the universal theory of language by Ted Gibson is that you can form dependency, you can form trees for many sentences.
Edward Gibson
That’s right.
That’s right.
Lex Fridman
You can measure the distance in some way of those dependencies. And then you can say that most languages have very short dependencies.
You can measure the distance in some way of those dependencies. And then you can say that most languages have very short dependencies.
Edward Gibson
All languages.
All languages.
Lex Fridman
All languages.
All languages.
Edward Gibson
All languages have short dependencies. You can actually measure that. So an ex-student of mine, this guy’s at University of California Irvine. Richard Futrell did a thing a bunch of years ago now, where he looked at all the languages we could look at, which was about 40 initially. And now I think there’s about 64, which there are dependency structures. Meaning it’s got to be a big text, a bunch of texts which have been parsed for their dependency structures. And there’s about 60 of those which have been parsed that way. And for all of those, what he did was take any sentence in one of those languages and you can do the dependency structure and then start at the root. We’re talking about dependency structures. That’s pretty easy now. And he’s trying to figure out what a control way you might say the same sentence is in that language.
All languages have short dependencies. You can actually measure that. So an ex-student of mine, this guy’s at University of California Irvine. Richard Futrell did a thing a bunch of years ago now, where he looked at all the languages we could look at, which was about 40 initially. And now I think there’s about 64, which there are dependency structures. Meaning it’s got to be a big text, a bunch of texts which have been parsed for their dependency structures. And there’s about 60 of those which have been parsed that way. And for all of those, what he did was take any sentence in one of those languages and you can do the dependency structure and then start at the root. We’re talking about dependency structures. That’s pretty easy now. And he’s trying to figure out what a control way you might say the same sentence is in that language.
And so we just like, all right, there’s a root. And let’s say a sentence is, let’s go back to, “Two dogs entered the room.” So entered is the root. And entered has two dependents. It’s got dogs and it has room. And what he did is let’s scramble that order, that’s three things, the root and the head, and the two dependents, and into some random order, just random. And then just do that for all the dependents down the tree. So now look, do it for the, and whatever, there’s two in dogs and room. And it’s a very short sentence. When sentences get longer and you have more dependents, there’s more scrambling that’s possible. So, you could figure out one scrambling for that sentence.
He did this a hundred times for every sentence in every one of these texts, every corpus. And then he just compared the dependency lengths in those random scramblings to what actually happened, what the English or the French or the German was in original language or Chinese or what all these like 60 languages. And the dependency lengths are always shorter in the real language compared to this kind of a control.
And there’s another, it’s a little more rigid, his control. So the way I described it, you could have crossed dependencies. By scrambling that way, you could scramble in any way at all, languages don’t do that. They tend not to cross dependencies very much. So the dependency structure, they tend to keep things non-crossed. There’s a technical term they call that projective, but it’s just non-crossed is all that is, projective. And so if you just constrain the scrambling so that it only gives you projective, non-crossed, the same thing holds.
So still human languages are much shorter than this kind of a control. So what it means is that in every language, we’re trying to put things close, relative to this kind of a control. It doesn’t matter about the word order. Some of these are verb final. Some of them these are verb medial like English. And some are even verb initial, there are a few languages in the world which have VSO, word order verb, subject, object, languages. Haven’t talked about those. It’s like 10% of them.
Lex Fridman
And even in those languages…
And even in those languages…
Edward Gibson
It doesn’t matter.
It doesn’t matter.
Lex Fridman
It’s still short dependencies?
It’s still short dependencies?
Edward Gibson
Short dependencies is rules.
Short dependencies is rules.
Lex Fridman
Okay, so what are some possible explanations for that? For why languages have evolved that way? So that’s one of the, I suppose, disagreements you might have with Chomsky. So you consider the evolution of language in terms of information theory. And for you, the purpose of language is ease of communication.
Okay, so what are some possible explanations for that? For why languages have evolved that way? So that’s one of the, I suppose, disagreements you might have with Chomsky. So you consider the evolution of language in terms of information theory. And for you, the purpose of language is ease of communication.
Lex Fridman
For you, the purpose of language is ease of communication, right, and processing?
For you, the purpose of language is ease of communication, right, and processing?
Edward Gibson
That’s right. That’s right. The story here is just about communication. It is just about production, really. It’s about ease of production, is the story.
That’s right. That’s right. The story here is just about communication. It is just about production, really. It’s about ease of production, is the story.
Lex Fridman
When you say production, can you-
When you say production, can you-
Edward Gibson
Oh, I just mean ease of language production. What I’m doing whenever I’m talking to you is somehow I’m formulating some idea in my head and I’m putting these words together, and it’s easier for me to do that, to say something where the words are closely connected in a dependency as opposed to separated by putting something in between and over and over again. It’s just hard for me to keep that in my head. That’s the whole story. The story is basically the dependency grammar sort of gives that to you, just like long is bad, short is good. It’s easier to keep in mind because you have to keep it in mind probably for production, probably matters in comprehension as well. Also matters in comprehension.
Oh, I just mean ease of language production. What I’m doing whenever I’m talking to you is somehow I’m formulating some idea in my head and I’m putting these words together, and it’s easier for me to do that, to say something where the words are closely connected in a dependency as opposed to separated by putting something in between and over and over again. It’s just hard for me to keep that in my head. That’s the whole story. The story is basically the dependency grammar sort of gives that to you, just like long is bad, short is good. It’s easier to keep in mind because you have to keep it in mind probably for production, probably matters in comprehension as well. Also matters in comprehension.
Lex Fridman
It’s on both sides of it, the production and the-
It’s on both sides of it, the production and the-
Edward Gibson
But I would guess it’s probably evolved for production. It’s about producing. It’s what’s easier for me to say that ends up being easier for you also. That’s very hard to disentangle, this idea of who is it for? Is it for me the speaker, or is it for you, the listener? Part of my language is for you. The way I talk to you is going to be different from how I talk to different people, so I’m definitely angling what I’m saying to who I’m saying. It’s not like I’m just talking the same way to every single person. And so I am sensitive to my audience, but does that work itself out in the dependency length differences? I don’t know. Maybe that’s about just the words, that part, which words I select.
But I would guess it’s probably evolved for production. It’s about producing. It’s what’s easier for me to say that ends up being easier for you also. That’s very hard to disentangle, this idea of who is it for? Is it for me the speaker, or is it for you, the listener? Part of my language is for you. The way I talk to you is going to be different from how I talk to different people, so I’m definitely angling what I’m saying to who I’m saying. It’s not like I’m just talking the same way to every single person. And so I am sensitive to my audience, but does that work itself out in the dependency length differences? I don’t know. Maybe that’s about just the words, that part, which words I select.
Lex Fridman
My initial intuition is that you optimize language for the audience.
My initial intuition is that you optimize language for the audience.
Edward Gibson
But it’s both.
But it’s both.
Lex Fridman
It’s just kind of messing with my head a little bit to say that some of the optimization may be the primary objective. The optimization might be the ease of production.
It’s just kind of messing with my head a little bit to say that some of the optimization may be the primary objective. The optimization might be the ease of production.
Edward Gibson
We have different senses, I guess. I’m very selfish and I think it’s all about me. I’m like, “I’m just doing what’s easiest for me at all times.”
We have different senses, I guess. I’m very selfish and I think it’s all about me. I’m like, “I’m just doing what’s easiest for me at all times.”
Lex Fridman
What’s easiest for me.
What’s easiest for me.
Edward Gibson
But I have to, of course, choose the words that I think you’re going to know. I’m not going to choose words you don’t know. In fact, I’m going to fix that. But maybe for the syntax, for the combinations, it’s just about me. I don’t know though. It’s very hard to-
But I have to, of course, choose the words that I think you’re going to know. I’m not going to choose words you don’t know. In fact, I’m going to fix that. But maybe for the syntax, for the combinations, it’s just about me. I don’t know though. It’s very hard to-
Lex Fridman
Wait, wait, wait. But the purpose of communication is to be understood-
Wait, wait, wait. But the purpose of communication is to be understood-
Edward Gibson
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
Lex Fridman
… is to convince others and so on. So the selfish thing is to be understood. It’s about the listener.
… is to convince others and so on. So the selfish thing is to be understood. It’s about the listener.
Edward Gibson
Okay. It’s a little circular there too then. Okay.
Okay. It’s a little circular there too then. Okay.
Lex Fridman
Right. The ease of production-
Right. The ease of production-
Edward Gibson
Helps me be understood then. I don’t think it’s circular.
Helps me be understood then. I don’t think it’s circular.
Lex Fridman
No, I think the primary objective is about the listener because otherwise, if you’re optimizing for the ease of production, then you’re not going to have any of the interesting complexity of language. You’re trying to explain-
No, I think the primary objective is about the listener because otherwise, if you’re optimizing for the ease of production, then you’re not going to have any of the interesting complexity of language. You’re trying to explain-
Edward Gibson
Well, let’s control for what it is I want to say. I’m saying let’s control for the thing, the message. Control for the message I want to tell you-
Well, let’s control for what it is I want to say. I’m saying let’s control for the thing, the message. Control for the message I want to tell you-
Lex Fridman
But that means the message needs to be understood. That’s the goal.
But that means the message needs to be understood. That’s the goal.
Edward Gibson
But that’s the meaning. So I’m still talking about just the form of the meaning. How do I frame the form of the meaning is all I’m talking about. You’re talking about a harder thing, I think. It’s like trying to change the meaning. Let’s keep the meaning constant.
But that’s the meaning. So I’m still talking about just the form of the meaning. How do I frame the form of the meaning is all I’m talking about. You’re talking about a harder thing, I think. It’s like trying to change the meaning. Let’s keep the meaning constant.
Lex Fridman
Got it.
Got it.
Edward Gibson
If you keep the meaning constant, how can I phrase whatever it is I need to say? I got to pick the right words and I’m going to pick the order so it’s easy for me. That’s what I think is probably-
If you keep the meaning constant, how can I phrase whatever it is I need to say? I got to pick the right words and I’m going to pick the order so it’s easy for me. That’s what I think is probably-
Lex Fridman
I think I’m still tying meaning and form together in my head, but you’re saying if you keep the meaning of what you’re saying constant, the optimization, it could be The primary objective of that optimization is for production. That’s interesting. I’m struggling to keep constant meaning. I’m a human, right? So for me, without having introspected on this, the form and the meaning are tied together deeply because I’m a human. For me when I’m speaking, because I haven’t thought about language in a rigorous way, about the form of language-
I think I’m still tying meaning and form together in my head, but you’re saying if you keep the meaning of what you’re saying constant, the optimization, it could be The primary objective of that optimization is for production. That’s interesting. I’m struggling to keep constant meaning. I’m a human, right? So for me, without having introspected on this, the form and the meaning are tied together deeply because I’m a human. For me when I’m speaking, because I haven’t thought about language in a rigorous way, about the form of language-
Edward Gibson
But look, for any event, there’s I don’t want to say infinite, but unbounded ways of that I might communicate that same event. Those two dogs entered a room I can say in many, many different ways. I could say, :Hey, there’s two dogs. They entered the room.” “Hey, the room was entered by something. The thing that was entered was two dogs.” That’s kind of awkward and weird and stuff, but those are all similar messages with different forms, different ways I might frame, and of course I use the same words there all the time.
But look, for any event, there’s I don’t want to say infinite, but unbounded ways of that I might communicate that same event. Those two dogs entered a room I can say in many, many different ways. I could say, :Hey, there’s two dogs. They entered the room.” “Hey, the room was entered by something. The thing that was entered was two dogs.” That’s kind of awkward and weird and stuff, but those are all similar messages with different forms, different ways I might frame, and of course I use the same words there all the time.
I could have referred to the dogs as a Dalmatian and a poodle or something. I could have been more specific or less specific about what they are, and I could have been more abstract about the number. So I am trying to keep the meaning, which is this event, constant. And then how am I going to describe that to get that to you? It kind of depends on what you need to know and what I think you need to know. But let’s get control for all that stuff and I’m just choosing, but I’m doing something simpler than you’re doing, which is just forms, just words.
Lex Fridman
To you, specifying the breed of dog and whether they’re cute or not is changing the meaning.
To you, specifying the breed of dog and whether they’re cute or not is changing the meaning.
Edward Gibson
That might be, yeah. Well, that would be changing the meaning for sure.
That might be, yeah. Well, that would be changing the meaning for sure.
Lex Fridman
Right. So you’re just-
Right. So you’re just-
Edward Gibson
That’s changing the meaning. But say even if we keep that constant, we can still talk about what’s easier or hard for me, the listener. Which phrase structures I use, which combinations.
That’s changing the meaning. But say even if we keep that constant, we can still talk about what’s easier or hard for me, the listener. Which phrase structures I use, which combinations.
Lex Fridman
This is so fascinating and just a really powerful window into human language, but I wonder still throughout this how vast the gap between meaning and form. I just have this maybe romanticized notion that they’re close together, that they evolve close, hand in hand. That you can’t just simply optimize for one without the other being in the room with us. Well, it’s kind of like an iceberg. Form is the tip of the iceberg and the rest, the meaning is the iceberg, but you can’t separate.
This is so fascinating and just a really powerful window into human language, but I wonder still throughout this how vast the gap between meaning and form. I just have this maybe romanticized notion that they’re close together, that they evolve close, hand in hand. That you can’t just simply optimize for one without the other being in the room with us. Well, it’s kind of like an iceberg. Form is the tip of the iceberg and the rest, the meaning is the iceberg, but you can’t separate.
Edward Gibson
But I think that’s why these large language models are so successful, is because good at form and form isn’t that hard in some sense. And meaning is tough still, and that’s why they don’t understand. We’re going to talk about that later maybe, but we can distinguish, forget about large language models, talking humans, maybe you’ll talk about that later too, is the difference between language, which is a communication system, and thinking, which is meaning. So language is a communication system for the meaning. It’s not the meaning. And there’s a lot of interesting evidence we can talk about relevant to that.
But I think that’s why these large language models are so successful, is because good at form and form isn’t that hard in some sense. And meaning is tough still, and that’s why they don’t understand. We’re going to talk about that later maybe, but we can distinguish, forget about large language models, talking humans, maybe you’ll talk about that later too, is the difference between language, which is a communication system, and thinking, which is meaning. So language is a communication system for the meaning. It’s not the meaning. And there’s a lot of interesting evidence we can talk about relevant to that.
Thinking and language
Lex Fridman
Well, that’s a really interesting question. What is the difference between language written communicated versus thought? What to you is the difference between them?
Well, that’s a really interesting question. What is the difference between language written communicated versus thought? What to you is the difference between them?
Edward Gibson
Well, you or anyone has to think of a task which they think is a good thinking task, and there’s lots and lots of tasks which would be good thinking tasks. And whatever those tasks are, let’s say it’s playing chess, that’s a good thinking task, or playing some game or doing some complex puzzles, maybe remembering some digits, that’s thinking, a lot of different tasks we might think. Maybe just listening to music is thinking. There’s a lot of different tasks we might think of as thinking.
Well, you or anyone has to think of a task which they think is a good thinking task, and there’s lots and lots of tasks which would be good thinking tasks. And whatever those tasks are, let’s say it’s playing chess, that’s a good thinking task, or playing some game or doing some complex puzzles, maybe remembering some digits, that’s thinking, a lot of different tasks we might think. Maybe just listening to music is thinking. There’s a lot of different tasks we might think of as thinking.
There’s this woman in my department, Fedorenko, and she’s done a lot of work on this question about what’s the connection between language and thought. And so she uses, I was referring earlier to MRI, fMRI, that’s her primary method. And so she has been really fascinated by this question about what language is. And so as I mentioned earlier, you can localize my language area or your language area in a few minutes, like 15 minutes. I can listen to language, listen to non-language or backward speech or something, and we’ll find areas left lateralized network in my head, which especially is very sensitive to language as opposed to whatever that control was.
Lex Fridman
Can you specify what you mean by language? Like communicating language? What is language?
Can you specify what you mean by language? Like communicating language? What is language?
Edward Gibson
Just sentences. I’m listening to English of any kind, a story, or I can read sentences. Anything at all that I understand, if I understand it, then it’ll activate my language network.
Just sentences. I’m listening to English of any kind, a story, or I can read sentences. Anything at all that I understand, if I understand it, then it’ll activate my language network.
Lex Fridman
[inaudible 01:18:42]
[inaudible 01:18:42]
Edward Gibson
My language network is going like crazy when I’m talking and when I’m listening to you because we’re communicating.
My language network is going like crazy when I’m talking and when I’m listening to you because we’re communicating.
Lex Fridman
And that’s pretty stable.
And that’s pretty stable.
Edward Gibson
Yeah, it’s incredibly stable. So I happen to be married to this woman at Fedorenko, and so I’ve been scanned by her over and over and over since 2007 or ’06 or something, and so my language network is exactly the same a month ago as it was back in 2007.
Yeah, it’s incredibly stable. So I happen to be married to this woman at Fedorenko, and so I’ve been scanned by her over and over and over since 2007 or ’06 or something, and so my language network is exactly the same a month ago as it was back in 2007.
Lex Fridman
Oh, wow.
Oh, wow.
Edward Gibson
It’s amazingly stable. It’s astounding. It’s a really fundamentally cool thing. And so my language network is like my face. Okay? It’s not changing much over time inside my head.
It’s amazingly stable. It’s astounding. It’s a really fundamentally cool thing. And so my language network is like my face. Okay? It’s not changing much over time inside my head.
Lex Fridman
Can I ask a quick question? Sorry, it’s a small tangent. At which point as you grow up from baby to adult does it stabilize?
Can I ask a quick question? Sorry, it’s a small tangent. At which point as you grow up from baby to adult does it stabilize?
Edward Gibson
We don’t know. That’s a very hard question. They’re working on that right now because of the problem scanning little kids. Trying to do the localization on little children in this scanner where you’re lying in the fMRI scan, that’s the best way to figure out where something’s going on inside our brains, and the scanner is loud and you’re in this tiny little area, you’re claustrophobic and it doesn’t bother me at all. I can go sleep in there, but some people are bothered by it and little kids don’t really like it and they don’t like to lie still, and you have to be really still because if you move around, that messes up the coordinates of where everything is. And so your question is how and when are language developing? How does this left lateralized system come to play? And it’s really hard to get a two-year-old to do this task, but you can maybe they’re starting to get three and four and five-year-olds to do this task for short periods and it looks like it’s there pretty early.
We don’t know. That’s a very hard question. They’re working on that right now because of the problem scanning little kids. Trying to do the localization on little children in this scanner where you’re lying in the fMRI scan, that’s the best way to figure out where something’s going on inside our brains, and the scanner is loud and you’re in this tiny little area, you’re claustrophobic and it doesn’t bother me at all. I can go sleep in there, but some people are bothered by it and little kids don’t really like it and they don’t like to lie still, and you have to be really still because if you move around, that messes up the coordinates of where everything is. And so your question is how and when are language developing? How does this left lateralized system come to play? And it’s really hard to get a two-year-old to do this task, but you can maybe they’re starting to get three and four and five-year-olds to do this task for short periods and it looks like it’s there pretty early.
Lex Fridman
So clearly, when you lead up to a baby’s first words, before that there’s a lot of fascinating turmoil going on about figuring out what are these people saying and you’re trying to make sense, how does that connect to the world and all that kind of stuff. That might be just fascinating development that’s happening there. That’s hard to introspect. But anyway-
So clearly, when you lead up to a baby’s first words, before that there’s a lot of fascinating turmoil going on about figuring out what are these people saying and you’re trying to make sense, how does that connect to the world and all that kind of stuff. That might be just fascinating development that’s happening there. That’s hard to introspect. But anyway-
Edward Gibson
We’re back to the scanner, and I can find my network in 15 minutes and now we can ask, “Find my network, find yours, find 20 other people to do this task,” and we can do some other tasks. Anything else you think is thinking of some other thing. I can do a spatial memory task. I can do a music perception task. I can do programming task if I program, where I can understand computer programs, and none of those tasks tap the language network at all. At all. There’s no overlap. They’re highly activated in other parts of the brain. There’s a bilateral network, which I think she tends to call the multiple demands network, which does anything kind of hard. And so anything that’s kind of difficult in some ways will activate that multiple demands network. Music will be in some music area, there’s music specific kinds of areas, but none of them are activating the language area at all unless there’s words. So if you have music and there’s a song and you can hear the words, then you get the language area.
We’re back to the scanner, and I can find my network in 15 minutes and now we can ask, “Find my network, find yours, find 20 other people to do this task,” and we can do some other tasks. Anything else you think is thinking of some other thing. I can do a spatial memory task. I can do a music perception task. I can do programming task if I program, where I can understand computer programs, and none of those tasks tap the language network at all. At all. There’s no overlap. They’re highly activated in other parts of the brain. There’s a bilateral network, which I think she tends to call the multiple demands network, which does anything kind of hard. And so anything that’s kind of difficult in some ways will activate that multiple demands network. Music will be in some music area, there’s music specific kinds of areas, but none of them are activating the language area at all unless there’s words. So if you have music and there’s a song and you can hear the words, then you get the language area.
Lex Fridman
Are we talking about speaking and listening or are we also talking about reading?
Are we talking about speaking and listening or are we also talking about reading?
Edward Gibson
This is all comprehension of any kind-
This is all comprehension of any kind-
Lex Fridman
That is fascinating.
That is fascinating.
Edward Gibson
… so this network, doesn’t make any difference if it’s written or spoken. So the thing that Fedorenko calls the language network is this high level language, so it’s not about the spoken language and it’s not about the written language, it’s about either one of them. And so when you do speech, you listen to speech and you subtract away some language you don’t understand or you subtract away backwards speech, which sounds like speech but isn’t. Then you take away the sound part altogether and then if you do written, you get exactly the same network for just reading the language versus reading nonsense words or something like that.
… so this network, doesn’t make any difference if it’s written or spoken. So the thing that Fedorenko calls the language network is this high level language, so it’s not about the spoken language and it’s not about the written language, it’s about either one of them. And so when you do speech, you listen to speech and you subtract away some language you don’t understand or you subtract away backwards speech, which sounds like speech but isn’t. Then you take away the sound part altogether and then if you do written, you get exactly the same network for just reading the language versus reading nonsense words or something like that.
You’ll find exactly the same network. And so this is about high level the comprehension of language in this case. Production’s a little harder to run the scanner, but the same thing happens in production. You get the same network, so production’s a little harder. You have to figure out how do you run a task in the network such that you’re doing some kind of production? And I can’t remember, they’ve done a bunch of different kinds of tasks there where you get people to produce things, figure out how to produce, and the same network goes on there exactly the same place.
Lex Fridman
Wait, wait, so if you read random words-
Wait, wait, so if you read random words-
Edward Gibson
If you read things like-
If you read things like-
Lex Fridman
Gibberish.
Gibberish.
Edward Gibson
… Lewis Carroll’s, “‘Twas brillig,” Jabberwocky, right? They call that Jabberwocky speech-
… Lewis Carroll’s, “‘Twas brillig,” Jabberwocky, right? They call that Jabberwocky speech-
Lex Fridman
The network doesn’t get activated.
The network doesn’t get activated.
Edward Gibson
Not as much. There are words in there. There’s function words and stuff, so it’s lower activation.
Not as much. There are words in there. There’s function words and stuff, so it’s lower activation.
Lex Fridman
That’s fascinating.
That’s fascinating.
Edward Gibson
So basically the more language it is, the higher it goes in the language network. And that network is there from when you speak, from as soon as you learn language and it’s there, you speak multiple languages, the same network is going for your multiple languages. So you speak English and you speak Russian, both of them are hitting that same network if you’re fluent in those languages.
So basically the more language it is, the higher it goes in the language network. And that network is there from when you speak, from as soon as you learn language and it’s there, you speak multiple languages, the same network is going for your multiple languages. So you speak English and you speak Russian, both of them are hitting that same network if you’re fluent in those languages.
Lex Fridman
Programming-
Programming-
Edward Gibson
Not at all. Isn’t that amazing? Even if you’re a really good programmer, that is not a human language. It is just not conveying the same information, and so it is not in the language network.
Not at all. Isn’t that amazing? Even if you’re a really good programmer, that is not a human language. It is just not conveying the same information, and so it is not in the language network.
Lex Fridman
Is that as mind-blowing as I think? That’s weird.
Is that as mind-blowing as I think? That’s weird.
Edward Gibson
It’s pretty cool. It is amazing.
It’s pretty cool. It is amazing.
Lex Fridman
That’s pretty weird.
That’s pretty weird.
Edward Gibson
So that’s one set of data. Hers shows that what you might think is thinking is not language. Language is just this conventionalized system that we’ve worked out in human languages. Oh, another fascinating little tidbit is that even if they’re these constructed languages like Klingon or I don’t know the languages from Game of Thrones, I’m sorry, I don’t remember those languages. Maybe you-
So that’s one set of data. Hers shows that what you might think is thinking is not language. Language is just this conventionalized system that we’ve worked out in human languages. Oh, another fascinating little tidbit is that even if they’re these constructed languages like Klingon or I don’t know the languages from Game of Thrones, I’m sorry, I don’t remember those languages. Maybe you-
Lex Fridman
There’s a lot of people offended right now.
There’s a lot of people offended right now.
Edward Gibson
… there’s people that speak those languages. They really speak those languages because the people that wrote the languages for the shows, they did an amazing job of constructing something like a human language and that lights up the language area because they can speak pretty much arbitrary thoughts in a human language. It’s a constructed human language, and probably it’s related to human languages because the people that were constructing them were making them like human languages in various ways, but it also activates the same network, which is pretty cool. Anyway.
… there’s people that speak those languages. They really speak those languages because the people that wrote the languages for the shows, they did an amazing job of constructing something like a human language and that lights up the language area because they can speak pretty much arbitrary thoughts in a human language. It’s a constructed human language, and probably it’s related to human languages because the people that were constructing them were making them like human languages in various ways, but it also activates the same network, which is pretty cool. Anyway.
Lex Fridman
Sorry to go into a place where you may be a little bit philosophical, but is it possible that this area of the brain is doing some kind of translation into a deeper set of almost like concepts?
Sorry to go into a place where you may be a little bit philosophical, but is it possible that this area of the brain is doing some kind of translation into a deeper set of almost like concepts?
Edward Gibson
That what it has to be doing. It’s doing in communication. It is translating from thought, whatever that is, it’s more abstract, and that’s what it’s doing. That is kind of what it is doing. It’s a meaning network, I guess.
That what it has to be doing. It’s doing in communication. It is translating from thought, whatever that is, it’s more abstract, and that’s what it’s doing. That is kind of what it is doing. It’s a meaning network, I guess.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, like a translation network. But I wonder what is at the core at the bottom of it? What are thoughts? Thoughts and words, are they neighbors or is it one turtle sitting on top of the other, meaning is there a deep set of concepts that we-
Yeah, like a translation network. But I wonder what is at the core at the bottom of it? What are thoughts? Thoughts and words, are they neighbors or is it one turtle sitting on top of the other, meaning is there a deep set of concepts that we-
Edward Gibson
Well, there’s connections between what these things mean and then there’s probably other parts of the brain, but what these things mean. And so when I’m talking about whatever it is I want to talk about, it’ll be represented somewhere else. That knowledge of whatever that is will be represented somewhere else.
Well, there’s connections between what these things mean and then there’s probably other parts of the brain, but what these things mean. And so when I’m talking about whatever it is I want to talk about, it’ll be represented somewhere else. That knowledge of whatever that is will be represented somewhere else.
Lex Fridman
Well, I wonder if there’s some stable-
Well, I wonder if there’s some stable-
Edward Gibson
That’s meaning.
That’s meaning.
Lex Fridman
… nicely compressed encoding of meanings-
… nicely compressed encoding of meanings-
Edward Gibson
I don’t know.
I don’t know.
Lex Fridman
… that’s separate from language. I guess the implication here is that we don’t think in language.
… that’s separate from language. I guess the implication here is that we don’t think in language.
Edward Gibson
That’s correct. Isn’t that cool? And that’s so interesting. This is hard to do experiments on, but there is this idea of inner voice, and a lot of people have an inner voice. And so if you do a poll on the internet and ask if you hear yourself talking when you’re just thinking or whatever, about 70 or 80% of people will say yes. Most people have an inner voice. I don’t, and so I always find this strange. So when people talk about an inner voice, I always thought this was a metaphor. And they hear, I know most of you, whoever’s listening to this thinks I’m crazy now because I don’t have an inner voice and I just don’t know what you’re listening to. It sounds so kind of annoying to me, to have this voice going on while you’re thinking, but I guess most people have that, and I don’t have that and we don’t really know what that connects to.
That’s correct. Isn’t that cool? And that’s so interesting. This is hard to do experiments on, but there is this idea of inner voice, and a lot of people have an inner voice. And so if you do a poll on the internet and ask if you hear yourself talking when you’re just thinking or whatever, about 70 or 80% of people will say yes. Most people have an inner voice. I don’t, and so I always find this strange. So when people talk about an inner voice, I always thought this was a metaphor. And they hear, I know most of you, whoever’s listening to this thinks I’m crazy now because I don’t have an inner voice and I just don’t know what you’re listening to. It sounds so kind of annoying to me, to have this voice going on while you’re thinking, but I guess most people have that, and I don’t have that and we don’t really know what that connects to.
Lex Fridman
I wonder if the inner voice activates that same network. I wonder.
I wonder if the inner voice activates that same network. I wonder.
Edward Gibson
I don’t know. This could be speechy, right? So that’s like you hear. Do you have an inner voice?
I don’t know. This could be speechy, right? So that’s like you hear. Do you have an inner voice?
Lex Fridman
I don’t think so.
I don’t think so.
Edward Gibson
Oh. A lot of people have this sense that they hear themselves and then say they read someone’s email, I’ve heard people tell me that they hear that this other person’s voice when they read other people’s emails and I’m like, “Wow, that sounds so disruptive.”
Oh. A lot of people have this sense that they hear themselves and then say they read someone’s email, I’ve heard people tell me that they hear that this other person’s voice when they read other people’s emails and I’m like, “Wow, that sounds so disruptive.”
Lex Fridman
I do think I vocalize what I’m reading, but I don’t think I hear a voice.
I do think I vocalize what I’m reading, but I don’t think I hear a voice.
Edward Gibson
Well, you probably don’t have an inner voice.
Well, you probably don’t have an inner voice.
Lex Fridman
I don’t think I have an inner voice.
I don’t think I have an inner voice.
Edward Gibson
People have an inner voice. People have this strong percept of hearing sound in their heads when they’re just thinking.
People have an inner voice. People have this strong percept of hearing sound in their heads when they’re just thinking.
Lex Fridman
I refuse to believe that’s the majority of people.
I refuse to believe that’s the majority of people.
Edward Gibson
Majority, absolutely.
Majority, absolutely.
Lex Fridman
What?
What?
Edward Gibson
It’s like two-thirds or three-quarters. It’s a lot. Whenever I ask the class and I went internet, they always say that. So you’re in a minority.
It’s like two-thirds or three-quarters. It’s a lot. Whenever I ask the class and I went internet, they always say that. So you’re in a minority.
Lex Fridman
It could be a self-report flaw.
It could be a self-report flaw.
Edward Gibson
It could be.
It could be.
Lex Fridman
When I’m reading inside my head, I’m kind of saying the words, which is probably the wrong way to read, but I don’t hear a voice. There’s no percept of a voice. I refuse to believe the majority of people have it. Anyway, the human brain is fascinating, but it still blew my mind that that language does appear, comprehension does appear to be separate from thinking.
When I’m reading inside my head, I’m kind of saying the words, which is probably the wrong way to read, but I don’t hear a voice. There’s no percept of a voice. I refuse to believe the majority of people have it. Anyway, the human brain is fascinating, but it still blew my mind that that language does appear, comprehension does appear to be separate from thinking.
Edward Gibson
So that’s one set. One set of data from Fedorenko’s group is that no matter what task you do, if it doesn’t have words and combinations of words in it, then it won’t light up the language network you. It’ll be active somewhere else but not there, so that’s one. And then this other piece of evidence relevant to that question is it turns out there are this group of people who’ve had a massive stroke on the left side and wiped out their language network, and as long as they didn’t wipe out everything on the right as well, in that case, they wouldn’t be cognitively functionable. But if they just wiped out language, which is pretty tough to do because it’s very expansive on the left, but if they have, then there’s patients like this called, so-called global aphasics, who can do any task just fine, but not language.
So that’s one set. One set of data from Fedorenko’s group is that no matter what task you do, if it doesn’t have words and combinations of words in it, then it won’t light up the language network you. It’ll be active somewhere else but not there, so that’s one. And then this other piece of evidence relevant to that question is it turns out there are this group of people who’ve had a massive stroke on the left side and wiped out their language network, and as long as they didn’t wipe out everything on the right as well, in that case, they wouldn’t be cognitively functionable. But if they just wiped out language, which is pretty tough to do because it’s very expansive on the left, but if they have, then there’s patients like this called, so-called global aphasics, who can do any task just fine, but not language.
You can’t talk to them, they don’t understand you. They can’t speak, they can’t write, they can’t read. But they can play chess, they can drive their cars, they can do all kinds of other stuff, do math. So math is not in the language area, for instance. You do arithmetic and stuff, that’s not in language area. It’s got symbols, so people confuse some kind of symbolic processing with language, and symbolic processing is not the same. So there are symbols and they have meaning, but it’s not language. It’s not a conventionalized language system, and so math isn’t there. And so they can do math. They do just as well as their control age matching controls and all these tasks. This is Rosemary Varley over in University College of London who has a bunch of patients who she’s shown this. So that sort of combination suggests that language isn’t necessary for thinking. It doesn’t mean you can’t think in language. You could think in language because language allows a lot of expression, but it’s just you don’t need it for thinking. It suggests that language is a separate system from-
Lex Fridman
This is kind of blowing my mind right now.
This is kind of blowing my mind right now.
Edward Gibson
It’s cool, isn’t it?
It’s cool, isn’t it?
Lex Fridman
I’m trying to load that in because it has implications for large language models.
I’m trying to load that in because it has implications for large language models.
Edward Gibson
It sure does, and they’ve been working on that.
It sure does, and they’ve been working on that.
LLMs
Lex Fridman
Well, let’s take a stroll there. You wrote that the best current theories of human language are arguably large language models, so this has to do with form.
Well, let’s take a stroll there. You wrote that the best current theories of human language are arguably large language models, so this has to do with form.
Edward Gibson
It’s a kind of a big theory, but the reason it’s arguably the best is that it does the best at predicting what’s English, for instance. It’s incredibly good, better than any other theory, but there’s not enough detail.
It’s a kind of a big theory, but the reason it’s arguably the best is that it does the best at predicting what’s English, for instance. It’s incredibly good, better than any other theory, but there’s not enough detail.
Lex Fridman
Well, it’s opaque. You don’t know what’s going on.
Well, it’s opaque. You don’t know what’s going on.
Edward Gibson
You don’t know what’s going on.
You don’t know what’s going on.
Lex Fridman
Black box.
Black box.
Edward Gibson
It’s in a black box. But I think it is a theory.
It’s in a black box. But I think it is a theory.
Lex Fridman
What’s your definition of a theory? Because it’s a gigantic black box with a very large number of parameters controlling it. To me, theory usually requires a simplicity, right?
What’s your definition of a theory? Because it’s a gigantic black box with a very large number of parameters controlling it. To me, theory usually requires a simplicity, right?
Edward Gibson
Well, I don’t know, maybe I’m just being loose there. I think it’s not a great theory, but it’s a theory. It’s a good theory in one sense in that it covers all the data. Anything you want to say in English, it does. And so that’s how it’s arguably the best, is that no other theory is as good as a large language model in predicting exactly what’s good and what’s bad in English. Now, you’re saying is it a good theory? Well, probably not because I want a smaller theory than that. It’s too big, I agree.
Well, I don’t know, maybe I’m just being loose there. I think it’s not a great theory, but it’s a theory. It’s a good theory in one sense in that it covers all the data. Anything you want to say in English, it does. And so that’s how it’s arguably the best, is that no other theory is as good as a large language model in predicting exactly what’s good and what’s bad in English. Now, you’re saying is it a good theory? Well, probably not because I want a smaller theory than that. It’s too big, I agree.
Lex Fridman
You could probably construct mechanism by which it can generate a simple explanation of a particular language, like a set of rules. Something like it could generate a dependency grammar for a language, right?
You could probably construct mechanism by which it can generate a simple explanation of a particular language, like a set of rules. Something like it could generate a dependency grammar for a language, right?
Edward Gibson
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
You could probably just ask it about itself.
You could probably just ask it about itself.
Edward Gibson
Well, that presumes, and there’s some evidence for this, that some large language models are implementing something like dependency grammar inside them. And so there’s work from a guy called Chris Manning and colleagues over at Stanford in natural language. And they looked at I don’t know how many large language model types, but certainly BERT and some others, where you do some kind of fancy math to figure out exactly what kind of abstractions of representations are going on, and they were saying it does look like dependency structure is what they’re constructing. It’s actually a very, very good map, so they are constructing something like that. Does it mean that they’re using that for meaning? Probably, but we don’t know.
Well, that presumes, and there’s some evidence for this, that some large language models are implementing something like dependency grammar inside them. And so there’s work from a guy called Chris Manning and colleagues over at Stanford in natural language. And they looked at I don’t know how many large language model types, but certainly BERT and some others, where you do some kind of fancy math to figure out exactly what kind of abstractions of representations are going on, and they were saying it does look like dependency structure is what they’re constructing. It’s actually a very, very good map, so they are constructing something like that. Does it mean that they’re using that for meaning? Probably, but we don’t know.
Lex Fridman
You write that the kinds of theories of language that LLMs are closest to are called construction-based theories. Can you explain what construction-based theories are?
You write that the kinds of theories of language that LLMs are closest to are called construction-based theories. Can you explain what construction-based theories are?
Edward Gibson
It’s just a general theory of language such that there’s a form and a meaning pair for lots of pieces of the language. And so it’s primarily usage-based is a construction grammar. It’s trying to deal with the things that people actually say and actually write, and so it’s a usage-based idea. What’s a construction? Construction’s either a simple word, so a morpheme plus its meaning or a combination of words. It’s basically combinations of words, the rules, but it’s unspecified as to what the form of the grammar is underlyingly. And so I would argue that the dependency grammar is maybe the right form to use for the types of construction grammar. Construction grammar typically isn’t formalized quite, and so maybe the a formalization of that, it might be in dependency grammar. I would think so, but it’s up to other researchers in that area if they agree or not.
It’s just a general theory of language such that there’s a form and a meaning pair for lots of pieces of the language. And so it’s primarily usage-based is a construction grammar. It’s trying to deal with the things that people actually say and actually write, and so it’s a usage-based idea. What’s a construction? Construction’s either a simple word, so a morpheme plus its meaning or a combination of words. It’s basically combinations of words, the rules, but it’s unspecified as to what the form of the grammar is underlyingly. And so I would argue that the dependency grammar is maybe the right form to use for the types of construction grammar. Construction grammar typically isn’t formalized quite, and so maybe the a formalization of that, it might be in dependency grammar. I would think so, but it’s up to other researchers in that area if they agree or not.
Lex Fridman
Do you think that large language models understand language? Are they mimicking language? I guess the deeper question there is, are they just understanding the surface form or do they understand something deeper about the meaning that then generates the form?
Do you think that large language models understand language? Are they mimicking language? I guess the deeper question there is, are they just understanding the surface form or do they understand something deeper about the meaning that then generates the form?
Edward Gibson
I would argue they’re doing the form. They’re doing the form, they’re doing it really, really well. And are they doing the meaning? No, probably not. There’s lots of these examples from various groups showing that they can be tricked in all kinds of ways. They really don’t understand the meaning of what’s going on. And so there’s a lot of examples that he and other groups have given which show they don’t really understand what’s going on. So the Monty Hall problem is this silly problem. Let’s Make a Deal is this old game show, and there’s three doors and there’s a prize behind one, and there’s some junk prizes behind the other two and you’re trying to select one. And Monty, he knows where the target item is. The good thing, he knows everything is back there, and he gives you a choice.
I would argue they’re doing the form. They’re doing the form, they’re doing it really, really well. And are they doing the meaning? No, probably not. There’s lots of these examples from various groups showing that they can be tricked in all kinds of ways. They really don’t understand the meaning of what’s going on. And so there’s a lot of examples that he and other groups have given which show they don’t really understand what’s going on. So the Monty Hall problem is this silly problem. Let’s Make a Deal is this old game show, and there’s three doors and there’s a prize behind one, and there’s some junk prizes behind the other two and you’re trying to select one. And Monty, he knows where the target item is. The good thing, he knows everything is back there, and he gives you a choice.
You choose one of the three and then he opens one of the doors and it’s some junk prize. And then the question is, should you trade to get the other one? And the answer is, yes, you should trade because he knew which ones you could turn around, and so now the odds are two-thirds. And then if you just change that a little bit to the large language model, the large language model has seen that explanation so many times. If you change the story, it’s a little bit, but you make it sound like it’s the Monty Hall problem, but it’s not. You just say, “Oh, there’s three doors and one behind them is a good prize and there’s two bad doors. I happen to know it’s behind door number one. The good prize, the car is behind door number one, so I’m going to choose door number one.”
Monty Hall opens door number three and shows me nothing there. Should I trade for door number two, even though I know the good prize in door number one? And then the large language model say, “Yes, you should trade,” because it just goes through the forms that it’s seen before so many times on these cases where yes, you should trade because your odds have shifted from one in three now to two out of three to being that thing. It doesn’t have any way to remember that actually, you have 100% probability behind that door number one. You know that. That’s not part of the scheme that it’s seen hundreds and hundreds of times before. And so even if you try to explain to it that it’s wrong, that they can’t do that, it’ll just keep giving you back the problem.
Lex Fridman
But it’s also possible the larger language model would be aware of the fact that there’s sometimes over-representation of a particular kind of formulation, and it’s easy to get tricked by that. And so you could see if they get larger and larger, models be a little bit more skeptical, so you see over-representation. It just feels like training on form can go really far in terms of being able to generate things that look like the thing understands deeply the underlying world model, of the kind of mathematical world, physical world, psychological world that would generate these kinds of sentences. It just feels like you’re creeping close to the meaning part, easily fooled, all this kind of stuff, but that’s humans too. So it just seems really impressive how often it seems like it understands concepts.
But it’s also possible the larger language model would be aware of the fact that there’s sometimes over-representation of a particular kind of formulation, and it’s easy to get tricked by that. And so you could see if they get larger and larger, models be a little bit more skeptical, so you see over-representation. It just feels like training on form can go really far in terms of being able to generate things that look like the thing understands deeply the underlying world model, of the kind of mathematical world, physical world, psychological world that would generate these kinds of sentences. It just feels like you’re creeping close to the meaning part, easily fooled, all this kind of stuff, but that’s humans too. So it just seems really impressive how often it seems like it understands concepts.
Edward Gibson
You don’t have to convince me of that. I am very, very impressed. You’re giving a possible world where maybe someone’s going to train some other versions such that it’ll be somehow abstracting away from types of forms, I don’t think that’s happened. And so-
You don’t have to convince me of that. I am very, very impressed. You’re giving a possible world where maybe someone’s going to train some other versions such that it’ll be somehow abstracting away from types of forms, I don’t think that’s happened. And so-
Lex Fridman
Well, no, no, no, I’m not saying that. I think when you just look at anecdotal examples and just showing a large number of them where it doesn’t seem to understand and it’s easily fooled, that does not seem like a scientific data-driven analysis of how many places is it damn impressive in terms of meaning and understanding and how many places is easily fooled?
Well, no, no, no, I’m not saying that. I think when you just look at anecdotal examples and just showing a large number of them where it doesn’t seem to understand and it’s easily fooled, that does not seem like a scientific data-driven analysis of how many places is it damn impressive in terms of meaning and understanding and how many places is easily fooled?
Edward Gibson
That’s not the inference, so I don’t want to make that. The inference I wouldn’t want to make was that inference. The inference I’m trying to push is just that is it like humans here? It’s probably not like humans here, it’s different. So humans don’t make that error. If you explain that to them, they’re not going to make that error. They don’t make that error. And so it’s doing something different from humans that they’re doing. In that case,
That’s not the inference, so I don’t want to make that. The inference I wouldn’t want to make was that inference. The inference I’m trying to push is just that is it like humans here? It’s probably not like humans here, it’s different. So humans don’t make that error. If you explain that to them, they’re not going to make that error. They don’t make that error. And so it’s doing something different from humans that they’re doing. In that case,
Lex Fridman
What’s the mechanism by which humans figure out that it’s an error?
What’s the mechanism by which humans figure out that it’s an error?
Edward Gibson
I’m just saying the error there is if I explained to you there’s a hundred percent chance that the car is behind this door, do you want to trade people say no, but this thing will say yes because it’s that trick, it’s so wound up on the form. That’s an error that a human doesn’t make, which is kind of interesting.
I’m just saying the error there is if I explained to you there’s a hundred percent chance that the car is behind this door, do you want to trade people say no, but this thing will say yes because it’s that trick, it’s so wound up on the form. That’s an error that a human doesn’t make, which is kind of interesting.
Lex Fridman
Less likely to make, I should say.
Less likely to make, I should say.
Edward Gibson
Less likely.
Less likely.
Lex Fridman
Because you’re asking a system to understand 100%, you’re asking some mathematical concepts.
Because you’re asking a system to understand 100%, you’re asking some mathematical concepts.
Edward Gibson
But the places where language models are, the form is amazing. So let’s go back to nested structure, center-embedded structures. If you ask a human to complete those, they can’t do it. Neither can a large language model. They’re just like humans in that. If I ask a large language model-
But the places where language models are, the form is amazing. So let’s go back to nested structure, center-embedded structures. If you ask a human to complete those, they can’t do it. Neither can a large language model. They’re just like humans in that. If I ask a large language model-
Lex Fridman
That’s fascinating, by the way. The central embedding struggles with anyone-
That’s fascinating, by the way. The central embedding struggles with anyone-
Edward Gibson
Just like humans. Exactly the same way as humans, and that’s not trained. So that is a similarity, but that’s not meaning. This is form. But when we get into meaning, this is where they get kind of messed up. When you start just saying, “Oh, what’s behind this door? Oh, this is the thing I want,” humans don’t mess that up as much. Here, the form is just like. The form of the match is amazingly similar without being trained to do that. It’s trained in the sense that it’s getting lots of data, which is just like human data, but it’s not being trained on bad sentences and being told what’s bad. It just can’t do those. It’ll actually say things like, “Those are too hard for me to complete or something,” which is kind of interesting, actually. How does it know that? I don’t know.
Just like humans. Exactly the same way as humans, and that’s not trained. So that is a similarity, but that’s not meaning. This is form. But when we get into meaning, this is where they get kind of messed up. When you start just saying, “Oh, what’s behind this door? Oh, this is the thing I want,” humans don’t mess that up as much. Here, the form is just like. The form of the match is amazingly similar without being trained to do that. It’s trained in the sense that it’s getting lots of data, which is just like human data, but it’s not being trained on bad sentences and being told what’s bad. It just can’t do those. It’ll actually say things like, “Those are too hard for me to complete or something,” which is kind of interesting, actually. How does it know that? I don’t know.
Lex Fridman
But it really often doesn’t just complete, it very often says stuff that’s true and sometimes says stuff that’s not true. And almost always the form is great, but it’s still very surprising that with really great form, it’s able to generate a lot of things that are true based on what it’s trained on and so on. So it’s not just form that is generating, it’s mimicking true statements-
But it really often doesn’t just complete, it very often says stuff that’s true and sometimes says stuff that’s not true. And almost always the form is great, but it’s still very surprising that with really great form, it’s able to generate a lot of things that are true based on what it’s trained on and so on. So it’s not just form that is generating, it’s mimicking true statements-
Edward Gibson
That’s right, that’s right. I think that’s right.
That’s right, that’s right. I think that’s right.
Lex Fridman
… from the internet. I guess the underlying idea there is that on the internet, truth is overrepresented versus falsehoods.
… from the internet. I guess the underlying idea there is that on the internet, truth is overrepresented versus falsehoods.
Edward Gibson
I think that’s probably right.
I think that’s probably right.
Lex Fridman
But the fundamental thing it’s trained on you’re saying is just form, and it’s really-
But the fundamental thing it’s trained on you’re saying is just form, and it’s really-
Edward Gibson
I think so.
I think so.
Lex Fridman
Well, to me, that’s still a little bit of an open question. I probably lean agreeing with you, especially now you’ve just blown my mind that there’s a separate module in the brain for language versus thinking. Maybe there’s a fundamental part missing from the large language model approach that lacks the thinking, the reasoning capability.
Well, to me, that’s still a little bit of an open question. I probably lean agreeing with you, especially now you’ve just blown my mind that there’s a separate module in the brain for language versus thinking. Maybe there’s a fundamental part missing from the large language model approach that lacks the thinking, the reasoning capability.
Edward Gibson
Yeah, that’s what this group argues. So the same group, Fedorenko’s group has a recent paper arguing exactly that. There’s a guy called Kyle Mahowald who’s here in Austin, Texas, actually. He’s an old student of mine, but he’s a faculty in linguistics at Texas, and he was the first author on that.
Yeah, that’s what this group argues. So the same group, Fedorenko’s group has a recent paper arguing exactly that. There’s a guy called Kyle Mahowald who’s here in Austin, Texas, actually. He’s an old student of mine, but he’s a faculty in linguistics at Texas, and he was the first author on that.
Lex Fridman
That’s fascinating. Still to me, an open question. What to you are the interesting limits of LLMs?
That’s fascinating. Still to me, an open question. What to you are the interesting limits of LLMs?
Edward Gibson
I don’t see any limits to their form. Their form is perfect.
I don’t see any limits to their form. Their form is perfect.
Lex Fridman
Impressive, perfect.
Impressive, perfect.
Edward Gibson
It’s pretty close to being-
It’s pretty close to being-
Lex Fridman
Well, you said ability to complete central embeddings.
Well, you said ability to complete central embeddings.
Edward Gibson
Yeah. It’s just the same as humans. It seems the same as humans.
Yeah. It’s just the same as humans. It seems the same as humans.
Lex Fridman
But that’s not perfect, right? It should be able to-
But that’s not perfect, right? It should be able to-
Edward Gibson
That’s good. No, but I want it to be like humans. I want a model of humans.
That’s good. No, but I want it to be like humans. I want a model of humans.
Lex Fridman
Oh, wait, wait. Oh, so perfect to you is as close to humans as possible.
Oh, wait, wait. Oh, so perfect to you is as close to humans as possible.
Edward Gibson
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
I got it. But if you’re not human, you’re superhuman, you should be able to complete central embedded sentences, right?
I got it. But if you’re not human, you’re superhuman, you should be able to complete central embedded sentences, right?
Edward Gibson
The mechanism is, if it’s modeling, I think it’s kind of really interesting that it can’t.
The mechanism is, if it’s modeling, I think it’s kind of really interesting that it can’t.
Lex Fridman
That is really interesting.
That is really interesting.
Edward Gibson
I think it’s potentially underlying modeling something like the way the form is processed.
I think it’s potentially underlying modeling something like the way the form is processed.
Lex Fridman
The form of human language and how humans process the language.
The form of human language and how humans process the language.
Edward Gibson
Yes. I think that’s plausible.
Yes. I think that’s plausible.
Center embedding
Lex Fridman
And how they generate language, process language and generate language. That’s fascinating. So in that sense, they’re perfect. If we can just linger on the center embedding thing, that’s hard for LLMs to produce and that seems really impressive because hard for humans to produce. And how does that connect to the thing we’ve been talking about before, which is the dependency grammar framework in which you view language, and the finding that short dependencies seem to be a universal part of language? So why is it hard to complete center embeddings?
And how they generate language, process language and generate language. That’s fascinating. So in that sense, they’re perfect. If we can just linger on the center embedding thing, that’s hard for LLMs to produce and that seems really impressive because hard for humans to produce. And how does that connect to the thing we’ve been talking about before, which is the dependency grammar framework in which you view language, and the finding that short dependencies seem to be a universal part of language? So why is it hard to complete center embeddings?
Edward Gibson
So what I like about dependency grammar is it makes the cognitive cost associated with longer distance connections very transparent. Basically, it turns out there is a cost associated with producing and comprehending connections between words, which are just not beside each other. The further apart they are, the worse it is. We can measure that and there is a cost associated with that.
So what I like about dependency grammar is it makes the cognitive cost associated with longer distance connections very transparent. Basically, it turns out there is a cost associated with producing and comprehending connections between words, which are just not beside each other. The further apart they are, the worse it is. We can measure that and there is a cost associated with that.
Lex Fridman
Can you just linger on what do you mean by cognitive cost and how do you measure it?
Can you just linger on what do you mean by cognitive cost and how do you measure it?
Edward Gibson
Sure. Well, you can measure it in a lot of ways. The simplest is just asking people to say how good a sentence sounds. Just ask. That’s one way to measure, and you try to triangulate then across sentences and across structures to try to figure out what the source of that is. You can look at reading times in controlled materials, in certain kinds of materials, and then we can measure the dependency distances there. There’s a recent study-
Sure. Well, you can measure it in a lot of ways. The simplest is just asking people to say how good a sentence sounds. Just ask. That’s one way to measure, and you try to triangulate then across sentences and across structures to try to figure out what the source of that is. You can look at reading times in controlled materials, in certain kinds of materials, and then we can measure the dependency distances there. There’s a recent study-
Edward Gibson
… the dependency distance is there. There’s a recent study which looked at, we’re talking about the brain here. We could look at the language network. We could look at the language network and we could look at the activation in the language network and how big the activation is, depending on the length of the dependencies. It turns out in just random sentences that you’re listening to, if you listen, as it turns out there are people listening to stories here. The longer the dependency is, the stronger the activation in the language network. So, there’s some measure… There’s a bunch of different measures we could do. That’s kind of a neat measure actually of actual-
… the dependency distance is there. There’s a recent study which looked at, we’re talking about the brain here. We could look at the language network. We could look at the language network and we could look at the activation in the language network and how big the activation is, depending on the length of the dependencies. It turns out in just random sentences that you’re listening to, if you listen, as it turns out there are people listening to stories here. The longer the dependency is, the stronger the activation in the language network. So, there’s some measure… There’s a bunch of different measures we could do. That’s kind of a neat measure actually of actual-
Lex Fridman
Activation.
Activation.
Edward Gibson
… activation in the brain.
… activation in the brain.
Lex Fridman
So then you can somehow in different ways convert it to a number. I wonder if there’s a beautiful equation connecting cognitive costs and length of dependency. E equals MC squared kind of thing.
So then you can somehow in different ways convert it to a number. I wonder if there’s a beautiful equation connecting cognitive costs and length of dependency. E equals MC squared kind of thing.
Edward Gibson
It’s complicated, but probably it’s doable. I would guess it’s doable. I tried to do that a while ago, and I was reasonably successful, but for some reason I stopped working on that. I agree with you that it would be nice to figure out… So, there’s some way to figure out the cost. It’s complicated.
It’s complicated, but probably it’s doable. I would guess it’s doable. I tried to do that a while ago, and I was reasonably successful, but for some reason I stopped working on that. I agree with you that it would be nice to figure out… So, there’s some way to figure out the cost. It’s complicated.
Another issue you raised before was how do you measure distance? Is it words? It probably isn’t, is part of the problem, is that some words matter than more than others meaning nouns might matter. And then it maybe depends on which kind of noun. Is it a noun we’ve already introduced or a noun that’s already been mentioned? Is it a pronoun versus a name? All these things probably matter. So, probably the simplest thing to do is just like, oh, let’s forget about all that and just think about words or morphemes.
Lex Fridman
For sure. But there might be some insight in the kind of function that fits the data. Meaning like quadratic… What-
For sure. But there might be some insight in the kind of function that fits the data. Meaning like quadratic… What-
Edward Gibson
I think it’s an exponential.
I think it’s an exponential.
Lex Fridman
Exponential.
Exponential.
Edward Gibson
So, we think it’s probably an exponential such that the longer the distance, the less it matters. So then it’s the sum of those, that was our best guess a while ago. So you’ve got a bunch of dependencies. If you’ve got a bunch of them that are being connected at some point, at the ends of those, the cost is some exponential function of those is my guess. But because the reason it’s probably an exponential is it’s not just the distance between two words. I can make a very, very long subject verb dependency by adding lots and lots of noun phrases and prepositional phrases and it doesn’t matter too much. It’s when you do nested, when I have multiple of these, then things go really bad, go south.
So, we think it’s probably an exponential such that the longer the distance, the less it matters. So then it’s the sum of those, that was our best guess a while ago. So you’ve got a bunch of dependencies. If you’ve got a bunch of them that are being connected at some point, at the ends of those, the cost is some exponential function of those is my guess. But because the reason it’s probably an exponential is it’s not just the distance between two words. I can make a very, very long subject verb dependency by adding lots and lots of noun phrases and prepositional phrases and it doesn’t matter too much. It’s when you do nested, when I have multiple of these, then things go really bad, go south.
Lex Fridman
That’s probably somehow connected to working memory or something like this?
That’s probably somehow connected to working memory or something like this?
Edward Gibson
Yeah, that’s probably a function of the memory here is the access, is trying to find those earlier things. It’s kind of hard to figure out what was referred to earlier. Those are those connections. That’s the notion of murky… As opposed to a storage-y thing, but trying to connect, retrieve those earlier words depending on what was in between. Then we’re talking about interference of similar things in between. The right theory probably has that kind of notion, it is an interference of similar.
Yeah, that’s probably a function of the memory here is the access, is trying to find those earlier things. It’s kind of hard to figure out what was referred to earlier. Those are those connections. That’s the notion of murky… As opposed to a storage-y thing, but trying to connect, retrieve those earlier words depending on what was in between. Then we’re talking about interference of similar things in between. The right theory probably has that kind of notion, it is an interference of similar.
So, I’m dealing with abstraction over the right theory, which is just, let’s count words, it’s not right, but it’s close. Then maybe you’re right though. There’s some sort of an exponential or something to figure out the total so we can figure out a function for any given sentence in any given language. But it’s funny, people haven’t done that too much, which I do think is… I’m interested that you find that interesting. I really find that interesting and a lot of people haven’t found it interesting. I don’t know why I haven’t got people to want to work on that. I really like that too.
Lex Fridman
That’s a beautiful idea, and the underlying idea is beautiful, that there’s a cognitive cost that correlates with the length of dependency. It feels like, I mean, language is so fundamental to the human experience. This is a nice, clean theory of language where it’s like, “Wow, okay, so we like our words close together, depend words close together.”
That’s a beautiful idea, and the underlying idea is beautiful, that there’s a cognitive cost that correlates with the length of dependency. It feels like, I mean, language is so fundamental to the human experience. This is a nice, clean theory of language where it’s like, “Wow, okay, so we like our words close together, depend words close together.”
Edward Gibson
Yeah, that’s why I like it too. It’s so simple. It’s so simple.
Yeah, that’s why I like it too. It’s so simple. It’s so simple.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, the simplicity of the theory is good.
Yeah, the simplicity of the theory is good.
Edward Gibson
And yet it explains some very complicated phenomena. If I write these very complicated sentences, it’s kind of hard to know why they’re so hard. And you can like, oh, nail it down. I can give you a math formula for why each one of them is bad and where, and that’s kind of cool. I think that’s very neat.
And yet it explains some very complicated phenomena. If I write these very complicated sentences, it’s kind of hard to know why they’re so hard. And you can like, oh, nail it down. I can give you a math formula for why each one of them is bad and where, and that’s kind of cool. I think that’s very neat.
Lex Fridman
Have you gone through the process… Is there, if you take a piece of text and then simplify, there’s an average length of dependency and then you reduce it and see comprehension on the entire, not just a single sentence, but you go from James Joyce to Hemingway or something.
Have you gone through the process… Is there, if you take a piece of text and then simplify, there’s an average length of dependency and then you reduce it and see comprehension on the entire, not just a single sentence, but you go from James Joyce to Hemingway or something.
Edward Gibson
No, no. Simple answer is no. There’s probably things you can do in that kind of direction.
No, no. Simple answer is no. There’s probably things you can do in that kind of direction.
Lex Fridman
That’s fun.
That’s fun.
Edward Gibson
We’re going to talk about legalese at some point, and so maybe we’ll talk about that kind of thinking with applied to legalese.
We’re going to talk about legalese at some point, and so maybe we’ll talk about that kind of thinking with applied to legalese.
Lex Fridman
Let’s talk about legalese because you mentioned that as an exception. We’re just taking a tangent upon tangent, that’s an interesting one, you give it as an exception.
Let’s talk about legalese because you mentioned that as an exception. We’re just taking a tangent upon tangent, that’s an interesting one, you give it as an exception.
Edward Gibson
It’s an exception.
It’s an exception.
Lex Fridman
That you say that most natural languages, as we’ve been talking about, have local dependencies with one exception, legalese.
That you say that most natural languages, as we’ve been talking about, have local dependencies with one exception, legalese.
Edward Gibson
That’s right.
That’s right.
Lex Fridman
So, what is legalese first of all?
So, what is legalese first of all?
Edward Gibson
Oh, well, legalese is what you think it is. It’s just any legal language.
Oh, well, legalese is what you think it is. It’s just any legal language.
Lex Fridman
Well, I actually know very little about the kind of language that lawyers use.
Well, I actually know very little about the kind of language that lawyers use.
Edward Gibson
So, I’m just thinking about language in laws and language and contracts.
So, I’m just thinking about language in laws and language and contracts.
Lex Fridman
Got it.
Got it.
Edward Gibson
The stuff that you have to run into, we have to run into every other day or every day and you skip over because it reads poorly or partly it’s just long, right? There’s a lot of texts there that we don’t really want to know about. But the thing I’m interested in, so I’ve been working with this guy called Eric Martinez. He was a lawyer who was taking my class. I was teaching a psycholinguistics lab class, I have been teaching it for a long time at MIT, and he was a law student at Harvard. He took the class because he had done some linguistics as an undergrad and he was interested in the problem of why legalese sounds hard to understand. So, why is it hard to understand and why do they write that way if it is so hard to understand? It seems apparent that it’s hard to understand. The question is, why is it?
The stuff that you have to run into, we have to run into every other day or every day and you skip over because it reads poorly or partly it’s just long, right? There’s a lot of texts there that we don’t really want to know about. But the thing I’m interested in, so I’ve been working with this guy called Eric Martinez. He was a lawyer who was taking my class. I was teaching a psycholinguistics lab class, I have been teaching it for a long time at MIT, and he was a law student at Harvard. He took the class because he had done some linguistics as an undergrad and he was interested in the problem of why legalese sounds hard to understand. So, why is it hard to understand and why do they write that way if it is so hard to understand? It seems apparent that it’s hard to understand. The question is, why is it?
So, we didn’t know and we did an evaluation of a bunch of contracts. Actually, we just took a bunch of random contracts. I don’t know, there’s contracts and laws might not be exactly the same, but contracts are the things that most people have to deal with most of the time. That’s the most common thing that humans have, that adults in our industrialized society have to deal with a lot. That’s what we pulled and we didn’t know what was hard about them, but it turns out that the way they’re written is very center embedded. It has nested structures in them. So, it has low frequency words as well. That’s not surprising. Lots of texts have low… It does have surprising slightly lower frequency words than other kinds of control texts, even academic texts. Legalese is even worse. It is the worst that we were being able to find-
Lex Fridman
Fascinating. You just reveal the game that lawyers are playing.
Fascinating. You just reveal the game that lawyers are playing.
Edward Gibson
They’re not though.
They’re not though.
Lex Fridman
That they’re optimizing a different… Well-
That they’re optimizing a different… Well-
Edward Gibson
It’s interesting. Now you’re getting at why. So, now you’re saying they’re doing intentionally. I don’t think they’re doing intentionally, but let’s-
It’s interesting. Now you’re getting at why. So, now you’re saying they’re doing intentionally. I don’t think they’re doing intentionally, but let’s-
Lex Fridman
It’s an emergent phenomena. Okay.
It’s an emergent phenomena. Okay.
Edward Gibson
We’ll get to that. We’ll get to that. But we wanted to see what first as opposed… Because it turns out that we’re not the first to observe that legalese is weird. Back to Nixon had a plain language act in 1970 and Obama had one. Boy, a lot of these presidents that said, “Oh, no, we’ve got to simplify legal language. Must simplify it.” But if you don’t know how it’s complicated, it’s not easy to simplify it. You need to know what it is you’re supposed to do before you can fix it. So, you need a psycholinguist to analyze the text and see what’s wrong with it before you can fix it. You don’t know how to fix it. How am I supposed to fix something I don’t know what’s wrong with it?
We’ll get to that. We’ll get to that. But we wanted to see what first as opposed… Because it turns out that we’re not the first to observe that legalese is weird. Back to Nixon had a plain language act in 1970 and Obama had one. Boy, a lot of these presidents that said, “Oh, no, we’ve got to simplify legal language. Must simplify it.” But if you don’t know how it’s complicated, it’s not easy to simplify it. You need to know what it is you’re supposed to do before you can fix it. So, you need a psycholinguist to analyze the text and see what’s wrong with it before you can fix it. You don’t know how to fix it. How am I supposed to fix something I don’t know what’s wrong with it?
And so what we did, that’s what we did. We figured out, okay, just a bunch of contracts, had people… And we encoded them for a bunch of features. Another feature, one of them was center embedding. That is basically how often a clause would intervene between a subject and a verb, for example. That’s one center embedding of a clause, and turns out they’re massively center embedded. So, I think in random contracts and in random laws, I think you get about 70%, something like 70% of sentences have a center embedded clause, which is insanely high.
If you go to any other text, it’s down to 20% or something. It’s so much higher than any control you can think of, including, you think, people think, oh, technical, academic texts. No, people don’t write center embedded sentences in technical academic texts. They do a little bit, but it’s on the 20%, 30% realm as opposed to 70. So, there’s that and there’s low frequency words. Then people, oh, maybe it’s passive. People don’t like the passive. Passive for some reason, the passive voice in English has a bad rap, and I’m not really sure where that comes from. And there is a lot of passive, there’s much more passive voice in legalese than there is in other texts-
Lex Fridman
And passive voice accounts for some of the low frequency words?
And passive voice accounts for some of the low frequency words?
Edward Gibson
No, no. Those separate. Those are separate.
No, no. Those separate. Those are separate.
Lex Fridman
[inaudible 01:54:28] I apologize. Oh, so passive voice sucks. Low frequency words sucks.
[inaudible 01:54:28] I apologize. Oh, so passive voice sucks. Low frequency words sucks.
Edward Gibson
Well sucks is different. So, these are different-
Well sucks is different. So, these are different-
Lex Fridman
That’s a judgment I’m passing?
That’s a judgment I’m passing?
Edward Gibson
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Drop the judgment. It’s just like, these are frequent. These are things which happen in legalese text. Then we can ask, the dependent measure is how well you understand those things with those features. And it turns out the passive makes no difference. So, it has zero effect on your comprehension ability, on your recall ability. Nothing at all, it has no effect. The words matter a little bit. Low frequency words are going to hurt you in recall and understanding, but what really hurts is the center of embedding.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Drop the judgment. It’s just like, these are frequent. These are things which happen in legalese text. Then we can ask, the dependent measure is how well you understand those things with those features. And it turns out the passive makes no difference. So, it has zero effect on your comprehension ability, on your recall ability. Nothing at all, it has no effect. The words matter a little bit. Low frequency words are going to hurt you in recall and understanding, but what really hurts is the center of embedding.
Lex Fridman
Center embedding.
Center embedding.
Edward Gibson
That kills you. That slows people down, that makes them very poor in understanding, they can’t recall what was said as well, nearly as well. And we did this not only on laypeople, we did on a lot of laypeople, we ran on a hundred lawyers. We recruited lawyers from a wide range of different levels of law firms and stuff. And they have the same pattern. When they did this, I did not know what would happen. I thought maybe they could process… They’re used to legalese, maybe they process it just as well as if it was normal.
That kills you. That slows people down, that makes them very poor in understanding, they can’t recall what was said as well, nearly as well. And we did this not only on laypeople, we did on a lot of laypeople, we ran on a hundred lawyers. We recruited lawyers from a wide range of different levels of law firms and stuff. And they have the same pattern. When they did this, I did not know what would happen. I thought maybe they could process… They’re used to legalese, maybe they process it just as well as if it was normal.
No, no, they’re much better than laypeople. So, they can much better recall, much better at understanding. But they have the same main effects as laypeople. Exactly the same. So, they also much prefer the non-center… So, we constructed non-center embedded versions of each of these. We constructed versions which have higher frequency words in those places. And we did, we un-passivized, we turned them into active versions. The passive/active made no difference. The words made a little difference. And the un-center embedding makes big differences in all the populations.
Lex Fridman
Un-center embedding. How hard is that process, by the way?
Un-center embedding. How hard is that process, by the way?
Edward Gibson
Not very hard.
Not very hard.
Lex Fridman
Sorry, dumb question, but how hard is it to detect center embedding?
Sorry, dumb question, but how hard is it to detect center embedding?
Edward Gibson
Oh, easy. Easy to detect. [inaudible 01:56:21]-
Oh, easy. Easy to detect. [inaudible 01:56:21]-
Lex Fridman
You’re just looking at long dependencies or is there a real-
You’re just looking at long dependencies or is there a real-
Edward Gibson
So, there’s automatic parsers for English, which are pretty good.
So, there’s automatic parsers for English, which are pretty good.
Lex Fridman
And they can detect center embedding?
And they can detect center embedding?
Edward Gibson
Oh yeah, very good.
Oh yeah, very good.
Lex Fridman
Or I guess nesting?
Or I guess nesting?
Edward Gibson
Perfectly. [inaudible 01:56:32]. Pretty much.
Perfectly. [inaudible 01:56:32]. Pretty much.
Lex Fridman
So, you’re not just looking for long dependencies, you’re just literally looking for center embedding.
So, you’re not just looking for long dependencies, you’re just literally looking for center embedding.
Edward Gibson
Yeah, we are in this case, in these cases. But long dependencies, they’re highly correlated, these things to this.
Yeah, we are in this case, in these cases. But long dependencies, they’re highly correlated, these things to this.
Lex Fridman
All right. So, like center embedding is a big bomb you throw inside of a sentence that just blows out, that makes super-
All right. So, like center embedding is a big bomb you throw inside of a sentence that just blows out, that makes super-
Edward Gibson
Yeah. Can I read a sentence for you from these things?
Yeah. Can I read a sentence for you from these things?
Lex Fridman
Sure.
Sure.
Edward Gibson
I’ll see if I can find. I mean, this is just one of the things that… This is just [inaudible 01:56:53]-
I’ll see if I can find. I mean, this is just one of the things that… This is just [inaudible 01:56:53]-
Lex Fridman
My eyes might glaze over in mid-sentence. No, I understand that. I mean, legalese is hard.
My eyes might glaze over in mid-sentence. No, I understand that. I mean, legalese is hard.
Edward Gibson
Here we go. It goes, “In the event that any payment or benefit by the company, all such payments and benefits, including the payments and benefits under section 3(A) hereof being here and after referred to as a total payments would be subject to the excise tax, then the cash severance payments shall be reduced.” So that’s something we pulled from a regular text from a contract.
Here we go. It goes, “In the event that any payment or benefit by the company, all such payments and benefits, including the payments and benefits under section 3(A) hereof being here and after referred to as a total payments would be subject to the excise tax, then the cash severance payments shall be reduced.” So that’s something we pulled from a regular text from a contract.
Lex Fridman
Wow.
Wow.
Edward Gibson
And the center embedded bit there is just for some reason, there’s a definition. They throw the definition of what payments and benefits are in between the subject and the verb. How about don’t do that? How about put the definition somewhere else as opposed to in the middle of the sentence? That’s very, very common, by the way. That’s what happens. You just throw your definitions, you use a word, a couple of words, and then you define it and then you continue the sentence. Just don’t write like that.
And the center embedded bit there is just for some reason, there’s a definition. They throw the definition of what payments and benefits are in between the subject and the verb. How about don’t do that? How about put the definition somewhere else as opposed to in the middle of the sentence? That’s very, very common, by the way. That’s what happens. You just throw your definitions, you use a word, a couple of words, and then you define it and then you continue the sentence. Just don’t write like that.
So then we asked lawyers, we thought, “Oh, maybe lawyers like this.” Lawyers don’t like this, they don’t like this. They don’t want to write like this. We asked them to rate materials which are with the same meaning, with un-center embedded and center embedded, and they much preferred the un-center embedded versions.
Lex Fridman
On comprehension, on the reading side.
On comprehension, on the reading side.
Edward Gibson
And we asked them, “Would you hire someone who writes like this or this?” We asked them all kinds of questions and they always preferred the less complicated version, all of them. So, I don’t even think they want it this way.
And we asked them, “Would you hire someone who writes like this or this?” We asked them all kinds of questions and they always preferred the less complicated version, all of them. So, I don’t even think they want it this way.
Lex Fridman
But how did it happen?
But how did it happen?
Edward Gibson
How did it happen? That’s a very good question. And the answer is, I still don’t know, but-
How did it happen? That’s a very good question. And the answer is, I still don’t know, but-
Lex Fridman
I have some theories.
I have some theories.
Edward Gibson
Our best theory at the moment is that there’s actually some kind of a performative meaning in the center embedding and the style, which tells you it’s legalese. We think that that’s the kind of a style which tells you it’s legalese, it’s a reasonable guess. And maybe it’s just, so for instance, it’s like a magic spell. We kind of call this the magic spell hypothesis. When you tell someone to put a magic spell on someone, what do you do? People know what a magic spell is and they do a lot of rhyming. That’s kind of what people will tend to do. They’ll do rhyming and they’ll do some kind of poetry kind of thing.
Our best theory at the moment is that there’s actually some kind of a performative meaning in the center embedding and the style, which tells you it’s legalese. We think that that’s the kind of a style which tells you it’s legalese, it’s a reasonable guess. And maybe it’s just, so for instance, it’s like a magic spell. We kind of call this the magic spell hypothesis. When you tell someone to put a magic spell on someone, what do you do? People know what a magic spell is and they do a lot of rhyming. That’s kind of what people will tend to do. They’ll do rhyming and they’ll do some kind of poetry kind of thing.
Lex Fridman
Abracadabra type of thing.
Abracadabra type of thing.
Edward Gibson
Yeah. And maybe there’s a syntactic reflex here of a magic spell, which is center embedding. And so that’s like, “Oh, it’s trying to tell you this is something which is true,” which is what the goal of law is. It’s telling you something that we want you to believe is certainly true. That’s what legal contracts are trying to enforce on you. And so maybe that’s a form which has… This is like an abstract, very abstract form center embedding, which has a meaning associated with it.
Yeah. And maybe there’s a syntactic reflex here of a magic spell, which is center embedding. And so that’s like, “Oh, it’s trying to tell you this is something which is true,” which is what the goal of law is. It’s telling you something that we want you to believe is certainly true. That’s what legal contracts are trying to enforce on you. And so maybe that’s a form which has… This is like an abstract, very abstract form center embedding, which has a meaning associated with it.
Lex Fridman
Well, don’t you think there’s an incentive for lawyers to generate things that are hard to understand?
Well, don’t you think there’s an incentive for lawyers to generate things that are hard to understand?
Edward Gibson
That was one of our working hypotheses. We just couldn’t find any evidence of that.
That was one of our working hypotheses. We just couldn’t find any evidence of that.
Lex Fridman
No, lawyers also don’t understand it, but you’re creating space-
No, lawyers also don’t understand it, but you’re creating space-
Edward Gibson
But when you ask lawyers-
But when you ask lawyers-
Lex Fridman
You ask in a communist Soviet Union, the individual members, their self-report is not going to correctly reflect what is broken about the gigantic bureaucracy then leads to Chernobyl or something like this. I think the incentives under which you operate are not always transparent to the members within that system. So, it just feels like a strange coincidence that there is benefit if you just zoom out, look at the system as opposed to asking individual lawyers, that making something hard to understand is going to make a lot of people money.
You ask in a communist Soviet Union, the individual members, their self-report is not going to correctly reflect what is broken about the gigantic bureaucracy then leads to Chernobyl or something like this. I think the incentives under which you operate are not always transparent to the members within that system. So, it just feels like a strange coincidence that there is benefit if you just zoom out, look at the system as opposed to asking individual lawyers, that making something hard to understand is going to make a lot of people money.
You’re going to need a lawyer to figure that out, I guess from the perspective of the individual. But then that could be the performative aspect. It could be as opposed to the incentive driven to be complicated. It could be performative to where, “We lawyers speak in this sophisticated way and you regular humans don’t understand it, so you need to hire a lawyer.” Yeah, I don’t know which one it is, but it’s suspicious. Suspicious that it’s hard to understand and that everybody’s eyes glaze over and they don’t read.
Edward Gibson
I’m suspicious as well. I’m still suspicious and I hear what you’re saying. It could be kind, no individual and even average of individuals. It could just be a few bad apples in a way which are driving the effect in some way.
I’m suspicious as well. I’m still suspicious and I hear what you’re saying. It could be kind, no individual and even average of individuals. It could just be a few bad apples in a way which are driving the effect in some way.
Lex Fridman
Influential bad apples that everybody looks up to or whatever, they’re central figures in how-
Influential bad apples that everybody looks up to or whatever, they’re central figures in how-
Edward Gibson
But it is kind of interesting that-
But it is kind of interesting that-
Lex Fridman
It’s fascinating.
It’s fascinating.
Edward Gibson
… among our hundred lawyers, they did not share that.
… among our hundred lawyers, they did not share that.
Lex Fridman
They didn’t want this. That’s fascinating.
They didn’t want this. That’s fascinating.
Edward Gibson
They really didn’t like it. And so it gave us hope-
They really didn’t like it. And so it gave us hope-
Lex Fridman
And they weren’t better than regular people at comprehending it.
And they weren’t better than regular people at comprehending it.
Edward Gibson
They were much-
They were much-
Lex Fridman
Or they were on average better-
Or they were on average better-
Edward Gibson
But they had the same difference.
But they had the same difference.
Lex Fridman
… but the same difference.
… but the same difference.
Edward Gibson
Exact same difference, but they wanted it fixed. And so that gave us hope that because it actually isn’t very hard to construct a material which is un-center embedded and has the same meaning. It’s not very hard to do. Just basically in that situation, you’re just putting definitions outside of the subject verb relation in that particular example, and that’s pretty general. What they’re doing is just throwing stuff in there, which you didn’t have to put in there.
Exact same difference, but they wanted it fixed. And so that gave us hope that because it actually isn’t very hard to construct a material which is un-center embedded and has the same meaning. It’s not very hard to do. Just basically in that situation, you’re just putting definitions outside of the subject verb relation in that particular example, and that’s pretty general. What they’re doing is just throwing stuff in there, which you didn’t have to put in there.
There’s extra words involved, typically. You may need a few extra words to refer to the things that you’re defining outside in some way. If you only use it in that one sentence, then there’s no reason to introduce extra terms. So, we might have a few more words, but it’ll be easier to understand. I have hope that now that maybe we can make legalese less convoluted in this way.
Lex Fridman
So, maybe the next President of the United States can, instead of saying generic things, say-
So, maybe the next President of the United States can, instead of saying generic things, say-
Edward Gibson
Say exactly-
Say exactly-
Lex Fridman
“I ban center embeddings, and make Ted the language czar of-
“I ban center embeddings, and make Ted the language czar of-
Edward Gibson
Well, make Eric. Martinez is the guy you should really put in there.
Well, make Eric. Martinez is the guy you should really put in there.
Lex Fridman
Eric Martinez, yeah. But center embeddings are the bad thing to have.
Eric Martinez, yeah. But center embeddings are the bad thing to have.
Edward Gibson
That’s right.
That’s right.
Lex Fridman
If you get rid of that-
If you get rid of that-
Edward Gibson
That’ll do a lot of it. That’ll fix a lot.
That’ll do a lot of it. That’ll fix a lot.
Lex Fridman
That’s fascinating. That is so fascinating. And just really fascinating on many fronts that humans are just not able to deal with this kind of thing and that language because of that evolved in the way you did. It’s fascinating. So, one of the mathematical formulations you have when talking about languages communication is this idea of noisy channels. What’s a noisy channel?
That’s fascinating. That is so fascinating. And just really fascinating on many fronts that humans are just not able to deal with this kind of thing and that language because of that evolved in the way you did. It’s fascinating. So, one of the mathematical formulations you have when talking about languages communication is this idea of noisy channels. What’s a noisy channel?
Edward Gibson
That’s about communication. And so this is going back to Shannon. Claude Shannon was a student at MIT in the ’40s. And so he wrote this very influential piece of work about communication theory or information theory, and he was interested in human language. Actually. He was interested in this problem of communication, of getting a message from my head to your head. And he was concerned or interested in what was a robust way to do that.
That’s about communication. And so this is going back to Shannon. Claude Shannon was a student at MIT in the ’40s. And so he wrote this very influential piece of work about communication theory or information theory, and he was interested in human language. Actually. He was interested in this problem of communication, of getting a message from my head to your head. And he was concerned or interested in what was a robust way to do that.
And so that assuming we both speak the same language, we both already speak English, whatever the language is, we speak that what is a way that I can say the language so that it’s most likely to get the signal that I want to you. And then the problem there in the communication is the noisy channel, is that I make… There’s a lot of noise in the system. I don’t speak perfectly. I make errors. That’s noise. There’s background noise, you know that.
Lex Fridman
Like literal.
Like literal.
Edward Gibson
Literal background noise. There is white noise in the background or some other kind of noise or some speaking going on or just you’re at a party, that’s background noise. You’re trying to hear someone, it’s hard to understand them because there’s all this other stuff going on in the background. And then there’s noise on the communication, on the receiver side so that you have some problem maybe understanding me for stuff that’s just internal to you in some way. You’ve got some other problems, whatever, with understanding for whatever reasons. Maybe you’ve had too much to drink. Who knows why you’re not able to pay attention to the signal.
Literal background noise. There is white noise in the background or some other kind of noise or some speaking going on or just you’re at a party, that’s background noise. You’re trying to hear someone, it’s hard to understand them because there’s all this other stuff going on in the background. And then there’s noise on the communication, on the receiver side so that you have some problem maybe understanding me for stuff that’s just internal to you in some way. You’ve got some other problems, whatever, with understanding for whatever reasons. Maybe you’ve had too much to drink. Who knows why you’re not able to pay attention to the signal.
So, that’s the noisy channel. And so that language, if it’s communication system, we are trying to optimize in some sense that the passing of the message from one side to the other. And so one idea is that maybe aspects of word order, for example, might’ve optimized in some way to make language a little more easy to be passed from speaker to listener. And so Shannon’s, the guy that did this stuff way back in the forties, it was very interesting.
Historically he was interested in working in linguistics. He was at MIT and this was his master’s thesis of all things. It’s crazy how much he did for his master’s thesis in 1948 I think, or ’49 something. And he wanted to keep working in language and it just wasn’t a popular communication as a reason source for what language was, wasn’t popular at the time. So, Chomsky was moving in there and he just wasn’t able to get a handle there, I think. And so he moved to [inaudible 02:06:04] and worked on communication from a mathematical point of view and did all kinds of amazing work. And so he’s just-
Lex Fridman
More on the signal side versus the language side.
More on the signal side versus the language side.
Edward Gibson
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
It would’ve been interesting to see if he pursued the language side. That’s really interesting.
It would’ve been interesting to see if he pursued the language side. That’s really interesting.
Edward Gibson
He was interested in that. His examples in the ’40s are like, they’re very language-like things. We can kind of show that there’s a noisy channel process going on in, when you’re listening to me, you can often guess what you think I meant, given what I said. And I mean, with respect to sort of why language looks the way it does, there might be, as I alluded to, there might be ways in which word orders is somewhat optimized because of the noisy channel in some way.
He was interested in that. His examples in the ’40s are like, they’re very language-like things. We can kind of show that there’s a noisy channel process going on in, when you’re listening to me, you can often guess what you think I meant, given what I said. And I mean, with respect to sort of why language looks the way it does, there might be, as I alluded to, there might be ways in which word orders is somewhat optimized because of the noisy channel in some way.
Lex Fridman
That’s really cool to model if you don’t hear certain parts of a sentence or have some probability of missing that part, how do you construct a language that’s resilient to that, that’s somewhat robust to that?
That’s really cool to model if you don’t hear certain parts of a sentence or have some probability of missing that part, how do you construct a language that’s resilient to that, that’s somewhat robust to that?
Edward Gibson
Yeah, that’s the idea.
Yeah, that’s the idea.
Lex Fridman
And then you’re kind saying the word order and the syntax of language, the dependency length are all helpful to do-
And then you’re kind saying the word order and the syntax of language, the dependency length are all helpful to do-
Edward Gibson
Well, dependency length is really about memory. I think that’s about what’s easier or harder to produce in some way. And these other ideas are about robustness to communication. So, the problem of potential loss of signal due to noise. There may be aspects of word order which is somewhat optimized for that. And we have this one guess in that direction… And these are kind of just so stories, I have to be pretty frank. They’re not like, I can’t show, this is true. All we can do is look at the current languages of the world.
Well, dependency length is really about memory. I think that’s about what’s easier or harder to produce in some way. And these other ideas are about robustness to communication. So, the problem of potential loss of signal due to noise. There may be aspects of word order which is somewhat optimized for that. And we have this one guess in that direction… And these are kind of just so stories, I have to be pretty frank. They’re not like, I can’t show, this is true. All we can do is look at the current languages of the world.
We can’t see how languages change or anything because we’ve got these snapshots of a few hundred or a few thousand languages. We can’t do the right kinds of modifications to test things experimentally. And so just take this with a grain of salt from here, this stuff. The dependency stuff, I’m much more solid on and here’s what the lengths are and here’s what’s hard, here’s what’s easy, and this is a reasonable structure. I think I’m pretty reasonable. Why does the word order look the way it does is, we’re now into shaky territory, but it’s kind of cool.
Lex Fridman
We’re talking about, just to be clear, we’re talking about maybe just actually the sounds of communication. You and I are sitting in a bar, it’s very loud, and you model with a noisy channel, the loudness, the noise, and we have the signal that’s coming across and you’re saying word to order might have something to do with optimizing that when there’s presence of noise.
We’re talking about, just to be clear, we’re talking about maybe just actually the sounds of communication. You and I are sitting in a bar, it’s very loud, and you model with a noisy channel, the loudness, the noise, and we have the signal that’s coming across and you’re saying word to order might have something to do with optimizing that when there’s presence of noise.
Edward Gibson
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
It’s really interesting. To me, it’s interesting how much you can load into the noisy channel. How much can you bake in? You said cognitive load on the receiver end-
It’s really interesting. To me, it’s interesting how much you can load into the noisy channel. How much can you bake in? You said cognitive load on the receiver end-
Edward Gibson
We think that there’s at least three different kinds of things going on there. We probably don’t want to treat them all as the same. And so I think that the right model, a better model of a noisy channel would have three different sources of noise, which are background noise, speaker-inherent noise and listener-inherent noise. And those are all different things.
We think that there’s at least three different kinds of things going on there. We probably don’t want to treat them all as the same. And so I think that the right model, a better model of a noisy channel would have three different sources of noise, which are background noise, speaker-inherent noise and listener-inherent noise. And those are all different things.
Lex Fridman
Sure. But then underneath it, there’s a million other subsets of what-
Sure. But then underneath it, there’s a million other subsets of what-
Edward Gibson
That’s true.
That’s true.
Lex Fridman
… on the receiving, I just mentioned cognitive load on both sides. Then there’s speech impediments or just everything, worldview. The meaning. We’ll start to creep into the meaning realm of we have different worldviews.
… on the receiving, I just mentioned cognitive load on both sides. Then there’s speech impediments or just everything, worldview. The meaning. We’ll start to creep into the meaning realm of we have different worldviews.
Edward Gibson
Well, how about just form still though? Just what language you know.
Well, how about just form still though? Just what language you know.
Lex Fridman
[inaudible 02:09:35].
[inaudible 02:09:35].
Edward Gibson
So, how well you know the language, and so if it’s second language for you versus first language and how maybe what other languages you know. These are still just form stuff and that’s potentially very informative. And how old you are, these things probably matter. So, child learning a language is as a noisy representation of English grammar, depending on how old they are. Maybe when they’re six, they’re perfectly formed, but…
So, how well you know the language, and so if it’s second language for you versus first language and how maybe what other languages you know. These are still just form stuff and that’s potentially very informative. And how old you are, these things probably matter. So, child learning a language is as a noisy representation of English grammar, depending on how old they are. Maybe when they’re six, they’re perfectly formed, but…
Learning a new language
Lex Fridman
You mentioned one of the things is a way to measure a language is learning problems. So, what’s the correlation between everything we’ve been talking about and how easy it’s to learn a language? Is a short dependencies correlated to ability to learn a language? Is there some kind of… Or the dependency grammar, is there some kind of connection there? How easy it is to learn?
You mentioned one of the things is a way to measure a language is learning problems. So, what’s the correlation between everything we’ve been talking about and how easy it’s to learn a language? Is a short dependencies correlated to ability to learn a language? Is there some kind of… Or the dependency grammar, is there some kind of connection there? How easy it is to learn?
Edward Gibson
Well, all the languages in the world’s language, none is right now we know is any better than any other with respect to optimizing dependency lengths, for example. They’re all kind of do it, do it well. They all keep low. So, I think of every human language as some kind of an optimization problem, a complex optimization problem to this communication problem. And so they’ve solved it. They’re just noisy solutions to this problem of communication. There’s just so many ways you can do this.
Well, all the languages in the world’s language, none is right now we know is any better than any other with respect to optimizing dependency lengths, for example. They’re all kind of do it, do it well. They all keep low. So, I think of every human language as some kind of an optimization problem, a complex optimization problem to this communication problem. And so they’ve solved it. They’re just noisy solutions to this problem of communication. There’s just so many ways you can do this.
Lex Fridman
So, they’re not optimized for learning. They’re probably optimized for communication.
So, they’re not optimized for learning. They’re probably optimized for communication.
Edward Gibson
And learning. So yes, one of the factors which-
And learning. So yes, one of the factors which-
Lex Fridman
Uh-oh.
Uh-oh.
Edward Gibson
So, learning is messing this up a bit. And so for example, if it were just about minimizing dependency lengths and that was all that matters, then we might find grammars which didn’t have regularity in their rules. But languages always have regularity in their rules. What I mean by that is that if I wanted to say something to you and the optimal way to say it was what really mattered to me, all that mattered was keeping the dependencies as close together as possible, then I would have a very lax set of free structure or dependency rules. I wouldn’t have very many of those. I would’ve very little of that. And I would just put the words as close to the things that refer to the things that are connected right beside each other. But we don’t do that.
So, learning is messing this up a bit. And so for example, if it were just about minimizing dependency lengths and that was all that matters, then we might find grammars which didn’t have regularity in their rules. But languages always have regularity in their rules. What I mean by that is that if I wanted to say something to you and the optimal way to say it was what really mattered to me, all that mattered was keeping the dependencies as close together as possible, then I would have a very lax set of free structure or dependency rules. I wouldn’t have very many of those. I would’ve very little of that. And I would just put the words as close to the things that refer to the things that are connected right beside each other. But we don’t do that.
There are word order rules. And depending on the language, they’re more and less strict. So, you speak Russian, they’re less strict than English. English is very rigid word order rules. We order things in a very particular way. And so why do we do that? That’s probably not about communication. That’s probably about learning. Then we’re talking about learning. It’s probably easier to learn regular things, things which are very predictable and easy. So, that’s probably about learning is our guess because that can’t be about communication.
Lex Fridman
Can it be just noise? Can it be just the messiness of the development of a language?
Can it be just noise? Can it be just the messiness of the development of a language?
Edward Gibson
If it were just a communication, then we should have languages which have very, very free word order. And we don’t have that. We have free-er, but not free. There’s always-
If it were just a communication, then we should have languages which have very, very free word order. And we don’t have that. We have free-er, but not free. There’s always-
Lex Fridman
Well, no, but what I mean by noise is cultural, sticky cultural things. Like the way you communicate, there’s a stickiness to it, that it’s an imperfect, it’s a noisy optimist… Stochastic, the function over which you’re optimizing is very noisy. Because it feels weird to say that learning is part of the objective function, because some languages are way harder to learn than others. Or that’s not true?
Well, no, but what I mean by noise is cultural, sticky cultural things. Like the way you communicate, there’s a stickiness to it, that it’s an imperfect, it’s a noisy optimist… Stochastic, the function over which you’re optimizing is very noisy. Because it feels weird to say that learning is part of the objective function, because some languages are way harder to learn than others. Or that’s not true?
Edward Gibson
That’s not true.
That’s not true.
Lex Fridman
That’s interesting.
That’s interesting.
Edward Gibson
I mean, yes-
I mean, yes-
Lex Fridman
That’s the public perception, right?
That’s the public perception, right?
Edward Gibson
Right? Yes, that’s true for a second language.
Right? Yes, that’s true for a second language.
Lex Fridman
For second language, [inaudible 02:13:13]-
For second language, [inaudible 02:13:13]-
Edward Gibson
But that depends on what you started with, right? So, it really depends on how close that second language is to the first language you’ve got. And so yes, it’s very, very hard to learn Arabic if you’ve started with English or it’s hard to learn Japanese or if you’ve started with… Chinese, I think is the worst. There’s Defense Language Institute in the United States has a list of how hard it is to learn what language from English, I think Chinese is the worse-
But that depends on what you started with, right? So, it really depends on how close that second language is to the first language you’ve got. And so yes, it’s very, very hard to learn Arabic if you’ve started with English or it’s hard to learn Japanese or if you’ve started with… Chinese, I think is the worst. There’s Defense Language Institute in the United States has a list of how hard it is to learn what language from English, I think Chinese is the worse-
Lex Fridman
But this is the second language. You’re saying babies don’t care.
But this is the second language. You’re saying babies don’t care.
Edward Gibson
No. There’s no evidence that there’s anything harder or easy about any language learned, by three or four, they speak that language. So, there’s no evidence of anything hard or easy about human language. They’re all kind of equal.
No. There’s no evidence that there’s anything harder or easy about any language learned, by three or four, they speak that language. So, there’s no evidence of anything hard or easy about human language. They’re all kind of equal.
Nature vs nurture
Lex Fridman
To what degree is language, this is returning to Chomsky a little bit, is innate. You said that for Chomsky, you used the idea that language is, some aspects of language are innate to explain away certain things that are observed. How much are we born with language at the core of our mind brain?
To what degree is language, this is returning to Chomsky a little bit, is innate. You said that for Chomsky, you used the idea that language is, some aspects of language are innate to explain away certain things that are observed. How much are we born with language at the core of our mind brain?
Edward Gibson
The answer is, I don’t know, of course. I’m an engineer at heart, I guess and I think it’s fine to postulate that a lot of it’s learned. And so I’m guessing that a lot of it’s learned. I think the reason Chomsky went with innateness is because he hypothesized movement in his grammar. He was interested in grammar and movement’s hard to learn. I think he’s right movement. It’s a hard thing to learn, to learn these two things together and how they interact. And there’s a lot of ways in which you might generate exactly the same sentences and it’s really hard.
The answer is, I don’t know, of course. I’m an engineer at heart, I guess and I think it’s fine to postulate that a lot of it’s learned. And so I’m guessing that a lot of it’s learned. I think the reason Chomsky went with innateness is because he hypothesized movement in his grammar. He was interested in grammar and movement’s hard to learn. I think he’s right movement. It’s a hard thing to learn, to learn these two things together and how they interact. And there’s a lot of ways in which you might generate exactly the same sentences and it’s really hard.
And so he’s like, “Oh, I guess it’s not learned. It’s innate.” And if you just throw out the movement and just think about that in a different way, then you get some messiness. But the messiness is human language, which it actually fits better. That messiness isn’t a problem. It’s actually, it’s a valuable asset of the theory. And so I think I don’t really see a reason to postulate much innate structure. And that’s kind of why I think these large language models are learning so well is because I think you can learn the form, the forms of human language from the input. I think that’s likely to be true.
Lex Fridman
So, that part of the brain that lights up when you’re doing all the comprehension, that could be learned? That could be just, you don’t need any-
So, that part of the brain that lights up when you’re doing all the comprehension, that could be learned? That could be just, you don’t need any-
Edward Gibson
Yeah, it doesn’t have to be an innate, so lots of stuff is modular in the brain that’s learned. So, there’s something called the visual word form area in the back, and so it’s in the back of your head near the visual cortex. And that is very specialized brain area, which does visual word processing if you read, if you’re a reader. If you don’t read, you don’t have it. Guess what? You spend some time learning to read and you develop that brain area, which does exactly that. And so the modularization is not evidence for innateness. So, the modularization of a language area doesn’t mean we’re born with it. We could have easily learned that. We might’ve been born with it. We just don’t know at this point. We might very well have been born with this left lateralized area.
Yeah, it doesn’t have to be an innate, so lots of stuff is modular in the brain that’s learned. So, there’s something called the visual word form area in the back, and so it’s in the back of your head near the visual cortex. And that is very specialized brain area, which does visual word processing if you read, if you’re a reader. If you don’t read, you don’t have it. Guess what? You spend some time learning to read and you develop that brain area, which does exactly that. And so the modularization is not evidence for innateness. So, the modularization of a language area doesn’t mean we’re born with it. We could have easily learned that. We might’ve been born with it. We just don’t know at this point. We might very well have been born with this left lateralized area.
There’s a lot of other interesting components here, features of this kind of argument. Some people get a stroke or something goes really wrong on the left side where the language area would be and that isn’t there. It’s not available. It develops just fine in the right. So, it’s not about the left. It goes to the left. This is a very interesting question. It’s like why are any of the brain areas the way that they are and how did they come to be that way? There’s these natural experiments which happen where people get these strange events in their brains at very young ages, which wipe out sections of their brain, and they behave totally normally and no one knows anything was wrong. And we find out later, because they happen to be accidentally scanned for some reason. It’s like what happened to your left hemisphere? It’s missing.
There’s not many people who have missed their whole left hemisphere, but they’ll be missing some other section of their left or their right. And they behave absolutely normally, you would never know. So, that’s a very interesting current research. This is another project that this person, Ev Fedorenko is working on. She’s got all these people contacting her because she’s scanned some people who have been missing sections. One person missed a section of her brain and was scanned in her lab, and she happened to be a writer for the New York Times.
And there was an article in New York Times just about the scanning procedure, about what might be learned by the general process of MRI and language, not necessarily language. And because she’s writing for the New York Times, then all these people started writing to her who also have similar kinds of deficits because they’ve been accidentally scanned for some reason and found out they’re missing some section. And they say they volunteer to be scanned.
Lex Fridman
These are natural experiments, you said?
These are natural experiments, you said?
Edward Gibson
Natural experiments. They’re kind of messy, but natural experiments, it’s kind of cool.
Natural experiments. They’re kind of messy, but natural experiments, it’s kind of cool.
Lex Fridman
The brain.
The brain.
Edward Gibson
She calls it Interesting Brains.
She calls it Interesting Brains.
Lex Fridman
The first few hours, days, months of human life are fascinating. Well, inside the womb actually, that development, that machinery, whatever that is, seems to create powerful humans that are able to speak, comprehend, think, all that kind of stuff, no matter what happens… Not no matter what, but robust to the different ways that the brain might be damaged and so on. That’s really interesting. But what would Chomsky say about the fact, the thing you’re saying now, that language seems to be happening separate from thought? Because as far as I understand, maybe you can correct me, he thought that language underpins a thought.
The first few hours, days, months of human life are fascinating. Well, inside the womb actually, that development, that machinery, whatever that is, seems to create powerful humans that are able to speak, comprehend, think, all that kind of stuff, no matter what happens… Not no matter what, but robust to the different ways that the brain might be damaged and so on. That’s really interesting. But what would Chomsky say about the fact, the thing you’re saying now, that language seems to be happening separate from thought? Because as far as I understand, maybe you can correct me, he thought that language underpins a thought.
Edward Gibson
Yeah, he thinks so. I don’t know what he’d say.
Yeah, he thinks so. I don’t know what he’d say.
Lex Fridman
He would be surprised, because for him, the idea is that language is the foundation of thought.
He would be surprised, because for him, the idea is that language is the foundation of thought.
Edward Gibson
That’s right. Absolutely.
That’s right. Absolutely.
Lex Fridman
It’s pretty mind-blowing to think that it could be completely separate from thought.
It’s pretty mind-blowing to think that it could be completely separate from thought.
Edward Gibson
That’s right. So, he’s basically a philosopher, philosopher of language in a way, thinking about these things. It’s a fine thought. You can’t test it in his methods. You can’t do a thought experiment to figure that out. You need a scanner, you need brain-damaged people. You need ways to measure that. And that’s what FMRI offers. And patients are a little messier. FMRI is pretty unambiguous, I’d say. It’s very unambiguous. There’s no way to say that the language network is doing any of these tasks. There’s-
That’s right. So, he’s basically a philosopher, philosopher of language in a way, thinking about these things. It’s a fine thought. You can’t test it in his methods. You can’t do a thought experiment to figure that out. You need a scanner, you need brain-damaged people. You need ways to measure that. And that’s what FMRI offers. And patients are a little messier. FMRI is pretty unambiguous, I’d say. It’s very unambiguous. There’s no way to say that the language network is doing any of these tasks. There’s-
Edward Gibson
The language network is doing any of these tasks, you should look at those data. It’s like there’s no chance that you can say that those networks are overlapping. They’re not overlapping, they’re just completely different. And so you can always make, oh, it’s only two people, it’s four people or something for the patients, and there’s something special about them we don’t know. But these are just random people and with lots of them, and you find always the same effects and it’s very robust, I’d say.
The language network is doing any of these tasks, you should look at those data. It’s like there’s no chance that you can say that those networks are overlapping. They’re not overlapping, they’re just completely different. And so you can always make, oh, it’s only two people, it’s four people or something for the patients, and there’s something special about them we don’t know. But these are just random people and with lots of them, and you find always the same effects and it’s very robust, I’d say.
Culture and language
Lex Fridman
Well, that’s a fascinating effect. You mentioned Bolivia. What’s the connection between culture and language? You’ve also mentioned that much of our study of language comes from W-E-I-R-D, WEIRD people, western, educated, industrialized rich, and democratic. So when you study remote cultures such as around the Amazon jungle, what can you learn about language?
Well, that’s a fascinating effect. You mentioned Bolivia. What’s the connection between culture and language? You’ve also mentioned that much of our study of language comes from W-E-I-R-D, WEIRD people, western, educated, industrialized rich, and democratic. So when you study remote cultures such as around the Amazon jungle, what can you learn about language?
Edward Gibson
So that term WEIRD is from Joe Henrich. He’s at Harvard. He’s a Harvard evolutionary biologist. And so he works on lots of different topics and he basically was pushing that observation that we should be careful about the inferences we want to make when we’re in psychology or mostly in psychology, I guess, about humans. If we’re talking about undergrads at MIT and Harvard, those aren’t the same. These aren’t the same things. And so if you want to make inferences about language, for instance, there’s a lot of other kinds of languages in the world than English and French and Chinese. And so maybe for language, we care about how culture, because cultures can be very, I mean, of course English and Chinese cultures are very different, but hunter-gatherers are much more different in some ways. And so if culture has an effect on what language is, then we kind of want to look there as well as looking.
So that term WEIRD is from Joe Henrich. He’s at Harvard. He’s a Harvard evolutionary biologist. And so he works on lots of different topics and he basically was pushing that observation that we should be careful about the inferences we want to make when we’re in psychology or mostly in psychology, I guess, about humans. If we’re talking about undergrads at MIT and Harvard, those aren’t the same. These aren’t the same things. And so if you want to make inferences about language, for instance, there’s a lot of other kinds of languages in the world than English and French and Chinese. And so maybe for language, we care about how culture, because cultures can be very, I mean, of course English and Chinese cultures are very different, but hunter-gatherers are much more different in some ways. And so if culture has an effect on what language is, then we kind of want to look there as well as looking.
It’s not like the industrialized cultures aren’t interesting, of course they are, but we want to look at non-industrialized cultures as well. And so I’ve worked with two, I’ve worked with the Tsimane, which are in Bolivia and Amazon, both in the Amazon in these cases. And there are so-called farmer-foragers, which is not hunter-gatherers, sort of one-up from hunter-gatherers in that they do a little bit of farming as well, a lot of hunting as well, but a little bit of farming. And the kind of farming they do is the kind of farming that I might do if I ever were to grow tomatoes or something in my backyard. So it’s not big field farming, it’s just farming for a family. A few things you do that. So that’s the kind of farming they do.
And the other group I’ve worked with are the Piraha, which are also in the Amazon and happened to be in Brazil. And that’s with a guy called Dan Everett, who was a linguist anthropologist who actually lived and worked in the, I mean, he was a missionary actually, initially back in the seventies working with trying to translate languages so they could teach them the Bible, teach them Christianity.
Lex Fridman
What can you say about that?
What can you say about that?
Edward Gibson
Yeah, so the two groups I’ve worked with, the Tsimane and the Piraha are both isolate languages, meaning there’s no known connected languages at all, just on their own. Yeah, there’s a lot of those. And most of the isolates occur in the Amazon or in Papua, New Guinea, these places where the world has sort of stayed still for a long enough. So there aren’t earthquakes there. Well, certainly no earthquakes in the Amazon jungle. And the climate isn’t bad, so you don’t have droughts. And so in Africa, you’ve got a lot of moving of people because there’s drought problems. So they get a lot of language contact when people have to, you got to move because you’ve got no water, then you’ve got to get going. And then you run into contact with other tribes, other groups.
Yeah, so the two groups I’ve worked with, the Tsimane and the Piraha are both isolate languages, meaning there’s no known connected languages at all, just on their own. Yeah, there’s a lot of those. And most of the isolates occur in the Amazon or in Papua, New Guinea, these places where the world has sort of stayed still for a long enough. So there aren’t earthquakes there. Well, certainly no earthquakes in the Amazon jungle. And the climate isn’t bad, so you don’t have droughts. And so in Africa, you’ve got a lot of moving of people because there’s drought problems. So they get a lot of language contact when people have to, you got to move because you’ve got no water, then you’ve got to get going. And then you run into contact with other tribes, other groups.
In the Amazon, that’s not the case. And so people can stay there for hundreds and hundreds and probably thousands of years, I guess. And so these groups, the Tsimane and the Piraha are both isolates in that. And I guess they’ve just lived there for ages and ages with minimal contact with other outside groups. So I mean, I’m interested in them because they are, in these cases, I’m interested in their words. I would love to study their syntax, their orders of words, but I’m mostly just interested in how languages are connected to their cultures in this way. And so, with the Piraha, they’re most interesting, I was working on number there, number information.
And so the basic idea is I think language is invented. This, what I get from the words here is that I think language is invented. We talked about color earlier. It’s the same idea. So that what you need to talk about with someone else is what you’re going to invent words for. And so we invent labels for colors, not that I can see, but the things I need to tell you about so that I can get objects from you or get you to give me the right objects. And I just don’t need a word for teal or a word for aquamarine in the Amazon jungle for the most part because I don’t have two things which differ on those colors. I just don’t have that. And so numbers are really another fascinating source of information here where you might naively, I certainly thought that all humans would have words for exact counting, and the Piraha don’t. Okay, so they don’t have any words for even one. There’s not a word for one in their language. And so there’s certainly not word for two, three or four. So that kind of blows people’s minds often.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, that’s blowing my mind.
Yeah, that’s blowing my mind.
Edward Gibson
That’s pretty weird, isn’t it?
That’s pretty weird, isn’t it?
Lex Fridman
How are you going to ask, I want two of those?
How are you going to ask, I want two of those?
Edward Gibson
You just don’t. And so that’s just not a thing you can possibly ask in the Piraha, it’s not possible. There’s no words for that. So here’s how we found this out. So it was thought to be a one, two, many language. There are three words for quantifiers for sets, and people had thought that those meant one, two, and many. But what they really mean is few, some and many. Many is correct. It’s few, some and many. And so the way we figured this out, and this is kind of cool, is that we gave people, we had a set of objects. These happen to be spools of thread. It doesn’t really matter what they are, identical objects, and I sort of start off here. I just give you one of those and say, what’s that? Okay, so you’re a Piraha speaker and you tell me what it is, and then I give you two and say, what’s that?
You just don’t. And so that’s just not a thing you can possibly ask in the Piraha, it’s not possible. There’s no words for that. So here’s how we found this out. So it was thought to be a one, two, many language. There are three words for quantifiers for sets, and people had thought that those meant one, two, and many. But what they really mean is few, some and many. Many is correct. It’s few, some and many. And so the way we figured this out, and this is kind of cool, is that we gave people, we had a set of objects. These happen to be spools of thread. It doesn’t really matter what they are, identical objects, and I sort of start off here. I just give you one of those and say, what’s that? Okay, so you’re a Piraha speaker and you tell me what it is, and then I give you two and say, what’s that?
And nothing’s changing in the set except for the number. And then I just ask you to label these things. And we just do this for a bunch of different people. And frankly, I did this task.
Lex Fridman
This is fascinating.
This is fascinating.
Edward Gibson
And it’s a little bit weird. So they say the word that we thought was one, it’s few, but for the first one, and then maybe they say few, or maybe they say some for the second, and then for the third or the fourth, they start using the word many for the set. And then 5, 6, 7, 8, I go all the way to 10 and it’s always the same word. And they look at me like I’m stupid because they told me what the word was for 6, 7, 8, and going to continue asking them at nine and 10. I’m like, I’m sorry. They understand that I want to know their language. That’s the point of the task is I’m trying to learn their language, so that’s okay. But it does seem like I’m a little slow because they already told me what the word for many was, 5, 6, 7, and I keep asking.
And it’s a little bit weird. So they say the word that we thought was one, it’s few, but for the first one, and then maybe they say few, or maybe they say some for the second, and then for the third or the fourth, they start using the word many for the set. And then 5, 6, 7, 8, I go all the way to 10 and it’s always the same word. And they look at me like I’m stupid because they told me what the word was for 6, 7, 8, and going to continue asking them at nine and 10. I’m like, I’m sorry. They understand that I want to know their language. That’s the point of the task is I’m trying to learn their language, so that’s okay. But it does seem like I’m a little slow because they already told me what the word for many was, 5, 6, 7, and I keep asking.
So it’s a little funny to do this task over and over. We did this with a guy called, Dan was our translator. He’s the only one who really speaks Piraha fluently. He’s a good bilingual for a bunch of languages, but also English and then a guy called Mike Frank was also a student with me down there, he and I did these things. So you do that and everyone does the same thing. We ask 10 people, and they all do exactly the same labeling for one up. And then we just do the same thing down on random order. Actually, we do some of them up, some of them down first, instead of one to 10, we do 10 down to one. I give them 10, 9, at 8, they start saying the word for some. And then when you get to four, everyone is saying the word for few, which we thought was one. So the context determined what that quantifier they used was. So it’s not a count word. They’re not count words, they’re just approximate words-
Lex Fridman
And they’re going to be noisy when you interview a bunch of people, the definition of few. And there’s going to be a threshold in the context.
And they’re going to be noisy when you interview a bunch of people, the definition of few. And there’s going to be a threshold in the context.
Edward Gibson
Yeah, I don’t know what that means. That’s going to depend on the context. I think that’s true in English too. If you ask an English person what a few is, I mean, that’s depend on the context.
Yeah, I don’t know what that means. That’s going to depend on the context. I think that’s true in English too. If you ask an English person what a few is, I mean, that’s depend on the context.
Lex Fridman
And it might actually be at first hard to discover because for a lot of people, the jump from one to two will be few. Right? So it’s the jump.
And it might actually be at first hard to discover because for a lot of people, the jump from one to two will be few. Right? So it’s the jump.
Edward Gibson
Yeah, it might be still be there. Yeah.
Yeah, it might be still be there. Yeah.
Lex Fridman
I mean that’s fascinating. That’s fascinating. The numbers don’t present themselves.
I mean that’s fascinating. That’s fascinating. The numbers don’t present themselves.
Edward Gibson
So the words aren’t there. And so then we did these other things. Well, if they don’t have the words, can they do exact matching kinds of tasks? Can they even do those tasks? And the answer is sort of yes and no. And so yes, they can do them. So here’s the tasks that we did. We put out those spools of thread again. So I even put three out here. And then we gave them some objects, and those happened to be uninflated red balloons. It doesn’t really matter what they are, they’re a bunch of exactly the same thing. And it was easy to put down right next to these spools of thread. And so then I put out three of these, and your task was to just put one against each of my three things, and they could do that perfectly. So I mean, I would actually do that.
So the words aren’t there. And so then we did these other things. Well, if they don’t have the words, can they do exact matching kinds of tasks? Can they even do those tasks? And the answer is sort of yes and no. And so yes, they can do them. So here’s the tasks that we did. We put out those spools of thread again. So I even put three out here. And then we gave them some objects, and those happened to be uninflated red balloons. It doesn’t really matter what they are, they’re a bunch of exactly the same thing. And it was easy to put down right next to these spools of thread. And so then I put out three of these, and your task was to just put one against each of my three things, and they could do that perfectly. So I mean, I would actually do that.
It was a very easy task to explain to them, because I did this with this guy, Mike Frank, and I’d be the experimenter telling him to do this and showing him to do this. And then we just, just do it what he did. You’ll copy him all we had to, I didn’t have to speak Piraha except for know what copy him. Do what he did is all we had to be able to say. And then they would do that just perfectly. And so we’d move it up. We’d do some sort of random number of items up to 10, and they basically do perfectly on that. They’d never get that wrong. I mean, that’s not a counting task that is just a match. You just put one against it doesn’t matter how many, I don’t need to know how many there are there to do that correctly. And they would make mistakes, but very, very few and no more than MIT undergrads, just going to say, these are low stakes. So you make mistakes.
Lex Fridman
Counting is not required to complete the matching class.
Counting is not required to complete the matching class.
Edward Gibson
That’s right. Not at all. And so that’s our control. And this, a guy had gone down there before and said that they couldn’t do this task, but I just don’t know what he did wrong there. They can do this task perfectly well, and I can train my dog to do this task. So of course they can do this task. And so it’s not a hard task. But the other task that was sort of more interesting is so then we do a bunch of tasks where you need some way to encode the set. So one of them is just, I just put a opaque sheet in front of the things. I put down a bunch, a set of these things, and I put an opaque sheet down. And so you can’t see them anymore. And I tell you, do the same thing you were doing before. It’s easy if it’s two or three, it’s very easy, but if I don’t have the words for eight, it’s a little harder maybe with practice. Well, no.
That’s right. Not at all. And so that’s our control. And this, a guy had gone down there before and said that they couldn’t do this task, but I just don’t know what he did wrong there. They can do this task perfectly well, and I can train my dog to do this task. So of course they can do this task. And so it’s not a hard task. But the other task that was sort of more interesting is so then we do a bunch of tasks where you need some way to encode the set. So one of them is just, I just put a opaque sheet in front of the things. I put down a bunch, a set of these things, and I put an opaque sheet down. And so you can’t see them anymore. And I tell you, do the same thing you were doing before. It’s easy if it’s two or three, it’s very easy, but if I don’t have the words for eight, it’s a little harder maybe with practice. Well, no.
Lex Fridman
Because you have to count-
Because you have to count-
Edward Gibson
For us, it’s easy because we just count them. It’s just so easy to count them. But they don’t, they can’t count them because they don’t count. They don’t have words for this thing. And so they would do approximate. It’s totally fascinating. So they would get them approximately right after four or five, because basically you always get four right, three or four that looks, that’s something we can visually see. But after that, you have its approximate number. And there’s a bunch of tasks we did, and they all failed. I mean, failed. They did approximate after five on all those tasks. And it kind of shows that the words, you kind of need the words to be able to do these kinds of tasks.
For us, it’s easy because we just count them. It’s just so easy to count them. But they don’t, they can’t count them because they don’t count. They don’t have words for this thing. And so they would do approximate. It’s totally fascinating. So they would get them approximately right after four or five, because basically you always get four right, three or four that looks, that’s something we can visually see. But after that, you have its approximate number. And there’s a bunch of tasks we did, and they all failed. I mean, failed. They did approximate after five on all those tasks. And it kind of shows that the words, you kind of need the words to be able to do these kinds of tasks.
Lex Fridman
But there’s a little bit of a chicken and egg thing there, because if you don’t have the words, then maybe they’ll limit you in the kind of a little baby Einstein there won’t be able to come up with a counting task. You know what I mean? The ability to count enables you to come up with interesting things probably. So yes, you develop counting because you need it, but then once you have counting, you can probably come up with a bunch of different inventions, how to, I don’t know what kind of thing they do matching really well for building purposes, building some kind of hut or something like this. So it’s interesting that language is a limiter on what you’re able to do.
But there’s a little bit of a chicken and egg thing there, because if you don’t have the words, then maybe they’ll limit you in the kind of a little baby Einstein there won’t be able to come up with a counting task. You know what I mean? The ability to count enables you to come up with interesting things probably. So yes, you develop counting because you need it, but then once you have counting, you can probably come up with a bunch of different inventions, how to, I don’t know what kind of thing they do matching really well for building purposes, building some kind of hut or something like this. So it’s interesting that language is a limiter on what you’re able to do.
Edward Gibson
Yeah, language is the words. Here is the words. The words for exact count is the limiting factor here. They just don’t have them in this-
Yeah, language is the words. Here is the words. The words for exact count is the limiting factor here. They just don’t have them in this-
Lex Fridman
But that’s what I mean. That limit is also a limit on the society of what they’re able to build.
But that’s what I mean. That limit is also a limit on the society of what they’re able to build.
Edward Gibson
That’s going to be true. Yeah. I mean, we don’t know. This is one of those problems with the snapshot of just current languages is that we don’t know what causes a culture to discover/ invent accounting system. But the hypothesis is, the guess out there is something to do with farming. So if you have a bunch of goats and you want to keep track of them, and you have saved 17 goats and you go to bed at night and you get up in the morning, boy, it’s easier to have a count system to do that. That’s an abstraction over a set. So don’t have, people often ask me when I tell them about this kind of work, and they say, well, don’t these people have… Don’t they have kids? They have a lot of children. I’m like, yeah, they have a lot of children. And they do. They often have families of three or four, five kids, and they go, well, they need the numbers to keep track of their kids. And I always ask this person who says this, do you have children? And the answer is always no, because that’s not how you keep track of your kids. You care about their identities. It’s very important to me when I go, I have five children, it doesn’t matter.
That’s going to be true. Yeah. I mean, we don’t know. This is one of those problems with the snapshot of just current languages is that we don’t know what causes a culture to discover/ invent accounting system. But the hypothesis is, the guess out there is something to do with farming. So if you have a bunch of goats and you want to keep track of them, and you have saved 17 goats and you go to bed at night and you get up in the morning, boy, it’s easier to have a count system to do that. That’s an abstraction over a set. So don’t have, people often ask me when I tell them about this kind of work, and they say, well, don’t these people have… Don’t they have kids? They have a lot of children. I’m like, yeah, they have a lot of children. And they do. They often have families of three or four, five kids, and they go, well, they need the numbers to keep track of their kids. And I always ask this person who says this, do you have children? And the answer is always no, because that’s not how you keep track of your kids. You care about their identities. It’s very important to me when I go, I have five children, it doesn’t matter.
Lex Fridman
You don’t think one, two, three, four?
You don’t think one, two, three, four?
Edward Gibson
It matters which five. If you replaced one with someone else, I would care. A goat, maybe not. Right? That’s the kind of point. It’s an abstraction. Something that looks very similar to the one wouldn’t matter to me probably.
It matters which five. If you replaced one with someone else, I would care. A goat, maybe not. Right? That’s the kind of point. It’s an abstraction. Something that looks very similar to the one wouldn’t matter to me probably.
Lex Fridman
But, if you care about goats, you’re going to know them actually individually also.
But, if you care about goats, you’re going to know them actually individually also.
Edward Gibson
Yeah, you will.
Yeah, you will.
Lex Fridman
I mean, cows, goats, if it’s a source of food and milk and all that kind stuff. You’re going to actually care-
I mean, cows, goats, if it’s a source of food and milk and all that kind stuff. You’re going to actually care-
Edward Gibson
Yeah, yeah, yeah. You’re actually, you’re absolutely right. But I’m saying it is an abstraction such that you don’t have to care about their identities to do this thing fast. That’s the hypothesis, not mine from anthropologists are guessing about where words for counting came from is from farming maybe. Any way…
Yeah, yeah, yeah. You’re actually, you’re absolutely right. But I’m saying it is an abstraction such that you don’t have to care about their identities to do this thing fast. That’s the hypothesis, not mine from anthropologists are guessing about where words for counting came from is from farming maybe. Any way…
Universal language
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Do you have a sense why universal languages like Esperanto have not taken off? Why do we have all these different languages?
Yeah. Do you have a sense why universal languages like Esperanto have not taken off? Why do we have all these different languages?
Edward Gibson
Well, my guess is the function of a language is to do something in a community. I mean, unless there’s some function to that language in the community, it’s not going to survive. It’s not going to be useful. So here’s a great example. Language death is super common. Okay? Languages are dying all around the world, and here’s why they’re dying. It’s like, yeah, I see this. It’s not happening right now in either the Tsimane or the Piraha, but it probably will. So there’s a neighboring group called Moseten, which is, I said that it’s isolate. It’s actually there’s a dual, there’s two of them. So it’s actually, there’s two languages which are really close, which are Moseten and Tsimane, which are unrelated to anything else. And Moseten is unlike Tsimane in that it has a lot of contact with Spanish and it’s dying, so that language is dying. The reason it’s dying is there’s not a lot of value for the local people in their native language.
Well, my guess is the function of a language is to do something in a community. I mean, unless there’s some function to that language in the community, it’s not going to survive. It’s not going to be useful. So here’s a great example. Language death is super common. Okay? Languages are dying all around the world, and here’s why they’re dying. It’s like, yeah, I see this. It’s not happening right now in either the Tsimane or the Piraha, but it probably will. So there’s a neighboring group called Moseten, which is, I said that it’s isolate. It’s actually there’s a dual, there’s two of them. So it’s actually, there’s two languages which are really close, which are Moseten and Tsimane, which are unrelated to anything else. And Moseten is unlike Tsimane in that it has a lot of contact with Spanish and it’s dying, so that language is dying. The reason it’s dying is there’s not a lot of value for the local people in their native language.
So there’s much more value in knowing Spanish because they want to feed their families. And how do you feed your family? You learn Spanish so you can make money so you can get a job and do these things, and then you make money. And so they want Spanish things. And so Moseten is in danger and is dying, and that’s normal. Basically, the problem is that people, the reason we learn language is to communicate. We use it to make money and to do whatever it is to feed our families. If that’s not happening, then it won’t take off. It’s not like a game or something. This is something we, why is English so popular? It’s not because it’s an easy language to learn. Maybe it is, I don’t really know. But that’s not why it’s popular.
Lex Fridman
But because the United States is gigantic economy therefore-
But because the United States is gigantic economy therefore-
Edward Gibson
Yeah, it’s big economies that do this. It’s all it is. It’s all about money. And that’s what, so there’s a motivation to learn Mandarin. There’s a motivation to learn Spanish. There’s a motivation to learn English. These languages are very valuable to know because there’s so many speakers all over the world.
Yeah, it’s big economies that do this. It’s all it is. It’s all about money. And that’s what, so there’s a motivation to learn Mandarin. There’s a motivation to learn Spanish. There’s a motivation to learn English. These languages are very valuable to know because there’s so many speakers all over the world.
Lex Fridman
That’s fascinating.
That’s fascinating.
Edward Gibson
There’s less of a value economically. It’s kind of what drives this, it’s not just for fun. I mean, there are these groups that do want to learn language just for language’s sake, and there’s something to that. But those are rarities in general. Those are a few small groups that do that. Not most people don’t do that.
There’s less of a value economically. It’s kind of what drives this, it’s not just for fun. I mean, there are these groups that do want to learn language just for language’s sake, and there’s something to that. But those are rarities in general. Those are a few small groups that do that. Not most people don’t do that.
Lex Fridman
Well, if that was a primary driver, then everybody was speaking English or speaking one language. There’s also a tension-
Well, if that was a primary driver, then everybody was speaking English or speaking one language. There’s also a tension-
Edward Gibson
That’s happening.
That’s happening.
Lex Fridman
Well, that-
Well, that-
Edward Gibson
We’re moving towards fewer and fewer languages. Exactly.
We’re moving towards fewer and fewer languages. Exactly.
Lex Fridman
We are. I wonder if, you’re right. Maybe, this is slow, but maybe that’s where we’re moving, but there is a tension. You’re saying language that infringes, but if you look at geopolitics and superpowers, it does seem that there’s another thing in tension, which is a language is a national identity sometimes for certain nations. That’s the war in Ukraine, language, Ukrainian language is a symbol of that war in many ways, like a country fighting for its own identity. So it’s not merely the convenience. I mean, those two things are at attention is the convenience of trade and the economics and be able to communicate with neighboring countries and trade more efficiently with neighboring countries, all that kind of stuff. But also identity of the group.
We are. I wonder if, you’re right. Maybe, this is slow, but maybe that’s where we’re moving, but there is a tension. You’re saying language that infringes, but if you look at geopolitics and superpowers, it does seem that there’s another thing in tension, which is a language is a national identity sometimes for certain nations. That’s the war in Ukraine, language, Ukrainian language is a symbol of that war in many ways, like a country fighting for its own identity. So it’s not merely the convenience. I mean, those two things are at attention is the convenience of trade and the economics and be able to communicate with neighboring countries and trade more efficiently with neighboring countries, all that kind of stuff. But also identity of the group.
Edward Gibson
That’s right. I completely agree.
That’s right. I completely agree.
Lex Fridman
Because language is the way for every community like dialects that emerge are a kind of identity for people and sometimes a way for people to say F you to the more powerful people. It’s interesting. So in that way, language can be used as that tool.
Because language is the way for every community like dialects that emerge are a kind of identity for people and sometimes a way for people to say F you to the more powerful people. It’s interesting. So in that way, language can be used as that tool.
Edward Gibson
Yeah, I completely agree. And there’s a lot of work to try to create that identity. So people want to do this. As a cognitive scientist and language expert, I hope that continues because I don’t want languages to die. I want languages to survive because they’re so interesting for so many reasons. But I mean, I find them fascinating just for the language part, but I think there’s a lot of connections to culture as well, which is also very important.
Yeah, I completely agree. And there’s a lot of work to try to create that identity. So people want to do this. As a cognitive scientist and language expert, I hope that continues because I don’t want languages to die. I want languages to survive because they’re so interesting for so many reasons. But I mean, I find them fascinating just for the language part, but I think there’s a lot of connections to culture as well, which is also very important.
Language translation
Lex Fridman
Do you have hope for machine translation that it can break down the barriers of language? So while all these different diverse languages exist, I guess there’s many ways of asking this question, but basically how hard is it to translate in an automated way for one language to another?
Do you have hope for machine translation that it can break down the barriers of language? So while all these different diverse languages exist, I guess there’s many ways of asking this question, but basically how hard is it to translate in an automated way for one language to another?
Edward Gibson
There’s going to be cases where it’s going to be really hard. So there are concepts that are in one language and not another. The most extreme kinds of cases are these cases of number information. So good luck translating a lot of English into Piraha. It’s just impossible. There’s no way to do it because there are no words for these concepts that we’re talking about. There’s probably the flip side. There’s probably stuff in Piraha, which is going to be hard to translate into English on the other side. And so I just don’t know what those concepts are. The space, the world space is a little different from my world space, so I don’t know what the things they talk about, things it’s going to have to do with their life as opposed to my industrial life, which is going to be different. And so there’s going to be problems like that always. Maybe it’s not so bad in the case of some of these spaces, and maybe it’s going to be hard or others. And so it’s pretty bad in number. It’s extreme, I’d say in the number space, exact number space. But in the color dimension, that’s not so bad. But it’s a problem that you don’t have to talk about the concepts.
There’s going to be cases where it’s going to be really hard. So there are concepts that are in one language and not another. The most extreme kinds of cases are these cases of number information. So good luck translating a lot of English into Piraha. It’s just impossible. There’s no way to do it because there are no words for these concepts that we’re talking about. There’s probably the flip side. There’s probably stuff in Piraha, which is going to be hard to translate into English on the other side. And so I just don’t know what those concepts are. The space, the world space is a little different from my world space, so I don’t know what the things they talk about, things it’s going to have to do with their life as opposed to my industrial life, which is going to be different. And so there’s going to be problems like that always. Maybe it’s not so bad in the case of some of these spaces, and maybe it’s going to be hard or others. And so it’s pretty bad in number. It’s extreme, I’d say in the number space, exact number space. But in the color dimension, that’s not so bad. But it’s a problem that you don’t have to talk about the concepts.
Lex Fridman
And there might be entire concepts that are missing. So to you, it’s more about the space of concept versus the space of form. Like form you can probably map.
And there might be entire concepts that are missing. So to you, it’s more about the space of concept versus the space of form. Like form you can probably map.
Edward Gibson
Yes. Yeah. So you were talking earlier about translation and about how translations, there’s good and bad translations. I mean, now we’re talking about translations of form, right? So what makes writing good, right? It’s not-
Yes. Yeah. So you were talking earlier about translation and about how translations, there’s good and bad translations. I mean, now we’re talking about translations of form, right? So what makes writing good, right? It’s not-
Lex Fridman
There’s the music to the form.
There’s the music to the form.
Edward Gibson
It’s not just the content, it’s how it’s written and translating that that sounds difficult.
It’s not just the content, it’s how it’s written and translating that that sounds difficult.
Lex Fridman
We shouldn’t should say that, there is, I hesitate to say meaning, but there’s a music and a rhythm to the form. When you look at the broad picture, like the difference between Dostoevsky and Tolstoy or Hemingway, Bukowski, James Joyce, like I mentioned, there’s a beat to it. There’s an edge to it that is in the form.
We shouldn’t should say that, there is, I hesitate to say meaning, but there’s a music and a rhythm to the form. When you look at the broad picture, like the difference between Dostoevsky and Tolstoy or Hemingway, Bukowski, James Joyce, like I mentioned, there’s a beat to it. There’s an edge to it that is in the form.
Edward Gibson
We can probably get measures of those.
We can probably get measures of those.
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Edward Gibson
I don’t know.
I don’t know.
Lex Fridman
That’s interesting.
That’s interesting.
Edward Gibson
I’m optimistic that we could get measures of those things. And so maybe that’s-
I’m optimistic that we could get measures of those things. And so maybe that’s-
Lex Fridman
Translatable?
Translatable?
Edward Gibson
I don’t know. I don’t know though. I have not worked on that.
I don’t know. I don’t know though. I have not worked on that.
Lex Fridman
Actually, I would love to see you translate-
Actually, I would love to see you translate-
Edward Gibson
That sounds totally fascinating.
That sounds totally fascinating.
Lex Fridman
Translation to, I mean, Hemingway is probably the lowest. I would love to see different authors, but the average per sentence dependency length for Hemingway is probably the shortest.
Translation to, I mean, Hemingway is probably the lowest. I would love to see different authors, but the average per sentence dependency length for Hemingway is probably the shortest.
Edward Gibson
That’s your sense, huh? It’s simple sentences?
That’s your sense, huh? It’s simple sentences?
Lex Fridman
Simple short sentences-
Simple short sentences-
Edward Gibson
Short. Yeah. Yeah.
Short. Yeah. Yeah.
Lex Fridman
I mean, that’s one. If you have really long sentences, even if they don’t have center embedding-
I mean, that’s one. If you have really long sentences, even if they don’t have center embedding-
Edward Gibson
They can have longer connections.
They can have longer connections.
Lex Fridman
They can have longer connections.
They can have longer connections.
Edward Gibson
They don’t have to. You can’t have a long, long sentence with a bunch of local words, but it is much more likely to have the possibility of long dependencies with long sentences. Yeah.
They don’t have to. You can’t have a long, long sentence with a bunch of local words, but it is much more likely to have the possibility of long dependencies with long sentences. Yeah.
Animal communication
Lex Fridman
I met a guy named Aza Raskin, who does a lot of cool stuff, really brilliant, works with Tristan Harris on a bunch of stuff, but he was talking to me about communicating with animals. He co-founded Earth Species Project where you’re trying to find the common language between whales, crows and humans. And he was saying that there’s a lot of promising work that even though the signals are very different, the actual, if you have embeddings of the languages, they’re actually trying to communicate similar type things. Is there something you can comment on that? Is there promise to that in everything you’ve seen in different cultures, especially remote cultures, that this is a possibility or no? That we can talk to whales?
I met a guy named Aza Raskin, who does a lot of cool stuff, really brilliant, works with Tristan Harris on a bunch of stuff, but he was talking to me about communicating with animals. He co-founded Earth Species Project where you’re trying to find the common language between whales, crows and humans. And he was saying that there’s a lot of promising work that even though the signals are very different, the actual, if you have embeddings of the languages, they’re actually trying to communicate similar type things. Is there something you can comment on that? Is there promise to that in everything you’ve seen in different cultures, especially remote cultures, that this is a possibility or no? That we can talk to whales?
Edward Gibson
I would say yes. I think it’s not crazy at all. I think it’s quite reasonable. There’s this sort of weird view, well, odd view, I think that to think that human language is somehow special. I mean, maybe it is. We can certainly do more than any of the other species, and maybe our language system is part of that. It’s possible. But people have often talked about how, like Chomsky, in fact, has talked about how human, only human language has this compositionality thing that he thinks is sort of key in language. And the problem with that argument is he doesn’t speak whale, and he doesn’t speak crow, and he doesn’t speak monkey. They say things like, well, they’re making a bunch of grunts and squeaks. And their reasoning is like, that’s bad reasoning. I’m pretty sure if you asked a whale what we’re saying, they’d say, well, I’m making a bunch of weird noises.
I would say yes. I think it’s not crazy at all. I think it’s quite reasonable. There’s this sort of weird view, well, odd view, I think that to think that human language is somehow special. I mean, maybe it is. We can certainly do more than any of the other species, and maybe our language system is part of that. It’s possible. But people have often talked about how, like Chomsky, in fact, has talked about how human, only human language has this compositionality thing that he thinks is sort of key in language. And the problem with that argument is he doesn’t speak whale, and he doesn’t speak crow, and he doesn’t speak monkey. They say things like, well, they’re making a bunch of grunts and squeaks. And their reasoning is like, that’s bad reasoning. I’m pretty sure if you asked a whale what we’re saying, they’d say, well, I’m making a bunch of weird noises.
Lex Fridman
Exactly.
Exactly.
Edward Gibson
And so it’s like, this is a very odd reasoning to be making that human language is special because we’re the only ones who have human language. I’m like, well, we don’t know what those other, we can’t talk to them yet. And so there are probably a signal in there, and it might very well be something complicated like human language. I mean, sure with a small brain in lower species, there’s probably not a very good communication system. But in these higher species where you have what seems to be abilities to communicate something, there might very well be a lot more signal there than we might’ve otherwise thought.
And so it’s like, this is a very odd reasoning to be making that human language is special because we’re the only ones who have human language. I’m like, well, we don’t know what those other, we can’t talk to them yet. And so there are probably a signal in there, and it might very well be something complicated like human language. I mean, sure with a small brain in lower species, there’s probably not a very good communication system. But in these higher species where you have what seems to be abilities to communicate something, there might very well be a lot more signal there than we might’ve otherwise thought.
Lex Fridman
But also if we have a lot of intellectual humility here, somebody formerly from MIT and Neri Oxman, who I admire very much, has talked a lot about, has worked on communicating with plants. So yes, the signal there is even less than, but it’s not out of the realm of possibility that all nature has a way of communicating. And it’s a very different language, but they do develop a kind of language through the chemistry, through some way of communicating with each other. And if you have enough humility about that possibility, I think it would be a very interesting, in a few decades, maybe centuries, hopefully not a humbling possibility of being able to communicate not just between humans effectively, but between all of living things on earth.
But also if we have a lot of intellectual humility here, somebody formerly from MIT and Neri Oxman, who I admire very much, has talked a lot about, has worked on communicating with plants. So yes, the signal there is even less than, but it’s not out of the realm of possibility that all nature has a way of communicating. And it’s a very different language, but they do develop a kind of language through the chemistry, through some way of communicating with each other. And if you have enough humility about that possibility, I think it would be a very interesting, in a few decades, maybe centuries, hopefully not a humbling possibility of being able to communicate not just between humans effectively, but between all of living things on earth.
Edward Gibson
Well, I mean, I think some of them are not going to have much interesting to say-
Well, I mean, I think some of them are not going to have much interesting to say-
Lex Fridman
But [inaudible 02:46:07] still?
But [inaudible 02:46:07] still?
Edward Gibson
But some of them will. We don’t know. We certainly don’t know. I think-
But some of them will. We don’t know. We certainly don’t know. I think-
Lex Fridman
I think if we’re humble, there could be some interesting trees out there.
I think if we’re humble, there could be some interesting trees out there.
Edward Gibson
Well, they’re probably talking to other trees, right? They’re not talking to us. And so to the extent they’re talking, they’re saying something interesting to some other conspecific as opposed to us. And so there probably is, there may be some signal there. So there are people out there. Actually, it’s pretty common to say that human language is special and different from any other animal communication system, and I just don’t think the evidence is there for that claim. I think it’s not obvious. We just don’t know because we don’t speak these other communication systems until we get better. I do think there are people working on that, as you pointed out though, people working on whale speak, for instance. That’s really fascinating.
Well, they’re probably talking to other trees, right? They’re not talking to us. And so to the extent they’re talking, they’re saying something interesting to some other conspecific as opposed to us. And so there probably is, there may be some signal there. So there are people out there. Actually, it’s pretty common to say that human language is special and different from any other animal communication system, and I just don’t think the evidence is there for that claim. I think it’s not obvious. We just don’t know because we don’t speak these other communication systems until we get better. I do think there are people working on that, as you pointed out though, people working on whale speak, for instance. That’s really fascinating.
Lex Fridman
Let me ask you a wild out there sci-fi question. If we make contact with an intelligent alien civilization and you get to meet them, how surprised would you be about their way of communicating? Do you think you would be recognizable? Maybe there’s some parallels here to when you go to the remote tribes.
Let me ask you a wild out there sci-fi question. If we make contact with an intelligent alien civilization and you get to meet them, how surprised would you be about their way of communicating? Do you think you would be recognizable? Maybe there’s some parallels here to when you go to the remote tribes.
Edward Gibson
I would want Dan Everett with me. He is amazing at learning foreign languages, and so this is an amazing feat to be able to go, this is a language, the Piraha, which has no translators before him. I mean, there-
I would want Dan Everett with me. He is amazing at learning foreign languages, and so this is an amazing feat to be able to go, this is a language, the Piraha, which has no translators before him. I mean, there-
Lex Fridman
Oh, wow. So he just shows up?
Oh, wow. So he just shows up?
Edward Gibson
He was a missionary that went there. Well, there was a guy that had been there before, but he wasn’t very good. And so he learned the language far better than anyone else had learned before him. He’s good at, he’s a very social person. I think that’s a big part of it is being able to interact. So I don’t know. It kind of depends on this species from outer space, how much they want to talk to us.
He was a missionary that went there. Well, there was a guy that had been there before, but he wasn’t very good. And so he learned the language far better than anyone else had learned before him. He’s good at, he’s a very social person. I think that’s a big part of it is being able to interact. So I don’t know. It kind of depends on this species from outer space, how much they want to talk to us.
Lex Fridman
Is there something you could say about the process he follows? How do you show up to a tribe and socialize? I mean, I guess colors and counting is one of the most basic things to figure out.
Is there something you could say about the process he follows? How do you show up to a tribe and socialize? I mean, I guess colors and counting is one of the most basic things to figure out.
Edward Gibson
You start that. You actually start with objects and just say, just throw a stick down and say stick. And then you say, what do you call this? And then they’ll say the word, whatever, and he says, a standard thing to do is to throw two sticks. Two sticks. And then he learned pretty quick that there weren’t any count words in this language because they didn’t know, this wasn’t interesting. I mean, it was kind of weird, they’d say some or something, the same word over and over again. But that is a standard thing. You just try to, but you have to be pretty out there socially willing to talk to random people, which these are really very different people from you. And he is very social. And so I think that’s a big part of this is that’s how a lot of people know a lot of languages is they’re willing to talk to other people.
You start that. You actually start with objects and just say, just throw a stick down and say stick. And then you say, what do you call this? And then they’ll say the word, whatever, and he says, a standard thing to do is to throw two sticks. Two sticks. And then he learned pretty quick that there weren’t any count words in this language because they didn’t know, this wasn’t interesting. I mean, it was kind of weird, they’d say some or something, the same word over and over again. But that is a standard thing. You just try to, but you have to be pretty out there socially willing to talk to random people, which these are really very different people from you. And he is very social. And so I think that’s a big part of this is that’s how a lot of people know a lot of languages is they’re willing to talk to other people.
Lex Fridman
That’s a tough one where you just show up knowing nothing.
That’s a tough one where you just show up knowing nothing.
Edward Gibson
Yeah. Oh god.
Yeah. Oh god.
Lex Fridman
It’s beautiful that humans are able to connect in that way. You’ve had an incredible career exploring this fascinating topic. What advice would you give to young people about how to have a career like that or a life that they can be proud of?
It’s beautiful that humans are able to connect in that way. You’ve had an incredible career exploring this fascinating topic. What advice would you give to young people about how to have a career like that or a life that they can be proud of?
Edward Gibson
When you see something interesting, just go and do it. I do that. That’s something I do, which is kind of unusual for most people. So when I saw the Piraha, if Piraha was available to go and visit, I was like, yes, yes, I’ll go. And then when we couldn’t go back, we had some trouble with the Brazilian government, there’s some corrupt people there. It was very difficult to go back in there. And so I was like, all right, I got to find another group. And so we searched around and we were able to find the, because I wanted to keep working on this kind of problem, and so we found the Tsimane and just go there. We didn’t have content. We had a little bit of contact and brought someone, and you just kind of try things. I say it’s like a lot of that’s just like ambition. Just try to do something that other people haven’t done. Just give it a shot, is what I mean. I do that all the time. I don’t know.
When you see something interesting, just go and do it. I do that. That’s something I do, which is kind of unusual for most people. So when I saw the Piraha, if Piraha was available to go and visit, I was like, yes, yes, I’ll go. And then when we couldn’t go back, we had some trouble with the Brazilian government, there’s some corrupt people there. It was very difficult to go back in there. And so I was like, all right, I got to find another group. And so we searched around and we were able to find the, because I wanted to keep working on this kind of problem, and so we found the Tsimane and just go there. We didn’t have content. We had a little bit of contact and brought someone, and you just kind of try things. I say it’s like a lot of that’s just like ambition. Just try to do something that other people haven’t done. Just give it a shot, is what I mean. I do that all the time. I don’t know.
Lex Fridman
I love it. And I love the fact that your pursuit of fun has landed You here talking to me. This was an incredible conversation that you’re just a fascinating human being. Thank you for taking a journey through human language with me today. This is awesome.
I love it. And I love the fact that your pursuit of fun has landed You here talking to me. This was an incredible conversation that you’re just a fascinating human being. Thank you for taking a journey through human language with me today. This is awesome.
Edward Gibson
Thank you very much, Lex, it’s been a pleasure.
Thank you very much, Lex, it’s been a pleasure.
Lex Fridman
Thanks for listening to this conversation with Edward Gibson. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now let me leave you with some words from Wittgenstein. The limits of my language mean the limits of my world. Thank you for listening and hope to see you next time.
Thanks for listening to this conversation with Edward Gibson. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now let me leave you with some words from Wittgenstein. The limits of my language mean the limits of my world. Thank you for listening and hope to see you next time.
Transcript for Andrew Callaghan: Channel 5, Gonzo, QAnon, O-Block, Politics & Alex Jones | Lex Fridman Podcast #425
This is a transcript of Lex Fridman Podcast #425 with Andrew Callaghan.
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Table of Contents
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The point that I was making is that being forced into the institution of school so young and having to take common core classes like biology, dissecting frogs, history of the Han Dynasty, stuff like that, that I didn’t want to learn, but I had to learn multiple times. I learned about the dynastic cycle in ancient China three separate times at three different schools. I was like, “Who is writing this curriculum and why is it so important that I understand this process?” The part that makes school difficult, especially in college, is that you have people just going to school just to get the degree who don’t really know exactly what they’re interested in, and they don’t even have time to figure that out because they’re in a business program or a communications program with no specific interest.
They were all about on-campus happenings, like the Pope visits New Orleans, or glass recycling to be restored in the French Quarter or hover boards banned on campus due to safety concerns. It just felt like, all right, well, I wanted to be a gonzo reporter. I’m not sure if working my way up through the traditional newsroom hierarchy is going to get me to that point. I started reading a bunch of old hobo literature, like post World War II vagabonding stuff, and there was this book called Vagabonding in America by an old hobo named Ed Buryn. I read this and just basically, obviously, some of it was outdated. They had stuff in there, like the hobo code, like, oh, this moniker on the side of a fence means this person has free soup or something like that. They didn’t have stuff like that.
There was a particular shooting, the murder of John Williams, who is a Native American woodcarver in downtown Seattle. He got killed by a Seattle police officer named Ian Burke. John Williams was carving a pipe from a woodblock with a pocket knife. He’s deaf in one ear. Officer pulls a gun on him and says, “Put it down.” He doesn’t hear him. He shoots him six seconds later. That police involved shooting is what instantly turned me into a very critical of law enforcement kind of person when I was super young. As someone who used to see this guy who got murdered… He was a 55-year-old man. I used to see him around Pike Place where my mom lived. It’s a public market in downtown. That to me, put me into the anarchist political sphere, just channeling the anger of that experience. And the officer got no charges by the way. You can look up the video. It’s horrific. And it didn’t get reported. The officer, I’m pretty sure, is still active duty.
Situations like that early in life channeled me toward political extremism. But I grew up to realize how incompatible that anarchistic worldview is with reality and with American society. It can only exist in a small, little chamber. You can’t apply that to the industrial heartland of the country.
There was this policy. We had these giant glass windows next to the tables. So if you’re eating at a Bourbon House, you can look out onto Bourbon Street and you can see as you’re dining, a full panoramic view of all these partiers throwing beads, boobs, all that. We had this policy where if we’re serving someone, we can’t look onto Bourbon Street if something crazy is happening. So if there’s a fight or something like that, we can’t look. I remember I’m fucking serving a table. There’s a dude in a Batman mask, butt naked, with 12 pairs of beads, just jerking it, back to jerking it.
But I would get off work at around midnight every night. And that was when Bourbon Street is at its most chaotic. I lived in the French Quarter as well. I lived about 12 blocks down Bourbon, in a small Creole cottage, in a cute little orange, old-school New Orleans, one story spot. I lived in the attic above these gay meth dealers named Frankie and Johnny.
And we sat down with a recovery specialist who works directly with them day in and day out. And he explained to me that he’s been trying to do the same thing I tried to do in a one-week period for the past 10 years. And that they have deeper underlying traumas and pain that need to be dealt with far before they even take the steps to enter society as a housed person.
Anyways, the idea of All Gas No Brakes as a show was to combine the, I guess, road dog ethos of the All Gas No Brakes book with the presentation and editing style of Quarter Confessions. So, it was to take quarter confessions on the road. That was pretty much like a simulated hitchhiking experience. But with the editing and punchy effects of Quarter Confessions, which is like I wear a suit, we do the Fast Zoom-ins, little effects, stuff like that.
Man, those were the best years. It was just so fun. I mean, imagine. You’re fresh out of college. You were just a doorman interviewing people about making out with their cousin and stuff. And then boom, this company that you’ve never even heard of is willing to buy you an RV and give you 45K a year, which to me at the time was more money than I could possibly imagine. So, I called my dad. I was like, “Dad, I need you to find me an RV.” Because he’s the only guy I know who knows about cars, and even he doesn’t know much about cars. He’s like, “All right, I’m on it.” The RV was 20,000.
And the first event that we were called to cover was the Burning Man Festival. And that was tough because Burning Man is not too keen on filming. It’s supposed to be a non-commercialized escape from reality. They have a gift economy set up. It’s based upon mutual participation and non-exploitation. And so, the idea of making a Burning Man video was tough at first. Because burners oftentimes, and this is not all of them, are pretty well off in general. A lot of them have tech jobs, are pretty high up in Silicon Valley. And Burning Man is where they go to take the edge off and basically become their burner persona. On the playa, they become reborn. And they take ketamine and they wear kaleidoscope glasses and steampunk hats and they snort MDMA and they run around the sand. Listen-
So, we go to Burning Man. We start asking people, what’s your craziest trip story? And they didn’t have the same type of free flowing storytelling style like a on the street, cross punk in New Orleans might have, where they’re like, “I don’t give a shit, I’ll tell you whatever.” These people were very bottled up about what they were willing to disclose. So we went on Burning Man Radio and we did a broadcast and we said, “Hey, we’re psychedelic journalists.” It was me and my friend Ciel at the time. I said, “We’re psychedelic journalists. We’re parked on Tan and I, which is a cross street in Black Rock City.” And we said, “We have a 1998 Catalina Coachman Sport. It’s an RV. We’ve set up a podcast studio. We’re doing a show about psychedelic voyages.” Lo and behold, two hours later, we had 10 people lined up at the RV willing to talk. That vetted people in advance for us. We did a couple interviews and that was that.
Everything was going good until we interviewed this guy named DJ Soft Baby. He was wearing a golden leotard with, once again, kaleidoscope glasses, shirtless dancing like you know dancing. And he was eating chowder out of a plastic bowl. And he was like, “This chowder is so fucking good.” He is like, “This is the best chowder I’ve ever had in my life.” And he starts putting the chowder on his face. And he is like, “I want the chowder all over me, yah.” And we just go, “Hey man, can you just do a dance for us real quick, just for some B-roll.” He does a dance. We post it on Instagram the next morning. Doing Things Media CEO calls me, Reid, he says, “All of our pages are down.” And he’s like, “That guy you filmed dancing last night on drugs, putting chowder on his face, that guy is at the top of MIT.”
So you had this polarization that led to more division, and that’s when the anti-vax protests started. And I went to Sacramento and the passion was unreal. This is about two months after the Covid lockdowns began, and that was my first political video was at the California State Capitol in Sacramento, documenting they called it the Freedom rally, but that’s typically anti-vax stuff. And it was real intensity. And that video was my most successful to date at that time. And so I was like, “Okay, am I a political reporter now? Am I covering politics? What’s going on?”
I can’t go to Minneapolis and cover this, it’ll be the end of my career. And I had a friend named Lacey who I went to college with, and she told me, she was like, “Bro, this is your chance for you to do something serious. You can actually create a meaningful piece of reporting like you always wanted to before Quarter Confessions, and you can turn All Gas No Brakes into a news source.” So I called Reid, who was the CEO of the company that owned All Gas No Brakes, and I was like, “Look man, I want to go to Minneapolis.” I was in Orlando at the time. I was actually at The sausage Castle. And he said-
And on the speaker, they say, “If you’re arriving here right now, you are not permitted to go anywhere outside of the airport. National Guardsmen will escort you to your Uber or to your car, they’re going to take a picture of your ID, they’re going to figure out where you’re going. You are not permitted to go outside tonight.” And so Lacey picks me up. There’s two people in the back, two of her homegirls wearing shiesty masks. I’m like, “What are we doing? Where are we going?” And she goes, “We’re going to go film the riot. We’re going to Lake Street.”
And so we drive down there, Kmart is burning, Target is burning, everything is on fire. She has the Sony A7. She gives me a microphone and she’s like, “Go talk to that guy”, and that was the guy with a Molotov cocktail in his hand who had just burned Kmart down. And so I go, ” What should I ask him?” She goes, “What’s on your mind?” So I walk up to him and I’m like, “What’s on your mind?” He said something like, “Everything that was happening here was supposed to happen. This is how we feel. Is it right? No. Is this going to benefit the community? No, but this is how we feel.”
I didn’t read the fine print because I was 21 and, like I told you, 45,000 a year RV sounds sick. And basically, the TV networks were like, “Why would we buy a show if the digital brand’s going to be running at the same time?” Because they didn’t want to stop doing All Gas No Brakes to make a TV show, they wanted All Gas No Brakes to continue as a web show while All Gas No Brakes as a future TV show at Showtime or Hulu or somewhere like that was also concurrently running, which is impossible for one man to do. And so every TV network said, “Okay, we’re not doing that. We want an exclusive rights contract with this guy.” Next, oh yeah, this is crazy to think about because it all happened so fast. So Jonah Hill says, “A24 Films wants to do a movie instead of a show, and they’re going to let you keep the digital brand running.”
So this meant that I could keep doing my Instagram stuff with Doing Things Media/All Gas No Brakes while making an A24 movie with Jonah Hill and Tim and Eric. So it was just like I was excited, it sounded perfect. So they said, “Okay, what do you want to make a movie about?” And I told them, “Okay, here’s what’s going to happen in 2020. If Trump wins, there’s going to be riots across the country. The major cities are going to burn down. If Trump loses, the militias and his loyal supporters are going to try to have a coup in DC.” That’s what I said. And I said, “So I’m going to follow the lead up to whoever wins the election and I’m going to document what happens after.” So they said, “Okay.” And so I was to begin filming in late October during the campaign trail, maybe mid-October up until November, and then in the following months to see what would happen. This meant that I couldn’t film anything for All Gas No Brakes the digital show because I had to dedicate 100% of my time to making this perfect movie.
He’s now facing 23 years in prison. It’s like a trip because I went to his house in Miami maybe two weeks after January 6th. And talking to him, it seemed like he didn’t think anything was going to happen. He was just like, “Yeah, man, that was crazy. I’m glad I wasn’t there. They’re dumb for doing that.” He even told me he doesn’t think the election was stolen, which is just a mindfuck. It’s like, why’d you get everyone so hyped up? It’s just weird to think about how so many people’s lives are drastically altered forever because of that just bizarre moment in time that will always live on.
He told me when I met with him, he was like, “I know you think that having me in this movie is a good idea, but you’re going to have some serious backlash because of that.” At the time, I was like, “Man, it’s fine. It’s all good. We’re just hanging out, drinking whiskey, doing bench presses, drinking Jameson. It’s all good.” First of all, I had to campaign to get him in the film because the studios were like, “We don’t…” There was a bizarre time around… I think it was 2018, where deplatforming was the big thing that people were encouraging. It said giving a platform to problematic ideologies will, in turn, expand their reach. And so even extending your platform to someone who’s problematic is helping them, aka destroying humanity, whatever it was. So that was the whole thing.
And when I did this media training that was mandated by HBO, it was all training in how to defend from that exact question. They said, “When we put you on NPR, when we put you on CNN, they’re going to ask you about platforming problematic ideologies, and you’re going to have to say stuff like, ‘Sunlight is the best disinfectant. I believe that extremism only goes away when you shine a light on it because leaving it in the dark will only allow it to grow.'” They gave me like 15 pointers. I didn’t use any of those pointers because I’m not the kind of person who wants to be media-trained. I like to speak freely.
But in the promotional run for the film, when I went on CNN, this was a crazy experience. So I went on CNN and thankfully, my friend was with me, and so I’m on CNN, and-
And he said, “There’s nothing fake about CNN.” I said, “I didn’t say you were fake news. I’m not saying you’re lying, but you’re directly antagonizing and stirring people up against half the country because you need money to support a dying platform.”
So my press tour was finished. All the late night shows that I was supposed to go on, I was supposed to go on the late night shows, and that was off the table because they were worried that I was a loose cannon, I think. And then, the only remaining appearance I had left was NPR in Boston, and that was supposed to be a premiere. So it wasn’t supposed to be an interrogation. It wasn’t supposed to be anything like that. Supposed to be a premiere in front of a live audience where they watched the film and I show up after for a Q&A. So I’m like, “All right, whatever. It’s weird, they only have this one press opportunity left.” I felt bad that I ruined the entire press tour by confronting Don Lemon, but at this point, I wanted to just do this final one, especially because it was a viewing, and I was like, “Cool.”
I sat in the audience, I watched people laugh to the film. It was awesome. So I go backstage and there’s an NPR journalist waiting for me. And nothing against people who wear masks, but she had two N95s on. Two N95s is-
And I literally am like, “Well, the Sandy Hook family’s lawyer, Mark Bankston, who represented them in court in Connecticut, told me specifically that Leonard Posner, the father of Noah Posner who died at Sandy Hook, was a huge fan of the film.” And so I said that to her and that just silenced that conversation, but the whole conversation was just about exploitation and, “Why are you platforming mentally ill people and giving a platform to conspiracies like QAnon? Don’t you feel like you’re a part of their spread? Some would call you a misinformation reporter,” all this crazy stuff. And yeah, next day hit the fan.
And walking back what I said a little bit, because I was just trying to make a point, but what I think of as bad poverty, let’s say West Baltimore or 9th Ward, New Orleans is nothing compared to what’s going on in almost half of the world, if not more. And so it just made me zoom out a little bit, and sometimes you forget about third world poverty when you live here for so long. And you get programmed to believe the worst things that are out there is like Kensington, Philadelphia or Tenderloin, San Francisco, but those are just microcosms of more or less functioning cities. Despite what they might lead you to believe, Philadelphia is a great place. So is San Francisco, but there’s places where everywhere is really run down.
If you look at other countries, even Europe, look at how they protest. And look at the Arab Spring. Those guys were talking like January 6ers, and they actually took control of the government. Think about even if the MAGA crowd took over the Capitol building, it’s just a building. I don’t know. I just think that Americans, they talk about civil war stuff, we’re so far from that. Even if the rhetoric is as divided as it was in 2020, it won’t happen again.
So every day for those 50 days to where I received word and to the movie announcement or to the movie release was like, I was like a kid waiting for Christmas morning. You know what I mean? Every day I saw the movie release date as the first day of the rest of my life. And so I remember the week of the movie release, it was like every day I was like, “Oh my God. Six days, five days, four days.” And when it became two days, I was so excited and so, honestly, anxiety riddled because it was such a massive platform that I went out to the desert by myself out in the Mojave, got a hotel and just sat there.
And then, movie release day comes. It was supposed to come out at 8:00 PM Pacific standard time. I remember it was like 12 hours left, 10 hours left. And then, eight minutes before the movie at 7:52, or I guess it was sent at 10:52 East Coast time, I got a text message requesting a portion of my fat HBO check to contribute toward apparently years of therapy bills that this person had accrued after she says that she felt that I pressured her into giving consent years prior. And I was confused, not only because of the timing, but because this is someone that I hadn’t seen in years or spoken to in years and I presumed that I was on good terms with. So I didn’t respond to the text message. And then, when I didn’t respond, about seven days later, this person made some TikTok videos and with the help of some friends launched an online campaign that got picked up by the press pretty quickly.
I didn’t have sex with this person, had a consensual encounter that they reached out to me about two weeks after saying, “Hey, I don’t want you to take this the wrong way.” But looking back, I felt a lot more pressure to agree than I realized in the moment. “I don’t think this is any fault of yours. I just think that you came on a bit too strong and I didn’t want to let you down. So I gave in,” and that language made me feel horrible, mainly because if this person had told me, “Hey, I don’t want to hook up,” I would’ve said, “Yeah, of course not. I don’t want to hook up with someone who doesn’t want to hook up with me.” And I think that as fame increased during that time, I think I was just oblivious to how people were seeing me, especially those who had a digital relationship with me prior to me knowing them. And I don’t think that I handled that the right way.
About six months after that, I was at Sturgis Bike Week, and I remember this day, this was the hardest day. I was just chilling and I got a text from my friend and it said, “Hey, man, you’re getting canceled right now.” I was like, “What do you mean? Did someone find an old tweet or something? What are you talking about?” I opened my phone and it was this Instagram story of me. It was like the ugliest picture of me you can find. It was like my face open. It was screenshotted, and it said… I remember this specifically because I just couldn’t believe it. It said, “The ugly loser who hosts All Gas No Breaks is a piece of shit. He knowingly abused my friend and got away with it. If you follow him, I’m going to message you and ask you why?”
So this person who I don’t know, I didn’t even know who the accusation was coming from, they emailed every production company that I was working with, DMd hundreds, if not thousands of people, just saying that I was this piece of shit. And I didn’t even know who this person was. So I was frantically calling and texting every person that I’d seen intimately for the past year and being like, “Hey, are we on good terms? Is everything okay?” And then, I figured out that the person was coming from Florida, and I knew who it was. And so, thankfully, I reached out to the original person who I had the communication with, and I said, “Hey, I think this might’ve been you. This might’ve been your friend who posted this. Are we good? I’m sorry.” I apologized again. I was like, “Listen, I feel bad that you feel this way. I want to do anything that I can to help you. Again, I apologize.”
And she said, “Apology accepted. I’m sorry. My friend asked if she could post on my behalf, and I’m sorry. I was going through a lot mentally, and I saw your fame increasing. And so I agreed to let her speak on my behalf,” and we made amends in private. I said, “Okay, I’m here for you. Let me know.” And she said, “Apology is enough. Thank you for taking the time to speak with me.” And that was two years prior to this…
Thankfully, somehow, two weeks after, I met an amazing partner who I’m still with to this day, and I was able to conquer my two biggest fears, which is monogamy and dogs. I was terrified of dogs and terrified of having a girlfriend. Now I have a girlfriend who I love and two dogs.
So I tried to think of what’s the way I can do it to get the least amount of anger on behalf of the people who would grieve? Because the hanging, someone will discover you. So I figured drinking myself to death would be the way to do it, and I wasn’t able to. Yeah, that was just a dark place. I remember hating the people who loved me because I knew they would grieve, and that made me mad, if that makes sense. I was ready to go. I had no will to live. But their grief was like… I didn’t want to cause that because I didn’t want to hurt them. So I was like, I hated the people who loved me because they were stopping me from taking my own life.
And it’s weird to think that when I was going through that, if you walk by me in the street, I look like a normal guy. And so now when I walk around and I see people, I think to myself, “You have no idea what that person is going through.” It’s crazy that so many people are suffering in complete silence and they don’t wear it on them.
And if you think that that conversation is a vibe killer, you probably shouldn’t be in that situation in the first place, especially now, how hyper sexualized things are and how common that type of violence is. You need to be able to have those conversations and stop and say, “Hey, tell me a little bit about your past? Is there any triggers that make you uncomfortable? Let me know how I can be the best partner to you.” And I’m sure that college-age people are not having those conversations, but I’m sure that it would go a long way.
And for me, as someone who doesn’t have much, honestly, childhood trauma or anything like that, it’s been an interesting year for me working in therapy and elsewhere, understanding how that affects the mind. And also, I understand that hurt people, hurt people, and that someone with a traumatic background isn’t going to have sympathy for applying that traumatic pain to someone else, even if that person isn’t the cause of what put them in that spot.
And it just so happened that we were in Miami Beach one time and this kid came up drinking liquor, trying to yell about whatever they yell about in Miami Beach, like titties or whatever, and we’re like, “Bro, this is Channel 5. Be careful what you say.” And he was like, “For real?” And he just walked off. And I said to my friend at the time, I was like, “That sounded pretty good, right? Channel 5.” And he goes, “That does sound pretty good.” He’s like, “That’s got to be trademarked though.” No, it’s not trademarked.
It’s crazy, right? There’s a Channel 5 in every city, Channel 5 KTLA, Channel 5 Seattle, Como News, dude, Channel 5 itself, we own it, because no one’s thought of something that simple, because you’d think you’d have to specify. We own channel5.com, channel5.news. Dude, we own it. It’s awesome.
Drill has a true crime component to where drill fans want to know that the person rapping about catching bodies does in fact kill people. So drill, it’s pretty horrifying. It sounds great, but it started in Chicago, then it spread to England, and now it’s bounced back to New York, the Bronx and Brooklyn specifically, and spread from New York to the rest of the country. So now there’s probably a drill rapper every 10 square miles.
So O Block right now, and when I filmed the video, is trying to go through a major image rehab. If you go on any Instagram of anyone in O Block, they’ve all converted to Islam. And so they post pictures of themselves praying in the morning and have captions like, “Put the guns down, let’s pray.” So I think when I went there, they saw it as a good opportunity to do a positive rebrand. And so I interviewed a rapper named Boss Top, who was there all the way back in 2011 when Chief Keef was coming up. And so he basically ensured my safe protection, but he didn’t even need to. They’re all very friendly and they know exactly what’s up with YouTube stuff.
And yeah, I think that most people are good. I’ve been through some things that leads me to believe that a lot of people though are primarily motivated by self-interest, and that in a fight or flight situation, most people will choose flight. So I don’t know if people are courageous as a whole, but I think generally good, but the energy to stand up for what’s right, not sure about that.
Click link to jump approximately to that part in the transcript:
- 0:00 – Introduction
- 1:18 – Walmart
- 2:48 – Early life
- 21:38 – Hitchhiking
- 33:14 – Couch surfing
- 42:14 – Quarter Confessions
- 59:58 – Burning Man
- 1:15:08 – Protests
- 1:20:41 – Jon Stewart
- 1:23:37 – Fame
- 1:36:55 – Jan 6
- 1:40:39 – QAnon
- 1:46:24 – Alex Jones
- 2:03:17 – Politics
- 2:12:53 – Response to allegations
- 2:29:53 – Channel 5
- 2:35:28 – Rap
- 2:37:15 – O Block
- 2:41:11 – Crip Mac
- 2:44:23 – Aliens
Introduction
Andrew Callaghan
There’s two people in the back, two of her homegirls wearing sheisty masks. I’m like, “What are we doing? Where are we going?” She goes, “We’re going to go film the riot. We’re going to Lake Street.” We drive down there, Kmart is burning, Target is burning, everything is on fire. She has the Sony a7, she gives me a microphone and she’s like, “Go talk to that guy.” That was the guy with a molotov cocktail in his hand who had just burned Kmart down. I go, “What should I ask him? She goes, “What’s on your mind?” I walk up to him and I’m like, “What’s on your mind?”
There’s two people in the back, two of her homegirls wearing sheisty masks. I’m like, “What are we doing? Where are we going?” She goes, “We’re going to go film the riot. We’re going to Lake Street.” We drive down there, Kmart is burning, Target is burning, everything is on fire. She has the Sony a7, she gives me a microphone and she’s like, “Go talk to that guy.” That was the guy with a molotov cocktail in his hand who had just burned Kmart down. I go, “What should I ask him? She goes, “What’s on your mind?” I walk up to him and I’m like, “What’s on your mind?”
Lex Fridman
The following is a conversation with Andrew Callaghan, host of Channel 5 on YouTube, where he does Gazelle style interviews with fascinating humans at the edges of society. The so-called vagrants, vagabonds, runaways, outlaws, from QAnon adherence to fish heads, O’Block residents, and much more. He created the documentary that I highly recommend called This Place Rules, on the undercurrents that led to the January 6th Capitol riots. This is the Lex Fridman podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. Now, dear friends, here’s Andrew Callaghan.
The following is a conversation with Andrew Callaghan, host of Channel 5 on YouTube, where he does Gazelle style interviews with fascinating humans at the edges of society. The so-called vagrants, vagabonds, runaways, outlaws, from QAnon adherence to fish heads, O’Block residents, and much more. He created the documentary that I highly recommend called This Place Rules, on the undercurrents that led to the January 6th Capitol riots. This is the Lex Fridman podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. Now, dear friends, here’s Andrew Callaghan.
Walmart
Andrew Callaghan
I tried to color match you though. Got the black and white going. I went to Walmart before this and got the Wrangler shirt with the Texas Longhorns Tee and everything.
I tried to color match you though. Got the black and white going. I went to Walmart before this and got the Wrangler shirt with the Texas Longhorns Tee and everything.
Lex Fridman
Is that where you shop, Walmart?
Is that where you shop, Walmart?
Andrew Callaghan
Generally, yeah.
Generally, yeah.
Lex Fridman
I’m a Target man myself. T.
I’m a Target man myself. T.
Andrew Callaghan
Here’s no way you get those suits from Target.
Here’s no way you get those suits from Target.
Lex Fridman
See, you’re saying it’s a nice way to complement a suit.
See, you’re saying it’s a nice way to complement a suit.
Andrew Callaghan
I think you go Men’s Warehouse, if not further.
I think you go Men’s Warehouse, if not further.
Lex Fridman
I think you would be wrong.
I think you would be wrong.
Andrew Callaghan
You go further.
You go further.
Lex Fridman
No, the other direction.
No, the other direction.
Andrew Callaghan
You got that from Target?
You got that from Target?
Lex Fridman
Not Target. I was joking about Target. I like Walmart better. It just felt like a funny thing to say.
Not Target. I was joking about Target. I like Walmart better. It just felt like a funny thing to say.
Andrew Callaghan
No, it was funny.
No, it was funny.
Lex Fridman
The most expensive thing I own is this watch, and it was given to me as a gift.
The most expensive thing I own is this watch, and it was given to me as a gift.
Andrew Callaghan
When I was on tour, I had these $2,700 Cartier glasses that I got for a lot of money, $2,700.
When I was on tour, I had these $2,700 Cartier glasses that I got for a lot of money, $2,700.
Lex Fridman
Like sunglasses?
Like sunglasses?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, but they’re really embarrassing. I was on tour, so I just felt like I could do anything as far as fashion choices. Looking back at pictures for myself in that era, I’m like, “God, that wasn’t…”
Yeah, but they’re really embarrassing. I was on tour, so I just felt like I could do anything as far as fashion choices. Looking back at pictures for myself in that era, I’m like, “God, that wasn’t…”
Lex Fridman
That was the symbol of the fame got to your head?
That was the symbol of the fame got to your head?
Andrew Callaghan
I think so, yeah. I think fame getting to your head. If you spend more than a hundred bucks on sunglasses, you’ve officially gone off the deep end.
I think so, yeah. I think fame getting to your head. If you spend more than a hundred bucks on sunglasses, you’ve officially gone off the deep end.
Lex Fridman
You’ve crossed the line.
You’ve crossed the line.
Andrew Callaghan
Totally.
Totally.
Lex Fridman
That’s where you go back to Walmart to humble yourself. I really love Walmart. In fact, I moved to Austin because I was at Walmart and a lady said that I look handsome in a suit. I was like, “That’s it. I love this place.” She just said it for no reason whatsoever. This older lady just kind of looked at me and with this genuine sweetness just said, “Oh, you look handsome.”
That’s where you go back to Walmart to humble yourself. I really love Walmart. In fact, I moved to Austin because I was at Walmart and a lady said that I look handsome in a suit. I was like, “That’s it. I love this place.” She just said it for no reason whatsoever. This older lady just kind of looked at me and with this genuine sweetness just said, “Oh, you look handsome.”
Andrew Callaghan
She’s not wrong, man.
She’s not wrong, man.
Lex Fridman
Thank you.
Thank you.
Andrew Callaghan
That’s part of your whole swag though.
That’s part of your whole swag though.
Early life
Lex Fridman
Yeah, the suit thing. Yep. Anyway, what was the first, if you remember, first recorded interview you did?
Yeah, the suit thing. Yep. Anyway, what was the first, if you remember, first recorded interview you did?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, my first-grade teacher, Mrs. Claudia, this is back in the day like I was telling you, we just asked her about her life in Columbia and stuff like that. I didn’t really get into actual journalism until my ninth-grade year. I had no idea I had an interest in it. Before then, I wanted to be a rapper. It’s all about hip hop and meditation and picking psilocybin mushrooms and public parks and stuff like that. That’s what I was into.
Well, my first-grade teacher, Mrs. Claudia, this is back in the day like I was telling you, we just asked her about her life in Columbia and stuff like that. I didn’t really get into actual journalism until my ninth-grade year. I had no idea I had an interest in it. Before then, I wanted to be a rapper. It’s all about hip hop and meditation and picking psilocybin mushrooms and public parks and stuff like that. That’s what I was into.
Lex Fridman
That’s a lot. Psilocybin, meditation, rap, public parks.
That’s a lot. Psilocybin, meditation, rap, public parks.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. I was making conscious rap music. I was to the point where I had four dream catchers hanging above my bed, Alex Grey painting on the wall, tapestry on the ceiling. Just scribbling rhymes down all the time.
Yeah. I was making conscious rap music. I was to the point where I had four dream catchers hanging above my bed, Alex Grey painting on the wall, tapestry on the ceiling. Just scribbling rhymes down all the time.
Lex Fridman
You said somewhere that you sucked at school.
You said somewhere that you sucked at school.
Andrew Callaghan
Okay, well, let’s step back a little bit. I had this amazing journalism course in ninth grade. I went to an alternative high school. The teacher was named Calvin Shaw. I ended up taking his class all four years and he used to let me actually leave school. I didn’t like going to school, so he let me basically go around Seattle and do different interviews with people as long as I could come back by the end of the day and write a story for his class and he’d mark me as present. The first article that I wrote was about the Silk Road and the Deep Web.
Okay, well, let’s step back a little bit. I had this amazing journalism course in ninth grade. I went to an alternative high school. The teacher was named Calvin Shaw. I ended up taking his class all four years and he used to let me actually leave school. I didn’t like going to school, so he let me basically go around Seattle and do different interviews with people as long as I could come back by the end of the day and write a story for his class and he’d mark me as present. The first article that I wrote was about the Silk Road and the Deep Web.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, nice.
Yeah, nice.
Andrew Callaghan
Because as a ninth grader when I discovered the Hidden Wiki, I thought that I was really tapping into the most secret society, elite-level black market in the world. If you remember, they had that hidden Wiki link that was like, hire a hitman. I messaged them and I was like, “All right, I want to get someone killed at my school. How much is it going to cost me?” I published my interview with the Hidden Wiki Hitman. He was probably a fed or something, but who knows? My first article was called Inside the Deep Web, A Conversation with a Hitman.
Because as a ninth grader when I discovered the Hidden Wiki, I thought that I was really tapping into the most secret society, elite-level black market in the world. If you remember, they had that hidden Wiki link that was like, hire a hitman. I messaged them and I was like, “All right, I want to get someone killed at my school. How much is it going to cost me?” I published my interview with the Hidden Wiki Hitman. He was probably a fed or something, but who knows? My first article was called Inside the Deep Web, A Conversation with a Hitman.
Lex Fridman
That’s nice. I mean, you were fearless even then.
That’s nice. I mean, you were fearless even then.
Andrew Callaghan
I mean, I was hiding behind a Tor browser, so there’s not much fear to be had.
I mean, I was hiding behind a Tor browser, so there’s not much fear to be had.
Lex Fridman
Oh, so it was anonymous?
Oh, so it was anonymous?
Andrew Callaghan
It was anonymous, but I did publish it under my name. You’re right, I could’ve been in danger.
It was anonymous, but I did publish it under my name. You’re right, I could’ve been in danger.
Lex Fridman
I also saw that you said you took too many shrooms when you were young and that led you to have hallucinogen persisting perception disorder, HPPD. Can you explain what this is?
I also saw that you said you took too many shrooms when you were young and that led you to have hallucinogen persisting perception disorder, HPPD. Can you explain what this is?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, that condition is classified by persistent visual snow floaters, morphing objects. I see them right now. I see them all the time.
Well, that condition is classified by persistent visual snow floaters, morphing objects. I see them right now. I see them all the time.
Lex Fridman
The snow is in the room?
The snow is in the room?
Andrew Callaghan
The snow is definitely in the room. It’s all over you. Basically, it wasn’t that I took too many shrooms, I think that it was… I took about an eighth of senescence mushrooms, which are the ones that come from the earth instead of cow shit. I took an eighth of those at my friend Toby’s house, which is a normal amount, but I was in eighth grade. I woke up the next morning with these extreme visual distortions and I thought that it would go away. I tried to make it go away, but there’s really no cure for HPPD, it’s a life-long condition. It’s just a matter of dealing with it and realizing that it is only visual. When people ask me, “Hey, I have HPPD, how do I cope with it?” I say, “Remember that every other sense that you have, what you can hear, what you can taste, your feet on the ground, you’re still on earth, you’re still here.”
The snow is definitely in the room. It’s all over you. Basically, it wasn’t that I took too many shrooms, I think that it was… I took about an eighth of senescence mushrooms, which are the ones that come from the earth instead of cow shit. I took an eighth of those at my friend Toby’s house, which is a normal amount, but I was in eighth grade. I woke up the next morning with these extreme visual distortions and I thought that it would go away. I tried to make it go away, but there’s really no cure for HPPD, it’s a life-long condition. It’s just a matter of dealing with it and realizing that it is only visual. When people ask me, “Hey, I have HPPD, how do I cope with it?” I say, “Remember that every other sense that you have, what you can hear, what you can taste, your feet on the ground, you’re still on earth, you’re still here.”
Lex Fridman
Well, you said it’s only visual, and yes, gratitude for being alive at all. It’s great. You said that this led you into some dark psychological places, like depersonalization disorder.
Well, you said it’s only visual, and yes, gratitude for being alive at all. It’s great. You said that this led you into some dark psychological places, like depersonalization disorder.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. Depersonalization is the feeling that you are not real, but that reality still exists. Derealization is the idea that reality itself is an illusion created by your mind and that you’re the only person alive and that everything that your brain is projecting to your visual cortex is a lie, and that you’re the only living human being.
Yeah. Depersonalization is the feeling that you are not real, but that reality still exists. Derealization is the idea that reality itself is an illusion created by your mind and that you’re the only person alive and that everything that your brain is projecting to your visual cortex is a lie, and that you’re the only living human being.
Lex Fridman
Both are pretty intense.
Both are pretty intense.
Andrew Callaghan
HPPD creates both of those things. When I’ve talked to people who have the condition, it’s really either-or, but more than 70% of people with HPPD fall into either category. They’re both coping mechanisms for the, I don’t know what really happens. I talked to a researcher once, named Dr. Abraham, he lives in Upstate New York. He’s the leading scientist when it comes to HPPD research. He’s the only one who actually seems to care about finding a cure. The only known treatment right now is alcohol and benzodiazepines.
HPPD creates both of those things. When I’ve talked to people who have the condition, it’s really either-or, but more than 70% of people with HPPD fall into either category. They’re both coping mechanisms for the, I don’t know what really happens. I talked to a researcher once, named Dr. Abraham, he lives in Upstate New York. He’s the leading scientist when it comes to HPPD research. He’s the only one who actually seems to care about finding a cure. The only known treatment right now is alcohol and benzodiazepines.
Lex Fridman
That’s not good.
That’s not good.
Andrew Callaghan
Alcoholism, something that came into my life pretty early. Alcohol abuse as a result of that experience because that helps with the visual symptoms, makes some of the static go away.
Alcoholism, something that came into my life pretty early. Alcohol abuse as a result of that experience because that helps with the visual symptoms, makes some of the static go away.
Lex Fridman
Man.
Man.
Andrew Callaghan
Never tried benzos, though.
Never tried benzos, though.
Lex Fridman
Can you explain to me where in that spectrum you are? Do you sometimes have a sense that you’re not real and something else is not real?
Can you explain to me where in that spectrum you are? Do you sometimes have a sense that you’re not real and something else is not real?
Andrew Callaghan
Sometimes.
Sometimes.
Lex Fridman
Like the reality is not real?
Like the reality is not real?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, I experience it all the time. Like I said, my job helps with that because I get to feel like when you seek out extremes to a certain extent and you put yourself on the front lines of intense events, whether it be politically or socially or just dive into deep fringe subcultures, you get this feeling that you’re real. Being filmed is also confirmation, if you can look at the MP4 file that you’re in fact living here on earth
Yeah, I experience it all the time. Like I said, my job helps with that because I get to feel like when you seek out extremes to a certain extent and you put yourself on the front lines of intense events, whether it be politically or socially or just dive into deep fringe subcultures, you get this feeling that you’re real. Being filmed is also confirmation, if you can look at the MP4 file that you’re in fact living here on earth
Lex Fridman
Confirming that you were in it with reality by watching yourself on video.
Confirming that you were in it with reality by watching yourself on video.
Andrew Callaghan
Exactly.
Exactly.
Lex Fridman
Is that basically the engine behind all the extreme interviews you’ve done?
Is that basically the engine behind all the extreme interviews you’ve done?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, I got HPPD around the same time that I began this journalism course in ninth grade. I sort of always used journalism as a therapeutic mechanism to deal with some of these symptoms, especially depersonalization. There’s some pretty good illustrations of what it feels like, kind of feels like you’re trapped behind your eyes or that you’re just this nebulous soul that’s trapped in a flesh suit that you’re not really a part of. You’re sort of puppeteering a flesh and bone skin suit.
Well, I got HPPD around the same time that I began this journalism course in ninth grade. I sort of always used journalism as a therapeutic mechanism to deal with some of these symptoms, especially depersonalization. There’s some pretty good illustrations of what it feels like, kind of feels like you’re trapped behind your eyes or that you’re just this nebulous soul that’s trapped in a flesh suit that you’re not really a part of. You’re sort of puppeteering a flesh and bone skin suit.
Lex Fridman
Trapped, or just the ability to step outside of yourself?
Trapped, or just the ability to step outside of yourself?
Andrew Callaghan
You feel like your soul is not something that is connected to your body, it’s something living in your head. It’s really hard to explain to people who haven’t gone through derealization or depersonalization, but if you go on support groups, they always say, “How do I break free from behind my eyes?” Dark stuff like that?
You feel like your soul is not something that is connected to your body, it’s something living in your head. It’s really hard to explain to people who haven’t gone through derealization or depersonalization, but if you go on support groups, they always say, “How do I break free from behind my eyes?” Dark stuff like that?
Lex Fridman
Oh, so you’re trapped. I mean, there’s a higher state of being through meditation that you can step outside of yourself, but this is not that.
Oh, so you’re trapped. I mean, there’s a higher state of being through meditation that you can step outside of yourself, but this is not that.
Andrew Callaghan
Unfortunately, it was the meditative path or the Eastern path that I took and fused that with psychedelic culture in Seattle that took me down the psychedelic use rabbit hole in the first place. I’d say it all started with Siddhartha.
Unfortunately, it was the meditative path or the Eastern path that I took and fused that with psychedelic culture in Seattle that took me down the psychedelic use rabbit hole in the first place. I’d say it all started with Siddhartha.
Lex Fridman
Siddhartha, that’s a good book. Have you done shroom since then?
Siddhartha, that’s a good book. Have you done shroom since then?
Andrew Callaghan
No, I don’t really do psychedelic drugs. A lot of people think that I’m against them, which I’m not, it just doesn’t work for me. If it works for you, I’m sure they can be really fun. Especially, I know there’s lots of therapeutic uses for acid and ketamine and psilocybin, but I personally abstain from those. Anything psychotropic, I try to stay away from.
No, I don’t really do psychedelic drugs. A lot of people think that I’m against them, which I’m not, it just doesn’t work for me. If it works for you, I’m sure they can be really fun. Especially, I know there’s lots of therapeutic uses for acid and ketamine and psilocybin, but I personally abstain from those. Anything psychotropic, I try to stay away from.
Lex Fridman
Drinking, a bit?
Drinking, a bit?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, yeah, I mean, I didn’t drink at all before I had the HPPD stuff. I would’ve drank later in life, but definitely, 14, 15. Every day after school, I drink a 40 ounce of Mickey’s. It looks like Old English, but the bottle is green and it has a hornet on the side of it. Just became a ritual just to deal with the anxiety of that situation.
Well, yeah, I mean, I didn’t drink at all before I had the HPPD stuff. I would’ve drank later in life, but definitely, 14, 15. Every day after school, I drink a 40 ounce of Mickey’s. It looks like Old English, but the bottle is green and it has a hornet on the side of it. Just became a ritual just to deal with the anxiety of that situation.
Lex Fridman
It made the snow go away?
It made the snow go away?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, alcohol really works to suppress HPPD symptoms.
Yeah, alcohol really works to suppress HPPD symptoms.
Lex Fridman
You said you hated classes in school, except that journalism class.
You said you hated classes in school, except that journalism class.
Andrew Callaghan
Okay, we need to clear this up. Because on my Wikipedia page, for some reason, for Andrew Callahan early life, it says, “Andrew hated every single class, except for one.” I’ve had a bunch of teachers who are super cool, like this guy Tim, my astronomy professor at ninth grade, Mrs. Zanetti, my creative writing teacher in sixth grade, and this really cool dude at my college in New Orleans named Charles Cannon, who taught me a class called New Orleans Mythology. My three favorite classes besides my journalism class, and they all hit me up and they’re like, “Hey, man. I saw you said you hated every class. Sorry, I couldn’t be everything that you wanted me to be.” I just want to say, shout out to all those teachers. I didn’t hate every class.
Okay, we need to clear this up. Because on my Wikipedia page, for some reason, for Andrew Callahan early life, it says, “Andrew hated every single class, except for one.” I’ve had a bunch of teachers who are super cool, like this guy Tim, my astronomy professor at ninth grade, Mrs. Zanetti, my creative writing teacher in sixth grade, and this really cool dude at my college in New Orleans named Charles Cannon, who taught me a class called New Orleans Mythology. My three favorite classes besides my journalism class, and they all hit me up and they’re like, “Hey, man. I saw you said you hated every class. Sorry, I couldn’t be everything that you wanted me to be.” I just want to say, shout out to all those teachers. I didn’t hate every class.
The point that I was making is that being forced into the institution of school so young and having to take common core classes like biology, dissecting frogs, history of the Han Dynasty, stuff like that, that I didn’t want to learn, but I had to learn multiple times. I learned about the dynastic cycle in ancient China three separate times at three different schools. I was like, “Who is writing this curriculum and why is it so important that I understand this process?” The part that makes school difficult, especially in college, is that you have people just going to school just to get the degree who don’t really know exactly what they’re interested in, and they don’t even have time to figure that out because they’re in a business program or a communications program with no specific interest.
Lex Fridman
Well, I think if you want to do school right, take on every single subject that you’re forced into. It’s like the David Foster Wallace, just be unborable by it. Just really go in as if ancient Chinese dynasties are the most interesting thing you could possibly learn.
Well, I think if you want to do school right, take on every single subject that you’re forced into. It’s like the David Foster Wallace, just be unborable by it. Just really go in as if ancient Chinese dynasties are the most interesting thing you could possibly learn.
Andrew Callaghan
It is somewhat interesting, the Silk Road and the Great Wall and terracotta the soldiers and stuff. I’m just saying, when I got to college, I signed up for journalism school and I didn’t get to take a media class until the second semester and I had to take everything prior to that, and I’d already spent so much time. I just think the excruciating boredom of schooling left a bad taste in my mouth, but there was individual classes that I liked a lot.
It is somewhat interesting, the Silk Road and the Great Wall and terracotta the soldiers and stuff. I’m just saying, when I got to college, I signed up for journalism school and I didn’t get to take a media class until the second semester and I had to take everything prior to that, and I’d already spent so much time. I just think the excruciating boredom of schooling left a bad taste in my mouth, but there was individual classes that I liked a lot.
Lex Fridman
There should be some choice or maybe a lot of choice even at the level of high school for what kind of classes you pursue.
There should be some choice or maybe a lot of choice even at the level of high school for what kind of classes you pursue.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, for sure.
Yeah, for sure.
Lex Fridman
You’re also saying, so Wikipedia is not always perfectly right.
You’re also saying, so Wikipedia is not always perfectly right.
Andrew Callaghan
No, but it’s just interesting because I’ve said so much in podcasts, but that’s what they isolated. I’ve gotten that question before, which I understand it’s the first thing on my Wikipedia page, but it makes me sound like a super hater. Have you ever seen this Instagram page called Depths of Wikipedia?
No, but it’s just interesting because I’ve said so much in podcasts, but that’s what they isolated. I’ve gotten that question before, which I understand it’s the first thing on my Wikipedia page, but it makes me sound like a super hater. Have you ever seen this Instagram page called Depths of Wikipedia?
Lex Fridman
It’s great.
It’s great.
Andrew Callaghan
Oh, it’s so good, dude.
Oh, it’s so good, dude.
Lex Fridman
You said you love journalism. What did you love about journalism? What hooked you?
You said you love journalism. What did you love about journalism? What hooked you?
Andrew Callaghan
On a basic level, everybody wants media coverage. Everyone likes to be on camera and get exposure for whatever they’re doing. Being a journalist and being almost like a portal for exposure for people allows you to be on the front row of everything that you want to be a part of. You get to be in the front row for history as it’s unfolding because everyone wants to be covered. Being a journalist gives you a ticket to everywhere that you want to go in life. It allows you to step into different realities almost and then go back to yours and it just keeps life interesting.
On a basic level, everybody wants media coverage. Everyone likes to be on camera and get exposure for whatever they’re doing. Being a journalist and being almost like a portal for exposure for people allows you to be on the front row of everything that you want to be a part of. You get to be in the front row for history as it’s unfolding because everyone wants to be covered. Being a journalist gives you a ticket to everywhere that you want to go in life. It allows you to step into different realities almost and then go back to yours and it just keeps life interesting.
Lex Fridman
Buy the ticket, take the Ride. Hunter S. Thompson, is he up there as one of the influences? Who are your influences?
Buy the ticket, take the Ride. Hunter S. Thompson, is he up there as one of the influences? Who are your influences?
Andrew Callaghan
I think the Early Daily Show was so good. Sacha Baron Cohen, huge influence. The Ali G show, especially. I think Louis Theroux’s broadcasts on BBC were great. I was really into Hunter S. Thompson too, but not really until college. I really like a particular Hunter S. Thompson book called The Great Shark Hunt, where he covers the Ruben Salazar murder by LAPD or LA Sheriff’s Department in Boyle Heights in the 70s. His relationship with his lawyer, Oscar Acosta, and that whole saga is great. Fear and Loathing, I like, but not as much as his straightforward reporting. Because there’s the gonzo side of Hunter where he’s like saying he’s taking drugs and seeing shit. Then there’s the other side of him, which is like an actual reporter interested in telling a story that has news value. It’s two different lanes for him.
I think the Early Daily Show was so good. Sacha Baron Cohen, huge influence. The Ali G show, especially. I think Louis Theroux’s broadcasts on BBC were great. I was really into Hunter S. Thompson too, but not really until college. I really like a particular Hunter S. Thompson book called The Great Shark Hunt, where he covers the Ruben Salazar murder by LAPD or LA Sheriff’s Department in Boyle Heights in the 70s. His relationship with his lawyer, Oscar Acosta, and that whole saga is great. Fear and Loathing, I like, but not as much as his straightforward reporting. Because there’s the gonzo side of Hunter where he’s like saying he’s taking drugs and seeing shit. Then there’s the other side of him, which is like an actual reporter interested in telling a story that has news value. It’s two different lanes for him.
Lex Fridman
There is something about you that makes people want to say you’re the Hunter S. Thompson of this generation. I don’t think they mean the drugs, I think they mean some kind of non-standard willingness to explore the extremes of humanity and almost a celebration of the extremes of humanity.
There is something about you that makes people want to say you’re the Hunter S. Thompson of this generation. I don’t think they mean the drugs, I think they mean some kind of non-standard willingness to explore the extremes of humanity and almost a celebration of the extremes of humanity.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. Well, that’s a very kind comparison. I’ll get there one day, maybe. I just went to Aspen on a little Hunter S. Thompson recon trip to go check out the Woody Creek Tavern, which is the spot that it was like his bar near his cabin. It was pretty cool to see. Unfortunately, it’s turned into not a dive bar now, but it’s a sit-down sort of country restaurant, but it was cool. I expected to see a bunch of gnarly Hunter, S. Thompson types doing speeds.
Yeah. Well, that’s a very kind comparison. I’ll get there one day, maybe. I just went to Aspen on a little Hunter S. Thompson recon trip to go check out the Woody Creek Tavern, which is the spot that it was like his bar near his cabin. It was pretty cool to see. Unfortunately, it’s turned into not a dive bar now, but it’s a sit-down sort of country restaurant, but it was cool. I expected to see a bunch of gnarly Hunter, S. Thompson types doing speeds.
Lex Fridman
Doing drugs. I mean, drugs and alcohol is all part of it, somehow. It opens a gateway to a deeper understanding of humanity.
Doing drugs. I mean, drugs and alcohol is all part of it, somehow. It opens a gateway to a deeper understanding of humanity.
Andrew Callaghan
I will say though, as someone now who doesn’t party like I did when I was younger, it’s not as important as I thought it was.
I will say though, as someone now who doesn’t party like I did when I was younger, it’s not as important as I thought it was.
Lex Fridman
I’m conflicted on this. I’m good friends with a lot of people that say alcohol is really bad for you, and I believe that too. There’s something that I just as an introvert, as a person who has a lot of anxiety, for me, alcohol has opened doors of just opening myself up to the world more.
I’m conflicted on this. I’m good friends with a lot of people that say alcohol is really bad for you, and I believe that too. There’s something that I just as an introvert, as a person who has a lot of anxiety, for me, alcohol has opened doors of just opening myself up to the world more.
Andrew Callaghan
I’m actually a fan of alcohol, moderate drinking. I’m saying my life before, I would say 2019, 2018, especially, there was the chaos on camera, but then there was my private life, which was chaotic partying all the time.
I’m actually a fan of alcohol, moderate drinking. I’m saying my life before, I would say 2019, 2018, especially, there was the chaos on camera, but then there was my private life, which was chaotic partying all the time.
Lex Fridman
Oh, I see.
Oh, I see.
Andrew Callaghan
I convinced myself much like Hunter did that, that was the secret sauce in the core, in my spiritual core, that gave me the creativity. Then I cut out a lot of that stuff and I’m just as creative. It’s interesting, I think one of the hardest parts about addiction is that if you’re functioning highly creative addict of any kind, your brain and the addictive part of your brain convinces yourself that it’s all part of the cross purpose and that it has this symbiotic inspirational thing going on, but it’s not true. It can be, but it’s typically not.
I convinced myself much like Hunter did that, that was the secret sauce in the core, in my spiritual core, that gave me the creativity. Then I cut out a lot of that stuff and I’m just as creative. It’s interesting, I think one of the hardest parts about addiction is that if you’re functioning highly creative addict of any kind, your brain and the addictive part of your brain convinces yourself that it’s all part of the cross purpose and that it has this symbiotic inspirational thing going on, but it’s not true. It can be, but it’s typically not.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, it’s not a requirement. You can sometimes channel, you can sometimes leverage all those things for your creativity, but the creative engine, it lives outside of that.
Yeah, it’s not a requirement. You can sometimes channel, you can sometimes leverage all those things for your creativity, but the creative engine, it lives outside of that.
Andrew Callaghan
Have you read Hunter’s daily routine in the year up to his death? It was like 15 grapefruits, an eight-ball of coke and just a certain amount of shotgun shells for him to fire into the sky every morning. There’s no way, and he didn’t do anything creative in those final years. The creativity goes away and gradually you just become a party animal, like Andy Dick.
Have you read Hunter’s daily routine in the year up to his death? It was like 15 grapefruits, an eight-ball of coke and just a certain amount of shotgun shells for him to fire into the sky every morning. There’s no way, and he didn’t do anything creative in those final years. The creativity goes away and gradually you just become a party animal, like Andy Dick.
Lex Fridman
A caricature of yourself.
A caricature of yourself.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
I mean, that’s why life is interesting. You make all kinds of choices and sometimes you can create works of genius in a short amount of time based on drugs and no drugs. Einstein had that miracle year where he published several incredible papers in one year, 1905.
I mean, that’s why life is interesting. You make all kinds of choices and sometimes you can create works of genius in a short amount of time based on drugs and no drugs. Einstein had that miracle year where he published several incredible papers in one year, 1905.
Andrew Callaghan
Did he do drugs before that?
Did he do drugs before that?
Lex Fridman
Lots of coke.
Lots of coke.
Andrew Callaghan
I was like, I believed you for a second. I’m like, did Einstein have blow? I don’t think he did.
I was like, I believed you for a second. I’m like, did Einstein have blow? I don’t think he did.
Lex Fridman
How do you think he gets that hair? Come on.
How do you think he gets that hair? Come on.
Andrew Callaghan
It’s true.
It’s true.
Lex Fridman
I’m just asking questions.
I’m just asking questions.
Andrew Callaghan
High confidence hair.
High confidence hair.
Lex Fridman
Look into it.
Look into it.
Andrew Callaghan
You know what I mean?
You know what I mean?
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Well, no, he’s a well put together, sexy young man. The hair came later.
Yeah. Well, no, he’s a well put together, sexy young man. The hair came later.
Andrew Callaghan
Was Albert Einstein attractive as a teenager? Not teenager, was he attractive as a young man?
Was Albert Einstein attractive as a teenager? Not teenager, was he attractive as a young man?
Lex Fridman
Sexually attractive? I’m turned on by Einstein at all ages. I don’t discriminate.
Sexually attractive? I’m turned on by Einstein at all ages. I don’t discriminate.
Andrew Callaghan
Are you more turned on by the work that he did or his physical being?
Are you more turned on by the work that he did or his physical being?
Lex Fridman
No. Sometimes I fantasize what it would be like to be in the arms of Einstein. I couldn’t even get that out.
No. Sometimes I fantasize what it would be like to be in the arms of Einstein. I couldn’t even get that out.
Andrew Callaghan
In the arms of Einstein.
In the arms of Einstein.
Lex Fridman
I want to feel safe.
I want to feel safe.
Andrew Callaghan
It’s a good idea for a rom-com
It’s a good idea for a rom-com
Lex Fridman
To be a little more serious, General Relativity, that space-time can be unified and curved by gravity is an incredibly wild and difficult idea to come up with. It’s a really, really difficult thing to imagine, given how well Newtonian classical mechanics physics works for predicting how stuff happens on earth. To think that gravity can morph space-time, both space and time, and it permeates the entire universe, it’s a field. It’s a really wild idea to come up. There’s one human on earth to intuit that is really, really, really difficult. It’s really sad to me that he didn’t get a Nobel Prize for that.
To be a little more serious, General Relativity, that space-time can be unified and curved by gravity is an incredibly wild and difficult idea to come up with. It’s a really, really difficult thing to imagine, given how well Newtonian classical mechanics physics works for predicting how stuff happens on earth. To think that gravity can morph space-time, both space and time, and it permeates the entire universe, it’s a field. It’s a really wild idea to come up. There’s one human on earth to intuit that is really, really, really difficult. It’s really sad to me that he didn’t get a Nobel Prize for that.
Andrew Callaghan
Was there people saying he was crazy when he was around, or was he universally recognized as an OG of this?
Was there people saying he was crazy when he was around, or was he universally recognized as an OG of this?
Lex Fridman
No, I think once the papers came out, he was widely recognized as a true genius. Before that, he wasn’t recognized. He had a really difficult life.
No, I think once the papers came out, he was widely recognized as a true genius. Before that, he wasn’t recognized. He had a really difficult life.
Andrew Callaghan
Backing up, where does a black hole go after something gets sucked into it?
Backing up, where does a black hole go after something gets sucked into it?
Lex Fridman
You mean is it a portal to another place, that kind of thing?
You mean is it a portal to another place, that kind of thing?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
No. Well, we don’t know. It could be. It could be that the universe is kind of like Swiss cheese full of black holes. There’s something called Hawking radiation where because of quantum mechanics, the information leaks out of a black hole, so it is possible to escape a black hole. There’s a lot of interesting questions there.
No. Well, we don’t know. It could be. It could be that the universe is kind of like Swiss cheese full of black holes. There’s something called Hawking radiation where because of quantum mechanics, the information leaks out of a black hole, so it is possible to escape a black hole. There’s a lot of interesting questions there.
Andrew Callaghan
I hope we get to the bottom of that.
I hope we get to the bottom of that.
Lex Fridman
There’s a super-massive black hole at the center of our galaxy, which doesn’t seem to scare physicists, but it terrifies me.
There’s a super-massive black hole at the center of our galaxy, which doesn’t seem to scare physicists, but it terrifies me.
Andrew Callaghan
Oh yeah, for sure. Astronomy can be terrifying.
Oh yeah, for sure. Astronomy can be terrifying.
Lex Fridman
We’re all like orbiting, I mean, we’re not just orbiting the sun, but the sun is part of the solar system, is part of the galaxy, and it’s all orbiting a gigantic black hole.
We’re all like orbiting, I mean, we’re not just orbiting the sun, but the sun is part of the solar system, is part of the galaxy, and it’s all orbiting a gigantic black hole.
Andrew Callaghan
Have you ever spoke to someone who’s been to outer space?
Have you ever spoke to someone who’s been to outer space?
Lex Fridman
Jeff Bezos, he flew his own rocket.
Jeff Bezos, he flew his own rocket.
Andrew Callaghan
Wow. That’s pretty cool.
Wow. That’s pretty cool.
Lex Fridman
Astronaut that’s been to deep space, no. Well, maybe I’ve spoken to an alien that just hasn’t admitted it.
Astronaut that’s been to deep space, no. Well, maybe I’ve spoken to an alien that just hasn’t admitted it.
Andrew Callaghan
I want to do a research paper or a report about space madness. It’s supposed to be this torturous feeling that you get when you look away from earth and into the abyss after you’ve exited Earth’s orbit or whatever, because there’s one specific psychiatrist who knows how to deal with space madness, and I want to figure out how and interview people with it.
I want to do a research paper or a report about space madness. It’s supposed to be this torturous feeling that you get when you look away from earth and into the abyss after you’ve exited Earth’s orbit or whatever, because there’s one specific psychiatrist who knows how to deal with space madness, and I want to figure out how and interview people with it.
Lex Fridman
Is this a real thing?
Is this a real thing?
Andrew Callaghan
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
Is there a Wikipedia article on it?
Is there a Wikipedia article on it?
Andrew Callaghan
Yes. Look up space madness treatment.
Yes. Look up space madness treatment.
Lex Fridman
Well, now I don’t trust Wikipedia after what you told me.
Well, now I don’t trust Wikipedia after what you told me.
Andrew Callaghan
I know. They think I hate classes.
I know. They think I hate classes.
Lex Fridman
I thought you meant more about the fact that you’re isolated out in space that we need social connection and it’s difficult.
I thought you meant more about the fact that you’re isolated out in space that we need social connection and it’s difficult.
Andrew Callaghan
I think it’s just a feeling of extreme insignificance that you might get sometimes when you look at the night sky, but it’s that times a thousand. It’s like an existential void that’s created after looking into the abyss and then realizing how small earth is in the grand scheme. You just start to really have a strange new perception about the pointlessness of existence.
I think it’s just a feeling of extreme insignificance that you might get sometimes when you look at the night sky, but it’s that times a thousand. It’s like an existential void that’s created after looking into the abyss and then realizing how small earth is in the grand scheme. You just start to really have a strange new perception about the pointlessness of existence.
Lex Fridman
I don’t need to go to space for that.
I don’t need to go to space for that.
Andrew Callaghan
Only a handful of people have been to space, but I’m sure they’re all pretty well off. The psychiatrist has to be in the multi-millions.
Only a handful of people have been to space, but I’m sure they’re all pretty well off. The psychiatrist has to be in the multi-millions.
Lex Fridman
Well, technically, we’re all in space because earth is in space. I wonder if you have to go to space to talk to the psychiatrist.
Well, technically, we’re all in space because earth is in space. I wonder if you have to go to space to talk to the psychiatrist.
Andrew Callaghan
Probably, so.
Probably, so.
Lex Fridman
Well, technically, we’re all in space, so that’s a boundary he can’t have.
Well, technically, we’re all in space, so that’s a boundary he can’t have.
Andrew Callaghan
Not everyone believes that, as you’ve seen from my work probably.
Not everyone believes that, as you’ve seen from my work probably.
Lex Fridman
You’re right. Those are important people that are asking important questions.
You’re right. Those are important people that are asking important questions.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Hitchhiking
Lex Fridman
You hitchhiked across us for 70 days when you were 19. Tell the story of that.
You hitchhiked across us for 70 days when you were 19. Tell the story of that.
Andrew Callaghan
Well, this connects to what I was talking about with the boredom of school and these common core classes. After my first year of school where I lived in the dorms, like an old-school dormitory building at a school in New Orleans called Loyola University. I wanted to just do something, I felt so bored. I was working for the school newspaper for that whole first year, it was called the Maroon. I didn’t have the ability to write my own stories. I had to defer to an older editor and they would give me stories to write about.
Well, this connects to what I was talking about with the boredom of school and these common core classes. After my first year of school where I lived in the dorms, like an old-school dormitory building at a school in New Orleans called Loyola University. I wanted to just do something, I felt so bored. I was working for the school newspaper for that whole first year, it was called the Maroon. I didn’t have the ability to write my own stories. I had to defer to an older editor and they would give me stories to write about.
They were all about on-campus happenings, like the Pope visits New Orleans, or glass recycling to be restored in the French Quarter or hover boards banned on campus due to safety concerns. It just felt like, all right, well, I wanted to be a gonzo reporter. I’m not sure if working my way up through the traditional newsroom hierarchy is going to get me to that point. I started reading a bunch of old hobo literature, like post World War II vagabonding stuff, and there was this book called Vagabonding in America by an old hobo named Ed Buryn. I read this and just basically, obviously, some of it was outdated. They had stuff in there, like the hobo code, like, oh, this moniker on the side of a fence means this person has free soup or something like that. They didn’t have stuff like that.
Lex Fridman
That’s great.
That’s great.
Andrew Callaghan
What it did tell me, it told me about train-stop towns, like Dunsmuir and places in Montana where there was a friendly attitude toward drifters, and that still persists from the 60s and 70s to this day. Even though, in my opinion, movies like Texas Chainsaw Massacre have ruined hitchhiking culture in America, because now everyone thinks you’re going to decapitate them if they pick you up. After my final day of courses at Loyola, I literally left all of my belongings inside my dorm and took the streetcar to the Greyhound station, got a one-Way ticket to Baton Rouge, and I was like, “I’m going to hitchhike across the whole country back to Seattle with no money.” That was the plan, and it worked out.
What it did tell me, it told me about train-stop towns, like Dunsmuir and places in Montana where there was a friendly attitude toward drifters, and that still persists from the 60s and 70s to this day. Even though, in my opinion, movies like Texas Chainsaw Massacre have ruined hitchhiking culture in America, because now everyone thinks you’re going to decapitate them if they pick you up. After my final day of courses at Loyola, I literally left all of my belongings inside my dorm and took the streetcar to the Greyhound station, got a one-Way ticket to Baton Rouge, and I was like, “I’m going to hitchhike across the whole country back to Seattle with no money.” That was the plan, and it worked out.
Lex Fridman
I love it. I traveled across the United States before in similar kind of plan.
I love it. I traveled across the United States before in similar kind of plan.
Andrew Callaghan
Were you on the silver dog? The Greyhound Bus.
Were you on the silver dog? The Greyhound Bus.
Lex Fridman
Greyhound is pretty nice.
Greyhound is pretty nice.
Andrew Callaghan
That’s a step above hitchhiking.
That’s a step above hitchhiking.
Lex Fridman
That’s way better than hitchhiking, because I don’t want to-
That’s way better than hitchhiking, because I don’t want to-
Andrew Callaghan
Hitchhiking, Greyhound, Amtrak.
Hitchhiking, Greyhound, Amtrak.
Lex Fridman
Amtrak, no, that’s elitist.
Amtrak, no, that’s elitist.
Andrew Callaghan
What’s in between Greyhound and Amtrak? A car, that’s what it is.
What’s in between Greyhound and Amtrak? A car, that’s what it is.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, it’s a car.
Yeah, it’s a car.
Andrew Callaghan
It’s a car.
It’s a car.
Lex Fridman
A shitty car.
A shitty car.
Andrew Callaghan
Okay, cool.
Okay, cool.
Lex Fridman
I lived in a shitty car.
I lived in a shitty car.
Andrew Callaghan
You lived in a car?
You lived in a car?
Lex Fridman
Yeah, when I was driving across the United States.
Yeah, when I was driving across the United States.
Andrew Callaghan
Solo?
Solo?
Lex Fridman
With a friend, some solo, and I would eat cold soup.
With a friend, some solo, and I would eat cold soup.
Andrew Callaghan
I love cold soup. What I like is the cold chickpeas in a can. You get the water out and just dump them into your mouth. Those are good. Beef jerky, KIND bars. KIND bars are really good for the road.
I love cold soup. What I like is the cold chickpeas in a can. You get the water out and just dump them into your mouth. Those are good. Beef jerky, KIND bars. KIND bars are really good for the road.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. I mean, all of that is great, but too much of it is not great. Too much cold soup, not great. Too much beef jerky, not good.
Yeah. I mean, all of that is great, but too much of it is not great. Too much cold soup, not great. Too much beef jerky, not good.
Andrew Callaghan
What was the route you took? Was it Chicago across, or was it Philadelphia across?
What was the route you took? Was it Chicago across, or was it Philadelphia across?
Lex Fridman
Philadelphia across.
Philadelphia across.
Andrew Callaghan
To LA, or where?
To LA, or where?
Lex Fridman
San Diego is a window, but it was a zigzagging, went up to Chicago and then all the way down to Texas.
San Diego is a window, but it was a zigzagging, went up to Chicago and then all the way down to Texas.
Andrew Callaghan
You went Philly, through Appalachia, up to the Midwest. Did you cut over through the Southwest down to San Diego?
You went Philly, through Appalachia, up to the Midwest. Did you cut over through the Southwest down to San Diego?
Lex Fridman
No. I went straight down to Texas, all the way down to the Midwest.
No. I went straight down to Texas, all the way down to the Midwest.
Andrew Callaghan
Did you cut from Texas West through New Mexico and Arizona to get to San Diego?
Did you cut from Texas West through New Mexico and Arizona to get to San Diego?
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Andrew Callaghan
That is the best road trip place. Interstate 40, like Albuquerque, Flagstaff, Vegas, Kingman, the Mojave Desert, Yuma, doesn’t get better.
That is the best road trip place. Interstate 40, like Albuquerque, Flagstaff, Vegas, Kingman, the Mojave Desert, Yuma, doesn’t get better.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. I mean, and you’re kids, so you don’t care and you’re throwing caution to the wind, and I met some crazy, crazy people.
Yeah. I mean, and you’re kids, so you don’t care and you’re throwing caution to the wind, and I met some crazy, crazy people.
Andrew Callaghan
It gives me some sanity whenever I’m feeling kind of out of control or bummed out, I just remembered that the road is still out there. The open road never goes anywhere, and it’s kind of like, I see an invisible door in the corner of the room all the time. That makes me more comfortable because I’m like, “Hey, at the end of the day, if I’m bummed out, I can go hit the road and I’m sure there’s going to be a fun time ahead.”
It gives me some sanity whenever I’m feeling kind of out of control or bummed out, I just remembered that the road is still out there. The open road never goes anywhere, and it’s kind of like, I see an invisible door in the corner of the room all the time. That makes me more comfortable because I’m like, “Hey, at the end of the day, if I’m bummed out, I can go hit the road and I’m sure there’s going to be a fun time ahead.”
Lex Fridman
Yeah, get that Greyhound ticket and go.
Yeah, get that Greyhound ticket and go.
Andrew Callaghan
I would say silver dog half, because sometimes I got to ride the dog when no one will pick me up. There’s some places in the country where no one is going to pick you up. Kansas, Missouri, they’re not going to do it.
I would say silver dog half, because sometimes I got to ride the dog when no one will pick me up. There’s some places in the country where no one is going to pick you up. Kansas, Missouri, they’re not going to do it.
Lex Fridman
Maybe you’re not charming enough. You thought about that?
Maybe you’re not charming enough. You thought about that?
Andrew Callaghan
I was 19, fresh, clean-shaven. I was pretty charming, I’d say.
I was 19, fresh, clean-shaven. I was pretty charming, I’d say.
Lex Fridman
All right.
All right.
Andrew Callaghan
The older you get, the harder it is to hitchhike because they think you’re an escaped convict or some type of psycho wanderer. Some of these people are like what we call punishers, it’s people who never stop talking. They see someone hitchhiking and they’re like, “Yes, I’m going to talk at this person.” You can tell their eyes are wide, they’re like, “What’s up?” You’re like, “Oh, shit.” It’s six hours of just like, oh, cool. Nice. Yeah.
The older you get, the harder it is to hitchhike because they think you’re an escaped convict or some type of psycho wanderer. Some of these people are like what we call punishers, it’s people who never stop talking. They see someone hitchhiking and they’re like, “Yes, I’m going to talk at this person.” You can tell their eyes are wide, they’re like, “What’s up?” You’re like, “Oh, shit.” It’s six hours of just like, oh, cool. Nice. Yeah.
Lex Fridman
That’s rough.
That’s rough.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
You’re right. I like people that are comfortable in silence.
You’re right. I like people that are comfortable in silence.
Andrew Callaghan
Then that also raises the question, are they about to kill me? You know what I mean?
Then that also raises the question, are they about to kill me? You know what I mean?
Lex Fridman
I think that’s a you problem, not a…
I think that’s a you problem, not a…
Andrew Callaghan
You know what’s funny? Is almost everybody who picked me up when I was hitchhiking was like a day laborer. It was almost all Mexican day laborers who picked me up.
You know what’s funny? Is almost everybody who picked me up when I was hitchhiking was like a day laborer. It was almost all Mexican day laborers who picked me up.
Lex Fridman
Oh, interesting.
Oh, interesting.
Andrew Callaghan
Because I think that in some places down there, that’s a typical thing to do, hitchhike to work. A lot of people don’t have cars, but they still have to get to their jobs. A lot of people ask me, “Hey, where should I drop you off? Where’s your job at?” I’m like, “My job is to explore.” They were down with it.
Because I think that in some places down there, that’s a typical thing to do, hitchhike to work. A lot of people don’t have cars, but they still have to get to their jobs. A lot of people ask me, “Hey, where should I drop you off? Where’s your job at?” I’m like, “My job is to explore.” They were down with it.
Lex Fridman
See, for me, it was really easy because you just say, I’m traveling across the United States. I think people love that idea and they want to help. They romanticize, because they also have that invisible door. Everybody has that invisible door, I just want to go.
See, for me, it was really easy because you just say, I’m traveling across the United States. I think people love that idea and they want to help. They romanticize, because they also have that invisible door. Everybody has that invisible door, I just want to go.
Andrew Callaghan
You know what I’m talking about.
You know what I’m talking about.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. I mean, I don’t think-
Yeah. I mean, I don’t think-
Andrew Callaghan
It can anchor you a bit, just to remind you that every pattern that I’ve fallen into is voluntary, and it’s for my own stability and mental health.
It can anchor you a bit, just to remind you that every pattern that I’ve fallen into is voluntary, and it’s for my own stability and mental health.
Lex Fridman
Well, that’s why I’m renting everything and I’m making sure tomorrow I can just go. I gave away everything I own twice in my life, just very like, I’m ready to go tonight. Let’s go.
Well, that’s why I’m renting everything and I’m making sure tomorrow I can just go. I gave away everything I own twice in my life, just very like, I’m ready to go tonight. Let’s go.
Andrew Callaghan
What’s the hardest item you’ve had to part with in this experience?
What’s the hardest item you’ve had to part with in this experience?
Lex Fridman
There’s nothing.
There’s nothing.
Andrew Callaghan
You’ve never had a material object that was really hard to let go of?
You’ve never had a material object that was really hard to let go of?
Lex Fridman
No.
No.
Andrew Callaghan
You’d give that watch to somebody if it meant object?
You’d give that watch to somebody if it meant object?
Lex Fridman
You’re right. That’s probably the only, I’ve never had to let go of that though. That’s the only thing I own. This means a lot to me, but everything else. Then again, listen, because this watch is given to me by Rogan, who’s become a close friend. Whenever I romanticize the notion that this watch means a lot to me, he’s like, “Don’t worry about it. I’ll just get you the same one again.” I was like, “God damn it.”
You’re right. That’s probably the only, I’ve never had to let go of that though. That’s the only thing I own. This means a lot to me, but everything else. Then again, listen, because this watch is given to me by Rogan, who’s become a close friend. Whenever I romanticize the notion that this watch means a lot to me, he’s like, “Don’t worry about it. I’ll just get you the same one again.” I was like, “God damn it.”
Andrew Callaghan
It’s a pretty sick ass gift though.
It’s a pretty sick ass gift though.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, it’s pretty sick. I’m not usually a gift guy, but when somebody you look up to gives you a thing, it’s a nice little symbol of that relationship, so it’s nice. Other than that, no. Even this, whatever. The relationship is what matters, the human is what matters, not the…
Yeah, it’s pretty sick. I’m not usually a gift guy, but when somebody you look up to gives you a thing, it’s a nice little symbol of that relationship, so it’s nice. Other than that, no. Even this, whatever. The relationship is what matters, the human is what matters, not the…
Andrew Callaghan
Agree, 100%.
Agree, 100%.
Lex Fridman
You had something like this?
You had something like this?
Andrew Callaghan
Not really. I mean, there was a hard drive that I lost that had all of my childhood pictures on it and stuff like that, that I think about all the time because I left it on a train. Certain memories, you think about it, you just get off. I just think to myself, someone has that somewhere. I have dreams about reuniting with the hard drive.
Not really. I mean, there was a hard drive that I lost that had all of my childhood pictures on it and stuff like that, that I think about all the time because I left it on a train. Certain memories, you think about it, you just get off. I just think to myself, someone has that somewhere. I have dreams about reuniting with the hard drive.
Lex Fridman
You and Hunter Biden have the similar kind of dream.
You and Hunter Biden have the similar kind of dream.
Andrew Callaghan
I don’t think he wants to reunite with that one. Dude, it’s crazy. All he did was smoke crack, right? Or was there more stuff going on?
I don’t think he wants to reunite with that one. Dude, it’s crazy. All he did was smoke crack, right? Or was there more stuff going on?
Lex Fridman
I think there’s prostitutes involved.
I think there’s prostitutes involved.
Andrew Callaghan
Oh, okay. Whatever.
Oh, okay. Whatever.
Lex Fridman
I think you got to look into it.
I think you got to look into it.
Andrew Callaghan
I think I have to look into it too.
I think I have to look into it too.
Lex Fridman
I don’t know. Was Jack Kerouac somebody that was an inspiration at all in this road trip?
I don’t know. Was Jack Kerouac somebody that was an inspiration at all in this road trip?
Andrew Callaghan
No.
No.
Lex Fridman
Did you even know who that is?
Did you even know who that is?
Andrew Callaghan
No.
No.
Lex Fridman
The Beat Generation and all of this?
The Beat Generation and all of this?
Andrew Callaghan
I didn’t know who it was, and then after I did the… Ultimately, I wrote a book about my hitchhiking experience years later, and everyone was like, “Have you read On the Road?” Then On the Road, I probably heard the title of that book every day, at least 10 times for two years. I’m sure Kerouac is a great guy. I mean, I’m not too familiar with the Beat Generation.
I didn’t know who it was, and then after I did the… Ultimately, I wrote a book about my hitchhiking experience years later, and everyone was like, “Have you read On the Road?” Then On the Road, I probably heard the title of that book every day, at least 10 times for two years. I’m sure Kerouac is a great guy. I mean, I’m not too familiar with the Beat Generation.
Lex Fridman
It’s a great book. You read it, or no?
It’s a great book. You read it, or no?
Andrew Callaghan
I refuse to read it. People even have gifted it to me, being like, “Hey, man, you’re going to love this one.” I’m like, “Is that On the Road?” Honestly, people have given me a book with wrapping paper on it, and they’re like, “This is right up your alley.” I was like, ” That’s fucking On the Road, isn’t it?”
I refuse to read it. People even have gifted it to me, being like, “Hey, man, you’re going to love this one.” I’m like, “Is that On the Road?” Honestly, people have given me a book with wrapping paper on it, and they’re like, “This is right up your alley.” I was like, ” That’s fucking On the Road, isn’t it?”
Lex Fridman
They give you a different cover.
They give you a different cover.
Andrew Callaghan
I’m like, “Anything, but that.” I’m sure it’s a great book, it’s just the comparison thing drives me crazy. Big respect to Kerouac. Would never speak down on anyone in the Beat Generation.
I’m like, “Anything, but that.” I’m sure it’s a great book, it’s just the comparison thing drives me crazy. Big respect to Kerouac. Would never speak down on anyone in the Beat Generation.
Lex Fridman
What are some interesting moments you remember from that, those 70 days?
What are some interesting moments you remember from that, those 70 days?
Andrew Callaghan
Man, there was so much. I mean, getting mistaken for a gay prostitute on my first hitchhiking ride in Louisiana was pretty funny.
Man, there was so much. I mean, getting mistaken for a gay prostitute on my first hitchhiking ride in Louisiana was pretty funny.
Lex Fridman
I can see that. Where did you come from and where did you go?
I can see that. Where did you come from and where did you go?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, I mean, the journey began in Baton Rouge, and the first destination was Houston, which is about four and a half hours west on Interstate 10. I’m in Crowley, Louisiana, I’m on the side of the road, and I guess this was a cruising truck stop. It was known for being a place where male lot lizards would go to procure clients, and I was there.
Well, I mean, the journey began in Baton Rouge, and the first destination was Houston, which is about four and a half hours west on Interstate 10. I’m in Crowley, Louisiana, I’m on the side of the road, and I guess this was a cruising truck stop. It was known for being a place where male lot lizards would go to procure clients, and I was there.
Lex Fridman
Lot lizards are?
Lot lizards are?
Andrew Callaghan
It’s a derogatory term in trucker culture for a prostitute who hangs out at the Love’s or Pilot Flying J. Large interstate truck stops. Now, trucker culture as it once is pretty much finished because of the live stream cameras they have inside of the trucks now, so you can’t snort Sudafed or pick up anybody. You can’t even pick up a hitchhiker or you get fired.
It’s a derogatory term in trucker culture for a prostitute who hangs out at the Love’s or Pilot Flying J. Large interstate truck stops. Now, trucker culture as it once is pretty much finished because of the live stream cameras they have inside of the trucks now, so you can’t snort Sudafed or pick up anybody. You can’t even pick up a hitchhiker or you get fired.
Lex Fridman
Killed all the romance.
Killed all the romance.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, definitely, the old-school outlaw trucker lifestyle. Unless you’re an owner operator who’s not even in a union, which is a real cowboy way to haul loads, you can’t do that.
Yeah, definitely, the old-school outlaw trucker lifestyle. Unless you’re an owner operator who’s not even in a union, which is a real cowboy way to haul loads, you can’t do that.
Lex Fridman
You were mistaken for a lot lizard?
You were mistaken for a lot lizard?
Andrew Callaghan
Mistaken for a lot lizard by a small man from Honduras with a spiky leather jacket covered in studs.
Mistaken for a lot lizard by a small man from Honduras with a spiky leather jacket covered in studs.
Lex Fridman
Nice.
Nice.
Andrew Callaghan
Didn’t speak any English, but I thought he was just a nice guy, and then he pulled over at a… There’s private theaters in the South where they have confessional booths set up and they have three channels and people go in there and, you know.
Didn’t speak any English, but I thought he was just a nice guy, and then he pulled over at a… There’s private theaters in the South where they have confessional booths set up and they have three channels and people go in there and, you know.
Lex Fridman
Porn?
Porn?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, People go in there and please themselves.
Yeah, People go in there and please themselves.
Lex Fridman
Masturbate?
Masturbate?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. I thought he was taking me to one of those, and I was like, “All right, cool, man.” If this guy wants to go jerk off, I’m just going to wait in the car. It’s all good. I don’t discriminate. Then I was like, he buys a booth for me, and I’m like, “Okay.”
Yeah. I thought he was taking me to one of those, and I was like, “All right, cool, man.” If this guy wants to go jerk off, I’m just going to wait in the car. It’s all good. I don’t discriminate. Then I was like, he buys a booth for me, and I’m like, “Okay.”
Lex Fridman
That’s nice.
That’s nice.
Andrew Callaghan
I’m not really in the mood to watch porn with this random guy. He gets in the same booth as me and he starts jerking off right next to me and I’m like, “Oh, man.” I don’t think this is chill. I’m like, “Dude, can you stop jacking off?” He’s like, “What do you mean? I thought this is what you want to do. I have money for you. What’s up?” I was like, “Oh, no, I’m just a regular guy.” He was super cool about it. He started laughing. He was like, “Oh, my bad, man. I thought you were selling something.” I said, “No.” He said, “Oh, it’s all good.” He gave me a ride all the way to Houston.
I’m not really in the mood to watch porn with this random guy. He gets in the same booth as me and he starts jerking off right next to me and I’m like, “Oh, man.” I don’t think this is chill. I’m like, “Dude, can you stop jacking off?” He’s like, “What do you mean? I thought this is what you want to do. I have money for you. What’s up?” I was like, “Oh, no, I’m just a regular guy.” He was super cool about it. He started laughing. He was like, “Oh, my bad, man. I thought you were selling something.” I said, “No.” He said, “Oh, it’s all good.” He gave me a ride all the way to Houston.
Lex Fridman
That’s great.
That’s great.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, we talked about anything except that for the rest of the car ride.
Yeah, we talked about anything except that for the rest of the car ride.
Lex Fridman
That’s great, you just rolled with it. Oh, sorry about that.
That’s great, you just rolled with it. Oh, sorry about that.
Andrew Callaghan
I had about a foot and a half on this, guys.
I had about a foot and a half on this, guys.
Lex Fridman
Honest mistake.
Honest mistake.
Andrew Callaghan
I wasn’t too scared, I also had a knife in my pocket, but I didn’t want to stab him, especially not at a place like that.
I wasn’t too scared, I also had a knife in my pocket, but I didn’t want to stab him, especially not at a place like that.
Lex Fridman
That didn’t leave a bad taste in your mouth, stuff like that?
That didn’t leave a bad taste in your mouth, stuff like that?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, I figured that can’t happen again. It can’t keep happening. Because I was like, all right, if I got this out of the way the first ride, the following rides are going to be spectacular.
Well, I figured that can’t happen again. It can’t keep happening. Because I was like, all right, if I got this out of the way the first ride, the following rides are going to be spectacular.
Lex Fridman
I mean, who among us have not been mistaken for a lot lizard?
I mean, who among us have not been mistaken for a lot lizard?
Andrew Callaghan
It’s a fact. You heard it here first.
It’s a fact. You heard it here first.
Couch surfing
Lex Fridman
What else? What’s some interesting, beautiful people that you’ve met along the way?
What else? What’s some interesting, beautiful people that you’ve met along the way?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, I used the app Couchsurfing to find places to stay.
Well, I used the app Couchsurfing to find places to stay.
Lex Fridman
Nice. I remember Couchsurfing.
Nice. I remember Couchsurfing.
Andrew Callaghan
Now you can only submit like five Couchsurfing requests a day, unless you’re a premium member, which means you also host people.
Now you can only submit like five Couchsurfing requests a day, unless you’re a premium member, which means you also host people.
Lex Fridman
Wait, Couchsurfing is still around?
Wait, Couchsurfing is still around?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, totally.
Yeah, totally.
Andrew Callaghan
Oh, nice.
Oh, nice.
Lex Fridman
It’s evolved obviously into a different thing.
It’s evolved obviously into a different thing.
Andrew Callaghan
Airbnb is a kind of competitor to that, right?
Airbnb is a kind of competitor to that, right?
Andrew Callaghan
Couchsurfing is free though. Couchsurfing, they call it the CS community. Basically, there’d be these Couchsurfing super hosts in different cities. There was one in Santa Fe, this firefighter dude who had 15 other couch-surfers there, chilling.
Couchsurfing is free though. Couchsurfing, they call it the CS community. Basically, there’d be these Couchsurfing super hosts in different cities. There was one in Santa Fe, this firefighter dude who had 15 other couch-surfers there, chilling.
Lex Fridman
Nice.
Nice.
Andrew Callaghan
I would do it everywhere. A lot of them were Catholics, so it was their way of giving back. A lot of them were nudists. I didn’t realize that there’s a small little section at the bottom of someone’s Couchsurfing profile that says clothing optional. That means if you go there, I thought it meant like it’s cool if you walk to the bathroom in your underwear. No, if you go there, everyone is going to be butt naked. I made that mistake a few times, not that I’m anti-nudist, but I wasn’t ready to take that leap of faith. It was just great. Couchsurfing hosts were amazing. That was just great. It was this constant thing where I felt like, wow, people were so welcoming. I’m not having to pay them a dollar for this experience. I
I would do it everywhere. A lot of them were Catholics, so it was their way of giving back. A lot of them were nudists. I didn’t realize that there’s a small little section at the bottom of someone’s Couchsurfing profile that says clothing optional. That means if you go there, I thought it meant like it’s cool if you walk to the bathroom in your underwear. No, if you go there, everyone is going to be butt naked. I made that mistake a few times, not that I’m anti-nudist, but I wasn’t ready to take that leap of faith. It was just great. Couchsurfing hosts were amazing. That was just great. It was this constant thing where I felt like, wow, people were so welcoming. I’m not having to pay them a dollar for this experience. I
Lex Fridman
I love Couchsurfing. For like, again, for me, being an introvert, just crashing on a person’s couch, being essentially forced into a great conversation is great.
I love Couchsurfing. For like, again, for me, being an introvert, just crashing on a person’s couch, being essentially forced into a great conversation is great.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. The one thing that gets exhausting about hitchhiking is constantly thanking people, being in constant superficial gratitude everywhere all the time like, oh, thanks for letting me sleep on your couch. Thanks for the food. Part of the reason I wanted to live in an RV later in life is to avoid having to constantly live in this like, thanks so much type of frequency, because it’s exhaust-
Yeah. The one thing that gets exhausting about hitchhiking is constantly thanking people, being in constant superficial gratitude everywhere all the time like, oh, thanks for letting me sleep on your couch. Thanks for the food. Part of the reason I wanted to live in an RV later in life is to avoid having to constantly live in this like, thanks so much type of frequency, because it’s exhaust-
Andrew Callaghan
… live in this thanks so much type of frequency. Because it’s exhausting to constantly, “Hey man, thanks.”
… live in this thanks so much type of frequency. Because it’s exhausting to constantly, “Hey man, thanks.”
Lex Fridman
I think the shallowness of that interaction is exhausting, not the thanks.
I think the shallowness of that interaction is exhausting, not the thanks.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. It was a true favor, of course I love giving people gratitude for that. But just this thing where everyone who picks you up… You get eight rides a day, you’re thanking eight people a day like they’re the second coming of Jesus. You start to feel a little bit debased.
Yeah. It was a true favor, of course I love giving people gratitude for that. But just this thing where everyone who picks you up… You get eight rides a day, you’re thanking eight people a day like they’re the second coming of Jesus. You start to feel a little bit debased.
Lex Fridman
What’d you learn about people from that journey? That’s your first time really going into it.
What’d you learn about people from that journey? That’s your first time really going into it.
Andrew Callaghan
That the American public is just so kind overall. They’re so embracing depending on who you are. And specifically though, the Christian family people of the US who drive in minivans and have that fish sticker on the back where it’s Jesus’ fish, and then they have the family sticker where each member of the family is a stick figure, those people never picked me up and would flip me off with their whole family. Sometimes they would throw full Dr. Peppers at me, as a family, while I stood on the side of the road.
That the American public is just so kind overall. They’re so embracing depending on who you are. And specifically though, the Christian family people of the US who drive in minivans and have that fish sticker on the back where it’s Jesus’ fish, and then they have the family sticker where each member of the family is a stick figure, those people never picked me up and would flip me off with their whole family. Sometimes they would throw full Dr. Peppers at me, as a family, while I stood on the side of the road.
Lex Fridman
As a family, together.
As a family, together.
Andrew Callaghan
They’d yell shit like, “Go to hell hippie,” when I was on the side of the road. And so, it’s weird that the most charitable Christian American family values people never gave me any charity or even conversation. They were antagonizing me and saw me as a hippie leftover from the ’60s who needed to go to work, go to Vietnam. I don’t get it. But the people who really extended a hand to me is people on the margins. People working on seasonal visas, people whose cars have less than a quarter tank left, people struggling with addiction. Who saw me struggling, or at least they thought that I was because they assumed I was hitchhiking not out of adventure but because I had no car, and were willing to sacrifice their day almost sometimes to take me exactly where I needed to go.
They’d yell shit like, “Go to hell hippie,” when I was on the side of the road. And so, it’s weird that the most charitable Christian American family values people never gave me any charity or even conversation. They were antagonizing me and saw me as a hippie leftover from the ’60s who needed to go to work, go to Vietnam. I don’t get it. But the people who really extended a hand to me is people on the margins. People working on seasonal visas, people whose cars have less than a quarter tank left, people struggling with addiction. Who saw me struggling, or at least they thought that I was because they assumed I was hitchhiking not out of adventure but because I had no car, and were willing to sacrifice their day almost sometimes to take me exactly where I needed to go.
Lex Fridman
That’s beautiful, man. I’ve had similar kind of experience that people who are struggling the most are the ones who are willing to help you when you’re struggling.
That’s beautiful, man. I’ve had similar kind of experience that people who are struggling the most are the ones who are willing to help you when you’re struggling.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
There’s people in religious contexts and other kind of communities that just judge others. Because they’ve constructed a value system where they’re better than others because of that value system, and that actually has a cascade that forces you to actually be kind of a dick.
There’s people in religious contexts and other kind of communities that just judge others. Because they’ve constructed a value system where they’re better than others because of that value system, and that actually has a cascade that forces you to actually be kind of a dick.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, I never thought about that. That’s so true. Do you think about morality and religion a lot?
Yeah, I never thought about that. That’s so true. Do you think about morality and religion a lot?
Lex Fridman
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I’ve been to certain parts of the world where religion is really a big part of life. I’m just always skeptical about tribes of people that believe a thing and they believe they’re better than others because they believe that thing. That could be nations, that could be religions. I mean, in Ukraine and Russia, I’ve seen a lot of hate towards the other. And that hate, I’m always very skeptical of. Because it could be used by powerful people to direct that hate just so the powerful people can maintain power and get money. This kind of stuff.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I’ve been to certain parts of the world where religion is really a big part of life. I’m just always skeptical about tribes of people that believe a thing and they believe they’re better than others because they believe that thing. That could be nations, that could be religions. I mean, in Ukraine and Russia, I’ve seen a lot of hate towards the other. And that hate, I’m always very skeptical of. Because it could be used by powerful people to direct that hate just so the powerful people can maintain power and get money. This kind of stuff.
Andrew Callaghan
It’s a scary thing to see how easy it is for high up political people to mobilize the hate of just the average working person and can almost convince them to sabotage their own countrymen, who they share more in common with than the politician they look up to, just to advance the agenda of one party. That’s what we’re seeing now.
It’s a scary thing to see how easy it is for high up political people to mobilize the hate of just the average working person and can almost convince them to sabotage their own countrymen, who they share more in common with than the politician they look up to, just to advance the agenda of one party. That’s what we’re seeing now.
Lex Fridman
Are there some places in America that are better than others? Can you speak negatively of… Like aforementioned Joe Rogan talked about Connecticut nonstop. Can you pick a region in the United States you can talk shit about?
Are there some places in America that are better than others? Can you speak negatively of… Like aforementioned Joe Rogan talked about Connecticut nonstop. Can you pick a region in the United States you can talk shit about?
Andrew Callaghan
To talk shit about? Oh, for sure.
To talk shit about? Oh, for sure.
Lex Fridman
Or, from that experience. Let’s just narrow it down to that.
Or, from that experience. Let’s just narrow it down to that.
Andrew Callaghan
Oh, Colorado. Oh, jeez.
Oh, Colorado. Oh, jeez.
Lex Fridman
Really?
Really?
Andrew Callaghan
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
I know so many people that love Colorado.
I know so many people that love Colorado.
Andrew Callaghan
Dude, Dallas, Denver. I used to think Phoenix sucks, but I love Phoenix now. The way they build these cities to just be so circular and massive, it’s just like, “Stop.”
Dude, Dallas, Denver. I used to think Phoenix sucks, but I love Phoenix now. The way they build these cities to just be so circular and massive, it’s just like, “Stop.”
Lex Fridman
You don’t like circles?
You don’t like circles?
Andrew Callaghan
I like grids, man.
I like grids, man.
Lex Fridman
Oh, you’re a grid guy.
Oh, you’re a grid guy.
Andrew Callaghan
Manhattan, New Orleans, San Francisco.
Manhattan, New Orleans, San Francisco.
Lex Fridman
What is it about grids that bring out the worst in people? Circles is where everyone is just-
What is it about grids that bring out the worst in people? Circles is where everyone is just-
Andrew Callaghan
Everyone’s just vibing out, loosey-goosey, but the grid gets people locked in hateful. I don’t know, man.
Everyone’s just vibing out, loosey-goosey, but the grid gets people locked in hateful. I don’t know, man.
Lex Fridman
I’ve never heard anyone talk shit about Colorado, I have to say. It’s kind of refreshing because it provides a necessary balance for the Colorado Wikipedia page.
I’ve never heard anyone talk shit about Colorado, I have to say. It’s kind of refreshing because it provides a necessary balance for the Colorado Wikipedia page.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. Oh, Oregon too. I got problems with Oregon.
Yeah. Oh, Oregon too. I got problems with Oregon.
Lex Fridman
Oregon?
Oregon?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. Well, here’s the issue. And I don’t like just calling people racist because it’s kind of a two-dimensional insult, but you have the most racist state with the most psychotic anarchist city in the middle of it. What is going on up there? How did this happen? The yin and the yang is so extreme that there must be something in the [inaudible 00:39:43].
Yeah. Well, here’s the issue. And I don’t like just calling people racist because it’s kind of a two-dimensional insult, but you have the most racist state with the most psychotic anarchist city in the middle of it. What is going on up there? How did this happen? The yin and the yang is so extreme that there must be something in the [inaudible 00:39:43].
Lex Fridman
What do you have against anarchism?
What do you have against anarchism?
Andrew Callaghan
Nothing. I used to be an anarchist. When I was in eighth grade, I had his friend named Mads who was part of a group called Seattle Solidarity, which is like an Antifa precursor. So, I grew up going to black bloc protests.
Nothing. I used to be an anarchist. When I was in eighth grade, I had his friend named Mads who was part of a group called Seattle Solidarity, which is like an Antifa precursor. So, I grew up going to black bloc protests.
There was a particular shooting, the murder of John Williams, who is a Native American woodcarver in downtown Seattle. He got killed by a Seattle police officer named Ian Burke. John Williams was carving a pipe from a woodblock with a pocket knife. He’s deaf in one ear. Officer pulls a gun on him and says, “Put it down.” He doesn’t hear him. He shoots him six seconds later. That police involved shooting is what instantly turned me into a very critical of law enforcement kind of person when I was super young. As someone who used to see this guy who got murdered… He was a 55-year-old man. I used to see him around Pike Place where my mom lived. It’s a public market in downtown. That to me, put me into the anarchist political sphere, just channeling the anger of that experience. And the officer got no charges by the way. You can look up the video. It’s horrific. And it didn’t get reported. The officer, I’m pretty sure, is still active duty.
Situations like that early in life channeled me toward political extremism. But I grew up to realize how incompatible that anarchistic worldview is with reality and with American society. It can only exist in a small, little chamber. You can’t apply that to the industrial heartland of the country.
Lex Fridman
And I think also, anarchism… I’ve gotten to know Michael Malice who’s written quite a bit about anarchism. And it also exists as a body of literature about different philosophical notions that resist the state, the ever expanding state in different kinds of ways. It’s always nice to have extreme thought experiments to understand what kind of society we want to build, but implementing it may not necessarily be a good idea.
And I think also, anarchism… I’ve gotten to know Michael Malice who’s written quite a bit about anarchism. And it also exists as a body of literature about different philosophical notions that resist the state, the ever expanding state in different kinds of ways. It’s always nice to have extreme thought experiments to understand what kind of society we want to build, but implementing it may not necessarily be a good idea.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. Emma Goldman, I’m a huge fan of her writing. Also, the prison abolitionists that are associated with the anarchist movement, Angela Davis, Ruth Wilson Gilmore, all that stuff, influential. I still adhere to a lot of those principles when talking about stuff like radical prison reform and stuff like that. But I drifted more toward having a more open mind as I got older.
Yeah. Emma Goldman, I’m a huge fan of her writing. Also, the prison abolitionists that are associated with the anarchist movement, Angela Davis, Ruth Wilson Gilmore, all that stuff, influential. I still adhere to a lot of those principles when talking about stuff like radical prison reform and stuff like that. But I drifted more toward having a more open mind as I got older.
Lex Fridman
Extremism implemented in almost all of its forms is probably going to cause a lot of suffering.
Extremism implemented in almost all of its forms is probably going to cause a lot of suffering.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Quarter Confessions
Lex Fridman
You worked as a doorman on the, I could say, legendary Bourbon Street in New Orleans.
You worked as a doorman on the, I could say, legendary Bourbon Street in New Orleans.
Andrew Callaghan
That’s right.
That’s right.
Lex Fridman
Where you saw what you described as… This might be another Wikipedia quote by the way. This is where I do my research.
Where you saw what you described as… This might be another Wikipedia quote by the way. This is where I do my research.
Andrew Callaghan
Does it say hellish scenes?
Does it say hellish scenes?
Lex Fridman
Hellish scenes, in quotes.
Hellish scenes, in quotes.
Andrew Callaghan
Wikipedia is damn right about that.
Wikipedia is damn right about that.
Lex Fridman
All right, thank you. That’s a win. That’s one in the win column. So yeah, tell the story of that. What’s it like to work on Bourbon Street? What kind of stuff did you see?
All right, thank you. That’s a win. That’s one in the win column. So yeah, tell the story of that. What’s it like to work on Bourbon Street? What kind of stuff did you see?
Andrew Callaghan
I was a host at a fine dining restaurant on the corner of Bourbon and Iberville. That’s the first street if you go from Canal Street onto the corridor. This is across from a daiquiri spot. It’s the middle of the tourist corridor of New Orleans. And the spot was kind of a tourist trap. It was called Bourbon House. The food was good. Chef Eric, I don’t want you to see this and think you don’t make good end dewy sausages. But it was overpriced. We had to maintain this fine dining facade on a street where almost everyone is throwing up fighting or is half naked.
I was a host at a fine dining restaurant on the corner of Bourbon and Iberville. That’s the first street if you go from Canal Street onto the corridor. This is across from a daiquiri spot. It’s the middle of the tourist corridor of New Orleans. And the spot was kind of a tourist trap. It was called Bourbon House. The food was good. Chef Eric, I don’t want you to see this and think you don’t make good end dewy sausages. But it was overpriced. We had to maintain this fine dining facade on a street where almost everyone is throwing up fighting or is half naked.
There was this policy. We had these giant glass windows next to the tables. So if you’re eating at a Bourbon House, you can look out onto Bourbon Street and you can see as you’re dining, a full panoramic view of all these partiers throwing beads, boobs, all that. We had this policy where if we’re serving someone, we can’t look onto Bourbon Street if something crazy is happening. So if there’s a fight or something like that, we can’t look. I remember I’m fucking serving a table. There’s a dude in a Batman mask, butt naked, with 12 pairs of beads, just jerking it, back to jerking it.
Lex Fridman
Full on.
Full on.
Andrew Callaghan
He’s jerking it, right? And every single person at the restaurant’s out there like, “Look.” They’re taking pictures. And the manager Stephen looks at me, he is like, “Keep your fucking eyes on the table.” So I’m serving these people and I’m like, “You like red beans and rice, or would you like something Creole?” And there’s just this dude. And ultimately, the manager went out and escorted him further down Bourbon Street.
He’s jerking it, right? And every single person at the restaurant’s out there like, “Look.” They’re taking pictures. And the manager Stephen looks at me, he is like, “Keep your fucking eyes on the table.” So I’m serving these people and I’m like, “You like red beans and rice, or would you like something Creole?” And there’s just this dude. And ultimately, the manager went out and escorted him further down Bourbon Street.
But I would get off work at around midnight every night. And that was when Bourbon Street is at its most chaotic. I lived in the French Quarter as well. I lived about 12 blocks down Bourbon, in a small Creole cottage, in a cute little orange, old-school New Orleans, one story spot. I lived in the attic above these gay meth dealers named Frankie and Johnny.
Lex Fridman
Oh, wow.
Oh, wow.
Andrew Callaghan
So, I would get off work and I would basically have to walk through this battlefield. I mean, it was a battlefield. Getting home was out of the Warriors movie.
So, I would get off work and I would basically have to walk through this battlefield. I mean, it was a battlefield. Getting home was out of the Warriors movie.
Lex Fridman
The best of humanity on display.
The best of humanity on display.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. It was like Kensington, Philadelphia, but just alcohol. You know what I mean?
Yeah. It was like Kensington, Philadelphia, but just alcohol. You know what I mean?
Lex Fridman
Oh, it’s all alcohol. But it’s a lot of visitors, right, from outside?
Oh, it’s all alcohol. But it’s a lot of visitors, right, from outside?
Andrew Callaghan
Almost all visitors. And that would set the floor for the weekend. For example, if the Raiders were playing the Saints, Raider Nation. And they do not play around. If it’s the Patriots, that’s a whole different crowd. They think they’re better than everybody else.
Almost all visitors. And that would set the floor for the weekend. For example, if the Raiders were playing the Saints, Raider Nation. And they do not play around. If it’s the Patriots, that’s a whole different crowd. They think they’re better than everybody else.
Lex Fridman
Well, they technically are better than everybody else, but yeah.
Well, they technically are better than everybody else, but yeah.
Andrew Callaghan
But people from Massachusetts aren’t like the cream of the crop in terms of American superiority.
But people from Massachusetts aren’t like the cream of the crop in terms of American superiority.
Lex Fridman
Strong words, yeah.
Strong words, yeah.
Andrew Callaghan
No offense, but I mean.
No offense, but I mean.
Lex Fridman
No, I’m sure they won’t take that as an offense.
No, I’m sure they won’t take that as an offense.
Andrew Callaghan
They are good at fighting though, I’ll tell you that.
They are good at fighting though, I’ll tell you that.
Lex Fridman
All right. Great.
All right. Great.
Andrew Callaghan
New England has hands compared to some places.
New England has hands compared to some places.
Lex Fridman
Which places are those? Colorado?
Which places are those? Colorado?
Andrew Callaghan
Colorado has no hands. The West Coast, not too much hands.
Colorado has no hands. The West Coast, not too much hands.
Lex Fridman
That’s why you feel safe talking shit about Colorado.
That’s why you feel safe talking shit about Colorado.
Andrew Callaghan
But if you get to the corn-fed parts of East Colorado, these guys got hands bigger than my head, they’ll beat the of me. But anyways, I’d walk back to my house on Bourbon Street and I would be sifting through this battlefield. And I had a friend at the time who was like, “Yo, we should do a taxi cab confessions type spin-off,” where we ask people to confess a deep dark secret and we post it the next day. We tried that and it went viral on Instagram instantly. It was mostly incest stories, people admitting to incest. I know it’s a common southern stereotype, but there’s some truth to it. There were some murder confessions. That was pretty crazy. We never really posted any of those.
But if you get to the corn-fed parts of East Colorado, these guys got hands bigger than my head, they’ll beat the of me. But anyways, I’d walk back to my house on Bourbon Street and I would be sifting through this battlefield. And I had a friend at the time who was like, “Yo, we should do a taxi cab confessions type spin-off,” where we ask people to confess a deep dark secret and we post it the next day. We tried that and it went viral on Instagram instantly. It was mostly incest stories, people admitting to incest. I know it’s a common southern stereotype, but there’s some truth to it. There were some murder confessions. That was pretty crazy. We never really posted any of those.
Lex Fridman
How did you get people to confess?
How did you get people to confess?
Andrew Callaghan
Pretty easy. And New Orleans has a homicide solve rate of 22%. So, most of the time, they’ll just tell you. I remember I was walking down Bourbon and I asked this kid, I was like, “What’s your deepest, darkest secret?” And he told me, he’s like, “I just smoked a dude in the Magnolia.” It’s a project house in the third ward, project development. And he said, “I just smoked a dude in the Magnolia playground for touching my sister,” molesting his sister. And I was like, “What?” And he was like, “Yeah, look it up.” And I was like, “All right, hold on.” And it was like, man found dead in Central City playground, appeared to be homeless, shot execution style. So I told the kid, I was like, “Why’d you tell me that?” He’s like, “Man, put that out there. I’m trying to go viral. Tag me too.”
Pretty easy. And New Orleans has a homicide solve rate of 22%. So, most of the time, they’ll just tell you. I remember I was walking down Bourbon and I asked this kid, I was like, “What’s your deepest, darkest secret?” And he told me, he’s like, “I just smoked a dude in the Magnolia.” It’s a project house in the third ward, project development. And he said, “I just smoked a dude in the Magnolia playground for touching my sister,” molesting his sister. And I was like, “What?” And he was like, “Yeah, look it up.” And I was like, “All right, hold on.” And it was like, man found dead in Central City playground, appeared to be homeless, shot execution style. So I told the kid, I was like, “Why’d you tell me that?” He’s like, “Man, put that out there. I’m trying to go viral. Tag me too.”
Lex Fridman
Oh, wow.
Oh, wow.
Andrew Callaghan
Dude, I don’t think you understand that even if you’re a juvenile, he was probably 15, you can get juvenile life in Louisiana for a homicide even if it’s justified. So, I just deleted the footage in front of him. I was like, “I’m going to delete this footage. See that trash button? I’m hitting it right now. Don’t tell anyone that again.” And he was like, “All right, I appreciate it,” and he walked off. It’s the little moments like that I always remember.
Dude, I don’t think you understand that even if you’re a juvenile, he was probably 15, you can get juvenile life in Louisiana for a homicide even if it’s justified. So, I just deleted the footage in front of him. I was like, “I’m going to delete this footage. See that trash button? I’m hitting it right now. Don’t tell anyone that again.” And he was like, “All right, I appreciate it,” and he walked off. It’s the little moments like that I always remember.
Lex Fridman
Anything for the Gram, I guess.
Anything for the Gram, I guess.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. After a while though, it became repetitive. Because there’s only so many things that people can confess to that go viral.
Yeah. After a while though, it became repetitive. Because there’s only so many things that people can confess to that go viral.
Lex Fridman
Oh, so you were trying to see what?
Oh, so you were trying to see what?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, I mean, there’s the incest one. Some people just say, “I eat ass.” Everyone said that. Or, I cheated on someone.
Well, I mean, there’s the incest one. Some people just say, “I eat ass.” Everyone said that. Or, I cheated on someone.
Lex Fridman
I’ve seen a surprising number of people on your channel mention eating ass.
I’ve seen a surprising number of people on your channel mention eating ass.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. How seriously you said that will live in my head for the rest of my life.
Yeah. How seriously you said that will live in my head for the rest of my life.
Lex Fridman
That’s good. I want to live in your head saying that a lot of people mentioned eating ass.
That’s good. I want to live in your head saying that a lot of people mentioned eating ass.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, a lot of people do mention that. Also, that’s kind of where I developed this magnetism for freestyle rapping. Everywhere I go, people rap, not sure why. I mean, as a former rapper myself in middle school and for the first year of high school, I think that maybe it takes one to know one. But everywhere I go, people start rapping. If you and me went outside of this podcast studio and walked around for five minutes, I could find somebody.
Yeah, a lot of people do mention that. Also, that’s kind of where I developed this magnetism for freestyle rapping. Everywhere I go, people rap, not sure why. I mean, as a former rapper myself in middle school and for the first year of high school, I think that maybe it takes one to know one. But everywhere I go, people start rapping. If you and me went outside of this podcast studio and walked around for five minutes, I could find somebody.
Lex Fridman
Who is rapping.
Who is rapping.
Andrew Callaghan
I can tell who raps or who can rap, who has eight bars in their head that they’re ready to go.
I can tell who raps or who can rap, who has eight bars in their head that they’re ready to go.
Lex Fridman
I think also, there’s something about you that creates the safe space to perform their art.
I think also, there’s something about you that creates the safe space to perform their art.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. The Quarter Confession series was the first time you saw the suit.
Yeah. The Quarter Confession series was the first time you saw the suit.
Lex Fridman
That’s when the suit came out.
That’s when the suit came out.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. It was kind of like a Ron Burgundy, Eric Andre inspired type.
Yeah. It was kind of like a Ron Burgundy, Eric Andre inspired type.
Lex Fridman
Where’d you get that suit?
Where’d you get that suit?
Andrew Callaghan
Goodwill.
Goodwill.
Lex Fridman
Goodwill?
Goodwill?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. Always.
Yeah. Always.
Lex Fridman
Wow. I was playing checkers, you were playing chess. Good job.
Wow. I was playing checkers, you were playing chess. Good job.
Andrew Callaghan
I mean, Goodwill has a surprising amount of identical gray suits for sale.
I mean, Goodwill has a surprising amount of identical gray suits for sale.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. I’ve actually gotten suits at thrift stores before. They’re great.
Yeah. I’ve actually gotten suits at thrift stores before. They’re great.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. A lot of people donate suits. And I was going for oversized suits, which are the cheapest ones there. It was $12 to $25 every time for the outfit.
Yeah. A lot of people donate suits. And I was going for oversized suits, which are the cheapest ones there. It was $12 to $25 every time for the outfit.
Lex Fridman
If I wanted to look super sophisticated, like I’m from another era, I would go to the thrift store. Because usually, the patterns they have, it’s just a more sophisticated suit. Which is what you kind of picked out. It made you look ridiculous but in the best kind of way.
If I wanted to look super sophisticated, like I’m from another era, I would go to the thrift store. Because usually, the patterns they have, it’s just a more sophisticated suit. Which is what you kind of picked out. It made you look ridiculous but in the best kind of way.
Andrew Callaghan
The tough part about Quarter Confessions for me is that everybody that was featured, for the most part, would more or less regret being a part of the show. And that over time just gave me a bad feeling where I was like, “You know what? I kind of feel like I am doing an ambush interview.” Especially because presenting as so agreeable, yet the intention is to make something funny. And I get that that’s what people do in the satire sphere. I’m sure Ali G and Bruno and Borat did the same thing. And I don’t think it’s unethical because that’s all for the purposes of comedy. It is what it is. But for me, I wanted to do something different.
The tough part about Quarter Confessions for me is that everybody that was featured, for the most part, would more or less regret being a part of the show. And that over time just gave me a bad feeling where I was like, “You know what? I kind of feel like I am doing an ambush interview.” Especially because presenting as so agreeable, yet the intention is to make something funny. And I get that that’s what people do in the satire sphere. I’m sure Ali G and Bruno and Borat did the same thing. And I don’t think it’s unethical because that’s all for the purposes of comedy. It is what it is. But for me, I wanted to do something different.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, because there’s an intimacy to confessing a thing, and then you just don’t really realize the implications of that.
Yeah, because there’s an intimacy to confessing a thing, and then you just don’t really realize the implications of that.
Andrew Callaghan
And the atmosphere of Bourbon Street is like anything goes, it’s a free spirited place. But if you transport that energy digitally to a different place like Colorado, they might look at it and be like…
And the atmosphere of Bourbon Street is like anything goes, it’s a free spirited place. But if you transport that energy digitally to a different place like Colorado, they might look at it and be like…
Lex Fridman
Different place in time. Five years later, that same person has a family and stuff like this, and all of a sudden they’re talking about eating ass.
Different place in time. Five years later, that same person has a family and stuff like this, and all of a sudden they’re talking about eating ass.
Andrew Callaghan
Right, exactly. Kids have to think about that. Or imagine if there’s a video of your grandma or grandpa out there, when he was a kid, talking about eating ass. That’s a horrible experience. To discover that about your respected elder later in life, it’s tough.
Right, exactly. Kids have to think about that. Or imagine if there’s a video of your grandma or grandpa out there, when he was a kid, talking about eating ass. That’s a horrible experience. To discover that about your respected elder later in life, it’s tough.
Lex Fridman
I don’t even know where to go with that. But literally the opening question was, tell me your deepest, darkest secret.
I don’t even know where to go with that. But literally the opening question was, tell me your deepest, darkest secret.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
You just come up to somebody like that?
You just come up to somebody like that?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
How often do you get a no? What’s the yes to no ratio?
How often do you get a no? What’s the yes to no ratio?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, the weird thing is we don’t really extract answers from people. What makes a good interview is when they’re ready to talk. The more you have to talk and try to get an answer out of them, it is just not a good vibe. So we kind of look for people who appear to be already ready to talk, open body language, they seem confident and verbose, and we approach them first.
Well, the weird thing is we don’t really extract answers from people. What makes a good interview is when they’re ready to talk. The more you have to talk and try to get an answer out of them, it is just not a good vibe. So we kind of look for people who appear to be already ready to talk, open body language, they seem confident and verbose, and we approach them first.
Lex Fridman
There’s a look.
There’s a look.
Andrew Callaghan
We wouldn’t approach a shy person and be like, “Come on, tell me.” No.
We wouldn’t approach a shy person and be like, “Come on, tell me.” No.
Lex Fridman
What about a person with pain in their eyes?
What about a person with pain in their eyes?
Andrew Callaghan
Oh yeah, we’re interviewing them.
Oh yeah, we’re interviewing them.
Lex Fridman
So they’re ready to talk, they’re just not… There’s different ways to be ready.
So they’re ready to talk, they’re just not… There’s different ways to be ready.
Andrew Callaghan
Right.
Right.
Lex Fridman
I see homeless people a lot, and they always look fascinating. And the ones I’ve talked to are always fascinating.
I see homeless people a lot, and they always look fascinating. And the ones I’ve talked to are always fascinating.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. We just did a video in the Vegas tunnels, trying to… Obviously it got taken down by Fox, but whatever.
Yeah. We just did a video in the Vegas tunnels, trying to… Obviously it got taken down by Fox, but whatever.
Lex Fridman
I was going to make a joke that I didn’t see it.
I was going to make a joke that I didn’t see it.
Andrew Callaghan
We tried to help a lot of them by getting them IDs. And when I made the documentary, I had this idea that if… It’s a big roadblock for them is getting identification. Without IDs, you can’t check into a homeless shelter, you can’t do day labor, you can’t qualify for housing, nothing. So when we interviewed them, they’d basically tell us, “If I had my ID, I wouldn’t be here.” And so we said, “Okay, we’re going to really help this time. We’re not just going to talk to them about their struggles. We’re going to actively go out and get them IDs at the DMV.” So, we did that and nothing really changed in their life.
We tried to help a lot of them by getting them IDs. And when I made the documentary, I had this idea that if… It’s a big roadblock for them is getting identification. Without IDs, you can’t check into a homeless shelter, you can’t do day labor, you can’t qualify for housing, nothing. So when we interviewed them, they’d basically tell us, “If I had my ID, I wouldn’t be here.” And so we said, “Okay, we’re going to really help this time. We’re not just going to talk to them about their struggles. We’re going to actively go out and get them IDs at the DMV.” So, we did that and nothing really changed in their life.
And we sat down with a recovery specialist who works directly with them day in and day out. And he explained to me that he’s been trying to do the same thing I tried to do in a one-week period for the past 10 years. And that they have deeper underlying traumas and pain that need to be dealt with far before they even take the steps to enter society as a housed person.
Lex Fridman
That’s a heavy truth right there.
That’s a heavy truth right there.
Andrew Callaghan
Breaking that shame cycle has to come first. Because you got to think, right? I’m from a generation that romanticizes vagrancy and homelessness to a certain extent if it’s called Van Life or if it is done in a way that’s sort of like Rolling Stone, Willie Nelson, hit the road. People who are above 50, they feel really embarrassed to be in the spiral of homelessness. They feel like failures. A lot of them have kids who they weren’t there for. That’s not the kind of pain that can be dealt with by giving someone a tiny home. It’s a good step forward. But for someone to really make a change, they have to want to change. And so it is, how do you help someone and guide themselves in the right direction? And if you’re too paternalistic and you use shame as a method to get them to clean up, they’re going to end up right where they started. That’s a tough truth to accept because a lot of people want a quick fix to things. And I don’t blame people who go out and give bologna sandwiches out to the homeless.
Breaking that shame cycle has to come first. Because you got to think, right? I’m from a generation that romanticizes vagrancy and homelessness to a certain extent if it’s called Van Life or if it is done in a way that’s sort of like Rolling Stone, Willie Nelson, hit the road. People who are above 50, they feel really embarrassed to be in the spiral of homelessness. They feel like failures. A lot of them have kids who they weren’t there for. That’s not the kind of pain that can be dealt with by giving someone a tiny home. It’s a good step forward. But for someone to really make a change, they have to want to change. And so it is, how do you help someone and guide themselves in the right direction? And if you’re too paternalistic and you use shame as a method to get them to clean up, they’re going to end up right where they started. That’s a tough truth to accept because a lot of people want a quick fix to things. And I don’t blame people who go out and give bologna sandwiches out to the homeless.
Lex Fridman
And each case is probably its own little puzzle.
And each case is probably its own little puzzle.
Andrew Callaghan
Each person is so complex. Now, imagine drug abuse. What that does for the brain? Trauma, childhood trauma. There’s so much to unpack. And then just the belief that they’re the undesirables, that they don’t deserve to be a part of society because they failed a fundamental obligation like taking care of their kids.
Each person is so complex. Now, imagine drug abuse. What that does for the brain? Trauma, childhood trauma. There’s so much to unpack. And then just the belief that they’re the undesirables, that they don’t deserve to be a part of society because they failed a fundamental obligation like taking care of their kids.
Lex Fridman
If we could take a small tangent to, you mentioned this Vegas video, which is fascinating. It was taken down recently by YouTube, or YouTube took it down based on-
If we could take a small tangent to, you mentioned this Vegas video, which is fascinating. It was taken down recently by YouTube, or YouTube took it down based on-
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, it was illegal.
Yeah, it was illegal.
Lex Fridman
… Fox 5, I guess.
… Fox 5, I guess.
Andrew Callaghan
So, the documentary was an hour and 45 minutes. We used 10 seconds of a news clip that was publicly broadcast by Fox 5 Vegas. And according to the Copyright Act of 1976, you’re allowed to use any publicly broadcast news clip in a transformative capacity in any documentary film or research paper or broadcast or anything. They, specifically this corporation called Gray Media that controls the TV stations in almost every small town, they had lawyers hit up YouTube. And YouTube complied with an illegal copyright strike to get our video immediately removed. And I’m a YouTube partner. I’m in the YouTube partner program. So, to think that I wasn’t forewarned, it’s a bit strange, but it also smells like corruption to me to a certain extent.
So, the documentary was an hour and 45 minutes. We used 10 seconds of a news clip that was publicly broadcast by Fox 5 Vegas. And according to the Copyright Act of 1976, you’re allowed to use any publicly broadcast news clip in a transformative capacity in any documentary film or research paper or broadcast or anything. They, specifically this corporation called Gray Media that controls the TV stations in almost every small town, they had lawyers hit up YouTube. And YouTube complied with an illegal copyright strike to get our video immediately removed. And I’m a YouTube partner. I’m in the YouTube partner program. So, to think that I wasn’t forewarned, it’s a bit strange, but it also smells like corruption to me to a certain extent.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, you shouldn’t have that amount of power. At the very least, they should have the power to just silence that five second clip maybe.
Yeah, you shouldn’t have that amount of power. At the very least, they should have the power to just silence that five second clip maybe.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. But I’m taking them to court because I have the means to be able to do so. I’m a larger creator. I have an audience. I have that financial backing to do it. I can’t imagine how many people out there are smaller creators with not as much of a fan base they can mobilize against someone like Fox 5 or the money to go to court. So I want to take them all the way there to set precedent for future cases, so that these giant mainstream media conglomerates can’t copyright strike documentary filmmakers at will. It doesn’t make sense.
Yeah. But I’m taking them to court because I have the means to be able to do so. I’m a larger creator. I have an audience. I have that financial backing to do it. I can’t imagine how many people out there are smaller creators with not as much of a fan base they can mobilize against someone like Fox 5 or the money to go to court. So I want to take them all the way there to set precedent for future cases, so that these giant mainstream media conglomerates can’t copyright strike documentary filmmakers at will. It doesn’t make sense.
Lex Fridman
Oh, thank you for doing that. That’s really, really, really important. And that’s really powerful. And it might hopefully empower YouTube to also put pressure on people to not… YouTube is in a difficult position because there’s so much content out there, there’s so many claims, it’s hard to investigate. But YouTube should be in a place where they push back against this kind of stuff as a first line of defense, especially to protect small creators. So what you’re doing is really, really important.
Oh, thank you for doing that. That’s really, really, really important. And that’s really powerful. And it might hopefully empower YouTube to also put pressure on people to not… YouTube is in a difficult position because there’s so much content out there, there’s so many claims, it’s hard to investigate. But YouTube should be in a place where they push back against this kind of stuff as a first line of defense, especially to protect small creators. So what you’re doing is really, really important.
Andrew Callaghan
Appreciate it, man.
Appreciate it, man.
Lex Fridman
And it sucks that it was taken down. Do you have any hope?
And it sucks that it was taken down. Do you have any hope?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, I talked to my YouTube partner today, and he said that the Fox 5 lawyers have two weeks to comply with my counter appeal. But I spent 20 grand on human voiceovers in five different languages. I invested probably in total like 70K into this video. So even if it gets reinstated, the steam’s kind of been taken out of its trajectory.
Well, I talked to my YouTube partner today, and he said that the Fox 5 lawyers have two weeks to comply with my counter appeal. But I spent 20 grand on human voiceovers in five different languages. I invested probably in total like 70K into this video. So even if it gets reinstated, the steam’s kind of been taken out of its trajectory.
Lex Fridman
But also, it’s just a really important video, it is good for the world.
But also, it’s just a really important video, it is good for the world.
Andrew Callaghan
Why the hell would Fox 5 have a vested interest in having the video taken down?
Why the hell would Fox 5 have a vested interest in having the video taken down?
Lex Fridman
I just hate it when people do that to videos or to creators that are doing good in the world.
I just hate it when people do that to videos or to creators that are doing good in the world.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. It’s not an expose on the mayor of Las Vegas. It’s an attempt to show the civilian public how to get involved in a local nonprofit and potentially intervene in the lives of the tunnel people.
Yeah. It’s not an expose on the mayor of Las Vegas. It’s an attempt to show the civilian public how to get involved in a local nonprofit and potentially intervene in the lives of the tunnel people.
Lex Fridman
Well, fuck Fox 5, the other Channel 5, as you said.
Well, fuck Fox 5, the other Channel 5, as you said.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
Well, thank you for pushing back and highlighting it. Hopefully, it gets brought back up. But yeah, defending other creators so that other creators can take risks and don’t get taken down for stupid reasons.
Well, thank you for pushing back and highlighting it. Hopefully, it gets brought back up. But yeah, defending other creators so that other creators can take risks and don’t get taken down for stupid reasons.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
So, Quarter Confessions was written?
So, Quarter Confessions was written?
Andrew Callaghan
No, it was all real life reality TV documentary. But it caught the attention of a larger company called Doing Things Media. And they contacted me pretty much a week after I graduated from college in the May of 2019, and they said, “Hey, how would you like to produce a show?” I was like, “What do you mean?” They were like, “We’ll get you an RV. We’ll pay you 45K a year. We’ll pay for gas, for food, for two hotels a week. Go out there, make content. And we’ll be in the background just powering it all.”
No, it was all real life reality TV documentary. But it caught the attention of a larger company called Doing Things Media. And they contacted me pretty much a week after I graduated from college in the May of 2019, and they said, “Hey, how would you like to produce a show?” I was like, “What do you mean?” They were like, “We’ll get you an RV. We’ll pay you 45K a year. We’ll pay for gas, for food, for two hotels a week. Go out there, make content. And we’ll be in the background just powering it all.”
Lex Fridman
And that was the birth of All Gas No Brakes.
And that was the birth of All Gas No Brakes.
Andrew Callaghan
Yes. All Gas No Brakes was named after a book that I wrote called All Gas No Brakes, a hitchhiker’s diary, which chronicled the 70-day journey that we were just talking about.
Yes. All Gas No Brakes was named after a book that I wrote called All Gas No Brakes, a hitchhiker’s diary, which chronicled the 70-day journey that we were just talking about.
Lex Fridman
It’s a tough book to find, by the way.
It’s a tough book to find, by the way.
Andrew Callaghan
Oh, yeah. There’s only a few copies left. I’m thinking about doing a reprint at some point down the line, but I sold off the last a hundred copies like a month and a half ago.
Oh, yeah. There’s only a few copies left. I’m thinking about doing a reprint at some point down the line, but I sold off the last a hundred copies like a month and a half ago.
Lex Fridman
Until then, you guys should go read On the Road by Jack Kerouac.
Until then, you guys should go read On the Road by Jack Kerouac.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, read-
Yeah, read-
Lex Fridman
You should read it. I don’t know if you’ve read it before.
You should read it. I don’t know if you’ve read it before.
Andrew Callaghan
If you can’t get my book, get On the Road by Jack Kerouac.
If you can’t get my book, get On the Road by Jack Kerouac.
Lex Fridman
It’s great.
It’s great.
Andrew Callaghan
It’s the best.
It’s the best.
Lex Fridman
When’s your birthday? I’ll send you-
When’s your birthday? I’ll send you-
Andrew Callaghan
April 23rd. I’m a Taurus. Coming soon.
April 23rd. I’m a Taurus. Coming soon.
Lex Fridman
Typical Taurus, yeah.
Typical Taurus, yeah.
Andrew Callaghan
I’m a typical Taurus man. I’m a Scorpio moon. You should write that down.
I’m a typical Taurus man. I’m a Scorpio moon. You should write that down.
Lex Fridman
What’s the time when you were born?
What’s the time when you were born?
Andrew Callaghan
11:30.
11:30.
Lex Fridman
11:30 at night? Of course.
11:30 at night? Of course.
Andrew Callaghan
Typical. This guy knew it. That’s the real science.
Typical. This guy knew it. That’s the real science.
Anyways, the idea of All Gas No Brakes as a show was to combine the, I guess, road dog ethos of the All Gas No Brakes book with the presentation and editing style of Quarter Confessions. So, it was to take quarter confessions on the road. That was pretty much like a simulated hitchhiking experience. But with the editing and punchy effects of Quarter Confessions, which is like I wear a suit, we do the Fast Zoom-ins, little effects, stuff like that.
Man, those were the best years. It was just so fun. I mean, imagine. You’re fresh out of college. You were just a doorman interviewing people about making out with their cousin and stuff. And then boom, this company that you’ve never even heard of is willing to buy you an RV and give you 45K a year, which to me at the time was more money than I could possibly imagine. So, I called my dad. I was like, “Dad, I need you to find me an RV.” Because he’s the only guy I know who knows about cars, and even he doesn’t know much about cars. He’s like, “All right, I’m on it.” The RV was 20,000.
Burning Man
And the first event that we were called to cover was the Burning Man Festival. And that was tough because Burning Man is not too keen on filming. It’s supposed to be a non-commercialized escape from reality. They have a gift economy set up. It’s based upon mutual participation and non-exploitation. And so, the idea of making a Burning Man video was tough at first. Because burners oftentimes, and this is not all of them, are pretty well off in general. A lot of them have tech jobs, are pretty high up in Silicon Valley. And Burning Man is where they go to take the edge off and basically become their burner persona. On the playa, they become reborn. And they take ketamine and they wear kaleidoscope glasses and steampunk hats and they snort MDMA and they run around the sand. Listen-
Lex Fridman
Do you snort MDMA?
Do you snort MDMA?
Andrew Callaghan
Yes, you can.
Yes, you can.
Lex Fridman
I need to do MDMA. I thought it’s a pill. I didn’t know.
I need to do MDMA. I thought it’s a pill. I didn’t know.
Andrew Callaghan
It’s better to take it in a pill or water, but you can snort MDMA.
It’s better to take it in a pill or water, but you can snort MDMA.
Lex Fridman
I definitely need to take MDMA. I’m already full of love, but that, I’d probably go on another level.
I definitely need to take MDMA. I’m already full of love, but that, I’d probably go on another level.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, don’t snort it because it’ll only last 90 minutes.
Yeah, don’t snort it because it’ll only last 90 minutes.
Lex Fridman
Let me write that down.
Let me write that down.
Andrew Callaghan
So anyways, we didn’t know what to do because we tried to film.
So anyways, we didn’t know what to do because we tried to film.
Lex Fridman
Don’t snort.
Don’t snort.
Andrew Callaghan
The initial idea for All Gas No Brakes was to, instead of asking people what’s your deepest, darkest secret, it was, what’s the craziest trip you’ve been on? The idea was to not satirize drunk people, but satirize people who are fried on acid. So we went to Boulder real quick, did a test interview with some lady who talked about seeing ancestral aliens during a peyote retreat. It’s pretty easy to extract trip reports from hippies and gutter punks and stuff like that, or oogles.
The initial idea for All Gas No Brakes was to, instead of asking people what’s your deepest, darkest secret, it was, what’s the craziest trip you’ve been on? The idea was to not satirize drunk people, but satirize people who are fried on acid. So we went to Boulder real quick, did a test interview with some lady who talked about seeing ancestral aliens during a peyote retreat. It’s pretty easy to extract trip reports from hippies and gutter punks and stuff like that, or oogles.
So, we go to Burning Man. We start asking people, what’s your craziest trip story? And they didn’t have the same type of free flowing storytelling style like a on the street, cross punk in New Orleans might have, where they’re like, “I don’t give a shit, I’ll tell you whatever.” These people were very bottled up about what they were willing to disclose. So we went on Burning Man Radio and we did a broadcast and we said, “Hey, we’re psychedelic journalists.” It was me and my friend Ciel at the time. I said, “We’re psychedelic journalists. We’re parked on Tan and I, which is a cross street in Black Rock City.” And we said, “We have a 1998 Catalina Coachman Sport. It’s an RV. We’ve set up a podcast studio. We’re doing a show about psychedelic voyages.” Lo and behold, two hours later, we had 10 people lined up at the RV willing to talk. That vetted people in advance for us. We did a couple interviews and that was that.
Lex Fridman
What were some of the stories from the trip reports?
What were some of the stories from the trip reports?
Andrew Callaghan
There was this lady named Rosmah who said that she was known in several circles in Berkeley for being multi-orgasmic and could create multiple repeated climaxes using only her mind, by squinting her eyes and squeezing her eyes together so much that the pleasure spiral just went crazy.
There was this lady named Rosmah who said that she was known in several circles in Berkeley for being multi-orgasmic and could create multiple repeated climaxes using only her mind, by squinting her eyes and squeezing her eyes together so much that the pleasure spiral just went crazy.
Lex Fridman
I feel like I talked to several people like that at Berkeley.
I feel like I talked to several people like that at Berkeley.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. You know what I’m talking about?
Yeah. You know what I’m talking about?
Lex Fridman
Not that… Well yeah, that lady, I think she manifests herself in many forms, yeah.
Not that… Well yeah, that lady, I think she manifests herself in many forms, yeah.
Andrew Callaghan
Right. But still, it was on the cruder end. There was one guy named, Kimbo Slice was his burner name. He talked about taking a shit after taking a quarter of mushrooms and how he was seeing his childhood and visualizing his past life as the turds were flowing into the toilet, and just talks about the psychedelic union between pooing and taking shrooms.
Right. But still, it was on the cruder end. There was one guy named, Kimbo Slice was his burner name. He talked about taking a shit after taking a quarter of mushrooms and how he was seeing his childhood and visualizing his past life as the turds were flowing into the toilet, and just talks about the psychedelic union between pooing and taking shrooms.
Lex Fridman
So, he was very visual with his words.
So, he was very visual with his words.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. There was stuff like that. I interviewed Alex Gray, which was super cool, about his first trip in San Francisco, in 1971, shortly after the Summer of Love. I got to do some pretty cool interviews. But still, it was semi-ambush style. I wouldn’t say that we were doing journalism yet. It was still comedic video work.
Yeah. There was stuff like that. I interviewed Alex Gray, which was super cool, about his first trip in San Francisco, in 1971, shortly after the Summer of Love. I got to do some pretty cool interviews. But still, it was semi-ambush style. I wouldn’t say that we were doing journalism yet. It was still comedic video work.
Lex Fridman
Was there a narrative-
Was there a narrative-
Andrew Callaghan
No.
No.
Lex Fridman
… that tied it together? It’s really just a trip, comedic almost.
… that tied it together? It’s really just a trip, comedic almost.
Andrew Callaghan
Interview and then I go Burning Man, and then it’s onto the next one. I guess that could give a loose structure, but it’s just a punch in slapstick thing.
Interview and then I go Burning Man, and then it’s onto the next one. I guess that could give a loose structure, but it’s just a punch in slapstick thing.
Everything was going good until we interviewed this guy named DJ Soft Baby. He was wearing a golden leotard with, once again, kaleidoscope glasses, shirtless dancing like you know dancing. And he was eating chowder out of a plastic bowl. And he was like, “This chowder is so fucking good.” He is like, “This is the best chowder I’ve ever had in my life.” And he starts putting the chowder on his face. And he is like, “I want the chowder all over me, yah.” And we just go, “Hey man, can you just do a dance for us real quick, just for some B-roll.” He does a dance. We post it on Instagram the next morning. Doing Things Media CEO calls me, Reid, he says, “All of our pages are down.” And he’s like, “That guy you filmed dancing last night on drugs, putting chowder on his face, that guy is at the top of MIT.”
Lex Fridman
Top of MIT, I don’t understand what that means.
Top of MIT, I don’t understand what that means.
Andrew Callaghan
He went to MIT.
He went to MIT.
Lex Fridman
That’s like saying, my brother’s rocket scientist, he’s head of NASA or whatever.
That’s like saying, my brother’s rocket scientist, he’s head of NASA or whatever.
Andrew Callaghan
Well, I mean, the guy knows people in Boston. Not in the Whitey Bulger sense, but in the reverse sense.
Well, I mean, the guy knows people in Boston. Not in the Whitey Bulger sense, but in the reverse sense.
Lex Fridman
I have trouble believing that DJ Soft Baby-
I have trouble believing that DJ Soft Baby-
Andrew Callaghan
Oh, DJ Soft Baby was major. It could have been Harvard. But it wasn’t UMass.
Oh, DJ Soft Baby was major. It could have been Harvard. But it wasn’t UMass.
Lex Fridman
I don’t think there’s anybody that’s, quote, at the head of MIT who’s putting… What was it, all over his face?
I don’t think there’s anybody that’s, quote, at the head of MIT who’s putting… What was it, all over his face?
Andrew Callaghan
Chowder.
Chowder.
Lex Fridman
Chowder.
Chowder.
Andrew Callaghan
Well then, you haven’t been to Burning Man yet.
Well then, you haven’t been to Burning Man yet.
Lex Fridman
Okay. I’ve not been to Burning Man. I would have to consult my colleagues at MIT if they know DJ Soft Baby. It probably was Harvard. Let’s put it on them.
Okay. I’ve not been to Burning Man. I would have to consult my colleagues at MIT if they know DJ Soft Baby. It probably was Harvard. Let’s put it on them.
Andrew Callaghan
Okay. The top of Harvard. So, he made some calls to the heads of Big Tech and got all the Doing Things Media pages taken down. At the time, that was a vast network of pages. And we ended up having to take the… Obviously, the video came down. And he held the entire network of Instagram pages hostage. He made us agree to never post that video again, and then somehow got all of our pages reinstated. That was my first brush with powerful people on drugs, and that was probably my last brush with powerful people on drugs.
Okay. The top of Harvard. So, he made some calls to the heads of Big Tech and got all the Doing Things Media pages taken down. At the time, that was a vast network of pages. And we ended up having to take the… Obviously, the video came down. And he held the entire network of Instagram pages hostage. He made us agree to never post that video again, and then somehow got all of our pages reinstated. That was my first brush with powerful people on drugs, and that was probably my last brush with powerful people on drugs.
Lex Fridman
What did you transition into from there?
What did you transition into from there?
Andrew Callaghan
I think after Burning Man, we went to the South. Went to Talladega Race weekend, went to a Donald Trump Jr. book signing, went to a juggalo adjacent fetish mansion in Central Florida called the Sausage Castle.
I think after Burning Man, we went to the South. Went to Talladega Race weekend, went to a Donald Trump Jr. book signing, went to a juggalo adjacent fetish mansion in Central Florida called the Sausage Castle.
Lex Fridman
Juggalo adjacent sausage. Okay. Can you run that by me again?
Juggalo adjacent sausage. Okay. Can you run that by me again?
Andrew Callaghan
Juggalo adjacent fetish mansion in Central Florida.
Juggalo adjacent fetish mansion in Central Florida.
Lex Fridman
Okay. Fetish mansion in Central Florida. Juggalo adjacent. Every single one of those words, I feel like, needs a book or something. By the way, who are the juggalos? Is this ICP?
Okay. Fetish mansion in Central Florida. Juggalo adjacent. Every single one of those words, I feel like, needs a book or something. By the way, who are the juggalos? Is this ICP?
Andrew Callaghan
Just ICP fans.
Just ICP fans.
Lex Fridman
ICP fans, okay.
ICP fans, okay.
Andrew Callaghan
But I say adjacent because it’s not a juggalo mansion, but there’s a lot of juggalos who kick it at the mansion and it’s juggalo friendly.
But I say adjacent because it’s not a juggalo mansion, but there’s a lot of juggalos who kick it at the mansion and it’s juggalo friendly.
Lex Fridman
Oh, okay. Juggalo friendly.
Oh, okay. Juggalo friendly.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, because they get made fun of in a lot of places.
Yeah, because they get made fun of in a lot of places.
Lex Fridman
Oh. Okay, got it.
Oh. Okay, got it.
Andrew Callaghan
And juggalos say outrageous shit, and they embarrass themselves and they fight a lot. They’re on the FBI’s gang list, which if you ask me-
And juggalos say outrageous shit, and they embarrass themselves and they fight a lot. They’re on the FBI’s gang list, which if you ask me-
Lex Fridman
ICP or the-
ICP or the-
Andrew Callaghan
The juggalos,
The juggalos,
Lex Fridman
The juggalos. Who’s the head of the juggalos?
The juggalos. Who’s the head of the juggalos?
Andrew Callaghan
It would be Violent J and Shaggy 2 Dope. But there’s associated acts like Twiztid, and there’s a whole rabbit hole. Honestly, Tech N9ne is sort of a part of that.
It would be Violent J and Shaggy 2 Dope. But there’s associated acts like Twiztid, and there’s a whole rabbit hole. Honestly, Tech N9ne is sort of a part of that.
Lex Fridman
Tech N9ne, I don’t know who that is. Should I know who that is?
Tech N9ne, I don’t know who that is. Should I know who that is?
Andrew Callaghan
He’s actually one of the top-selling touring rappers, despite having not that many streams. Tech N9ne, he’s got a huge cult following in Missouri. The juggalos started in Warren, Michigan.
He’s actually one of the top-selling touring rappers, despite having not that many streams. Tech N9ne, he’s got a huge cult following in Missouri. The juggalos started in Warren, Michigan.
Lex Fridman
We should also say, ICP, Insane Clown Posse. This is a thing, this is a movement.
We should also say, ICP, Insane Clown Posse. This is a thing, this is a movement.
Andrew Callaghan
Oh, yeah. If you went to Seattle right now and punched a cop and they booked you in county jail, you may end up running with the juggalos.
Oh, yeah. If you went to Seattle right now and punched a cop and they booked you in county jail, you may end up running with the juggalos.
Lex Fridman
Running with the juggalos.
Running with the juggalos.
Andrew Callaghan
They’re a presence in Pacific Northwest prison system from what I’ve heard.
They’re a presence in Pacific Northwest prison system from what I’ve heard.
Lex Fridman
Can you tell a juggalo from a distance?
Can you tell a juggalo from a distance?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, they say, whoop, whoop. If you see a Juggalo, they’ll say that also.
Well, they say, whoop, whoop. If you see a Juggalo, they’ll say that also.
Lex Fridman
I’ll try to look up that.
I’ll try to look up that.
Andrew Callaghan
It’s called the Dark Carnivals, the mythology they abide by.
It’s called the Dark Carnivals, the mythology they abide by.
Lex Fridman
What do they define themselves? What’s the ideology?
What do they define themselves? What’s the ideology?
Andrew Callaghan
A family.
A family.
Lex Fridman
No, I understand, but what’s the ideology? What’s the philosophical foundation?
No, I understand, but what’s the ideology? What’s the philosophical foundation?
Andrew Callaghan
They’re anti-racist. They like to drink Faygo and also just cheap liquor and stuff like that. They’re into drugs. A lot of circles, if you pull out a crack pipe, people will be like, “I don’t want to drink with you anymore.” If you’re at a juggalo party and someone’s smoking twizz or something, it’s relatively accepted.
They’re anti-racist. They like to drink Faygo and also just cheap liquor and stuff like that. They’re into drugs. A lot of circles, if you pull out a crack pipe, people will be like, “I don’t want to drink with you anymore.” If you’re at a juggalo party and someone’s smoking twizz or something, it’s relatively accepted.
Lex Fridman
What’s twizz?
What’s twizz?
Andrew Callaghan
Meth.
Meth.
Lex Fridman
Meth, right, right. Lots of tattoos?
Meth, right, right. Lots of tattoos?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. The Hatchet Man is the most common one. It’s a Psychopathic Records logo. It’s a cartoon of a clown wheeling a hatchet. It’s actually a pretty sick logo.
Yeah. The Hatchet Man is the most common one. It’s a Psychopathic Records logo. It’s a cartoon of a clown wheeling a hatchet. It’s actually a pretty sick logo.
Lex Fridman
I vaguely remember enjoying some of the ICP music.
I vaguely remember enjoying some of the ICP music.
Andrew Callaghan
It’s good.
It’s good.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, it’s pretty good. It’s funny. It’s edgy.
Yeah, it’s pretty good. It’s funny. It’s edgy.
Andrew Callaghan
They get satirized a lot, but I got love for the clowns. And also, when All Gas No Brakes transitioned away from rich, elite drug parties and into the South, that’s when the fun really started to happen. Living in your RV in Alabama and Florida and stuff is the best.
They get satirized a lot, but I got love for the clowns. And also, when All Gas No Brakes transitioned away from rich, elite drug parties and into the South, that’s when the fun really started to happen. Living in your RV in Alabama and Florida and stuff is the best.
Lex Fridman
Why? What is it about it?
Why? What is it about it?
Andrew Callaghan
People are just so friendly down there. And it is warm year round, and people are non-judgmental, and it’s just great. The South gets hated on a lot, especially in the coastal states. Mississippi and Alabama are kind of like the butts of a lot of jokes and stuff, but those are great states.
People are just so friendly down there. And it is warm year round, and people are non-judgmental, and it’s just great. The South gets hated on a lot, especially in the coastal states. Mississippi and Alabama are kind of like the butts of a lot of jokes and stuff, but those are great states.
Lex Fridman
No, I love it. New Mexico, Albuquerque, all those-
No, I love it. New Mexico, Albuquerque, all those-
Andrew Callaghan
Oh, yeah. The ABQ is great.
Oh, yeah. The ABQ is great.
Lex Fridman
ABQ, what’s that?
ABQ, what’s that?
Andrew Callaghan
Albuquerque. That’s what Jesse Pinkman called it, the ABQ.
Albuquerque. That’s what Jesse Pinkman called it, the ABQ.
Lex Fridman
Oh, shit. The depth of references you bring to the table is intense.
Oh, shit. The depth of references you bring to the table is intense.
Andrew Callaghan
It’s okay.
It’s okay.
Lex Fridman
I met a lady in Albuquerque when I was traveling across the United States, and she said, “Take me with you.”
I met a lady in Albuquerque when I was traveling across the United States, and she said, “Take me with you.”
Lex Fridman
In Albuquerque when I was traveling across the United States and she said, “Take me with you.” I said, “I’m sorry, ma’am. I can’t.” But I didn’t think about that lady.
In Albuquerque when I was traveling across the United States and she said, “Take me with you.” I said, “I’m sorry, ma’am. I can’t.” But I didn’t think about that lady.
Andrew Callaghan
I think you made the right call.
I think you made the right call.
Lex Fridman
I don’t know. On the Road by Jack Kerouac.
I don’t know. On the Road by Jack Kerouac.
Andrew Callaghan
Best book I’ve ever read in my life.
Best book I’ve ever read in my life.
Lex Fridman
There’s a moment when he meets a nice girl on a bus and they have a love affair. It was good.
There’s a moment when he meets a nice girl on a bus and they have a love affair. It was good.
Andrew Callaghan
On the bus or [inaudible 01:10:26]?
On the bus or [inaudible 01:10:26]?
Lex Fridman
No, no, they went to California. Well, yeah, and there was a love affair on the bus, but it wasn’t sexual. It was just romantic.
No, no, they went to California. Well, yeah, and there was a love affair on the bus, but it wasn’t sexual. It was just romantic.
Andrew Callaghan
It was in the air?
It was in the air?
Lex Fridman
It was in the air, which there is something in the air on the bus, like a Greyhound Megabus, that type of situation. There’s something-
It was in the air, which there is something in the air on the bus, like a Greyhound Megabus, that type of situation. There’s something-
Andrew Callaghan
Certainly something in the air?
Certainly something in the air?
Lex Fridman
It was a romance. There is, man. When you travel, because it’s like strangers getting together and you’re feeling each other out, but you’re in it. You each have a story because you wouldn’t be taking a bus unless you had a story. So especially if you’re traveling cross-country, there’s something.
It was a romance. There is, man. When you travel, because it’s like strangers getting together and you’re feeling each other out, but you’re in it. You each have a story because you wouldn’t be taking a bus unless you had a story. So especially if you’re traveling cross-country, there’s something.
Andrew Callaghan
You ever taken the dollar bus from Philly to New York? The Chinatown bus?
You ever taken the dollar bus from Philly to New York? The Chinatown bus?
Lex Fridman
Yeah, I have. Yeah.
Yeah, I have. Yeah.
Andrew Callaghan
That’s a great bus, the people on that.
That’s a great bus, the people on that.
Lex Fridman
It’s not a fucking dollar, though. [inaudible 01:11:05].
It’s not a fucking dollar, though. [inaudible 01:11:05].
Andrew Callaghan
There’s some that are $5.
There’s some that are $5.
Lex Fridman
No, no, no, no. If you book it way ahead of time, which it’s like $20. I was like, “This is a fucking lie calling it $1.” I don’t know why I’m swearing. The anger came out, and I apologize.
No, no, no, no. If you book it way ahead of time, which it’s like $20. I was like, “This is a fucking lie calling it $1.” I don’t know why I’m swearing. The anger came out, and I apologize.
Andrew Callaghan
Hey, swearing is okay sometimes. Last time I was on the Chinatown bus, there was a rooster walking down the aisle.
Hey, swearing is okay sometimes. Last time I was on the Chinatown bus, there was a rooster walking down the aisle.
Lex Fridman
Actual rooster?
Actual rooster?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, watched him chilling. It was awesome.
Yeah, watched him chilling. It was awesome.
Lex Fridman
Well, there’s a nice part of your film with the rooster.
Well, there’s a nice part of your film with the rooster.
Andrew Callaghan
I forgot about that.
I forgot about that.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, that felt almost fake.
Yeah, that felt almost fake.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
Did you plant the rooster?
Did you plant the rooster?
Andrew Callaghan
No, there’s a place in Ybor City in Tampa where roosters walk around all the time. And we had a rooster parked there right by the main drag for… What did I say? We had a rooster parked? We had the RV parked at Ybor City for a long time, and the rooster laid eggs in the undercarriage.
No, there’s a place in Ybor City in Tampa where roosters walk around all the time. And we had a rooster parked there right by the main drag for… What did I say? We had a rooster parked? We had the RV parked at Ybor City for a long time, and the rooster laid eggs in the undercarriage.
Lex Fridman
Nice.
Nice.
Andrew Callaghan
Back to the All Gas No Brakes thing though, so it was really fun making it. And then we started All Gas No Brakes in September of 2019. Six months later, the country shuts down and everything just hits the fan. I was actually here in Austin when it shut down. I was on 6th Street. I remember the, I don’t just hang out on 6th Street all the time, but I was just here.
Back to the All Gas No Brakes thing though, so it was really fun making it. And then we started All Gas No Brakes in September of 2019. Six months later, the country shuts down and everything just hits the fan. I was actually here in Austin when it shut down. I was on 6th Street. I remember the, I don’t just hang out on 6th Street all the time, but I was just here.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, you do. Come on, let’s just be honest.
Yeah, you do. Come on, let’s just be honest.
Andrew Callaghan
I do like 6th Street. I like East Austin better, but I like 6th Street too. So anyways, the NBA shuts down, everything’s shutting down. So I went down to the Dirty 6 and I asked this doorman, I was like, “Are you guys ever going to shut down?” He was like, “Fuck no, bro. The Dirty 6 never closes.” And I was like, “All right, we’ll see about that.” Next day, plywood. And then I was like, “All right.” I thought my career was over when Covid hit. I was like, “What are we going to do? Nothing’s happening anymore. There’s no more parties or Talladega races or Burning Man’s to go to.” So I went back to Seattle in the RV and I just spent four months just depressed, living in the RV, trying to figure out what would happen.
I do like 6th Street. I like East Austin better, but I like 6th Street too. So anyways, the NBA shuts down, everything’s shutting down. So I went down to the Dirty 6 and I asked this doorman, I was like, “Are you guys ever going to shut down?” He was like, “Fuck no, bro. The Dirty 6 never closes.” And I was like, “All right, we’ll see about that.” Next day, plywood. And then I was like, “All right.” I thought my career was over when Covid hit. I was like, “What are we going to do? Nothing’s happening anymore. There’s no more parties or Talladega races or Burning Man’s to go to.” So I went back to Seattle in the RV and I just spent four months just depressed, living in the RV, trying to figure out what would happen.
Lex Fridman
But All Gas No Brakes went on still through that?
But All Gas No Brakes went on still through that?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, this was the craziest thing about that period of time is that when Covid hit, I’m sure you remember, everything turned political overnight. In Seattle, if you went to a house party, you can get canceled because people were like, “Oh, you’re a super-spreader.” So if you wanted to socialize even with a group of four or more, you had to do so with your phones damn near turned off. And a lot of people were doing hyper social policing at that time. Beyond that, in the south and in more conservative places, they were doing the opposite. They were trying to prove that they could hang out 500 deep with no mask to make a statement against the establishment.
Well, this was the craziest thing about that period of time is that when Covid hit, I’m sure you remember, everything turned political overnight. In Seattle, if you went to a house party, you can get canceled because people were like, “Oh, you’re a super-spreader.” So if you wanted to socialize even with a group of four or more, you had to do so with your phones damn near turned off. And a lot of people were doing hyper social policing at that time. Beyond that, in the south and in more conservative places, they were doing the opposite. They were trying to prove that they could hang out 500 deep with no mask to make a statement against the establishment.
So you had this polarization that led to more division, and that’s when the anti-vax protests started. And I went to Sacramento and the passion was unreal. This is about two months after the Covid lockdowns began, and that was my first political video was at the California State Capitol in Sacramento, documenting they called it the Freedom rally, but that’s typically anti-vax stuff. And it was real intensity. And that video was my most successful to date at that time. And so I was like, “Okay, am I a political reporter now? Am I covering politics? What’s going on?”
Lex Fridman
What were the interviews that made up that video? What style of questions were you asking?
What were the interviews that made up that video? What style of questions were you asking?
Andrew Callaghan
I don’t know if you remember, but I was actually scared when the pandemic started. I thought that this is something that might kill us all based upon what I was consuming. And so I’d asked people, “What do you think about this lockdown?” And I’ve had people say, “I’m immune-compromised. If I get exposed to Covid, I have a 95% fatality rate. But guess what? I’d rather be free and dead than alive living in fear.” And I was like, wow. So it was just stuff along those lines. You had some San Diego surfers there complaining about the beaches being shut down when such awesome waves were coming.
I don’t know if you remember, but I was actually scared when the pandemic started. I thought that this is something that might kill us all based upon what I was consuming. And so I’d asked people, “What do you think about this lockdown?” And I’ve had people say, “I’m immune-compromised. If I get exposed to Covid, I have a 95% fatality rate. But guess what? I’d rather be free and dead than alive living in fear.” And I was like, wow. So it was just stuff along those lines. You had some San Diego surfers there complaining about the beaches being shut down when such awesome waves were coming.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, it’s interesting how that really brought out the worst in people.
Yeah, it’s interesting how that really brought out the worst in people.
Andrew Callaghan
Oh, yeah.
Oh, yeah.
Protests
Lex Fridman
I’m not sure why that is. Fear, maybe. Paranoia, I don’t know. It really divided people. Along the lines, as you mentioned, triple mask yourself or fight for your country.
I’m not sure why that is. Fear, maybe. Paranoia, I don’t know. It really divided people. Along the lines, as you mentioned, triple mask yourself or fight for your country.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, right. Exactly. Why are those the two options? That is literally what it was.
Yeah, right. Exactly. Why are those the two options? That is literally what it was.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, it’s wild.
Yeah, it’s wild.
Andrew Callaghan
And both groups think they’re fighting for the survival of something. And so that’s where you really run into problems, when you have two polarized groups who both think that their cause is for the common good, mutual understanding is impossible at that juncture. And so after three months of almost everybody being locked down, George Floyd happens. And I remember I saw the third precinct burning on my phone in Minneapolis, and everyone says, “Andrew, you have to go cover this.” And I’m somebody, like I said, police violence has been close to my heart since I was a kid. And my first thought is, I can’t do that. I’m a comedic reporter.
And both groups think they’re fighting for the survival of something. And so that’s where you really run into problems, when you have two polarized groups who both think that their cause is for the common good, mutual understanding is impossible at that juncture. And so after three months of almost everybody being locked down, George Floyd happens. And I remember I saw the third precinct burning on my phone in Minneapolis, and everyone says, “Andrew, you have to go cover this.” And I’m somebody, like I said, police violence has been close to my heart since I was a kid. And my first thought is, I can’t do that. I’m a comedic reporter.
I can’t go to Minneapolis and cover this, it’ll be the end of my career. And I had a friend named Lacey who I went to college with, and she told me, she was like, “Bro, this is your chance for you to do something serious. You can actually create a meaningful piece of reporting like you always wanted to before Quarter Confessions, and you can turn All Gas No Brakes into a news source.” So I called Reid, who was the CEO of the company that owned All Gas No Brakes, and I was like, “Look man, I want to go to Minneapolis.” I was in Orlando at the time. I was actually at The sausage Castle. And he said-
Lex Fridman
Sorry, The Sausage Castle?
Sorry, The Sausage Castle?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, the Juggalo Mansion.
Yeah, the Juggalo Mansion.
Lex Fridman
Oh, right. That was called The Sausage Castle. Right.
Oh, right. That was called The Sausage Castle. Right.
Andrew Callaghan
So I’m watching Minneapolis unfold on Lake Street where it was burning, and I got to the Orlando Airport and I booked a flight. I booked it on my own card, I didn’t consult my boss or anything. And I was sitting in my seat on the flight and he straight up told me, he’s like, “If you fuck this up and this destroys the brand, we’re getting a different host. If you mess this up and you turn our show away from a party show about drinking and drugs and all that stuff and you make this a social justice show, you’re done.” But I was like, I just turned my phone off. I got to the Minneapolis Airport on the second night of the riots. And when I got to the airport, there was National Guardsmen in the airport and it was like a Call of Duty mission, the one in the airport.
So I’m watching Minneapolis unfold on Lake Street where it was burning, and I got to the Orlando Airport and I booked a flight. I booked it on my own card, I didn’t consult my boss or anything. And I was sitting in my seat on the flight and he straight up told me, he’s like, “If you fuck this up and this destroys the brand, we’re getting a different host. If you mess this up and you turn our show away from a party show about drinking and drugs and all that stuff and you make this a social justice show, you’re done.” But I was like, I just turned my phone off. I got to the Minneapolis Airport on the second night of the riots. And when I got to the airport, there was National Guardsmen in the airport and it was like a Call of Duty mission, the one in the airport.
And on the speaker, they say, “If you’re arriving here right now, you are not permitted to go anywhere outside of the airport. National Guardsmen will escort you to your Uber or to your car, they’re going to take a picture of your ID, they’re going to figure out where you’re going. You are not permitted to go outside tonight.” And so Lacey picks me up. There’s two people in the back, two of her homegirls wearing shiesty masks. I’m like, “What are we doing? Where are we going?” And she goes, “We’re going to go film the riot. We’re going to Lake Street.”
And so we drive down there, Kmart is burning, Target is burning, everything is on fire. She has the Sony A7. She gives me a microphone and she’s like, “Go talk to that guy”, and that was the guy with a Molotov cocktail in his hand who had just burned Kmart down. And so I go, ” What should I ask him?” She goes, “What’s on your mind?” So I walk up to him and I’m like, “What’s on your mind?” He said something like, “Everything that was happening here was supposed to happen. This is how we feel. Is it right? No. Is this going to benefit the community? No, but this is how we feel.”
Lex Fridman
“This is how we feel”, that’s pretty powerful. Through a lot of the documenting that you do, “this is how we feel” is screaming through that.
“This is how we feel”, that’s pretty powerful. Through a lot of the documenting that you do, “this is how we feel” is screaming through that.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. And I noticed that aside from a group called Unicorn Riot, there was no one else actually interviewing the protesters. The local news was on the bridge 15, not 15, but five blocks away filming just the scene itself, just the fire. But I saw some crazy things off camera, too. So there was two groups there. There was the anarchists, more mobilized protestors, and then there was just mostly African-American community members who were just pissed, who had nothing to do with the organized resistance. And they were all joining forces to riot. And there was this anarchist kid who ran up to White Castle with a Molotov cocktail, and he was about to throw it at White Castle. And this black dude ran up to him and grabbed his arm and he’s like, “Nah, we fuck with white Castle.” And I was like, what? And so you see, if you go on Lake Street, every business is burned. White Castle remains.
Yeah. And I noticed that aside from a group called Unicorn Riot, there was no one else actually interviewing the protesters. The local news was on the bridge 15, not 15, but five blocks away filming just the scene itself, just the fire. But I saw some crazy things off camera, too. So there was two groups there. There was the anarchists, more mobilized protestors, and then there was just mostly African-American community members who were just pissed, who had nothing to do with the organized resistance. And they were all joining forces to riot. And there was this anarchist kid who ran up to White Castle with a Molotov cocktail, and he was about to throw it at White Castle. And this black dude ran up to him and grabbed his arm and he’s like, “Nah, we fuck with white Castle.” And I was like, what? And so you see, if you go on Lake Street, every business is burned. White Castle remains.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, White Castle stands.
Yeah, White Castle stands.
Andrew Callaghan
I also saw all these dudes rip this ATM out of a bank and hit it with sledgehammers. They were a group of friends hitting it with sledgehammers, right? They’re hitting with sledgehammers, boom. All of a sudden, money starts spraying out of the ATM. I’ve never seen some shit like this, pouring out of it. And then these group of friends, who were just united and getting it open, start fighting each other for the money as it’s flying out of it. And so it was like Joker from The Batman’s army type vibes, but I got shot in the ass by the National Guard. It was no good.
I also saw all these dudes rip this ATM out of a bank and hit it with sledgehammers. They were a group of friends hitting it with sledgehammers, right? They’re hitting with sledgehammers, boom. All of a sudden, money starts spraying out of the ATM. I’ve never seen some shit like this, pouring out of it. And then these group of friends, who were just united and getting it open, start fighting each other for the money as it’s flying out of it. And so it was like Joker from The Batman’s army type vibes, but I got shot in the ass by the National Guard. It was no good.
Lex Fridman
Like what, a rubber bullet?
Like what, a rubber bullet?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, yeah. Not shot-
Yeah, yeah. Not shot-
Lex Fridman
How’d that feel like?
How’d that feel like?
Andrew Callaghan
Honestly, it hurt. Yeah, it hurt.
Honestly, it hurt. Yeah, it hurt.
Lex Fridman
I’m not sure what I was expecting as an answer to that question.
I’m not sure what I was expecting as an answer to that question.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
I liked it. It was good.
I liked it. It was good.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. And then after that, I posted the video and it was very well received. And that was the pivotal point where I realized that everything was going to change.
Yeah. And then after that, I posted the video and it was very well received. And that was the pivotal point where I realized that everything was going to change.
Jon Stewart
Lex Fridman
I mean, there was still a comedic element to the way you do conversations, so the way you edit. So did you see yourself as potentially like a Jon Stewart type of character?
I mean, there was still a comedic element to the way you do conversations, so the way you edit. So did you see yourself as potentially like a Jon Stewart type of character?
Andrew Callaghan
At first, but I just think human beings are just funny in general.
At first, but I just think human beings are just funny in general.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, the absurdity of it.
Yeah, the absurdity of it.
Andrew Callaghan
Cool thing about Jon Stewart is I generally like to say that anybody who works for corporate media, whether it be Comedy Central or anything owned by Time Warner, Fox, MSNBC, they can’t say what they want because in order to climb up in those organizations, you have to appease the narrative of the company that you’re working for to rise in the ranks. Jon Stewart I feel like has so much clout in the media world that I’m pretty sure he can say whatever he wants. I actually don’t think that Jon Stewart is controlled by anybody, I really don’t. I think that he can go on the show and talk about whatever.
Cool thing about Jon Stewart is I generally like to say that anybody who works for corporate media, whether it be Comedy Central or anything owned by Time Warner, Fox, MSNBC, they can’t say what they want because in order to climb up in those organizations, you have to appease the narrative of the company that you’re working for to rise in the ranks. Jon Stewart I feel like has so much clout in the media world that I’m pretty sure he can say whatever he wants. I actually don’t think that Jon Stewart is controlled by anybody, I really don’t. I think that he can go on the show and talk about whatever.
Lex Fridman
I do think that certain people have broken the brains of, Covid broke the brains of a lot of really great people I admire. Trump broke the brains of a lot of people I admire to where Trump derangement syndrome became a thing, you can’t see the world quite as clearly because of it. And I think Jon Stewart is quite a genius at stepping away. Even though the world needed him in that time, stepping away during that moment of Trump and coming back now, being able to reflect being [inaudible 01:22:12] that elder statesman.
I do think that certain people have broken the brains of, Covid broke the brains of a lot of really great people I admire. Trump broke the brains of a lot of people I admire to where Trump derangement syndrome became a thing, you can’t see the world quite as clearly because of it. And I think Jon Stewart is quite a genius at stepping away. Even though the world needed him in that time, stepping away during that moment of Trump and coming back now, being able to reflect being [inaudible 01:22:12] that elder statesman.
Andrew Callaghan
My favorite Jon Stewart moment that illustrates that perfectly is whenever he went on the Colbert show. And he was just joking around with Stephen Colbert, who I think is a full-blown propagandist, about the Wuhan Lab leak theory. He was just goofing around and he was like, ” It’s called the Coronavirus Lab and they had it before. And now what do we have?” And it was like you could see in Stephen Colbert that he was like gun to his head type shit where he is like, “Jon, Jon, stop joking about that.” And that made me realize, oh, everything that Jon Stewart did, especially for the 9/11 first responders, he’s a true American. And not in the sense that the different political parties want you to believe as an American, not a do your part in social distance American, not a wave your Trump flag in the back of your pickup truck American, just a guy who genuinely stands up for what’s right.
My favorite Jon Stewart moment that illustrates that perfectly is whenever he went on the Colbert show. And he was just joking around with Stephen Colbert, who I think is a full-blown propagandist, about the Wuhan Lab leak theory. He was just goofing around and he was like, ” It’s called the Coronavirus Lab and they had it before. And now what do we have?” And it was like you could see in Stephen Colbert that he was like gun to his head type shit where he is like, “Jon, Jon, stop joking about that.” And that made me realize, oh, everything that Jon Stewart did, especially for the 9/11 first responders, he’s a true American. And not in the sense that the different political parties want you to believe as an American, not a do your part in social distance American, not a wave your Trump flag in the back of your pickup truck American, just a guy who genuinely stands up for what’s right.
Lex Fridman
There is a degree to which you can be in those positions easily captured by groupthink though, even when you’re not controlled by bosses and money and all that stuff. I think Jon Stewart has been mostly resistant, but it’s hard. His position is difficult.
There is a degree to which you can be in those positions easily captured by groupthink though, even when you’re not controlled by bosses and money and all that stuff. I think Jon Stewart has been mostly resistant, but it’s hard. His position is difficult.
Andrew Callaghan
I think he’s done the best job though. If someone in that obviously Democrat-connected corporate media economy, he seems to be the freest talker.
I think he’s done the best job though. If someone in that obviously Democrat-connected corporate media economy, he seems to be the freest talker.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. So this is when you first became famous?
Yeah. So this is when you first became famous?
Fame
Andrew Callaghan
I’m not even sure what fame means. I mean, I just see myself as me.
I’m not even sure what fame means. I mean, I just see myself as me.
Lex Fridman
When did you get the shades?
When did you get the shades?
Andrew Callaghan
Oh, that was on tour. That’s a whole… The shades, that’s a dark time. I didn’t make-
Oh, that was on tour. That’s a whole… The shades, that’s a dark time. I didn’t make-
Lex Fridman
This is a meme really. I don’t even know if that’s a symbol of fame or whatever.
This is a meme really. I don’t even know if that’s a symbol of fame or whatever.
Andrew Callaghan
I didn’t make journalism to become famous, I made it to give people a platform to share their stories. It just so happens that people liked it enough to where I became famous. But if I could go back and not be the on-camera guy and just platform the stories, I would. But the reality is people need a face to attach to stuff they like, and so that’s just how it is. But yeah, I would say right around Minneapolis protest, Portland protest, Proud Boys rally time when I was really in there is when I started to be acclaimed as more than just a ambush meme lord.
I didn’t make journalism to become famous, I made it to give people a platform to share their stories. It just so happens that people liked it enough to where I became famous. But if I could go back and not be the on-camera guy and just platform the stories, I would. But the reality is people need a face to attach to stuff they like, and so that’s just how it is. But yeah, I would say right around Minneapolis protest, Portland protest, Proud Boys rally time when I was really in there is when I started to be acclaimed as more than just a ambush meme lord.
Lex Fridman
Did that have effect on you, the fame?
Did that have effect on you, the fame?
Andrew Callaghan
Not at that point.
Not at that point.
Lex Fridman
Not at that point? So you were still able to have a lightness to you?
Not at that point? So you were still able to have a lightness to you?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, the country was basically closed.
Well, the country was basically closed.
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Andrew Callaghan
So it wasn’t like there was a street to walk down where people were like, “There’s that guy.” So getting famous during Covid made it. So when the country reopened, it was as if my life really changed because I was like, “Oh, all these fans I made during Covid are seeing me out at the bar. This is cool.”
So it wasn’t like there was a street to walk down where people were like, “There’s that guy.” So getting famous during Covid made it. So when the country reopened, it was as if my life really changed because I was like, “Oh, all these fans I made during Covid are seeing me out at the bar. This is cool.”
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Andrew Callaghan
At first, fame is the best thing ever because you can go anywhere in the country and these spaces that you normally feel a bit insecure in, like a local dive bar, a cool restaurant, a coffee shop where you just be another guy, all of a sudden they’re like, “Oh my God, I’m a big fan.” They give you free stuff. You get this sense of acceptance that you never would’ve gotten before, but there’s also-
At first, fame is the best thing ever because you can go anywhere in the country and these spaces that you normally feel a bit insecure in, like a local dive bar, a cool restaurant, a coffee shop where you just be another guy, all of a sudden they’re like, “Oh my God, I’m a big fan.” They give you free stuff. You get this sense of acceptance that you never would’ve gotten before, but there’s also-
Lex Fridman
The dark side. It’s all love, man. Just to speak to the first part you’re saying it’s just so much love that people have [inaudible 01:25:26].
The dark side. It’s all love, man. Just to speak to the first part you’re saying it’s just so much love that people have [inaudible 01:25:26].
Andrew Callaghan
It’s amazing. I’m sure you know what it’s like.
It’s amazing. I’m sure you know what it’s like.
Lex Fridman
That’s beautiful.
That’s beautiful.
Andrew Callaghan
The only downside of fame really is that you can’t really be anonymous again, and you have to seek out more strange environments to be anonymous in. Right now, I live in the desert basically, and I want to live in the middle of nowhere in the Mojave Desert. Not because I’m scared of people, but because I just want to be curious me again who people don’t know and I can ask questions to people that I’m interested in without them going, “I remember, I seen you here” or, “I seen you there.” That’s the main thing. That’s what I loved about hitchhiking.
The only downside of fame really is that you can’t really be anonymous again, and you have to seek out more strange environments to be anonymous in. Right now, I live in the desert basically, and I want to live in the middle of nowhere in the Mojave Desert. Not because I’m scared of people, but because I just want to be curious me again who people don’t know and I can ask questions to people that I’m interested in without them going, “I remember, I seen you here” or, “I seen you there.” That’s the main thing. That’s what I loved about hitchhiking.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, just to have an anonymity. For sure.
Yeah, just to have an anonymity. For sure.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, it’s the best. But both are great. Complaining about fame is just the lamest shit.
Yeah, it’s the best. But both are great. Complaining about fame is just the lamest shit.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Did you go to furry conventions that you covered wearing an outfit?
Yeah. Did you go to furry conventions that you covered wearing an outfit?
Andrew Callaghan
I love furries. I should do that.
I love furries. I should do that.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, we should go together. I go all the time, we should go together. What’s your favorite outfit?
Yeah, we should go together. I go all the time, we should go together. What’s your favorite outfit?
Andrew Callaghan
You ever hopped into a furry convention?
You ever hopped into a furry convention?
Lex Fridman
No, I have not.
No, I have not.
Andrew Callaghan
I think you might like it more than you think.
I think you might like it more than you think.
Lex Fridman
Listen, maybe I’m just afraid to face who I really am.
Listen, maybe I’m just afraid to face who I really am.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. Your fursona, the true Lex will come out when you’re in a $3,600 lizard suit.
Yeah. Your fursona, the true Lex will come out when you’re in a $3,600 lizard suit.
Lex Fridman
Everything is possible. Lizard? Is that what they go with?
Everything is possible. Lizard? Is that what they go with?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, scalies are the lizard furries. And there’s a big division in the community where they think scalies are douchebag because the scaly suits are more expensive. They’re about 7,000, whereas a fur suit is 3,600. And they’re also taller. So when the scalies pull up to the fur fest, it’s like, “Ah, fuck the reptiles.”
Well, scalies are the lizard furries. And there’s a big division in the community where they think scalies are douchebag because the scaly suits are more expensive. They’re about 7,000, whereas a fur suit is 3,600. And they’re also taller. So when the scalies pull up to the fur fest, it’s like, “Ah, fuck the reptiles.”
Lex Fridman
Fuck the reptiles, I can get behind that. I’m more like a teddy bear type of guy. I think bears, maybe squirrels. I don’t know.
Fuck the reptiles, I can get behind that. I’m more like a teddy bear type of guy. I think bears, maybe squirrels. I don’t know.
Andrew Callaghan
Squirrels are so cool.
Squirrels are so cool.
Lex Fridman
Giant squirrels, yeah.
Giant squirrels, yeah.
Andrew Callaghan
I want to put a GoPro on one and just see what the hell they do.
I want to put a GoPro on one and just see what the hell they do.
Lex Fridman
You were talking about that conversation with the guy at the head of Doing Things Media. How did that end up?
You were talking about that conversation with the guy at the head of Doing Things Media. How did that end up?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, I mean, I want to clear up a few things. Reid, the CEO of Doing Things, I actually think he’s a good guy. I think that he was just trying to run a business. He saw what was working for his brand, which is very college-centric, very festival-centric. And he was right to think that journalism and especially coverage of sensitive topics like Covid or police brutality would definitely not work on merch. You’re not going to sell a picture of me interviewing someone at a riot like you would me interviewing a furry or a drunk dude in Alabama, it doesn’t work the same. So it was a lot harder to monetize not just because of YouTube censorship, but also just because of the sensitive nature of the content. So Reid was looking out for himself as a businessman. There was a different partner, I’m not going to say his name, that was more connected in Hollywood. I think he’s responsible for the collapse of the show.
Well, I mean, I want to clear up a few things. Reid, the CEO of Doing Things, I actually think he’s a good guy. I think that he was just trying to run a business. He saw what was working for his brand, which is very college-centric, very festival-centric. And he was right to think that journalism and especially coverage of sensitive topics like Covid or police brutality would definitely not work on merch. You’re not going to sell a picture of me interviewing someone at a riot like you would me interviewing a furry or a drunk dude in Alabama, it doesn’t work the same. So it was a lot harder to monetize not just because of YouTube censorship, but also just because of the sensitive nature of the content. So Reid was looking out for himself as a businessman. There was a different partner, I’m not going to say his name, that was more connected in Hollywood. I think he’s responsible for the collapse of the show.
Lex Fridman
What was the collapse like? What happened?
What was the collapse like? What happened?
Andrew Callaghan
So right as the country’s reopening, I get a DM from Eric Wareheim of Tim & Eric, and I’m covering something called the UFO Mega Conference in Laughlin Nevada, which is a beautiful river town. And he DMed me and says, “Let’s make a show.” And I’m like, “Oh shit, is this real?” I grew up such a big fan of Nathan for You and The Eric Andre show, and those are produced by their company, Abso Lutely. So I was like, “Hell yeah, let’s do it.” Three days later, I get a call that says, “Jonah Hill wants to hop on board”, and I can’t believe this. I’m still in the RV and I’m in Laughlin, Nevada. So I’m like, “Jonah Hill, Super Bad. Are you shitting me right now?” So I was excited. Oh, and Moneyball. Jonah Hill’s a great actor.
So right as the country’s reopening, I get a DM from Eric Wareheim of Tim & Eric, and I’m covering something called the UFO Mega Conference in Laughlin Nevada, which is a beautiful river town. And he DMed me and says, “Let’s make a show.” And I’m like, “Oh shit, is this real?” I grew up such a big fan of Nathan for You and The Eric Andre show, and those are produced by their company, Abso Lutely. So I was like, “Hell yeah, let’s do it.” Three days later, I get a call that says, “Jonah Hill wants to hop on board”, and I can’t believe this. I’m still in the RV and I’m in Laughlin, Nevada. So I’m like, “Jonah Hill, Super Bad. Are you shitting me right now?” So I was excited. Oh, and Moneyball. Jonah Hill’s a great actor.
Lex Fridman
Oh, he is great. He’s great all around.
Oh, he is great. He’s great all around.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
He doesn’t get the credit he deserves. Well, I mean, he’s got the credit by now, but still deserves more.
He doesn’t get the credit he deserves. Well, I mean, he’s got the credit by now, but still deserves more.
Andrew Callaghan
So basically just within a week, I assembled this super team of Tim and Eric.
So basically just within a week, I assembled this super team of Tim and Eric.
Lex Fridman
Super Bad team?
Super Bad team?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, pretty much of Tim and Eric.
Yeah, pretty much of Tim and Eric.
Lex Fridman
Sorry, I’m so sorry.
Sorry, I’m so sorry.
Andrew Callaghan
No, that’s good. And Jonah Hill. And yeah, we just pitched it around. Every single TV network rejected it, I don’t know why. And they mainly did that because I was in this weird situation where I had signed a contract with Doing Things Media that I didn’t realize was called a 360 deal. That’s what they use in the rap world. Basically means that I can’t do anything outside of them without them getting 100% of the money. So if I was to go work at Sbarro or Quiznos while I was working for All Gas No Brakes, they would get my $500 a week from the sandwich spot. I was unable to earn any outside income.
No, that’s good. And Jonah Hill. And yeah, we just pitched it around. Every single TV network rejected it, I don’t know why. And they mainly did that because I was in this weird situation where I had signed a contract with Doing Things Media that I didn’t realize was called a 360 deal. That’s what they use in the rap world. Basically means that I can’t do anything outside of them without them getting 100% of the money. So if I was to go work at Sbarro or Quiznos while I was working for All Gas No Brakes, they would get my $500 a week from the sandwich spot. I was unable to earn any outside income.
I didn’t read the fine print because I was 21 and, like I told you, 45,000 a year RV sounds sick. And basically, the TV networks were like, “Why would we buy a show if the digital brand’s going to be running at the same time?” Because they didn’t want to stop doing All Gas No Brakes to make a TV show, they wanted All Gas No Brakes to continue as a web show while All Gas No Brakes as a future TV show at Showtime or Hulu or somewhere like that was also concurrently running, which is impossible for one man to do. And so every TV network said, “Okay, we’re not doing that. We want an exclusive rights contract with this guy.” Next, oh yeah, this is crazy to think about because it all happened so fast. So Jonah Hill says, “A24 Films wants to do a movie instead of a show, and they’re going to let you keep the digital brand running.”
So this meant that I could keep doing my Instagram stuff with Doing Things Media/All Gas No Brakes while making an A24 movie with Jonah Hill and Tim and Eric. So it was just like I was excited, it sounded perfect. So they said, “Okay, what do you want to make a movie about?” And I told them, “Okay, here’s what’s going to happen in 2020. If Trump wins, there’s going to be riots across the country. The major cities are going to burn down. If Trump loses, the militias and his loyal supporters are going to try to have a coup in DC.” That’s what I said. And I said, “So I’m going to follow the lead up to whoever wins the election and I’m going to document what happens after.” So they said, “Okay.” And so I was to begin filming in late October during the campaign trail, maybe mid-October up until November, and then in the following months to see what would happen. This meant that I couldn’t film anything for All Gas No Brakes the digital show because I had to dedicate 100% of my time to making this perfect movie.
Lex Fridman
Yes.
Yes.
Andrew Callaghan
Still, one of the partners at Doing Things Media was demanding that I not only produce the movie, but also more content for the show. And I told them, “There’s only so many hours in a day, man. That’s going to be impossible.” And I said, “If you want it to be possible, I can make it work, but I want to have half of the monetization from the show. 50% profit split”, which I thought is fair. If you want me to do double work when I was getting almost nothing before, split me in on the profits. They fired us immediately, me and my two childhood friends who I hired to work on the show with me were all out of a job. As we were filming for the Now HBO project, we got our fire notices.
Still, one of the partners at Doing Things Media was demanding that I not only produce the movie, but also more content for the show. And I told them, “There’s only so many hours in a day, man. That’s going to be impossible.” And I said, “If you want it to be possible, I can make it work, but I want to have half of the monetization from the show. 50% profit split”, which I thought is fair. If you want me to do double work when I was getting almost nothing before, split me in on the profits. They fired us immediately, me and my two childhood friends who I hired to work on the show with me were all out of a job. As we were filming for the Now HBO project, we got our fire notices.
Lex Fridman
The guts on that person, because you should be owning probably close to 100% of it.
The guts on that person, because you should be owning probably close to 100% of it.
Andrew Callaghan
I think so too, but they didn’t see it that way because they figured we made the initial investment. “We discovered him” is how they looked at it. So it wasn’t Reid, but it was the other partner who wasn’t Reid who said, verbatim he said this, “I have tons of connections in the comedy world. We can replace Andrew overnight.” I’m not sure why he made that miscalculation. I wish he would’ve thought about it twice, I wish it didn’t have to end like that, but it did.
I think so too, but they didn’t see it that way because they figured we made the initial investment. “We discovered him” is how they looked at it. So it wasn’t Reid, but it was the other partner who wasn’t Reid who said, verbatim he said this, “I have tons of connections in the comedy world. We can replace Andrew overnight.” I’m not sure why he made that miscalculation. I wish he would’ve thought about it twice, I wish it didn’t have to end like that, but it did.
Lex Fridman
Why do people do that? What’s the benefit of acting like that? Because you can part amicably without the drama.
Why do people do that? What’s the benefit of acting like that? Because you can part amicably without the drama.
Andrew Callaghan
I think all betrayal in anything like that is motivated by self-interest, whether that be economic success, social stability, whatever it is. They figured that because I was being such a burden in asking for the profit that they could just release me and find someone equally talented and not split them in so they can make more money.
I think all betrayal in anything like that is motivated by self-interest, whether that be economic success, social stability, whatever it is. They figured that because I was being such a burden in asking for the profit that they could just release me and find someone equally talented and not split them in so they can make more money.
Lex Fridman
Oh, I see. Well, that’s a stupid way to think.
Oh, I see. Well, that’s a stupid way to think.
Andrew Callaghan
People think like that, man. The word I use is sidekick syndrome. When people are a part of the production, but they’re not integral, they start thinking that the front man doesn’t matter or something, and that the brains of the operation are actually the people on the periphery. And so they start to believe that they can just shift things around and the audience won’t care, not realizing that I was actually the one who created the show and that the lore of the show is connected to my rise outside of their jurisdiction, if that makes sense. The people who watch All Gas No Brake watched Quarter Confessions and read the book.
People think like that, man. The word I use is sidekick syndrome. When people are a part of the production, but they’re not integral, they start thinking that the front man doesn’t matter or something, and that the brains of the operation are actually the people on the periphery. And so they start to believe that they can just shift things around and the audience won’t care, not realizing that I was actually the one who created the show and that the lore of the show is connected to my rise outside of their jurisdiction, if that makes sense. The people who watch All Gas No Brake watched Quarter Confessions and read the book.
Lex Fridman
Well, this happens also not just financially, but just with people that part of a team, but they don’t really contribute creatively to the team and they force their opinion or pressure. Whether this comes from editors or all that stuff or from sponsors, there’s pressure they create when the creator alone should be celebrated and have all the power because they’re the ones that are creating the thing.
Well, this happens also not just financially, but just with people that part of a team, but they don’t really contribute creatively to the team and they force their opinion or pressure. Whether this comes from editors or all that stuff or from sponsors, there’s pressure they create when the creator alone should be celebrated and have all the power because they’re the ones that are creating the thing.
Andrew Callaghan
In a way, I have sympathy because I can’t relate to that because I’ve always been the front man of my own projects by design. So I’m not sure what it’s like to be someone’s owner from a content perspective. I don’t understand the challenges they face. Maybe there was something that I didn’t understand, I don’t know.
In a way, I have sympathy because I can’t relate to that because I’ve always been the front man of my own projects by design. So I’m not sure what it’s like to be someone’s owner from a content perspective. I don’t understand the challenges they face. Maybe there was something that I didn’t understand, I don’t know.
Lex Fridman
True. Well, oftentimes if you own a thing like this, like this company, you do think about brand and then maybe have a big picture idea of what brand means. And that can be at tension with the creative project, right?
True. Well, oftentimes if you own a thing like this, like this company, you do think about brand and then maybe have a big picture idea of what brand means. And that can be at tension with the creative project, right?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
But ultimately, freedom for the creators is the best brand.
But ultimately, freedom for the creators is the best brand.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. I remember all three of us who worked on All Gas No Brakes got fired at the same time. And we were in the RV that Tim and Eric’s company bought for us, which was a bigger RV in the parking lot of a Walmart in South Philly. And the propane had just ran out and it was 15 degrees outside, so the RV was getting really cold really fast. And I just looked at my phone and it was like, “You’re fired”, and I was just like, “God, help me.” I’ve had a couple moments like that and God does help me.
Yeah. I remember all three of us who worked on All Gas No Brakes got fired at the same time. And we were in the RV that Tim and Eric’s company bought for us, which was a bigger RV in the parking lot of a Walmart in South Philly. And the propane had just ran out and it was 15 degrees outside, so the RV was getting really cold really fast. And I just looked at my phone and it was like, “You’re fired”, and I was just like, “God, help me.” I’ve had a couple moments like that and God does help me.
Lex Fridman
And they were always in the parking lot of Walmart, right?
And they were always in the parking lot of Walmart, right?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, yeah. Although-
Well, yeah. Although-
Lex Fridman
I know that Walmart, by the way.
I know that Walmart, by the way.
Andrew Callaghan
The one in South Philly is great.
The one in South Philly is great.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, that’s great.
Yeah, that’s great.
Andrew Callaghan
But technically now, you can’t park an RV there.
But technically now, you can’t park an RV there.
Lex Fridman
Well, you’re not a man who follows the rules, if you know what I’m saying.
Well, you’re not a man who follows the rules, if you know what I’m saying.
Andrew Callaghan
Well, the thing is though, Walmart, Cracker Barrel and Big 5 are supposed to technically all let RV campers park overnight. But if there’s a crime problem in the city where they’re at, individual Walmarts can lobby with the corporate to take that away. So all the Portland Walmarts, you can’t sleep there anymore. Any city with significant homelessness and petty property crime, the Walmarts are a no-go.
Well, the thing is though, Walmart, Cracker Barrel and Big 5 are supposed to technically all let RV campers park overnight. But if there’s a crime problem in the city where they’re at, individual Walmarts can lobby with the corporate to take that away. So all the Portland Walmarts, you can’t sleep there anymore. Any city with significant homelessness and petty property crime, the Walmarts are a no-go.
Lex Fridman
Fascinating. So that was a low point.
Fascinating. So that was a low point.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
But from there, from the ashes, the phoenix rose.
But from there, from the ashes, the phoenix rose.
Andrew Callaghan
Over time, yeah.
Over time, yeah.
Lex Fridman
Channel 5 was born.
Channel 5 was born.
Andrew Callaghan
Channel 5 was born in the March of 2021 after we finished filming for the HBO Project.
Channel 5 was born in the March of 2021 after we finished filming for the HBO Project.
Lex Fridman
Oh, really? So you went all in on the HBO project [inaudible 01:36:45]?
Oh, really? So you went all in on the HBO project [inaudible 01:36:45]?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. I mean, we filmed the HBO project from November, 2020 up until April, 2021, damn near. We were just picking up the pieces, going back for individual interviews, stuff like that.
Yeah. I mean, we filmed the HBO project from November, 2020 up until April, 2021, damn near. We were just picking up the pieces, going back for individual interviews, stuff like that.
Jan 6
Lex Fridman
So let’s go to that project. It turned out to be a movie called This Place Rules.
So let’s go to that project. It turned out to be a movie called This Place Rules.
Andrew Callaghan
It was supposed to be called America Shits Itself.
It was supposed to be called America Shits Itself.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Maybe you can tell the story of the film. You have, what’s his name? I wrote this down. Joker Gang and Gum Gang, is that correct?
Yeah. Maybe you can tell the story of the film. You have, what’s his name? I wrote this down. Joker Gang and Gum Gang, is that correct?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, the opening scene.
Yeah, the opening scene.
Lex Fridman
The opening scene of two characters just talking shit and then getting into a fight. And that I think was really brilliant how you presented that as almost like a microcosm of the division between the extremes of the left and the extremes of the right.
The opening scene of two characters just talking shit and then getting into a fight. And that I think was really brilliant how you presented that as almost like a microcosm of the division between the extremes of the left and the extremes of the right.
Andrew Callaghan
That’s exactly what it was. I’m glad you picked up on it.
That’s exactly what it was. I’m glad you picked up on it.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. And then what I really liked is that the joke, again, Joker Gang was, a little bit of a spoiler alert, I apologize, but at the end of the film was a voice of wisdom.
Yeah. And then what I really liked is that the joke, again, Joker Gang was, a little bit of a spoiler alert, I apologize, but at the end of the film was a voice of wisdom.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. I just realized-
Yeah. I just realized-
Lex Fridman
He seems the most sane.
He seems the most sane.
Andrew Callaghan
He was the voice of wisdom. He cut through it.
He was the voice of wisdom. He cut through it.
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Andrew Callaghan
I also just realized that a lot of people are going to stream the movie after watching this podcast, which is cool.
I also just realized that a lot of people are going to stream the movie after watching this podcast, which is cool.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Where do they stream it? On HBO Max, right?
Yeah. Where do they stream it? On HBO Max, right?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, HBO Max. I never got a chance to promote them.
Yeah, HBO Max. I never got a chance to promote them.
Lex Fridman
It’s such a pain in the ass, man. I wish we could all just pay on it on YouTube or something. And HBO gets the profits or whatever, but it’s such… You have to subscribe for every single thing. But yes, if you want to watch it, it’s really, I recommend extremely, highly… Sign up to HBO, whatever the hell.
It’s such a pain in the ass, man. I wish we could all just pay on it on YouTube or something. And HBO gets the profits or whatever, but it’s such… You have to subscribe for every single thing. But yes, if you want to watch it, it’s really, I recommend extremely, highly… Sign up to HBO, whatever the hell.
Andrew Callaghan
On the positive note, HBO is great to work with. They’re the most professional, respectful company I’ve ever worked with, pretty much.
On the positive note, HBO is great to work with. They’re the most professional, respectful company I’ve ever worked with, pretty much.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, HBO has created some of the greatest TV ever.
Yeah, HBO has created some of the greatest TV ever.
Andrew Callaghan
But even in the background, they get shit done. There’s no wait time. They have some of the best heavy hitters on their team. For trailers, for posters, all the promotional apparatus they have is super solid.
But even in the background, they get shit done. There’s no wait time. They have some of the best heavy hitters on their team. For trailers, for posters, all the promotional apparatus they have is super solid.
Lex Fridman
Did you get good notes from people there, like how to-
Did you get good notes from people there, like how to-
Andrew Callaghan
A little bit, man, but-
A little bit, man, but-
Lex Fridman
It’s a truly original documentary, meaning I just haven’t seen anything like it. So there’s a humor and a lightness at the right moments. Like I said, there’s a rooster in your… That’s like, okay, that’s like a non sequitur thing as part of a storytelling. It intensifies and reveals the absurdity of the division and how ones like January 6th happens, everybody goes onto the next thing. It’s like, what happened to us? It was almost like a delirium that everybody was participating in. Some weird, just like, well, like people say, mind virus. All of a sudden, we just got captured and people were just yelling at each other and doing the most ridiculous shit. And I mean, really, January 6th, the way you presented especially just reveals the circus of it all.
It’s a truly original documentary, meaning I just haven’t seen anything like it. So there’s a humor and a lightness at the right moments. Like I said, there’s a rooster in your… That’s like, okay, that’s like a non sequitur thing as part of a storytelling. It intensifies and reveals the absurdity of the division and how ones like January 6th happens, everybody goes onto the next thing. It’s like, what happened to us? It was almost like a delirium that everybody was participating in. Some weird, just like, well, like people say, mind virus. All of a sudden, we just got captured and people were just yelling at each other and doing the most ridiculous shit. And I mean, really, January 6th, the way you presented especially just reveals the circus of it all.
Andrew Callaghan
I mean, it really broke the fourth wall. That’s how I would describe it because if you were at January 6th and the lead up, it felt like it was the beginning to a series of similar riots. But it just popped off so much that that was it, that you haven’t seen anything like it since. There was supposed to be a second one on January 20th, it was the actual inauguration. It never happened. It was a crazy time to be alive and around, and especially the relationship that I developed with Enrique Tarrio, who’s the former chairman of The Proud Boys.
I mean, it really broke the fourth wall. That’s how I would describe it because if you were at January 6th and the lead up, it felt like it was the beginning to a series of similar riots. But it just popped off so much that that was it, that you haven’t seen anything like it since. There was supposed to be a second one on January 20th, it was the actual inauguration. It never happened. It was a crazy time to be alive and around, and especially the relationship that I developed with Enrique Tarrio, who’s the former chairman of The Proud Boys.
He’s now facing 23 years in prison. It’s like a trip because I went to his house in Miami maybe two weeks after January 6th. And talking to him, it seemed like he didn’t think anything was going to happen. He was just like, “Yeah, man, that was crazy. I’m glad I wasn’t there. They’re dumb for doing that.” He even told me he doesn’t think the election was stolen, which is just a mindfuck. It’s like, why’d you get everyone so hyped up? It’s just weird to think about how so many people’s lives are drastically altered forever because of that just bizarre moment in time that will always live on.
QAnon
Lex Fridman
Yeah. QAnon is part of that story, what’d you learn about QAnon from that?
Yeah. QAnon is part of that story, what’d you learn about QAnon from that?
Andrew Callaghan
Just an all encompassing worldview. That family that I talked to, I call them the QAnon family, but it’s called the Spencer family. They were non-political up until the Stop the Steal movement began in September of 2020. And within four months, their entire life revolved around the mythology and lore of Q. And I’ve never seen in my life a psyop just devour people’s minds in such an intense way, in such a rapid period of time.
Just an all encompassing worldview. That family that I talked to, I call them the QAnon family, but it’s called the Spencer family. They were non-political up until the Stop the Steal movement began in September of 2020. And within four months, their entire life revolved around the mythology and lore of Q. And I’ve never seen in my life a psyop just devour people’s minds in such an intense way, in such a rapid period of time.
Lex Fridman
And I love how the kids in the movie are also the voices of wisdom. The Spencer family, it’s the kid who goes through the full journey of believing that whatever, Hillary Clinton is a lizard, and just believing all the worst versions of the conspiracy theories. And then waking up was like, what was the point? [inaudible 01:41:34].
And I love how the kids in the movie are also the voices of wisdom. The Spencer family, it’s the kid who goes through the full journey of believing that whatever, Hillary Clinton is a lizard, and just believing all the worst versions of the conspiracy theories. And then waking up was like, what was the point? [inaudible 01:41:34].
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. It was heartbreaking to see his disappointment in his dad for even following QAnon so militantly because he was like, “I felt like they let my dad down. I felt like they let our family down” because January 6th was supposed to be the day, according to QAnon, that the storm happens and that the military is supposed to mobilize and arrest the members of the deep state, Clinton, Soros, all that. Trump was supposed to go into a helicopter, you know what I mean? And take control of the country back from the swamp, and it didn’t happen. In fact, the next day, he was almost denouncing it. Now he doesn’t, but then he did. And I think it hurt people’s pride a lot. My friend, Forgiato Blow, he’s a Trump rapper, he describes it that way. He says, “A lot of people’s pride got hurt by January 6th.”
Yeah. It was heartbreaking to see his disappointment in his dad for even following QAnon so militantly because he was like, “I felt like they let my dad down. I felt like they let our family down” because January 6th was supposed to be the day, according to QAnon, that the storm happens and that the military is supposed to mobilize and arrest the members of the deep state, Clinton, Soros, all that. Trump was supposed to go into a helicopter, you know what I mean? And take control of the country back from the swamp, and it didn’t happen. In fact, the next day, he was almost denouncing it. Now he doesn’t, but then he did. And I think it hurt people’s pride a lot. My friend, Forgiato Blow, he’s a Trump rapper, he describes it that way. He says, “A lot of people’s pride got hurt by January 6th.”
Lex Fridman
Trump rapper?
Trump rapper?
Andrew Callaghan
Oh, yeah, dude. Honestly, there’s some pretty dope Trump rap out there. I’m serious.
Oh, yeah, dude. Honestly, there’s some pretty dope Trump rap out there. I’m serious.
Lex Fridman
MAGA rap?
MAGA rap?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. You would think like, “Oh, yeah. MAGA, there’s no rappers there”, but there’s rappers. And they do a pretty good job.
Yeah. You would think like, “Oh, yeah. MAGA, there’s no rappers there”, but there’s rappers. And they do a pretty good job.
Lex Fridman
They’re good?
They’re good?
Andrew Callaghan
At delivering the messaging they want to deliver, yeah. I mean, they think of stuff and I’m like, “That’s clever.”
At delivering the messaging they want to deliver, yeah. I mean, they think of stuff and I’m like, “That’s clever.”
Lex Fridman
Oh, they have some political depth to them?
Oh, they have some political depth to them?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
Wow. I mean, is there something more you could say about how QAnon works? Who’s behind it? What’s your sense of who’s behind the whole thing?
Wow. I mean, is there something more you could say about how QAnon works? Who’s behind it? What’s your sense of who’s behind the whole thing?
Andrew Callaghan
I don’t want this to sound rude or anything, I just don’t care about QAnon. You know what I mean? I’ve put so much thought into it and I just can’t seem to care about it.
I don’t want this to sound rude or anything, I just don’t care about QAnon. You know what I mean? I’ve put so much thought into it and I just can’t seem to care about it.
Lex Fridman
Was it almost a disappointment? Because to me, it was like a thing that just captured a very large number of people’s minds, and then it just faded.
Was it almost a disappointment? Because to me, it was like a thing that just captured a very large number of people’s minds, and then it just faded.
Andrew Callaghan
I guess that’s why. It just seems like it’s gone, and the ideas of QAnon have just bled into mainstream standard conservative thinking.
I guess that’s why. It just seems like it’s gone, and the ideas of QAnon have just bled into mainstream standard conservative thinking.
Lex Fridman
But there has to be a retrospective. That’s the problem I have with Covid. A lot of stuff happened, everybody freaked out. There’s a lot of big drama around it. And now, everyone was like, “Okay, forgot.” Just moved away. What are the lessons learned? Has anyone learned any lessons?
But there has to be a retrospective. That’s the problem I have with Covid. A lot of stuff happened, everybody freaked out. There’s a lot of big drama around it. And now, everyone was like, “Okay, forgot.” Just moved away. What are the lessons learned? Has anyone learned any lessons?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, exactly. And what I’m saying is I don’t want QAnon adherents to see this and think I don’t care about them, but as far as who is behind it, the damage is done.
Yeah, exactly. And what I’m saying is I don’t want QAnon adherents to see this and think I don’t care about them, but as far as who is behind it, the damage is done.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, but what are the mechanisms that made it work? I mean, that’s a really-
Yeah, but what are the mechanisms that made it work? I mean, that’s a really-
Andrew Callaghan
What do you think? Have you thought about that?
What do you think? Have you thought about that?
Lex Fridman
I think that these viral ideas can be driven by, and your film shows this, by just a handful of people. And they’re not malevolent, they just want the clout. And there’s something sexy, there’s something really sticky about conspiracy theories, especially extreme ones. Some of them can have this momentum. They capture the minds of a lot of people and you just go with it. And when I hear some conspiracy theories, there’s something like a small part of me that like, yeah, like excited.
I think that these viral ideas can be driven by, and your film shows this, by just a handful of people. And they’re not malevolent, they just want the clout. And there’s something sexy, there’s something really sticky about conspiracy theories, especially extreme ones. Some of them can have this momentum. They capture the minds of a lot of people and you just go with it. And when I hear some conspiracy theories, there’s something like a small part of me that like, yeah, like excited.
Andrew Callaghan
It’s possible that QAnon is a psyop to distract people away from actually uncovering what the deep state is and who is truly running things behind the scenes because the deep state is just the 1%. It’s that you get people so close to any type of class consciousness, and then you totally divert everything into lizard humans who live on the moon and that Hillary Clinton is…
It’s possible that QAnon is a psyop to distract people away from actually uncovering what the deep state is and who is truly running things behind the scenes because the deep state is just the 1%. It’s that you get people so close to any type of class consciousness, and then you totally divert everything into lizard humans who live on the moon and that Hillary Clinton is…
Andrew Callaghan
… lizard humans who live on the moon and that Hillary Clinton is eating babies on camera, and QAnon did just that. They want to convince you that, one, there’s no conservative deep state, which is even more hilarious, that Trump isn’t connected to a huge, rich corporate apparatus of propagandists. And two, that the Democratic establishment is the only deep state and that some middle-of-the-road conservatives, that there’s no grifters or manipulators outside of that three-headed snake.
… lizard humans who live on the moon and that Hillary Clinton is eating babies on camera, and QAnon did just that. They want to convince you that, one, there’s no conservative deep state, which is even more hilarious, that Trump isn’t connected to a huge, rich corporate apparatus of propagandists. And two, that the Democratic establishment is the only deep state and that some middle-of-the-road conservatives, that there’s no grifters or manipulators outside of that three-headed snake.
Lex Fridman
There’s grifters everywhere.
There’s grifters everywhere.
Andrew Callaghan
Everywhere. Everyone wants to make money, dude. This is the world that we’re in. It’s in collapse. Everybody wants to make money, and engagement is the rule of law. That’s why these news organizations follow retention incentives. They want to make money by selling ads, so they try to create fear and constant division to enrich the corporate media establishment. And you have people who are almost realizing, “Hey, it seems like Fox and CNN might be owned by the same people and are tactically using these machines to keep us divided perfectly 50-50 to ensure that the power structure never gets disrupted.” And then, you get these people, “You know who’s going to save us? Donald Trump.” That’s the guy? How is that the guy? It’s not the guy, and I don’t have TDS. I’m not an orange man basher who thinks about the guy all the time, but I don’t think he’s the guy.
Everywhere. Everyone wants to make money, dude. This is the world that we’re in. It’s in collapse. Everybody wants to make money, and engagement is the rule of law. That’s why these news organizations follow retention incentives. They want to make money by selling ads, so they try to create fear and constant division to enrich the corporate media establishment. And you have people who are almost realizing, “Hey, it seems like Fox and CNN might be owned by the same people and are tactically using these machines to keep us divided perfectly 50-50 to ensure that the power structure never gets disrupted.” And then, you get these people, “You know who’s going to save us? Donald Trump.” That’s the guy? How is that the guy? It’s not the guy, and I don’t have TDS. I’m not an orange man basher who thinks about the guy all the time, but I don’t think he’s the guy.
Alex Jones
Lex Fridman
You were shirtless, lifting weights while whiskey or some alcohol was poured into your mouth by Alex Jones in this movie, and then you did the same to him.
You were shirtless, lifting weights while whiskey or some alcohol was poured into your mouth by Alex Jones in this movie, and then you did the same to him.
Andrew Callaghan
That’s true.
That’s true.
Lex Fridman
This feels like an interrogation. So Alex was a part of this film. He was throughout the narrative, and yes, you had a great interview with him. What did you learn about interacting with Alex Jones from making this film?
This feels like an interrogation. So Alex was a part of this film. He was throughout the narrative, and yes, you had a great interview with him. What did you learn about interacting with Alex Jones from making this film?
Andrew Callaghan
For one is that he’s the exact same off-camera as he is on camera.
For one is that he’s the exact same off-camera as he is on camera.
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Andrew Callaghan
It’s not an act. He told me that all real Americans die before 58. He mentioned Sean Connery and a few others, and…
It’s not an act. He told me that all real Americans die before 58. He mentioned Sean Connery and a few others, and…
Lex Fridman
How old is he?
How old is he?
Andrew Callaghan
Getting up there.
Getting up there.
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Andrew Callaghan
I think early 50s.
I think early 50s.
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Andrew Callaghan
I just found it fascinating, how nice his studio is. The guy’s got like an MSNBC-level setup. I actually had a great time with him, you know? It’s bizarre because having him in that movie created so many problems for me, and when I interviewed him, I didn’t necessarily portray him in the best light. We joked around a bit, but it wasn’t an Alex Jones hit piece necessarily. But I like to think that I was a bit critical of him in the film, especially the ways that he antagonized his supporters to storm the Capitol or to follow that trajectory.
I just found it fascinating, how nice his studio is. The guy’s got like an MSNBC-level setup. I actually had a great time with him, you know? It’s bizarre because having him in that movie created so many problems for me, and when I interviewed him, I didn’t necessarily portray him in the best light. We joked around a bit, but it wasn’t an Alex Jones hit piece necessarily. But I like to think that I was a bit critical of him in the film, especially the ways that he antagonized his supporters to storm the Capitol or to follow that trajectory.
He told me when I met with him, he was like, “I know you think that having me in this movie is a good idea, but you’re going to have some serious backlash because of that.” At the time, I was like, “Man, it’s fine. It’s all good. We’re just hanging out, drinking whiskey, doing bench presses, drinking Jameson. It’s all good.” First of all, I had to campaign to get him in the film because the studios were like, “We don’t…” There was a bizarre time around… I think it was 2018, where deplatforming was the big thing that people were encouraging. It said giving a platform to problematic ideologies will, in turn, expand their reach. And so even extending your platform to someone who’s problematic is helping them, aka destroying humanity, whatever it was. So that was the whole thing.
And when I did this media training that was mandated by HBO, it was all training in how to defend from that exact question. They said, “When we put you on NPR, when we put you on CNN, they’re going to ask you about platforming problematic ideologies, and you’re going to have to say stuff like, ‘Sunlight is the best disinfectant. I believe that extremism only goes away when you shine a light on it because leaving it in the dark will only allow it to grow.'” They gave me like 15 pointers. I didn’t use any of those pointers because I’m not the kind of person who wants to be media-trained. I like to speak freely.
But in the promotional run for the film, when I went on CNN, this was a crazy experience. So I went on CNN and thankfully, my friend was with me, and so I’m on CNN, and-
Lex Fridman
By the way, your friend is chilling in sunglasses, laying in the cocktail.
By the way, your friend is chilling in sunglasses, laying in the cocktail.
Andrew Callaghan
That’s Larry [inaudible 01:49:32].
That’s Larry [inaudible 01:49:32].
Lex Fridman
It’s a mix of the dude from Big Lebowski and the Brad Pitt role in True Romance, you know that reference?
It’s a mix of the dude from Big Lebowski and the Brad Pitt role in True Romance, you know that reference?
Andrew Callaghan
No, I’m sure it describes Larry. He kind of looks like Brad Pitt.
No, I’m sure it describes Larry. He kind of looks like Brad Pitt.
Lex Fridman
[inaudible 01:49:49] Yes.
[inaudible 01:49:49] Yes.
Andrew Callaghan
So HBO had a press tour set up for me, and the main ones were CNN and NPR. And so they said, “You’re going to go on CNN on the Don Lemon morning show, and he’s going to ask you about your life, what led up to the movie, what we can expect?” So I get in the studio, it’s about seven o’clock in the morning in New York. Had a show the night before at Times Square. So I’m groggy eyed, whatever. They put the lab on me, boom. I’m live on CNN, Sunday morning. And he goes, “How would you describe Enrique Tarrio’s mental state in the lead-up to the Capitol insurrection?” And I’m looking around, I’m like, “Is this guy serious? Am I sandwiched in the January 6th hit piece right now? I thought it was about me.” And so I told him, “It’s not about Enrique Tarrio. It’s about how companies like Fox, MSNBC, and even your station, CNN, use the 24-hour news cycle to enrage people to generate ad revenue and pit Americans against each other during times like that.”
So HBO had a press tour set up for me, and the main ones were CNN and NPR. And so they said, “You’re going to go on CNN on the Don Lemon morning show, and he’s going to ask you about your life, what led up to the movie, what we can expect?” So I get in the studio, it’s about seven o’clock in the morning in New York. Had a show the night before at Times Square. So I’m groggy eyed, whatever. They put the lab on me, boom. I’m live on CNN, Sunday morning. And he goes, “How would you describe Enrique Tarrio’s mental state in the lead-up to the Capitol insurrection?” And I’m looking around, I’m like, “Is this guy serious? Am I sandwiched in the January 6th hit piece right now? I thought it was about me.” And so I told him, “It’s not about Enrique Tarrio. It’s about how companies like Fox, MSNBC, and even your station, CNN, use the 24-hour news cycle to enrage people to generate ad revenue and pit Americans against each other during times like that.”
And he said, “There’s nothing fake about CNN.” I said, “I didn’t say you were fake news. I’m not saying you’re lying, but you’re directly antagonizing and stirring people up against half the country because you need money to support a dying platform.”
Lex Fridman
You said that?
You said that?
Andrew Callaghan
Pretty much.
Pretty much.
Lex Fridman
Nice. Great.
Nice. Great.
Andrew Callaghan
And my mom was watching it. She was texting me. She was like, “What are you doing?” And I was like, “I don’t know.” And so he goes, “Why did you extend the platform to Alex Jones?” I go, “I don’t know. I just wanted to drink some Jameson and lift some weights with him.” At this point, I don’t support that kind of media. I don’t support CNN, so I didn’t give them much information about Alex, but it was very awkward. They never posted the segment online. When I got off of that interview, I had a handler that A24 assigned to me. So I had someone with me and you could tell she was flustered, she was furious about what I just did. And so she goes, “I just got an email from Time Warner C-Suite.” And I go, “What’s Time Warner C-Suite?” She says, “I don’t know if you know this, but the same people who own CNN own HBO, and it’s Time Warner.” And so they canceled my press tour.
And my mom was watching it. She was texting me. She was like, “What are you doing?” And I was like, “I don’t know.” And so he goes, “Why did you extend the platform to Alex Jones?” I go, “I don’t know. I just wanted to drink some Jameson and lift some weights with him.” At this point, I don’t support that kind of media. I don’t support CNN, so I didn’t give them much information about Alex, but it was very awkward. They never posted the segment online. When I got off of that interview, I had a handler that A24 assigned to me. So I had someone with me and you could tell she was flustered, she was furious about what I just did. And so she goes, “I just got an email from Time Warner C-Suite.” And I go, “What’s Time Warner C-Suite?” She says, “I don’t know if you know this, but the same people who own CNN own HBO, and it’s Time Warner.” And so they canceled my press tour.
So my press tour was finished. All the late night shows that I was supposed to go on, I was supposed to go on the late night shows, and that was off the table because they were worried that I was a loose cannon, I think. And then, the only remaining appearance I had left was NPR in Boston, and that was supposed to be a premiere. So it wasn’t supposed to be an interrogation. It wasn’t supposed to be anything like that. Supposed to be a premiere in front of a live audience where they watched the film and I show up after for a Q&A. So I’m like, “All right, whatever. It’s weird, they only have this one press opportunity left.” I felt bad that I ruined the entire press tour by confronting Don Lemon, but at this point, I wanted to just do this final one, especially because it was a viewing, and I was like, “Cool.”
I sat in the audience, I watched people laugh to the film. It was awesome. So I go backstage and there’s an NPR journalist waiting for me. And nothing against people who wear masks, but she had two N95s on. Two N95s is-
Lex Fridman
It’s a lot.
It’s a lot.
Andrew Callaghan
It’s over the line. So I go, “Hey, great to meet you.” She doesn’t shake my hand and I go, “Why not?” And she goes, “You’ve been around some people who I don’t want their germs.” And I’m like, “Okay, okay, this is weird. I thought this is a fun premiere for my movie.” We sit down. The first thing she asks me is, “How do you think the Sandy Hook families would feel about you platforming one of the most despicable Americans in history, Alex Jones?” In front of a live audience. NPR never published this. The only recordings of it are by a fan named Rob in Boston who put it on YouTube. It’s vertical phone footage.
It’s over the line. So I go, “Hey, great to meet you.” She doesn’t shake my hand and I go, “Why not?” And she goes, “You’ve been around some people who I don’t want their germs.” And I’m like, “Okay, okay, this is weird. I thought this is a fun premiere for my movie.” We sit down. The first thing she asks me is, “How do you think the Sandy Hook families would feel about you platforming one of the most despicable Americans in history, Alex Jones?” In front of a live audience. NPR never published this. The only recordings of it are by a fan named Rob in Boston who put it on YouTube. It’s vertical phone footage.
And I literally am like, “Well, the Sandy Hook family’s lawyer, Mark Bankston, who represented them in court in Connecticut, told me specifically that Leonard Posner, the father of Noah Posner who died at Sandy Hook, was a huge fan of the film.” And so I said that to her and that just silenced that conversation, but the whole conversation was just about exploitation and, “Why are you platforming mentally ill people and giving a platform to conspiracies like QAnon? Don’t you feel like you’re a part of their spread? Some would call you a misinformation reporter,” all this crazy stuff. And yeah, next day hit the fan.
Lex Fridman
Fuck all those people. That film, just in case you don’t get a chance to see it, you should, you were critical of Alex Jones in the most artful way. It was the correct way to be critical. It showed him to be more interested in the grift of it. And you didn’t do it in a pointing fingers and saying in the NPR way that you just mentioned, but more like a human way. This is, tragedies happen all over the world and there’s grifters that roll in and then take advantage of it in interesting ways, and then human beings get swept up on either side of it, and it’s revealing the humor, the absurdity of it all, and it was done masterfully. For people who criticize you for platforming Alex Jones or whatever, the film, from a political perspective, probably leans very much left, heavily left, but does it without that exhausting energy of judging, two masks judging?
Fuck all those people. That film, just in case you don’t get a chance to see it, you should, you were critical of Alex Jones in the most artful way. It was the correct way to be critical. It showed him to be more interested in the grift of it. And you didn’t do it in a pointing fingers and saying in the NPR way that you just mentioned, but more like a human way. This is, tragedies happen all over the world and there’s grifters that roll in and then take advantage of it in interesting ways, and then human beings get swept up on either side of it, and it’s revealing the humor, the absurdity of it all, and it was done masterfully. For people who criticize you for platforming Alex Jones or whatever, the film, from a political perspective, probably leans very much left, heavily left, but does it without that exhausting energy of judging, two masks judging?
Andrew Callaghan
When all that was happening, when I was under fire from the mainstream press for platforming Alex Jones, I thought back to what he said to me. And doesn’t mean I agree with everything he says, but he told me, “You’re going to be in trouble with these people if you put me in your video.” And yeah, it wasn’t too bad of trouble, but definitely, I do think sometimes what the film would’ve been like without him. And I think that it was worth it because his scene is so funny to me and it brings me back to a different time in my life and I’m happy that scene’s out there.
When all that was happening, when I was under fire from the mainstream press for platforming Alex Jones, I thought back to what he said to me. And doesn’t mean I agree with everything he says, but he told me, “You’re going to be in trouble with these people if you put me in your video.” And yeah, it wasn’t too bad of trouble, but definitely, I do think sometimes what the film would’ve been like without him. And I think that it was worth it because his scene is so funny to me and it brings me back to a different time in my life and I’m happy that scene’s out there.
Lex Fridman
I think it was really well done.
I think it was really well done.
Andrew Callaghan
Thanks, man.
Thanks, man.
Lex Fridman
It showed the layering of it all, the entertainment plus not considering from his perspective the consequences of riling people up in this way, that it’s not just… You really highlight this in the interview. He keeps saying it’s infowars, but then there’s always a sense that infowars can turn to actual civil war, but maybe not. Maybe it’s all just a circus we play for each other.
It showed the layering of it all, the entertainment plus not considering from his perspective the consequences of riling people up in this way, that it’s not just… You really highlight this in the interview. He keeps saying it’s infowars, but then there’s always a sense that infowars can turn to actual civil war, but maybe not. Maybe it’s all just a circus we play for each other.
Andrew Callaghan
If you look at the speech he did on January 5th, he said, “Tomorrow, millions of patriotic Americans will take our country back.” He eggs people on and then when it gets hot, he steps away.
If you look at the speech he did on January 5th, he said, “Tomorrow, millions of patriotic Americans will take our country back.” He eggs people on and then when it gets hot, he steps away.
Lex Fridman
But like you said, the thing he told you, he turned out to be right.
But like you said, the thing he told you, he turned out to be right.
Andrew Callaghan
Oh, yeah.
Oh, yeah.
Lex Fridman
And the frogs are becoming gay.
And the frogs are becoming gay.
Andrew Callaghan
They’ve always been gay.
They’ve always been gay.
Lex Fridman
Well-
Well-
Andrew Callaghan
Saying frogs are straight is even crazier.
Saying frogs are straight is even crazier.
Lex Fridman
I’ve read stories where you kiss one and becomes a prince.
I’ve read stories where you kiss one and becomes a prince.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, that shit’s true.
Yeah, that shit’s true.
Lex Fridman
100%. You think Alex believes what he says in terms of everything he says on infowars, how much of it is real?
100%. You think Alex believes what he says in terms of everything he says on infowars, how much of it is real?
Andrew Callaghan
He’s right about big tech censorship. I think if he’s right about anything, it would probably be the heads of big tech colluding together across company lines to deplatform certain people. He’s right about that. I think most of the things that he says follow the question everything narrative, and then everything is like a conspiracy or a plot or a false flag. I think that he’s built up a following for so long that wants him to do that. So I think he’ll question things that he probably thinks are relatively straightforward because that’s the shtick of the show. The infowar is fighting misinformation and people want to see him be that guy. To a certain extent, if you’re a creator who supports your family, you do follow economic incentives and people want you to be the character, and so you’re going to naturally gravitate toward being it.
He’s right about big tech censorship. I think if he’s right about anything, it would probably be the heads of big tech colluding together across company lines to deplatform certain people. He’s right about that. I think most of the things that he says follow the question everything narrative, and then everything is like a conspiracy or a plot or a false flag. I think that he’s built up a following for so long that wants him to do that. So I think he’ll question things that he probably thinks are relatively straightforward because that’s the shtick of the show. The infowar is fighting misinformation and people want to see him be that guy. To a certain extent, if you’re a creator who supports your family, you do follow economic incentives and people want you to be the character, and so you’re going to naturally gravitate toward being it.
Lex Fridman
Do you feel that pressure yourself?
Do you feel that pressure yourself?
Andrew Callaghan
I did years ago, not anymore. I feel like now I can speak freely and really say what I want to say in my new life, but when I was younger, I felt like I had to be this awkward, amicable, aloof guy who just didn’t think anything about anything and just was here to listen. But now I feel more confident adding some narrative and voiceover and things like that.
I did years ago, not anymore. I feel like now I can speak freely and really say what I want to say in my new life, but when I was younger, I felt like I had to be this awkward, amicable, aloof guy who just didn’t think anything about anything and just was here to listen. But now I feel more confident adding some narrative and voiceover and things like that.
Lex Fridman
So for some people, especially who publish on YouTube, the YouTube algorithm, they can become a slave to the YouTube algorithm.
So for some people, especially who publish on YouTube, the YouTube algorithm, they can become a slave to the YouTube algorithm.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, for sure. And I definitely feel that sometimes. I know what works for me, but I like to think that my audience appreciates when I try new things, so I’m not totally enslaved to it.
Yeah, for sure. And I definitely feel that sometimes. I know what works for me, but I like to think that my audience appreciates when I try new things, so I’m not totally enslaved to it.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, I try not to pay attention to views or any of that.
Yeah, I try not to pay attention to views or any of that.
Andrew Callaghan
Well, you get some high views, so I’ll report that for you.
Well, you get some high views, so I’ll report that for you.
Lex Fridman
So I wrote a Chrome extension that hides all the views on anything I create.
So I wrote a Chrome extension that hides all the views on anything I create.
Andrew Callaghan
So you took it to that level?
So you took it to that level?
Lex Fridman
Yeah, just because it’s a drug, man. And I’m also a number guy, meaning if I do 30 pushups today, tomorrow I’m going to try to do 35, just enjoying number go up. That’s why I like video games like RPGs, where you’re improving your skill tree, you’re getting an extra point, and there’s some aspect of YouTube and other platforms, anything, any other platform. You’re like, “Ooh, I got more today than I got yesterday.” That’s really, really dangerous to me because it can influence how much I enjoy a thing. If nobody gives a shit about it based on the numbers, you’re like, “Oh, maybe that wasn’t such a great experience. I thought it was a great experience, but maybe it wasn’t.”
Yeah, just because it’s a drug, man. And I’m also a number guy, meaning if I do 30 pushups today, tomorrow I’m going to try to do 35, just enjoying number go up. That’s why I like video games like RPGs, where you’re improving your skill tree, you’re getting an extra point, and there’s some aspect of YouTube and other platforms, anything, any other platform. You’re like, “Ooh, I got more today than I got yesterday.” That’s really, really dangerous to me because it can influence how much I enjoy a thing. If nobody gives a shit about it based on the numbers, you’re like, “Oh, maybe that wasn’t such a great experience. I thought it was a great experience, but maybe it wasn’t.”
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, honestly, I do actually feel that way sometimes. I’ll put out something that I care about a lot, but if it doesn’t get as many views, I’m like, “All right, it must have not been as good as my higher review videos or whatever.”
Yeah, honestly, I do actually feel that way sometimes. I’ll put out something that I care about a lot, but if it doesn’t get as many views, I’m like, “All right, it must have not been as good as my higher review videos or whatever.”
Lex Fridman
That’s just not true though. It might mean on YouTube that your thumbnail sucks or something like this, or whatever, however the algorithm works. But that’s the thing I’m battling against to make sure I ignore all of that.
That’s just not true though. It might mean on YouTube that your thumbnail sucks or something like this, or whatever, however the algorithm works. But that’s the thing I’m battling against to make sure I ignore all of that.
Andrew Callaghan
Right.
Right.
Lex Fridman
It’s actually something Joe Rogan has been extremely good at. He gives zero shits.
It’s actually something Joe Rogan has been extremely good at. He gives zero shits.
Andrew Callaghan
I think it’s easier to do when you’re really successful.
I think it’s easier to do when you’re really successful.
Lex Fridman
Well, he was doing that when he wasn’t successful.
Well, he was doing that when he wasn’t successful.
Andrew Callaghan
Really?
Really?
Lex Fridman
But anything. He just follows the stuff he enjoys doing and legitimately enjoys it. He happens to be really good at it, but he gets good because he’s doing the things he really enjoys and full-on passionate about, and that’s why he’ll have ridiculous guests and just shit he enjoys doing.
But anything. He just follows the stuff he enjoys doing and legitimately enjoys it. He happens to be really good at it, but he gets good because he’s doing the things he really enjoys and full-on passionate about, and that’s why he’ll have ridiculous guests and just shit he enjoys doing.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, that’s pretty cool. Maybe I’ll one day try to do that. For now, I’m too attached to the gratification of getting a million views in a day and stuff like that. I’m not going to lie to you and say that I’ve beat that or something.
Yeah, that’s pretty cool. Maybe I’ll one day try to do that. For now, I’m too attached to the gratification of getting a million views in a day and stuff like that. I’m not going to lie to you and say that I’ve beat that or something.
Lex Fridman
Well, it’s a worthy enemy to be fighting because it’s a drug and it’s one that should be resisted for a creator. Because I feel like it can do negative stuff to your mind as a creator.
Well, it’s a worthy enemy to be fighting because it’s a drug and it’s one that should be resisted for a creator. Because I feel like it can do negative stuff to your mind as a creator.
Andrew Callaghan
Oh yeah, for sure.
Oh yeah, for sure.
Lex Fridman
Anybody that controls you is not good.
Anybody that controls you is not good.
Andrew Callaghan
A lot of people are controlled by their audience. They don’t have to have a puppet master on a corporate level. Audience incentive is a different type of… I don’t want to say slavery, but-
A lot of people are controlled by their audience. They don’t have to have a puppet master on a corporate level. Audience incentive is a different type of… I don’t want to say slavery, but-
Lex Fridman
Yeah, it is. And that’s why variety is good, and you’re doing that, always expanding. Well, let me just zoom out on this. You made a film.
Yeah, it is. And that’s why variety is good, and you’re doing that, always expanding. Well, let me just zoom out on this. You made a film.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
That’s pretty cool.
That’s pretty cool.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, it was a great experience, man. It was awesome working with Tim and Eric. Awesome working with Jonah Hill. I feel the same about HBO and A24. Everybody that I worked on the film with, I have a lot of love for and I appreciate the experience. It’s my first movie. It’s a big deal.
Yeah, it was a great experience, man. It was awesome working with Tim and Eric. Awesome working with Jonah Hill. I feel the same about HBO and A24. Everybody that I worked on the film with, I have a lot of love for and I appreciate the experience. It’s my first movie. It’s a big deal.
Lex Fridman
It was a good one.
It was a good one.
Andrew Callaghan
In my head, it’s like I finally got to make the transition from YouTuber to filmmaker, and that was always this psychic barrier that I felt like I had to jump over.
In my head, it’s like I finally got to make the transition from YouTuber to filmmaker, and that was always this psychic barrier that I felt like I had to jump over.
Lex Fridman
Just the way it’s shot, the humor that goes throughout it, just the narration that you’re doing in a shitty director’s chair, that was really well done. Whose idea was that?
Just the way it’s shot, the humor that goes throughout it, just the narration that you’re doing in a shitty director’s chair, that was really well done. Whose idea was that?
Andrew Callaghan
It was actually Tim and Eric’s idea. There was a really great editor named Clay who works for Absolutely, and they did all the editing pretty much in the office. And so it was Clay’s idea to add a retrospective director’s chair narrative arc to the whole film.
It was actually Tim and Eric’s idea. There was a really great editor named Clay who works for Absolutely, and they did all the editing pretty much in the office. And so it was Clay’s idea to add a retrospective director’s chair narrative arc to the whole film.
Lex Fridman
Just starting with the absurd fight and then going like, “Oh, that’s a good way to start the movie.” Just really, really well done.
Just starting with the absurd fight and then going like, “Oh, that’s a good way to start the movie.” Just really, really well done.
Andrew Callaghan
Thanks, man.
Thanks, man.
Lex Fridman
Well, what about Jonah Hill?
Well, what about Jonah Hill?
Andrew Callaghan
Great guy.
Great guy.
Lex Fridman
He believed in this.
He believed in this.
Andrew Callaghan
He did.
He did.
Lex Fridman
What’s that like? What do you think is behind him believing in such a wild project?
What’s that like? What do you think is behind him believing in such a wild project?
Andrew Callaghan
I think that Jonah Hill has a good eye for what’s cool amongst the younger folks. He’s into skateboarding stuff. That’s why he did that film, Mid90s. I think he probably saw a similar thing in what was going on with All Gas No Breaks and was like, “Shit, this could be big.” And so not only did he actually fund the film, he also gave me his agent. And I forgot to mention that it was Jonah Hill’s lawyers that he gave me for free that got me out of my contract eventually with Doing Things Media or freed me up to speak about what happened.
I think that Jonah Hill has a good eye for what’s cool amongst the younger folks. He’s into skateboarding stuff. That’s why he did that film, Mid90s. I think he probably saw a similar thing in what was going on with All Gas No Breaks and was like, “Shit, this could be big.” And so not only did he actually fund the film, he also gave me his agent. And I forgot to mention that it was Jonah Hill’s lawyers that he gave me for free that got me out of my contract eventually with Doing Things Media or freed me up to speak about what happened.
Lex Fridman
So he was also part of you gaining your freedom?
So he was also part of you gaining your freedom?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, in a weird way, even though him and I don’t talk that much just because he’s doing his own thing, Jonah Hill is a huge factor in my current success and just everything that I’ve been able to accomplish.
Yeah, in a weird way, even though him and I don’t talk that much just because he’s doing his own thing, Jonah Hill is a huge factor in my current success and just everything that I’ve been able to accomplish.
Politics
Lex Fridman
Just on your own politics, is it fair to say that your politics leans left?
Just on your own politics, is it fair to say that your politics leans left?
Andrew Callaghan
I’m not really sure sometimes. I like to think that I am socially left. I think people should be able to dress and act however they want. I don’t believe in restricting people’s social freedoms. Economics-wise, it doesn’t seem like leftist economic policy works very well on a city funding level. Like if you see what’s going on in California, it seems like the city leadership is mishandling the funds in California too. So I don’t know about that, but… I don’t know. I don’t really see myself as left or right. I just never have.
I’m not really sure sometimes. I like to think that I am socially left. I think people should be able to dress and act however they want. I don’t believe in restricting people’s social freedoms. Economics-wise, it doesn’t seem like leftist economic policy works very well on a city funding level. Like if you see what’s going on in California, it seems like the city leadership is mishandling the funds in California too. So I don’t know about that, but… I don’t know. I don’t really see myself as left or right. I just never have.
Lex Fridman
Well, if you just objectively zoom out and don’t have an insane standard of the extremes, it feels like a lot of your work leans left.
Well, if you just objectively zoom out and don’t have an insane standard of the extremes, it feels like a lot of your work leans left.
Andrew Callaghan
I tend to lean toward the empathetic perspective, which I do think is more on the left than the right. But also, I’m not into super PC stuff. I don’t believe in limiting free speech either. I believe in a free internet, which I think is more embraced now by conservatives.
I tend to lean toward the empathetic perspective, which I do think is more on the left than the right. But also, I’m not into super PC stuff. I don’t believe in limiting free speech either. I believe in a free internet, which I think is more embraced now by conservatives.
Lex Fridman
But it does seem that… Maybe you can correct me, but I get a sense sometimes that the left attack their own very intensely.
But it does seem that… Maybe you can correct me, but I get a sense sometimes that the left attack their own very intensely.
Andrew Callaghan
It does happen, but every community has terms of exile. Think about what happens in the conservative realm, like when Black Rifle Coffee Company denounced Kyle Rittenhouse. They lost a lot of money, too. The right attacks its own, too. Think about Bud Light and stuff like that.
It does happen, but every community has terms of exile. Think about what happens in the conservative realm, like when Black Rifle Coffee Company denounced Kyle Rittenhouse. They lost a lot of money, too. The right attacks its own, too. Think about Bud Light and stuff like that.
Lex Fridman
[inaudible 02:05:01].
[inaudible 02:05:01].
Andrew Callaghan
Every community has terms of exile. You just got to know who you’re engaging with and you got to make that decision carefully.
Every community has terms of exile. You just got to know who you’re engaging with and you got to make that decision carefully.
Lex Fridman
It’d be nice if there’s an actual write-up of the things you’re not allowed to say for each thing. And then, I wonder whose list would be longer? It just does feel like the left’s list is a little longer.
It’d be nice if there’s an actual write-up of the things you’re not allowed to say for each thing. And then, I wonder whose list would be longer? It just does feel like the left’s list is a little longer.
Andrew Callaghan
Right. If you’re a conservative and you have a T-shirt with a demon on it, say goodbye. You know what I mean? There’s certain stuff that they freak the hell out about.
Right. If you’re a conservative and you have a T-shirt with a demon on it, say goodbye. You know what I mean? There’s certain stuff that they freak the hell out about.
Lex Fridman
And conservatives are really concerned about pedophiles.
And conservatives are really concerned about pedophiles.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, I don’t like pedophiles either, but I don’t think about it all the time.
Yeah, I don’t like pedophiles either, but I don’t think about it all the time.
Lex Fridman
It’s one of the things you do in the film is confront one of the QAnon folks, where his concern is that everybody’s a pedophile and you showed to him-
It’s one of the things you do in the film is confront one of the QAnon folks, where his concern is that everybody’s a pedophile and you showed to him-
Andrew Callaghan
Well, he calls himself a pedophile hunter and makes videos exposing Democratic elite pedophile cabals, and he’s himself a convicted child molester. There’s an old thing that people say that every accusation is a confession to a certain extent. So it’s bizarre that some people’s whole life after a big mistake will revolve around trying to seem like the good guy instead of taking accountability for themselves. It’s a common thing you see all the time. Like Neighborhood Watch people, you know what I mean? What made you that? What did you do, bro? That you feel like you have to get karmic retribution by doing the reverse? I don’t get it.
Well, he calls himself a pedophile hunter and makes videos exposing Democratic elite pedophile cabals, and he’s himself a convicted child molester. There’s an old thing that people say that every accusation is a confession to a certain extent. So it’s bizarre that some people’s whole life after a big mistake will revolve around trying to seem like the good guy instead of taking accountability for themselves. It’s a common thing you see all the time. Like Neighborhood Watch people, you know what I mean? What made you that? What did you do, bro? That you feel like you have to get karmic retribution by doing the reverse? I don’t get it.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Do you think to the degree you have bias, it affects your journalism?
Yeah. Do you think to the degree you have bias, it affects your journalism?
Andrew Callaghan
No, but with the migrant situation, I don’t know.
No, but with the migrant situation, I don’t know.
Lex Fridman
What was that covering that like?
What was that covering that like?
Andrew Callaghan
I just got a lot of hate from conservatives for letting the migrants tell their stories about their journey and stuff.
I just got a lot of hate from conservatives for letting the migrants tell their stories about their journey and stuff.
Lex Fridman
What did you learn from just going to the border?
What did you learn from just going to the border?
Andrew Callaghan
just the sheer desperation that the citizens of the world are in. There’s people who truly believe that America is the only hope for their success and to feed their family, and I think a lot of them are getting catfished.
just the sheer desperation that the citizens of the world are in. There’s people who truly believe that America is the only hope for their success and to feed their family, and I think a lot of them are getting catfished.
Lex Fridman
Meaning America has its problems too?
Meaning America has its problems too?
Andrew Callaghan
It has severe problems. There’s extreme poverty here.
It has severe problems. There’s extreme poverty here.
Lex Fridman
But in America, if you just compare to other nations, the level of corruption is much lower to where the opportunity for a person to succeed, to rise is higher.
But in America, if you just compare to other nations, the level of corruption is much lower to where the opportunity for a person to succeed, to rise is higher.
Andrew Callaghan
I wish success on everybody who comes here, but my thing is the expectation that they have and the American dream propaganda they’ve been installed with isn’t necessarily a reflection of contemporary American reality. So I’m talking to people who speak no English and say, “I’m here for a better life.” I go, “Where are you going to go?” They say, “I have no idea.” And I’m like, “Man, that’s tough.” And you almost think, how bad are things elsewhere for someone to abandon their family, make this journey across multiple continents and end up here with no plan? And it just made me realize how sheltered I am to a certain extent as an American.
I wish success on everybody who comes here, but my thing is the expectation that they have and the American dream propaganda they’ve been installed with isn’t necessarily a reflection of contemporary American reality. So I’m talking to people who speak no English and say, “I’m here for a better life.” I go, “Where are you going to go?” They say, “I have no idea.” And I’m like, “Man, that’s tough.” And you almost think, how bad are things elsewhere for someone to abandon their family, make this journey across multiple continents and end up here with no plan? And it just made me realize how sheltered I am to a certain extent as an American.
And walking back what I said a little bit, because I was just trying to make a point, but what I think of as bad poverty, let’s say West Baltimore or 9th Ward, New Orleans is nothing compared to what’s going on in almost half of the world, if not more. And so it just made me zoom out a little bit, and sometimes you forget about third world poverty when you live here for so long. And you get programmed to believe the worst things that are out there is like Kensington, Philadelphia or Tenderloin, San Francisco, but those are just microcosms of more or less functioning cities. Despite what they might lead you to believe, Philadelphia is a great place. So is San Francisco, but there’s places where everywhere is really run down.
Lex Fridman
People focus on in major cities in the United States, like homelessness, somehow that’s a sign of a fallen empire.
People focus on in major cities in the United States, like homelessness, somehow that’s a sign of a fallen empire.
Andrew Callaghan
Right.
Right.
Lex Fridman
But that’s a problem. It reveals some mismanagement of cities and government [inaudible 02:08:55].
But that’s a problem. It reveals some mismanagement of cities and government [inaudible 02:08:55].
Andrew Callaghan
Homelessness in Seattle and San Francisco is for sure a result of the housing crisis, especially post- COVID and all the gentrification that preceded it. And it’s unfortunate now that the conservative media is saying, “Look at Biden’s America,” as if Biden created homeless people. And it’s just disappointing because once again, you’re seeing the media use real issues that should concern every US citizen and causing people to point fingers at a different political party as responsible for the suffering of others.
Homelessness in Seattle and San Francisco is for sure a result of the housing crisis, especially post- COVID and all the gentrification that preceded it. And it’s unfortunate now that the conservative media is saying, “Look at Biden’s America,” as if Biden created homeless people. And it’s just disappointing because once again, you’re seeing the media use real issues that should concern every US citizen and causing people to point fingers at a different political party as responsible for the suffering of others.
Lex Fridman
Do you think January 6th can happen again?
Do you think January 6th can happen again?
Andrew Callaghan
No. I don’t think so.
No. I don’t think so.
Lex Fridman
So all the lessons were learned?
So all the lessons were learned?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, for sure. People got really screwed over.
Yeah, for sure. People got really screwed over.
Lex Fridman
Don’t you have a sense that there’s a greater and greater growing questioning of the electoral process and all this kind of stuff?
Don’t you have a sense that there’s a greater and greater growing questioning of the electoral process and all this kind of stuff?
Andrew Callaghan
I think that Americans overall are very comfortable with our standard of living. I think people like going to Sonic and waiting in their car and getting milkshakes, and people like going to the AMC theaters and they like going ice skating and mini golfing and going to the bar after work. I don’t think that anyone wants a collapse of the basic structure of the country. Even the most politically divided don’t want to see 7-Eleven go away. We are so comfortable.
I think that Americans overall are very comfortable with our standard of living. I think people like going to Sonic and waiting in their car and getting milkshakes, and people like going to the AMC theaters and they like going ice skating and mini golfing and going to the bar after work. I don’t think that anyone wants a collapse of the basic structure of the country. Even the most politically divided don’t want to see 7-Eleven go away. We are so comfortable.
If you look at other countries, even Europe, look at how they protest. And look at the Arab Spring. Those guys were talking like January 6ers, and they actually took control of the government. Think about even if the MAGA crowd took over the Capitol building, it’s just a building. I don’t know. I just think that Americans, they talk about civil war stuff, we’re so far from that. Even if the rhetoric is as divided as it was in 2020, it won’t happen again.
Lex Fridman
For it to really happen, there has to be a level of desperation.
For it to really happen, there has to be a level of desperation.
Andrew Callaghan
There has to be a level of economic desperation that’s causing people to starve or some basic resource going away, water, something like that.
There has to be a level of economic desperation that’s causing people to starve or some basic resource going away, water, something like that.
Lex Fridman
Who do you think wins, Trump or Biden?
Who do you think wins, Trump or Biden?
Andrew Callaghan
In the civil war? Well, we know who has the guns.
In the civil war? Well, we know who has the guns.
Lex Fridman
No, in a game of Mario Kart? No, in the election 2024.
No, in a game of Mario Kart? No, in the election 2024.
Andrew Callaghan
Oh. Man, I have no idea, man. I don’t even know if I’m going to vote.
Oh. Man, I have no idea, man. I don’t even know if I’m going to vote.
Lex Fridman
It’s weird that this is our choice.
It’s weird that this is our choice.
Andrew Callaghan
I know. I wish people were more focused on city politics. I’d rather vote yes or no for a bike lane in my neighborhood than I would for the president.
I know. I wish people were more focused on city politics. I’d rather vote yes or no for a bike lane in my neighborhood than I would for the president.
Lex Fridman
So local politics to you is where it is. And you feel [inaudible 02:11:26].
So local politics to you is where it is. And you feel [inaudible 02:11:26].
Andrew Callaghan
Oh, your vote actually matters. Let’s say you have a community of 500 people and you live in Henderson, Nevada. You can influence whether or not there’s a bike lane or if this is going to be a playground or an AMPM. You get to choose and you can influence 100 people to choose and boom, this is your community. You can’t influence the result of an election.
Oh, your vote actually matters. Let’s say you have a community of 500 people and you live in Henderson, Nevada. You can influence whether or not there’s a bike lane or if this is going to be a playground or an AMPM. You get to choose and you can influence 100 people to choose and boom, this is your community. You can’t influence the result of an election.
Lex Fridman
Still, those at the presidential level, it sets the tone of the country. And Trump running again and Biden running again, it just feels like there’s going to be a lot of questioning of election results.
Still, those at the presidential level, it sets the tone of the country. And Trump running again and Biden running again, it just feels like there’s going to be a lot of questioning of election results.
Andrew Callaghan
I just can’t believe those are our guys.
I just can’t believe those are our guys.
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Andrew Callaghan
That’s really our guys? That’s where we’re at? All these smart people we have in this country, the great history.
That’s really our guys? That’s where we’re at? All these smart people we have in this country, the great history.
Lex Fridman
We got Joker Gang versus Gum Gang. Where’d you find Joker Gang?
We got Joker Gang versus Gum Gang. Where’d you find Joker Gang?
Andrew Callaghan
Well-
Well-
Lex Fridman
Is he a legit juggler or is he just-
Is he a legit juggler or is he just-
Andrew Callaghan
No, no, no, no. Joker Gang is like a Miami Cuban guy.
No, no, no, no. Joker Gang is like a Miami Cuban guy.
Lex Fridman
Oh.
Oh.
Andrew Callaghan
Is Joker 305 rawest Chico alive? I had been following him for a long time on Instagram because he used to post videos of himself popping Percocets and smoking blunts on the toilet freestyling. So I had followed him for a while. And then I finally got this platform and I said, “Oh my God, I bet you now that we have a million followers, Joker Gang will sit down with us.” And lo and behold, the clout did its thing and there I was, face to face with the man.
Is Joker 305 rawest Chico alive? I had been following him for a long time on Instagram because he used to post videos of himself popping Percocets and smoking blunts on the toilet freestyling. So I had followed him for a while. And then I finally got this platform and I said, “Oh my God, I bet you now that we have a million followers, Joker Gang will sit down with us.” And lo and behold, the clout did its thing and there I was, face to face with the man.
Response to allegations
Lex Fridman
There was a controversy a year ago where a woman came forward and said that you were pushy with her. You respected to know, you got the consent, but you were pushy about it. Looking back, can you tell the story of that? What are the lessons you learned from it?
There was a controversy a year ago where a woman came forward and said that you were pushy with her. You respected to know, you got the consent, but you were pushy about it. Looking back, can you tell the story of that? What are the lessons you learned from it?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, I’ve yet to speak on this for a lot of reasons. Mostly because it was a hard time and it’s a sensitive subject. And I’ve wanted to prioritize the reporting, but I think that now I’m ready and able to do so. Everything started on December 30th, 2022, and that was the release date of the HBO project. Like I told you, we didn’t know when the movie was going to come out. We weren’t told that it was going to come out on that date until early November. And so it was like, “Oh my God, here we go. We got a movie coming out.” I didn’t even know it was going to be them.
Yeah, I’ve yet to speak on this for a lot of reasons. Mostly because it was a hard time and it’s a sensitive subject. And I’ve wanted to prioritize the reporting, but I think that now I’m ready and able to do so. Everything started on December 30th, 2022, and that was the release date of the HBO project. Like I told you, we didn’t know when the movie was going to come out. We weren’t told that it was going to come out on that date until early November. And so it was like, “Oh my God, here we go. We got a movie coming out.” I didn’t even know it was going to be them.
So every day for those 50 days to where I received word and to the movie announcement or to the movie release was like, I was like a kid waiting for Christmas morning. You know what I mean? Every day I saw the movie release date as the first day of the rest of my life. And so I remember the week of the movie release, it was like every day I was like, “Oh my God. Six days, five days, four days.” And when it became two days, I was so excited and so, honestly, anxiety riddled because it was such a massive platform that I went out to the desert by myself out in the Mojave, got a hotel and just sat there.
And then, movie release day comes. It was supposed to come out at 8:00 PM Pacific standard time. I remember it was like 12 hours left, 10 hours left. And then, eight minutes before the movie at 7:52, or I guess it was sent at 10:52 East Coast time, I got a text message requesting a portion of my fat HBO check to contribute toward apparently years of therapy bills that this person had accrued after she says that she felt that I pressured her into giving consent years prior. And I was confused, not only because of the timing, but because this is someone that I hadn’t seen in years or spoken to in years and I presumed that I was on good terms with. So I didn’t respond to the text message. And then, when I didn’t respond, about seven days later, this person made some TikTok videos and with the help of some friends launched an online campaign that got picked up by the press pretty quickly.
Lex Fridman
So what did you feel like when you got that text?
So what did you feel like when you got that text?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, it’s tough because on one hand, I’m not opposed to restitution being part of a private accountability process for real abuse. If you’ve hurt someone to an extent that it took them out of work or something, I think they’re entitled to some money. But unfortunately, as I later learned, this person had legal counsel, and this was an attempt to basically create evidence by extracting a confession from me to use as precedent for a civil lawsuit to the tune of a couple of million dollars.
Well, it’s tough because on one hand, I’m not opposed to restitution being part of a private accountability process for real abuse. If you’ve hurt someone to an extent that it took them out of work or something, I think they’re entitled to some money. But unfortunately, as I later learned, this person had legal counsel, and this was an attempt to basically create evidence by extracting a confession from me to use as precedent for a civil lawsuit to the tune of a couple of million dollars.
Lex Fridman
It’s dark.
It’s dark.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
How did you meet this person?
How did you meet this person?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, I met them when I was 22. Like I told you, I was living in an RV, making this show called All Gas No Breaks. And I would travel between cities every other day. And so I would basically pick a new city, and I got in this pretty bad habit of what I would say is essentially treating Instagram like a dating app. I would go to a new place, I’d post my location, I’d surf the DMs, and I would look for fans to meet up with. It wasn’t always girls, it was just people to party with because I was also partying every night, but a lot of times ended up being girls and stuff. And so that’s how this situation was.
Well, I met them when I was 22. Like I told you, I was living in an RV, making this show called All Gas No Breaks. And I would travel between cities every other day. And so I would basically pick a new city, and I got in this pretty bad habit of what I would say is essentially treating Instagram like a dating app. I would go to a new place, I’d post my location, I’d surf the DMs, and I would look for fans to meet up with. It wasn’t always girls, it was just people to party with because I was also partying every night, but a lot of times ended up being girls and stuff. And so that’s how this situation was.
I didn’t have sex with this person, had a consensual encounter that they reached out to me about two weeks after saying, “Hey, I don’t want you to take this the wrong way.” But looking back, I felt a lot more pressure to agree than I realized in the moment. “I don’t think this is any fault of yours. I just think that you came on a bit too strong and I didn’t want to let you down. So I gave in,” and that language made me feel horrible, mainly because if this person had told me, “Hey, I don’t want to hook up,” I would’ve said, “Yeah, of course not. I don’t want to hook up with someone who doesn’t want to hook up with me.” And I think that as fame increased during that time, I think I was just oblivious to how people were seeing me, especially those who had a digital relationship with me prior to me knowing them. And I don’t think that I handled that the right way.
Lex Fridman
Well, thank you for taking accountability, but just to clarify, you got consent?
Well, thank you for taking accountability, but just to clarify, you got consent?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, I was the initiatory party in an interaction with a fan who felt it she had to say yes because of… I’m not sure why. I don’t know why, but like I said, this person also disclosed to me they had a history of childhood trauma and were actively being treated for PTSD and that they felt things moved too fast for them given their situation. And so I told her, I said, “Hey, if you want to reach out, if you want to talk on the phone, I’m always here for you. I’m sorry to hear that. Let me know if we can talk further.”
Yeah, I was the initiatory party in an interaction with a fan who felt it she had to say yes because of… I’m not sure why. I don’t know why, but like I said, this person also disclosed to me they had a history of childhood trauma and were actively being treated for PTSD and that they felt things moved too fast for them given their situation. And so I told her, I said, “Hey, if you want to reach out, if you want to talk on the phone, I’m always here for you. I’m sorry to hear that. Let me know if we can talk further.”
About six months after that, I was at Sturgis Bike Week, and I remember this day, this was the hardest day. I was just chilling and I got a text from my friend and it said, “Hey, man, you’re getting canceled right now.” I was like, “What do you mean? Did someone find an old tweet or something? What are you talking about?” I opened my phone and it was this Instagram story of me. It was like the ugliest picture of me you can find. It was like my face open. It was screenshotted, and it said… I remember this specifically because I just couldn’t believe it. It said, “The ugly loser who hosts All Gas No Breaks is a piece of shit. He knowingly abused my friend and got away with it. If you follow him, I’m going to message you and ask you why?”
So this person who I don’t know, I didn’t even know who the accusation was coming from, they emailed every production company that I was working with, DMd hundreds, if not thousands of people, just saying that I was this piece of shit. And I didn’t even know who this person was. So I was frantically calling and texting every person that I’d seen intimately for the past year and being like, “Hey, are we on good terms? Is everything okay?” And then, I figured out that the person was coming from Florida, and I knew who it was. And so, thankfully, I reached out to the original person who I had the communication with, and I said, “Hey, I think this might’ve been you. This might’ve been your friend who posted this. Are we good? I’m sorry.” I apologized again. I was like, “Listen, I feel bad that you feel this way. I want to do anything that I can to help you. Again, I apologize.”
And she said, “Apology accepted. I’m sorry. My friend asked if she could post on my behalf, and I’m sorry. I was going through a lot mentally, and I saw your fame increasing. And so I agreed to let her speak on my behalf,” and we made amends in private. I said, “Okay, I’m here for you. Let me know.” And she said, “Apology is enough. Thank you for taking the time to speak with me.” And that was two years prior to this…
Andrew Callaghan
… “Thank you for taking the time to speak with me.” And that was two years prior to this text message being sent to my phone eight minutes before the movie. So naturally, I wanted to go on my platforms and talk about what was happening, but I also didn’t want to mess up the rollout of the movie. And so the PR firm was like, “We got this, we’ll handle this for you.” And that was, I guess by way of a TMZ thing that said, “Andrew Callaghan is devastated.” I’m not sure why they thought that that was going to make people be in my favor, but it was just a picture of me on NBC that said, “Andrew Callaghan devastated by allegations.” That that was their plan, I guess, to show that I was remorseful or something.
… “Thank you for taking the time to speak with me.” And that was two years prior to this text message being sent to my phone eight minutes before the movie. So naturally, I wanted to go on my platforms and talk about what was happening, but I also didn’t want to mess up the rollout of the movie. And so the PR firm was like, “We got this, we’ll handle this for you.” And that was, I guess by way of a TMZ thing that said, “Andrew Callaghan is devastated.” I’m not sure why they thought that that was going to make people be in my favor, but it was just a picture of me on NBC that said, “Andrew Callaghan devastated by allegations.” That that was their plan, I guess, to show that I was remorseful or something.
Lex Fridman
How much of this do you think lawyers pushing this when money and fame are involved?
How much of this do you think lawyers pushing this when money and fame are involved?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, I wish I could say the lawyer, but I just can’t, that was involved in this. But I will tell you that I try to lean away from resentment and toward accountability completely. What was my role in the situation? How can I never make someone feel like that again? What can I do? What changes can I make to make sure that, one, I never treat someone this way, and two, to never be in that position again?
Well, I wish I could say the lawyer, but I just can’t, that was involved in this. But I will tell you that I try to lean away from resentment and toward accountability completely. What was my role in the situation? How can I never make someone feel like that again? What can I do? What changes can I make to make sure that, one, I never treat someone this way, and two, to never be in that position again?
Lex Fridman
Well, again, thank you for taking accountability.
Well, again, thank you for taking accountability.
Andrew Callaghan
And the main reason I talk about that is because it wasn’t just that person. There was multiple people who made videos reporting similar behavior. And so it’s obvious that that was a pattern of behavior of mine. And so I made the apology video to announce that I was taking some time away because I just needed time away. My entire support system collapsed. My friends at the time disappeared. I was getting obituaries texted to my phone that were like, “Hey, it’s been nice knowing you. It was great to see you grow. Good luck,” like I was dead. And yeah, got dropped from my agency. No one gave me tough love. No one called me to ask me if I was all right. It was just only… Everyone disappeared in a week.
And the main reason I talk about that is because it wasn’t just that person. There was multiple people who made videos reporting similar behavior. And so it’s obvious that that was a pattern of behavior of mine. And so I made the apology video to announce that I was taking some time away because I just needed time away. My entire support system collapsed. My friends at the time disappeared. I was getting obituaries texted to my phone that were like, “Hey, it’s been nice knowing you. It was great to see you grow. Good luck,” like I was dead. And yeah, got dropped from my agency. No one gave me tough love. No one called me to ask me if I was all right. It was just only… Everyone disappeared in a week.
Lex Fridman
Again, thank you for taking accountability, but I just hate how many cowards there are out there. When people hit low points is when you should help, when you should stand with them if you know their character.
Again, thank you for taking accountability, but I just hate how many cowards there are out there. When people hit low points is when you should help, when you should stand with them if you know their character.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. And it was hard to separate the initial situation that I knew was more or less a setup and the possibly genuine other accounts. And so it was like, “All right, you know what? At this point in my life, I want to be on the right side of history. I don’t want to be the anti-cancel culture mouthpiece. I don’t have the mental strength to fight this,” especially because I was envisioning the HBO drop to be this, the world opens up to me moment and it was just the reverse, but it wasn’t so much the media reporting on it that hurt me. It was just little stuff like a childhood friend that you love, seeing they unfollowed you on Instagram, or just seeing someone on the street that you grew up with and waving at them and they don’t do anything back and you’re just like, “Oh my God, man. This is my new life,” but what are you supposed to do?
Yeah. And it was hard to separate the initial situation that I knew was more or less a setup and the possibly genuine other accounts. And so it was like, “All right, you know what? At this point in my life, I want to be on the right side of history. I don’t want to be the anti-cancel culture mouthpiece. I don’t have the mental strength to fight this,” especially because I was envisioning the HBO drop to be this, the world opens up to me moment and it was just the reverse, but it wasn’t so much the media reporting on it that hurt me. It was just little stuff like a childhood friend that you love, seeing they unfollowed you on Instagram, or just seeing someone on the street that you grew up with and waving at them and they don’t do anything back and you’re just like, “Oh my God, man. This is my new life,” but what are you supposed to do?
Thankfully, somehow, two weeks after, I met an amazing partner who I’m still with to this day, and I was able to conquer my two biggest fears, which is monogamy and dogs. I was terrified of dogs and terrified of having a girlfriend. Now I have a girlfriend who I love and two dogs.
Lex Fridman
What was the lowest point?
What was the lowest point?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, right after this happened, I entered recovery programs. Started with AA, but then I found a more specialized program that dealt with the issues that I was dealing with. I’d say the hardest point was logically deducing that the lives of my loved ones would be better off if I was gone, you know what I mean? And thinking that my mom and my friends, that their life would be better if I took myself out of the picture. And for one, I just figured their friends canceled. “Her son is a disgrace.” My family’s going to think they raised me wrong, and my friends, I’m a social pariah now I’m a burden. I’m better off dead. And the hard part was I would read stories and books written by parents who lost their kids to suicide, and they reported feeling a lot of anger after the suicide.
Well, right after this happened, I entered recovery programs. Started with AA, but then I found a more specialized program that dealt with the issues that I was dealing with. I’d say the hardest point was logically deducing that the lives of my loved ones would be better off if I was gone, you know what I mean? And thinking that my mom and my friends, that their life would be better if I took myself out of the picture. And for one, I just figured their friends canceled. “Her son is a disgrace.” My family’s going to think they raised me wrong, and my friends, I’m a social pariah now I’m a burden. I’m better off dead. And the hard part was I would read stories and books written by parents who lost their kids to suicide, and they reported feeling a lot of anger after the suicide.
So I tried to think of what’s the way I can do it to get the least amount of anger on behalf of the people who would grieve? Because the hanging, someone will discover you. So I figured drinking myself to death would be the way to do it, and I wasn’t able to. Yeah, that was just a dark place. I remember hating the people who loved me because I knew they would grieve, and that made me mad, if that makes sense. I was ready to go. I had no will to live. But their grief was like… I didn’t want to cause that because I didn’t want to hurt them. So I was like, I hated the people who loved me because they were stopping me from taking my own life.
And it’s weird to think that when I was going through that, if you walk by me in the street, I look like a normal guy. And so now when I walk around and I see people, I think to myself, “You have no idea what that person is going through.” It’s crazy that so many people are suffering in complete silence and they don’t wear it on them.
Lex Fridman
Many of the people you talk to are probably that.
Many of the people you talk to are probably that.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
Many people you’ve interviewed before, all this and after are probably going through some shit.
Many people you’ve interviewed before, all this and after are probably going through some shit.
Andrew Callaghan
I also thought if I could write down what I just told you on a piece of paper and I was to do it, and then they found the note, they would take it more seriously because they would know that I wasn’t lying.
I also thought if I could write down what I just told you on a piece of paper and I was to do it, and then they found the note, they would take it more seriously because they would know that I wasn’t lying.
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Andrew Callaghan
But then you know if you do it, it reduces the lifespan of your parents by 15 years. So I looked at it like I was taking time away from them.
But then you know if you do it, it reduces the lifespan of your parents by 15 years. So I looked at it like I was taking time away from them.
Lex Fridman
Well, thank you, for the most part, leaning towards accountability. That’s the right path to take. What advice would you give to young men that look up to you on how they can be good men, especially in regard to women?
Well, thank you, for the most part, leaning towards accountability. That’s the right path to take. What advice would you give to young men that look up to you on how they can be good men, especially in regard to women?
Andrew Callaghan
If you have any kind of platform, it doesn’t have to be famous on Instagram. It could be like if you’re a pillar of your community in the culinary world or whatever it is, just be hyper aware of that and remember that you are inheriting a power dynamic that can create situations where there might be some pressure that you don’t even realize is there, but it’s definitely there and you just have to be aware of that. And two, when meeting new partners, having hookups and stuff like that, just try to have a trauma-informed conversation about their past. Really know the experiences and the backstory of what a new partner has gone through in that world of intimacy. Whatever they’re comfortable to share, obviously. But I would advise against one-night-stands. I would advise against hooking up with someone that you’re meeting for the first time. Have those conversations prior because even though it might sound like a vibe killer, it’s not.
If you have any kind of platform, it doesn’t have to be famous on Instagram. It could be like if you’re a pillar of your community in the culinary world or whatever it is, just be hyper aware of that and remember that you are inheriting a power dynamic that can create situations where there might be some pressure that you don’t even realize is there, but it’s definitely there and you just have to be aware of that. And two, when meeting new partners, having hookups and stuff like that, just try to have a trauma-informed conversation about their past. Really know the experiences and the backstory of what a new partner has gone through in that world of intimacy. Whatever they’re comfortable to share, obviously. But I would advise against one-night-stands. I would advise against hooking up with someone that you’re meeting for the first time. Have those conversations prior because even though it might sound like a vibe killer, it’s not.
And if you think that that conversation is a vibe killer, you probably shouldn’t be in that situation in the first place, especially now, how hyper sexualized things are and how common that type of violence is. You need to be able to have those conversations and stop and say, “Hey, tell me a little bit about your past? Is there any triggers that make you uncomfortable? Let me know how I can be the best partner to you.” And I’m sure that college-age people are not having those conversations, but I’m sure that it would go a long way.
Lex Fridman
So especially when you’re young, college-aged, you don’t have enough experience to be able to read a person without having that conversation because a lot of times you can see the trauma without explicitly talking about it, but that takes experience and knowledge and seeing the world. When you’re young and you really don’t know shit, making things a bit more explicit is probably better.
So especially when you’re young, college-aged, you don’t have enough experience to be able to read a person without having that conversation because a lot of times you can see the trauma without explicitly talking about it, but that takes experience and knowledge and seeing the world. When you’re young and you really don’t know shit, making things a bit more explicit is probably better.
Andrew Callaghan
And also, as men, were trained to believe that it’s our duty to be the initiatory party in any type of sexual encounter. Like, oh, man chases woman. You know what I mean? You have to be the one to make the move, or she’s playing hard to get if she’s resistant to your first compliment or something. I think that that’s not always how it has to be. And that extra caution needs to be placed if you’re taking the initiatory role in an interaction, especially if someone has a traumatic background. They might agree to do something with you because they’re scared and you might not realize that’s what’s going on because you don’t see yourself as a predatory person, you don’t see yourself as someone who would ever consciously make someone uncomfortable or cross a boundary, but people have histories that you might not understand.
And also, as men, were trained to believe that it’s our duty to be the initiatory party in any type of sexual encounter. Like, oh, man chases woman. You know what I mean? You have to be the one to make the move, or she’s playing hard to get if she’s resistant to your first compliment or something. I think that that’s not always how it has to be. And that extra caution needs to be placed if you’re taking the initiatory role in an interaction, especially if someone has a traumatic background. They might agree to do something with you because they’re scared and you might not realize that’s what’s going on because you don’t see yourself as a predatory person, you don’t see yourself as someone who would ever consciously make someone uncomfortable or cross a boundary, but people have histories that you might not understand.
And for me, as someone who doesn’t have much, honestly, childhood trauma or anything like that, it’s been an interesting year for me working in therapy and elsewhere, understanding how that affects the mind. And also, I understand that hurt people, hurt people, and that someone with a traumatic background isn’t going to have sympathy for applying that traumatic pain to someone else, even if that person isn’t the cause of what put them in that spot.
Channel 5
Lex Fridman
If we can go back to Channel 5, can you tell the origin story of that?
If we can go back to Channel 5, can you tell the origin story of that?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. Channel 5, during the All Gas No Breaks days, we used to tell people that we were called Channel 5 if we wanted them to stop antagonizing us while we were filming, because every town has a Channel 5. So when people were like, “What’s this for?” If they were being super rude and trying to get in the camera and be hell of obnoxious, we would just say, “Oh, we’re Channel 5.” And they would be like, “Oh, my grandma’s going to see that,” and they would leave us alone. So Channel 5 was a diversion tactic during All Gas No Breaks.
Yeah. Channel 5, during the All Gas No Breaks days, we used to tell people that we were called Channel 5 if we wanted them to stop antagonizing us while we were filming, because every town has a Channel 5. So when people were like, “What’s this for?” If they were being super rude and trying to get in the camera and be hell of obnoxious, we would just say, “Oh, we’re Channel 5.” And they would be like, “Oh, my grandma’s going to see that,” and they would leave us alone. So Channel 5 was a diversion tactic during All Gas No Breaks.
And it just so happened that we were in Miami Beach one time and this kid came up drinking liquor, trying to yell about whatever they yell about in Miami Beach, like titties or whatever, and we’re like, “Bro, this is Channel 5. Be careful what you say.” And he was like, “For real?” And he just walked off. And I said to my friend at the time, I was like, “That sounded pretty good, right? Channel 5.” And he goes, “That does sound pretty good.” He’s like, “That’s got to be trademarked though.” No, it’s not trademarked.
It’s crazy, right? There’s a Channel 5 in every city, Channel 5 KTLA, Channel 5 Seattle, Como News, dude, Channel 5 itself, we own it, because no one’s thought of something that simple, because you’d think you’d have to specify. We own channel5.com, channel5.news. Dude, we own it. It’s awesome.
Lex Fridman
So it was the same kind of spirit as the previous thing.
So it was the same kind of spirit as the previous thing.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
What was the first one you did under the Channel 5 flag?
What was the first one you did under the Channel 5 flag?
Andrew Callaghan
Miami Beach Spring Break.
Miami Beach Spring Break.
Lex Fridman
I think I’ve seen that and it’s going to be a callback. I think somebody mentioning eating ass there too.
I think I’ve seen that and it’s going to be a callback. I think somebody mentioning eating ass there too.
Andrew Callaghan
That would be the place.
That would be the place.
Lex Fridman
I believe that was-
I believe that was-
Andrew Callaghan
There’s only about five places in the US where people yell about eating ass all the time, Bourbon Street, South Beach Miami, 6th Street in Austin, Broadway in Nashville. And I’m just going to go ahead and say Times Square, you might not think it, but-
There’s only about five places in the US where people yell about eating ass all the time, Bourbon Street, South Beach Miami, 6th Street in Austin, Broadway in Nashville. And I’m just going to go ahead and say Times Square, you might not think it, but-
Lex Fridman
Times Square, really?
Times Square, really?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, they yell about ass there.
Yeah, they yell about ass there.
Lex Fridman
Times Square.
Times Square.
Andrew Callaghan
I would say Beale Street in Memphis, but it’s not good.
I would say Beale Street in Memphis, but it’s not good.
Lex Fridman
Oh, yeah.
Oh, yeah.
Andrew Callaghan
The median age is too high on Beale Street for anyone to yell about ass.
The median age is too high on Beale Street for anyone to yell about ass.
Lex Fridman
Oh, this is a fascinating portrait of America, through that specific lens. So Miami Beach. And then how would you describe your style of interviewing, just now that you’ve collected so many? If you had a style, how would you describe your style?
Oh, this is a fascinating portrait of America, through that specific lens. So Miami Beach. And then how would you describe your style of interviewing, just now that you’ve collected so many? If you had a style, how would you describe your style?
Andrew Callaghan
I guess before especially, it used to be like deadpan. Now I would describe it as more directed, but still relatively affable, agreeable, deadpan interview style.
I guess before especially, it used to be like deadpan. Now I would describe it as more directed, but still relatively affable, agreeable, deadpan interview style.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, like in the face of absurdity, you’re just there with a microphone. There’s a comic aspect to it, and that’s intentional.
Yeah, like in the face of absurdity, you’re just there with a microphone. There’s a comic aspect to it, and that’s intentional.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, I used to look at the camera like Jim from the office back in the day. I don’t do that anymore.
Yeah, I used to look at the camera like Jim from the office back in the day. I don’t do that anymore.
Lex Fridman
What about the editing? How do you think about the editing?
What about the editing? How do you think about the editing?
Andrew Callaghan
I still do most of it, but Susan helps a lot too. It’s my associate. Yeah, the editing style, like I said, we pioneered this editing style that honestly was inspired a bit by Vic Berger, but we took it to real life, crash zooms, chopping up vocals a bit to add comedic timing where it didn’t necessarily exist. You might add two seconds of awkward silence that are built with room tone, or you might make everything really fast by cutting silence and switching camera angles. But now, we try to be pretty straightforward because we want to be taken more seriously.
I still do most of it, but Susan helps a lot too. It’s my associate. Yeah, the editing style, like I said, we pioneered this editing style that honestly was inspired a bit by Vic Berger, but we took it to real life, crash zooms, chopping up vocals a bit to add comedic timing where it didn’t necessarily exist. You might add two seconds of awkward silence that are built with room tone, or you might make everything really fast by cutting silence and switching camera angles. But now, we try to be pretty straightforward because we want to be taken more seriously.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, sure. What’s crash Zoom, by the way?
Yeah, sure. What’s crash Zoom, by the way?
Andrew Callaghan
A crash zoom is when it’s artificial zoom that you might add in Adobe Premiere where the camera zooms in on someone’s face.
A crash zoom is when it’s artificial zoom that you might add in Adobe Premiere where the camera zooms in on someone’s face.
Lex Fridman
Where the resolution is not there?
Where the resolution is not there?
Andrew Callaghan
The resolution is not there, unless you have a Blackmagic Cinema Camera.
The resolution is not there, unless you have a Blackmagic Cinema Camera.
Lex Fridman
Which you don’t.
Which you don’t.
Andrew Callaghan
We don’t use those. The file size is too big.
We don’t use those. The file size is too big.
Lex Fridman
That’s the only constraint?
That’s the only constraint?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
Okay.
Okay.
Andrew Callaghan
100%.
100%.
Lex Fridman
All right. And you also do voiceover storytelling.
All right. And you also do voiceover storytelling.
Andrew Callaghan
I think the first time I really did that was in the San Francisco Streets video because there’s so much content about San Francisco homelessness, tenderloin shoplifting, but there’s not that much context in those videos about the history of San Francisco, the housing crisis, NIMBYism, random zoning stuff that sounds boring, but has a major role in the current situation on the streets there as to why the tenderloin is neglected by police and by the City Council and the other neighborhoods like Knob Hill and North Beach was so nice. So I added that purposely to the San Francisco video. And then also, to the Philadelphia Streets video to accentuate the reporting and add some historical analysis.
I think the first time I really did that was in the San Francisco Streets video because there’s so much content about San Francisco homelessness, tenderloin shoplifting, but there’s not that much context in those videos about the history of San Francisco, the housing crisis, NIMBYism, random zoning stuff that sounds boring, but has a major role in the current situation on the streets there as to why the tenderloin is neglected by police and by the City Council and the other neighborhoods like Knob Hill and North Beach was so nice. So I added that purposely to the San Francisco video. And then also, to the Philadelphia Streets video to accentuate the reporting and add some historical analysis.
Lex Fridman
What’s your goal with some of these videos, like the Philadelphia Streets one? Is it to reveal the full spectrum of humanity, or is it also tell a story that’s almost political about the state?
What’s your goal with some of these videos, like the Philadelphia Streets one? Is it to reveal the full spectrum of humanity, or is it also tell a story that’s almost political about the state?
Andrew Callaghan
Number one is always humanization. That’s the primary goal, is to take people in circumstances where they’re often news items and remind the public that these are people with lives and concerns and dreams just like you. But secondly, we also want to start introducing more solution-oriented journalism. So not just, “Oh my God, I’m becoming aware of how horrible this is,” but what can you actually do to help? And as you could see with the Vegas Tunnels video, people are responding pretty positively to it like here’s how you can maybe help a homeless neighbor, help get them an ID, help them qualify for housing or get a job at the scrap yard. There’s always ways to help, but so much of the YouTube world is over-saturated by just endless videos of people suffering, and the comments are always like, “Wow, so horrible.” But what does that really do for somebody?
Number one is always humanization. That’s the primary goal, is to take people in circumstances where they’re often news items and remind the public that these are people with lives and concerns and dreams just like you. But secondly, we also want to start introducing more solution-oriented journalism. So not just, “Oh my God, I’m becoming aware of how horrible this is,” but what can you actually do to help? And as you could see with the Vegas Tunnels video, people are responding pretty positively to it like here’s how you can maybe help a homeless neighbor, help get them an ID, help them qualify for housing or get a job at the scrap yard. There’s always ways to help, but so much of the YouTube world is over-saturated by just endless videos of people suffering, and the comments are always like, “Wow, so horrible.” But what does that really do for somebody?
Rap
Lex Fridman
You’ve interviewed many rappers.
You’ve interviewed many rappers.
Andrew Callaghan
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
Educate me?
Educate me?
Andrew Callaghan
There’s a lot to it.
There’s a lot to it.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Can you explain this drill rap situation? What is drill rap?
Yeah. Can you explain this drill rap situation? What is drill rap?
Andrew Callaghan
It’s an evolving situation. Drill began in 2010. Some people say it was Chief Keef in Chicago. I think it was King Louie in Chicago, but I think all of it was very influenced by Waka Flocka Flame who dropped an album called Flockaveli in 2010 that was hyper violent, adrenaline-boosting, rap music made by people who were actually in the streets. So in the 90s, you had 50 Cent, you had rappers rapping about whatever, gangster shit, selling crack and beating people up, but they weren’t actually doing it.
It’s an evolving situation. Drill began in 2010. Some people say it was Chief Keef in Chicago. I think it was King Louie in Chicago, but I think all of it was very influenced by Waka Flocka Flame who dropped an album called Flockaveli in 2010 that was hyper violent, adrenaline-boosting, rap music made by people who were actually in the streets. So in the 90s, you had 50 Cent, you had rappers rapping about whatever, gangster shit, selling crack and beating people up, but they weren’t actually doing it.
Drill has a true crime component to where drill fans want to know that the person rapping about catching bodies does in fact kill people. So drill, it’s pretty horrifying. It sounds great, but it started in Chicago, then it spread to England, and now it’s bounced back to New York, the Bronx and Brooklyn specifically, and spread from New York to the rest of the country. So now there’s probably a drill rapper every 10 square miles.
Lex Fridman
So as opposed to pretending to be a gangster and killing people, you get some credibility by actually doing it?
So as opposed to pretending to be a gangster and killing people, you get some credibility by actually doing it?
Andrew Callaghan
Yes. And the fans are typically not in the communities that are affected by poverty, so they’re like superheroes to white kids.
Yes. And the fans are typically not in the communities that are affected by poverty, so they’re like superheroes to white kids.
Lex Fridman
It’s dark.
It’s dark.
Andrew Callaghan
And not just white kids, but just anyone who’s not in the hood. It’s not necessarily a race thing. There’s white drill rappers too. Slim Jesus was a big one. He’s out of the picture now, but there’s white drill rappers.
And not just white kids, but just anyone who’s not in the hood. It’s not necessarily a race thing. There’s white drill rappers too. Slim Jesus was a big one. He’s out of the picture now, but there’s white drill rappers.
O Block
Lex Fridman
Slim Jesus. You made a video on O Block.
Slim Jesus. You made a video on O Block.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
What is O Block? The place, the culture, the people [inaudible 02:37:22]?
What is O Block? The place, the culture, the people [inaudible 02:37:22]?
Andrew Callaghan
O Block is a housing project in South Chicago in the Englewood area where Michelle Obama grew up. It’s also where Chief Keef was born and raised. I don’t know if he was born there, but he was raised there and he is the forefather of modern drill music as we know it. So these are the projects where drill began. It’s also the first place where you have that intersection of drill music and true crime because O Block has a lot of rappers, and then nearby is an area called St. Lawrence, aka Tookaville, which has a lot of rappers as well. And so these two rival drill gangs basically have a lot of history and it connects to music at large.
O Block is a housing project in South Chicago in the Englewood area where Michelle Obama grew up. It’s also where Chief Keef was born and raised. I don’t know if he was born there, but he was raised there and he is the forefather of modern drill music as we know it. So these are the projects where drill began. It’s also the first place where you have that intersection of drill music and true crime because O Block has a lot of rappers, and then nearby is an area called St. Lawrence, aka Tookaville, which has a lot of rappers as well. And so these two rival drill gangs basically have a lot of history and it connects to music at large.
Lex Fridman
So you’ve interviewed people there. Was there any concern for your safety?
So you’ve interviewed people there. Was there any concern for your safety?
Andrew Callaghan
No. I think that O Block has calmed down a lot. For one, it has security, so you can’t even really get in and out. But two, I think that O Block’s trying to rebrand itself a lot. It could be because Lil Durk’s avoiding a RICO charge, could be for a variety of reasons. I know you don’t know exactly what that means, but-
No. I think that O Block has calmed down a lot. For one, it has security, so you can’t even really get in and out. But two, I think that O Block’s trying to rebrand itself a lot. It could be because Lil Durk’s avoiding a RICO charge, could be for a variety of reasons. I know you don’t know exactly what that means, but-
Lex Fridman
Lil Durk or RICO charge?
Lil Durk or RICO charge?
Andrew Callaghan
Rapper Lil Durk is affiliated with O Block, and a lot of people have been murdered and retribution for killings that Lil Durk may or may not have influenced the ordering of. But anyways-
Rapper Lil Durk is affiliated with O Block, and a lot of people have been murdered and retribution for killings that Lil Durk may or may not have influenced the ordering of. But anyways-
Lex Fridman
And Lil Durk documented the killings via rap music probably.
And Lil Durk documented the killings via rap music probably.
Andrew Callaghan
Okay. I know you don’t know about drill, but Lil Durk was associated with a rapper named King Von, and King Von perhaps paid for the assassination of a rapper named FBG Duck, who got killed in Chicago’s Gold Coast neighborhood. It’s possible. The O-Block 6 are drill-associated, not rappers, but just shooters, and they, perhaps operating on King Von’s behalf, went and killed FBG Duck. King Von was Lil Durk’s artist. King Von’s now dead. So there’s definitely a concern that some of the Fed charges will fall on Durk. I’m not sure if that’s true, but it’s rumors in the hip-hop community.
Okay. I know you don’t know about drill, but Lil Durk was associated with a rapper named King Von, and King Von perhaps paid for the assassination of a rapper named FBG Duck, who got killed in Chicago’s Gold Coast neighborhood. It’s possible. The O-Block 6 are drill-associated, not rappers, but just shooters, and they, perhaps operating on King Von’s behalf, went and killed FBG Duck. King Von was Lil Durk’s artist. King Von’s now dead. So there’s definitely a concern that some of the Fed charges will fall on Durk. I’m not sure if that’s true, but it’s rumors in the hip-hop community.
So O Block right now, and when I filmed the video, is trying to go through a major image rehab. If you go on any Instagram of anyone in O Block, they’ve all converted to Islam. And so they post pictures of themselves praying in the morning and have captions like, “Put the guns down, let’s pray.” So I think when I went there, they saw it as a good opportunity to do a positive rebrand. And so I interviewed a rapper named Boss Top, who was there all the way back in 2011 when Chief Keef was coming up. And so he basically ensured my safe protection, but he didn’t even need to. They’re all very friendly and they know exactly what’s up with YouTube stuff.
Lex Fridman
I like how 2011 is the old days, like the ancient-
I like how 2011 is the old days, like the ancient-
Andrew Callaghan
Oh yeah.
Oh yeah.
Lex Fridman
The founding fathers.
The founding fathers.
Andrew Callaghan
I was in eighth grade.
I was in eighth grade.
Lex Fridman
Oh, man. Time flies when you’re having fun.
Oh, man. Time flies when you’re having fun.
Andrew Callaghan
It sure does.
It sure does.
Lex Fridman
Lil Durk. Where’s Lil Durk now?
Lil Durk. Where’s Lil Durk now?
Andrew Callaghan
Atlanta.
Atlanta.
Lex Fridman
So he left Chicago, not safe.
So he left Chicago, not safe.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, every rapper has to leave their hometown. It’s what I did.
Yeah, every rapper has to leave their hometown. It’s what I did.
Lex Fridman
It’s a journey.
It’s a journey.
Andrew Callaghan
Seattle would’ve taken me out, bro.
Seattle would’ve taken me out, bro.
Lex Fridman
You do interview a lot of people. That’s a top comment, but it speaks to the reality of the fact that you always find somebody rapping or you create the space for people to rap. What’s that about?
You do interview a lot of people. That’s a top comment, but it speaks to the reality of the fact that you always find somebody rapping or you create the space for people to rap. What’s that about?
Andrew Callaghan
I don’t know, man.
I don’t know, man.
Lex Fridman
Well, they’re usually really good.
Well, they’re usually really good.
Andrew Callaghan
You think so?
You think so?
Lex Fridman
I appreciate it.
I appreciate it.
Andrew Callaghan
Well, hell yeah, man. Rappers-
Well, hell yeah, man. Rappers-
Lex Fridman
In their own way.
In their own way.
Andrew Callaghan
Since I touched a microphone, rappers have gravitated toward me. I think there’s something happening.
Since I touched a microphone, rappers have gravitated toward me. I think there’s something happening.
Lex Fridman
You’re a rapper whisperer?
You’re a rapper whisperer?
Andrew Callaghan
I think there’s something happening on a deeper cosmic spiritual level that lets the mind of rappers know that they have a safe place in front of our camera crew.
I think there’s something happening on a deeper cosmic spiritual level that lets the mind of rappers know that they have a safe place in front of our camera crew.
Crip Mac
Lex Fridman
You have an interview with Crip Mac?
You have an interview with Crip Mac?
Andrew Callaghan
I do. Free Crip Mac. He’s in VO right now.
I do. Free Crip Mac. He’s in VO right now.
Lex Fridman
Oh, he is?
Oh, he is?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. Is that a hashtag?
Yeah. Is that a hashtag?
Lex Fridman
Yeah, for sure.
Yeah, for sure.
Andrew Callaghan
That’s an intense interview. People should go watch it. People should go watch all your interviews, but that one is pretty intense.
That’s an intense interview. People should go watch it. People should go watch all your interviews, but that one is pretty intense.
Lex Fridman
Thanks.
Thanks.
Andrew Callaghan
I was a little afraid for your life.
I was a little afraid for your life.
Andrew Callaghan
Oh, Crip Mac’s the safest guy in the world.
Oh, Crip Mac’s the safest guy in the world.
Lex Fridman
He’s a sweetheart?
He’s a sweetheart?
Andrew Callaghan
Oh, definitely dude.
Oh, definitely dude.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, thought it was fun.
Yeah, thought it was fun.
Andrew Callaghan
I feel more safer on Crip Mac than I do with any given pedestrian.
I feel more safer on Crip Mac than I do with any given pedestrian.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, he was loud and flavorful.
Yeah, he was loud and flavorful.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
I should say. So who’s he? What’s his story?
I should say. So who’s he? What’s his story?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, his name’s Trevor. He grew up in Ontario, California in the Inland empire, moved to Texas with his mom after his dad left. His mom started dating a cop from Houston named Mr. Gary. His mom found Mr. Gary getting anally penetrated by a co-worker, and so she booked Crip Mac a one-way Greyhound ticket to LA where he joined the Crips.
Well, his name’s Trevor. He grew up in Ontario, California in the Inland empire, moved to Texas with his mom after his dad left. His mom started dating a cop from Houston named Mr. Gary. His mom found Mr. Gary getting anally penetrated by a co-worker, and so she booked Crip Mac a one-way Greyhound ticket to LA where he joined the Crips.
Lex Fridman
That’s a good story.
That’s a good story.
Speaker 1
[inaudible 02:42:14].
[inaudible 02:42:14].
Andrew Callaghan
It’s true.
It’s true.
Speaker 1
Oh, you jumped right to Mr. Gary.
Oh, you jumped right to Mr. Gary.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah. Of course.
Yeah. Of course.
Speaker 1
[inaudible 02:42:25].
[inaudible 02:42:25].
Andrew Callaghan
I’m just saying that he’s a classic case of somebody without a father figure who found camaraderie and sense of belonging and purpose in a street gang, which in LA is like a rule of law in most of the city.
I’m just saying that he’s a classic case of somebody without a father figure who found camaraderie and sense of belonging and purpose in a street gang, which in LA is like a rule of law in most of the city.
Lex Fridman
We were, I forget in what context earlier, talking about martial arts and fighting and he’s got to work on his punching form.
We were, I forget in what context earlier, talking about martial arts and fighting and he’s got to work on his punching form.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, I think so. He gets into a lot of fights in jail though, and from what I’ve heard, he wins-
Yeah, I think so. He gets into a lot of fights in jail though, and from what I’ve heard, he wins-
Lex Fridman
He does that?
He does that?
Andrew Callaghan
About half of them. So it’s good.
About half of them. So it’s good.
Lex Fridman
What did he go to jail for now?
What did he go to jail for now?
Andrew Callaghan
Firearm possession. It was a probation violation.
Firearm possession. It was a probation violation.
Lex Fridman
Oh.
Oh.
Andrew Callaghan
It’s too bad.
It’s too bad.
Lex Fridman
All right. So Philly, you went to the border, Occupy Seattle protests. You went to Ukraine.
All right. So Philly, you went to the border, Occupy Seattle protests. You went to Ukraine.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
What are some interesting things that stand out to you from memory? Just as I asked the question, some interesting-
What are some interesting things that stand out to you from memory? Just as I asked the question, some interesting-
Andrew Callaghan
I was in jail at the border for a while. That was horrible.
I was in jail at the border for a while. That was horrible.
Lex Fridman
What was that like? Was that your first time?
What was that like? Was that your first time?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah, well, I didn’t know that I couldn’t hop my own border as an American. I’m thinking, “This is my country. I can get in any way that I want.” Wrong. You can only enter the US through an official port of entry, which I learned the hard way because I got arrested by border patrol and held as a detainee at a Migrant Center for a few days.
Yeah, well, I didn’t know that I couldn’t hop my own border as an American. I’m thinking, “This is my country. I can get in any way that I want.” Wrong. You can only enter the US through an official port of entry, which I learned the hard way because I got arrested by border patrol and held as a detainee at a Migrant Center for a few days.
Lex Fridman
What was that like?
What was that like?
Andrew Callaghan
Horrible.
Horrible.
Lex Fridman
Which aspect?
Which aspect?
Andrew Callaghan
Well, I don’t know. It was just to be in a place like that, and I probably sound like such a wimp right now because I know someone’s watching this who’s done some hard time, but we thought we were going to do at least six months in jail because the guards freaked us out and were like, “You’re being charged with a federal crime. You know what you boys did is serious. We’re waiting on word from San Antonio about whether or not we’re going to extradite you.” So we’re just sitting in these cells alone, most of the time in solitary, with no pillows.
Well, I don’t know. It was just to be in a place like that, and I probably sound like such a wimp right now because I know someone’s watching this who’s done some hard time, but we thought we were going to do at least six months in jail because the guards freaked us out and were like, “You’re being charged with a federal crime. You know what you boys did is serious. We’re waiting on word from San Antonio about whether or not we’re going to extradite you.” So we’re just sitting in these cells alone, most of the time in solitary, with no pillows.
Lex Fridman
No pillows.
No pillows.
Andrew Callaghan
No pillows, no mat, nothing. Just a space blanket, and I was sleeping on my shoes, stinking up the place. It was no good.
No pillows, no mat, nothing. Just a space blanket, and I was sleeping on my shoes, stinking up the place. It was no good.
Aliens
Lex Fridman
You mentioned the UFO Convention.
You mentioned the UFO Convention.
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
What have you learned from those guys, the UFOlogists?
What have you learned from those guys, the UFOlogists?
Andrew Callaghan
I really want to know what you think about that. That’s the one question that I want to reverse on you because you’ve talked to so many people. Do you think that aliens have actually visited earth?
I really want to know what you think about that. That’s the one question that I want to reverse on you because you’ve talked to so many people. Do you think that aliens have actually visited earth?
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Andrew Callaghan
When?
When?
Lex Fridman
Exact dates? I think there’s alien civilizations everywhere. I talk to a lot of people that have doubts about it. I just think I even suspect there’s an intelligent alien civilization in our galaxy and I just can’t imagine them not having visited us. So I lean on that. What that actually looks like, I don’t know. The stuff we’re seeing in terms of UFO sightings, I think to the degree it’s real, it’s much more likely government projects. So military, Lockheed Martin, this kind of stuff.
Exact dates? I think there’s alien civilizations everywhere. I talk to a lot of people that have doubts about it. I just think I even suspect there’s an intelligent alien civilization in our galaxy and I just can’t imagine them not having visited us. So I lean on that. What that actually looks like, I don’t know. The stuff we’re seeing in terms of UFO sightings, I think to the degree it’s real, it’s much more likely government projects. So military, Lockheed Martin, this kind of stuff.
Andrew Callaghan
So you think that they have knowledge of it?
So you think that they have knowledge of it?
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Andrew Callaghan
One thing I think about with aliens is scale. So we have this idea that an alien would be a gray alien or a almost humanoid lookalike that would visit us in human form, arms, legs, head. But who’s to say that they’re not able to shrink down to microscopic size with the same neural capacity?
One thing I think about with aliens is scale. So we have this idea that an alien would be a gray alien or a almost humanoid lookalike that would visit us in human form, arms, legs, head. But who’s to say that they’re not able to shrink down to microscopic size with the same neural capacity?
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Or just have a very difficult to perceive form.
Yeah. Or just have a very difficult to perceive form.
Andrew Callaghan
But they would go small, not big.
But they would go small, not big.
Lex Fridman
No, I think that would take a humanoid-like form just to be able to communicate with humans. I think that the big challenge with aliens is to be able to find a common language. So if you come to another planet and you suspect that there’s some kind of complexity going on, but it looks nothing like humans, you have to find a common language. And I think aliens would try to take physical form that’s similar that us dumb humans would understand.
No, I think that would take a humanoid-like form just to be able to communicate with humans. I think that the big challenge with aliens is to be able to find a common language. So if you come to another planet and you suspect that there’s some kind of complexity going on, but it looks nothing like humans, you have to find a common language. And I think aliens would try to take physical form that’s similar that us dumb humans would understand.
Andrew Callaghan
Language is really interesting too. I have this series that I’m going to announce for the first time on here, but I’m really interested in endangered languages in the US. There’s like 150 languages in the US with less than 1,000 speakers.
Language is really interesting too. I have this series that I’m going to announce for the first time on here, but I’m really interested in endangered languages in the US. There’s like 150 languages in the US with less than 1,000 speakers.
Lex Fridman
Wow.
Wow.
Andrew Callaghan
And I want to help spearhead efforts to preserve some of these. For example, Hawaiian Sign language, 15 of those people left.
And I want to help spearhead efforts to preserve some of these. For example, Hawaiian Sign language, 15 of those people left.
Lex Fridman
Holy shit.
Holy shit.
Andrew Callaghan
Because when Hawaii got annexed, the ASL community tried to make it so the deaf native Hawaiians wouldn’t be able to speak their native sign language. And so they would do it under the desks at schools for the deaf and blind, and they would get their mouth washed out, washed out with soap and stuff if they so much as did the Hawaiian hand signs. Also, the Gullah Geechee language and the South Carolina Sea Islands. Hilton Head Island and stuff, that’s almost a Creole language that’s been in the US for hundreds of years existing in isolation. That’s being threatened by golf course developments. I don’t know how into language you are, but I’ve been getting super nerded out about it.
Because when Hawaii got annexed, the ASL community tried to make it so the deaf native Hawaiians wouldn’t be able to speak their native sign language. And so they would do it under the desks at schools for the deaf and blind, and they would get their mouth washed out, washed out with soap and stuff if they so much as did the Hawaiian hand signs. Also, the Gullah Geechee language and the South Carolina Sea Islands. Hilton Head Island and stuff, that’s almost a Creole language that’s been in the US for hundreds of years existing in isolation. That’s being threatened by golf course developments. I don’t know how into language you are, but I’ve been getting super nerded out about it.
Lex Fridman
Actually, I’m interviewing somebody tomorrow who’s an expert in human language. He’s from MIT, studying the syntax of a lot of languages, including in the Amazon jungle, the peoples that live in the Amazon jungle region. Yeah, it’s fascinating. Human language is fascinating, and also the barriers that creates, and also how the games are played, to what you’re speaking, by governments. This is part of the story of Russia, and Ukraine, is a battle over language. The Ukrainian language is a symbol of independence, which is why they were trying to make it the primary language of the nation. And so sometimes the language represents the culture and the peoples, and it’s intricately tied to the culture of the people.
Actually, I’m interviewing somebody tomorrow who’s an expert in human language. He’s from MIT, studying the syntax of a lot of languages, including in the Amazon jungle, the peoples that live in the Amazon jungle region. Yeah, it’s fascinating. Human language is fascinating, and also the barriers that creates, and also how the games are played, to what you’re speaking, by governments. This is part of the story of Russia, and Ukraine, is a battle over language. The Ukrainian language is a symbol of independence, which is why they were trying to make it the primary language of the nation. And so sometimes the language represents the culture and the peoples, and it’s intricately tied to the culture of the people.
Andrew Callaghan
I’ve been trying to learn Navajo.
I’ve been trying to learn Navajo.
Lex Fridman
Which languages do you know?
Which languages do you know?
Andrew Callaghan
Spanish and English.
Spanish and English.
Lex Fridman
Spanish well?
Spanish well?
Andrew Callaghan
Si.
Si.
Lex Fridman
I don’t know Spanish that well. So that passes me. You’re fluent.
I don’t know Spanish that well. So that passes me. You’re fluent.
Andrew Callaghan
It means yes.
It means yes.
Lex Fridman
Oh, it doesn’t. Ola.
Oh, it doesn’t. Ola.
Andrew Callaghan
That was good. That was real Cancun Spring break.
That was good. That was real Cancun Spring break.
Lex Fridman
Well, I actually speak fluent Spanish according to Spotify because every episode is translated, overdubbed by AI in Spanish.
Well, I actually speak fluent Spanish according to Spotify because every episode is translated, overdubbed by AI in Spanish.
Andrew Callaghan
Oh my God.
Oh my God.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. There’s a very-
Yeah. There’s a very-
Andrew Callaghan
You have a Spanish robot assigned to you?
You have a Spanish robot assigned to you?
Lex Fridman
I have a Spanish robot. I sound incredibly intelligent and intellectual in Spanish.
I have a Spanish robot. I sound incredibly intelligent and intellectual in Spanish.
Andrew Callaghan
Senor Fridman.
Senor Fridman.
Lex Fridman
Exactly. From everything you’ve done, all the people you’ve seen, do you think most people are good, underneath it all?
Exactly. From everything you’ve done, all the people you’ve seen, do you think most people are good, underneath it all?
Andrew Callaghan
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
So the ones that do all the extreme shit?
So the ones that do all the extreme shit?
Andrew Callaghan
Okay, I’ll put it like this. Most people think they’re doing the best thing for the world. I don’t think anyone, except for maybe a small fraction of sociopaths, wakes up every day and says, “I’m going to fuck somebody’s life up today.” I think the far majority of people are fighting for what they think is right and do want to see America succeed and want us to be in a happy place where no one is subjugated. I just think people have drastically different ideas of what means will get us there. And unfortunately, that’s leading to a lot of misunderstandings between cultures.
Okay, I’ll put it like this. Most people think they’re doing the best thing for the world. I don’t think anyone, except for maybe a small fraction of sociopaths, wakes up every day and says, “I’m going to fuck somebody’s life up today.” I think the far majority of people are fighting for what they think is right and do want to see America succeed and want us to be in a happy place where no one is subjugated. I just think people have drastically different ideas of what means will get us there. And unfortunately, that’s leading to a lot of misunderstandings between cultures.
And yeah, I think that most people are good. I’ve been through some things that leads me to believe that a lot of people though are primarily motivated by self-interest, and that in a fight or flight situation, most people will choose flight. So I don’t know if people are courageous as a whole, but I think generally good, but the energy to stand up for what’s right, not sure about that.
Lex Fridman
They have the capacity though to do good.
They have the capacity though to do good.
Andrew Callaghan
I think human beings are inherently selfish as well, but I don’t think that selfish is inherently bad. I think humans are primarily motivated by self-interest, but generally have positive intentions.
I think human beings are inherently selfish as well, but I don’t think that selfish is inherently bad. I think humans are primarily motivated by self-interest, but generally have positive intentions.
Lex Fridman
I do hope more humans rise to the occasion and have courage, courage of their convictions, courage to have integrity. But yeah, I think that most people are good and they want to do good, and they have the capacity to do a lot of good. That’s why I have hope for this whole thing we’ve got going on. How do you heal the misunderstandings between people you think?
I do hope more humans rise to the occasion and have courage, courage of their convictions, courage to have integrity. But yeah, I think that most people are good and they want to do good, and they have the capacity to do a lot of good. That’s why I have hope for this whole thing we’ve got going on. How do you heal the misunderstandings between people you think?
Andrew Callaghan
Listening. It’s the only option we have. No forced education, no forced meetings or mediations between political opponents. Just listen to more people and really listen. Try to get rid of whatever preconceived notions you might have about how you should feel about someone you are supposed to disagree with, and just keep your ears and your heart open to people that you don’t know and your life will change.
Listening. It’s the only option we have. No forced education, no forced meetings or mediations between political opponents. Just listen to more people and really listen. Try to get rid of whatever preconceived notions you might have about how you should feel about someone you are supposed to disagree with, and just keep your ears and your heart open to people that you don’t know and your life will change.
Lex Fridman
Keep your heart open.
Keep your heart open.
Andrew Callaghan
A lot of people are scared to listen.
A lot of people are scared to listen.
Lex Fridman
Well, Andrew, I’m a big fan and thank you for being one of the best listeners in the world.
Well, Andrew, I’m a big fan and thank you for being one of the best listeners in the world.
Andrew Callaghan
Amen.
Amen.
Lex Fridman
And showing the full spectrum of humanity to us so we can listen as well and learn. And just thank you for doing everything you’re doing. Keep doing it.
And showing the full spectrum of humanity to us so we can listen as well and learn. And just thank you for doing everything you’re doing. Keep doing it.
Andrew Callaghan
Hey man, thanks so much for having me on. You’re a great man.
Hey man, thanks so much for having me on. You’re a great man.
Lex Fridman
Thank you, brother. I appreciate it. Thanks for listening to this conversation with Andrew Callaghan. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now let me leave you some words from Hunter. S. Thompson, “The Edge, there is no honest way to explain it because the only people who really know where it is are the ones who have gone over.” Thank you for listening and hope to see you next time.
Thank you, brother. I appreciate it. Thanks for listening to this conversation with Andrew Callaghan. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now let me leave you some words from Hunter. S. Thompson, “The Edge, there is no honest way to explain it because the only people who really know where it is are the ones who have gone over.” Thank you for listening and hope to see you next time.
Transcript for Bassem Youssef: Israel-Palestine, Gaza, Hamas, Middle East, Satire & Fame | Lex Fridman Podcast #424
This is a transcript of Lex Fridman Podcast #424 with Bassem Youssef.
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Your wife is half Palestinian, and I’ve heard you say that you’ve been trying to kill her, but she keeps using the kids as human shields. So have you considered negotiating a ceasefire?
And then I started kind of looking in the news a little bit, and then I started seeing people coming on the shows and saying things that I know as an Arab, as a Muslim, as someone from that region, that it’s not true. But I didn’t know what to say, how to say it. So by the third time when they asked me, I said, “Fine, put me on.” And I went there, it was [inaudible 00:03:36], figuratively speaking, a suicide mission because it’s a lose-lose situation. I can lose stuff in Hollywood. I remember my managers like, “Bessem, be careful. I mean, are you sure you want to do it?” My managers was like, “Please don’t do it. Please don’t do it.” And on the other side, if I don’t perform well, whatever, “Well” means, I’m going to be rejected by my own people. So it was a lose-lose situation because whatever I say, it’ll never be enough, and whatever I say will not be good enough. And I was going into there, and I felt that I was going into a trance for the 33 minutes that I was on that interview for the first time.
But also because when Piers Morgan team called me a couple of times and said, “Okay, let’s see what’s going on in the show,” and I just watched the stuff, and the lies, and the one-sided reporting that made my blood boil. And then I thought, “What am I afraid of? I’m afraid of if I say something, I can lose my career. Wait a minute, but that was the reason why I left Egypt.” I said, “Wait, I left Egypt, I came to United States, I came to the Land of the Free where I can say anything I want. And yet I have limitation of what to say. I mean, I thought we left that shit behind. I mean, what’s happening?”
And I understand the connection of how sensitive it is when you speak about Israel and all of the ready-made accusations. But as an Arab, as a Muslim, I don’t react the same when you talk about Saudi Arabia, or Iran, or Egypt or any of them, it’s like, “Hey, you want to dis some of these countries, I’ll do that with you because I have strong opinions about what happened and I already been expressing them.” But that’s why, and there’s a lot of Jewish people who come to my show and they understand that. They understand the separation, but that kind of a grouping of blackmailing people and saying, and not saying what they have in their mind, it is that one of the things that kind of pushed me to go on the show.
So when you tell me what would you do if Israel would do, we need to ask how does Israel look at the Palestinian and view the Palestinians? Because they do look at them less than human. And there is an incredible talk by [inaudible 00:11:12] Meyer. He was a Holocaust survivor, and he said, “I learned in Auschwitz when I was there in the Concentration Camp that in order for a dominant group of people to dehumanize another group, they need first, to dehumanize themselves. And Israel looks at Palestinians as lesser people, as lesser beings, as some people who are dispensable. And the way that they treat them is that, they don’t really care about… That’s why that the exchange rate thing.
So for me, if I am Israel, it’ll be like, “What would you do if you’re the United States in the time of the Native Americans? They were killing people with the millions.” When you dehumanize a group of people, you really don’t care. So if I was Israel, I would do exactly what Israel is doing right now, because there’s no one is holding me accountable. There is no one stopping me, and I can get whatever I want, throughout my history, through violence.
March 4th, Amir al-Najjar, age 10, sitting next to his father, shot in while he’s sitting in the car next to his father by the IDF soldiers. Mohammed Ziyad, 13 years old, March 3rd, shot in front of a UN school while sitting with his friends. Mohammed Ghanem, age 15, March 2nd, he shot while standing in front of a storefront during a night raid. February 23rd, Saeed Jardal, he was killed by a drone fire. February 22nd, Fadi Suleiman killed while standing in front of a top of a red cross building. Nihil Ziyad, February 14th, Valentine’s Day, killed and shot in the head while leaving school. February 11th, Mohammed Khattour, US citizens killed while being in a parked car. And [inaudible 00:16:54], February 9th, killed right in front of his home because a military car came reversing back to him, and then somebody opened the door, shot him and leave. This is a daily life of people in the West Bank.
It is heartbreaking, as a doctor, there’s five stages of trials. There is discovery, pre-clinical, clinical, and then market, and then post-market evaluation by the FDA, the FDA approve, and then the FDA post-market. Five just to take a pill. And you go in and he interviews people as like, “Where did you test this?” They tested in the field.
So when human life is so cheap, and it is so indispensable, it gave me a visceral reaction because this has been actually the state of humanity. Humanity lived, and survived and thrive by actually killing each other. But there was kind of a, we were remotely, we are removed from it. People in Greece didn’t know what the Alexander the Great was doing. He was killing and pillaging. We call him, “The Great,” but he was killing. He was conquering, he was invading. Julius Caesar, all of the greats, he would do it, but killing was difficult. Killing had to have some sort of… You have to be with your enemy. Then you go back, catapults, then cannons, then a little bit back, and then you are kind of starting remotely. Now you’re killing people behind the screen with a push of a button. A lot of people say, “Terrorism, they killed you with a knife, killed one person with a knife, shot you. That’s terrorism.” But if you fly a $64 million F-16 and you drop up in an A-84 bomb that costs $16,000, that’s not terrorism because it’s remote. You’re behind the screen.
So what happened, what Israel is doing, it is removing itself, like America too, drones [inaudible 00:19:55]. And then when you push someone to be, they always brag about bombing them to the Stone Ages. What happens when the screens, and all of the obstacles that you have been put between you and those people, that you have treated them this way, when this is a breach and you come face to face, you will come face to face with what you have created.
So when you put these people in this condition, you have literally put them in a different universe than yours. You are behind in your air conditioned screens, pushing them, blowing up a university. It’s amazing. But then you meet what you have done, you meet the Frankenstein that you have created, and then people are like, “Oh, look what they did to us.”
My show in Egypt was all about propaganda. It’s all about the use of words. Words are very important. The decapitated babies were not chosen randomly. Because you see, it plants a certain image in your brain. Imagine if you’re going in what a baby can do; it can smile, cry and poop, that’s it. It is absolutely no threat. So when you tell people, “40 decapitated babies, they’re so animalistic, they didn’t see the babies. Women raped. Of course, he’s an animal to do that.” And they would go through that and what was very frustrating about the conversation is the Gish galloping. The gish galloping. You see the distractions? You see what happens? ” What’s the proportionate response?” “Can Israel defend itself?” “Do you condemn Hamas?” “Does Israel have the right to exist?” “Decapitated babies.” “Raped women.” “Why don’t the Arab countries take them?” “Muslims kill Muslims.” “Look what happened in Yemen, in Syria, in Iraq.” See how they kind of distract you? They throw little things at you so you don’t know what to do. Or the honor war, “The UNN,” “Anti-Semitic.” “October 7th,” “October 7th,” “October 7th,” and then suddenly you are distracted and pulled into discussing all of these little things and you’re not discussing what’s happening right now. It is basically stalling, giving them time to do what they do.
So for example, how many times have we heard, “Oh, Palestinians were giving four, five, six, seven, 15 chances and they said no to them.” And yet when you read the history, that’s not the case at all. For example, in the whole idea about Arafat walked away from Oslo, that didn’t happen. And there is an incredible video by, what’s his name? Joe Scarborough with Misha. And they were hosting her father Brzezinski. He was the national security advisor. And Joe Scarborough was like, “Well, Arafat left the Oslo Accord and the Palestinians left.” And then Brzezinski said, “This is like embarrassingly shallow.” It’s like, “Listen, what happened was there was a lot of catches on the Oslo Accord. It was very unfair to the Palestinians. So Arafat said, “I agree, but I need to take it to the Arab capitals.”” And they went to Sharm el-Sheikh, they came to Egypt, and he and Ehud Barak went to there. And then Ehud Barak left because there was election and he lost the Ariel Sharon game and it was destroyed. This is one of the reason why people… It’s kind of like facts don’t matter as much as what is the narrative that has been controlled.
They went into October 7th. Why did they did that release our hostages, the people in prison? Because if you’re talk about people who are kidnapped, Israel kidnaps people every single day and when they had the first exchange in November 4th, Israel leaves 400 people. Three quarters of them were women and children. Why are those people in prison? There’s one in four kids that are in prison that stay in solitary confinement, which is by international law, a form of torture and you’re putting kids through that.
That book, it’s called the Muslim and the Jew, and it is written by an author called Ronen Steinke. I read an article about this book in 2016 and I chased that book for rights for seven years. I didn’t have that much money, but I wanted that book and that book was translated into English called Anna and Dr. Hanmi, and that book tells the incredible story under Nazi Germany where Arabs went in droves to Berlin in 1920s after the first World War in the Weimar Republic, and they became doctors and engineers and journalists for two reasons. Number one, they’re cheap, very cheap because of the inflation. And two, a lot of the Arab nationalists didn’t want to send their kids to England or France because they were the occupiers and Dr. Hanmi was the hero of that. He’s an Egyptian doctor and that’s why I personally connected with him and he went to medical school, didn’t find a place to live, so he lived in the Jewish ghetto.
Like many Arabs, he didn’t find a school to work at, a hospital to work in, so he worked in a Jewish hospital. So there was a lot of Arabs who lived with the ghetto and actually the first director of the Berlin mosque with a Jewish convert who converted to Islam, and he was a gay activist. I’m telling you, this is a crazy story, and this is not a fiction story. This is actually like a nonfiction. It’s written actually based on the statement, the documents of the Nazis and Gustavo, Dr. Hemi, he was in this hospital and the Nazis came in and they killed and tortured and beat up the Jewish doctor and they made him the head of his department. Then now he’s surrounded by Nazi doctor. They didn’t touch him because he was an Arab. There was kind of like a thing between Germany and the Arabs because they wanted to appease to them in order to have kind of a grassroots base in the Arab world where he want to go next.
And this is why 19 34, 19 35, the racial laws of Nuremberg, they had a name change. First they were called anti-Semitic. Then they changed into anti-Jewish because also Arabs were Semitic, so they wanted to appease the Arabs. Now what happened to Dr. Hanmi when that happened to him, he would go back to the ghetto and he would see the apartments next to him. The Jewish apartments become more and more and more flooded with people because they were moving Jews and pushing them and putting them together, pushing them to the side and each flat, each apartment instead of one family, it would have 3, 4, 6, 7 families. And he was there when at home and he looked, he was there.
This is where the people he grew up with, he lived with, and now he’s seeing that kind of discrimination just because he was an Arab. And then he started to kind of atone for, because he felt responsible because he wasn’t treated the same way. And he started to go and treat Jewish people in their homes because they couldn’t go to hospitals. And then one family gave them his daughter. It’s like, this is Anna. Save her. He took her pretended that she’s his niece, put a hijab around her, taught her Arabic, called her Nadia, my daughter’s name by the way.
And he hid her in plain sight for seven years in front of the Nazis as his nurse. It’s an incredible story. And then not just that, he went to prison and then he went out and he formed with the Arab people that was imprisoned with him, a network that saves 300 Jews. You see that kind of story. This is the Jews that were living in the airport. I’m not saying that the Jews living in the airport was living like an incredible life. Of course, as LA kind of minority, they did not have the full power of their full advantages of the rule. That’s normal. But we had this kind of a relationship
Before Israel was erected in 1948. And then of course, everybody looked at Jews at time as fifth column. And of course the nationalistic regimes used that. And this is why what Biden said was very dangerous when he said, if there’s no Israel, no Israel, you are the leader of the free world. You are the President of the United States. Do you mean that you are telling me that Jews in your country, in the United States of America are not safe? That is wrong on two levels. Number one, America historically and right now is more safe to Jews in the world than anybody. They’re safer than the Jews in Israel.
They never had pogroms or the Holocaust like Europe. They live here a good life, not perfect life, but they’re better. Second of all, if you are the president and you’re telling that a group of people will not feel safe unless there is a different one, you are already feeding into their fifth column. They’re like, you’re Russian. You come from there. And there is a group of laws in the Russian constitution that says that Russia will protect its citizens everywhere in the world. What happens if the president says like, oh, you’re Russians. You’re protected by your own country. Don’t belong here. This
So you have to put yourself between and the Arabs, okay, we’re sitting here, okay, come and then, all right, you don’t have a home or a country anymore that kills you. I mean, you see, if I’m not an Arab and you give me that kind of piece of terrible human tragedy, like oh my God, that is terrible. But then I’m an Arab like, yes, I’m so sorry, but what do I have to do with that? Why is that my fault? The persecution of the Jewish people have started since then the eighth and ninth century because they were like they first anti-Christians, they were with criminal immigrants. They were conspirators. This is the anti people as if Europe kind of throw anti-Semitism on us. You understand that like Henry Ford, Henry Ford is one of the biggest anti, he was the inspiration for Adolf Hitler.
This is how anti-Semitic Henry Ford was. And you kind of gloss over that and then suddenly we as Arabs have to pay the price. Why?
They were not allowed to get into the syndicates of certain professions. So they had to work usually and they got rich, so the people hated them more. The first crusade didn’t kill a single Muslim. All the killed were Jews. And when they finally arrived to Jerusalem, all the killed were Jews. They almost annihilated the Jews. So it was all this, and of course you have the dark ages. Who do you need as an enemy? The Jews. They’re the killer of Christ. There’s nothing bigger than this.
And then you fast-forward. I mean, one of the things that I found out that was very, very, very, very crazy when Henry Ford imported the protocols of the elders of Zion, by the way, in the Arab world, protocols of the elders of Zion is so popular and for the obvious years and for the people who don’t know it’s kind of a bunch of stories. And basically it’s like the Jews saying, we got to control the war and we’re going to do this and we’re going to do that and whatever. What people don’t know that that is a work of plagiarism. It was plagiarized from a satirical play called Conversation in Hell between Machiavelli and Montesquieu, and it is kind of based on one chapter or one scene or something. It’s crazy, but it’s crazy
But it is the Palestinians that are in and they are being subjected to that. So it’s not really like the 1.8 billion and the 16 million Jews and the 1.8 billion. If you look at them, some of them don’t care. Some of them live into regimes that being oppressed and those regimes are supported by the United States in order. It’s easier for me as an empire to take what I want from this country if I control the dictator. And I tell them that his power is linked to my desire to keep him in power. So that’s why you have a total disconnect between people in power in the Arab and the Muslim countries and the people themselves.
France, Greece, Persia, Egypt. They will go in, expand and shrink, expand and shrink. It’s always been there. What is different here is exactly what happened in Australia and the United States. A group of people came in not just to conquer and take the land, but to completely change, to replace them and get them out or kill them. It was very easy with the Indians because they had smallpox. There was no social media. They did it over 400 years. They had time. The problem is what is happening right now, I agree with you. It might not be that new, but we are there and we are watching it happen.
The university declaration of right, one of the co-authors, his name is Stephane Hessel. He’s a Jew. He’s a survivor of the Holocaust. And what happened to him, he died, by the way a couple of years ago, but before he died, he was canceled by so many people and he was called anti-Semitic because he joined the BDS movement and he spoke about truth Palestine, that is the author of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that we value so much. And we think that that would define our humanity. But then we go in and we are shocked. It’s like maybe we were sold something. Maybe that was false advertisement.
So I was always an outsider, and I compensated with that by two things, being good at school and being good at sports. So I was not like the typical nerd. It was just like, I was playing football, basketball, track and field, and I was one of the… People would like to have me on their team. So I wasn’t kind of like, “Ah, he’s a nerd, get him away.” But I never had a girlfriend. I never had any kind of… I was not boyfriend material. So that kind of leaves remnants in you, that you’re not good enough.
So they would always like, “Oh, because you’re a dancer. Oh, because you don’t care about medicine. You just want to go there and dance with women,” which is true. So all of my life, I felt that I’m an outsider. I’m not part of the team. I’m not part of the core group. And I have a story that you would love. Right before my residency, I was so much into salsa, so I had all of the money, and then you saved that. And I was working summers and I was doing extra jobs, and I took that money and I went to Miami in order to learn Rueda de Casino, which is the Cuban kind of circle salsa kind of thing. And I went there in the summer of 2001. My return ticket was 9/12/2001.
I mean, of course they’re brilliant and everything, but they have a different social life. And part of me now, I realize that just very, very recently, maybe I went to the hardest school ever so I don’t have space to use other than studying. Because if I have that much space, what I’m going to do with it? I don’t have that much freedom. I don’t have that much money. I can’t compete with those people going out, so maybe I need a solid excuse that I’m in a place where I don’t have that much of a spare time.
I cannot say “rrr.” I cannot roll it. So in Arabic, like Spanish, it’s very obvious. So when I did my first video on the internet, that made me famous. And then I got my television deal back there in Egypt. My partner at the time, he took the video and he went to a producer, and said like, “Are you giving me a guy with a lisp?” That’s why when I came on television, I was the first ever guy with a lisp. I had two things going for me, the lisp and the big nose. And I was always bullied for these two all the time, so I always felt less.
But at the time, the Arab Spring didn’t start in Egypt. It started in Tunisia. Bouazizi, a fruit vendor, burned himself up like the American soldiers who did that a few days ago. And that kind of sparked protests in Tunisia. And Ben Ali was a dictator in Tunisia for about 20 years, and they removed him. So suddenly it was kind of like a domino effect. And then Egypt started and it just took 18 days. And people, hindsight is 20/20. Same said just Mubarak became a burden on the military because the military are the real rulers of the country. You might have a president that kind of have certain powers, but at the end of the day, when the military sees that a certain president is too much of a burden, too much of a… So they cut him off.
Political satire is basically us making fun of politicians in the media. And a lot of people have really strong opinions about politicians in the media. So we came that, we articulate that, and we give it to them and we make them laugh. So for them, we made a great job. So why don’t you do more? But you are limited. And at a certain time, you can’t. And at a certain time you’re afraid because we’re humans, because you’re afraid about if I continue speaking up… not something will happen to me. I’m kind of like maybe have some protection because people see me, but what the people around you? And I’ve seen that. So that’s why at a certain point, that’s it.
They were like that. So I called Jon Stewart, I was like, “I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what to do.” And at that time, all of the channels were closed down, all of… I was the only one left because it was difficult for them to get rid of me very quickly because I was too popular. It was kind of like piecemealing kind of like… And I remember I told him, “I don’t know what to do.” He said, “You don’t have to do anything, just, your safety comes first.” And said, “But I can’t. I mean, I’ve been doing that for two years and I cannot just say, ‘Bye-bye guys.’ I have a responsibility. I have a team, I have people working for me. And also, I cannot just disappear.” And he said the most interesting thing ever. And say, “If you’re afraid of something, make fun about the fact that you’re afraid of it, instead of talking about that something.”
And I kind of try to do what I can under the military. I mean, they came up with a machine that treats AIDS and Hepatitis C virus and basically every single… And I went to town with that because people… It doesn’t really have to go in to go to the bigger post like, “You’re an asshole.” No, you talk about their propaganda. You talk about what they want people to perceive them at, and it’s a failure. And for that, that kind of hit them even more. Because what do authoritarian figures do? They work on two things, fear and propaganda. And from that, it gets the respect. So when you go into their propaganda and expose them, they have nothing else.
And it was this kind of thing, like I’m being attacked for not doing what I should do in their face and attacked for not being funny and not doing good… And now I feel like, maybe it was wrong and… It was so traumatic that I don’t know actually how I went through these years. And I blocked so many details from my brain, because I have been using this technique for a while now that I have been erasing a lot of my… There is a lot of memory gaps in my brain, and I’m trying to suppress it because it was very, very, very traumatic. And a lot of people told me, “You have to go to therapy.” But I’m worried to open the floodgates. And I’m thinking, if I’m functional and I’m not killing anybody, I’m okay.
And it’s like, “Ah, if the war happened two years ago, I will not be ready.” So now they come to the show, and by the way, my show had nothing to do with October 7th. My show is my thing that I’ve been crafting and working on. You know how difficult it’s to do the first hour, the hour that I’ve been working on for five years? And it’s all my personal story, all about what happened to me in Egypt, me as an immigrant, coming here to the United States, finding Trump as a president, finding myself in the middle of a guns rally, finding myself in the middle of a bombing, kind of talking about how I got my citizenship. It’s funny stories about my origin story.
So they come in and they expect October 7th and all of a sudden my personal story, but it’s good and it kills and they love it. It’s like if that kind of blew up in America happened to me two, three years ago, I would not have… People would come and be disappointed.
So a big part of my show is like, “What are you guys expecting of this?” When I do profanity and you’re going to like it. This is the problem with the show as a dialect, and I construct all of these sentences formed of so different words. For example, an iron in any Arabic dialect is an iron. In Saudi Arabia, it means ass. That’s one example. That’s one example. So imagine if you can actually construct sentences having all of these things in one… So I would construct a whole section of my show about that.
And a lot of people tell me, “Well, don’t you miss Egypt?” And I tell them every time, “The Egypt that I miss is not there anymore. It’s not bad or good. It’s not worse or better. It’s just I’m different.” And the places are different and the people are different and their circumstances are different. Whatever image you had you have of what you love is not there anymore. That’s why a lot of immigrants, especially Arab immigrants, they live here, but they’re there. And then when they go back for a vacation, they get disappointed because they didn’t find what they want. And then they come back here and they’re disappointed because they want to come back, but it’s not there anymore.
And they went there militarized and went there, and it was actually co-founded a Jew from Brooklyn. Not even… and like an Israeli. And he’s like one of the disciples of Meir Kahane. I’m sure that you know who Meir Kahane is, who was the Jewish defense leader, the people who assassinated Alex Odeh here in the United States, and they were there with their weapons outside intimidating people. Now this story carries everything that is wrong with the situation. You have people from Brooklyn, from outside, just because they’re Jewish, they can’t come and they can claim the land from the people there. Anybody from… just because he’s Jewish, you can come and take the land from other people.
They’re using technology to intimidate Palestinians. They have unchecked military power. These are not IDF soldiers, these are settlers and they have free reign in order to intimidate and to kill the people. And you understand, this is the daily life of Palestinians, not in Gaza. In the West Bank.
I am really worried because the rise of antisemitism and the rise of hate against Jews is not because of the Jews. It’s because of the actions of a government. Jews do not have to be on the side of apartheid. Ronnie Kasrils, he’s a Jewish South African, and he fought shoulder-to-shoulder next to Nelson Mandela. He was part of the African National Conference, ANC. And he had an article said like, “I know what apartheid is and I saw Israel and this is what they have.” And the thing is, Israel, the Israeli government should listen to other people. You cannot call anybody who criticizes you either an antisemite, or if they’re already Jewish, you call them like self-hating Jew. You cannot do that. You cannot continue doing that, because we did that.
When I would go in and criticize the Islamists, it’s like, “Oh, you’re self-hating Muslim. You’re not really Muslim, you’re an infidel, you’re a secret, you’re secular,” whatever. We have the power in order to reform the course by holding people in power accountable. And the thing is, it is very stupid to actually call this antisemitism. My idol is Jon Stewart. I voted for Bernie Sanders. Sarah Taxler, the one who did this amazing documentary about me, Tickling Giants, she’s a Jew. She is married to an Israeli Jew. We have a good ratio because we know what the right is. They don’t have to associate themselves with the action of the Israeli government.
So the nitpicking of a certain narrative, religious narrative that is separate from the political context and what’s happening right now, it’s very unfair, because I can read… If you want to have a deep dive into religious texts, nobody will be happy. And I can bring stuff from the Talmud and the Torah and stuff that is horrible. But this is a way, again, of distraction.
And then the early man was there in the desert and all of these natural phenomena. They didn’t know what to do. They were afraid. So they need to have refuge. They need to have something to take care of. They need to have a reason for everything, because if there’s no reason, it’s chaos. It’s chaos.
So I read the role as if a mixture of Trump and Mubarak. I did this mix, like, “You know…” Kind of the Middle East, but also kind of the essence of Trump into it. I went to the airport. It’s like an hour. It’s like James Gunn saw it, he loves it. It’s like, what? I never had an audition that fast. I mean, I had a few roles, but not that fast, not like that. And then I said, “Well, the strike starts tomorrow and we need to be on the phone… After the strike, we cannot talk.” The SAG after strike, like the writers and the actors strike. So like, “well, I’m going to be on a plane right now.” It’s like, “Okay, once you land, you can have a Zoom call with James Gunn.”
I have a call with James Gunn. I’m a huge fan of him. The guy took something like Guardians of the Galaxy, nobody knew about it, made amazing trilogy. And he is like a really cool guy. I like what he did. And it was really nice. And he started to talk to me about the movie. And I talked to people before we were casting them. So I know that everybody on set have a good chemistry. It was amazing. So in your mind, if you’re an actor, what does that mean? You got the part. And he told me, “You got the part.” Month goes by, strike goes by. October 7th happens. I do Piers Morgan one and two. And then I go to my Australian tour. My manager called me. “Bassem…” The strike was over. It’s like, “You don’t have the part anymore.”
I was sad, very sad, but for three days. And I said, “[inaudible 02:08:30].” I’m actually doing very well. [inaudible 02:08:34]. And then when I went to Chris Cuomo after I finished the show, he told me, “Did you lose any opportunities?” And that was off record, after the show was concluded. And I talked about Superman, and I found myself when I was talking, I was angry, I was bitter. And I went home. I was like, ” Why was I angry? Why was I bitter? It wasn’t meant to be. And I’m living a good life now. I don’t need to…”
So when I was asked again the next day in two different interviews, the BBC and another one also with my friend, [inaudible 02:09:15], I said the story in a different way. I said, “I don’t have any anger. As a matter of fact, maybe if I was Warner Brothers…” I didn’t talk about James Gunn. I thought it was the studio. If I was Warner Brothers and I’m a Muslim, I wouldn’t have a Zionist or a pro-Israeli in my movie. But I want to tell them that when I criticize Israel, I am not a threat to you as a Jew. And we can actually have more in common. That was more of a kind of empathic.
So when I said, that the internet went crazy, and James Gunn have haters because the Snyder-verse and all of this. It’s a world that I don’t understand. And James Gunn had all of these attacks on him, and I was pissed with how it was handled. I wasn’t angry at James Gunn, but I thought it was handled… So my publicist and manager is like, “Bassem, stay calm, don’t speak. It’s better to not talk about it.” I said, “Okay.”
So there’s nothing wrong about me, but I see the heat is rising against James Gunn. And that is a guy that I had a personal connection with, even through Zoom. And I didn’t like what was happening. And then he called me and he explained to me and said, “Bassem, I actually have camera tests before people, before finally…” I didn’t know that. “And then we changed the script and it was the strike. So I didn’t call.” And also I thought to myself, I’m small. I’m a small actor. I’m not that important for him to call me to say, “We’re going to change the script.”
So I still think that the timing sucks and everything. But then I went and I did a video explaining exactly what I’m telling you, because I didn’t want to be famous for the wrong reasons, because that would be unfair. Because already people were… and I was having interviews. “Can you come about to Superman?” I was like, ” Guys, that’s it. I’m not going to talk about it, because this is a non-issue.” And when I talked to James on the phone, I felt how sincere he was. So I didn’t want someone, because of me will, have that kind of attack, because I know what it means to be on the other side of that kind of attack. It’s terrible. And it ruins your life and it ruins your day. And nobody deserves to be doing that. And I don’t want to be the reason for someone else to go through that pain.
I had shows, when I was still starting, I had hecklers being sent to me by the Egyptian embassy and Egyptian Consulate in New York and in London to curse me and to take videos of that and then send it to state-run media in Egypt. I didn’t speak about that because I felt that if I speak about that, I feel about what was going on to me, I would be victimizing myself. It’s like if I’m going to be good, I’m going to be good because of what I do, not because of what people’s perception of what I’m going through.
It doesn’t matter now who you vote into power, they will not listen to you. They would listen to the people who paid them to be there, and it is very concerning because I can see the American democracies turning, not even slowly, very rapidly into an oligarchy. I’m sure that all of the millions of people who are voting, they don’t vote for the NRA, they don’t vote for APAC, they don’t vote for the pharmaceutical companies, they don’t vote for the military industry complex. Yet, the people in power, they come in, they take your vote and my vote, and they’re loyal to those people, not to us. It is very, very, very concerning. Very concerning. This is the danger of American policies, American politics and American democracies. It’s dangerous, because basically, the vote becomes just a ceremony that the someone with the more funding will get to power, and then he’s not loyal to you.
Now, in order to cut expenses, now we’re paying more money. The thing is, we do not have a say in this. We do not have a say in how my tax money and your tax money is being spent, because I’m sure you don’t want your money to be sent to Israel like that. I’m sure, even if you’re Jewish, I’m sure, I’m sure that I don’t want my money to be given to some Muslim countries who kill other Muslims. I’m sure. Here’s the thing, what kind of power do we have other than speaking? What is left for us is free speech. Now when you speak, they call you anti-Semitic. You see why I’m angry.
It’s all about, we are heading to Armageddon. The problem is Islam, they’re people that believe that at the end of time. Then, we have the Christians that believe in the end of time. Then, you have Israel happy that those people are using it for the end of time. Then, the whole idea about them pushing as many weapons and troops and people in the Middle East to be there for the nuclear Holocaust. John Hagee, one of the pastors talk about that, about the brimstones and it’s not going to be a nuclear Holocaust. It’s crazy how people are so despising life that they are wanting death. Now, you all would have these revelations, but these revelations mean nothing if you don’t have an effective weapon in order to make it happen. This is the crazy thing, and I’m worried that the end is going to be by someone that wants to meet God a little bit earlier.
Click link to jump approximately to that part in the transcript:
- 0:00 – Introduction
- 1:21 – Oct 7
- 31:49 – Two-state solution
- 47:28 – Holocaust
- 55:15 – 1948
- 1:04:07 – Egypt
- 1:18:29 – Jon Stewart
- 1:20:42 – Going viral during the Arab Spring
- 1:44:45 – Arabic vs English
- 1:57:08 – Sam Harris and Jihad
- 2:02:16 – Religion
- 2:21:28 – TikTok
- 2:26:00 – Joe Rogan
- 2:27:58 – Joe Biden
- 2:32:23 – Putin
- 2:34:11 – War
- 2:39:07 – Hope
Introduction
Bassem Youssef
If I hate you, that’s great, but if I have a story to support that hate, that’s even better.
If I hate you, that’s great, but if I have a story to support that hate, that’s even better.
Lex Fridman
One of your favorite words, “Jihad.”
One of your favorite words, “Jihad.”
Bassem Youssef
That’s my favorite hobbies. It doesn’t matter now, who do you vote into power; they will not listen to you, they would listen to the people who paid them to be there. When the military came in, people were walking to me, pointing their fingers like, “Don’t speak about [inaudible 00:00:24], don’t speak about the army. We love you now, but don’t you…” They would, like that. So I called John Stewart, I was like, “I don’t know what to do.” And he said the most interesting thing ever. And say, “If you’re afraid of something, make fun about the fact that you’re afraid of it.”
That’s my favorite hobbies. It doesn’t matter now, who do you vote into power; they will not listen to you, they would listen to the people who paid them to be there. When the military came in, people were walking to me, pointing their fingers like, “Don’t speak about [inaudible 00:00:24], don’t speak about the army. We love you now, but don’t you…” They would, like that. So I called John Stewart, I was like, “I don’t know what to do.” And he said the most interesting thing ever. And say, “If you’re afraid of something, make fun about the fact that you’re afraid of it.”
Lex Fridman
The following is a conversation with Bassem Youssef, a legendary Egyptian-American comedian, the so-called John Stewart of the Middle East, who fearlessly satirized those in power even when his job and life were on the line. Bassem is a beautiful human being. It was truly a pleasure for me to get to know him and to have this fun, fascinating, and challenging conversation. This is the Lex Fridman podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here’s Bassem Youssef.
The following is a conversation with Bassem Youssef, a legendary Egyptian-American comedian, the so-called John Stewart of the Middle East, who fearlessly satirized those in power even when his job and life were on the line. Bassem is a beautiful human being. It was truly a pleasure for me to get to know him and to have this fun, fascinating, and challenging conversation. This is the Lex Fridman podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here’s Bassem Youssef.
Oct 7
Your wife is half Palestinian, and I’ve heard you say that you’ve been trying to kill her, but she keeps using the kids as human shields. So have you considered negotiating a ceasefire?
Bassem Youssef
Well, the thing is, every day, every minute of the day in a married life is a negotiation. Everything can blow up into a full-scale war. Starting from a simple sentence like, “Good morning, what should we do with the kids today? What should we do with that piece of furniture?” Any sentence can lead you to heaven or to hell in the same time.
Well, the thing is, every day, every minute of the day in a married life is a negotiation. Everything can blow up into a full-scale war. Starting from a simple sentence like, “Good morning, what should we do with the kids today? What should we do with that piece of furniture?” Any sentence can lead you to heaven or to hell in the same time.
Lex Fridman
So, you do negotiate with terrorists.
So, you do negotiate with terrorists.
Bassem Youssef
Oh yeah. Yeah, 100%. You must. Yeah. And for her, I’m her terrorist too. So it’s equal.
Oh yeah. Yeah, 100%. You must. Yeah. And for her, I’m her terrorist too. So it’s equal.
Lex Fridman
Terrorists on both sides. On a more serious note, when you found out about the attacks of October 7th, what went through your mind?
Terrorists on both sides. On a more serious note, when you found out about the attacks of October 7th, what went through your mind?
Bassem Youssef
If I’m allowed to use a curse word, I was like-
If I’m allowed to use a curse word, I was like-
Lex Fridman
As many as possible.
As many as possible.
Bassem Youssef
I was like, “Oh shit.” Part of my stand-up comedy is I describe a situation where I was in a restaurant with producers and there was a bombing two blocks away in Chelsea, New York in 2016. And of course, this is the like, “Damn, what’s going to happen to us now?” And there’s two different reactions, the white reaction, which is like, “Oh my God, I hope nobody is hurt. This is terrible. I hope everybody’s okay.” And there’s the Arab reaction. “What’s his name? What’s his name? What is the name?” Because you know what’s going to come. I was scared what’s going to really happened in that area, and I said like, “Oh my God, it’s going to be horrible.” And the way that it was reported, I didn’t know how to handle this. So I went into hiding for a few days, three or four days, and I talked about Piers Morgan team talking to me two times, three times. I was like, “No, I can’t. How can you defend that? How can you defend the rape, the decapitated babies and whatever?”
I was like, “Oh shit.” Part of my stand-up comedy is I describe a situation where I was in a restaurant with producers and there was a bombing two blocks away in Chelsea, New York in 2016. And of course, this is the like, “Damn, what’s going to happen to us now?” And there’s two different reactions, the white reaction, which is like, “Oh my God, I hope nobody is hurt. This is terrible. I hope everybody’s okay.” And there’s the Arab reaction. “What’s his name? What’s his name? What is the name?” Because you know what’s going to come. I was scared what’s going to really happened in that area, and I said like, “Oh my God, it’s going to be horrible.” And the way that it was reported, I didn’t know how to handle this. So I went into hiding for a few days, three or four days, and I talked about Piers Morgan team talking to me two times, three times. I was like, “No, I can’t. How can you defend that? How can you defend the rape, the decapitated babies and whatever?”
And then I started kind of looking in the news a little bit, and then I started seeing people coming on the shows and saying things that I know as an Arab, as a Muslim, as someone from that region, that it’s not true. But I didn’t know what to say, how to say it. So by the third time when they asked me, I said, “Fine, put me on.” And I went there, it was [inaudible 00:03:36], figuratively speaking, a suicide mission because it’s a lose-lose situation. I can lose stuff in Hollywood. I remember my managers like, “Bessem, be careful. I mean, are you sure you want to do it?” My managers was like, “Please don’t do it. Please don’t do it.” And on the other side, if I don’t perform well, whatever, “Well” means, I’m going to be rejected by my own people. So it was a lose-lose situation because whatever I say, it’ll never be enough, and whatever I say will not be good enough. And I was going into there, and I felt that I was going into a trance for the 33 minutes that I was on that interview for the first time.
Lex Fridman
You blacked out?
You blacked out?
Bassem Youssef
I blacked out. I blacked out. And a lot of people ask me, “Was that a bit when the earpiece kept falling?” It’s like, “No, it was really falling off and it disconnected and I had to save it because I cannot see them, I can just hear them and I could expecting at any time, “Okay, Bessem, thank you.”” I was fighting for every second, to say words, to put stuff in there.
I blacked out. I blacked out. And a lot of people ask me, “Was that a bit when the earpiece kept falling?” It’s like, “No, it was really falling off and it disconnected and I had to save it because I cannot see them, I can just hear them and I could expecting at any time, “Okay, Bessem, thank you.”” I was fighting for every second, to say words, to put stuff in there.
Lex Fridman
For people who don’t know, this is your conversation, interview with Piers Morgan and you couldn’t see.
For people who don’t know, this is your conversation, interview with Piers Morgan and you couldn’t see.
Bassem Youssef
I couldn’t see. I was just like, the lens of the camera and-
I couldn’t see. I was just like, the lens of the camera and-
Lex Fridman
It was like a surreal dream or nightmare.
It was like a surreal dream or nightmare.
Bassem Youssef
Yeah. “Hello, Bessem.” It was like, “Hello, Bessem,” I was like, “Hi.”
Yeah. “Hello, Bessem.” It was like, “Hello, Bessem,” I was like, “Hi.”
Lex Fridman
And it could end at any moment, your career and everything.
And it could end at any moment, your career and everything.
Bassem Youssef
Everything. Yeah. Yeah.
Everything. Yeah. Yeah.
Lex Fridman
So what was the drive that got you to actually do it, to overcome that fear?
So what was the drive that got you to actually do it, to overcome that fear?
Bassem Youssef
Multiple things. First of all, I don’t want to say it’s just my wife’s family because my wife’s family has always been there, but this time was different. The bombing, the attack, they’re usually one of those people that they’re aware of everything. When whatever happened in Gaza, they are always in safe places. But this time, it seems that there was no place safe. And already we heard about two, three of the cousins, and the uncles already lost their home. So this was too much. So I wanted to say something for those people, because I know that… One of the jokes that I made about like, “Oh, it’s Hasan, her cousin, he’s a loser, he’s a doctor. He’s a doctor.” And every time a hospital was bombed, we were worried about him. So I wanted to say that because I felt that this is a family that I have never seen in my life. She actually hardly saw an uncle or two, because they cannot leave. But I said, “I need to speak, at least I do something for those extended family that I have never known.”
Multiple things. First of all, I don’t want to say it’s just my wife’s family because my wife’s family has always been there, but this time was different. The bombing, the attack, they’re usually one of those people that they’re aware of everything. When whatever happened in Gaza, they are always in safe places. But this time, it seems that there was no place safe. And already we heard about two, three of the cousins, and the uncles already lost their home. So this was too much. So I wanted to say something for those people, because I know that… One of the jokes that I made about like, “Oh, it’s Hasan, her cousin, he’s a loser, he’s a doctor. He’s a doctor.” And every time a hospital was bombed, we were worried about him. So I wanted to say that because I felt that this is a family that I have never seen in my life. She actually hardly saw an uncle or two, because they cannot leave. But I said, “I need to speak, at least I do something for those extended family that I have never known.”
But also because when Piers Morgan team called me a couple of times and said, “Okay, let’s see what’s going on in the show,” and I just watched the stuff, and the lies, and the one-sided reporting that made my blood boil. And then I thought, “What am I afraid of? I’m afraid of if I say something, I can lose my career. Wait a minute, but that was the reason why I left Egypt.” I said, “Wait, I left Egypt, I came to United States, I came to the Land of the Free where I can say anything I want. And yet I have limitation of what to say. I mean, I thought we left that shit behind. I mean, what’s happening?”
And I understand the connection of how sensitive it is when you speak about Israel and all of the ready-made accusations. But as an Arab, as a Muslim, I don’t react the same when you talk about Saudi Arabia, or Iran, or Egypt or any of them, it’s like, “Hey, you want to dis some of these countries, I’ll do that with you because I have strong opinions about what happened and I already been expressing them.” But that’s why, and there’s a lot of Jewish people who come to my show and they understand that. They understand the separation, but that kind of a grouping of blackmailing people and saying, and not saying what they have in their mind, it is that one of the things that kind of pushed me to go on the show.
Lex Fridman
The thing that was bothering you, was that what was being said or how it was being said?
The thing that was bothering you, was that what was being said or how it was being said?
Bassem Youssef
Both. Because there are lies, which is usually in the media, but there was the total disregard of humanity. You talk a lot on your show about human suffering, and I felt that here the human suffering was not equal. I felt that’s why I came up with this like, “What’s the exchange rate today? What’s the exchange rate today?” Of course, it’s terrible to see anybody die, but I feel that like, isn’t our life not worth anything?
Both. Because there are lies, which is usually in the media, but there was the total disregard of humanity. You talk a lot on your show about human suffering, and I felt that here the human suffering was not equal. I felt that’s why I came up with this like, “What’s the exchange rate today? What’s the exchange rate today?” Of course, it’s terrible to see anybody die, but I feel that like, isn’t our life not worth anything?
Lex Fridman
Yeah. You had a chart akin to crypto, you analyzed it from an investing perspective, of course, in a dark human economy-
Yeah. You had a chart akin to crypto, you analyzed it from an investing perspective, of course, in a dark human economy-
Bassem Youssef
The ROI on-
The ROI on-
Lex Fridman
The ROI. And you were saying that a certain year was a good year.
The ROI. And you were saying that a certain year was a good year.
Bassem Youssef
Yeah, 2014.
Yeah, 2014.
Lex Fridman
2014 was a good year for investment purposes and also to refer to family member that you called a loser, you were saying that you called him, had a conversation with him, and he keeps saying that he’s not using anybody for human shields, and you called him a loser. What do you do? He can’t even keep a job.
2014 was a good year for investment purposes and also to refer to family member that you called a loser, you were saying that you called him, had a conversation with him, and he keeps saying that he’s not using anybody for human shields, and you called him a loser. What do you do? He can’t even keep a job.
Bassem Youssef
Liar. He lied to us because I have to believe. It’s also one of the things, like how it was said, it was stuff that I’ve been hearing. I don’t know what turned on in my head, but it’s stuff that I’ve been hearing all my life from the media, “Israel warns civilians before bombing them, and that’s okay,” but that’s not okay. Israel is trying to minimize the civilians, but killing them anyway. And that’s okay, but that’s not okay. So it is kind of like the indoctrination that we’ve been hearing, as if it is okay, and then suddenly it’s not.
Liar. He lied to us because I have to believe. It’s also one of the things, like how it was said, it was stuff that I’ve been hearing. I don’t know what turned on in my head, but it’s stuff that I’ve been hearing all my life from the media, “Israel warns civilians before bombing them, and that’s okay,” but that’s not okay. Israel is trying to minimize the civilians, but killing them anyway. And that’s okay, but that’s not okay. So it is kind of like the indoctrination that we’ve been hearing, as if it is okay, and then suddenly it’s not.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, there’s a kind of several layers of bullshit, almost sometimes hiding the obvious horror of the situation with kind of politeness and all this kind of stuff. Just the basic value of human life. That said, it’s a difficult situation.
Yeah, there’s a kind of several layers of bullshit, almost sometimes hiding the obvious horror of the situation with kind of politeness and all this kind of stuff. Just the basic value of human life. That said, it’s a difficult situation.
Bassem Youssef
It is.
It is.
Lex Fridman
What would you do if you were Israel? Bibi called you, awesome, big fan, big fan of your comedy. First of all, would you hang up right away? Would you hear him out?
What would you do if you were Israel? Bibi called you, awesome, big fan, big fan of your comedy. First of all, would you hang up right away? Would you hear him out?
Bassem Youssef
Oh, I’ll definitely hear him out. That was like, “Wait a minute. That’s material. That’s material, man.” It was like, “So Netanyahu called me. I was sitting with my family. Just like, I’m on my phone, and it was like, “Oh, Netanyahu.”
Oh, I’ll definitely hear him out. That was like, “Wait a minute. That’s material. That’s material, man.” It was like, “So Netanyahu called me. I was sitting with my family. Just like, I’m on my phone, and it was like, “Oh, Netanyahu.”
Lex Fridman
Yeah, it just shows up that way. I mean, what would you do? What would you do in this situation?
Yeah, it just shows up that way. I mean, what would you do? What would you do in this situation?
Bassem Youssef
To answer this question, we need to understand how Israel thinks. There is an incredible speech given by Gideon Levy, the famous Israeli reporter [inaudible 00:10:23]. He describes a situation where he was in the West Bank and there was a checkpoint. And in that checkpoint there was an ambulance with a Palestinian patient and it was there, sitting for an hour and a half, not moving. And then he went to talk to the soldiers, like, “Guys, why are you not letting them go?” It’s like, “Ah, let them go.” And then he told them, “Imagine if he was your father.” And the soldiers stood up, it was like, “What? These are pigs. These are not humans.”
To answer this question, we need to understand how Israel thinks. There is an incredible speech given by Gideon Levy, the famous Israeli reporter [inaudible 00:10:23]. He describes a situation where he was in the West Bank and there was a checkpoint. And in that checkpoint there was an ambulance with a Palestinian patient and it was there, sitting for an hour and a half, not moving. And then he went to talk to the soldiers, like, “Guys, why are you not letting them go?” It’s like, “Ah, let them go.” And then he told them, “Imagine if he was your father.” And the soldiers stood up, it was like, “What? These are pigs. These are not humans.”
So when you tell me what would you do if Israel would do, we need to ask how does Israel look at the Palestinian and view the Palestinians? Because they do look at them less than human. And there is an incredible talk by [inaudible 00:11:12] Meyer. He was a Holocaust survivor, and he said, “I learned in Auschwitz when I was there in the Concentration Camp that in order for a dominant group of people to dehumanize another group, they need first, to dehumanize themselves. And Israel looks at Palestinians as lesser people, as lesser beings, as some people who are dispensable. And the way that they treat them is that, they don’t really care about… That’s why that the exchange rate thing.
So for me, if I am Israel, it’ll be like, “What would you do if you’re the United States in the time of the Native Americans? They were killing people with the millions.” When you dehumanize a group of people, you really don’t care. So if I was Israel, I would do exactly what Israel is doing right now, because there’s no one is holding me accountable. There is no one stopping me, and I can get whatever I want, throughout my history, through violence.
Lex Fridman
I think a lot of the things you just said are a tiny bit slightly exaggerated. So let me try.
I think a lot of the things you just said are a tiny bit slightly exaggerated. So let me try.
Bassem Youssef
Please, please.
Please, please.
Lex Fridman
Let’s try. So not everybody in Israel.
Let’s try. So not everybody in Israel.
Bassem Youssef
Of course.
Of course.
Lex Fridman
So let’s look at several groups. So people in government, IDF soldiers and citizens that are neither of those. And not everybody of any of those sees Palestinians as less than human, just some percentage. So what percentage is that in your sense?
So let’s look at several groups. So people in government, IDF soldiers and citizens that are neither of those. And not everybody of any of those sees Palestinians as less than human, just some percentage. So what percentage is that in your sense?
Bassem Youssef
It’s the people who have the power.
It’s the people who have the power.
Lex Fridman
So it’s mostly the focus of your commentary, when you say, “People in Israel,” you really mean the people in power.
So it’s mostly the focus of your commentary, when you say, “People in Israel,” you really mean the people in power.
Bassem Youssef
The people who have the power, but as much as, of course, I mean the people in power, because even when I speak about America, I speak about people in power. When I speak about Egypt, I speak the people about power, because you can’t really talk about the 100 million people in Egypt, or the 11 million people in Israel. Of course not. There are people who go in, and they demonstrate against Netanyahu and they want him out of the government. But we have to admit that the Israeli society at a whole have moved quite bit to the right and has been many extreme. And you know what happens when you go to the right or you go to the most extreme, the other person go to the most extreme, and extremism breeds extremism. So thank you for the clarification, but I really meant, with the people of power. When people criticize the United States for going in Iraq, of course I’m not criticizing citizens.
The people who have the power, but as much as, of course, I mean the people in power, because even when I speak about America, I speak about people in power. When I speak about Egypt, I speak the people about power, because you can’t really talk about the 100 million people in Egypt, or the 11 million people in Israel. Of course not. There are people who go in, and they demonstrate against Netanyahu and they want him out of the government. But we have to admit that the Israeli society at a whole have moved quite bit to the right and has been many extreme. And you know what happens when you go to the right or you go to the most extreme, the other person go to the most extreme, and extremism breeds extremism. So thank you for the clarification, but I really meant, with the people of power. When people criticize the United States for going in Iraq, of course I’m not criticizing citizens.
Lex Fridman
But you made another point, which is an interesting point and it’s very difficult to see in the heart of people. But I wonder if you look at the average Palestinian and the average Israeli, and when they look at the other, do they have some hate in their heart? Well, everybody probably has some. What is that amount? When you look at a person that looks different than you, how much hate is there?
But you made another point, which is an interesting point and it’s very difficult to see in the heart of people. But I wonder if you look at the average Palestinian and the average Israeli, and when they look at the other, do they have some hate in their heart? Well, everybody probably has some. What is that amount? When you look at a person that looks different than you, how much hate is there?
Bassem Youssef
It depends on what is the living situation of each person. So in the Berlin Film Festival, just like a few couple of weeks ago, there was an Israeli and a Palestinian receiving an award together. And the Israeli director said, “We are going to go back to Israel. He’s going to go to the West Bank, he will have no rights, and I’ll have full living rights.” These people managed to work together and be friends, and they have empathy to each other. Now, the average Palestinian, it’s a very difficult question because is it the Palestinian in the diaspora or the Palestinian in Gaza? Or the diaspora in the West Bank or the one as a citizen of Israel, who still have less right than a normal citizen of Israel, a Jew?” And it really depends. There are Arabs in Israel who are having a great life, and there are people, Arabs, who are having a miserable life, but definitely people that living in Gaza or in the West Bank is kind of like on the lower tier of the living conditions. Now, let’s talk about the hate. What does that Palestinian see from an Israeli? The Palestinian see oppression, limitation of movement, limitation of freedom. And then when there’s something happens, you see the full force coming in, destroying their home, taking away members of his family. There would be absolutely no reason for him to love the other. The Israeli, because he doesn’t have the power, but he lives under his government, all he sees is the rockets or whatever, but he sees the reaction and he doesn’t see what happened to those humans. And as humans, we are selfish. We see what really affects us as humans. And I cannot even imagine what it would be like to live as a Palestinian, and I’m not even talk about Gaza because everybody talks about Gaza. But let me give you an example, and I’m not going to talk about the 12,000 kids killed in Gaza, let’s talk about just the four weeks in the West Bank.
It depends on what is the living situation of each person. So in the Berlin Film Festival, just like a few couple of weeks ago, there was an Israeli and a Palestinian receiving an award together. And the Israeli director said, “We are going to go back to Israel. He’s going to go to the West Bank, he will have no rights, and I’ll have full living rights.” These people managed to work together and be friends, and they have empathy to each other. Now, the average Palestinian, it’s a very difficult question because is it the Palestinian in the diaspora or the Palestinian in Gaza? Or the diaspora in the West Bank or the one as a citizen of Israel, who still have less right than a normal citizen of Israel, a Jew?” And it really depends. There are Arabs in Israel who are having a great life, and there are people, Arabs, who are having a miserable life, but definitely people that living in Gaza or in the West Bank is kind of like on the lower tier of the living conditions. Now, let’s talk about the hate. What does that Palestinian see from an Israeli? The Palestinian see oppression, limitation of movement, limitation of freedom. And then when there’s something happens, you see the full force coming in, destroying their home, taking away members of his family. There would be absolutely no reason for him to love the other. The Israeli, because he doesn’t have the power, but he lives under his government, all he sees is the rockets or whatever, but he sees the reaction and he doesn’t see what happened to those humans. And as humans, we are selfish. We see what really affects us as humans. And I cannot even imagine what it would be like to live as a Palestinian, and I’m not even talk about Gaza because everybody talks about Gaza. But let me give you an example, and I’m not going to talk about the 12,000 kids killed in Gaza, let’s talk about just the four weeks in the West Bank.
March 4th, Amir al-Najjar, age 10, sitting next to his father, shot in while he’s sitting in the car next to his father by the IDF soldiers. Mohammed Ziyad, 13 years old, March 3rd, shot in front of a UN school while sitting with his friends. Mohammed Ghanem, age 15, March 2nd, he shot while standing in front of a storefront during a night raid. February 23rd, Saeed Jardal, he was killed by a drone fire. February 22nd, Fadi Suleiman killed while standing in front of a top of a red cross building. Nihil Ziyad, February 14th, Valentine’s Day, killed and shot in the head while leaving school. February 11th, Mohammed Khattour, US citizens killed while being in a parked car. And [inaudible 00:16:54], February 9th, killed right in front of his home because a military car came reversing back to him, and then somebody opened the door, shot him and leave. This is a daily life of people in the West Bank.
Lex Fridman
What is the justification the IDF provides?
What is the justification the IDF provides?
Bassem Youssef
Terrorism.
Terrorism.
Lex Fridman
Terrorism?
Terrorism?
Bassem Youssef
Or I don’t know. I mean you cannot really say, “Human shields,” but they would say they were throwing rocks. There was a guy who went on Chris Rock and he said his son, a US citizen was killed, and they were throwing rocks, so we killed him. Even when they were throwing rocks, you killed him? But the thing is, you see, this is how easy for them to get rid of Palestinians. I mean, I had to say, I prepared a little bit for the podcast because you are in tech and I am ignorant in tech. There is a movie called The Lab. It is directed by an Israeli director called Yotam Feldman. And he talks about how the military industry in Israel is very advanced. And what is really mind-boggling is in that movie, he shows how the military tests its weapons in the field, in urban areas, on Palestinians.
Or I don’t know. I mean you cannot really say, “Human shields,” but they would say they were throwing rocks. There was a guy who went on Chris Rock and he said his son, a US citizen was killed, and they were throwing rocks, so we killed him. Even when they were throwing rocks, you killed him? But the thing is, you see, this is how easy for them to get rid of Palestinians. I mean, I had to say, I prepared a little bit for the podcast because you are in tech and I am ignorant in tech. There is a movie called The Lab. It is directed by an Israeli director called Yotam Feldman. And he talks about how the military industry in Israel is very advanced. And what is really mind-boggling is in that movie, he shows how the military tests its weapons in the field, in urban areas, on Palestinians.
It is heartbreaking, as a doctor, there’s five stages of trials. There is discovery, pre-clinical, clinical, and then market, and then post-market evaluation by the FDA, the FDA approve, and then the FDA post-market. Five just to take a pill. And you go in and he interviews people as like, “Where did you test this?” They tested in the field.
So when human life is so cheap, and it is so indispensable, it gave me a visceral reaction because this has been actually the state of humanity. Humanity lived, and survived and thrive by actually killing each other. But there was kind of a, we were remotely, we are removed from it. People in Greece didn’t know what the Alexander the Great was doing. He was killing and pillaging. We call him, “The Great,” but he was killing. He was conquering, he was invading. Julius Caesar, all of the greats, he would do it, but killing was difficult. Killing had to have some sort of… You have to be with your enemy. Then you go back, catapults, then cannons, then a little bit back, and then you are kind of starting remotely. Now you’re killing people behind the screen with a push of a button. A lot of people say, “Terrorism, they killed you with a knife, killed one person with a knife, shot you. That’s terrorism.” But if you fly a $64 million F-16 and you drop up in an A-84 bomb that costs $16,000, that’s not terrorism because it’s remote. You’re behind the screen.
So what happened, what Israel is doing, it is removing itself, like America too, drones [inaudible 00:19:55]. And then when you push someone to be, they always brag about bombing them to the Stone Ages. What happens when the screens, and all of the obstacles that you have been put between you and those people, that you have treated them this way, when this is a breach and you come face to face, you will come face to face with what you have created.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, there’s a lot of interesting things you just said. So one is the methodology of killing. If you want to look at some horrific, hard-scaled killing, people often talk about the Holocaust, but that’s visceral. You can look at Holodomor by Stalin, where the murders through starvation.
Yeah, there’s a lot of interesting things you just said. So one is the methodology of killing. If you want to look at some horrific, hard-scaled killing, people often talk about the Holocaust, but that’s visceral. You can look at Holodomor by Stalin, where the murders through starvation.
Bassem Youssef
By Churchill in India.
By Churchill in India.
Lex Fridman
Churchill, in India, and the Great Leap Forward by Mao. So starvation is a thing we don’t often think of it as murder because it’s quiet, it’s slow. And the interesting thing about starvation is that the people don’t complain as they’re dying because they’re exhausted. That’s one. And the other is the value of human life, it does seem that every culture has an unequal valuation of human life. So those two things combined create a complicated military landscape of the world.
Churchill, in India, and the Great Leap Forward by Mao. So starvation is a thing we don’t often think of it as murder because it’s quiet, it’s slow. And the interesting thing about starvation is that the people don’t complain as they’re dying because they’re exhausted. That’s one. And the other is the value of human life, it does seem that every culture has an unequal valuation of human life. So those two things combined create a complicated military landscape of the world.
Bassem Youssef
Yes, but the thing is that how we would look at technology as the savior, as if we talk about how, “AI will disrupt, will disrupt, will disrupt.” And now if you talk about going to the West Bank, the people in the West Bank walk, and they don’t see humans, they see people shouting them from towers or behind the screens and they have biometrics that is developed by Basel System, that’s done by HP or Google and Amazon who are part of Project Nimbus. And you see indivision developing all of this metric, and surveillance and all of that stuff. And then, you have something like the gospel that people have actually said that the gospel can actually create a target list using AI and give you a green, yellow, or a red to go ahead. And now AI is not just disrupting the market, it’s disrupting our humanity. And we became so comfortable killing people from afar, killing people with a push of the button. And now it is like dating apps when you swipe left and right, it’s like, “Oh, right,” it becomes so cheap. It’s not meeting someone. It’s like, “Oh, [inaudible 00:22:36],” it’s like a lot of fish in the sea. Same with AI. Boom, 500 people killed. Boom, get killed. It’s so easy, it’s so easy, it’s so easy. And then it’s so far removed from you.
Yes, but the thing is that how we would look at technology as the savior, as if we talk about how, “AI will disrupt, will disrupt, will disrupt.” And now if you talk about going to the West Bank, the people in the West Bank walk, and they don’t see humans, they see people shouting them from towers or behind the screens and they have biometrics that is developed by Basel System, that’s done by HP or Google and Amazon who are part of Project Nimbus. And you see indivision developing all of this metric, and surveillance and all of that stuff. And then, you have something like the gospel that people have actually said that the gospel can actually create a target list using AI and give you a green, yellow, or a red to go ahead. And now AI is not just disrupting the market, it’s disrupting our humanity. And we became so comfortable killing people from afar, killing people with a push of the button. And now it is like dating apps when you swipe left and right, it’s like, “Oh, right,” it becomes so cheap. It’s not meeting someone. It’s like, “Oh, [inaudible 00:22:36],” it’s like a lot of fish in the sea. Same with AI. Boom, 500 people killed. Boom, get killed. It’s so easy, it’s so easy, it’s so easy. And then it’s so far removed from you.
So when you put these people in this condition, you have literally put them in a different universe than yours. You are behind in your air conditioned screens, pushing them, blowing up a university. It’s amazing. But then you meet what you have done, you meet the Frankenstein that you have created, and then people are like, “Oh, look what they did to us.”
Lex Fridman
You just gave me this image of a dating app from hell. Where leaders are just sitting there and swiping left, right.
You just gave me this image of a dating app from hell. Where leaders are just sitting there and swiping left, right.
Bassem Youssef
Like, “Invade,” “Destroy.” “Puppet government.”
Like, “Invade,” “Destroy.” “Puppet government.”
Lex Fridman
Yeah. And then, turn off the phone and go to sleep. So I traveled to the West Bank and I mentioned to you offline that I really loved the people there. I’ve met a bunch of people like that in Eastern Europe where I grew up. Yeah, like the flamboyant, the big personalities, all of that. I also met a person who’s in charge of a refugee camp who was shot by an IDF soldier. And I’m not sure the words he said are important as the consequences of the thing that you mentioned, which is the deep hate in his eyes. That didn’t feel repairable at all. It was pain, it was like a foundation of pain, and on top of that, a hatred. And I was like, “Wow, you kill one person. This is what you create.”
Yeah. And then, turn off the phone and go to sleep. So I traveled to the West Bank and I mentioned to you offline that I really loved the people there. I’ve met a bunch of people like that in Eastern Europe where I grew up. Yeah, like the flamboyant, the big personalities, all of that. I also met a person who’s in charge of a refugee camp who was shot by an IDF soldier. And I’m not sure the words he said are important as the consequences of the thing that you mentioned, which is the deep hate in his eyes. That didn’t feel repairable at all. It was pain, it was like a foundation of pain, and on top of that, a hatred. And I was like, “Wow, you kill one person. This is what you create.”
Bassem Youssef
Mm-hmm. Because we have kind of like a front row seat to what’s happening. We think we are in it, but we can’t really grasp it. I mean people’s like, ” Oh, we’re just going to go in, get Hamas out and we are going to get them back in.” And what about the people get back in? How do you think they would look at you? What have you created? What have you done?
Mm-hmm. Because we have kind of like a front row seat to what’s happening. We think we are in it, but we can’t really grasp it. I mean people’s like, ” Oh, we’re just going to go in, get Hamas out and we are going to get them back in.” And what about the people get back in? How do you think they would look at you? What have you created? What have you done?
My show in Egypt was all about propaganda. It’s all about the use of words. Words are very important. The decapitated babies were not chosen randomly. Because you see, it plants a certain image in your brain. Imagine if you’re going in what a baby can do; it can smile, cry and poop, that’s it. It is absolutely no threat. So when you tell people, “40 decapitated babies, they’re so animalistic, they didn’t see the babies. Women raped. Of course, he’s an animal to do that.” And they would go through that and what was very frustrating about the conversation is the Gish galloping. The gish galloping. You see the distractions? You see what happens? ” What’s the proportionate response?” “Can Israel defend itself?” “Do you condemn Hamas?” “Does Israel have the right to exist?” “Decapitated babies.” “Raped women.” “Why don’t the Arab countries take them?” “Muslims kill Muslims.” “Look what happened in Yemen, in Syria, in Iraq.” See how they kind of distract you? They throw little things at you so you don’t know what to do. Or the honor war, “The UNN,” “Anti-Semitic.” “October 7th,” “October 7th,” “October 7th,” and then suddenly you are distracted and pulled into discussing all of these little things and you’re not discussing what’s happening right now. It is basically stalling, giving them time to do what they do.
Lex Fridman
So there’s some degree to the propaganda though. So the beheaded babies and all this kind of stuff that is so over the top that it shuts down actual conversation about actual wrongs, war crimes on both sides. So it’s overstating it to where everyone on social media and everywhere in the press and everywhere is arguing, almost become desensitized to actual horrors of death, which are more mundane. They’re not so dramatic as beheaded babies.
So there’s some degree to the propaganda though. So the beheaded babies and all this kind of stuff that is so over the top that it shuts down actual conversation about actual wrongs, war crimes on both sides. So it’s overstating it to where everyone on social media and everywhere in the press and everywhere is arguing, almost become desensitized to actual horrors of death, which are more mundane. They’re not so dramatic as beheaded babies.
Bassem Youssef
Yeah, because may be shot, but decapitated babies, there’s like a knife blade that goes into the skin, the trachea, the flesh, the spine. Decapitated. You can just, like, “He’s dead.” No, you go in. This is the hate. So much hate. And that’s why you-
Yeah, because may be shot, but decapitated babies, there’s like a knife blade that goes into the skin, the trachea, the flesh, the spine. Decapitated. You can just, like, “He’s dead.” No, you go in. This is the hate. So much hate. And that’s why you-
Lex Fridman
You have made me laugh at the darkest shit. You’re such a beautiful person. Your dark humor is just wonderful.
You have made me laugh at the darkest shit. You’re such a beautiful person. Your dark humor is just wonderful.
Bassem Youssef
But you see this happened to Jews before. Remember blood libel? Where did the blood libel come from? It come from these rumors that Jews suck baby’s blood. This is what they did to them.
But you see this happened to Jews before. Remember blood libel? Where did the blood libel come from? It come from these rumors that Jews suck baby’s blood. This is what they did to them.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, it’s in the cup.
Yeah, it’s in the cup.
Bassem Youssef
Exactly. That’s a very delicious baby cup.
Exactly. That’s a very delicious baby cup.
Lex Fridman
Delicious baby blood.
Delicious baby blood.
Bassem Youssef
But this is what you do. You tell people something. And it happened with the Native Americans when they were here, when they went in and they wipe a whole tribe. And Jewish people, one of the minorities that were persecuted and had this used against them for a very long time, and it is terrible, and it’s terrifying that’ it’s been used again.
But this is what you do. You tell people something. And it happened with the Native Americans when they were here, when they went in and they wipe a whole tribe. And Jewish people, one of the minorities that were persecuted and had this used against them for a very long time, and it is terrible, and it’s terrifying that’ it’s been used again.
Lex Fridman
So I just did a very lengthy debate on Israel and Palestine and the really painful thing from that, those two historians, and it was deep, it was thorough, it was fascinating. But in constantly asking about sources of hope or solutions, there was none. There was a really dark sense of, it’s hopeless, from both sides. It’s hopeless. So I look to you for a source hope. For a source of hope. Is there any hope here? Solutions? Short term, long term?
So I just did a very lengthy debate on Israel and Palestine and the really painful thing from that, those two historians, and it was deep, it was thorough, it was fascinating. But in constantly asking about sources of hope or solutions, there was none. There was a really dark sense of, it’s hopeless, from both sides. It’s hopeless. So I look to you for a source hope. For a source of hope. Is there any hope here? Solutions? Short term, long term?
Bassem Youssef
Obama have kind of summarized this beautifully in his book. He said, the reason why the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is so chronic is one side have so much power and the other side have absolutely no power. And that’s what Obama said, he said, you have Israel, that basically don’t listen to us because they’re supported by people who are bigger than the president, bigger than administration. They know that they can. I mean, Netanyahu was quoted on tape many times saying like, he’s basically belittling Americans like, “We control 80% of the population. We don’t care.” This has nonchalant, kind of like, “We have them.” And there’s nothing really that compels Israel to give up anything because at the end of the day, what is compromise? Compromise is like, “I give something, you give something.” Israel’s giving anything, and they project that on you.
Obama have kind of summarized this beautifully in his book. He said, the reason why the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is so chronic is one side have so much power and the other side have absolutely no power. And that’s what Obama said, he said, you have Israel, that basically don’t listen to us because they’re supported by people who are bigger than the president, bigger than administration. They know that they can. I mean, Netanyahu was quoted on tape many times saying like, he’s basically belittling Americans like, “We control 80% of the population. We don’t care.” This has nonchalant, kind of like, “We have them.” And there’s nothing really that compels Israel to give up anything because at the end of the day, what is compromise? Compromise is like, “I give something, you give something.” Israel’s giving anything, and they project that on you.
So for example, how many times have we heard, “Oh, Palestinians were giving four, five, six, seven, 15 chances and they said no to them.” And yet when you read the history, that’s not the case at all. For example, in the whole idea about Arafat walked away from Oslo, that didn’t happen. And there is an incredible video by, what’s his name? Joe Scarborough with Misha. And they were hosting her father Brzezinski. He was the national security advisor. And Joe Scarborough was like, “Well, Arafat left the Oslo Accord and the Palestinians left.” And then Brzezinski said, “This is like embarrassingly shallow.” It’s like, “Listen, what happened was there was a lot of catches on the Oslo Accord. It was very unfair to the Palestinians. So Arafat said, “I agree, but I need to take it to the Arab capitals.”” And they went to Sharm el-Sheikh, they came to Egypt, and he and Ehud Barak went to there. And then Ehud Barak left because there was election and he lost the Ariel Sharon game and it was destroyed. This is one of the reason why people… It’s kind of like facts don’t matter as much as what is the narrative that has been controlled.
Lex Fridman
But what were the biggest barriers to peace there? Do you think it’s, fundamentally leaders don’t want a two-state solution? Or was there nuanced small differences that, if solved, could lead to a two-state solution?
But what were the biggest barriers to peace there? Do you think it’s, fundamentally leaders don’t want a two-state solution? Or was there nuanced small differences that, if solved, could lead to a two-state solution?
Bassem Youssef
I mean, maybe there was a certain point when the Israeli leaders were more open to compromise. But I can’t say that because each time Israel gives back land, it has to be after some use of force. The 1973 war, the first and second, the casualties in Gaza, they never give up land willingly and because of peace. Because if I have that much military, I can do whatever I want, why would I give up anything? I have that much power. Why would America or China give everything if they’re so powerful? And especially if they have this kind of open check from the United States. So it is really about what can push Israel to give up something? Because you are so much stronger than me, what could compel you to give up something? And this is why the whole thing about trying to equalize Palestinians and the Israeli state and government, it doesn’t make any sense.
I mean, maybe there was a certain point when the Israeli leaders were more open to compromise. But I can’t say that because each time Israel gives back land, it has to be after some use of force. The 1973 war, the first and second, the casualties in Gaza, they never give up land willingly and because of peace. Because if I have that much military, I can do whatever I want, why would I give up anything? I have that much power. Why would America or China give everything if they’re so powerful? And especially if they have this kind of open check from the United States. So it is really about what can push Israel to give up something? Because you are so much stronger than me, what could compel you to give up something? And this is why the whole thing about trying to equalize Palestinians and the Israeli state and government, it doesn’t make any sense.
Two-state solution
Lex Fridman
So what is the source of hope? John Stewart, who will talk about it from many angles, somebody you admire, a friend, he proposed a two-state solution.
So what is the source of hope? John Stewart, who will talk about it from many angles, somebody you admire, a friend, he proposed a two-state solution.
Bassem Youssef
Of course.
Of course.
Lex Fridman
Look to the comedians for hope.
Look to the comedians for hope.
Bassem Youssef
Yes. Well, everybody’s talking about the two-state solution, but Israel has said many times, or Netanyahu and [inaudible 00:32:15], “There’s going to be no state solutions.” In the past, it’s like even Naftali Bennett, he came in on [inaudible 00:32:23] like, “Yeah, maybe in the past we wanted two-state solutions, but look, every time we give them land, they kill us. So no state solutions.” And they are openly saying it.
Yes. Well, everybody’s talking about the two-state solution, but Israel has said many times, or Netanyahu and [inaudible 00:32:15], “There’s going to be no state solutions.” In the past, it’s like even Naftali Bennett, he came in on [inaudible 00:32:23] like, “Yeah, maybe in the past we wanted two-state solutions, but look, every time we give them land, they kill us. So no state solutions.” And they are openly saying it.
Lex Fridman
But that’s, perhaps rhetoric?
But that’s, perhaps rhetoric?
Bassem Youssef
The rhetoric that is supported by action. Because look at what they’re doing in the West Bank, as you said. They are cutting it, illegal settlement, piecemealing it. So if you have an intention at all to give them anything, why do you keep doing this?
The rhetoric that is supported by action. Because look at what they’re doing in the West Bank, as you said. They are cutting it, illegal settlement, piecemealing it. So if you have an intention at all to give them anything, why do you keep doing this?
Lex Fridman
And you’ve called it, “A bunch of little Gazas.”
And you’ve called it, “A bunch of little Gazas.”
Bassem Youssef
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
It’s a nice little picture of what’s happening.
It’s a nice little picture of what’s happening.
Bassem Youssef
Piecemealing it. Because what happened in the past four months, the Palestinians have been micro-dosing on it for a very long time.
Piecemealing it. Because what happened in the past four months, the Palestinians have been micro-dosing on it for a very long time.
Bassem Youssef
The Palestinians have been micro-dosing on it for a very long time. Little by little, little by little. And we would shout every time when it gets too much and then we’ll shut down, and then little by little. But this time it was hard. It was hard to see the blatant oppression. And the world said, “Maybe the Hamas Ministry of Health are giving us the bad numbers. Maybe these are human shields.” And I laughed. There’s 13,000 babies killed. Does that mean that there are 13,000 military target hiding in their diapers? Because it doesn’t make any sense to kill that many babies it’s just like, “Oops, it’s out of our hands.”
The Palestinians have been micro-dosing on it for a very long time. Little by little, little by little. And we would shout every time when it gets too much and then we’ll shut down, and then little by little. But this time it was hard. It was hard to see the blatant oppression. And the world said, “Maybe the Hamas Ministry of Health are giving us the bad numbers. Maybe these are human shields.” And I laughed. There’s 13,000 babies killed. Does that mean that there are 13,000 military target hiding in their diapers? Because it doesn’t make any sense to kill that many babies it’s just like, “Oops, it’s out of our hands.”
Lex Fridman
It’s hard to know what to do with those numbers. Just one baby is enough.
It’s hard to know what to do with those numbers. Just one baby is enough.
Bassem Youssef
But you know what happens when you hear so many numbers? Numbers become numbers and you become so desensitized. And this is why there’s a difference between saying, “13,000 Palestinian kids dead.” It’s like, “Mila Cohen an Israeli baby, 10 month old, she was killed in her crib.” And this is what we hear from CNN. We never hear a story about the Palestinian kid. That’s why thank you for giving me the space for saying the names of the Palestinian children that were killed just in four weeks. Because humans needs context. They need depth. They need a 3D look at what they can look at. But if you just tell numbers, “Oh.” They don’t mean anything.
But you know what happens when you hear so many numbers? Numbers become numbers and you become so desensitized. And this is why there’s a difference between saying, “13,000 Palestinian kids dead.” It’s like, “Mila Cohen an Israeli baby, 10 month old, she was killed in her crib.” And this is what we hear from CNN. We never hear a story about the Palestinian kid. That’s why thank you for giving me the space for saying the names of the Palestinian children that were killed just in four weeks. Because humans needs context. They need depth. They need a 3D look at what they can look at. But if you just tell numbers, “Oh.” They don’t mean anything.
Lex Fridman
Is there some degree to where both leaderships, Hamas, PA, Palestinian Authority, Israel, all want war, like perpetual war to remain in power?
Is there some degree to where both leaderships, Hamas, PA, Palestinian Authority, Israel, all want war, like perpetual war to remain in power?
Bassem Youssef
That’s an interesting question. But let’s admit something. The Arab regimes in the area have actually used the problem of Palestine in order to stay in power, in order to take, get excuses, have this enemy. And Israel, the Israeli government has used that too. And maybe the Palestinians. But my problem with when going into discussion this is that the two sides are not equal. They’re not equal in power, they’re not equal in influence, and they’re not equal in international support, especially with the United States. People who have made changes in history were the people with power, the people who would have the ability to change things and the Palestinians cannot really change it. What can they change?
That’s an interesting question. But let’s admit something. The Arab regimes in the area have actually used the problem of Palestine in order to stay in power, in order to take, get excuses, have this enemy. And Israel, the Israeli government has used that too. And maybe the Palestinians. But my problem with when going into discussion this is that the two sides are not equal. They’re not equal in power, they’re not equal in influence, and they’re not equal in international support, especially with the United States. People who have made changes in history were the people with power, the people who would have the ability to change things and the Palestinians cannot really change it. What can they change?
Lex Fridman
Well, is that true though, with how much support the Palestinian people have? So just like you said, there’s a lot of Arab states that will voice their pro-Palestinian position in order to distract from their own corruption and abuses of power in their own countries. But I don’t think, if you look globally, there’s a complete asymmetry of power and public opinion here, maybe in the press in the West. But if you look globally…
Well, is that true though, with how much support the Palestinian people have? So just like you said, there’s a lot of Arab states that will voice their pro-Palestinian position in order to distract from their own corruption and abuses of power in their own countries. But I don’t think, if you look globally, there’s a complete asymmetry of power and public opinion here, maybe in the press in the West. But if you look globally…
Bassem Youssef
But do they have the same kind of weapons that the Israeli have?
But do they have the same kind of weapons that the Israeli have?
Lex Fridman
Literally power? No, there’s a major asymmetry of literal power.
Literally power? No, there’s a major asymmetry of literal power.
Bassem Youssef
Some money to their leaders. Does that make any difference? And also when you say Palestinian Authority, which authority are you talking about? Hamas or the Palestinian Authority who has been kind of a domesticated, kind of like a puppy for the Palestinians who basically have been an informant on their own people. And this is the thing also that kind of really pissed me off when I was hearing the thing about these things like, “Hamas, Hamas, Hamas, Hamas.” We have Netanyahu on tape confessing that he supported Hamas giving money in order to cause factions between the Palestinians. So it’s just like it doesn’t make… You just told me this. You just told me this, you just told me they didn’t have any support Hamas, but Hamas is like “What?”
Some money to their leaders. Does that make any difference? And also when you say Palestinian Authority, which authority are you talking about? Hamas or the Palestinian Authority who has been kind of a domesticated, kind of like a puppy for the Palestinians who basically have been an informant on their own people. And this is the thing also that kind of really pissed me off when I was hearing the thing about these things like, “Hamas, Hamas, Hamas, Hamas.” We have Netanyahu on tape confessing that he supported Hamas giving money in order to cause factions between the Palestinians. So it’s just like it doesn’t make… You just told me this. You just told me this, you just told me they didn’t have any support Hamas, but Hamas is like “What?”
Lex Fridman
To which degree does Netanyahu represent the Israeli people? Is a real question.
To which degree does Netanyahu represent the Israeli people? Is a real question.
Bassem Youssef
To which point does Trump or Biden represent the American people?
To which point does Trump or Biden represent the American people?
Lex Fridman
And to which degree does Hamas represent the Palestinian people?
And to which degree does Hamas represent the Palestinian people?
Bassem Youssef
None of these represent it, but who have the power in order to make the decisions? It really comes down to that.
None of these represent it, but who have the power in order to make the decisions? It really comes down to that.
Lex Fridman
Well, who does have the power? You’re giving a lot of power to Israel.
Well, who does have the power? You’re giving a lot of power to Israel.
Bassem Youssef
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
But the Arab League-
But the Arab League-
Bassem Youssef
What should Hamas do? What do you think? What should Hamas do?
What should Hamas do? What do you think? What should Hamas do?
Lex Fridman
Continue doing what the charter says which is trying to destroy Israel. And the role of the Palestinian people is to overthrow Hamas and get a more moderate leadership probably. And the role of the Israeli people is to vote out this right-wing government and elect a more moderate leader so that there’s a chance at peace with two moderate leaders.
Continue doing what the charter says which is trying to destroy Israel. And the role of the Palestinian people is to overthrow Hamas and get a more moderate leadership probably. And the role of the Israeli people is to vote out this right-wing government and elect a more moderate leader so that there’s a chance at peace with two moderate leaders.
Bassem Youssef
So before Hamas even got to control 2006 Gaza there was a real sure one in 2000, and we all know what happened, and I really sure one kind of had make the came up with this amazing policy of breaking kids’ bones in the into father. So even Barrack he was also, I mean which one is moderate I think is Hamas is a product of what happened. I mean, if there was no apartheid in South Africa, there will be no NFC. There will be no Nelson Mandela though if there was no Nazis in Paris will be no French resistance. And I’m not saying, and again, I don’t want to be put in a position to defend Hamas or anybody because you know what that entails. But those are Hamas, again, not defending them.
So before Hamas even got to control 2006 Gaza there was a real sure one in 2000, and we all know what happened, and I really sure one kind of had make the came up with this amazing policy of breaking kids’ bones in the into father. So even Barrack he was also, I mean which one is moderate I think is Hamas is a product of what happened. I mean, if there was no apartheid in South Africa, there will be no NFC. There will be no Nelson Mandela though if there was no Nazis in Paris will be no French resistance. And I’m not saying, and again, I don’t want to be put in a position to defend Hamas or anybody because you know what that entails. But those are Hamas, again, not defending them.
They went into October 7th. Why did they did that release our hostages, the people in prison? Because if you’re talk about people who are kidnapped, Israel kidnaps people every single day and when they had the first exchange in November 4th, Israel leaves 400 people. Three quarters of them were women and children. Why are those people in prison? There’s one in four kids that are in prison that stay in solitary confinement, which is by international law, a form of torture and you’re putting kids through that.
Lex Fridman
Is it possible, so first of all, ceasefire and longer term, is it possible for Arab states and the United States to get together and with power through diplomacy enforce a solution?
Is it possible, so first of all, ceasefire and longer term, is it possible for Arab states and the United States to get together and with power through diplomacy enforce a solution?
Bassem Youssef
It’s a very, very ideal solution, but you know and I know that Arab states don’t really have the power. All of the powers are in the hands of America.
It’s a very, very ideal solution, but you know and I know that Arab states don’t really have the power. All of the powers are in the hands of America.
Lex Fridman
I think they have the power. See, I think they have the power.
I think they have the power. See, I think they have the power.
Bassem Youssef
Maybe they Don’t want to use it. Maybe they don’t want to.
Maybe they Don’t want to use it. Maybe they don’t want to.
Lex Fridman
Because there is a benefit. The dark sense I have is that a lot of people win from the suffering that Palestinians are going through because they can point to that and distract from
Because there is a benefit. The dark sense I have is that a lot of people win from the suffering that Palestinians are going through because they can point to that and distract from
Bassem Youssef
Definitely
Definitely
Lex Fridman
Corruption in their own states. And then obviously Iran can benefit also from the same kind of dynamic distracting from the authoritarian nature of their regime.
Corruption in their own states. And then obviously Iran can benefit also from the same kind of dynamic distracting from the authoritarian nature of their regime.
Bassem Youssef
Definitely. But what is the core of the problem here? Is it the Arab states using the suffering or actually the suffering itself and the suffering comes from people being displaced. Their homes were taken away. There are 7 million Palestinians in diaspora, seven millions, 7 million went out there and now they’re living in Canada and America and Europe. They had homes there. They cannot go back to 1.7 million people. Of the people in Gaza don’t belong in Gaza. They were pushed from other places. The piecemeal thing of people are being in Germany, I’m going to shift gear a little bit. It’s going to be a little bit of fun. There is a book that I bought the rights to and I want to turn it into a movie, and I optioned the right for two years in March of last year, before October 7th, after October 7th, I bought the permanent, right,
Definitely. But what is the core of the problem here? Is it the Arab states using the suffering or actually the suffering itself and the suffering comes from people being displaced. Their homes were taken away. There are 7 million Palestinians in diaspora, seven millions, 7 million went out there and now they’re living in Canada and America and Europe. They had homes there. They cannot go back to 1.7 million people. Of the people in Gaza don’t belong in Gaza. They were pushed from other places. The piecemeal thing of people are being in Germany, I’m going to shift gear a little bit. It’s going to be a little bit of fun. There is a book that I bought the rights to and I want to turn it into a movie, and I optioned the right for two years in March of last year, before October 7th, after October 7th, I bought the permanent, right,
That book, it’s called the Muslim and the Jew, and it is written by an author called Ronen Steinke. I read an article about this book in 2016 and I chased that book for rights for seven years. I didn’t have that much money, but I wanted that book and that book was translated into English called Anna and Dr. Hanmi, and that book tells the incredible story under Nazi Germany where Arabs went in droves to Berlin in 1920s after the first World War in the Weimar Republic, and they became doctors and engineers and journalists for two reasons. Number one, they’re cheap, very cheap because of the inflation. And two, a lot of the Arab nationalists didn’t want to send their kids to England or France because they were the occupiers and Dr. Hanmi was the hero of that. He’s an Egyptian doctor and that’s why I personally connected with him and he went to medical school, didn’t find a place to live, so he lived in the Jewish ghetto.
Like many Arabs, he didn’t find a school to work at, a hospital to work in, so he worked in a Jewish hospital. So there was a lot of Arabs who lived with the ghetto and actually the first director of the Berlin mosque with a Jewish convert who converted to Islam, and he was a gay activist. I’m telling you, this is a crazy story, and this is not a fiction story. This is actually like a nonfiction. It’s written actually based on the statement, the documents of the Nazis and Gustavo, Dr. Hemi, he was in this hospital and the Nazis came in and they killed and tortured and beat up the Jewish doctor and they made him the head of his department. Then now he’s surrounded by Nazi doctor. They didn’t touch him because he was an Arab. There was kind of like a thing between Germany and the Arabs because they wanted to appease to them in order to have kind of a grassroots base in the Arab world where he want to go next.
And this is why 19 34, 19 35, the racial laws of Nuremberg, they had a name change. First they were called anti-Semitic. Then they changed into anti-Jewish because also Arabs were Semitic, so they wanted to appease the Arabs. Now what happened to Dr. Hanmi when that happened to him, he would go back to the ghetto and he would see the apartments next to him. The Jewish apartments become more and more and more flooded with people because they were moving Jews and pushing them and putting them together, pushing them to the side and each flat, each apartment instead of one family, it would have 3, 4, 6, 7 families. And he was there when at home and he looked, he was there.
This is where the people he grew up with, he lived with, and now he’s seeing that kind of discrimination just because he was an Arab. And then he started to kind of atone for, because he felt responsible because he wasn’t treated the same way. And he started to go and treat Jewish people in their homes because they couldn’t go to hospitals. And then one family gave them his daughter. It’s like, this is Anna. Save her. He took her pretended that she’s his niece, put a hijab around her, taught her Arabic, called her Nadia, my daughter’s name by the way.
And he hid her in plain sight for seven years in front of the Nazis as his nurse. It’s an incredible story. And then not just that, he went to prison and then he went out and he formed with the Arab people that was imprisoned with him, a network that saves 300 Jews. You see that kind of story. This is the Jews that were living in the airport. I’m not saying that the Jews living in the airport was living like an incredible life. Of course, as LA kind of minority, they did not have the full power of their full advantages of the rule. That’s normal. But we had this kind of a relationship
Before Israel was erected in 1948. And then of course, everybody looked at Jews at time as fifth column. And of course the nationalistic regimes used that. And this is why what Biden said was very dangerous when he said, if there’s no Israel, no Israel, you are the leader of the free world. You are the President of the United States. Do you mean that you are telling me that Jews in your country, in the United States of America are not safe? That is wrong on two levels. Number one, America historically and right now is more safe to Jews in the world than anybody. They’re safer than the Jews in Israel.
They never had pogroms or the Holocaust like Europe. They live here a good life, not perfect life, but they’re better. Second of all, if you are the president and you’re telling that a group of people will not feel safe unless there is a different one, you are already feeding into their fifth column. They’re like, you’re Russian. You come from there. And there is a group of laws in the Russian constitution that says that Russia will protect its citizens everywhere in the world. What happens if the president says like, oh, you’re Russians. You’re protected by your own country. Don’t belong here. This
Lex Fridman
Is terrible. Yeah, you’re right. That’s actually an indirect threat. Even saying Muslims cannot feel safe in America or something like this. That means that’s a threat.
Is terrible. Yeah, you’re right. That’s actually an indirect threat. Even saying Muslims cannot feel safe in America or something like this. That means that’s a threat.
Bassem Youssef
But what would a Jewish person in Beverly Hills or in Brooklyn feel if he hears that you are already telling people you need to be loyal to Israel? I mean, Israel is a foreign country. I am sorry, but Israel is a foreign country. Israel is a client country that we sponsor, and it should actually be responsible and held accountable for what they do.
But what would a Jewish person in Beverly Hills or in Brooklyn feel if he hears that you are already telling people you need to be loyal to Israel? I mean, Israel is a foreign country. I am sorry, but Israel is a foreign country. Israel is a client country that we sponsor, and it should actually be responsible and held accountable for what they do.
Holocaust
Lex Fridman
You mentioned 1948, the Nakba, but before that, 41, 39, 41 to 45, the Holocaust. What do you do? What do do with the Holocaust? How do you incorporate into the calculus of what’s,
You mentioned 1948, the Nakba, but before that, 41, 39, 41 to 45, the Holocaust. What do you do? What do do with the Holocaust? How do you incorporate into the calculus of what’s,
Bassem Youssef
Oh, it’s terrible
Oh, it’s terrible
Lex Fridman
Of morality. That leads up to the displacement of 700,000 Palestinians from the land. How do you work that
Of morality. That leads up to the displacement of 700,000 Palestinians from the land. How do you work that
Bassem Youssef
Out? It is terrible, but I mean the systemic annihilation of Jewish people under the Nazi, that is a carefully engineered thoughtful plan. It was terrible. It was kind of like the human ingenuity put into something that is very evil, but also it is not just that happened. We need to remember that Otto Frank, the father of Anna, Frank has his visa, refugee visa rejected by the United States. There’s a lot of people that were rejected by the United States, rejected by other European countries, and then they were pushed into Palestine.
Out? It is terrible, but I mean the systemic annihilation of Jewish people under the Nazi, that is a carefully engineered thoughtful plan. It was terrible. It was kind of like the human ingenuity put into something that is very evil, but also it is not just that happened. We need to remember that Otto Frank, the father of Anna, Frank has his visa, refugee visa rejected by the United States. There’s a lot of people that were rejected by the United States, rejected by other European countries, and then they were pushed into Palestine.
So you have to put yourself between and the Arabs, okay, we’re sitting here, okay, come and then, all right, you don’t have a home or a country anymore that kills you. I mean, you see, if I’m not an Arab and you give me that kind of piece of terrible human tragedy, like oh my God, that is terrible. But then I’m an Arab like, yes, I’m so sorry, but what do I have to do with that? Why is that my fault? The persecution of the Jewish people have started since then the eighth and ninth century because they were like they first anti-Christians, they were with criminal immigrants. They were conspirators. This is the anti people as if Europe kind of throw anti-Semitism on us. You understand that like Henry Ford, Henry Ford is one of the biggest anti, he was the inspiration for Adolf Hitler.
This is how anti-Semitic Henry Ford was. And you kind of gloss over that and then suddenly we as Arabs have to pay the price. Why?
Lex Fridman
Several questions I want to ask there, but one just zooming out, why do you think hatred of Jews has been such a viral kind of idea throughout human history? Oh,
Several questions I want to ask there, but one just zooming out, why do you think hatred of Jews has been such a viral kind of idea throughout human history? Oh,
Bassem Youssef
It’s very easy. It all started from Christ. They killed Christ. They kill Christ. They killed Christ. They’re the killer of Christ. That’s a very sexy story. And that stayed for years. That stayed for centuries. I’m sorry, centuries. They’re the killer of Christ. And then the Catholic Church did not allow usury, but they would work in usury, so they become rich. Now, the people that we hate, that we accuse them of feeling Christ are becoming rich. So that’s envy now and that’s hatred. I mean, when you talk about ghettos, ghettos were not just as secluded parts in cities. Sometimes those ghettos or outside the cities, Jews were not even allowed to work a lot of professions.
It’s very easy. It all started from Christ. They killed Christ. They kill Christ. They killed Christ. They’re the killer of Christ. That’s a very sexy story. And that stayed for years. That stayed for centuries. I’m sorry, centuries. They’re the killer of Christ. And then the Catholic Church did not allow usury, but they would work in usury, so they become rich. Now, the people that we hate, that we accuse them of feeling Christ are becoming rich. So that’s envy now and that’s hatred. I mean, when you talk about ghettos, ghettos were not just as secluded parts in cities. Sometimes those ghettos or outside the cities, Jews were not even allowed to work a lot of professions.
They were not allowed to get into the syndicates of certain professions. So they had to work usually and they got rich, so the people hated them more. The first crusade didn’t kill a single Muslim. All the killed were Jews. And when they finally arrived to Jerusalem, all the killed were Jews. They almost annihilated the Jews. So it was all this, and of course you have the dark ages. Who do you need as an enemy? The Jews. They’re the killer of Christ. There’s nothing bigger than this.
And then you fast-forward. I mean, one of the things that I found out that was very, very, very, very crazy when Henry Ford imported the protocols of the elders of Zion, by the way, in the Arab world, protocols of the elders of Zion is so popular and for the obvious years and for the people who don’t know it’s kind of a bunch of stories. And basically it’s like the Jews saying, we got to control the war and we’re going to do this and we’re going to do that and whatever. What people don’t know that that is a work of plagiarism. It was plagiarized from a satirical play called Conversation in Hell between Machiavelli and Montesquieu, and it is kind of based on one chapter or one scene or something. It’s crazy, but it’s crazy
Lex Fridman
How sticky it is. Yes, that’s weird
How sticky it is. Yes, that’s weird
Bassem Youssef
Because if I hate you, that’s great, but if I have a story to support that hate, that’s even better.
Because if I hate you, that’s great, but if I have a story to support that hate, that’s even better.
Lex Fridman
But it’s one of the best stories, one of the stickiest stories about hate. Of course, it’s probably the most effective. A lot of peoples hate other groups of peoples, but that’s just the sexiest story of them
But it’s one of the best stories, one of the stickiest stories about hate. Of course, it’s probably the most effective. A lot of peoples hate other groups of peoples, but that’s just the sexiest story of them
Bassem Youssef
All. Because humans need to concentrate their hate, their insecurities and their shortcomings into one thing that they can practice that hate on. If it’s a person, great, if it’s a group, even better.
All. Because humans need to concentrate their hate, their insecurities and their shortcomings into one thing that they can practice that hate on. If it’s a person, great, if it’s a group, even better.
Lex Fridman
How do you into this calculus incorporate That group is pretty small. There’s 16 million Jews worldwide, and you mentioned how is that the responsibility of the Arab peoples? Everybody should be to blame for not taking in Jews after the Holocaust, but the reality of the situation, if we look at the religious slice of this, there’s 16, let’s say million Jews, and there’s, I don’t know how many Muslims, but 1.8 billion. That difference, that a hundred x difference. Do you incorporate that into the sense that Jews in Israel might feel for the existential dread that this small group might be destroyed? Jews
How do you into this calculus incorporate That group is pretty small. There’s 16 million Jews worldwide, and you mentioned how is that the responsibility of the Arab peoples? Everybody should be to blame for not taking in Jews after the Holocaust, but the reality of the situation, if we look at the religious slice of this, there’s 16, let’s say million Jews, and there’s, I don’t know how many Muslims, but 1.8 billion. That difference, that a hundred x difference. Do you incorporate that into the sense that Jews in Israel might feel for the existential dread that this small group might be destroyed? Jews
Bassem Youssef
In Israel have every right to feel afraid because of everything that they see and everything they’ve been told everything. But I would say that the calculus or the numbers doesn’t, of course being small,
In Israel have every right to feel afraid because of everything that they see and everything they’ve been told everything. But I would say that the calculus or the numbers doesn’t, of course being small,
Lex Fridman
It
It
Bassem Youssef
Is of course a factor, but it is never an excuse in order to take something that’s not yours. It’s saying like, Hey, you have 300 million Americans and we have 52, 52 give one state for, there’s too many of them, too many of you just give them something. It’s like the fact that I have something and you don’t, and I have, there’s too many of me, and there is little of you. And then you come in and it’s not really Israel against the Arab word or the Muslim or because we have to say we up big time.
Is of course a factor, but it is never an excuse in order to take something that’s not yours. It’s saying like, Hey, you have 300 million Americans and we have 52, 52 give one state for, there’s too many of them, too many of you just give them something. It’s like the fact that I have something and you don’t, and I have, there’s too many of me, and there is little of you. And then you come in and it’s not really Israel against the Arab word or the Muslim or because we have to say we up big time.
But it is the Palestinians that are in and they are being subjected to that. So it’s not really like the 1.8 billion and the 16 million Jews and the 1.8 billion. If you look at them, some of them don’t care. Some of them live into regimes that being oppressed and those regimes are supported by the United States in order. It’s easier for me as an empire to take what I want from this country if I control the dictator. And I tell them that his power is linked to my desire to keep him in power. So that’s why you have a total disconnect between people in power in the Arab and the Muslim countries and the people themselves.
1948
Lex Fridman
Can you speak to the 1948, because you mentioned taking land that’s not yours, maybe parallels with Native Americans. There was a war, the Jewish minority fought that war against several Arab states and won that war. How do we incorporate that into the catalyst?
Can you speak to the 1948, because you mentioned taking land that’s not yours, maybe parallels with Native Americans. There was a war, the Jewish minority fought that war against several Arab states and won that war. How do we incorporate that into the catalyst?
Bassem Youssef
Yeah, well, that’s also a misconception, like a misinterpretation of the event because it seems that it was the small, it’s kind of like a David and Goliath kind of story. And I was always like, how did we not do that? But in reality with numbers, I can’t pull it up right now, but if you look at the numbers, the number of tanks, the planes, the trained officer, because many of those Jewish fighters came from World War Two, they were seasoned fighters and they actually had more planes, more tanks, more artillery, more pieces of weapon, more of all of other combined, because the people that really was Egypt and 1948, many of those Arab countries didn’t even have their independence. So they would kind of send a cavalry or a people in horses. But in fact, the whole idea was like we won against seven nations. The numbers totally in Israel’s favor. They were better equipped, they were better trained. They had more tanks and artillery and airplanes, and they planned better. So yes, they deserved the win because they planned and we did it. So
Yeah, well, that’s also a misconception, like a misinterpretation of the event because it seems that it was the small, it’s kind of like a David and Goliath kind of story. And I was always like, how did we not do that? But in reality with numbers, I can’t pull it up right now, but if you look at the numbers, the number of tanks, the planes, the trained officer, because many of those Jewish fighters came from World War Two, they were seasoned fighters and they actually had more planes, more tanks, more artillery, more pieces of weapon, more of all of other combined, because the people that really was Egypt and 1948, many of those Arab countries didn’t even have their independence. So they would kind of send a cavalry or a people in horses. But in fact, the whole idea was like we won against seven nations. The numbers totally in Israel’s favor. They were better equipped, they were better trained. They had more tanks and artillery and airplanes, and they planned better. So yes, they deserved the win because they planned and we did it. So
Lex Fridman
To you, there was an asymmetry of military power even then. But what do you do with the fact that the war was won? So if you look at the history of the world, there is wars fought over land.
To you, there was an asymmetry of military power even then. But what do you do with the fact that the war was won? So if you look at the history of the world, there is wars fought over land.
Bassem Youssef
I agree with you. This has been the history of humanity. Humanity was not living peacefully. It’s all about people taking people and equaling people taking their land. But there’s two difference here, mostly usually the conquering power. For example, England, they had England and they conquered you in India and after the occupation finished, they go back to England,
I agree with you. This has been the history of humanity. Humanity was not living peacefully. It’s all about people taking people and equaling people taking their land. But there’s two difference here, mostly usually the conquering power. For example, England, they had England and they conquered you in India and after the occupation finished, they go back to England,
France, Greece, Persia, Egypt. They will go in, expand and shrink, expand and shrink. It’s always been there. What is different here is exactly what happened in Australia and the United States. A group of people came in not just to conquer and take the land, but to completely change, to replace them and get them out or kill them. It was very easy with the Indians because they had smallpox. There was no social media. They did it over 400 years. They had time. The problem is what is happening right now, I agree with you. It might not be that new, but we are there and we are watching it happen.
Lex Fridman
And so now we have to confront the realities of war and empire and conquering,
And so now we have to confront the realities of war and empire and conquering,
Bassem Youssef
Because what’s the problem? We told ourselves we can be better. After 1948, there was the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It means that we are going to be better humans. We are not going to kill and take land. We’re not going to displace people. We’re not going to take people for what they’re, there’s now laws, there’s international laws, there’s International Court of Justice, and now Israel is giving the middle finger to all of them.
Because what’s the problem? We told ourselves we can be better. After 1948, there was the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It means that we are going to be better humans. We are not going to kill and take land. We’re not going to displace people. We’re not going to take people for what they’re, there’s now laws, there’s international laws, there’s International Court of Justice, and now Israel is giving the middle finger to all of them.
Lex Fridman
So isn’t in some fundamental way. This whole thing that we’re talking about is us as a civilization on social media in articles and books, in newspapers. We’re just trying to figure out who are we as a
So isn’t in some fundamental way. This whole thing that we’re talking about is us as a civilization on social media in articles and books, in newspapers. We’re just trying to figure out who are we as a
Bassem Youssef
People. I think that the shock came from the fact that we thought that we as humanity have evolved and now we are. What have actually changed is that we became more advanced in effectively eradicating a group of people because of the technology that we have and the fact that we can do that under the eyes and ears of all the world. And we are watching it under our phone. We have a window. We have a window to the war. 1945, people didn’t know what was happening in Japan. Well, we heard about it on the radio like, oh, today our forces came in and they launched. We don’t know. We heard it. Maybe we saw pictures after that and it’s quite edited. But now we see it, we’re into it, and it’s so much for our psyche and we can get it. The Arabs say like, guys, you told us we came to the West because we were told that we were equal.
People. I think that the shock came from the fact that we thought that we as humanity have evolved and now we are. What have actually changed is that we became more advanced in effectively eradicating a group of people because of the technology that we have and the fact that we can do that under the eyes and ears of all the world. And we are watching it under our phone. We have a window. We have a window to the war. 1945, people didn’t know what was happening in Japan. Well, we heard about it on the radio like, oh, today our forces came in and they launched. We don’t know. We heard it. Maybe we saw pictures after that and it’s quite edited. But now we see it, we’re into it, and it’s so much for our psyche and we can get it. The Arabs say like, guys, you told us we came to the West because we were told that we were equal.
The university declaration of right, one of the co-authors, his name is Stephane Hessel. He’s a Jew. He’s a survivor of the Holocaust. And what happened to him, he died, by the way a couple of years ago, but before he died, he was canceled by so many people and he was called anti-Semitic because he joined the BDS movement and he spoke about truth Palestine, that is the author of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that we value so much. And we think that that would define our humanity. But then we go in and we are shocked. It’s like maybe we were sold something. Maybe that was false advertisement.
Lex Fridman
You shared a tweet by an account called Awesome Jew. It reads Islamo-Nazi comedian Bassem Youssef comedian in quotes, by the way.
You shared a tweet by an account called Awesome Jew. It reads Islamo-Nazi comedian Bassem Youssef comedian in quotes, by the way.
Bassem Youssef
Yeah, yeah, of course, because I’m not funny.
Yeah, yeah, of course, because I’m not funny.
Lex Fridman
So Islamo-Nazi comedian, Bassem Youssef is now denying the October. I love that you retweeted this twice, I guess suppose because it’s advertising some upcoming dates. He’s now denying October 7th massacre. The Muslim Radical Bassem Youssef is notorious for his radical radical set twice for his radical hatred of Jews in Israel. In a recent clip, he claims that the atrocities committed on October 7th, they’re fabricated or looking for all information regarding any of his upcoming shows, as well as the venues which host the scumbag. Would Jews feel safe around this Nazi Nazi?
So Islamo-Nazi comedian, Bassem Youssef is now denying the October. I love that you retweeted this twice, I guess suppose because it’s advertising some upcoming dates. He’s now denying October 7th massacre. The Muslim Radical Bassem Youssef is notorious for his radical radical set twice for his radical hatred of Jews in Israel. In a recent clip, he claims that the atrocities committed on October 7th, they’re fabricated or looking for all information regarding any of his upcoming shows, as well as the venues which host the scumbag. Would Jews feel safe around this Nazi Nazi?
Bassem Youssef
Yeah,
Yeah,
Lex Fridman
This is my first time interviewing a Nazi
This is my first time interviewing a Nazi
Bassem Youssef
Honor. It’s my first time I actually get called a Nazi.
Honor. It’s my first time I actually get called a Nazi.
Lex Fridman
First time. First time.
First time. First time.
Bassem Youssef
I have been called so many things in Egypt. So in Egypt, I was called a CIA operative, a Mossad spy, a secret Muslim brotherhood, a secret Jew. And there was also an article that was published about me in the state-Run Media saying in details how Bassem has been recruited by CIA agents using John Stewart in order to use satire to bring down the country. I was a Freemason, an infidel, a member of the Knights of the Temple, something like that. And there’s actually people, the Muslim Brotherhood on their show, they would say like, he’s action Israeli, and they have forged and Egyptian Id for him to come here. So it’s kind of like when I said I left all of that behind and I come here, it’s like, boom, anti-Semitic, Nazi. I mean, I really covered everything. I don’t know what else. I mean, think it’s kind of like I’m collecting PhDs. I’m just getting all of these credits.
I have been called so many things in Egypt. So in Egypt, I was called a CIA operative, a Mossad spy, a secret Muslim brotherhood, a secret Jew. And there was also an article that was published about me in the state-Run Media saying in details how Bassem has been recruited by CIA agents using John Stewart in order to use satire to bring down the country. I was a Freemason, an infidel, a member of the Knights of the Temple, something like that. And there’s actually people, the Muslim Brotherhood on their show, they would say like, he’s action Israeli, and they have forged and Egyptian Id for him to come here. So it’s kind of like when I said I left all of that behind and I come here, it’s like, boom, anti-Semitic, Nazi. I mean, I really covered everything. I don’t know what else. I mean, think it’s kind of like I’m collecting PhDs. I’m just getting all of these credits.
Lex Fridman
How do you deal with that? How do you deal with the attacks? I mean, this goes back to the decision to do the interview with Piers Morgan. How do you psychologically do all of it?
How do you deal with that? How do you deal with the attacks? I mean, this goes back to the decision to do the interview with Piers Morgan. How do you psychologically do all of it?
Bassem Youssef
These kinds of attacks? At the beginning its fun, but when they evolve into something else, so for example, I was laughing of all of the stuff about calling me this, calling me that, but then when people would come and thread the theater, because it’s not the people who are making those accusations that would come to you. It’s the people that will hear and see those accusations and act on it. And there’s always the fear of, I mean, we have in the air board a lot of things that somebody would hear something about someone else and go kill him and whatever, anybody else. So there’s this, but somehow I want to make fun of it. And it is to be called an Islamo-Nazi. It must been the funniest thing ever
These kinds of attacks? At the beginning its fun, but when they evolve into something else, so for example, I was laughing of all of the stuff about calling me this, calling me that, but then when people would come and thread the theater, because it’s not the people who are making those accusations that would come to you. It’s the people that will hear and see those accusations and act on it. And there’s always the fear of, I mean, we have in the air board a lot of things that somebody would hear something about someone else and go kill him and whatever, anybody else. So there’s this, but somehow I want to make fun of it. And it is to be called an Islamo-Nazi. It must been the funniest thing ever
Speaker 1
Does Islam Nazi. Wow. How did you An radical Muslim me. A lot of Islamist’s hate me. They don’t call me a secular infidel. So it’s kind of like, who am I? Maybe I have an identity
Does Islam Nazi. Wow. How did you An radical Muslim me. A lot of Islamist’s hate me. They don’t call me a secular infidel. So it’s kind of like, who am I? Maybe I have an identity
Bassem Youssef
Crisis and I need the people to tell me who I’m,
Crisis and I need the people to tell me who I’m,
Egypt
Lex Fridman
Let’s go to the beginning. Let’s go to your childhood. You grew up in Egypt, Cairo, Egypt,
Let’s go to the beginning. Let’s go to your childhood. You grew up in Egypt, Cairo, Egypt,
Bassem Youssef
Childhood.
Childhood.
Lex Fridman
Well, let’s figure out how you came to be who you are.
Well, let’s figure out how you came to be who you are.
Bassem Youssef
How did you become an Islamo-Nazi.
How did you become an Islamo-Nazi.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, exactly. It’s a long journey. I do like the swastika tattoo on your, which I didn’t.
Yeah, exactly. It’s a long journey. I do like the swastika tattoo on your, which I didn’t.
Speaker 1
How did you see my?
How did you see my?
Lex Fridman
You know what you did. I know I did. It was very inappropriate. You’re also obviously a sexual harasser of me.
You know what you did. I know I did. It was very inappropriate. You’re also obviously a sexual harasser of me.
Speaker 1
This is
This is
Bassem Youssef
Like a me too.
Like a me too.
Lex Fridman
Yes.
Yes.
Bassem Youssef
This is like 2020. Someone will come up. It’s like, okay,
This is like 2020. Someone will come up. It’s like, okay,
Lex Fridman
We clip it. This is your me too moment. All right, Cairo, what’s, what’s a defining memory, positive or negative from your childhood?
We clip it. This is your me too moment. All right, Cairo, what’s, what’s a defining memory, positive or negative from your childhood?
Bassem Youssef
My memory in general was cool. It was cool. I went to a Catholic school for primary school, elementary, and by the time I’d done, there was kind of a start of a decline into the public education. And my parents, they’re middle-class working officials. My dad was a judge, my mom was a business professor and they were one of the people who’s like, they didn’t have that much luxury. My dad drove a regular car, a Fiat, which is the equivalent for the Lada in Russia.
My memory in general was cool. It was cool. I went to a Catholic school for primary school, elementary, and by the time I’d done, there was kind of a start of a decline into the public education. And my parents, they’re middle-class working officials. My dad was a judge, my mom was a business professor and they were one of the people who’s like, they didn’t have that much luxury. My dad drove a regular car, a Fiat, which is the equivalent for the Lada in Russia.
Lex Fridman
Thank you for speaking to the audience.
Thank you for speaking to the audience.
Bassem Youssef
Lada.
Lada.
Lex Fridman
So would that be a good car
So would that be a good car
Bassem Youssef
Or bad car? No, it’s kind of like the minimum. And my dad was not a command of showing off whatever money they would do. They would put it for us. Education, give everything to their kids. This is kind of a very, very typical mentality, and I’m sure it’s in many cultures, but we grew up with this. Everything that we have is like for kids, so they will put us into education. So.
Or bad car? No, it’s kind of like the minimum. And my dad was not a command of showing off whatever money they would do. They would put it for us. Education, give everything to their kids. This is kind of a very, very typical mentality, and I’m sure it’s in many cultures, but we grew up with this. Everything that we have is like for kids, so they will put us into education. So.
Bassem Youssef
… everything that we have is left for kids, so they will put us into education. So middle school, that was… 1986 was the beginning of the explosion of international schools, private schools. And these schools were relatively expensive. Of course now with today’s currency, it’s ridiculous, but at that time it’s very expensive. So I went to that school, and from… There was this moment, it was like you feel less right away. I mean, of course there’s the regular bullying and stuff, but it’s not that. It’s kind like you always feel less. You don’t have that much of purchasing power that can allow you to go to the same outings or travel with them. And even how you dress, it will be modest compared to them.
… everything that we have is left for kids, so they will put us into education. So middle school, that was… 1986 was the beginning of the explosion of international schools, private schools. And these schools were relatively expensive. Of course now with today’s currency, it’s ridiculous, but at that time it’s very expensive. So I went to that school, and from… There was this moment, it was like you feel less right away. I mean, of course there’s the regular bullying and stuff, but it’s not that. It’s kind like you always feel less. You don’t have that much of purchasing power that can allow you to go to the same outings or travel with them. And even how you dress, it will be modest compared to them.
So I was always an outsider, and I compensated with that by two things, being good at school and being good at sports. So I was not like the typical nerd. It was just like, I was playing football, basketball, track and field, and I was one of the… People would like to have me on their team. So I wasn’t kind of like, “Ah, he’s a nerd, get him away.” But I never had a girlfriend. I never had any kind of… I was not boyfriend material. So that kind of leaves remnants in you, that you’re not good enough.
Lex Fridman
But psychologically you were always… Like when you were by yourself, you felt like an outsider.
But psychologically you were always… Like when you were by yourself, you felt like an outsider.
Bassem Youssef
Yes, all the time. And that’s why I’m more of a loner. I don’t have a lot of what you call friends. I have acquaintances, people that I do stuff with, but I don’t have the people that I tell them everything. When I went to medical school, now medical school is a different animal. Medical school is where all of the people from the public schools go. Public schools are very… They don’t have English language as a strong part, but they are brilliant people, because they would mostly study in Arabic. But they are brilliant and they are very, very, very smart, very sharp. But then I’ll go there. Now I am the sissy boy from the private school that comes into medical school. Now I’m an outsider again, and I go into residency and I pick up salsa. So now I’m a salsa teacher while being a cardiothoracic surgery resident. And I’m an outsider for the third time because in salsa, I’m kind of like the respectful doctor. And in resident, I’m the guy who is just dancing. And everything, of course, as a medical resident, you will mess up a lot.
Yes, all the time. And that’s why I’m more of a loner. I don’t have a lot of what you call friends. I have acquaintances, people that I do stuff with, but I don’t have the people that I tell them everything. When I went to medical school, now medical school is a different animal. Medical school is where all of the people from the public schools go. Public schools are very… They don’t have English language as a strong part, but they are brilliant people, because they would mostly study in Arabic. But they are brilliant and they are very, very, very smart, very sharp. But then I’ll go there. Now I am the sissy boy from the private school that comes into medical school. Now I’m an outsider again, and I go into residency and I pick up salsa. So now I’m a salsa teacher while being a cardiothoracic surgery resident. And I’m an outsider for the third time because in salsa, I’m kind of like the respectful doctor. And in resident, I’m the guy who is just dancing. And everything, of course, as a medical resident, you will mess up a lot.
So they would always like, “Oh, because you’re a dancer. Oh, because you don’t care about medicine. You just want to go there and dance with women,” which is true. So all of my life, I felt that I’m an outsider. I’m not part of the team. I’m not part of the core group. And I have a story that you would love. Right before my residency, I was so much into salsa, so I had all of the money, and then you saved that. And I was working summers and I was doing extra jobs, and I took that money and I went to Miami in order to learn Rueda de Casino, which is the Cuban kind of circle salsa kind of thing. And I went there in the summer of 2001. My return ticket was 9/12/2001.
Lex Fridman
The universe has a sense of humor. I got to tell you that.
The universe has a sense of humor. I got to tell you that.
Bassem Youssef
9/12, I was supposed to be on a plane coming back to Egypt. What happens? Thank God I ran out of money 10 days before that. It was like, “All right,” I changed my ticket and I came back. 9/11. I’m kind of like, ah, sleeping… My mom, “Wake up, wake up!” “What? What?” And I see the two tower falling, Mom was like, “Oh, you’re here, you’re here, you’re here, thank God you’re here.” And I was like, “I could have been in Guantanamo right now.”
9/12, I was supposed to be on a plane coming back to Egypt. What happens? Thank God I ran out of money 10 days before that. It was like, “All right,” I changed my ticket and I came back. 9/11. I’m kind of like, ah, sleeping… My mom, “Wake up, wake up!” “What? What?” And I see the two tower falling, Mom was like, “Oh, you’re here, you’re here, you’re here, thank God you’re here.” And I was like, “I could have been in Guantanamo right now.”
Lex Fridman
Yeah, flying on 9/12.
Yeah, flying on 9/12.
Bassem Youssef
But by the way, I was in Miami when they went to the flying school, in Miami. So I mean, I had like 9/11 written all over my face.
But by the way, I was in Miami when they went to the flying school, in Miami. So I mean, I had like 9/11 written all over my face.
Lex Fridman
You’d be all over the news.
You’d be all over the news.
Bassem Youssef
All over… And my mom was like, “What? He went there to dance salsa. I didn’t know that salsa is like a name for terrorists.”
All over… And my mom was like, “What? He went there to dance salsa. I didn’t know that salsa is like a name for terrorists.”
Lex Fridman
Why salsa? Why did that attract you? Can you explain what salsa is? So I mentioned to you offline that I’ve been doing a little bit of tango, trying to learn it.
Why salsa? Why did that attract you? Can you explain what salsa is? So I mentioned to you offline that I’ve been doing a little bit of tango, trying to learn it.
Bassem Youssef
Yeah. Samba, salsa, bachata, merengue. It’s kind of like Latin dances and it’s like… I don’t know how you describe salsa. Couple dance and Latin beat. And I did it because I once… And I talk about that in my Arabic stand-up comedy, not the English. I talk about how I didn’t have really a great social life. And my friends went there one day, and I go into a place which it was called El Gato Negro. No, no, it was called Big Fat Black Pussycat. And then I think they thought it will be racist or something though, so to change it to El Gato Negro. Anyway, so-
Yeah. Samba, salsa, bachata, merengue. It’s kind of like Latin dances and it’s like… I don’t know how you describe salsa. Couple dance and Latin beat. And I did it because I once… And I talk about that in my Arabic stand-up comedy, not the English. I talk about how I didn’t have really a great social life. And my friends went there one day, and I go into a place which it was called El Gato Negro. No, no, it was called Big Fat Black Pussycat. And then I think they thought it will be racist or something though, so to change it to El Gato Negro. Anyway, so-
Lex Fridman
Great, great, great decision.
Great, great, great decision.
Bassem Youssef
I know. So I went there. I was like, “Damn! Music and women and I’m a doctor, a doctor dancing salsa. That is a chick magnet.”
I know. So I went there. I was like, “Damn! Music and women and I’m a doctor, a doctor dancing salsa. That is a chick magnet.”
Lex Fridman
Yeah, 100%.
Yeah, 100%.
Bassem Youssef
We do everything for that.
We do everything for that.
Lex Fridman
All of human [inaudible 01:11:32]
All of human [inaudible 01:11:32]
Bassem Youssef
Even power, even money.
Even power, even money.
Lex Fridman
All the wars we’ve been talking about.
All the wars we’ve been talking about.
Bassem Youssef
Women.
Women.
Lex Fridman
At the end of the day-
At the end of the day-
Bassem Youssef
The approval from the other sex. We are babies. We are terrible people. So of course that was great. But then, as a nerd, I went in so hard and now I became a salsa teacher. And I earned more money from salsa, more than I did as a doctor’s resident.
The approval from the other sex. We are babies. We are terrible people. So of course that was great. But then, as a nerd, I went in so hard and now I became a salsa teacher. And I earned more money from salsa, more than I did as a doctor’s resident.
Lex Fridman
I didn’t know this part of you. That’s hilarious.
I didn’t know this part of you. That’s hilarious.
Bassem Youssef
I know. I was making a killing amount of money, huge amount of money. And I would go finish my shift and I’d go to the salsa class, and sometimes I would have like 70 people in my salsa class.
I know. I was making a killing amount of money, huge amount of money. And I would go finish my shift and I’d go to the salsa class, and sometimes I would have like 70 people in my salsa class.
Lex Fridman
Oh wow.
Oh wow.
Bassem Youssef
I had the biggest salsa class in Egypt, at the beginning of the 2000. And it was fantastic. And it was an outlet because you go there and there’s the shifts and people dying. Damn. And then you go salsa.
I had the biggest salsa class in Egypt, at the beginning of the 2000. And it was fantastic. And it was an outlet because you go there and there’s the shifts and people dying. Damn. And then you go salsa.
Lex Fridman
An escape. You must’ve been good.
An escape. You must’ve been good.
Bassem Youssef
I was okay. I was cool. I was fun. There were people better than me, but I have a thing about teaching. I like teaching people.
I was okay. I was cool. I was fun. There were people better than me, but I have a thing about teaching. I like teaching people.
Lex Fridman
So you mentioned heart surgery. So what motivated you to become a doctor?
So you mentioned heart surgery. So what motivated you to become a doctor?
Bassem Youssef
It was a choice of exclusion. I mean, there’s nothing else you can do with these high grades other than doctor and engineering. I hate math, so go be a doctor. This is the Middle East. What do you expect? It’s either… In my joke in my show, I said you can be one of three things in the Middle East, a doctor, an engineer, or a disappointment. That is the choices that you have. So years after, I’m a disappointment.
It was a choice of exclusion. I mean, there’s nothing else you can do with these high grades other than doctor and engineering. I hate math, so go be a doctor. This is the Middle East. What do you expect? It’s either… In my joke in my show, I said you can be one of three things in the Middle East, a doctor, an engineer, or a disappointment. That is the choices that you have. So years after, I’m a disappointment.
Lex Fridman
You’re damn good at it though. That’s a hard path, though. And it’s a fascinating one for-
You’re damn good at it though. That’s a hard path, though. And it’s a fascinating one for-
Bassem Youssef
Can I tell you something?
Can I tell you something?
Lex Fridman
Yes.
Yes.
Bassem Youssef
That actually I was thinking about why did I actually go into medicine and why did I always choose the hardest thing, although I didn’t love it? And I have to tell you, I had an epiphany only two weeks ago, and I don’t know if that’s actually related or not. Remember when I told you I went to this school, and I didn’t have that much money and I didn’t have the luxury of time or money to be with those people and do what they do? So by the time I finished school and everybody was going to university, everybody in my school went to the AUC, the American University in Cairo. Of course, private American education, party time.
That actually I was thinking about why did I actually go into medicine and why did I always choose the hardest thing, although I didn’t love it? And I have to tell you, I had an epiphany only two weeks ago, and I don’t know if that’s actually related or not. Remember when I told you I went to this school, and I didn’t have that much money and I didn’t have the luxury of time or money to be with those people and do what they do? So by the time I finished school and everybody was going to university, everybody in my school went to the AUC, the American University in Cairo. Of course, private American education, party time.
I mean, of course they’re brilliant and everything, but they have a different social life. And part of me now, I realize that just very, very recently, maybe I went to the hardest school ever so I don’t have space to use other than studying. Because if I have that much space, what I’m going to do with it? I don’t have that much freedom. I don’t have that much money. I can’t compete with those people going out, so maybe I need a solid excuse that I’m in a place where I don’t have that much of a spare time.
Lex Fridman
Is it also possible… I like how this is a therapy session where we’re psychoanalyzing you. Is it also possible that you always just pick the hardest thing you could possibly do?
Is it also possible… I like how this is a therapy session where we’re psychoanalyzing you. Is it also possible that you always just pick the hardest thing you could possibly do?
Bassem Youssef
Maybe, but-
Maybe, but-
Lex Fridman
Maybe that’s the Piers Morgan thing too.
Maybe that’s the Piers Morgan thing too.
Bassem Youssef
Maybe. But when I left Egypt and I came here, I still had the choice to go back to medicine. But I hated it. Medicine traumatized me. The amount of… You give up… My brother in Egypt, he had a daughter. She’s a brilliant basketball player. She’s in the national team. Amazing. I used to play basketball also in the Egyptian League, but I never was… Kind of my favorite position in the court was the bench, and I was not as good as her. And then it was time for her to go into college, and he didn’t talk to me for six weeks. I said, “Tamer, what’s happening to Farida? Which college?” Like, “I didn’t want to tell you. She went into medicine.” I said, “What? Medicine? Why did he do?” Because he knows how I hated it. I was traumatized. And I said, “Dude, she’s a basketball player. Make her go to an easy school.” Said, “Nah…” So that’s kind of why-
Maybe. But when I left Egypt and I came here, I still had the choice to go back to medicine. But I hated it. Medicine traumatized me. The amount of… You give up… My brother in Egypt, he had a daughter. She’s a brilliant basketball player. She’s in the national team. Amazing. I used to play basketball also in the Egyptian League, but I never was… Kind of my favorite position in the court was the bench, and I was not as good as her. And then it was time for her to go into college, and he didn’t talk to me for six weeks. I said, “Tamer, what’s happening to Farida? Which college?” Like, “I didn’t want to tell you. She went into medicine.” I said, “What? Medicine? Why did he do?” Because he knows how I hated it. I was traumatized. And I said, “Dude, she’s a basketball player. Make her go to an easy school.” Said, “Nah…” So that’s kind of why-
Lex Fridman
You still did it. You still did it.
You still did it. You still did it.
Bassem Youssef
I still did it, but I don’t know, is it because of the difficulty or because of what I told you? Maybe I needed something. Maybe because I was not very confident in my social life, so I needed a distraction not to have that much of a social life.
I still did it, but I don’t know, is it because of the difficulty or because of what I told you? Maybe I needed something. Maybe because I was not very confident in my social life, so I needed a distraction not to have that much of a social life.
Lex Fridman
Oh wow, okay.
Oh wow, okay.
Bassem Youssef
You understand?
You understand?
Lex Fridman
I see. Yeah.
I see. Yeah.
Bassem Youssef
It’s kind of… Because I will always have an excuse. I’m studying, I have something, I have exams. And I don’t know, I kind of self-sabotaged my own thing because I couldn’t compete with those people on the outing and the money and whatever, so I need an excuse to be… Like, “Oh, he’s a doctor. He’s studying.”
It’s kind of… Because I will always have an excuse. I’m studying, I have something, I have exams. And I don’t know, I kind of self-sabotaged my own thing because I couldn’t compete with those people on the outing and the money and whatever, so I need an excuse to be… Like, “Oh, he’s a doctor. He’s studying.”
Lex Fridman
At least in your own mind, you couldn’t compete.
At least in your own mind, you couldn’t compete.
Bassem Youssef
Yeah, I always felt as less because, I mean, I didn’t have any girlfriends in school. I had very late in life, everything to me came to life, so I always felt… Even stand-up comedy, it came very late to me in life, so I always feel that I’m not good enough. I feel that I didn’t spend the time to fill the foundation that other comedians do, so I always feel that I am too lucky. I always feel that this is a fleeting thing. And when I had the height and the fall, the fall of… In Egypt, when I would like the top of everything, I was so famous, and then everything was taken away from me. That’s like, “Ah. You see? I told you. That happens when you don’t build foundation, you fall.” So I always feel that I am not good enough, or if I am in a position where people think I am, deep inside I’m not. You know that I have a speech impediment, that I was not meant to be a TV presenter? In Arabic, it’s very obvious. I cannot roll my Rs.
Yeah, I always felt as less because, I mean, I didn’t have any girlfriends in school. I had very late in life, everything to me came to life, so I always felt… Even stand-up comedy, it came very late to me in life, so I always feel that I’m not good enough. I feel that I didn’t spend the time to fill the foundation that other comedians do, so I always feel that I am too lucky. I always feel that this is a fleeting thing. And when I had the height and the fall, the fall of… In Egypt, when I would like the top of everything, I was so famous, and then everything was taken away from me. That’s like, “Ah. You see? I told you. That happens when you don’t build foundation, you fall.” So I always feel that I am not good enough, or if I am in a position where people think I am, deep inside I’m not. You know that I have a speech impediment, that I was not meant to be a TV presenter? In Arabic, it’s very obvious. I cannot roll my Rs.
I cannot say “rrr.” I cannot roll it. So in Arabic, like Spanish, it’s very obvious. So when I did my first video on the internet, that made me famous. And then I got my television deal back there in Egypt. My partner at the time, he took the video and he went to a producer, and said like, “Are you giving me a guy with a lisp?” That’s why when I came on television, I was the first ever guy with a lisp. I had two things going for me, the lisp and the big nose. And I was always bullied for these two all the time, so I always felt less.
Lex Fridman
See, but that’s a foundation of creating a great person.
See, but that’s a foundation of creating a great person.
Bassem Youssef
Yeah. Because if you’re pretty, you don’t need to do much.
Yeah. Because if you’re pretty, you don’t need to do much.
Lex Fridman
I probably wouldn’t recommend it, but it is true that-
I probably wouldn’t recommend it, but it is true that-
Bassem Youssef
So if you are pretty, do some disfigurement that you’re-
So if you are pretty, do some disfigurement that you’re-
Jon Stewart
Lex Fridman
Find the flaws and be extremely self-critical about them. So you saw Jon Stewart on TV for the first time in 2003, I believe. How did that change your life?
Find the flaws and be extremely self-critical about them. So you saw Jon Stewart on TV for the first time in 2003, I believe. How did that change your life?
Bassem Youssef
I was in a gym and I was running on the treadmill. And at that time, CNN was coming up on cable. And I was watching, and there is this studio, I don’t know what it is. So I put the earphones on and I started watching. And I was so taken by this that I stopped the treadmill and I just stood for the 20 minutes like this on the treadmill, just like standing there. I didn’t know what he was saying, I didn’t understand what is Democrats, what is Republicans? Those names that he’s saying… What is Fox News? I don’t understand. But I was fascinated. There was something… You know when you don’t understand the music, but you get the rhythm? It was that.
I was in a gym and I was running on the treadmill. And at that time, CNN was coming up on cable. And I was watching, and there is this studio, I don’t know what it is. So I put the earphones on and I started watching. And I was so taken by this that I stopped the treadmill and I just stood for the 20 minutes like this on the treadmill, just like standing there. I didn’t know what he was saying, I didn’t understand what is Democrats, what is Republicans? Those names that he’s saying… What is Fox News? I don’t understand. But I was fascinated. There was something… You know when you don’t understand the music, but you get the rhythm? It was that.
Lex Fridman
I wonder what that is that you saw. It’s like the timing of the humor. I mean, Jon Stewart is one of a kind. His biting criticism of power, I would say. And also ability to highlight the absurdity of it all.
I wonder what that is that you saw. It’s like the timing of the humor. I mean, Jon Stewart is one of a kind. His biting criticism of power, I would say. And also ability to highlight the absurdity of it all.
Bassem Youssef
But you understand, I didn’t understand any of that. I didn’t understand any of the references. But it is the rhythm. You know sometimes when you even see a comedy that’s the language you don’t understand, but there’s a rhythm? Da da da, da da da, boom boom. There’s something, there’s something in the music. So there’s something with the videos and the pictures and he and the face and people reacting. What is this? What is this? What is this? And we had the global edition. So I went to the YouTube and I just started to kind of watch every single episode that I can. I said, “Do you think we can have this in Egypt?” I said, “Ah, never.” And then 2011, I had a friend of mine who was also a YouTube partner, it was something new at the time, he said, “Let’s do something on internet. Let’s do something…” I said, “I want to do Jon Stewart.” It’s like, “Nah, do Ray William Johnson, Jon Stewart will not work.” It’s like, “Nah! I want to do Jon Stewart.”
But you understand, I didn’t understand any of that. I didn’t understand any of the references. But it is the rhythm. You know sometimes when you even see a comedy that’s the language you don’t understand, but there’s a rhythm? Da da da, da da da, boom boom. There’s something, there’s something in the music. So there’s something with the videos and the pictures and he and the face and people reacting. What is this? What is this? What is this? And we had the global edition. So I went to the YouTube and I just started to kind of watch every single episode that I can. I said, “Do you think we can have this in Egypt?” I said, “Ah, never.” And then 2011, I had a friend of mine who was also a YouTube partner, it was something new at the time, he said, “Let’s do something on internet. Let’s do something…” I said, “I want to do Jon Stewart.” It’s like, “Nah, do Ray William Johnson, Jon Stewart will not work.” It’s like, “Nah! I want to do Jon Stewart.”
Lex Fridman
So that was in there.
So that was in there.
Bassem Youssef
Yeah, it was in there. And I did it. And it worked.
Yeah, it was in there. And I did it. And it worked.
Going viral during the Arab Spring
Lex Fridman
Can you talk about 2011? I mean, the Arab Spring, what is it? People here in America-
Can you talk about 2011? I mean, the Arab Spring, what is it? People here in America-
Bassem Youssef
It depends on which side-
It depends on which side-
Lex Fridman
Did something happen or what?
Did something happen or what?
Bassem Youssef
Depends which side of the equation you are. Because for a lot of people it’s a conspiracy. It’s American made. It is the Muslim Brotherhood, it’s the Islamists, it is Israel, it’s everything else other than people. But it’s a pure revolution. It’s a pure… I think we put too much weight on conspiracies. I think it is normal human behavior that then get maybe used or abused or taken advantage of by other powers, and then the conspiracy starts.
Depends which side of the equation you are. Because for a lot of people it’s a conspiracy. It’s American made. It is the Muslim Brotherhood, it’s the Islamists, it is Israel, it’s everything else other than people. But it’s a pure revolution. It’s a pure… I think we put too much weight on conspiracies. I think it is normal human behavior that then get maybe used or abused or taken advantage of by other powers, and then the conspiracy starts.
But at the time, the Arab Spring didn’t start in Egypt. It started in Tunisia. Bouazizi, a fruit vendor, burned himself up like the American soldiers who did that a few days ago. And that kind of sparked protests in Tunisia. And Ben Ali was a dictator in Tunisia for about 20 years, and they removed him. So suddenly it was kind of like a domino effect. And then Egypt started and it just took 18 days. And people, hindsight is 20/20. Same said just Mubarak became a burden on the military because the military are the real rulers of the country. You might have a president that kind of have certain powers, but at the end of the day, when the military sees that a certain president is too much of a burden, too much of a… So they cut him off.
Lex Fridman
And Mubarak is the leader of Egypt at the time.
And Mubarak is the leader of Egypt at the time.
Bassem Youssef
At that time. He was there for 30 years.
At that time. He was there for 30 years.
Lex Fridman
30 years. By the way, speaking of which, because it was a joke in your Mark Twain speech. I got teary-eyed just watching that. That was just great. You’re fucking great, what you did with Mark Twain Awards for Jon Stewart. It’s great. I mean, your comedy is great in general, and I wanted to go to your show. I definitely will. But that’s like a little stroll and a complete tangent of just a masterful introduction and celebration of Jon Stewart. Anyway, Mubarak. 30 years.
30 years. By the way, speaking of which, because it was a joke in your Mark Twain speech. I got teary-eyed just watching that. That was just great. You’re fucking great, what you did with Mark Twain Awards for Jon Stewart. It’s great. I mean, your comedy is great in general, and I wanted to go to your show. I definitely will. But that’s like a little stroll and a complete tangent of just a masterful introduction and celebration of Jon Stewart. Anyway, Mubarak. 30 years.
Bassem Youssef
And it’s a joke that I say also, Mubarak was a president for 30 years. Like, “Oh my God, you had a president for 30 years?” It’s the Middle East. It’s a very short first term. It’s like we’re still warming up, baby.
And it’s a joke that I say also, Mubarak was a president for 30 years. Like, “Oh my God, you had a president for 30 years?” It’s the Middle East. It’s a very short first term. It’s like we’re still warming up, baby.
Lex Fridman
Just warming up.
Just warming up.
Bassem Youssef
And I told them, we need to plan ahead. We need to plan our vacations, our careers, our jail time. It’s just like we need to-
And I told them, we need to plan ahead. We need to plan our vacations, our careers, our jail time. It’s just like we need to-
Lex Fridman
That’s great. It’s true.
That’s great. It’s true.
Bassem Youssef
So we had kind of the shortest, nicest revolution, 18 days. And we thought, “Oh, 18 days, we can change the country in 18 days.” But of course we were naive and we had this kind of hope. So Mubarak was removed. There was an interim period by the military, took it for one year, then they did elections. Muslim Brotherhood came to power. They stayed for one year, and then the military removed them. And in these three years, my show started, it started by kind of a YouTube video.
So we had kind of the shortest, nicest revolution, 18 days. And we thought, “Oh, 18 days, we can change the country in 18 days.” But of course we were naive and we had this kind of hope. So Mubarak was removed. There was an interim period by the military, took it for one year, then they did elections. Muslim Brotherhood came to power. They stayed for one year, and then the military removed them. And in these three years, my show started, it started by kind of a YouTube video.
Lex Fridman
It became famous overnight.
It became famous overnight.
Bassem Youssef
Overnight, five to six videos, boom, went out. And at that time I was waiting to get my clearance to go to Cleveland. I was accepted in a fellowship as a pediatric heart surgery in a hospital in Cleveland. And I said, ” All right, I’m just going to do a couple of videos. Maybe I’m going to put it in internet, and maybe after a year or two, after I come back from the fellowship, somebody will come, ‘Hey, why don’t you write a show that looks like John Stewart?'” That was my mind. It took five weeks. I had my first contract of television, and overnight, the exposure. And over the next two, three years, I had 30 to 40 million people watch. 30 to 40 million people watching every episode. A lot of this like, “Wow, that’s too much.” That is terrifying because it means that there are 30 million people who have an opinion about you.
Overnight, five to six videos, boom, went out. And at that time I was waiting to get my clearance to go to Cleveland. I was accepted in a fellowship as a pediatric heart surgery in a hospital in Cleveland. And I said, ” All right, I’m just going to do a couple of videos. Maybe I’m going to put it in internet, and maybe after a year or two, after I come back from the fellowship, somebody will come, ‘Hey, why don’t you write a show that looks like John Stewart?'” That was my mind. It took five weeks. I had my first contract of television, and overnight, the exposure. And over the next two, three years, I had 30 to 40 million people watch. 30 to 40 million people watching every episode. A lot of this like, “Wow, that’s too much.” That is terrifying because it means that there are 30 million people who have an opinion about you.
Lex Fridman
You said there’s a lot of aspects of that sudden fame that were just horrible.
You said there’s a lot of aspects of that sudden fame that were just horrible.
Bassem Youssef
It’s toxic. It’s unnatural. When people started to recognize me in the street and take pictures, I was awkward. It’s like, “Why do you want to have a picture of me? Why? Is it…” Because I didn’t feel that I’m worthy enough to be a reward for someone to have a picture. And I didn’t understand it. I was kind of an ass sometimes because… People thought it was arrogance. No, it was confusion. And I remember my director and my producers and people, they always saw me in a very bad mood. It’s like, “Why are you not enjoying this?” It’s like, “Because this is not natural. This is not natural, this adoration, this love, and this have to end somehow.” And it did. Because at a certain point you are a human, and people, kind of the adoration and the fun and the love comes because they see you saying stuff… because you do your job, basically.
It’s toxic. It’s unnatural. When people started to recognize me in the street and take pictures, I was awkward. It’s like, “Why do you want to have a picture of me? Why? Is it…” Because I didn’t feel that I’m worthy enough to be a reward for someone to have a picture. And I didn’t understand it. I was kind of an ass sometimes because… People thought it was arrogance. No, it was confusion. And I remember my director and my producers and people, they always saw me in a very bad mood. It’s like, “Why are you not enjoying this?” It’s like, “Because this is not natural. This is not natural, this adoration, this love, and this have to end somehow.” And it did. Because at a certain point you are a human, and people, kind of the adoration and the fun and the love comes because they see you saying stuff… because you do your job, basically.
Political satire is basically us making fun of politicians in the media. And a lot of people have really strong opinions about politicians in the media. So we came that, we articulate that, and we give it to them and we make them laugh. So for them, we made a great job. So why don’t you do more? But you are limited. And at a certain time, you can’t. And at a certain time you’re afraid because we’re humans, because you’re afraid about if I continue speaking up… not something will happen to me. I’m kind of like maybe have some protection because people see me, but what the people around you? And I’ve seen that. So that’s why at a certain point, that’s it.
Lex Fridman
I mean, there’s a lot of things to say there, but one of the difficult things of fame in your situation is you’re not just having fun. You’re criticizing power.
I mean, there’s a lot of things to say there, but one of the difficult things of fame in your situation is you’re not just having fun. You’re criticizing power.
Bassem Youssef
Yeah. And it is loved by the people, but it comes with a price. Because at a certain… If the power is too strong and you are not into a situation or a system that allows that, that gives you that kind of safety-
Yeah. And it is loved by the people, but it comes with a price. Because at a certain… If the power is too strong and you are not into a situation or a system that allows that, that gives you that kind of safety-
Lex Fridman
So what happened?
So what happened?
Bassem Youssef
What happened? So the height of my fame was when the Muslim Brotherhood was in power. And at that time they had their media, and I had one show. I had one hour per week, and they had five channels, 24/7. And they were like… Jon Stewart said it beautifully once. It’s like, “We say shit and you say shit, and we just say shit better than you.” This is exactly what Jon Stewart was like. “We’re just better at saying shit back at you.” So basically I had one hour and they had the five thing that they were like… They’re calling me all kinds of names, not just me, all their enemies. And then I just had one hour and I would kind of annihilate them in one hour a week. So at a certain point they would even kind of side with the army against the liberal seculars, whatever you call it. And at a certain point, the army kind of flipped everybody.
What happened? So the height of my fame was when the Muslim Brotherhood was in power. And at that time they had their media, and I had one show. I had one hour per week, and they had five channels, 24/7. And they were like… Jon Stewart said it beautifully once. It’s like, “We say shit and you say shit, and we just say shit better than you.” This is exactly what Jon Stewart was like. “We’re just better at saying shit back at you.” So basically I had one hour and they had the five thing that they were like… They’re calling me all kinds of names, not just me, all their enemies. And then I just had one hour and I would kind of annihilate them in one hour a week. So at a certain point they would even kind of side with the army against the liberal seculars, whatever you call it. And at a certain point, the army kind of flipped everybody.
Lex Fridman
What do you mean flipped?
What do you mean flipped?
Bassem Youssef
Yeah, they removed the Muslim Brotherhood. They came to power. And I have to say, I admit it, I supported that in the beginning because I had daily threats. I was actually interrogated and arrested under the Muslim Brotherhood. I was in an interrogation for six hours, and they were asking me all my jokes. And I used that in my standup comedy describing exactly what happened in the six hours. And it is so funny.
Yeah, they removed the Muslim Brotherhood. They came to power. And I have to say, I admit it, I supported that in the beginning because I had daily threats. I was actually interrogated and arrested under the Muslim Brotherhood. I was in an interrogation for six hours, and they were asking me all my jokes. And I used that in my standup comedy describing exactly what happened in the six hours. And it is so funny.
Lex Fridman
Okay, well, it’s hilarious. But what… Slow down. You were interrogated by the Muslim Brotherhood?
Okay, well, it’s hilarious. But what… Slow down. You were interrogated by the Muslim Brotherhood?
Bassem Youssef
The general prosecutor. The general prosecutor. And it was basically because of complaints by the officials in the government. Because in order the general prosecutor to do it, it has to have a high up mandate to bring that person to questioning.
The general prosecutor. The general prosecutor. And it was basically because of complaints by the officials in the government. Because in order the general prosecutor to do it, it has to have a high up mandate to bring that person to questioning.
Lex Fridman
So they went through kind of official channels.
So they went through kind of official channels.
Bassem Youssef
Oh yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Oh yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Lex Fridman
So it’s all-
So it’s all-
Bassem Youssef
Yeah, it was official. It was legal.
Yeah, it was official. It was legal.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Very legal.
Yeah. Very legal.
Bassem Youssef
So I went there, and I asked… And it’s kind of like a bunch of insulting Islam, insulting president, spreading false rumors. And I went there, and it was funny because I go into the building where there’s police officers and there’s judges, and all of them are big fans of the show. And some of them were taking pictures of me. And then I’m sitting there, and it was the most ridiculous interview ever because he was asking me about my jokes. It’s like, “What did you mean by this joke?” And it’s like, “Nothing.” And it was there for six hours.
So I went there, and I asked… And it’s kind of like a bunch of insulting Islam, insulting president, spreading false rumors. And I went there, and it was funny because I go into the building where there’s police officers and there’s judges, and all of them are big fans of the show. And some of them were taking pictures of me. And then I’m sitting there, and it was the most ridiculous interview ever because he was asking me about my jokes. It’s like, “What did you mean by this joke?” And it’s like, “Nothing.” And it was there for six hours.
Lex Fridman
He’s just reading your jokes back to you.
He’s just reading your jokes back to you.
Bassem Youssef
He was reading my joke, and he’s reading the jokes and the junior judge is sitting there cracking up. It’s like, “I remember that.” It’s like, “Guys, guys.”
He was reading my joke, and he’s reading the jokes and the junior judge is sitting there cracking up. It’s like, “I remember that.” It’s like, “Guys, guys.”
Lex Fridman
That’s dark.
That’s dark.
Bassem Youssef
It’s kind of like… And I’m laughing, but in the same time it’s like the whole situation is ridiculous. But then at the end, I was released on bail. So I went back to my show, and I make fun of that. And you have to be honest, the Muslim Brotherhood were in power, but Egypt was right out of the revolution, for there was kind of an equal spread of power between the people. There was not someone who would come in and just… The Muslim Brotherhood didn’t have that power yet, but people saw that they were moving towards that. And then the tension rose, and then there was a kind of a confrontation between them and the army. And then a lot of people were killed in the street. It was terrible massacre. And then suddenly, I am blamed for all of that. It’s like, “You made fun of us, so now it made it easier for people to kill us.” Like, “Dude, come on. You’re doing that to me too. I just did it better than you. And the fact that you sided with the same people that flipped against you, that’s not my fault.”
It’s kind of like… And I’m laughing, but in the same time it’s like the whole situation is ridiculous. But then at the end, I was released on bail. So I went back to my show, and I make fun of that. And you have to be honest, the Muslim Brotherhood were in power, but Egypt was right out of the revolution, for there was kind of an equal spread of power between the people. There was not someone who would come in and just… The Muslim Brotherhood didn’t have that power yet, but people saw that they were moving towards that. And then the tension rose, and then there was a kind of a confrontation between them and the army. And then a lot of people were killed in the street. It was terrible massacre. And then suddenly, I am blamed for all of that. It’s like, “You made fun of us, so now it made it easier for people to kill us.” Like, “Dude, come on. You’re doing that to me too. I just did it better than you. And the fact that you sided with the same people that flipped against you, that’s not my fault.”
Lex Fridman
Did you criticize the army at all?
Did you criticize the army at all?
Bassem Youssef
Yeah. So after that show, I did one episode against the army and I was canceled the next day. And then I went to another channel, did 16 episodes in a different season, and I was walking on eggshells. And then that was canceled again. And then the production company that was doing my show, that we severed ties, because we didn’t have the show, they had their offices raided, they have people having death threats. So I woke up one day, 11th of November 2014, and my lawyer said, “Leave the country right now. There is this legal case that they… They’re coming for you.” But they said, “You cannot…” It was an arbitration case, and I lost against the channel that basically canceled me. And I told them, “But there’s no jail time in arbitration.” It’s like, “Yeah, tell that to the judge. Just leave.” So I jumped on a plane. The verdict was 12:00 noon, 11 November. 5:00 afternoon I was on a plane, left Egypt, and I never came back since then.
Yeah. So after that show, I did one episode against the army and I was canceled the next day. And then I went to another channel, did 16 episodes in a different season, and I was walking on eggshells. And then that was canceled again. And then the production company that was doing my show, that we severed ties, because we didn’t have the show, they had their offices raided, they have people having death threats. So I woke up one day, 11th of November 2014, and my lawyer said, “Leave the country right now. There is this legal case that they… They’re coming for you.” But they said, “You cannot…” It was an arbitration case, and I lost against the channel that basically canceled me. And I told them, “But there’s no jail time in arbitration.” It’s like, “Yeah, tell that to the judge. Just leave.” So I jumped on a plane. The verdict was 12:00 noon, 11 November. 5:00 afternoon I was on a plane, left Egypt, and I never came back since then.
Lex Fridman
Was there a worry of non-legal things like assassination?
Was there a worry of non-legal things like assassination?
Bassem Youssef
I can tell you something, I was so stressed because of the show and because of everything, sometimes I would wake up in the morning and I hope that a bullet will come and finish everything because I was so stressed. It’s like, “I would love…” Because I’m too much of a chicken to kill myself, so I would rather have someone else do it for me. So I was under so much pressure. And I remember the day that my show was canceled indefinitely, the second time, under the army. And I was like, “Ah. I don’t have to worry about what kind of script I have to write next week.” Because remember when you asked me about that tweet? About all those… Those accusation doesn’t bother me. Infidel, spy, secret Jew, Zionist, Islamonazi. That’s bullshit. What really leaves a mark is the criticism to your craft and your work. So, “You’re not funny,” goes deeper.
I can tell you something, I was so stressed because of the show and because of everything, sometimes I would wake up in the morning and I hope that a bullet will come and finish everything because I was so stressed. It’s like, “I would love…” Because I’m too much of a chicken to kill myself, so I would rather have someone else do it for me. So I was under so much pressure. And I remember the day that my show was canceled indefinitely, the second time, under the army. And I was like, “Ah. I don’t have to worry about what kind of script I have to write next week.” Because remember when you asked me about that tweet? About all those… Those accusation doesn’t bother me. Infidel, spy, secret Jew, Zionist, Islamonazi. That’s bullshit. What really leaves a mark is the criticism to your craft and your work. So, “You’re not funny,” goes deeper.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, certain things get to you better than others, especially if you have a secret suspicion that you are maybe not funny.
Yeah, certain things get to you better than others, especially if you have a secret suspicion that you are maybe not funny.
Bassem Youssef
Maybe I’m not, because I was put into that, it’s like, because that touched your insecurities. Like, “I know, but you shouldn’t say it out loud.”
Maybe I’m not, because I was put into that, it’s like, because that touched your insecurities. Like, “I know, but you shouldn’t say it out loud.”
Lex Fridman
You shouldn’t say the truth out loud.
You shouldn’t say the truth out loud.
Bassem Youssef
You shouldn’t say it out loud [inaudible 01:32:42]
You shouldn’t say it out loud [inaudible 01:32:42]
Lex Fridman
But what about the weight of the responsibility of speaking truth to power, walking on eggshells, what did that feel like?
But what about the weight of the responsibility of speaking truth to power, walking on eggshells, what did that feel like?
Bassem Youssef
Well, after the Muslim Brotherhood were removed… You have to understand, when the military coup happened, it was a very popular coup. People loved the army. In Egypt, the army is more sacred than the religion. People love the army. Popular army can go no wrong. So me going against the army was… I mean, the Muslim Brotherhood was not very popular. They were popular for their own basis, but people accepted the fact that we make fun of them. But Sisi, at that time, he was a God. And I used to go to this high class club called Gezira Club, and this is basically kind of the upper middle class, upper class kind of people. And during that year of the Muslim Brotherhood, I was the most popular ever. People come, “Yay!” When the military came in, people were walking to me, pointing their fingers like, “Don’t speak about Sisi, don’t speak about the army. We love you now, but don’t you…”
Well, after the Muslim Brotherhood were removed… You have to understand, when the military coup happened, it was a very popular coup. People loved the army. In Egypt, the army is more sacred than the religion. People love the army. Popular army can go no wrong. So me going against the army was… I mean, the Muslim Brotherhood was not very popular. They were popular for their own basis, but people accepted the fact that we make fun of them. But Sisi, at that time, he was a God. And I used to go to this high class club called Gezira Club, and this is basically kind of the upper middle class, upper class kind of people. And during that year of the Muslim Brotherhood, I was the most popular ever. People come, “Yay!” When the military came in, people were walking to me, pointing their fingers like, “Don’t speak about Sisi, don’t speak about the army. We love you now, but don’t you…”
They were like that. So I called Jon Stewart, I was like, “I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what to do.” And at that time, all of the channels were closed down, all of… I was the only one left because it was difficult for them to get rid of me very quickly because I was too popular. It was kind of like piecemealing kind of like… And I remember I told him, “I don’t know what to do.” He said, “You don’t have to do anything, just, your safety comes first.” And said, “But I can’t. I mean, I’ve been doing that for two years and I cannot just say, ‘Bye-bye guys.’ I have a responsibility. I have a team, I have people working for me. And also, I cannot just disappear.” And he said the most interesting thing ever. And say, “If you’re afraid of something, make fun about the fact that you’re afraid of it, instead of talking about that something.”
Lex Fridman
Brilliant.
Brilliant.
Bassem Youssef
So there was a whole episode that we did not even mention Sisi. We did not even mention it, but the videos did all the thing. And the whole episode was me trying to avoid talking about him. And that’s how the comedy was created, the fact that I don’t want to be here. And so he said, “You’ll be surprised how people can relate to that,” because there was a lot of kind of like, “Oh, we love him, but we feel we cannot speak.” So just by doing the simple thing about mirroring the society, that goes a long way.
So there was a whole episode that we did not even mention Sisi. We did not even mention it, but the videos did all the thing. And the whole episode was me trying to avoid talking about him. And that’s how the comedy was created, the fact that I don’t want to be here. And so he said, “You’ll be surprised how people can relate to that,” because there was a lot of kind of like, “Oh, we love him, but we feel we cannot speak.” So just by doing the simple thing about mirroring the society, that goes a long way.
And I kind of try to do what I can under the military. I mean, they came up with a machine that treats AIDS and Hepatitis C virus and basically every single… And I went to town with that because people… It doesn’t really have to go in to go to the bigger post like, “You’re an asshole.” No, you talk about their propaganda. You talk about what they want people to perceive them at, and it’s a failure. And for that, that kind of hit them even more. Because what do authoritarian figures do? They work on two things, fear and propaganda. And from that, it gets the respect. So when you go into their propaganda and expose them, they have nothing else.
Lex Fridman
That’s brilliant. So you are walking on eggshells, but you’re doing it masterfully, that you’re revealing sort of the flaws in the propaganda, the absurdity of the propaganda and in so doing are criticizing them.
That’s brilliant. So you are walking on eggshells, but you’re doing it masterfully, that you’re revealing sort of the flaws in the propaganda, the absurdity of the propaganda and in so doing are criticizing them.
Bassem Youssef
And this is why comedy is very specific, because people say, “You were not as hard on him as you were on the Muslim…” I was like, “Yeah, because on the Muslim Brotherhood we were just saying shit for each other,” but now the ceiling was like here. So it’s kind of like, how can you do something from here?
And this is why comedy is very specific, because people say, “You were not as hard on him as you were on the Muslim…” I was like, “Yeah, because on the Muslim Brotherhood we were just saying shit for each other,” but now the ceiling was like here. So it’s kind of like, how can you do something from here?
Lex Fridman
Yeah, exactly. That’s the art form. Yeah. In the Soviet Union under Stalin, a lot of the criticism came from children stories and children’s cartoons.
Yeah, exactly. That’s the art form. Yeah. In the Soviet Union under Stalin, a lot of the criticism came from children stories and children’s cartoons.
Bassem Youssef
Double meaning, double innuendos, stuff that means other stuff. That is-
Double meaning, double innuendos, stuff that means other stuff. That is-
Lex Fridman
Real creative.
Real creative.
Bassem Youssef
That’s the brilliance.
That’s the brilliance.
Lex Fridman
But everyone knows.
But everyone knows.
Bassem Youssef
Everyone knows.
Everyone knows.
Lex Fridman
Because you are putting a mirror, you’re mirroring the society. It’s fascinating, actually.
Because you are putting a mirror, you’re mirroring the society. It’s fascinating, actually.
Bassem Youssef
And that’s why I was canceled twice.
And that’s why I was canceled twice.
Lex Fridman
And that is a scary one, the army. You see that in Ukraine, everybody supports the army. That’s why Zelensky getting rid of the head of the army was a big, big deal. It’s a really dangerous thing. And everyone was afraid to say anything negative about the army, especially during war, in that case. And in this case, maybe there’s civil war, that kind of thing.
And that is a scary one, the army. You see that in Ukraine, everybody supports the army. That’s why Zelensky getting rid of the head of the army was a big, big deal. It’s a really dangerous thing. And everyone was afraid to say anything negative about the army, especially during war, in that case. And in this case, maybe there’s civil war, that kind of thing.
Bassem Youssef
But think about it. Actually, an army during peace is much more dangerous. Because think about it. I don’t really have an enemy to fight, but I have all of this power, all of this tank. Why does this actor have more money than me? I’m protecting him. Why does this businessman think that he can get onto his private plane and go to Paris? And why I’m here sitting, not having all of these things? And there’s a lot of time on your hand because your job is to go fight. When you don’t go fight, and when you have the lack of… That’s one of the things I love the United States about, is the fact that the army cannot really get power, but the power is actually in the military-industrial complex, which is a different issue. It’s kind a different kind of issue. But if you have all of that power, why am I sitting around just playing guard for you guys?
But think about it. Actually, an army during peace is much more dangerous. Because think about it. I don’t really have an enemy to fight, but I have all of this power, all of this tank. Why does this actor have more money than me? I’m protecting him. Why does this businessman think that he can get onto his private plane and go to Paris? And why I’m here sitting, not having all of these things? And there’s a lot of time on your hand because your job is to go fight. When you don’t go fight, and when you have the lack of… That’s one of the things I love the United States about, is the fact that the army cannot really get power, but the power is actually in the military-industrial complex, which is a different issue. It’s kind a different kind of issue. But if you have all of that power, why am I sitting around just playing guard for you guys?
Lex Fridman
That’s why Iran is terrifying because you have this military that just becomes a police force that turns against its own people. So you’re a famous guy talking shit in the middle of all that.
That’s why Iran is terrifying because you have this military that just becomes a police force that turns against its own people. So you’re a famous guy talking shit in the middle of all that.
Bassem Youssef
Yeah. And when I left, I went through a very dark side, dark, dark, dark. Because all of the insecurities, all of the stuff that had been working on my head now came to life. And now I’m in America and I’m a nobody. I’m a nobody. And now it’s like I have to do something. I have to earn some money. So I started to do stand-up comedy five years ago, and I sucked because it was my second language and it was new. And now I would go to these comedy clubs-
Yeah. And when I left, I went through a very dark side, dark, dark, dark. Because all of the insecurities, all of the stuff that had been working on my head now came to life. And now I’m in America and I’m a nobody. I’m a nobody. And now it’s like I have to do something. I have to earn some money. So I started to do stand-up comedy five years ago, and I sucked because it was my second language and it was new. And now I would go to these comedy clubs-
Bassem Youssef
It was my second language and it was new. And now I would go to these comedy clubs with kids and 21, 22 people. And then I’m there with a family to support that. I’m going there to do it for $15, $20. And I was bad. I was bad.
It was my second language and it was new. And now I would go to these comedy clubs with kids and 21, 22 people. And then I’m there with a family to support that. I’m going there to do it for $15, $20. And I was bad. I was bad.
Lex Fridman
You’re bombing.
You’re bombing.
Bassem Youssef
Bombing big time.
Bombing big time.
Lex Fridman
Eating shit.
Eating shit.
Bassem Youssef
Eating shit big time, dying up there big time. And I would go back home and I would cry. And then what made it worse is sometimes like a fan, not a fan, a bunch of fans from Egypt. It’s like, “Bassem Youssef…” They come and it’s like….
Eating shit big time, dying up there big time. And I would go back home and I would cry. And then what made it worse is sometimes like a fan, not a fan, a bunch of fans from Egypt. It’s like, “Bassem Youssef…” They come and it’s like….
Lex Fridman
Yeah, just-
Yeah, just-
Bassem Youssef
Their disappointment. That kind of face of adoration that goes into… And I could see it in their face. “I think he’s going to drive an Uber in a couple of weeks.”
Their disappointment. That kind of face of adoration that goes into… And I could see it in their face. “I think he’s going to drive an Uber in a couple of weeks.”
Lex Fridman
Oh, that’s so incredible.
Oh, that’s so incredible.
Bassem Youssef
That kind of pressure. And I would go and I would cry and I… And then the fans were like, “Oh, you left. You gave up. You were a sellout. You’re a coward. Why don’t you speak from abroad? You’re safe now.” It’s like, I already spoke. I don’t want to be an activist. I was doing that for comedy when it was good for everybody, but now they want me to go into YouTube and just like throw rocks from outside. I was like, “You don’t understand. I have family there.”
That kind of pressure. And I would go and I would cry and I… And then the fans were like, “Oh, you left. You gave up. You were a sellout. You’re a coward. Why don’t you speak from abroad? You’re safe now.” It’s like, I already spoke. I don’t want to be an activist. I was doing that for comedy when it was good for everybody, but now they want me to go into YouTube and just like throw rocks from outside. I was like, “You don’t understand. I have family there.”
And it was this kind of thing, like I’m being attacked for not doing what I should do in their face and attacked for not being funny and not doing good… And now I feel like, maybe it was wrong and… It was so traumatic that I don’t know actually how I went through these years. And I blocked so many details from my brain, because I have been using this technique for a while now that I have been erasing a lot of my… There is a lot of memory gaps in my brain, and I’m trying to suppress it because it was very, very, very traumatic. And a lot of people told me, “You have to go to therapy.” But I’m worried to open the floodgates. And I’m thinking, if I’m functional and I’m not killing anybody, I’m okay.
Lex Fridman
I think Elon tweeted, “‘Never went to therapy,’ is going to be on my headstone.”
I think Elon tweeted, “‘Never went to therapy,’ is going to be on my headstone.”
Bassem Youssef
Yeah…
Yeah…
Lex Fridman
You’re best buds. Okay. I mean that is terrifyingly difficult to… After being a surgeon, after being a superstar, super famous, going to eat shit at local tiny clubs in the United States. I mean eating shit period. Like bombing is really, really, really difficult. Really difficult, for twenty-year-olds.
You’re best buds. Okay. I mean that is terrifyingly difficult to… After being a surgeon, after being a superstar, super famous, going to eat shit at local tiny clubs in the United States. I mean eating shit period. Like bombing is really, really, really difficult. Really difficult, for twenty-year-olds.
Bassem Youssef
Imagine when you’re 45, 46. And then people’s like, “Is this his midlife crisis? What is this?” I went through a lot of pain and a lot of the doubts and it was terrible.
Imagine when you’re 45, 46. And then people’s like, “Is this his midlife crisis? What is this?” I went through a lot of pain and a lot of the doubts and it was terrible.
Lex Fridman
How did you survive? I know you [inaudible 01:42:11] most of it, but what gave you strength through all that?
How did you survive? I know you [inaudible 01:42:11] most of it, but what gave you strength through all that?
Bassem Youssef
Because I didn’t have any other choice, because I started that and the only reason that I could… is continue. I don’t know what else to do. I don’t want to go back to medicine. I don’t want to do that. And I don’t know. And bit by bit, bit by bit, I started to kind of be better, be better, be better. And I was at a certain time, a year ago, a year ago, this is where I started to kind of hone the craft and kind of sell more tickets and sometimes even sell out some shows and sometimes sell a theater. So it was going and the money was flowing and it was good. And then I was like, I wanted faster, I wanted more. I want it now. I want Netflix deal and whatever. And then the Piers Morgan thing happened and then I blew up and then suddenly I’m selling out everywhere.
Because I didn’t have any other choice, because I started that and the only reason that I could… is continue. I don’t know what else to do. I don’t want to go back to medicine. I don’t want to do that. And I don’t know. And bit by bit, bit by bit, I started to kind of be better, be better, be better. And I was at a certain time, a year ago, a year ago, this is where I started to kind of hone the craft and kind of sell more tickets and sometimes even sell out some shows and sometimes sell a theater. So it was going and the money was flowing and it was good. And then I was like, I wanted faster, I wanted more. I want it now. I want Netflix deal and whatever. And then the Piers Morgan thing happened and then I blew up and then suddenly I’m selling out everywhere.
And it’s like, “Ah, if the war happened two years ago, I will not be ready.” So now they come to the show, and by the way, my show had nothing to do with October 7th. My show is my thing that I’ve been crafting and working on. You know how difficult it’s to do the first hour, the hour that I’ve been working on for five years? And it’s all my personal story, all about what happened to me in Egypt, me as an immigrant, coming here to the United States, finding Trump as a president, finding myself in the middle of a guns rally, finding myself in the middle of a bombing, kind of talking about how I got my citizenship. It’s funny stories about my origin story.
So they come in and they expect October 7th and all of a sudden my personal story, but it’s good and it kills and they love it. It’s like if that kind of blew up in America happened to me two, three years ago, I would not have… People would come and be disappointed.
Lex Fridman
I got to say the timing of October 7th is very suspicious.
I got to say the timing of October 7th is very suspicious.
Bassem Youssef
Oh my God. Please don’t say that.
Oh my God. Please don’t say that.
Lex Fridman
I don’t know. I’m just asking questions. I don’t know.
I don’t know. I’m just asking questions. I don’t know.
Bassem Youssef
I’m telling you, one of the funniest thing, a guy… I was in Dubai and a TV anchor came to me. “Bassem Youssef, he flourishes during revolutions and wars.” Like, whoa, whoa. Wait, what? Dude. You’re making me sound like a bad omen. A very bad omen.
I’m telling you, one of the funniest thing, a guy… I was in Dubai and a TV anchor came to me. “Bassem Youssef, he flourishes during revolutions and wars.” Like, whoa, whoa. Wait, what? Dude. You’re making me sound like a bad omen. A very bad omen.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. You, Hamas and Bibi together orchestrated all of this.
Yeah. You, Hamas and Bibi together orchestrated all of this.
Bassem Youssef
Oh my god. That’s the trilogy.
Oh my god. That’s the trilogy.
Lex Fridman
You guys should go on the road together. I’m telling you that phone call is coming,
You guys should go on the road together. I’m telling you that phone call is coming,
Bassem Youssef
Yeah, but Hamas has to open.
Yeah, but Hamas has to open.
Lex Fridman
And that would really bomb, right? That
And that would really bomb, right? That
Bassem Youssef
They would really bomb.
They would really bomb.
Arabic vs English
Lex Fridman
I love dark humor. You do a show, like you were saying, in English and in Arabic, and the story is very different.
I love dark humor. You do a show, like you were saying, in English and in Arabic, and the story is very different.
Bassem Youssef
Totally different. Two different stories.
Totally different. Two different stories.
Lex Fridman
I would love to… just the language difference, because the music of the language is also different. So how can you convert it into words, but what’s the difference in the music of the languages?
I would love to… just the language difference, because the music of the language is also different. So how can you convert it into words, but what’s the difference in the music of the languages?
Bassem Youssef
I’ll tell you, because I thought about that thought.
I’ll tell you, because I thought about that thought.
Lex Fridman
[inaudible 01:45:08]. All right, all right.
[inaudible 01:45:08]. All right, all right.
Bassem Youssef
Okay, so when I was doing the English first, I actually had good jokes, but I was missing the delivery because the cadence and the music and the rhythm is different. The way that an English-speaking American member of audience will receive it’ll be different than how I receive it. The energy, everything’s different. So when I kind of got it, I didn’t know how to switch back to Arabic.
Okay, so when I was doing the English first, I actually had good jokes, but I was missing the delivery because the cadence and the music and the rhythm is different. The way that an English-speaking American member of audience will receive it’ll be different than how I receive it. The energy, everything’s different. So when I kind of got it, I didn’t know how to switch back to Arabic.
Lex Fridman
Oh wow. Yeah. Fascinating.
Oh wow. Yeah. Fascinating.
Bassem Youssef
Because here’s the thing. With English stand-up comedy you have a huge library, you have a legacy. You have years and years and years and years of people doing comedy. But in Arabic it’s very new to us. And most of the Arabic stand-up comedy, especially in Egypt, is very tamed. This is kind of like, imagine the stand-up comedy scene in American 1960s before Lenny Bruce.
Because here’s the thing. With English stand-up comedy you have a huge library, you have a legacy. You have years and years and years and years of people doing comedy. But in Arabic it’s very new to us. And most of the Arabic stand-up comedy, especially in Egypt, is very tamed. This is kind of like, imagine the stand-up comedy scene in American 1960s before Lenny Bruce.
Lex Fridman
So no swearing, conservative, careful.
So no swearing, conservative, careful.
Bassem Youssef
No swearing, nothing, conservative, everything.
No swearing, nothing, conservative, everything.
Lex Fridman
No [inaudible 01:46:09].
No [inaudible 01:46:09].
Bassem Youssef
It’s kind of very… So I didn’t know what to do with Arabic, so I broke the barriers. I became Lenny Bruce, I became George Carlin. So I went in and I went and I changed the whole thing.
It’s kind of very… So I didn’t know what to do with Arabic, so I broke the barriers. I became Lenny Bruce, I became George Carlin. So I went in and I went and I changed the whole thing.
Lex Fridman
The seven words you’re not allowed to say.
The seven words you’re not allowed to say.
Bassem Youssef
Ah, for me, 15 words.
Ah, for me, 15 words.
Lex Fridman
There’s a lot.
There’s a lot.
Bassem Youssef
Arabic is a very rich language. So here’s the difference between the Arabic and the English show. The English show, surprise, surprise is a unifying language, even for a group of Arabs.
Arabic is a very rich language. So here’s the difference between the Arabic and the English show. The English show, surprise, surprise is a unifying language, even for a group of Arabs.
Lex Fridman
Interesting.
Interesting.
Bassem Youssef
So if I give the same exact show to the same 1000 audience members in the same theater, and they’re the same people, same makeup of like Lebanese, Egyptian, Syrian, Saudis, English will be a unifying language. Arabic is a dividing language.
So if I give the same exact show to the same 1000 audience members in the same theater, and they’re the same people, same makeup of like Lebanese, Egyptian, Syrian, Saudis, English will be a unifying language. Arabic is a dividing language.
Lex Fridman
Why is that?
Why is that?
Bassem Youssef
Because you have 22 dialects, and the dialects are vastly different. And maybe Egyptians understand a little bit of Lebanese, but not that much. But the references, Algerian, Moroccan, Tunisian, totally different animal. That’s like a totally different language. Saudi, Emirati, Kuwaiti, totally different. People understand the Egyptian dialect because it’s the dialect of most of the artwork and the movies. But the reference in the everyday street talk might not be understood by them. So now I have to go in and talk to all of these dialects together.
Because you have 22 dialects, and the dialects are vastly different. And maybe Egyptians understand a little bit of Lebanese, but not that much. But the references, Algerian, Moroccan, Tunisian, totally different animal. That’s like a totally different language. Saudi, Emirati, Kuwaiti, totally different. People understand the Egyptian dialect because it’s the dialect of most of the artwork and the movies. But the reference in the everyday street talk might not be understood by them. So now I have to go in and talk to all of these dialects together.
So a big part of my show is like, “What are you guys expecting of this?” When I do profanity and you’re going to like it. This is the problem with the show as a dialect, and I construct all of these sentences formed of so different words. For example, an iron in any Arabic dialect is an iron. In Saudi Arabia, it means ass. That’s one example. That’s one example. So imagine if you can actually construct sentences having all of these things in one… So I would construct a whole section of my show about that.
Lex Fridman
So it’s really very much about, like self-reflective on language and the limits of language that’s allowed.
So it’s really very much about, like self-reflective on language and the limits of language that’s allowed.
Bassem Youssef
And the limits of language. And I tell them part of the show is I know what’s the problem with me doing Arabic. It’s like if this was an English show and I was telling you fuck and shit and bitch, you’ll be, “Ha, ha, ha, ha…” But if I do one swear word, all of you will cringe. It’s like, why?
And the limits of language. And I tell them part of the show is I know what’s the problem with me doing Arabic. It’s like if this was an English show and I was telling you fuck and shit and bitch, you’ll be, “Ha, ha, ha, ha…” But if I do one swear word, all of you will cringe. It’s like, why?
Lex Fridman
That’s fascinating.
That’s fascinating.
Bassem Youssef
Is it because we are ashamed of our own… So it’s not just about swearing, it’s about… There’s a lot of philosophical pathways in this. Yeah, there’s profanity and people have fun, whatever. But it is about how do we treat our language? And I tell them, “We speak Arabic as Arabs, but it’s not the same Arabic.” It’s crazy, right?
Is it because we are ashamed of our own… So it’s not just about swearing, it’s about… There’s a lot of philosophical pathways in this. Yeah, there’s profanity and people have fun, whatever. But it is about how do we treat our language? And I tell them, “We speak Arabic as Arabs, but it’s not the same Arabic.” It’s crazy, right?
Lex Fridman
And you’re doing the show in America also, which is another level of [inaudible 01:48:58].
And you’re doing the show in America also, which is another level of [inaudible 01:48:58].
Bassem Youssef
Oh yeah. Actually the Arab diaspora in America is some of the best audiences I have. They are wonderful. And I did it also in the Middle East, and maybe I’ll do like an Arab tour in the Middle East in the fall.
Oh yeah. Actually the Arab diaspora in America is some of the best audiences I have. They are wonderful. And I did it also in the Middle East, and maybe I’ll do like an Arab tour in the Middle East in the fall.
Lex Fridman
Which countries would you go to or not?
Which countries would you go to or not?
Bassem Youssef
I already did Jordan, Lebanon. I’m doing UAE, I’m doing Kuwait.
I already did Jordan, Lebanon. I’m doing UAE, I’m doing Kuwait.
Lex Fridman
Egypt?
Egypt?
Bassem Youssef
Bahrain. Egypt, I don’t think so. I don’t think so.
Bahrain. Egypt, I don’t think so. I don’t think so.
Lex Fridman
Is it personal? Is it worry about your safety?
Is it personal? Is it worry about your safety?
Bassem Youssef
Well, I have the American citizenship right now, so I am relatively safe. There’s a block, honestly. There’s a block. There’s so much that happened. And I’ll never bad mouth Egypt. It is my country. It has all of my marriage. 40 years of my life I lived there. But when you get hurt so much, instead of trying to kind of… I don’t want to take revenge, I don’t want to like battle. I just want to avoid because Egypt gave me so much fame and so much love and so much hate and so much rejection. It was a very tumultuous relationship. Very, very difficult.
Well, I have the American citizenship right now, so I am relatively safe. There’s a block, honestly. There’s a block. There’s so much that happened. And I’ll never bad mouth Egypt. It is my country. It has all of my marriage. 40 years of my life I lived there. But when you get hurt so much, instead of trying to kind of… I don’t want to take revenge, I don’t want to like battle. I just want to avoid because Egypt gave me so much fame and so much love and so much hate and so much rejection. It was a very tumultuous relationship. Very, very difficult.
And a lot of people tell me, “Well, don’t you miss Egypt?” And I tell them every time, “The Egypt that I miss is not there anymore. It’s not bad or good. It’s not worse or better. It’s just I’m different.” And the places are different and the people are different and their circumstances are different. Whatever image you had you have of what you love is not there anymore. That’s why a lot of immigrants, especially Arab immigrants, they live here, but they’re there. And then when they go back for a vacation, they get disappointed because they didn’t find what they want. And then they come back here and they’re disappointed because they want to come back, but it’s not there anymore.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Their view of that place is from a different time. I have that… My parents, but everybody that left the Soviet Union, I mean it’s such a complicated relationship with that. It’s sometimes borders on hate, disappointment. In the case of the Soviet Union, perhaps similar to Egypt is the promise is sold when you were younger and the promise is broken by the possibility of what it was supposed to be. With the Soviet Union, I’m sure with Egypt it’s the same. Iran is the same. So they have a very complicated relationship with that.
Yeah. Their view of that place is from a different time. I have that… My parents, but everybody that left the Soviet Union, I mean it’s such a complicated relationship with that. It’s sometimes borders on hate, disappointment. In the case of the Soviet Union, perhaps similar to Egypt is the promise is sold when you were younger and the promise is broken by the possibility of what it was supposed to be. With the Soviet Union, I’m sure with Egypt it’s the same. Iran is the same. So they have a very complicated relationship with that.
Bassem Youssef
Yeah. That’s why, for example, people from Iran, I remember quite well the World Cup that was done in the United States, and the Iranian team will play in America. And there were people in the audience all wearing Iranian shirts. They hate the regime, but they have this kind of connection with the country. And this is the whole thing. You can actually love the country and you not have to agree with the regime.
Yeah. That’s why, for example, people from Iran, I remember quite well the World Cup that was done in the United States, and the Iranian team will play in America. And there were people in the audience all wearing Iranian shirts. They hate the regime, but they have this kind of connection with the country. And this is the whole thing. You can actually love the country and you not have to agree with the regime.
Lex Fridman
Would you ever perform in the West Bank?
Would you ever perform in the West Bank?
Bassem Youssef
No.
No.
Lex Fridman
Gaza?
Gaza?
Bassem Youssef
Because if I go there, I have to go through the Israeli checkpoints and I don’t want to go through the… I don’t want to have an Israeli soldier telling me what to do.
Because if I go there, I have to go through the Israeli checkpoints and I don’t want to go through the… I don’t want to have an Israeli soldier telling me what to do.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, there’s a demeaning aspect to that whole-
Yeah, there’s a demeaning aspect to that whole-
Bassem Youssef
Very.
Very.
Lex Fridman
Even in subtle ways, yeah.
Even in subtle ways, yeah.
Bassem Youssef
Yeah, yeah. I mean I have so many Palestinian friends with an American passport, US passports, living here, they’re born here. And they talk about the humiliation and the intimidation and the harassment that they go in. It’s like, do you want me to try?
Yeah, yeah. I mean I have so many Palestinian friends with an American passport, US passports, living here, they’re born here. And they talk about the humiliation and the intimidation and the harassment that they go in. It’s like, do you want me to try?
Lex Fridman
Yeah, that little bit of a humiliation…
Yeah, that little bit of a humiliation…
Bassem Youssef
A little bit.
A little bit.
Lex Fridman
Oh, sometimes it’s major, but-
Oh, sometimes it’s major, but-
Bassem Youssef
I know, I know.
I know, I know.
Lex Fridman
… I noticed that even the little bit, after a lifetime of that, it can turn to hate towards the other.
… I noticed that even the little bit, after a lifetime of that, it can turn to hate towards the other.
Bassem Youssef
Yeah, and resentment.
Yeah, and resentment.
Lex Fridman
Resentment. And then how do you do anything with that resentment?
Resentment. And then how do you do anything with that resentment?
Bassem Youssef
I have a friend of mine, he is from Palestine from the West Bank. He’s American. He was born here. And we have of course all of this discussion of what happened. And he tells me on October 11th in the West Bank, and there was a village called Qusra. And on that village, the settlers went in around the village and they send a message on Facebook. It was like, “You rats, get out of your sewers and we’re going to be waiting for you.” Intimidation through technology. Qusra have another settlement next to it called Esh Kodesh. Esh Kodesh, they have people there who were training something called [inaudible 01:53:32], which is basically the guardians of [inaudible 01:53:36]. And it’s like a paramilitary group that trains other settlers on military compact, give them weapons and do military drills.
I have a friend of mine, he is from Palestine from the West Bank. He’s American. He was born here. And we have of course all of this discussion of what happened. And he tells me on October 11th in the West Bank, and there was a village called Qusra. And on that village, the settlers went in around the village and they send a message on Facebook. It was like, “You rats, get out of your sewers and we’re going to be waiting for you.” Intimidation through technology. Qusra have another settlement next to it called Esh Kodesh. Esh Kodesh, they have people there who were training something called [inaudible 01:53:32], which is basically the guardians of [inaudible 01:53:36]. And it’s like a paramilitary group that trains other settlers on military compact, give them weapons and do military drills.
And they went there militarized and went there, and it was actually co-founded a Jew from Brooklyn. Not even… and like an Israeli. And he’s like one of the disciples of Meir Kahane. I’m sure that you know who Meir Kahane is, who was the Jewish defense leader, the people who assassinated Alex Odeh here in the United States, and they were there with their weapons outside intimidating people. Now this story carries everything that is wrong with the situation. You have people from Brooklyn, from outside, just because they’re Jewish, they can’t come and they can claim the land from the people there. Anybody from… just because he’s Jewish, you can come and take the land from other people.
They’re using technology to intimidate Palestinians. They have unchecked military power. These are not IDF soldiers, these are settlers and they have free reign in order to intimidate and to kill the people. And you understand, this is the daily life of Palestinians, not in Gaza. In the West Bank.
Lex Fridman
What do we do, what do people do to nudge this towards peace, towards flourishing?
What do we do, what do people do to nudge this towards peace, towards flourishing?
Bassem Youssef
Here’s the thing, I want to talk to the people of Israel. What is Israel doing right now is not just unfair to the Palestinians, it’s unfair to the Jewish people in Israel. No, it is unfair to the Jewish people around the world, because the way that Israel links itself to Judaism, at a certain point… Remember ISIS and Al-Qaeda, and when everybody hated Muslims? Humans are simple. They cannot have the nuances to separate. So anybody with a Muslim name, with a Muslim face with a beard who looks Muslim, he would do it because of that actions of those atrocities, you have the power as a person to separate yourself from an abusive power, a horrible power, and be yourself.
Here’s the thing, I want to talk to the people of Israel. What is Israel doing right now is not just unfair to the Palestinians, it’s unfair to the Jewish people in Israel. No, it is unfair to the Jewish people around the world, because the way that Israel links itself to Judaism, at a certain point… Remember ISIS and Al-Qaeda, and when everybody hated Muslims? Humans are simple. They cannot have the nuances to separate. So anybody with a Muslim name, with a Muslim face with a beard who looks Muslim, he would do it because of that actions of those atrocities, you have the power as a person to separate yourself from an abusive power, a horrible power, and be yourself.
I am really worried because the rise of antisemitism and the rise of hate against Jews is not because of the Jews. It’s because of the actions of a government. Jews do not have to be on the side of apartheid. Ronnie Kasrils, he’s a Jewish South African, and he fought shoulder-to-shoulder next to Nelson Mandela. He was part of the African National Conference, ANC. And he had an article said like, “I know what apartheid is and I saw Israel and this is what they have.” And the thing is, Israel, the Israeli government should listen to other people. You cannot call anybody who criticizes you either an antisemite, or if they’re already Jewish, you call them like self-hating Jew. You cannot do that. You cannot continue doing that, because we did that.
When I would go in and criticize the Islamists, it’s like, “Oh, you’re self-hating Muslim. You’re not really Muslim, you’re an infidel, you’re a secret, you’re secular,” whatever. We have the power in order to reform the course by holding people in power accountable. And the thing is, it is very stupid to actually call this antisemitism. My idol is Jon Stewart. I voted for Bernie Sanders. Sarah Taxler, the one who did this amazing documentary about me, Tickling Giants, she’s a Jew. She is married to an Israeli Jew. We have a good ratio because we know what the right is. They don’t have to associate themselves with the action of the Israeli government.
Sam Harris and Jihad
Lex Fridman
One of your favorite words, Jihad.
One of your favorite words, Jihad.
Bassem Youssef
That’s my favorite hobbies.
That’s my favorite hobbies.
Lex Fridman
Favorite hobby.
Favorite hobby.
Bassem Youssef
It’s in my shows. What’s your guys’ favorite… I talk about how when a white shooter does something, he talks about all of his family. And I was like, “What if we took this for Arab terrorists. What are his hobbies? Jihad.” You see? You could be a comedian.
It’s in my shows. What’s your guys’ favorite… I talk about how when a white shooter does something, he talks about all of his family. And I was like, “What if we took this for Arab terrorists. What are his hobbies? Jihad.” You see? You could be a comedian.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Wow. You’re making me feel good. Okay. Sam Harris has done several episodes on Jihad and people should go listen to it, even if you disagree with it. But the basic idea that he’s proposing is that this idea of Jihad in the negative connotation of it, of martyrdom, is counterproductive, is destructive to the possible future flourishing of Palestinian people. What do you think of that? There’s just the idea of martyrdom-
Yeah. Wow. You’re making me feel good. Okay. Sam Harris has done several episodes on Jihad and people should go listen to it, even if you disagree with it. But the basic idea that he’s proposing is that this idea of Jihad in the negative connotation of it, of martyrdom, is counterproductive, is destructive to the possible future flourishing of Palestinian people. What do you think of that? There’s just the idea of martyrdom-
Bassem Youssef
Yeah, I totally agree. But people don’t wake up in the morning and say like, “I want to declare Jihad.” Think about it. Why would anybody choose to end his life by taking other people with him, and end that life? His life must be miserable. He must be pushed into that. Nobody chooses death over life willingly. One of the first suicide bombers in the Palestinian resistance were Christians. We don’t talk about that.
Yeah, I totally agree. But people don’t wake up in the morning and say like, “I want to declare Jihad.” Think about it. Why would anybody choose to end his life by taking other people with him, and end that life? His life must be miserable. He must be pushed into that. Nobody chooses death over life willingly. One of the first suicide bombers in the Palestinian resistance were Christians. We don’t talk about that.
Lex Fridman
I think he would say that the presence of a story that you can tell yourself when you’re in a really shitty place, that you can go to a much better place by sacrificing your own life… just the fact the presence of that story is there is harmful.
I think he would say that the presence of a story that you can tell yourself when you’re in a really shitty place, that you can go to a much better place by sacrificing your own life… just the fact the presence of that story is there is harmful.
Bassem Youssef
Of course. But here’s my problem with Sam Harris, and usually people, they have free range talking about the Islamic faith and nitpicking the stuff that makes it put in a bad light. I can go and nitpick every single religion. They are Jews there like Ben-Gvir who openly say spitting on Christians is not a hate speech. I mean, you can bring me all kinds of videos of Islamic Jihadists saying horrible things on YouTube, and I can bring you Jews who live there, they say like, “we are going to have the whole world enslaved for us. And everybody would love to be slaves for the Jews.” I can use the Talmudic argument that if you tie a man to a tree and he dies of thirst and hunger, you didn’t kill that man. And this is kind of the same arguments like, “Ah, we are not killing Palestinians. They’re dying by themselves.”
Of course. But here’s my problem with Sam Harris, and usually people, they have free range talking about the Islamic faith and nitpicking the stuff that makes it put in a bad light. I can go and nitpick every single religion. They are Jews there like Ben-Gvir who openly say spitting on Christians is not a hate speech. I mean, you can bring me all kinds of videos of Islamic Jihadists saying horrible things on YouTube, and I can bring you Jews who live there, they say like, “we are going to have the whole world enslaved for us. And everybody would love to be slaves for the Jews.” I can use the Talmudic argument that if you tie a man to a tree and he dies of thirst and hunger, you didn’t kill that man. And this is kind of the same arguments like, “Ah, we are not killing Palestinians. They’re dying by themselves.”
So the nitpicking of a certain narrative, religious narrative that is separate from the political context and what’s happening right now, it’s very unfair, because I can read… If you want to have a deep dive into religious texts, nobody will be happy. And I can bring stuff from the Talmud and the Torah and stuff that is horrible. But this is a way, again, of distraction.
Lex Fridman
I dare you to talk about Buddhism and Jainism though. Try.
I dare you to talk about Buddhism and Jainism though. Try.
Bassem Youssef
Well, the people who killed the Muslims in Myanmar, weren’t they Buddhist?
Well, the people who killed the Muslims in Myanmar, weren’t they Buddhist?
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Well, hey, let’s go Jainism. Okay, I’ll find the religion. I’ll get back to you. I’ll have to find one.
Yeah. Well, hey, let’s go Jainism. Okay, I’ll find the religion. I’ll get back to you. I’ll have to find one.
Bassem Youssef
The Church of the Flying Monster-
The Church of the Flying Monster-
Lex Fridman
The spaghetti thing?
The spaghetti thing?
Bassem Youssef
Spaghetti.
Spaghetti.
Lex Fridman
As a person who tries not to eat carbs, I’m deeply offended by that.
As a person who tries not to eat carbs, I’m deeply offended by that.
Bassem Youssef
I mean, there’s Scientologists, all they do is actually buy real estate.
I mean, there’s Scientologists, all they do is actually buy real estate.
Lex Fridman
I think there’s a few books written about the fact that they do other stuff as well. So even there…
I think there’s a few books written about the fact that they do other stuff as well. So even there…
Bassem Youssef
I know, I know.
I know, I know.
Lex Fridman
Mormons sometimes… They’re some of the nicest people I’ve ever met, but I’m sure there’s also darkness there too. Oh boy, religion.
Mormons sometimes… They’re some of the nicest people I’ve ever met, but I’m sure there’s also darkness there too. Oh boy, religion.
Bassem Youssef
There’s soaking in Mormons.
There’s soaking in Mormons.
Lex Fridman
There’s what?
There’s what?
Bassem Youssef
Soaking.
Soaking.
Lex Fridman
What’s soaking?
What’s soaking?
Bassem Youssef
Okay. Soaking, basically if you get into the woman and you don’t move, that’s not adultery. That’s not like-
Okay. Soaking, basically if you get into the woman and you don’t move, that’s not adultery. That’s not like-
Lex Fridman
Oh, interesting. So there’s a loophole.
Oh, interesting. So there’s a loophole.
Bassem Youssef
Yeah, you go in and you just stay…
Yeah, you go in and you just stay…
Lex Fridman
There’s a loophole.
There’s a loophole.
Bassem Youssef
A loophole. That’s the thing. Religion has loopholes.
A loophole. That’s the thing. Religion has loopholes.
Lex Fridman
Religion has a loophole.
Religion has a loophole.
Bassem Youssef
Yes. And Muslims, we do that the whole time. We pick and choose our sins, the stuff that we enjoy. It’s just we’re humans.
Yes. And Muslims, we do that the whole time. We pick and choose our sins, the stuff that we enjoy. It’s just we’re humans.
Lex Fridman
There’s 72 virgins waiting for all of us.
There’s 72 virgins waiting for all of us.
Bassem Youssef
Maybe if I converted you as a Jew, I’ll get you 80. I don’t know. We can negotiate.
Maybe if I converted you as a Jew, I’ll get you 80. I don’t know. We can negotiate.
Lex Fridman
But I also have questions about whether-
But I also have questions about whether-
Bassem Youssef
I’ll give you a very good deal. And maybe I’ll throw there a Camry.
I’ll give you a very good deal. And maybe I’ll throw there a Camry.
Lex Fridman
I have to be honest. A Camry? It’s pretty good. What year? I don’t know.
I have to be honest. A Camry? It’s pretty good. What year? I don’t know.
Bassem Youssef
1998. Best year ever.
1998. Best year ever.
Lex Fridman
Well, they last a long time, so I’m not sure I want 72. I-
Well, they last a long time, so I’m not sure I want 72. I-
Bassem Youssef
Well, I’ll throw five in the mix and see how we feel.
Well, I’ll throw five in the mix and see how we feel.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, can we-
Yeah, can we-
Bassem Youssef
If you want to upgrade…
If you want to upgrade…
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Can we do a trial period? But in general, if you just zoom out, do you think religion is… In what way is it good for the world? In what way is it harmful?
Yeah. Can we do a trial period? But in general, if you just zoom out, do you think religion is… In what way is it good for the world? In what way is it harmful?
Religion
Bassem Youssef
If there was no religion, humans would have invented religion, because think about it. Think of the early humanity. You’re a caveman or whatever, and then you see your family members killed and then you say, “What? I’m going to be the sheep or the gazelle that just ends and perish? I am more important.” I think with the development of consciousness, humans thought that they are much more precious and important than the other animals because they have now intelligence. So my life will not end like that. My death will be even more important. There’s consequences for that. There’s consequences for what I do.
If there was no religion, humans would have invented religion, because think about it. Think of the early humanity. You’re a caveman or whatever, and then you see your family members killed and then you say, “What? I’m going to be the sheep or the gazelle that just ends and perish? I am more important.” I think with the development of consciousness, humans thought that they are much more precious and important than the other animals because they have now intelligence. So my life will not end like that. My death will be even more important. There’s consequences for that. There’s consequences for what I do.
And then the early man was there in the desert and all of these natural phenomena. They didn’t know what to do. They were afraid. So they need to have refuge. They need to have something to take care of. They need to have a reason for everything, because if there’s no reason, it’s chaos. It’s chaos.
Lex Fridman
It’s terrifying.
It’s terrifying.
Bassem Youssef
It’s terrifying. There’s nothing. There has to be a reason. There has to be a reason, there has to be a purpose. There has to be a cause, something. I’m not just going to be die like a cockroach being stepped on. And that’s kind of part of it is ego.
It’s terrifying. There’s nothing. There has to be a reason. There has to be a reason, there has to be a purpose. There has to be a cause, something. I’m not just going to be die like a cockroach being stepped on. And that’s kind of part of it is ego.
Lex Fridman
The whole world rotates around you in a way.
The whole world rotates around you in a way.
Bassem Youssef
It’s the ego. So religion actually got a lot of it from humanity itself. Like me, like us being humans. And many religion is a collection of stories, and those stories based on things that humans did themselves and they attributed it to gods.
It’s the ego. So religion actually got a lot of it from humanity itself. Like me, like us being humans. And many religion is a collection of stories, and those stories based on things that humans did themselves and they attributed it to gods.
Lex Fridman
And there’s an aspect of religion where you humble yourself before a thing that is much greater than you. So that has, I would say, a very positive effect of humbling.
And there’s an aspect of religion where you humble yourself before a thing that is much greater than you. So that has, I would say, a very positive effect of humbling.
Bassem Youssef
It will be great if it stop there. But here’s the thing, if you humble, in order that your ego kicks in and feel that you are better than someone else who’s not humbled in front of the same God-
It will be great if it stop there. But here’s the thing, if you humble, in order that your ego kicks in and feel that you are better than someone else who’s not humbled in front of the same God-
Lex Fridman
You always go there.
You always go there.
Bassem Youssef
… that means that I will have all of that [inaudible 02:04:22] that I can use that because now… What does mean, being humble? I’m divine. But I’m not-
… that means that I will have all of that [inaudible 02:04:22] that I can use that because now… What does mean, being humble? I’m divine. But I’m not-
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Also, I’m way more humble than you.
Yeah. Also, I’m way more humble than you.
Bassem Youssef
Ah, but you’re not. So you see how they kind of like the oxymoron. I’m humble and I’m surrendering, but in the same time I am better than you and I’m more entitled. Isn’t it crazy?
Ah, but you’re not. So you see how they kind of like the oxymoron. I’m humble and I’m surrendering, but in the same time I am better than you and I’m more entitled. Isn’t it crazy?
Lex Fridman
Yeah, it’s beautiful. It’s crazy. It’s absurd. It’s-
Yeah, it’s beautiful. It’s crazy. It’s absurd. It’s-
Bassem Youssef
I mean, look at the Muslim, Christians and Jews and everyone. Say, “All right, Muslims, we surrendered.” I’m talking about the extreme ones. I mean people… I surrender to God. Good. Keep it that way. If you go there. I surrender to God, that means that I am closer to God than you, then you should die. Okay, Christians. Christ is love and he loves me and we are going to be together. But you don’t get into his kingdom and you die. You see, it’s the same thing. If you-
I mean, look at the Muslim, Christians and Jews and everyone. Say, “All right, Muslims, we surrendered.” I’m talking about the extreme ones. I mean people… I surrender to God. Good. Keep it that way. If you go there. I surrender to God, that means that I am closer to God than you, then you should die. Okay, Christians. Christ is love and he loves me and we are going to be together. But you don’t get into his kingdom and you die. You see, it’s the same thing. If you-
Lex Fridman
Just stop it and-
Just stop it and-
Bassem Youssef
Like stop there. Stop where you are humble and you feel that you’re a piece of shit and you are a worthless human being and you are there. Stop there. But once you says like, “Oh, that makes me a better person than you, and it makes me more with God than you, so that would give me the entitlement to kick your ass.”
Like stop there. Stop where you are humble and you feel that you’re a piece of shit and you are a worthless human being and you are there. Stop there. But once you says like, “Oh, that makes me a better person than you, and it makes me more with God than you, so that would give me the entitlement to kick your ass.”
Lex Fridman
Yeah, we always ruin a good thing,
Yeah, we always ruin a good thing,
Bassem Youssef
Don’t we?
Don’t we?
Lex Fridman
That ego. You’ve been outspoken, with Piers Morgan, but just on this topic, and you talked about the Superman story, which I would love it if you were in a Superman movie. But have you lost job opportunities because of this, because of speaking out?
That ego. You’ve been outspoken, with Piers Morgan, but just on this topic, and you talked about the Superman story, which I would love it if you were in a Superman movie. But have you lost job opportunities because of this, because of speaking out?
Bassem Youssef
There was a couple of things that were going on, but they stopped again. I don’t know if it’s October 7th.
There was a couple of things that were going on, but they stopped again. I don’t know if it’s October 7th.
Lex Fridman
Can you tell the Superman story just so-
Can you tell the Superman story just so-
Bassem Youssef
Yeah, yeah. So-
Yeah, yeah. So-
Lex Fridman
What role were you?
What role were you?
Bassem Youssef
Oh, okay-
Oh, okay-
Lex Fridman
What did you audition for?
What did you audition for?
Bassem Youssef
Yes. Okay, okay. So in June I was traveling to Dubai and an hour before I get into the car and go there, my manager is like, “Bass, I’m going to send you a script, read it. It’s for Superman.” It’s like, oh, Superman. I am not really good in auditions. I’m not a seasoned actor. So I was like, “Okay, I’m just going to do it, send the tape.” I do the tape, I send it. I go to the airport, and I read… and I think I can talk about it now because they said they changed the script. So basically what I found it interesting in that new script is that there is a dictator in a country that invades another country, and Superman interferes politically. That’s the first time we ever see Superman interferes politically. So basically it was Russia and Ukraine, but because of me, it was like it couldn’t be Russia and Ukraine. So it had to be something kind of with a flavor.
Yes. Okay, okay. So in June I was traveling to Dubai and an hour before I get into the car and go there, my manager is like, “Bass, I’m going to send you a script, read it. It’s for Superman.” It’s like, oh, Superman. I am not really good in auditions. I’m not a seasoned actor. So I was like, “Okay, I’m just going to do it, send the tape.” I do the tape, I send it. I go to the airport, and I read… and I think I can talk about it now because they said they changed the script. So basically what I found it interesting in that new script is that there is a dictator in a country that invades another country, and Superman interferes politically. That’s the first time we ever see Superman interferes politically. So basically it was Russia and Ukraine, but because of me, it was like it couldn’t be Russia and Ukraine. So it had to be something kind of with a flavor.
So I read the role as if a mixture of Trump and Mubarak. I did this mix, like, “You know…” Kind of the Middle East, but also kind of the essence of Trump into it. I went to the airport. It’s like an hour. It’s like James Gunn saw it, he loves it. It’s like, what? I never had an audition that fast. I mean, I had a few roles, but not that fast, not like that. And then I said, “Well, the strike starts tomorrow and we need to be on the phone… After the strike, we cannot talk.” The SAG after strike, like the writers and the actors strike. So like, “well, I’m going to be on a plane right now.” It’s like, “Okay, once you land, you can have a Zoom call with James Gunn.”
I have a call with James Gunn. I’m a huge fan of him. The guy took something like Guardians of the Galaxy, nobody knew about it, made amazing trilogy. And he is like a really cool guy. I like what he did. And it was really nice. And he started to talk to me about the movie. And I talked to people before we were casting them. So I know that everybody on set have a good chemistry. It was amazing. So in your mind, if you’re an actor, what does that mean? You got the part. And he told me, “You got the part.” Month goes by, strike goes by. October 7th happens. I do Piers Morgan one and two. And then I go to my Australian tour. My manager called me. “Bassem…” The strike was over. It’s like, “You don’t have the part anymore.”
I was sad, very sad, but for three days. And I said, “[inaudible 02:08:30].” I’m actually doing very well. [inaudible 02:08:34]. And then when I went to Chris Cuomo after I finished the show, he told me, “Did you lose any opportunities?” And that was off record, after the show was concluded. And I talked about Superman, and I found myself when I was talking, I was angry, I was bitter. And I went home. I was like, ” Why was I angry? Why was I bitter? It wasn’t meant to be. And I’m living a good life now. I don’t need to…”
So when I was asked again the next day in two different interviews, the BBC and another one also with my friend, [inaudible 02:09:15], I said the story in a different way. I said, “I don’t have any anger. As a matter of fact, maybe if I was Warner Brothers…” I didn’t talk about James Gunn. I thought it was the studio. If I was Warner Brothers and I’m a Muslim, I wouldn’t have a Zionist or a pro-Israeli in my movie. But I want to tell them that when I criticize Israel, I am not a threat to you as a Jew. And we can actually have more in common. That was more of a kind of empathic.
So when I said, that the internet went crazy, and James Gunn have haters because the Snyder-verse and all of this. It’s a world that I don’t understand. And James Gunn had all of these attacks on him, and I was pissed with how it was handled. I wasn’t angry at James Gunn, but I thought it was handled… So my publicist and manager is like, “Bassem, stay calm, don’t speak. It’s better to not talk about it.” I said, “Okay.”
So there’s nothing wrong about me, but I see the heat is rising against James Gunn. And that is a guy that I had a personal connection with, even through Zoom. And I didn’t like what was happening. And then he called me and he explained to me and said, “Bassem, I actually have camera tests before people, before finally…” I didn’t know that. “And then we changed the script and it was the strike. So I didn’t call.” And also I thought to myself, I’m small. I’m a small actor. I’m not that important for him to call me to say, “We’re going to change the script.”
So I still think that the timing sucks and everything. But then I went and I did a video explaining exactly what I’m telling you, because I didn’t want to be famous for the wrong reasons, because that would be unfair. Because already people were… and I was having interviews. “Can you come about to Superman?” I was like, ” Guys, that’s it. I’m not going to talk about it, because this is a non-issue.” And when I talked to James on the phone, I felt how sincere he was. So I didn’t want someone, because of me will, have that kind of attack, because I know what it means to be on the other side of that kind of attack. It’s terrible. And it ruins your life and it ruins your day. And nobody deserves to be doing that. And I don’t want to be the reason for someone else to go through that pain.
Lex Fridman
And you also said that you don’t want to be a victim.
And you also said that you don’t want to be a victim.
Bassem Youssef
Yeah, I don’t want to be. I’m doing great. I’m selling out everywhere. I’m having a wonderful, loyal audiences coming to me. Why I would be angry about the role of its Superman? Yes, it’s great to be in the superhero movies, but so what?
Yeah, I don’t want to be. I’m doing great. I’m selling out everywhere. I’m having a wonderful, loyal audiences coming to me. Why I would be angry about the role of its Superman? Yes, it’s great to be in the superhero movies, but so what?
Lex Fridman
There’s a wisdom in that. Even if you weren’t doing great, that’s a choice a lot of people can come to, which is like, do I play victim here or not?
There’s a wisdom in that. Even if you weren’t doing great, that’s a choice a lot of people can come to, which is like, do I play victim here or not?
Bassem Youssef
It’s greed. It’s greed. They want more attention. They want to be more into the thing. They want more and more. And there’s so much to go around to be enough for all of us. But it is-
It’s greed. It’s greed. They want more attention. They want to be more into the thing. They want more and more. And there’s so much to go around to be enough for all of us. But it is-
Bassem Youssef
There is so much to go around to be enough for all of us, but it’s great. It is ego, ego, ego, ego. I need to be in the center, I need to be victimized, I need to make people feel sorry for me and love me. It is not the right way. It is not because it is fake, it’s fake, it’s made up. I did not victimize myself when I left for Egypt. I speak about it now, but in that dark times, I was detained in airports. I didn’t have my American passport yet, I was still traveling with my Egyptian passport, and I was detained in an Arab airport and I was going to be delivered to the Egyptians.
There is so much to go around to be enough for all of us, but it’s great. It is ego, ego, ego, ego. I need to be in the center, I need to be victimized, I need to make people feel sorry for me and love me. It is not the right way. It is not because it is fake, it’s fake, it’s made up. I did not victimize myself when I left for Egypt. I speak about it now, but in that dark times, I was detained in airports. I didn’t have my American passport yet, I was still traveling with my Egyptian passport, and I was detained in an Arab airport and I was going to be delivered to the Egyptians.
I had shows, when I was still starting, I had hecklers being sent to me by the Egyptian embassy and Egyptian Consulate in New York and in London to curse me and to take videos of that and then send it to state-run media in Egypt. I didn’t speak about that because I felt that if I speak about that, I feel about what was going on to me, I would be victimizing myself. It’s like if I’m going to be good, I’m going to be good because of what I do, not because of what people’s perception of what I’m going through.
Lex Fridman
That becomes a slippery slope, and somehow victimizing yourself=
That becomes a slippery slope, and somehow victimizing yourself=
Bassem Youssef
Goes to more victimizing, and then you cannot leave that habit. You can only exist and thrive if people feel sorry for you.
Goes to more victimizing, and then you cannot leave that habit. You can only exist and thrive if people feel sorry for you.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, Israel and Palestine currently both have that temptation.
Yeah, Israel and Palestine currently both have that temptation.
Bassem Youssef
I would always push back when you do the comparison, because one of them is not really the same kind of power.
I would always push back when you do the comparison, because one of them is not really the same kind of power.
Lex Fridman
For sure, for you that’s a big problem.
For sure, for you that’s a big problem.
Bassem Youssef
It’s very easy to say why Palestinians would victimize themselves, but Israel, with all of that military white man, it’s too much. What Israel is doing is that they’re victimizing the Jewish experience, and I don’t think it’s fair for a lot of Jews. I don’t think that they should use the Holocaust and the persecution that happened to Jewish people all through history in order to push an equally oppressive agenda. That is not fair and it’s not good for the Jewish people living, and it is basically a disrespect to the memory of the Holocaust. I told you I want to make a movie about the Holocaust. I do, because what happened, that kind of engineered torture, should never happen again, and it should not be happening now.
It’s very easy to say why Palestinians would victimize themselves, but Israel, with all of that military white man, it’s too much. What Israel is doing is that they’re victimizing the Jewish experience, and I don’t think it’s fair for a lot of Jews. I don’t think that they should use the Holocaust and the persecution that happened to Jewish people all through history in order to push an equally oppressive agenda. That is not fair and it’s not good for the Jewish people living, and it is basically a disrespect to the memory of the Holocaust. I told you I want to make a movie about the Holocaust. I do, because what happened, that kind of engineered torture, should never happen again, and it should not be happening now.
Lex Fridman
To you, what Israel is doing is leading to more anti-Semitism in the world?
To you, what Israel is doing is leading to more anti-Semitism in the world?
Bassem Youssef
A hundred percent. Can I be a conspiracy theorist for a second?
A hundred percent. Can I be a conspiracy theorist for a second?
Lex Fridman
Please. There earth is flat, we all know this.
Please. There earth is flat, we all know this.
Bassem Youssef
A part of me thinking maybe they’re doing that intentionally, because if there’s a rise of anti-Semitism in Jews, there will always point like, “See, they hate us, so we can do whatever we want. If we let go of our might in our strength, we are going to go back to the concentration camps because you see how the word hates you.”
A part of me thinking maybe they’re doing that intentionally, because if there’s a rise of anti-Semitism in Jews, there will always point like, “See, they hate us, so we can do whatever we want. If we let go of our might in our strength, we are going to go back to the concentration camps because you see how the word hates you.”
Lex Fridman
Again, when you say “they”, are people in power.
Again, when you say “they”, are people in power.
Bassem Youssef
Yeah, absolutely. Listen, it’s always the people in power. I believe that humans are easily corruptible and easily repairable, but the corruptive part is much easier. People could change, but power, people in power are very dangerous. Very, very dangerous. Especially if you have religion – which is power by itself -military might, political support, and money. Dude, that’s a very, very, very dangerous recipe.
Yeah, absolutely. Listen, it’s always the people in power. I believe that humans are easily corruptible and easily repairable, but the corruptive part is much easier. People could change, but power, people in power are very dangerous. Very, very dangerous. Especially if you have religion – which is power by itself -military might, political support, and money. Dude, that’s a very, very, very dangerous recipe.
Lex Fridman
All that said, I do believe in the power of the little guy. The individual just overthrow the government. I don’t know if you heard, but the Arab Spring… It happens.
All that said, I do believe in the power of the little guy. The individual just overthrow the government. I don’t know if you heard, but the Arab Spring… It happens.
Bassem Youssef
We are here-
We are here-
Lex Fridman
Just among friends.
Just among friends.
Bassem Youssef
We are Americans, right?
We are Americans, right?
Lex Fridman
Yes.
Yes.
Bassem Youssef
We’re Americans
We’re Americans
Lex Fridman
Allegedly.
Allegedly.
Bassem Youssef
We’re Americans.
We’re Americans.
Lex Fridman
How funny is that? Just given our two backgrounds. We’re American.
How funny is that? Just given our two backgrounds. We’re American.
Bassem Youssef
We’re Americans. It’s like we’re Americans. There’s one thing about the power of the little guy that I am very sad about because you see… I love America by the way. I consider it my new home, and I want my kids to grow up here. I am very grateful for the opportunity that I have in the United States, and I criticize the United States politics, and I criticize it out of love. The same way that I was criticizing what’s happening of Egypt out of love. What is worrying for me is how the power of the little man is diminishing.
We’re Americans. It’s like we’re Americans. There’s one thing about the power of the little guy that I am very sad about because you see… I love America by the way. I consider it my new home, and I want my kids to grow up here. I am very grateful for the opportunity that I have in the United States, and I criticize the United States politics, and I criticize it out of love. The same way that I was criticizing what’s happening of Egypt out of love. What is worrying for me is how the power of the little man is diminishing.
It doesn’t matter now who you vote into power, they will not listen to you. They would listen to the people who paid them to be there, and it is very concerning because I can see the American democracies turning, not even slowly, very rapidly into an oligarchy. I’m sure that all of the millions of people who are voting, they don’t vote for the NRA, they don’t vote for APAC, they don’t vote for the pharmaceutical companies, they don’t vote for the military industry complex. Yet, the people in power, they come in, they take your vote and my vote, and they’re loyal to those people, not to us. It is very, very, very concerning. Very concerning. This is the danger of American policies, American politics and American democracies. It’s dangerous, because basically, the vote becomes just a ceremony that the someone with the more funding will get to power, and then he’s not loyal to you.
Lex Fridman
Still the fire. We are in Texas. Everybody’s armed to the teeth here.
Still the fire. We are in Texas. Everybody’s armed to the teeth here.
Bassem Youssef
What are these arms going to do in front of tanks?
What are these arms going to do in front of tanks?
Lex Fridman
You said the American military is unique in this way.
You said the American military is unique in this way.
Bassem Youssef
I know, but for now
I know, but for now
Lex Fridman
For now, the tanks are… First of all, I believe Russia has more tanks than the United States. Tanks. I’m not an expert in military strategic deployment of arms, but the United States uses different kinds of weapons.
For now, the tanks are… First of all, I believe Russia has more tanks than the United States. Tanks. I’m not an expert in military strategic deployment of arms, but the United States uses different kinds of weapons.
Bassem Youssef
They have drones and they have the lasers, and they’re sitting comfortably behind the screens. It’s kind of like it turns a big Xbox game.
They have drones and they have the lasers, and they’re sitting comfortably behind the screens. It’s kind of like it turns a big Xbox game.
Lex Fridman
They sell a lot of those things to everybody.
They sell a lot of those things to everybody.
Bassem Youssef
It’s crazy because the defense budget is 68% of American military, it’s like almost 850 billion each year. Most of that weapons, we don’t even need it. We just do it because of the contracts. There was an incredible 60 Minutes, I’m sure that you saw it, the one about the gouging of the prices of the Department of… It was one of the most fascinating things that I’ve ever seen. They say like a valve, a safety of a oil valve, that used to be sold for $329, now it’s sold for $9,000. Why? Because there’s only five weapon companies and they can control the prices, and in 2006, the whole Apache fleet of the American army in Iraq was grounded because there was one valve that they were gouging the price and didn’t want to give them. The Stinger missile, the one that you carry and it’s like the anti-aircraft, used to be sold for $25,000. Now it’s sold for $400,000. Nobody is doing that because the DOD has fired 130,000 people, including engineers and negotiators.
It’s crazy because the defense budget is 68% of American military, it’s like almost 850 billion each year. Most of that weapons, we don’t even need it. We just do it because of the contracts. There was an incredible 60 Minutes, I’m sure that you saw it, the one about the gouging of the prices of the Department of… It was one of the most fascinating things that I’ve ever seen. They say like a valve, a safety of a oil valve, that used to be sold for $329, now it’s sold for $9,000. Why? Because there’s only five weapon companies and they can control the prices, and in 2006, the whole Apache fleet of the American army in Iraq was grounded because there was one valve that they were gouging the price and didn’t want to give them. The Stinger missile, the one that you carry and it’s like the anti-aircraft, used to be sold for $25,000. Now it’s sold for $400,000. Nobody is doing that because the DOD has fired 130,000 people, including engineers and negotiators.
Now, in order to cut expenses, now we’re paying more money. The thing is, we do not have a say in this. We do not have a say in how my tax money and your tax money is being spent, because I’m sure you don’t want your money to be sent to Israel like that. I’m sure, even if you’re Jewish, I’m sure, I’m sure that I don’t want my money to be given to some Muslim countries who kill other Muslims. I’m sure. Here’s the thing, what kind of power do we have other than speaking? What is left for us is free speech. Now when you speak, they call you anti-Semitic. You see why I’m angry.
Lex Fridman
Still, America’s holding pretty strong despite the criticisms on the free speech front. If you look at the freedom of the press, freedom of the speech index, America is not at the top.
Still, America’s holding pretty strong despite the criticisms on the free speech front. If you look at the freedom of the press, freedom of the speech index, America is not at the top.
Bassem Youssef
It is not. This is why, for example, it is very disheartening for me to see that the Western media, Western press, that used to be the beacon of freedom as now using as mouthpieces. It is funny how Nixon got angry in the New York Times in 1971 when they found leaks about Tim lying about the Vietnam War since the beginning. Now, he hired the plumbers, the special units, in order to go in and find the leaks. This was Watergate basically, because he was angry to see who leaked that instead of fixing the problem. Now, the New York Times have published this story about the rape that was a hoax that was written by Anna Schwartz, someone will have no experience, and now when it was leaked, instead of them correcting themselves, they went in and they had their own investigation to see who leaked. The New York Times in 2003 became the mouthpiece of George W. Bush of the WMD, and now as an American, I see the New York Times becoming a mouthpiece of a foreign country? Why do you do that?
It is not. This is why, for example, it is very disheartening for me to see that the Western media, Western press, that used to be the beacon of freedom as now using as mouthpieces. It is funny how Nixon got angry in the New York Times in 1971 when they found leaks about Tim lying about the Vietnam War since the beginning. Now, he hired the plumbers, the special units, in order to go in and find the leaks. This was Watergate basically, because he was angry to see who leaked that instead of fixing the problem. Now, the New York Times have published this story about the rape that was a hoax that was written by Anna Schwartz, someone will have no experience, and now when it was leaked, instead of them correcting themselves, they went in and they had their own investigation to see who leaked. The New York Times in 2003 became the mouthpiece of George W. Bush of the WMD, and now as an American, I see the New York Times becoming a mouthpiece of a foreign country? Why do you do that?
TikTok
Lex Fridman
One of the things that’s really difficult to know is where to find the truth. It does seem that both sides use propaganda, and both sides lie a lot.
One of the things that’s really difficult to know is where to find the truth. It does seem that both sides use propaganda, and both sides lie a lot.
Bassem Youssef
Both sides as in?
Both sides as in?
Lex Fridman
Both Israel and Palestine. Pro-Palestine, Pro-Israel, there’s a lot of lies
Both Israel and Palestine. Pro-Palestine, Pro-Israel, there’s a lot of lies
Bassem Youssef
I know, but it’s a lot of inequality, man. There’s a lot of people on the internet, but who have the mainstream media siding with.
I know, but it’s a lot of inequality, man. There’s a lot of people on the internet, but who have the mainstream media siding with.
Lex Fridman
Thanks to social media.
Thanks to social media.
Bassem Youssef
Yes, thank God for social media, because now it’s individuals. They’re the people. They’re people. You are comparing BBC, New York Times, Washington Post with just people with a TikTok account.
Yes, thank God for social media, because now it’s individuals. They’re the people. They’re people. You are comparing BBC, New York Times, Washington Post with just people with a TikTok account.
Lex Fridman
Who have more power in your view?
Who have more power in your view?
Bassem Youssef
It is actually very, very fascinating to see the little man having that power over the media, because-
It is actually very, very fascinating to see the little man having that power over the media, because-
Lex Fridman
In fact, disproportionately so. This is my problem.
In fact, disproportionately so. This is my problem.
Bassem Youssef
You cannot call people with TikTok propagandists while people being paid to casually give you the news and they deliberately lie to you.
You cannot call people with TikTok propagandists while people being paid to casually give you the news and they deliberately lie to you.
Lex Fridman
Yes, I can. They’re both propagandists.
Yes, I can. They’re both propagandists.
Bassem Youssef
Yes, but the mechanism and the intentions are different because here’s the thing-
Yes, but the mechanism and the intentions are different because here’s the thing-
Lex Fridman
I’d rather have the TikTok guy than the…
I’d rather have the TikTok guy than the…
Bassem Youssef
The TikTok guy is a TikTok guy, but if you have the New York Times being exposed to be lying, and then they get this UN report, which is like a disgrace, and you just put the title and you don’t talk about it. I’m fine with CNN and Jake Tapper and all of those people spreading the rape allegations for years. I don’t even want them to refute them, I want them to bring the Israeli reports saying that it didn’t happen. The Israeli media themselves, they didn’t even bother, not once. Is that balanced? That’s not, so that’s why people in TikTok, because they have to take matters in their own hand.
The TikTok guy is a TikTok guy, but if you have the New York Times being exposed to be lying, and then they get this UN report, which is like a disgrace, and you just put the title and you don’t talk about it. I’m fine with CNN and Jake Tapper and all of those people spreading the rape allegations for years. I don’t even want them to refute them, I want them to bring the Israeli reports saying that it didn’t happen. The Israeli media themselves, they didn’t even bother, not once. Is that balanced? That’s not, so that’s why people in TikTok, because they have to take matters in their own hand.
Lex Fridman
The problem with the people in TikTok is the drug, the dopamine rush, of getting a lot of likes. Instead of talking about the death of civilians, they’ll talk about beheaded babies, or the equivalent of. They’re going to actually make up stories, because the made up stories are going to be more viral. Now, we’re just in the sea, in this muck of lies.
The problem with the people in TikTok is the drug, the dopamine rush, of getting a lot of likes. Instead of talking about the death of civilians, they’ll talk about beheaded babies, or the equivalent of. They’re going to actually make up stories, because the made up stories are going to be more viral. Now, we’re just in the sea, in this muck of lies.
Bassem Youssef
There’s a lot of people who actually exposed those lies on TikTok. You have both.
There’s a lot of people who actually exposed those lies on TikTok. You have both.
Lex Fridman
True.
True.
Bassem Youssef
You have both. It’s kind of like the democracy of the social media as we always it. But if you have the street-run media that is the legacy media, CNN, BBC, New York Times, Fox News, all of those people, and they are spreading lies and they’re not even doing the journalistic job in order to at least bring the other side, that’s problematic.
You have both. It’s kind of like the democracy of the social media as we always it. But if you have the street-run media that is the legacy media, CNN, BBC, New York Times, Fox News, all of those people, and they are spreading lies and they’re not even doing the journalistic job in order to at least bring the other side, that’s problematic.
Lex Fridman
That’s worse. You’re supposed to be journalists.
That’s worse. You’re supposed to be journalists.
Bassem Youssef
It’s supposed to be report. Report.
It’s supposed to be report. Report.
Lex Fridman
I see that this as a catalyst, an inspiration, for the citizen journalists to rise up.
I see that this as a catalyst, an inspiration, for the citizen journalists to rise up.
Bassem Youssef
This is what you’re doing.
This is what you’re doing.
Lex Fridman
This, yeah,
This, yeah,
Bassem Youssef
This is what you’re doing. No, this is what you’re doing, because you go into a deep dive. This is a no filter thing. There’s no spin.
This is what you’re doing. No, this is what you’re doing, because you go into a deep dive. This is a no filter thing. There’s no spin.
Lex Fridman
The long form, the long form is going to save us.
The long form, the long form is going to save us.
Bassem Youssef
I see why you hate the TikToks, like a dopamine rush.
I see why you hate the TikToks, like a dopamine rush.
Lex Fridman
Stupid TikTok. Five hours later.
Stupid TikTok. Five hours later.
Bassem Youssef
I saw the resentment in your face.
I saw the resentment in your face.
Lex Fridman
Can’t look away.
Can’t look away.
Bassem Youssef
Those 30 seconds, I do four hours.
Those 30 seconds, I do four hours.
Lex Fridman
Both have a place, both are exciting, but it is very dangerous because you can’t look away. I almost never, maybe I’m doing it wrong, but I almost never feel better ever after having used TikTok.
Both have a place, both are exciting, but it is very dangerous because you can’t look away. I almost never, maybe I’m doing it wrong, but I almost never feel better ever after having used TikTok.
Bassem Youssef
Makes two of us. I can’t. I have a team. By the way, I give my password to a team. I don’t even go there because once in a dark night, very late at night, I went TikTok, and it was like, two hours. What?
Makes two of us. I can’t. I have a team. By the way, I give my password to a team. I don’t even go there because once in a dark night, very late at night, I went TikTok, and it was like, two hours. What?
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Bassem Youssef
What? I said, ” No, this is dangerous.” I’m really like an Instagram and Facebook guy. I don’t need that.
What? I said, ” No, this is dangerous.” I’m really like an Instagram and Facebook guy. I don’t need that.
Lex Fridman
Even there, man.
Even there, man.
Bassem Youssef
I barely get out of Twitter, I mean X, I can’t. It’s a cesspool. It’s just like the concentrated hate, X is too much. It’s too much. I can’t.
I barely get out of Twitter, I mean X, I can’t. It’s a cesspool. It’s just like the concentrated hate, X is too much. It’s too much. I can’t.
Lex Fridman
You don’t check it at all, you try not to check it at all? It is very intense.
You don’t check it at all, you try not to check it at all? It is very intense.
Bassem Youssef
I don’t, I post something and I run.
I don’t, I post something and I run.
Lex Fridman
Post and ghost. You’re doing comedy here in the United States right now?
Post and ghost. You’re doing comedy here in the United States right now?
Joe Rogan
Bassem Youssef
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
Joe Rogan has the Comedy Mothership, which is an incredible club. Have you considered doing that club?
Joe Rogan has the Comedy Mothership, which is an incredible club. Have you considered doing that club?
Bassem Youssef
I would love to.
I would love to.
Lex Fridman
Do you know Joe?
Do you know Joe?
Bassem Youssef
Of course. Who doesn’t new Joe?
Of course. Who doesn’t new Joe?
Lex Fridman
I feel like it’s a small world of comedy. That’s why I…
I feel like it’s a small world of comedy. That’s why I…
Bassem Youssef
I think Joe’s story, like what he did and stuff that he did in the UFC and his podcast, it’s very impressive. The fact that he’s there and he’s bringing all of those people, whether in comedy or his podcast, is very impressive. This is what the media is all about, what the internet is all about, to give you the experiences of stuff that you might never experience. That is very important. You do it with people where you go into their brains. He goes, takes people, and they take their experiences and their lives and their stories. It’s very interesting. This is the beauty of that art form, because you have all of these experiences at the tips of your hands and it’s there for you to learn from. When he moved to Texas and we did the Comedy Mothership, anybody who would push comedy forward, that is the most difficult art form and the most demanding. The fact that you do that, and he might not even be making money out of it, but he’s doing that because of his passion, that is enough.
I think Joe’s story, like what he did and stuff that he did in the UFC and his podcast, it’s very impressive. The fact that he’s there and he’s bringing all of those people, whether in comedy or his podcast, is very impressive. This is what the media is all about, what the internet is all about, to give you the experiences of stuff that you might never experience. That is very important. You do it with people where you go into their brains. He goes, takes people, and they take their experiences and their lives and their stories. It’s very interesting. This is the beauty of that art form, because you have all of these experiences at the tips of your hands and it’s there for you to learn from. When he moved to Texas and we did the Comedy Mothership, anybody who would push comedy forward, that is the most difficult art form and the most demanding. The fact that you do that, and he might not even be making money out of it, but he’s doing that because of his passion, that is enough.
Lex Fridman
He really believes in creating this place where comedians could be really free. One of the cool things about the Comedy Mothership is comedian is king there. You have to bow down to the…
He really believes in creating this place where comedians could be really free. One of the cool things about the Comedy Mothership is comedian is king there. You have to bow down to the…
Bassem Youssef
Because the comedian who came there came after eating shit, dying out there.
Because the comedian who came there came after eating shit, dying out there.
Lex Fridman
Eating shit everywhere else.
Eating shit everywhere else.
Bassem Youssef
Basically, you’re a saint.
Basically, you’re a saint.
Lex Fridman
I have eaten shit for many years.
I have eaten shit for many years.
Bassem Youssef
Now, I’m going to give you shit.
Now, I’m going to give you shit.
Joe Biden
Lex Fridman
You already told me what you think about the state of politics in the United States, but now tell me what you really think. What do you think of the choice of Trump versus Biden? How did we end up here?
You already told me what you think about the state of politics in the United States, but now tell me what you really think. What do you think of the choice of Trump versus Biden? How did we end up here?
Bassem Youssef
I don’t know, man. The fact that you have two people over the age of 90, it is-
I don’t know, man. The fact that you have two people over the age of 90, it is-
Lex Fridman
I think it’s over a hundred, but that’s all right.
I think it’s over a hundred, but that’s all right.
Bassem Youssef
Combined like 170. It is so sad. It is so sad that this is what we can produce as a society, like a demagogue and a sleepy Joe. He’s not there, man. He’s gone. He’s gone. When old people could be a danger for themselves, he’s a danger for the whole world. The whole world. If an old person would die who would have a hip replacement, we can need them a new planet because of one decision. It’s not just that, it’s not that. I am a Democrat, and I told you I vote for Bernie Sanders. I supported him 2016, but I couldn’t vote then. Of course, a huge fan of Obama. One of my things is he’s the first Muslim president, but he killed Muslims. It’s like, that’s things Muslims do.
Combined like 170. It is so sad. It is so sad that this is what we can produce as a society, like a demagogue and a sleepy Joe. He’s not there, man. He’s gone. He’s gone. When old people could be a danger for themselves, he’s a danger for the whole world. The whole world. If an old person would die who would have a hip replacement, we can need them a new planet because of one decision. It’s not just that, it’s not that. I am a Democrat, and I told you I vote for Bernie Sanders. I supported him 2016, but I couldn’t vote then. Of course, a huge fan of Obama. One of my things is he’s the first Muslim president, but he killed Muslims. It’s like, that’s things Muslims do.
Lex Fridman
I love that line.
I love that line.
Bassem Youssef
I think the whole idea, my shock, is… I told you about what Biden said about “I’m a Zionist.” Okay, you’re a Zionist, but then it’s, “Jews are not safe in anywhere other than Israel.” It’s like, dude, what the hell are you saying? If you don’t care about me and you don’t care about my misery, why would I care about you winning or losing? I have a joke that I told people. Why would even Biden listen to us? He just raised $ 145 million in California alone from pro-Israeli groups. What can we, Arabs, working in the vape business do to him? We cannot compete with that. Practically. Life is unfair. The guy’s a politician. He needs bills to pay. He needs a campaign to run. He needs money. He will go to the people who will give me money. Joe Biden is the highest paid politician from Israeli lobbyists, $4.6 million over the years.
I think the whole idea, my shock, is… I told you about what Biden said about “I’m a Zionist.” Okay, you’re a Zionist, but then it’s, “Jews are not safe in anywhere other than Israel.” It’s like, dude, what the hell are you saying? If you don’t care about me and you don’t care about my misery, why would I care about you winning or losing? I have a joke that I told people. Why would even Biden listen to us? He just raised $ 145 million in California alone from pro-Israeli groups. What can we, Arabs, working in the vape business do to him? We cannot compete with that. Practically. Life is unfair. The guy’s a politician. He needs bills to pay. He needs a campaign to run. He needs money. He will go to the people who will give me money. Joe Biden is the highest paid politician from Israeli lobbyists, $4.6 million over the years.
Lex Fridman
I also believe in great leaders that go against all of that. Unfortunately-
I also believe in great leaders that go against all of that. Unfortunately-
Bassem Youssef
Bernie Sanders was like that.
Bernie Sanders was like that.
Lex Fridman
Bernie Sanders, yes, but also age. I don’t want to be ageist.
Bernie Sanders, yes, but also age. I don’t want to be ageist.
Bassem Youssef
Of course, no.
Of course, no.
Lex Fridman
Because I remember listening to Bernie Sanders 20 years ago on Tom Hartman show, and I don’t want to say anything against Bernie, but he was sharper then.
Because I remember listening to Bernie Sanders 20 years ago on Tom Hartman show, and I don’t want to say anything against Bernie, but he was sharper then.
Bassem Youssef
Of course.
Of course.
Lex Fridman
There’s a thing with age.
There’s a thing with age.
Bassem Youssef
Of course. I think I’m a huge fan about putting a limit on your working years, because you don’t want to have a Mitch McConnell moment every now. Because now the whole thing of what is this, isn’t this not like a horse by [inaudible 02:31:17]? It is unfair. It is unfair. The whole idea that you have unlimited… You have a limit for the president, but you don’t have a limit for Congress people and senators? What do you mean? This is, basically, you can go in and be in governance forever, and the longer that you can get, the more corrupt you’ll get.
Of course. I think I’m a huge fan about putting a limit on your working years, because you don’t want to have a Mitch McConnell moment every now. Because now the whole thing of what is this, isn’t this not like a horse by [inaudible 02:31:17]? It is unfair. It is unfair. The whole idea that you have unlimited… You have a limit for the president, but you don’t have a limit for Congress people and senators? What do you mean? This is, basically, you can go in and be in governance forever, and the longer that you can get, the more corrupt you’ll get.
Lex Fridman
Yes, that’s the thing.
Yes, that’s the thing.
Bassem Youssef
That is very concerning for Americans.
That is very concerning for Americans.
Lex Fridman
Everybody. Everybody becomes corrupt after. That’s why two terms is a good limit.
Everybody. Everybody becomes corrupt after. That’s why two terms is a good limit.
Bassem Youssef
For everybody.
For everybody.
Lex Fridman
Maybe half a term for Egyptian leaders.
Maybe half a term for Egyptian leaders.
Bassem Youssef
Our half-term is 15 years,
Our half-term is 15 years,
Lex Fridman
Quarter term. You should come back and run for office there.
Quarter term. You should come back and run for office there.
Bassem Youssef
Oh my god, no. There’s a curse in Egyptian of Egyptian presidency. No, nobody comes there. He is either dead or in jail. It’s not the most appealing job.
Oh my god, no. There’s a curse in Egyptian of Egyptian presidency. No, nobody comes there. He is either dead or in jail. It’s not the most appealing job.
Lex Fridman
They might make a statue of you though. Make you look good.
They might make a statue of you though. Make you look good.
Bassem Youssef
After my death. I look very good dead.
After my death. I look very good dead.
Putin
Lex Fridman
When you look at what happened with Navalny, since you kind of really thought about this in Egypt, what happened with Navalny in Russia? What do you think about that?
When you look at what happened with Navalny, since you kind of really thought about this in Egypt, what happened with Navalny in Russia? What do you think about that?
Bassem Youssef
What happened in Navalny in Russia is not something new in Russia. Putin have this whole history of poisoning and killing people. I would have to cite credit Putin. He’s bringing us the essence of the dark ages, the Middle Ages. Basically, Putin is the living example of what happens if Game of Thrones was reality. It’s like, death by poison. Like blow up a plane, it like mysteriously disappears. It is very dark, but it’s like, wow, it’s a television show.
What happened in Navalny in Russia is not something new in Russia. Putin have this whole history of poisoning and killing people. I would have to cite credit Putin. He’s bringing us the essence of the dark ages, the Middle Ages. Basically, Putin is the living example of what happens if Game of Thrones was reality. It’s like, death by poison. Like blow up a plane, it like mysteriously disappears. It is very dark, but it’s like, wow, it’s a television show.
Lex Fridman
Maybe that’s what attracts us to that part of the world is that it’s so much on display, this game of power, of geopolitics, of war.
Maybe that’s what attracts us to that part of the world is that it’s so much on display, this game of power, of geopolitics, of war.
Bassem Youssef
The same happens in the West, but behind closed doors. It’s not that open, it’s not that pronounced. It’s like, “Oops, Epstein.” I think because the West is more advanced in movies and cinemas, we kind of direct it better. I think the outcome is the way that you kind of set the scene, it’s like scene, and scene.
The same happens in the West, but behind closed doors. It’s not that open, it’s not that pronounced. It’s like, “Oops, Epstein.” I think because the West is more advanced in movies and cinemas, we kind of direct it better. I think the outcome is the way that you kind of set the scene, it’s like scene, and scene.
Lex Fridman
That’s why people about landing on the moon, they’re like… I get it, but we haven’t gone back.
That’s why people about landing on the moon, they’re like… I get it, but we haven’t gone back.
Bassem Youssef
The Earth is flat.
The Earth is flat.
War
Lex Fridman
If we zoom out, do you think there will always be war in the world?
If we zoom out, do you think there will always be war in the world?
Bassem Youssef
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
Always be suffering? Yes?
Always be suffering? Yes?
Bassem Youssef
Yeah. But, here’s the thing, I don’t think for long. I don’t think that will happen for them.
Yeah. But, here’s the thing, I don’t think for long. I don’t think that will happen for them.
Lex Fridman
Wait a minute.
Wait a minute.
Bassem Youssef
Because here’s the thing. Humanity is destined to have war, it will have war, but something happened in the last 50 years. Now, we have much more lethal weapons. The problem is the beginning, it’s like swords against swords, horses, cavalry, like cannons, catapults, medium-sized. But now, like a press of a button, you can annihilate the whole planet, and this is the problem. Wars will always continue, the problem is when is going to be the tipping point where we are actually going to destroy ourselves. It is so easy now to destroy ourselves. The amount of weapons and the quality of weapons that we have, it is designed to kill more effectively. It is crazy. It’s like we can create our own destruction on ourselves, and I think we are not that far away from it.
Because here’s the thing. Humanity is destined to have war, it will have war, but something happened in the last 50 years. Now, we have much more lethal weapons. The problem is the beginning, it’s like swords against swords, horses, cavalry, like cannons, catapults, medium-sized. But now, like a press of a button, you can annihilate the whole planet, and this is the problem. Wars will always continue, the problem is when is going to be the tipping point where we are actually going to destroy ourselves. It is so easy now to destroy ourselves. The amount of weapons and the quality of weapons that we have, it is designed to kill more effectively. It is crazy. It’s like we can create our own destruction on ourselves, and I think we are not that far away from it.
Lex Fridman
Just looking at nuclear weapons. The fascinating thing about nuclear weapons is I’ve gotten to learn recently just how few people are involved in a full on nuclear war that basically kills everybody. Three plus billion people right away.
Just looking at nuclear weapons. The fascinating thing about nuclear weapons is I’ve gotten to learn recently just how few people are involved in a full on nuclear war that basically kills everybody. Three plus billion people right away.
Bassem Youssef
The consequences the of the nuclear winter, it’s unlivable.
The consequences the of the nuclear winter, it’s unlivable.
Lex Fridman
All it takes is one president can do it. It could be even a false alarm, misunderstanding,
All it takes is one president can do it. It could be even a false alarm, misunderstanding,
Bassem Youssef
Like what happened in the Cuba Missile crisis.
Like what happened in the Cuba Missile crisis.
Lex Fridman
Again. And now there’s more nations are prepared and ready to launch. I don’t know.
Again. And now there’s more nations are prepared and ready to launch. I don’t know.
Bassem Youssef
You have a media and a 24 hours kind of thing that makes you at edge the whole time. That’s that’s crazy.
You have a media and a 24 hours kind of thing that makes you at edge the whole time. That’s that’s crazy.
Lex Fridman
There’s a dark perspective on this where there’s certain members of the media that would kind of enjoy the prospect of nuclear war a little bit. Just let’s get as close to it as possible.
There’s a dark perspective on this where there’s certain members of the media that would kind of enjoy the prospect of nuclear war a little bit. Just let’s get as close to it as possible.
Bassem Youssef
You have another factor that will contribute to that: religion. Remember how the radical Islamists talk about the end of time and whatever, but most of the Islamists don’t have that much power. Problem is with Christian Zionists now being on the top of the world with America, they have been pushing for that kind of conflict to kind of escalate, escalate. Listen to Sarah Palin’s “God wants us here”, like Karl Rove, “All of the new gods”, the Dispensationalist Reagan. Here’s an incredible book called Forcing the Hands of God. Beautiful book I read. It’s published 1998, but it still matters today. The whole idea about, especially the Zionist Christians who love Israel, but they hate the Jews, they’re anti-Semites but they love Israel because of its role. This is all basically formed because of the interpretation of the Bible of Schofield and how they talk about the end of time, then Armageddon, and then the late great planet Earth, and then left behind Sirius and all of that.
You have another factor that will contribute to that: religion. Remember how the radical Islamists talk about the end of time and whatever, but most of the Islamists don’t have that much power. Problem is with Christian Zionists now being on the top of the world with America, they have been pushing for that kind of conflict to kind of escalate, escalate. Listen to Sarah Palin’s “God wants us here”, like Karl Rove, “All of the new gods”, the Dispensationalist Reagan. Here’s an incredible book called Forcing the Hands of God. Beautiful book I read. It’s published 1998, but it still matters today. The whole idea about, especially the Zionist Christians who love Israel, but they hate the Jews, they’re anti-Semites but they love Israel because of its role. This is all basically formed because of the interpretation of the Bible of Schofield and how they talk about the end of time, then Armageddon, and then the late great planet Earth, and then left behind Sirius and all of that.
It’s all about, we are heading to Armageddon. The problem is Islam, they’re people that believe that at the end of time. Then, we have the Christians that believe in the end of time. Then, you have Israel happy that those people are using it for the end of time. Then, the whole idea about them pushing as many weapons and troops and people in the Middle East to be there for the nuclear Holocaust. John Hagee, one of the pastors talk about that, about the brimstones and it’s not going to be a nuclear Holocaust. It’s crazy how people are so despising life that they are wanting death. Now, you all would have these revelations, but these revelations mean nothing if you don’t have an effective weapon in order to make it happen. This is the crazy thing, and I’m worried that the end is going to be by someone that wants to meet God a little bit earlier.
Lex Fridman
Somebody who’s really in a hurry. I have good news for you, maybe we’ll become a multi-planetary species.
Somebody who’s really in a hurry. I have good news for you, maybe we’ll become a multi-planetary species.
Bassem Youssef
Maybe Elon Musk will lead the way.
Maybe Elon Musk will lead the way.
Lex Fridman
To get out in space.
To get out in space.
Bassem Youssef
Maybe he’s one of them. He’s a secret lizard.
Maybe he’s one of them. He’s a secret lizard.
Lex Fridman
I asked you offline to not mention the lizard people. They are-
I asked you offline to not mention the lizard people. They are-
Bassem Youssef
There’s like a whole people that believe in the lizard people, it’s crazy.
There’s like a whole people that believe in the lizard people, it’s crazy.
Lex Fridman
I actually have to be honest, I haven’t fully looked into lizard people. I probably should.
I actually have to be honest, I haven’t fully looked into lizard people. I probably should.
Bassem Youssef
You should.
You should.
Lex Fridman
Maybe I’m afraid of the truth.
Maybe I’m afraid of the truth.
Bassem Youssef
Removing my face.
Removing my face.
Hope
Lex Fridman
Let’s say you’re wrong about the end of the world,-
Let’s say you’re wrong about the end of the world,-
Bassem Youssef
I hope so.
I hope so.
Lex Fridman
And it all turns out great and humanity flourishes. Why would that happen? What gives you hope for that trajectory for humanity?
And it all turns out great and humanity flourishes. Why would that happen? What gives you hope for that trajectory for humanity?
Bassem Youssef
Younger people, the people of TikTok that you don’t like. There is a lot of bullshit there.
Younger people, the people of TikTok that you don’t like. There is a lot of bullshit there.
Lex Fridman
After you saying this, people just keep sending you TikTok videos. These younger people, these younger people?
After you saying this, people just keep sending you TikTok videos. These younger people, these younger people?
Bassem Youssef
This woman showing her boobs, that woman?
This woman showing her boobs, that woman?
Lex Fridman
That’s going to save us? All right, awesome. Thank you.
That’s going to save us? All right, awesome. Thank you.
Bassem Youssef
Remember the joke that said, we thought that when we have internet, we’re going to have be more informed, and now we are watching twerking videos. That is true. But on the other side, the fact that you have the availability of information, I’m learning a lot. There’s people who are using that platform for that. It’s not the majority because it’s not very interesting and exciting, but I think there might be a tipping point where there’s enough people that will be aware and maybe they would collectively do something in order to bring back the power to the small man. Maybe it sounds very naive, but we don’t know. We don’t know, because you have already seen the legacy media and the legacy politicians shaking in the past few months.
Remember the joke that said, we thought that when we have internet, we’re going to have be more informed, and now we are watching twerking videos. That is true. But on the other side, the fact that you have the availability of information, I’m learning a lot. There’s people who are using that platform for that. It’s not the majority because it’s not very interesting and exciting, but I think there might be a tipping point where there’s enough people that will be aware and maybe they would collectively do something in order to bring back the power to the small man. Maybe it sounds very naive, but we don’t know. We don’t know, because you have already seen the legacy media and the legacy politicians shaking in the past few months.
Lex Fridman
They’re getting nervous.
They’re getting nervous.
Bassem Youssef
They’re getting nervous because people are calling them out, and those people were hiding behind their desk, behind in their offices and not to holding out how to support that. People now are calling them out. It is not going to happen this year or next year. But I think it’s something.
They’re getting nervous because people are calling them out, and those people were hiding behind their desk, behind in their offices and not to holding out how to support that. People now are calling them out. It is not going to happen this year or next year. But I think it’s something.
Lex Fridman
What advice would you give to those young folks?
What advice would you give to those young folks?
Bassem Youssef
I will never give advice to those people.
I will never give advice to those people.
Lex Fridman
Get off TikTok.
Get off TikTok.
Bassem Youssef
I will never, because their input is different than mine. There’s one thing I learned when people saw me. Did the revolution fail in Egypt? The revolution is not an event. It’s not like, “Hey, we go in, we topple the government.” That’s not a revolution. A revolution is a process, it’s a very long process, and maybe that process, as much as we don’t like what happened in the Arab War, but the people there, the awareness that happened and the discussions that have been opened that you didn’t even imagine would happen in the Middle East is happening. Maybe the beginning of any hope of change is that people start talking, speaking out, talking about stuff they were not allowed to speak about. Like, for example, Israel.
I will never, because their input is different than mine. There’s one thing I learned when people saw me. Did the revolution fail in Egypt? The revolution is not an event. It’s not like, “Hey, we go in, we topple the government.” That’s not a revolution. A revolution is a process, it’s a very long process, and maybe that process, as much as we don’t like what happened in the Arab War, but the people there, the awareness that happened and the discussions that have been opened that you didn’t even imagine would happen in the Middle East is happening. Maybe the beginning of any hope of change is that people start talking, speaking out, talking about stuff they were not allowed to speak about. Like, for example, Israel.
Lex Fridman
The revolution continues. Bassem, you’re a beautiful human being. It was truly a pleasure and honor to meet you, I can just feel the love radiating from you. I hope I get to see you perform live. I hope to get to see you many more times. Thank you for being who you are.
The revolution continues. Bassem, you’re a beautiful human being. It was truly a pleasure and honor to meet you, I can just feel the love radiating from you. I hope I get to see you perform live. I hope to get to see you many more times. Thank you for being who you are.
Bassem Youssef
Thank you so much. AI would love to invite you for my new special, the Islamo-Nazi Bassem.
Thank you so much. AI would love to invite you for my new special, the Islamo-Nazi Bassem.
Lex Fridman
That should be the title of your autobiography.
That should be the title of your autobiography.
Bassem Youssef
Islamo-Nazi. Thank you so much.
Islamo-Nazi. Thank you so much.
Lex Fridman
Thank you, brother. Thanks for listening to this conversation with Bassem Youssef. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. Now, let me leave you some words from John Stewart: “The press can hold this magnifying glass up to our problems, bringing them into focus, illuminating issues heretofore unseen, or they can use that magnifying glass to light ants on fire and then perhaps host a week of shows on the sudden, unexpected, dangerous, flaming ant epidemic. If we amplify everything, we hear nothing.” Thank you for listening, and hope to see you next time.
Thank you, brother. Thanks for listening to this conversation with Bassem Youssef. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. Now, let me leave you some words from John Stewart: “The press can hold this magnifying glass up to our problems, bringing them into focus, illuminating issues heretofore unseen, or they can use that magnifying glass to light ants on fire and then perhaps host a week of shows on the sudden, unexpected, dangerous, flaming ant epidemic. If we amplify everything, we hear nothing.” Thank you for listening, and hope to see you next time.
Transcript for Tulsi Gabbard: War, Politics, and the Military Industrial Complex | Lex Fridman Podcast #423
This is a transcript of Lex Fridman Podcast #423 with Tulsi Gabbard.
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This is a Lex Fridman podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description.
And now, dear friends, here’s Tulsi Gabbard.
You’ve served in the US military for many years, achieving rank of Lieutenant Colonel. You were deployed in Iraq in 2004 and ’05, Kuwait in ’08 and ’09. What lessons about life and about country have you learned from that experience of war?
Of course, I served in a medical unit during that first deployment to Iraq. It was 2005 during the height of that war, and unfortunately we took a lot of casualties. We, across the entire US military, my brigade that I deployed with was from the Hawaii National Guard. We had approximately 3000 soldiers who were operating in four different areas of Iraq. And my first task every day was to go through a list of every combat related injury that had occurred the day before in the country.
I went through that list name by name, looking to see if any one of our nearly 3000 soldiers from Hawaii had been hurt in the line of duty. And then, if seeing them on the list, tracking them down. Where were they? Were they getting the care they needed? Would they be able to get sufficient care to stay in the country and return to duty? Did I need to get them evacuated? Usually it would be to military hospitals that at that time were in Landstuhl and Ramstein in Germany. And then from there, getting them to either Brooke Army Medical Center, which is here in Texas, that specialized in burn related injuries, or to Walter Reed, and tracking them and their care until they were finally home with their families. It never became a routine task. It never became like, okay, cool, check the list, kind of dot the Is, cross the Ts. It was that daily confrontation with the reality of the cost of war. Friends of mine were killed in combat.
Experiencing firsthand that high human cost of war caused me, a 20-something-year-old from Hawaii… I had left my seat in the state legislature to volunteer to deploy with my brothers and sisters in my unit to Iraq, and so recognize the cost of war, I think, in two fundamental ways. Number one is the high human cost of war on our troops and on the people in the country where this war was being waged. And also the cost on American taxpayers.
Seeing then, back again in 2005, and recognizing KBR Halliburton, one of the biggest defense contracting companies then, and I know that they’re still very much in that business now, Dick Cheney being connected with that company at one point or another, but in our camp specifically, which was one of the larger ones in Iraq at that time, there wasn’t anything that happened in our camp that didn’t have the KBR Halliburton logo imprinted on it. We had a big shack, a place where we ate our meals. They call it a dining facility, a DFAC in the military. They served four meals a day. They brought in, and they being KBR Halliburton, they imported workers in from places like Nepal and Sri Lanka and the Philippines to come in and cook food and work at this dining facility.
I got curious about how much it costs us as taxpayers. And so I started asking around some of the people, and I think at that time it was like, well, every time a soldier or a service member walks through the door, if I were to go in for breakfast and grab a banana and walk out, that’s an automatic $35 per head per meal four times a day, thousands and thousands of people.
And then we made friends. There’s a pretty large Filipino community in Hawaii. A lot of Filipino soldiers from Hawaii. We made friends with the Filipino workers who were there. They would often go in the back of the tents and set up their own rice cookers and cook their own meals, which is where the real good food was. But just started talking to them and getting to know them and asked like, “Hey, how much do you get paid?” And on average it was like, “Oh, I get paid like 500 bucks a month.” 500 bucks a month to go and do this work of either cleaning out porta-potties, picking up trash, the dining facility, doing laundry, all of these different tasks, because the military wanted soldiers to be out doing things that only soldiers could do. Understandable. But when I started putting two and two together and knowing that this company, one company alone, was making trillions of dollars, trillions of dollars, and yet this Filipino mom is making 500 bucks a month, maybe getting one day off a week, maybe, working 12 hours a day otherwise. And I said, “How often are you able to go home to your family?” “Well, they’ll let us go home a couple of weeks every other year.”
It was an eye-opening experience that growing up in Hawaii, I frankly hadn’t given much thought to before, but it’s what led me ultimately coming back from that first deployment there was no way that I could go back to the life that I had left behind. And I knew somehow, someway I needed to find a way to use those experiences to try to make a positive impact, to try to influence those… I mean, frankly, the politicians who are making decisions to go and launch these regime-change wars and send our men and women in uniform into war, and to what end, ultimately.
What my dad told me later when I got home after that deployment was that every time they saw the news, and they saw a helicopter shot down or crashed or some IED, they held their breath until they saw or heard the news of who it was or what it was.
For soldiers, of course, we all have our own political opinions on things, but when it comes right down to it in a war zone, it’s about your friends. It’s about your brothers and sisters that you’re serving alongside. It’s not about the politicians or whatever insanity is going on in Washington. It’s about getting up and going out, getting the job done and coming back home together.
I had friends of mine who were from Hawaii, who were from American Samoa, a very culturally tight-knit community, who confided in me throughout that year that we were there, infantry soldiers who were going out on security patrols and doing raids every day, just some of the very traumatic experiences that they went through. No physical injury, but creating a kind of emotional stress and trauma that, as human beings, they were struggling in dealing with.
On a positive note, Polynesian culture especially, but also Asian culture and other cultures around the world, our guys found that shortly after we got there, the unit that we were replacing were taking the guys out on patrol and saying, “Hey, here’s this village. Here’s where we found friendlies.” Or, “Here’s where we know that there are insurgents operating, and they’ve got allies and lookouts.” And showing them the lay of the land basically.
And what our guys found was that as they were doing these ride-alongs, they call it a left seat, right seat when you’re coming in and taking over, that there was a bit of a tense, even adversarial type of relationship, where on the military side there was an assumption of suspicion or lack of trust just with the locally Iraqi people who lived around the base that we were at. And without anybody telling them to culturally, our guys began trying to build relationships.
For Hawaii and Samoa, and we had soldiers from Guam and Saipan, little things like you’re riding down in a Humvee, you’ve got a gunner in the turret with a 50 cal or a machine gun of some sort, little things like pointing the muzzle to the sky as you’re riding through a town rather than pointing it directly at where people are walking down the street was a huge gesture of an assumption of, “Hey, let’s actually talk and become friends.” We had our guys riding down the street and throwing shakas out to the local people there, breaking bread, sharing tea, and building those relationships.
Again, I served in a medical unit and what we saw was a downward shift in casualties from the unit that had been there before us, simply because of that basic human connection that our guys sought to make. And then, gradually, finding local people who lived in the town right next to us were saying, “Hey, you guys, somebody was digging a big hole a mile down the road. You might want to bypass that or check that out.” And finding weapons, caches and IEDs, improvised explosive devices, and other things that helped save people’s lives.
We see it with our own Secretary of Defense now. He retired as a general officer, went and served on one of the boards for one of the big defense contractors, and then now back as the Secretary of Defense. We see the same thing in Congress with members of Congress and senior professional staffers in Congress. Same exact revolving door where you have people, whether they’re writing contracts for the Department of Defense, for the company that then wins the bid for that contract, and then going and working for that company. Or those in Congress who are writing policies and doing exactly the same thing.
I support the initial mission that lifted off shortly after the attack on 9/11, the Islamist terrorist attack on 9/11. It was a relatively small group of US military launched to go after those al-Qaeda cells and Osama bin Laden in the wake of that attack. That is the mission that should have been supported and focused on in its execution. Instead, as you know, attention was diverted very quickly to the regime-change war in Iraq that was waged on false pretenses, and the resources and focus was taken away from that initial mission that went to Afghanistan.
The war in Afghanistan blew up into something that became about regime change and governance and the Taliban, and less focus on al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden. And it became this thing that even general officers had a hard time articulating what is the objective here? What are we trying to accomplish? What does winning look like? At what point do we know it’s time to exit and get out? And as you look at things like the Afghanistan files and others, the answers to these simple and essential questions shifted and changed over time, over a very long time.
Similarly, in Iraq. I bought into a lot of what was being sold by the administration and by Democrats and Republicans and Congress at the time. And very quickly, even as I was on the ground there, started to have my eyes opened up into how we had been lied to tremendously, and how that protracted war went on for a very, very long time with decisions being made that ultimately served to strengthen terrorist groups like al-Qaeda, the creation of ISIS and others, really undermining our national security interests in the meantime. Understanding the enemy that you are trying to defeat is essential to being able to build a strategy.
The declaration of President Biden, for example, saying, “Well, the war on terror is over. The war on terror is over.” What does that mean? Or, “The forever wars are over.” Well, what does that actually mean?”
I served on my last most recent deployment in 2021 to East Africa and Somalia, where al-Shabaab is one of those Islamist terrorist groups that follows the same ideology as al-Qaeda, ISIS, Hamas and others. This group has been allowed to grow and be strengthened, even though they are one of the main groups that provides funding to al-Qaeda in that entire region.
So any president or politician can declare a war to be over, but when you have an enemy like these Islamist terrorist groups who are still intent on their goal and their objective, which is to ultimately establish their Islamic caliphate and destroy Israel and exterminate the Jewish people, and basically kill or convert anyone who doesn’t adhere to their ideology, that continues on. And they will only become stronger the longer our leaders put their heads in the sand and pretend like, “Oh no, this doesn’t exist.”
This kind of war, this war specifically, is one that has to be waged militarily and ideologically. And the ideological component to this, which is defeating their ideology with a superior one, is one that I pointed out in Congress during the Obama administration, we, the collective we, were failing at. The Obama administration was failing at because they were so afraid of being labeled Islamophobes, that they refused to accurately identify that ideology driving these terrorist groups. And instead said, “We are countering violent extremism,” was the term that the Obama administration started to use and was coined and kind of mandated across the US government.
Well, again, you have to know the enemy that threatens you and why they’re doing what they’re doing if you have any hope of actually preventing their attack, both militarily, and as we’re seeing now with Hamas’s actions, not only directly in the assault on Israel, but how Hamas achieved their objectives in spreading their ideology around the world.
But we’ve seen examples of this before. I saw this in Somalia. We saw it in some cases in Iraq where, for example, you have Imams who recognize the threat that these terrorist groups pose to their own people and their own communities, and exerting their influence in defeating the terrorist Islamist ideology with their own teachings of Islam and preaching peace amongst their people.
War is ugly and it is messy. It is also an unfortunate reality of the world we live in. So, while I firmly believe that we must always pursue peace, I’m not a pacifist, I’m a realist, and recognize that where there are these threats, we must do what we can to work towards that safety, that security, that freedom and peace that we all want.
The complexities of what’s going on in Israeli politics is, I think, a different conversation, but also one that is directly intertwined with the answer to this question. When you have some people in the Israeli government who don’t want the Palestinian people in Gaza at all and want them to go and repatriate in other countries, I think that’s a big problem, and that further exacerbates this hatred and resentment that continues to grow there. This is a generation’s long challenge, unfortunately, of the resentment and tension that exists between many Israelis and many Palestinians that can only be resolved when there’s strong leadership representing both peoples who are able and willing to come together and recognize that the only way forward is to let the past be in the past and find a way towards peace in the future.
Whoever that most effective neutral broker is, that’s the best person to do this. The Biden-Harris administration, I think the role that they have to take is actually encouraging Zelenskyy to sit down and begin this process. Those kinds of engagements are the most, to me, the most powerful exercises of diplomacy that can’t be matched, especially when our president’s foremost role and responsibility is to serve as commander in chief, and I wish that we had leaders who were more willing to engage because I think we’d make a lot more progress more quickly to find areas both of mutual interest as well as to help de-conflict and de-escalate areas where there is tension or disagreement or adversarial interests.
I think that these kinds of engagements are weaponized and politicized as they were against me by those who have their own interests, whether it be the military industrial complex or in Washington. If you’re not part of the official narrative of the US government, which was intent on a regime change war in Syria, then you’re an outcast. And it was unfortunate because people levied all kinds of accusations and smears against me for going and having the audacity to go and learn more, try to seek the truth, in the hopes of preventing more needless war and in the hopes of preventing yet another quagmire and disastrous war in the Middle East. And simply for going, and yes, meeting with Assad, also meeting with religious leaders in Syria, also meeting and talking with people on the streets of Damascus, talking with college students, talking with people from the opposition party who would like to see Assad replaced, talking with local law, just a whole host of people over the course of a few days, the accusation was like, “Oh, she loves dictators.”
It’s a sad state of affairs when some of the most influential voices in our country will label someone a lover or supporter of dictators simply because you’re saying, “Hey, we shouldn’t be going to war. There is another way.” And I’m not alone in this. People who were against the war in Iraq were given similar labels, until it became popular in our politics to have been against the Iraq war. We see the same thing now with people like Tucker, myself and others who are saying, “We should not be waging this proxy war against Russia via Ukraine and using the Ukrainian people’s lives in this war.” Well, now all of a sudden, you’re a Putin lover or a Putin puppet or whatever, the traitor, treason, all of these accusations that are used ultimately by people who are not interested in having a substantive conversation about the truth, about looking at these wars and conflicts with a comprehensive view on exactly all the dynamics that are at play.
And that’s what I found when I came back. I went to Syria looking forward to coming back and shedding light on different perspectives, experiences and stories that I found that would give people a more broad understanding of what was happening in that country. And what I found was there was zero interest in the mainstream media or in Congress in hearing any other perspective other than their own, which was, “We need to launch this regime change war through the use of arming and equipping known terrorists within Syria to overthrow the regime,” without them stating any realistic idea of who would take control once Assad was overthrown. But the reality actually being that no matter which opposition group they might try to prop up, they would not have the power to withstand the terrorist groups whose stated goal it was to go and take over power from Assad. They had no interest in trying to gain true understanding, and it was very disheartening. It was very disheartening and a big lesson learned about where their interests really were focused.
Well, let me ask you about the criticism you’ve mentioned. It’s probably the most common criticism of you, that you love Putin. So just to linger on it, what do you think is the foundation of this criticism?
And so the likes of Hillary Clinton and the cabal of Warmongers in Washington, they weren’t fans of mine to say the least. I can’t say it was a total surprise, but it was disheartening nonetheless that the very day that I announced my candidacy, that I was running for president, which was in February, 2019. The hour that I walked up onto that stage to announce my candidacy, it was in Hawaii and I gave my announcement speech, NBC News published a hit piece that planted the seeds of suspicion in voters’ minds that somehow, I was a darling of Putin and Russia and whatever. It was baseless, all of it baseless. And that continued like a steady drumbeat throughout my candidacy, but that really was escalated when in a podcast with David Axelrod, Hillary Clinton said, “Oh, well, the Russians are grooming her.”
And this came from a very influential person. She was the former Secretary of State, the former US Senator, former First Lady, someone who wielded and continues to wield a lot of power in the Democratic Party and amongst voters, and that took it to a whole new level. What is the basis for this? Nothing. It is a tired yet dependable playbook that is used not only by people like Hillary Clinton, but also people like Mitt Romney and others to try to smear, discredit and destroy the reputations of people who have the audacity to question their objectives as they call for one war or another, or have the audacity to say that this is not in the best interest of peace, or in our country, our national security.
They keep going back to this playbook as they do today, because again, they’re not willing to debate the substance of one position versus another, which is what we should have. If people feel so strongly that we should be going and waging this war, that war, okay, great. Go make your case to the American people. Go stand on the floor of the United States House and actually have this debate. Allow those who are saying, “No, this is not a good idea,” to also stand freely and make that argument. Instead, they resort to the kind of name-calling that tells voters, “Hey, you can’t trust this person or anything that they say.”
Myself and some of my other colleagues got the same treatment when we tried to pass legislation in Congress that would have taken out provisions from the Patriot Act that are most egregiously violating our Fourth Amendment rights and civil liberties, authorities that have allowed our government to illegally surveil Americans without a warrant. And as we did so, we were called traitors. We had other members of Congress on the house floor saying that if you pass this legislation, you will be responsible for another nine-eleven style attack on our soil.
These are all distraction tactics to try to divert our attention away from what’s actually happening, and instead, just tell voters, “Hey, you can’t trust these people.” Obviously, this has happened to Trump. It’s happened to Bobby Kennedy. It’s happened to people like Rand Paul and others. There’s a small group, but a growing number, at least I’m on the Republican side at this point, people who are actually willing to stand up and challenge the military industrial complex, challenge the warmongers in both parties.
And unfortunately within the Democratic Party in Washington, there is no room for debate, that if you challenge the Biden administration’s position on foreign policy, you’re going to hear about it. And what we have seen is that’s exactly what’s happened, and people have retracted statements or just fallen silent or whatever the case may be. This debate that should be existent within both parties, on the Democrat side unfortunately, it just doesn’t exist anymore.
Ronald Reagan was 100% correct when he said a nuclear war cannot be won and should never be waged. It was true then and it’s true now, no matter how much these guys who are producing these weapons or those who are benefiting from that industry try to tell us, “Oh no, it’ll never happen.” So to me, that’s an important first step, to continue to inform and educate and sound the alarms to people. Don’t buy this crap because it’s not true, and I look forward to listening to your podcast, but the PSA that was put out by New York City’s Emergency Management Office about what to do in the event of a nuclear attack, you would find it funny if it wasn’t so deeply disturbing. How they created this public service announcement, they distributed it everywhere across the city, on the internet. I think it was on the radio where you had a woman who appeared to be an actor coming in and saying, “Hey, in the event of when the big one hits, here’s what you should do. Focus on doing these three things,” and I’m paraphrasing but I encourage you to watch it.
I’m paraphrasing but she said, “Get inside. Stay inside and stay tuned.” That was it. And, “Get inside, go away from the windows. Stay inside. Don’t go outside until you get the all clear, and stay tuned. Follow our account on Instagram and Twitter.” And at the very end of this short PSA, her closing words were, “We’ve got this.” And it was so disturbing in that it was so completely out of touch with reality. It creates this kind of false sense of security that, okay, well, it’s like here’s what you do when a tornado hits or when a big storm hits, and categorizing the big one, a nuclear attack within that same kind of preparedness that you would want people to have in the event of a natural disaster of some sort. And it is reflective of the carelessness with which people in our government, that careless attitude that people in our government have towards nuclear war and a nuclear attack, even as they set us up for failure in pushing us closer and closer to the brink of a nuclear war occurring, whether it be an intentional attack, or as we saw during the last Cold War, one that could be launched unintentionally. How many near misses were there during the last Cold War? I saw this documentary called The Man Who Saved the World, and it was some mid-level officer who happened to be on duty and who didn’t do what he was told in launching the nuclear missiles because of what they thought was an incoming attack, and it turned out to be a complete mistake or misread on the radar, but that’s what we’re facing.
This is one of the biggest costs of this establishment, destroying the reputations of, and smearing and trying to cancel and censor those who are voices of peace, or just those who take a contrarian position and say, “Well, hey, why don’t we just pause for a moment and actually think this through? Why don’t we talk through, ‘What happens if we take this course of action? What happens if we go down a different path?’ Let’s actually be thoughtful about what our options are for A, B, and C, and then make the decision in a thoughtful manner based on that.” Even advocating for that is seen as a kind of heresy in the warmongering establishment in Washington, and the cost of their retaliation against those who are reasonable voices, who look at the world as it is, not some fantasy that they wish existed is, in those rooms, during those critical moments, people will, even if they know in their heart or their mind that this could end really badly, their instinct is to self-censor and not speak up because they don’t want to experience the wrath and ire, whether it be coming from four-star generals, or the secretaries of state, or defense, or these high-ranking people in positions of power and influence.
They don’t want to be the one guy in the room who’s just like, “Hey, guys, let’s just take a breath and actually think this through. What will happen, not just in the immediate response of this action that you’re advocating for, but what are all of the other people, other actors, stakeholders in the world, how will they respond, and then how will we respond to them? How will they respond to us?” Actually go through this exercise of, in the military, this is commonly referred to as, “What are the second, third, fourth order of effects that will occur as a result of pursuing a specific course of action?”
The words, TikTok, is not actually in the bill, but it gives the power to the president to decide, “Who is a foreign adversary?,” single-handedly, no consultation with or agreement from members of Congress or anyone else. It actually gives the power to a cabinet secretary to designate, “Who is a foreign adversary?,” and if a social media platform has at least 20% ownership in a social media platform, that platform may be banned from doing business in America essentially, but it’s not just a foreign state actor that could be named as a foreign adversary. It also includes a line in the legislation that if, let’s say a person has at least 25% financial interest or ownership in a social media platform, they’re an American citizen who may be working or living in some other country, or working or living here, but doing business with other countries. If the executive branch of our government decides that this individual is under the influence of, or controlled by someone that they deem a foreign adversary, then that platform must not do business in America, and that person obviously, even an American citizen, is banned from conducting that business. They must divest, essentially.
So when you look at, and this is where there’s been a lot of chatter around this, when you look at Elon Musk, for example, well, you already have people in the Biden administration, even President Biden himself, implying that Elon Musk’s activities need to be investigated. Well, he is someone with Tesla who does business in a lot of countries, including China, and therefore, he must be investigated. It is not at all a stretch of imagination to say that X could be the next platform that the executive branch decides. Nope. We’ve designated this person to be a foreign adversary, and therefore, his business interest cannot be allowed for this social media platform, cannot be allowed to exist.
We’ve seen this already with people accusing him and X of interfering in our elections. Again, it’s ironic that it’s coming from the Democratic party, that they are claiming that a guy who has set himself, he’s committed to free speech and is allowing free speech on his platform, and is not allowing the federal government to manipulate his platform by deeming which accounts are okay to post their content and which accounts are not because of disinformation, or whatever they claim it to be, it’s not an accident that the social media platforms that have been proven to take action at the behest of the federal government and the White House to censor certain voices, they’re not included with or being targeted at all in this legislation or outside of it, yet, other platforms that are not cooperating or collaborating somehow are. So the underlying issue here, this is being sold as TikTok and national security, but ultimately, even as Ron Paul said, this is a legislation that’s the greatest assault on liberty since the Patriot Act was passed.
“I saw this thing or this thing is happening, and it’s pissing me off, so I’m going to bring a superior argument. I’m going to show what the right way is.” And gosh, this is what our founders envisioned for us as a society in this country, and we would be so much stronger with a more engaged people and a more informed people if we had this and had it supported.
The other thing that I saw was how the mainstream media and those who are supposed to be in a position to be neutral arbiters to facilitate debates and forums and conversations so that voters can be best informed in who they want to vote for, were calling Hillary Clinton the most qualified person ever to run for president in the history of our country because of the positions that she had held as secretary of state, as a U.S. senator, as first lady, and yet, they glossed over those titles without ever holding her, asking questions even, or holding her to account for her record, especially in the area of foreign policy. The job she was running for was to be commander in chief, to be the president of the United States. That responsibility to serve as commander in chief is the foremost responsibility a president has. It’s essentially the one area where the president can unilaterally make decisions without education, healthcare, immigration. Congress has to actually pass legislation. President can come through and say, “Hey, here’s the policies that I want.”
“Here’s legislation that I’ll propose,” but those changes can’t be made without Congress, working with Congress to pass them. So she was essentially being let off the hook for her record, as an American, as a soldier, as a veteran. That was a big problem for me, and so I made the decision to resign as vice chair of the DNC so that I could endorse Bernie Sanders, who largely at heart, I believe is a non-interventionist. He hasn’t focused a lot on foreign policy. It’s not at the heart of what his focus has been for decades, but he was certainly far more of a non-interventionist than Hillary Clinton, who has shown through her record to be the queen of warmongers in Washington. I wanted to be in a position where I would have a platform to inform voters about her record so that they could make that decision for themselves, so that they could see, “Hey, in this area, on this issue, which is incredibly important, there is a clear contrast between these two candidates running in the Democratic primary,” and that’s what drove my decision to resign and to endorse Bernie Sanders, and that’s what I went on to do throughout the rest of that primary election.
The fact that it’s a question up for debate about whether or not … Well, actually, it’s not a question up for debate for them. They are actively pushing …
I go into detail around each of these issues and more in the book. But you will see as we go through each of these issues, fundamental and foundational to every one of them is that, sadly, the Democratic Party has become a party that is so consumed by their desire for power, this insatiable hunger for power, that they are willing to destroy our republic, our democracy, our freedom, just so that they can try to hold on to power and gain more power.
There are very serious problems within both of our political parties, specifically coming from politicians who are driven by this desire for power and who are so afraid of losing that power that they’re willing to do whatever they feel they need to do, which centers around taking away our freedom because the more free we are to make our own decisions, even if they may end up being the wrong decisions, but to learn from those things and know that we’ve got to live with the consequences, the beauty and messiness of what a free society looks like.
They’re so afraid of us because they see us as the people and our freedom as the central threat to their ability to remain in power. I think the difference that we’re seeing today is that, unfortunately, we talked about this a little bit how the Democratic Party has become a party where you must walk in lockstep with the leadership of that party or risk being faced with your reputation being destroyed and smeared and all of these different attacks. And the reason why they do that is to put people like me and Bobby Kennedy and others up as an example of saying, “Hey, if you step out of line, if you challenge us, this is what we’re going to do to you.”
The Republican Party has also done that, and they also have politicians and leaders who are more interested in feeding the thriving system in the Washington establishment. But we are also seeing that the Republican Party also has some voices and, I would say, increasing voices of people. And I would put Donald Trump in this category who are challenging the, quote, unquote, norms of the Republican Party that are represented by people like Nikki Haley or Mike Pence, for example. The Republican Party is not a monolithic entity, and it means different things to different people.
And that’s where I think the real challenge in this next election is less… it’s really less about one political party over another, and it’s more about our opportunity as voters to select leaders… First of all, to fire those who are against freedom and who are warmongers, who, by their essence, are willing to take away our freedom in the name of national security and vote for people… Nobody’s perfect. We shouldn’t hold anybody up on a pedestal, but vote for those who are committed to the Constitution and who hold those values that represent the interests of the people.
But the truth that I know exists, which points to his weakness, is that instead of listening to his better angels, he has instead at every turn… If you go back and I look back to his inauguration speech where he promised to be a president for all Americans, and during his campaign, promised to be the uniter in chief, to bring a country together that was deeply divided. That’s the Joe Biden that I’ve known for many years.
A guy who has worked with different people with different backgrounds and different political views but tried to find at different points in time a way to work together. At every turn, he has done the exact opposite of what he spoke about during his inauguration speech and has left us as the American people today more divided, less secure, both from an economic standpoint as well as a national security or safety and security standpoint, and less free as a society and as a people.
And they’ve expressed to me personally how heartbroken they were because so quickly after he was elected, instead of bringing in a new generation of fresh leadership that was not a part of the Washington establishment, he instead immediately chose to surround himself with people who were more of the same old, same old. Who were essentially part of the problem. And many of his actions after that proved that fear and that brokenheartedness that they felt to be true. I’ll mention one example related to civil liberties that we talked about.
He was someone as a US senator who gave some pretty powerful speeches on the Senate floor about his concerns with the Patriot Act, his concerns with surveillance from the NSA, his concerns with a violation of our Fourth Amendment Rights and civil liberties. But when, as president, he was confronted with leaked information about this surveillance occurring under those authorities in his presidency, he sided… he took the side of the national security state and did not take action to right the wrongs that he correctly pointed out as senator and during his campaign for the presidency, which is unfortunate because he really did build this unifying momentum throughout his campaign.
There have been some documented examples around how he promised to crack down on Big Pharma, but when push came to shove, his Department of Justice campaign funding was threatened, and they chose not to take action even when they had a very, very strong case to make. This was with regard to the opioid crisis in the country. And this just goes back to the heart of why it’s so essential that we have leaders who have courage and who are focused on doing what we elect them to do.
And if he is re-elected, that is my hope that that he sees… he’s learned from what went wrong in 2016. That he went in with a largely non-interventionist, more focused on peace agenda, and yet he surrounded himself with people who are at the heart of the warmongers in Washington and who directly went against the policies that he advocated for. On the strength side, I think it’s easy to point out because it’s also what has caused him to be so attacked in ways that we haven’t seen before. Certainly not in my lifetime by the Democrats, by the Biden administration, not only now, but something that started back in 2016 when he was a candidate.
He’s a guy who, by all measures, has been successful in his own life, and because of that, he’s not coming in with this desire to please Washington that many other politicians have. And because he is so willing to challenge the, quote, unquote, norms, and these are not norms that serve the interests of the American people. These are norms that serve the interests of the most powerful, he’s a direct threat. And so that attitude and that mindset of not coming in with the kind of caution that too many politicians come in with of wanting to be the popular one at the parties or whatever it is that they want, that is the strength that he brings.
So to withstand the attacks is tough, and something about his psychology allows for that. I mean, I guess a question for you also in your own psychology, you’ve been attacked quite a bit. We’ve mentioned some of that sort of misrepresentations, and how do you deal with that by yourself? How do you not become cynical or overcompensate the other direction, that kind of stuff?
Being rooted in that has made it so that, as the attacks are coming from different directions, even as people who I was friends with, former colleagues of mine, others, even family members, even as they have turned away or become attackers against me themselves because of different reasons related to politics, of course, it’s a sad thing, especially when it’s someone that personally and have had a personal friendship or relationship with. But I don’t live my life trying to please politicians or please the people who show up on TV or anyone else. As long as I am doing my best to be pleasing to God, that is where I draw my happiness from and my fulfillment and contentment and strength.
They are timeless truths that, whether you consider yourself Christian or Catholic or Muslim or Jewish or Hindu, these truths are eternal and relevant through all time. So for us as kids growing up, we learned from and had bedtime stories that came from both the Bhagavad Gita and the New Testament. My dad was raised Catholic, my mom was raised Episcopalian, and both of them were attracted to the Bhagavad Gita as they were in their own lives searching for a more personal relationship with God than they had been able to find elsewhere in their own spiritual journeys. And that’s where the application of… There’re teachings in the Bhagavad Gita, for example, that talk about Bhakti Yoga.
Bhakti Yoga essentially translates into dedicating your life, striving to develop a loving relationship with God. Karma Yoga. There’s a chapter in the Bhagavad Gita that speaks about Karma Yoga. Karma is a word that has become a part of the… Both karma and yoga have become very common terms, but what it really means is trying to dedicate your actions in life that have… in a way that have a positive impact on others, being of service to others. And so for me, growing up, I never really understood as kid the idea of sectarianism of one religion battling against another because I knew and understood and experienced that the real meaning of religion was love for God.
No matter what name you worship Him by or how you worship that is the real meaning of religion. And the application of that in your life is you ask, “How do I see God in a personal way?” I see… I know that God is my best friend. God is my confidant. When I am struggling with a problem in my life or during those quiet moments by myself where I am anxious or I’m sad, I turn to God for that solace, for that clarity, for that strength to both know what the right thing to do is and the strength to act accordingly and to constantly strive to further develop that very personal loving relationship with God.
But now, we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense; we have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions. This conjunction of immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.” Thank you for listening, and hope to see you next time.
Click link to jump approximately to that part in the transcript:
- 0:00 – Introduction
- 1:07 – War in Iraq
- 8:53 – Battle injuries and PTSD
- 16:03 – War on terrorism
- 24:44 – War in Gaza
- 28:45 – War in Ukraine
- 32:31 – Syria
- 40:13 – Warmongers
- 49:33 – Nuclear war
- 1:05:01 – TikTok ban
- 1:17:06 – Bernie Sanders
- 1:22:01 – Politics
- 1:40:52 – Personal attacks
- 1:43:01 – God
Introduction
Tulsi Gabbard
It’s a sad state of affairs when some of the most influential voices in our country will label someone a lover or supporter of dictators simply because you’re saying, “Hey, we shouldn’t be going to war. There is another way.”
It’s a sad state of affairs when some of the most influential voices in our country will label someone a lover or supporter of dictators simply because you’re saying, “Hey, we shouldn’t be going to war. There is another way.”
Lex Fridman
The following is a conversation with Tulsi Gabbard, who was a longtime Democrat, including being the vice chair of the Democratic National Committee. She endorsed Bernie in 2016 and Biden in 2020. She has been both loved and heavily criticized for her independent thinking and bold political stances, especially on topics of war and the military industrial complex. She served in the US military for many years, achieving the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. And now she’s the author of a new book called For Love of Country.
The following is a conversation with Tulsi Gabbard, who was a longtime Democrat, including being the vice chair of the Democratic National Committee. She endorsed Bernie in 2016 and Biden in 2020. She has been both loved and heavily criticized for her independent thinking and bold political stances, especially on topics of war and the military industrial complex. She served in the US military for many years, achieving the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. And now she’s the author of a new book called For Love of Country.
This is a Lex Fridman podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description.
And now, dear friends, here’s Tulsi Gabbard.
War in Iraq
You’ve served in the US military for many years, achieving rank of Lieutenant Colonel. You were deployed in Iraq in 2004 and ’05, Kuwait in ’08 and ’09. What lessons about life and about country have you learned from that experience of war?
Tulsi Gabbard
So many. Central to those lessons learned was having my eyes open to the very real cost of war.
So many. Central to those lessons learned was having my eyes open to the very real cost of war.
Of course, I served in a medical unit during that first deployment to Iraq. It was 2005 during the height of that war, and unfortunately we took a lot of casualties. We, across the entire US military, my brigade that I deployed with was from the Hawaii National Guard. We had approximately 3000 soldiers who were operating in four different areas of Iraq. And my first task every day was to go through a list of every combat related injury that had occurred the day before in the country.
I went through that list name by name, looking to see if any one of our nearly 3000 soldiers from Hawaii had been hurt in the line of duty. And then, if seeing them on the list, tracking them down. Where were they? Were they getting the care they needed? Would they be able to get sufficient care to stay in the country and return to duty? Did I need to get them evacuated? Usually it would be to military hospitals that at that time were in Landstuhl and Ramstein in Germany. And then from there, getting them to either Brooke Army Medical Center, which is here in Texas, that specialized in burn related injuries, or to Walter Reed, and tracking them and their care until they were finally home with their families. It never became a routine task. It never became like, okay, cool, check the list, kind of dot the Is, cross the Ts. It was that daily confrontation with the reality of the cost of war. Friends of mine were killed in combat.
Experiencing firsthand that high human cost of war caused me, a 20-something-year-old from Hawaii… I had left my seat in the state legislature to volunteer to deploy with my brothers and sisters in my unit to Iraq, and so recognize the cost of war, I think, in two fundamental ways. Number one is the high human cost of war on our troops and on the people in the country where this war was being waged. And also the cost on American taxpayers.
Seeing then, back again in 2005, and recognizing KBR Halliburton, one of the biggest defense contracting companies then, and I know that they’re still very much in that business now, Dick Cheney being connected with that company at one point or another, but in our camp specifically, which was one of the larger ones in Iraq at that time, there wasn’t anything that happened in our camp that didn’t have the KBR Halliburton logo imprinted on it. We had a big shack, a place where we ate our meals. They call it a dining facility, a DFAC in the military. They served four meals a day. They brought in, and they being KBR Halliburton, they imported workers in from places like Nepal and Sri Lanka and the Philippines to come in and cook food and work at this dining facility.
I got curious about how much it costs us as taxpayers. And so I started asking around some of the people, and I think at that time it was like, well, every time a soldier or a service member walks through the door, if I were to go in for breakfast and grab a banana and walk out, that’s an automatic $35 per head per meal four times a day, thousands and thousands of people.
And then we made friends. There’s a pretty large Filipino community in Hawaii. A lot of Filipino soldiers from Hawaii. We made friends with the Filipino workers who were there. They would often go in the back of the tents and set up their own rice cookers and cook their own meals, which is where the real good food was. But just started talking to them and getting to know them and asked like, “Hey, how much do you get paid?” And on average it was like, “Oh, I get paid like 500 bucks a month.” 500 bucks a month to go and do this work of either cleaning out porta-potties, picking up trash, the dining facility, doing laundry, all of these different tasks, because the military wanted soldiers to be out doing things that only soldiers could do. Understandable. But when I started putting two and two together and knowing that this company, one company alone, was making trillions of dollars, trillions of dollars, and yet this Filipino mom is making 500 bucks a month, maybe getting one day off a week, maybe, working 12 hours a day otherwise. And I said, “How often are you able to go home to your family?” “Well, they’ll let us go home a couple of weeks every other year.”
It was an eye-opening experience that growing up in Hawaii, I frankly hadn’t given much thought to before, but it’s what led me ultimately coming back from that first deployment there was no way that I could go back to the life that I had left behind. And I knew somehow, someway I needed to find a way to use those experiences to try to make a positive impact, to try to influence those… I mean, frankly, the politicians who are making decisions to go and launch these regime-change wars and send our men and women in uniform into war, and to what end, ultimately.
Lex Fridman
If we can just go back to that list. So the list is just name and injury, name and injury.
If we can just go back to that list. So the list is just name and injury, name and injury.
Tulsi Gabbard
Name, unit, potentially location if someone had documented that, and their injury.
Name, unit, potentially location if someone had documented that, and their injury.
Lex Fridman
And it’s just pages and pages of that.
And it’s just pages and pages of that.
Tulsi Gabbard
Yeah. Yeah. I didn’t get to call home every day, but when I called home and talked to my parents, I felt the tension in their voice. They didn’t want me to worry about anything at home. And so they were always like, “Hey, how are you? What can we send you?” And this and that. But it wasn’t like I was calling them from down the street and saying, “Hey, how’s it going? Let’s go have lunch,” or whatever. I knew that the reason for that tension was they were terrified of getting a phone call delivering the worst possible news. And that was what I thought of as I went through that list of how it is the reality of war. Behind every one of those names on that list was a husband or a wife, parents, sons and daughters, family members, who had no idea what we were dealing with, really. All they knew was what they saw on the news.
Yeah. Yeah. I didn’t get to call home every day, but when I called home and talked to my parents, I felt the tension in their voice. They didn’t want me to worry about anything at home. And so they were always like, “Hey, how are you? What can we send you?” And this and that. But it wasn’t like I was calling them from down the street and saying, “Hey, how’s it going? Let’s go have lunch,” or whatever. I knew that the reason for that tension was they were terrified of getting a phone call delivering the worst possible news. And that was what I thought of as I went through that list of how it is the reality of war. Behind every one of those names on that list was a husband or a wife, parents, sons and daughters, family members, who had no idea what we were dealing with, really. All they knew was what they saw on the news.
What my dad told me later when I got home after that deployment was that every time they saw the news, and they saw a helicopter shot down or crashed or some IED, they held their breath until they saw or heard the news of who it was or what it was.
Battle injuries and PTSD
Lex Fridman
What can you say about what the soldiers had to go through physically and psychologically when they get injured?
What can you say about what the soldiers had to go through physically and psychologically when they get injured?
Tulsi Gabbard
The physical; some injuries appeared to be minor upfront. At that time, traumatic brain injury was not something that was talked about much, if at all. Many had visible wounds. Others are now what we know appeared like, “All right, cool, you checked out,” but had invisible wounds. Those who were injured in a way that did not allow them to get back to work, found it emotionally very difficult to be put on a plane and evacuated out of there. Feeling guilty that they were leaving their friends behind, and not thinking about themselves or not feeling bad for themselves, but instead feeling bad for being forced to be in a position to leave.
The physical; some injuries appeared to be minor upfront. At that time, traumatic brain injury was not something that was talked about much, if at all. Many had visible wounds. Others are now what we know appeared like, “All right, cool, you checked out,” but had invisible wounds. Those who were injured in a way that did not allow them to get back to work, found it emotionally very difficult to be put on a plane and evacuated out of there. Feeling guilty that they were leaving their friends behind, and not thinking about themselves or not feeling bad for themselves, but instead feeling bad for being forced to be in a position to leave.
For soldiers, of course, we all have our own political opinions on things, but when it comes right down to it in a war zone, it’s about your friends. It’s about your brothers and sisters that you’re serving alongside. It’s not about the politicians or whatever insanity is going on in Washington. It’s about getting up and going out, getting the job done and coming back home together.
I had friends of mine who were from Hawaii, who were from American Samoa, a very culturally tight-knit community, who confided in me throughout that year that we were there, infantry soldiers who were going out on security patrols and doing raids every day, just some of the very traumatic experiences that they went through. No physical injury, but creating a kind of emotional stress and trauma that, as human beings, they were struggling in dealing with.
On a positive note, Polynesian culture especially, but also Asian culture and other cultures around the world, our guys found that shortly after we got there, the unit that we were replacing were taking the guys out on patrol and saying, “Hey, here’s this village. Here’s where we found friendlies.” Or, “Here’s where we know that there are insurgents operating, and they’ve got allies and lookouts.” And showing them the lay of the land basically.
And what our guys found was that as they were doing these ride-alongs, they call it a left seat, right seat when you’re coming in and taking over, that there was a bit of a tense, even adversarial type of relationship, where on the military side there was an assumption of suspicion or lack of trust just with the locally Iraqi people who lived around the base that we were at. And without anybody telling them to culturally, our guys began trying to build relationships.
For Hawaii and Samoa, and we had soldiers from Guam and Saipan, little things like you’re riding down in a Humvee, you’ve got a gunner in the turret with a 50 cal or a machine gun of some sort, little things like pointing the muzzle to the sky as you’re riding through a town rather than pointing it directly at where people are walking down the street was a huge gesture of an assumption of, “Hey, let’s actually talk and become friends.” We had our guys riding down the street and throwing shakas out to the local people there, breaking bread, sharing tea, and building those relationships.
Again, I served in a medical unit and what we saw was a downward shift in casualties from the unit that had been there before us, simply because of that basic human connection that our guys sought to make. And then, gradually, finding local people who lived in the town right next to us were saying, “Hey, you guys, somebody was digging a big hole a mile down the road. You might want to bypass that or check that out.” And finding weapons, caches and IEDs, improvised explosive devices, and other things that helped save people’s lives.
Lex Fridman
On the cost side of things, how is it possible for a company like Halliburton or others to get away with $40 bananas? However much it was, but the overhead costs.
On the cost side of things, how is it possible for a company like Halliburton or others to get away with $40 bananas? However much it was, but the overhead costs.
Tulsi Gabbard
Look, what they will claim is that it’s expensive to move logistics through a country at war, but they get away with it, ultimately, this insane war profiteering, and they’re not alone. Obviously, there are other companies that this is their business model. They get away with it because of their political connections, and the lobbyists that they have, the relationships they have with politicians. And ultimately, what President Eisenhower warned against with regard to that cozy relationship between Congress and even what he called then the military industrial complex, it’s been alive and well. He warned us against it, and I would say it’s thriving more now than ever before.
Look, what they will claim is that it’s expensive to move logistics through a country at war, but they get away with it, ultimately, this insane war profiteering, and they’re not alone. Obviously, there are other companies that this is their business model. They get away with it because of their political connections, and the lobbyists that they have, the relationships they have with politicians. And ultimately, what President Eisenhower warned against with regard to that cozy relationship between Congress and even what he called then the military industrial complex, it’s been alive and well. He warned us against it, and I would say it’s thriving more now than ever before.
Lex Fridman
How powerful is the military industrial complex as a thing? Is it a machine that can be slowed down, can be stopped, can be reversed?
How powerful is the military industrial complex as a thing? Is it a machine that can be slowed down, can be stopped, can be reversed?
Tulsi Gabbard
It can be. It’s powerful. I don’t think you can overstate the powerful nature of it because it extends so deeply within our government. It’s not just those in these specific big defense contracting companies that benefit from it. You look at the revolving door within the Pentagon, for example, where you have both high-ranking people who wear military uniforms as well as those who serve as high-ranking, Department of Defense civilians who are literally working their way into a big payout when they leave that job.
It can be. It’s powerful. I don’t think you can overstate the powerful nature of it because it extends so deeply within our government. It’s not just those in these specific big defense contracting companies that benefit from it. You look at the revolving door within the Pentagon, for example, where you have both high-ranking people who wear military uniforms as well as those who serve as high-ranking, Department of Defense civilians who are literally working their way into a big payout when they leave that job.
We see it with our own Secretary of Defense now. He retired as a general officer, went and served on one of the boards for one of the big defense contractors, and then now back as the Secretary of Defense. We see the same thing in Congress with members of Congress and senior professional staffers in Congress. Same exact revolving door where you have people, whether they’re writing contracts for the Department of Defense, for the company that then wins the bid for that contract, and then going and working for that company. Or those in Congress who are writing policies and doing exactly the same thing.
War on terrorism
Lex Fridman
You have been both a war hawk and a war dove at times. So what is your philosophy on when war is justified and when it is not?
You have been both a war hawk and a war dove at times. So what is your philosophy on when war is justified and when it is not?
Tulsi Gabbard
War is justified when it is in the best interest of our national security, and when it is the last resort, when all diplomatic efforts have been completed and exhausted and war is the last possible route that must be taken to ensure the safety, security, and freedom of the American people.
War is justified when it is in the best interest of our national security, and when it is the last resort, when all diplomatic efforts have been completed and exhausted and war is the last possible route that must be taken to ensure the safety, security, and freedom of the American people.
Lex Fridman
So that’s a high-level beautiful idea, but there’s messy details. So terrorism, for example.
So that’s a high-level beautiful idea, but there’s messy details. So terrorism, for example.
Tulsi Gabbard
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
The United States involvement in the war in Iraq and Afghanistan was in part the big umbrella of the war on terrorism. So, when you decide whether something’s justified or not and whether something can be defeated or not, how hard is it? Is it even possible? To what degree is it possible to defeat terrorism?
The United States involvement in the war in Iraq and Afghanistan was in part the big umbrella of the war on terrorism. So, when you decide whether something’s justified or not and whether something can be defeated or not, how hard is it? Is it even possible? To what degree is it possible to defeat terrorism?
Tulsi Gabbard
Well, first of all, part of the problem of our foreign policy has been how many conflicts, wars, military actions have been waged in the name of this “war on terrorism” in the name of national security, legislation like the Patriot Act that violates our civil liberties and freedoms in the name of the war on terrorism and national security when it’s not justified. I’ll use Afghanistan as an example.
Well, first of all, part of the problem of our foreign policy has been how many conflicts, wars, military actions have been waged in the name of this “war on terrorism” in the name of national security, legislation like the Patriot Act that violates our civil liberties and freedoms in the name of the war on terrorism and national security when it’s not justified. I’ll use Afghanistan as an example.
I support the initial mission that lifted off shortly after the attack on 9/11, the Islamist terrorist attack on 9/11. It was a relatively small group of US military launched to go after those al-Qaeda cells and Osama bin Laden in the wake of that attack. That is the mission that should have been supported and focused on in its execution. Instead, as you know, attention was diverted very quickly to the regime-change war in Iraq that was waged on false pretenses, and the resources and focus was taken away from that initial mission that went to Afghanistan.
The war in Afghanistan blew up into something that became about regime change and governance and the Taliban, and less focus on al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden. And it became this thing that even general officers had a hard time articulating what is the objective here? What are we trying to accomplish? What does winning look like? At what point do we know it’s time to exit and get out? And as you look at things like the Afghanistan files and others, the answers to these simple and essential questions shifted and changed over time, over a very long time.
Similarly, in Iraq. I bought into a lot of what was being sold by the administration and by Democrats and Republicans and Congress at the time. And very quickly, even as I was on the ground there, started to have my eyes opened up into how we had been lied to tremendously, and how that protracted war went on for a very, very long time with decisions being made that ultimately served to strengthen terrorist groups like al-Qaeda, the creation of ISIS and others, really undermining our national security interests in the meantime. Understanding the enemy that you are trying to defeat is essential to being able to build a strategy.
The declaration of President Biden, for example, saying, “Well, the war on terror is over. The war on terror is over.” What does that mean? Or, “The forever wars are over.” Well, what does that actually mean?”
I served on my last most recent deployment in 2021 to East Africa and Somalia, where al-Shabaab is one of those Islamist terrorist groups that follows the same ideology as al-Qaeda, ISIS, Hamas and others. This group has been allowed to grow and be strengthened, even though they are one of the main groups that provides funding to al-Qaeda in that entire region.
So any president or politician can declare a war to be over, but when you have an enemy like these Islamist terrorist groups who are still intent on their goal and their objective, which is to ultimately establish their Islamic caliphate and destroy Israel and exterminate the Jewish people, and basically kill or convert anyone who doesn’t adhere to their ideology, that continues on. And they will only become stronger the longer our leaders put their heads in the sand and pretend like, “Oh no, this doesn’t exist.”
This kind of war, this war specifically, is one that has to be waged militarily and ideologically. And the ideological component to this, which is defeating their ideology with a superior one, is one that I pointed out in Congress during the Obama administration, we, the collective we, were failing at. The Obama administration was failing at because they were so afraid of being labeled Islamophobes, that they refused to accurately identify that ideology driving these terrorist groups. And instead said, “We are countering violent extremism,” was the term that the Obama administration started to use and was coined and kind of mandated across the US government.
Well, again, you have to know the enemy that threatens you and why they’re doing what they’re doing if you have any hope of actually preventing their attack, both militarily, and as we’re seeing now with Hamas’s actions, not only directly in the assault on Israel, but how Hamas achieved their objectives in spreading their ideology around the world.
Lex Fridman
If you look at the lessons learned from the US involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq, how do you fight terrorism?
If you look at the lessons learned from the US involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq, how do you fight terrorism?
Tulsi Gabbard
Clearly understanding who they are and where they are and why they’re doing what they’re doing is essential, first of all. Obviously, there are different groups, different names. They have morphed and changed based on their locale and how they operate. Building relationships with people in other countries, both state leaders as well as religious leaders and others who share that same objective of defeating these Islamist terrorists on both fronts, and acting as a united front in taking that action. What exactly that action looks like, details on the ground dictate that. Details about these different groups will dictate that.
Clearly understanding who they are and where they are and why they’re doing what they’re doing is essential, first of all. Obviously, there are different groups, different names. They have morphed and changed based on their locale and how they operate. Building relationships with people in other countries, both state leaders as well as religious leaders and others who share that same objective of defeating these Islamist terrorists on both fronts, and acting as a united front in taking that action. What exactly that action looks like, details on the ground dictate that. Details about these different groups will dictate that.
But we’ve seen examples of this before. I saw this in Somalia. We saw it in some cases in Iraq where, for example, you have Imams who recognize the threat that these terrorist groups pose to their own people and their own communities, and exerting their influence in defeating the terrorist Islamist ideology with their own teachings of Islam and preaching peace amongst their people.
War is ugly and it is messy. It is also an unfortunate reality of the world we live in. So, while I firmly believe that we must always pursue peace, I’m not a pacifist, I’m a realist, and recognize that where there are these threats, we must do what we can to work towards that safety, that security, that freedom and peace that we all want.
War in Gaza
Lex Fridman
If we look at the perspective of Israel and the Israel-Gaza war going on now, what do you do with the fact that the death of a civilian serves as a catalyst, gives birth to hate, potentially generational hate? So in Israel’s stated goal of destroying Hamas, they are creating immeasurable hate. What do you do with that? From a perspective of Israel, what is the correct action to take in response to October 7th?
If we look at the perspective of Israel and the Israel-Gaza war going on now, what do you do with the fact that the death of a civilian serves as a catalyst, gives birth to hate, potentially generational hate? So in Israel’s stated goal of destroying Hamas, they are creating immeasurable hate. What do you do with that? From a perspective of Israel, what is the correct action to take in response to October 7th?
Tulsi Gabbard
It’s a complex question with a complex answer. I think Israel’s approach has to be in recognizing that delineation as far as possible. And I know it’s tough when you have a terrorist group like Hamas that is so interwoven within the community of people in Gaza. But to recognize that there should be, and there is a shared purpose there for the Palestinian people to be able to live free and in peace and not under the oppression of this terrorist group, just as the people of Israel would like to live in peace and free from the threat of attack from a terrorist group that wants to exterminate them.
It’s a complex question with a complex answer. I think Israel’s approach has to be in recognizing that delineation as far as possible. And I know it’s tough when you have a terrorist group like Hamas that is so interwoven within the community of people in Gaza. But to recognize that there should be, and there is a shared purpose there for the Palestinian people to be able to live free and in peace and not under the oppression of this terrorist group, just as the people of Israel would like to live in peace and free from the threat of attack from a terrorist group that wants to exterminate them.
The complexities of what’s going on in Israeli politics is, I think, a different conversation, but also one that is directly intertwined with the answer to this question. When you have some people in the Israeli government who don’t want the Palestinian people in Gaza at all and want them to go and repatriate in other countries, I think that’s a big problem, and that further exacerbates this hatred and resentment that continues to grow there. This is a generation’s long challenge, unfortunately, of the resentment and tension that exists between many Israelis and many Palestinians that can only be resolved when there’s strong leadership representing both peoples who are able and willing to come together and recognize that the only way forward is to let the past be in the past and find a way towards peace in the future.
Lex Fridman
How do you think, how do you hope the war in Ukraine will end?
How do you think, how do you hope the war in Ukraine will end?
Tulsi Gabbard
The only way that this war ends is to do exactly what we’re talking about. There has to be a brokered dialogue and conversation about peace that has to occur with representatives from Russia and Ukraine. It is really truly heartbreaking to see both how efforts that began just weeks after Russia invaded Ukraine to do exactly this, were thwarted by the Biden-Harris administration, and other Western powers has cost so many innocent people’s lives. And this is where I get…
The only way that this war ends is to do exactly what we’re talking about. There has to be a brokered dialogue and conversation about peace that has to occur with representatives from Russia and Ukraine. It is really truly heartbreaking to see both how efforts that began just weeks after Russia invaded Ukraine to do exactly this, were thwarted by the Biden-Harris administration, and other Western powers has cost so many innocent people’s lives. And this is where I get…
Tulsi Gabbard
… innocent people’s lives, and this is where I get… I have friends in Ukraine. I’ve been there more than a few times. I’ve enjoyed and appreciated the time that I’ve spent there. When I hear from my friends about how afraid they are of their husbands being conscripted and feeling like they have to hide for fear of being yanked off the streets, their friends and family members who’ve been killed in this war. The only way this ends is when both sides come to the table and find an agreement that neither side is going to be completely happy with, both sides being forced to make some concessions, but one where they will both walk away and this war can end.
… innocent people’s lives, and this is where I get… I have friends in Ukraine. I’ve been there more than a few times. I’ve enjoyed and appreciated the time that I’ve spent there. When I hear from my friends about how afraid they are of their husbands being conscripted and feeling like they have to hide for fear of being yanked off the streets, their friends and family members who’ve been killed in this war. The only way this ends is when both sides come to the table and find an agreement that neither side is going to be completely happy with, both sides being forced to make some concessions, but one where they will both walk away and this war can end.
War in Ukraine
Lex Fridman
What’s the role of the US president perhaps to bring everybody to the table? Do you think that the US president should sit down with Zelenskyy and Putin together?
What’s the role of the US president perhaps to bring everybody to the table? Do you think that the US president should sit down with Zelenskyy and Putin together?
Tulsi Gabbard
Yes. Yes. In an ideal world, yes. This should have happened long ago. The question of whether or not President Biden is the right person to do that at this time when all of the statements and comments that they have made, the Biden-Harris administration has made from the beginning of this war essentially point to their objective being to basically destroy Russia, and that’s one of the reasons why they have supported both the continuation of this war for as long as it’s lasted, as well as why they have thwarted efforts towards peace.
Yes. Yes. In an ideal world, yes. This should have happened long ago. The question of whether or not President Biden is the right person to do that at this time when all of the statements and comments that they have made, the Biden-Harris administration has made from the beginning of this war essentially point to their objective being to basically destroy Russia, and that’s one of the reasons why they have supported both the continuation of this war for as long as it’s lasted, as well as why they have thwarted efforts towards peace.
Whoever that most effective neutral broker is, that’s the best person to do this. The Biden-Harris administration, I think the role that they have to take is actually encouraging Zelenskyy to sit down and begin this process. Those kinds of engagements are the most, to me, the most powerful exercises of diplomacy that can’t be matched, especially when our president’s foremost role and responsibility is to serve as commander in chief, and I wish that we had leaders who were more willing to engage because I think we’d make a lot more progress more quickly to find areas both of mutual interest as well as to help de-conflict and de-escalate areas where there is tension or disagreement or adversarial interests.
Lex Fridman
Well, some of it is basic human camaraderie. People call me naive for this, but sometimes, just knowing that there’s a human on the other side. Even when it’s in private, if you look at Zelenskyy and Putin for example, just humor. Both are very intelligent, witty at times, even funny people. Yes, this is wartime. Yes, a lot of civilians and soldiers are dying. There’s hate, but if you can look above it all and think about the future of the countries, the flourishing of the people and the stopping of the death of civilians and soldiers, then in that place, you can have that basic human connection.
Well, some of it is basic human camaraderie. People call me naive for this, but sometimes, just knowing that there’s a human on the other side. Even when it’s in private, if you look at Zelenskyy and Putin for example, just humor. Both are very intelligent, witty at times, even funny people. Yes, this is wartime. Yes, a lot of civilians and soldiers are dying. There’s hate, but if you can look above it all and think about the future of the countries, the flourishing of the people and the stopping of the death of civilians and soldiers, then in that place, you can have that basic human connection.
Tulsi Gabbard
I agree. I don’t think that’s naive at all and I think there are so many examples through history that point to the power of that, the real power in that. In the Cuban Missile crisis, how JFK had to literally find a secret way to communicate with Khrushchev to try to go around the backs of the military commanders who were urging him to take military action, and instead find, hey, we both ultimately want the same thing. Neither of us wants to launch a catastrophic nuclear war so let’s figure this out.
I agree. I don’t think that’s naive at all and I think there are so many examples through history that point to the power of that, the real power in that. In the Cuban Missile crisis, how JFK had to literally find a secret way to communicate with Khrushchev to try to go around the backs of the military commanders who were urging him to take military action, and instead find, hey, we both ultimately want the same thing. Neither of us wants to launch a catastrophic nuclear war so let’s figure this out.
Lex Fridman
Of course, there’s examples throughout history. Leaders are complicated people. They’re manipulative people, so you have Hitler and Chamberlain meeting and Chamberlain kind of getting hoodwinked by Hitler’s charisma and being convinced that Hitler doesn’t have any interest in invading and destroying the rest of the world, so you have to-
Of course, there’s examples throughout history. Leaders are complicated people. They’re manipulative people, so you have Hitler and Chamberlain meeting and Chamberlain kind of getting hoodwinked by Hitler’s charisma and being convinced that Hitler doesn’t have any interest in invading and destroying the rest of the world, so you have to-
Tulsi Gabbard
Be smart. Don’t be hoodwinked.
Be smart. Don’t be hoodwinked.
Syria
Lex Fridman
You’ve met, and you’ve been criticized for this, you’ve met with Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, and as part of the campaign when running for president, got criticized for not calling him a war criminal. What’s the right way to meet and communicate with these kinds of leaders?
You’ve met, and you’ve been criticized for this, you’ve met with Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, and as part of the campaign when running for president, got criticized for not calling him a war criminal. What’s the right way to meet and communicate with these kinds of leaders?
Tulsi Gabbard
As I just stated, we need leaders who have the courage to meet not just with allies, but with adversaries in the pursuit of peace, in the pursuit of increased understanding. If policies are being made through the lenses and the barriers of bureaucrats and the media and others who have or may have their own interests. Our president, a leader, even members of Congress can’t make decisions with the kind of clarity that we the American people need them to make.
As I just stated, we need leaders who have the courage to meet not just with allies, but with adversaries in the pursuit of peace, in the pursuit of increased understanding. If policies are being made through the lenses and the barriers of bureaucrats and the media and others who have or may have their own interests. Our president, a leader, even members of Congress can’t make decisions with the kind of clarity that we the American people need them to make.
I think that these kinds of engagements are weaponized and politicized as they were against me by those who have their own interests, whether it be the military industrial complex or in Washington. If you’re not part of the official narrative of the US government, which was intent on a regime change war in Syria, then you’re an outcast. And it was unfortunate because people levied all kinds of accusations and smears against me for going and having the audacity to go and learn more, try to seek the truth, in the hopes of preventing more needless war and in the hopes of preventing yet another quagmire and disastrous war in the Middle East. And simply for going, and yes, meeting with Assad, also meeting with religious leaders in Syria, also meeting and talking with people on the streets of Damascus, talking with college students, talking with people from the opposition party who would like to see Assad replaced, talking with local law, just a whole host of people over the course of a few days, the accusation was like, “Oh, she loves dictators.”
It’s a sad state of affairs when some of the most influential voices in our country will label someone a lover or supporter of dictators simply because you’re saying, “Hey, we shouldn’t be going to war. There is another way.” And I’m not alone in this. People who were against the war in Iraq were given similar labels, until it became popular in our politics to have been against the Iraq war. We see the same thing now with people like Tucker, myself and others who are saying, “We should not be waging this proxy war against Russia via Ukraine and using the Ukrainian people’s lives in this war.” Well, now all of a sudden, you’re a Putin lover or a Putin puppet or whatever, the traitor, treason, all of these accusations that are used ultimately by people who are not interested in having a substantive conversation about the truth, about looking at these wars and conflicts with a comprehensive view on exactly all the dynamics that are at play.
And that’s what I found when I came back. I went to Syria looking forward to coming back and shedding light on different perspectives, experiences and stories that I found that would give people a more broad understanding of what was happening in that country. And what I found was there was zero interest in the mainstream media or in Congress in hearing any other perspective other than their own, which was, “We need to launch this regime change war through the use of arming and equipping known terrorists within Syria to overthrow the regime,” without them stating any realistic idea of who would take control once Assad was overthrown. But the reality actually being that no matter which opposition group they might try to prop up, they would not have the power to withstand the terrorist groups whose stated goal it was to go and take over power from Assad. They had no interest in trying to gain true understanding, and it was very disheartening. It was very disheartening and a big lesson learned about where their interests really were focused.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, it’s a simplistic narrative template that’s fit into every single situation. A lot of stuff is not talked about in the Russia-Ukraine war. One of the things that’s not talked about is, okay, so Putin is overthrown, then who do you think will come into power?
Yeah, it’s a simplistic narrative template that’s fit into every single situation. A lot of stuff is not talked about in the Russia-Ukraine war. One of the things that’s not talked about is, okay, so Putin is overthrown, then who do you think will come into power?
Tulsi Gabbard
Exactly.
Exactly.
Lex Fridman
One of the things I talk about with Arestovych is that Putin, and he gets criticized for this, that Putin, out of all the people that might take power is the most liberal, is the most dovish. In fact, every indication shows that he really hates this war, and so everybody that will step in if he steps down or if he is overthrown is just going to accelerate this war and the expansionism and the thirst for empire and all that kind of stuff that the U.S military industrial complex will feed into. So you have to think about what the future holds and what the different power players are and what the level of corruption there is, and the realistic view of the situation versus the idealistic view of the situation.
One of the things I talk about with Arestovych is that Putin, and he gets criticized for this, that Putin, out of all the people that might take power is the most liberal, is the most dovish. In fact, every indication shows that he really hates this war, and so everybody that will step in if he steps down or if he is overthrown is just going to accelerate this war and the expansionism and the thirst for empire and all that kind of stuff that the U.S military industrial complex will feed into. So you have to think about what the future holds and what the different power players are and what the level of corruption there is, and the realistic view of the situation versus the idealistic view of the situation.
Tulsi Gabbard
Just on that note real quick, I think that was exposed in broad daylight when it appeared that the former head of the Wagner Group was about to try to launch a coup, and how that was so celebrated, even on MSNBC and Rachel Maddow and others touting that this was somehow going to be a great thing, without looking at who is this guy really? What has he been doing in different countries around the world and what would be his ruling philosophy and how that would differ or benefit American interests or the interest of security and peace.
Just on that note real quick, I think that was exposed in broad daylight when it appeared that the former head of the Wagner Group was about to try to launch a coup, and how that was so celebrated, even on MSNBC and Rachel Maddow and others touting that this was somehow going to be a great thing, without looking at who is this guy really? What has he been doing in different countries around the world and what would be his ruling philosophy and how that would differ or benefit American interests or the interest of security and peace.
Lex Fridman
But also the interest of Ukraine or Russia, or humanity overall, just the flourishing of nations, which is great for everybody, and collaborations with nations.
But also the interest of Ukraine or Russia, or humanity overall, just the flourishing of nations, which is great for everybody, and collaborations with nations.
Tulsi Gabbard
I agree.
I agree.
Lex Fridman
Friendly competition. One of the things I love about the 20th century is the friendly, sometimes not so friendly, competition between the Soviet Union and the United States in space, in the space race. That’s created some incredible engineering and scientific breakthroughs and all of this, and also made people dream about reaching out to the stars, and war destroys all of that, or damages it. Hopefully just damages it. Hopefully the Phoenix will rise again.
Friendly competition. One of the things I love about the 20th century is the friendly, sometimes not so friendly, competition between the Soviet Union and the United States in space, in the space race. That’s created some incredible engineering and scientific breakthroughs and all of this, and also made people dream about reaching out to the stars, and war destroys all of that, or damages it. Hopefully just damages it. Hopefully the Phoenix will rise again.
Warmongers
Well, let me ask you about the criticism you’ve mentioned. It’s probably the most common criticism of you, that you love Putin. So just to linger on it, what do you think is the foundation of this criticism?
Tulsi Gabbard
Well, I’ll tell you when it began. My first day in Congress was January 3rd, 2013. I believe it was the third, fourth, fifth, somewhere around there, and my last day was January 3rd, 2021. I had been given my experience of serving as a soldier in the Middle East, and the motivation that really drove me to run for Congress in the first place. I served on the Foreign Affairs Committee and the Armed Services Committee for almost eight years, the eight years that I was there, with my drive and motivation to actually be in a position to challenge the influence of the military industrial complex, to try to prevent us from needlessly going to war.
Well, I’ll tell you when it began. My first day in Congress was January 3rd, 2013. I believe it was the third, fourth, fifth, somewhere around there, and my last day was January 3rd, 2021. I had been given my experience of serving as a soldier in the Middle East, and the motivation that really drove me to run for Congress in the first place. I served on the Foreign Affairs Committee and the Armed Services Committee for almost eight years, the eight years that I was there, with my drive and motivation to actually be in a position to challenge the influence of the military industrial complex, to try to prevent us from needlessly going to war.
And so the likes of Hillary Clinton and the cabal of Warmongers in Washington, they weren’t fans of mine to say the least. I can’t say it was a total surprise, but it was disheartening nonetheless that the very day that I announced my candidacy, that I was running for president, which was in February, 2019. The hour that I walked up onto that stage to announce my candidacy, it was in Hawaii and I gave my announcement speech, NBC News published a hit piece that planted the seeds of suspicion in voters’ minds that somehow, I was a darling of Putin and Russia and whatever. It was baseless, all of it baseless. And that continued like a steady drumbeat throughout my candidacy, but that really was escalated when in a podcast with David Axelrod, Hillary Clinton said, “Oh, well, the Russians are grooming her.”
And this came from a very influential person. She was the former Secretary of State, the former US Senator, former First Lady, someone who wielded and continues to wield a lot of power in the Democratic Party and amongst voters, and that took it to a whole new level. What is the basis for this? Nothing. It is a tired yet dependable playbook that is used not only by people like Hillary Clinton, but also people like Mitt Romney and others to try to smear, discredit and destroy the reputations of people who have the audacity to question their objectives as they call for one war or another, or have the audacity to say that this is not in the best interest of peace, or in our country, our national security.
They keep going back to this playbook as they do today, because again, they’re not willing to debate the substance of one position versus another, which is what we should have. If people feel so strongly that we should be going and waging this war, that war, okay, great. Go make your case to the American people. Go stand on the floor of the United States House and actually have this debate. Allow those who are saying, “No, this is not a good idea,” to also stand freely and make that argument. Instead, they resort to the kind of name-calling that tells voters, “Hey, you can’t trust this person or anything that they say.”
Myself and some of my other colleagues got the same treatment when we tried to pass legislation in Congress that would have taken out provisions from the Patriot Act that are most egregiously violating our Fourth Amendment rights and civil liberties, authorities that have allowed our government to illegally surveil Americans without a warrant. And as we did so, we were called traitors. We had other members of Congress on the house floor saying that if you pass this legislation, you will be responsible for another nine-eleven style attack on our soil.
These are all distraction tactics to try to divert our attention away from what’s actually happening, and instead, just tell voters, “Hey, you can’t trust these people.” Obviously, this has happened to Trump. It’s happened to Bobby Kennedy. It’s happened to people like Rand Paul and others. There’s a small group, but a growing number, at least I’m on the Republican side at this point, people who are actually willing to stand up and challenge the military industrial complex, challenge the warmongers in both parties.
Lex Fridman
Well, people on the left have challenged the warmongers as well throughout the last few decades.
Well, people on the left have challenged the warmongers as well throughout the last few decades.
Tulsi Gabbard
Less so recently. I agree with you, but less so recently, and this is one of the reasons why I left the Democratic Party, one of the foremost reasons. I devote an entire chapter to this issue in my book, For Love of Country: Leave the Democrat Party Behind. Going into the detail of some of the things we’ve talked about, about my own experiences, about what I have learned along the way, but also how even in the last year or two years, certainly under this administration, people who I worked with in Congress who were Democrats, dependable voices for civil liberties, dependable voices, speaking out against the insanity of people who wanted to wage war for the sake of war. They’re largely silent now.
Less so recently. I agree with you, but less so recently, and this is one of the reasons why I left the Democratic Party, one of the foremost reasons. I devote an entire chapter to this issue in my book, For Love of Country: Leave the Democrat Party Behind. Going into the detail of some of the things we’ve talked about, about my own experiences, about what I have learned along the way, but also how even in the last year or two years, certainly under this administration, people who I worked with in Congress who were Democrats, dependable voices for civil liberties, dependable voices, speaking out against the insanity of people who wanted to wage war for the sake of war. They’re largely silent now.
And unfortunately within the Democratic Party in Washington, there is no room for debate, that if you challenge the Biden administration’s position on foreign policy, you’re going to hear about it. And what we have seen is that’s exactly what’s happened, and people have retracted statements or just fallen silent or whatever the case may be. This debate that should be existent within both parties, on the Democrat side unfortunately, it just doesn’t exist anymore.
Lex Fridman
There seems to be some kind of mass hysteria over the war in Ukraine. It was strange to watch that the nuance aspect of the discussion was lost very quickly. It was, “Putin bad.” It was a war between good and evil. And in that, if you bring up any kind of nuanced discussion of how do we actually achieve peace in the situation, you’re immediately put on the side of evil.
There seems to be some kind of mass hysteria over the war in Ukraine. It was strange to watch that the nuance aspect of the discussion was lost very quickly. It was, “Putin bad.” It was a war between good and evil. And in that, if you bring up any kind of nuanced discussion of how do we actually achieve peace in the situation, you’re immediately put on the side of evil.
Tulsi Gabbard
Yeah, which is pretty sick when you think about it.
Yeah, which is pretty sick when you think about it.
Lex Fridman
The cynical view is, of course, it’s the military industrial complex machine, the war profiteers just driving this kind of conversation. I hope they don’t have that much power. I hope they just have incentives and they push people and they use people’s natural desire to divide the world into good and evil and fight for the side of good. People just have a natural proclivity for that, and that’s a good thing, that we want to fight for the side of good, but then that gets captured.
The cynical view is, of course, it’s the military industrial complex machine, the war profiteers just driving this kind of conversation. I hope they don’t have that much power. I hope they just have incentives and they push people and they use people’s natural desire to divide the world into good and evil and fight for the side of good. People just have a natural proclivity for that, and that’s a good thing, that we want to fight for the side of good, but then that gets captured.
Tulsi Gabbard
And manipulated.
And manipulated.
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Tulsi Gabbard
Yes. I admire your hopefulness. I am hopeful also because of the goodness in people and the naturally compassionate nature of people. However, I will tell you from firsthand experience that what we talk about is the national security state, and the military industrial complex, this cabal of warmongers that extends not only within government but outside of government, extends to many powerful media outlets. They are incredibly powerful and don’t have any qualms at destroying those who try to get in the way of their power, and they’ve got a lot of tools. They’ve got a lot of tools to do that, which I think is why President Eisenhower chose to include this in his farewell address as a warning, because the only recourse, the only real power that has the ability to destroy them and stand up against them is a free people living in a free society, exercising the rights that we have enshrined in the Constitution and Bill of Rights.
Yes. I admire your hopefulness. I am hopeful also because of the goodness in people and the naturally compassionate nature of people. However, I will tell you from firsthand experience that what we talk about is the national security state, and the military industrial complex, this cabal of warmongers that extends not only within government but outside of government, extends to many powerful media outlets. They are incredibly powerful and don’t have any qualms at destroying those who try to get in the way of their power, and they’ve got a lot of tools. They’ve got a lot of tools to do that, which I think is why President Eisenhower chose to include this in his farewell address as a warning, because the only recourse, the only real power that has the ability to destroy them and stand up against them is a free people living in a free society, exercising the rights that we have enshrined in the Constitution and Bill of Rights.
Nuclear war
Lex Fridman
I just talked to Annie Jacobsen. She wrote a book on nuclear war, a scenario of how a nuclear war will happen, second by second, minute by minute. I apologize. If it happens, how it would happen. It is terrifying.
I just talked to Annie Jacobsen. She wrote a book on nuclear war, a scenario of how a nuclear war will happen, second by second, minute by minute. I apologize. If it happens, how it would happen. It is terrifying.
Tulsi Gabbard
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
It’s terrifying how easy it is to start, that one person can start it first of all, and then there’s no way to stop it. Even potentially with tactical nuclear weapons, that the machinery of it, how clueless everybody is combined with the machinery of it, it’s just impossible to stop, and it’s just between Russia and the United States especially. And then all of a sudden, you have nuclear winter and 5 billion people are dead, and they die through just essentially torture, slowly. How do we avoid that? How do we avoid a nuclear war? That’s something that you talk about and think about. How do we avoid this kind of escalation of a hot war?
It’s terrifying how easy it is to start, that one person can start it first of all, and then there’s no way to stop it. Even potentially with tactical nuclear weapons, that the machinery of it, how clueless everybody is combined with the machinery of it, it’s just impossible to stop, and it’s just between Russia and the United States especially. And then all of a sudden, you have nuclear winter and 5 billion people are dead, and they die through just essentially torture, slowly. How do we avoid that? How do we avoid a nuclear war? That’s something that you talk about and think about. How do we avoid this kind of escalation of a hot war?
Tulsi Gabbard
I think the most essential thing, first of all, is understanding exactly what you have just detailed. We are in this very strange and absurd time where we have talking heads and so-called pundits on TV. We have politicians, we have people who are talking about a nuclear war as though it is a war that can be won, period, and a war that can be waged somehow without that risk of escalation to the point of destruction of human civilization. And so they talk about this as though it’s just another war, and especially as they talk about the use of tactical nuclear weapons. “Oh, well, this is small and we think it’ll send a message without actually escalating to the point where we are dealing with the kind of destruction that we witnessed in World War II.” That’s a dangerous thing when it becomes normalized as, “Well, we’ve got this new missile that’ll go and it’s targeted and it’s strategic, and it’ll only harm this, quote unquote, military target.”
I think the most essential thing, first of all, is understanding exactly what you have just detailed. We are in this very strange and absurd time where we have talking heads and so-called pundits on TV. We have politicians, we have people who are talking about a nuclear war as though it is a war that can be won, period, and a war that can be waged somehow without that risk of escalation to the point of destruction of human civilization. And so they talk about this as though it’s just another war, and especially as they talk about the use of tactical nuclear weapons. “Oh, well, this is small and we think it’ll send a message without actually escalating to the point where we are dealing with the kind of destruction that we witnessed in World War II.” That’s a dangerous thing when it becomes normalized as, “Well, we’ve got this new missile that’ll go and it’s targeted and it’s strategic, and it’ll only harm this, quote unquote, military target.”
Ronald Reagan was 100% correct when he said a nuclear war cannot be won and should never be waged. It was true then and it’s true now, no matter how much these guys who are producing these weapons or those who are benefiting from that industry try to tell us, “Oh no, it’ll never happen.” So to me, that’s an important first step, to continue to inform and educate and sound the alarms to people. Don’t buy this crap because it’s not true, and I look forward to listening to your podcast, but the PSA that was put out by New York City’s Emergency Management Office about what to do in the event of a nuclear attack, you would find it funny if it wasn’t so deeply disturbing. How they created this public service announcement, they distributed it everywhere across the city, on the internet. I think it was on the radio where you had a woman who appeared to be an actor coming in and saying, “Hey, in the event of when the big one hits, here’s what you should do. Focus on doing these three things,” and I’m paraphrasing but I encourage you to watch it.
I’m paraphrasing but she said, “Get inside. Stay inside and stay tuned.” That was it. And, “Get inside, go away from the windows. Stay inside. Don’t go outside until you get the all clear, and stay tuned. Follow our account on Instagram and Twitter.” And at the very end of this short PSA, her closing words were, “We’ve got this.” And it was so disturbing in that it was so completely out of touch with reality. It creates this kind of false sense of security that, okay, well, it’s like here’s what you do when a tornado hits or when a big storm hits, and categorizing the big one, a nuclear attack within that same kind of preparedness that you would want people to have in the event of a natural disaster of some sort. And it is reflective of the carelessness with which people in our government, that careless attitude that people in our government have towards nuclear war and a nuclear attack, even as they set us up for failure in pushing us closer and closer to the brink of a nuclear war occurring, whether it be an intentional attack, or as we saw during the last Cold War, one that could be launched unintentionally. How many near misses were there during the last Cold War? I saw this documentary called The Man Who Saved the World, and it was some mid-level officer who happened to be on duty and who didn’t do what he was told in launching the nuclear missiles because of what they thought was an incoming attack, and it turned out to be a complete mistake or misread on the radar, but that’s what we’re facing.
Lex Fridman
But by the way, there’s so many things to say there, but one of the things that Annie Jacobsen details is just how organized the machinery of all of this is, where the humans involved don’t have to think. They just follow orders. There’s a very clear set of steps you take, and there’s very few places where you can inject your humanity and be like, “Wait a minute, what’s the big picture of this?” The only person that can think is the…
But by the way, there’s so many things to say there, but one of the things that Annie Jacobsen details is just how organized the machinery of all of this is, where the humans involved don’t have to think. They just follow orders. There’s a very clear set of steps you take, and there’s very few places where you can inject your humanity and be like, “Wait a minute, what’s the big picture of this?” The only person that can think is the…
Lex Fridman
That can think is the president of the United States. The president of the United States gets six minutes after the warning. The early warning system says, whether it’s false or not, says that, “We believe that there’s been a nuclear weapon launched. You have six minutes before you can make the decision of launch back, initiate.” And to me, that’s what I’m voting based on, in the current situation.
That can think is the president of the United States. The president of the United States gets six minutes after the warning. The early warning system says, whether it’s false or not, says that, “We believe that there’s been a nuclear weapon launched. You have six minutes before you can make the decision of launch back, initiate.” And to me, that’s what I’m voting based on, in the current situation.
Tulsi Gabbard
Right.
Right.
Lex Fridman
You really have to see that as one of the most important aspects of the United States President, is, “Who do you trust in those six minutes to sit there?”
You really have to see that as one of the most important aspects of the United States President, is, “Who do you trust in those six minutes to sit there?”
Tulsi Gabbard
I agree.
I agree.
Lex Fridman
And I’m not really sure, looking at Biden and Trump, boy, I don’t know, but I do know that I would like somebody who’s thinking independently, and not part of the machinery of warmongers, that that’s really … I mean, I don’t want to make it sound cynical or dramatic, but sometimes in such scary situations, in such dramatic situations, you kind of follow the momentum.
And I’m not really sure, looking at Biden and Trump, boy, I don’t know, but I do know that I would like somebody who’s thinking independently, and not part of the machinery of warmongers, that that’s really … I mean, I don’t want to make it sound cynical or dramatic, but sometimes in such scary situations, in such dramatic situations, you kind of follow the momentum.
Tulsi Gabbard
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
When the right thing to do, the right thing for a leader to do is to step back and look of all human history, and ignore all the people in the room that are saying stuff, because most likely, what they’re going to be saying is warmongering type of things.
When the right thing to do, the right thing for a leader to do is to step back and look of all human history, and ignore all the people in the room that are saying stuff, because most likely, what they’re going to be saying is warmongering type of things.
Tulsi Gabbard
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
That’s one of the things, why I also get criticized for, I still think Zelenskyy is a hero for staying in Kyiv. Everybody was telling him to flee. It was all the information was basically saying the world’s second biggest military is like coming at Kyiv. It’s just dumb on all fronts to stay in Kyiv, but that’s what a great leader does, is ignores everybody and stays.
That’s one of the things, why I also get criticized for, I still think Zelenskyy is a hero for staying in Kyiv. Everybody was telling him to flee. It was all the information was basically saying the world’s second biggest military is like coming at Kyiv. It’s just dumb on all fronts to stay in Kyiv, but that’s what a great leader does, is ignores everybody and stays.
Tulsi Gabbard
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
“Screw it. I’m going to die for my country. I’m going to die as a leader,” and that’s the right thing for a leader to do.
“Screw it. I’m going to die for my country. I’m going to die as a leader,” and that’s the right thing for a leader to do.
Tulsi Gabbard
It’s sad that … I mean, to me, that’s what we should expect of our leaders, is exactly that, and it’s sad that having a leader in that position fulfill their responsibility, and the oath that they take is seen as a heroic act, when we should … That’s your job. That’s what we elect our leaders to do, and yet, so many have failed. But to your point, it’s not cynical at all to know that in those rooms, especially in these moments of crisis, unfortunately, there are the predominant and prevailing opinion of this warmongering establishment that’s not specific to one party, is the knee-jerk reaction, which is to go to war, or to execute an act of war.
It’s sad that … I mean, to me, that’s what we should expect of our leaders, is exactly that, and it’s sad that having a leader in that position fulfill their responsibility, and the oath that they take is seen as a heroic act, when we should … That’s your job. That’s what we elect our leaders to do, and yet, so many have failed. But to your point, it’s not cynical at all to know that in those rooms, especially in these moments of crisis, unfortunately, there are the predominant and prevailing opinion of this warmongering establishment that’s not specific to one party, is the knee-jerk reaction, which is to go to war, or to execute an act of war.
This is one of the biggest costs of this establishment, destroying the reputations of, and smearing and trying to cancel and censor those who are voices of peace, or just those who take a contrarian position and say, “Well, hey, why don’t we just pause for a moment and actually think this through? Why don’t we talk through, ‘What happens if we take this course of action? What happens if we go down a different path?’ Let’s actually be thoughtful about what our options are for A, B, and C, and then make the decision in a thoughtful manner based on that.” Even advocating for that is seen as a kind of heresy in the warmongering establishment in Washington, and the cost of their retaliation against those who are reasonable voices, who look at the world as it is, not some fantasy that they wish existed is, in those rooms, during those critical moments, people will, even if they know in their heart or their mind that this could end really badly, their instinct is to self-censor and not speak up because they don’t want to experience the wrath and ire, whether it be coming from four-star generals, or the secretaries of state, or defense, or these high-ranking people in positions of power and influence.
They don’t want to be the one guy in the room who’s just like, “Hey, guys, let’s just take a breath and actually think this through. What will happen, not just in the immediate response of this action that you’re advocating for, but what are all of the other people, other actors, stakeholders in the world, how will they respond, and then how will we respond to them? How will they respond to us?” Actually go through this exercise of, in the military, this is commonly referred to as, “What are the second, third, fourth order of effects that will occur as a result of pursuing a specific course of action?”
Lex Fridman
It’s weird how difficult it is to be that person in the room.
It’s weird how difficult it is to be that person in the room.
Tulsi Gabbard
It requires courage-
It requires courage-
Lex Fridman
Yeah, but like it-
Yeah, but like it-
Tulsi Gabbard
… which is sad, but it requires courage.
… which is sad, but it requires courage.
Lex Fridman
But why does it require, like even just to ask, “Okay, we’ve been in Afghanistan and Iraq for this number of years. What’s the exit plan?”
But why does it require, like even just to ask, “Okay, we’ve been in Afghanistan and Iraq for this number of years. What’s the exit plan?”
Tulsi Gabbard
Right.
Right.
Lex Fridman
Just bring that up every day at a meeting.
Just bring that up every day at a meeting.
Tulsi Gabbard
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
Like, “What’s the exit plan?” It’s strange that that gets criticized, the war in Iraq and so on, but I just remember there’s this pressure you can’t quite criticize, or ask dumb questions about, “Wait, what? Why are we going into Iraq again?” Like-
Like, “What’s the exit plan?” It’s strange that that gets criticized, the war in Iraq and so on, but I just remember there’s this pressure you can’t quite criticize, or ask dumb questions about, “Wait, what? Why are we going into Iraq again?” Like-
Tulsi Gabbard
But they’re not dumb questions.
But they’re not dumb questions.
Lex Fridman
Right. In retrospect, you’re like, “Oh, they’re not dumb questions at all,” but actually required a lot of courage to ask them while still working within the institution. It’s easier if you’re an activist from the outside saying, “No war,” this kind of stuff.
Right. In retrospect, you’re like, “Oh, they’re not dumb questions at all,” but actually required a lot of courage to ask them while still working within the institution. It’s easier if you’re an activist from the outside saying, “No war,” this kind of stuff.
Tulsi Gabbard
Sure. Sure.
Sure. Sure.
Lex Fridman
But within the institution, in the position of power, to ask the questions like, “Maybe let’s not.”
But within the institution, in the position of power, to ask the questions like, “Maybe let’s not.”
Tulsi Gabbard
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
It seems really difficult, and the same kind of thing in the war in Ukraine and just any kind of military involvement. Again, I guess the cynical interpretation is that it’s the military industrial complex that permeates just the halls of power.
It seems really difficult, and the same kind of thing in the war in Ukraine and just any kind of military involvement. Again, I guess the cynical interpretation is that it’s the military industrial complex that permeates just the halls of power.
Tulsi Gabbard
It does, and what is behind the military industrial complex? And there are different examples of this. You can look at the pharmaceutical industry as well. There’s a huge amount of money and a huge amount of power that wields tremendous influence over members of Congress. There are different examples of this across different sectors of our society, but I think the military industrial complex over time has proven itself to be the most powerful and influential, and that’s what is behind it, is this is why they try to destroy anyone who dares to ask the most obvious questions is because it is about power and wielding power.
It does, and what is behind the military industrial complex? And there are different examples of this. You can look at the pharmaceutical industry as well. There’s a huge amount of money and a huge amount of power that wields tremendous influence over members of Congress. There are different examples of this across different sectors of our society, but I think the military industrial complex over time has proven itself to be the most powerful and influential, and that’s what is behind it, is this is why they try to destroy anyone who dares to ask the most obvious questions is because it is about power and wielding power.
Lex Fridman
Well, the good thing about the United States presidents is they have the power to say F you to everybody in the room, I think.
Well, the good thing about the United States presidents is they have the power to say F you to everybody in the room, I think.
Tulsi Gabbard
They do.
They do.
Lex Fridman
It just seems like they don’t quite take that power. People say like, “Yeah, the U.S. President doesn’t have that much power.” I don’t know about that. It’s just like if you look at the law, especially in the military, when you’re talking about war and the military, they have a lot of power.
It just seems like they don’t quite take that power. People say like, “Yeah, the U.S. President doesn’t have that much power.” I don’t know about that. It’s just like if you look at the law, especially in the military, when you’re talking about war and the military, they have a lot of power.
Tulsi Gabbard
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
So they can fire everybody.
So they can fire everybody.
Tulsi Gabbard
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
They have a lot of power. They can stop wars, they can start wars. They have a lot of power.
They have a lot of power. They can stop wars, they can start wars. They have a lot of power.
Tulsi Gabbard
The position of the presidency certainly does. Unfortunately, we have people, too often, who assume the presidency from a position of weakness because they’re afraid of losing power, and so they make those calculated decisions not based on what is right for the right reasons, but instead, driven by fear of loss of power and loss of influence, and that’s where, especially given all that we are facing, we need leaders in the presidency and in Congress who have courage to be that voice in the room to ask about, to remain mindful of and rooted in the Constitution to, even as we are seeing this legislation being billed as the anti-TikTok bill, that’s really not about TikTok, it’s about freedom of speech.
The position of the presidency certainly does. Unfortunately, we have people, too often, who assume the presidency from a position of weakness because they’re afraid of losing power, and so they make those calculated decisions not based on what is right for the right reasons, but instead, driven by fear of loss of power and loss of influence, and that’s where, especially given all that we are facing, we need leaders in the presidency and in Congress who have courage to be that voice in the room to ask about, to remain mindful of and rooted in the Constitution to, even as we are seeing this legislation being billed as the anti-TikTok bill, that’s really not about TikTok, it’s about freedom of speech.
TikTok ban
Lex Fridman
Can you actually explain that bill?
Can you actually explain that bill?
Tulsi Gabbard
Yes. I guess the bottom line upfront is this is another piece of legislation being expedited through Congress with strong bipartisan support in the name of national security interests that is essentially a power grab and an assault on freedom and liberty. And I’ll just say this in, I think, probably the top three things that they’re not actually telling us that’s in the bill. Freedom of speech, it’s our ability to be able to express ourselves, whether it be in person, on a podcast, on a social media platform, in a newspaper, whatever the platform may be. This legislation gives the executive the power to decide which platforms are acceptable for us to be able to use TikTok itself.
Yes. I guess the bottom line upfront is this is another piece of legislation being expedited through Congress with strong bipartisan support in the name of national security interests that is essentially a power grab and an assault on freedom and liberty. And I’ll just say this in, I think, probably the top three things that they’re not actually telling us that’s in the bill. Freedom of speech, it’s our ability to be able to express ourselves, whether it be in person, on a podcast, on a social media platform, in a newspaper, whatever the platform may be. This legislation gives the executive the power to decide which platforms are acceptable for us to be able to use TikTok itself.
The words, TikTok, is not actually in the bill, but it gives the power to the president to decide, “Who is a foreign adversary?,” single-handedly, no consultation with or agreement from members of Congress or anyone else. It actually gives the power to a cabinet secretary to designate, “Who is a foreign adversary?,” and if a social media platform has at least 20% ownership in a social media platform, that platform may be banned from doing business in America essentially, but it’s not just a foreign state actor that could be named as a foreign adversary. It also includes a line in the legislation that if, let’s say a person has at least 25% financial interest or ownership in a social media platform, they’re an American citizen who may be working or living in some other country, or working or living here, but doing business with other countries. If the executive branch of our government decides that this individual is under the influence of, or controlled by someone that they deem a foreign adversary, then that platform must not do business in America, and that person obviously, even an American citizen, is banned from conducting that business. They must divest, essentially.
So when you look at, and this is where there’s been a lot of chatter around this, when you look at Elon Musk, for example, well, you already have people in the Biden administration, even President Biden himself, implying that Elon Musk’s activities need to be investigated. Well, he is someone with Tesla who does business in a lot of countries, including China, and therefore, he must be investigated. It is not at all a stretch of imagination to say that X could be the next platform that the executive branch decides. Nope. We’ve designated this person to be a foreign adversary, and therefore, his business interest cannot be allowed for this social media platform, cannot be allowed to exist.
We’ve seen this already with people accusing him and X of interfering in our elections. Again, it’s ironic that it’s coming from the Democratic party, that they are claiming that a guy who has set himself, he’s committed to free speech and is allowing free speech on his platform, and is not allowing the federal government to manipulate his platform by deeming which accounts are okay to post their content and which accounts are not because of disinformation, or whatever they claim it to be, it’s not an accident that the social media platforms that have been proven to take action at the behest of the federal government and the White House to censor certain voices, they’re not included with or being targeted at all in this legislation or outside of it, yet, other platforms that are not cooperating or collaborating somehow are. So the underlying issue here, this is being sold as TikTok and national security, but ultimately, even as Ron Paul said, this is a legislation that’s the greatest assault on liberty since the Patriot Act was passed.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, it’s quite dark that it’s just a grab of power.
Yeah, it’s quite dark that it’s just a grab of power.
Tulsi Gabbard
It is.
It is.
Lex Fridman
I mean, it’s not just with Elon, it’s probably with Zuck, with Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp. It puts pressure. It’s not just about banning, but it puts pressure for them to kind of moderate behavior, which is a slippery slope.
I mean, it’s not just with Elon, it’s probably with Zuck, with Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp. It puts pressure. It’s not just about banning, but it puts pressure for them to kind of moderate behavior, which is a slippery slope.
Tulsi Gabbard
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
Of course, it’s a beautiful dance of power, because you don’t want tech companies to have too much power either, or individuals at the top of those tech companies to have too much power, but then, do you want that power in the hands of government?
Of course, it’s a beautiful dance of power, because you don’t want tech companies to have too much power either, or individuals at the top of those tech companies to have too much power, but then, do you want that power in the hands of government?
Tulsi Gabbard
No.
No.
Lex Fridman
The history of this nation is a fascinatingly effective journey towards the balance of power, and it does seem like this sneaky, little thing, as much as I hate TikTok on all fronts. My brain rots every time I use TikTok. I know it is also the national security dangers of China and so on, but it’s just like, “TikTok, man.”
The history of this nation is a fascinatingly effective journey towards the balance of power, and it does seem like this sneaky, little thing, as much as I hate TikTok on all fronts. My brain rots every time I use TikTok. I know it is also the national security dangers of China and so on, but it’s just like, “TikTok, man.”
Tulsi Gabbard
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
I just … I don’t know, it’s so addicting. It’s so addicting. So when I first saw this TikTok bill, I was like, “Yes,” on all fronts, but then they got me. The Trojan Horse got me. No-
I just … I don’t know, it’s so addicting. It’s so addicting. So when I first saw this TikTok bill, I was like, “Yes,” on all fronts, but then they got me. The Trojan Horse got me. No-
Tulsi Gabbard
I mean, they all … And this is like The Social Dilemma documentary, I think exposed a lot, that there’s so much that these algorithms do in these various social media platforms that’s problematic to say the least. Data security and privacy is a serious issue. These are serious things, and so let’s have a conversation about these serious things, and cease these attempts to have our government try to tell us what we are and aren’t allowed to see, where we are and aren’t allowed to say what we want to say. That’s really what it comes down to.
I mean, they all … And this is like The Social Dilemma documentary, I think exposed a lot, that there’s so much that these algorithms do in these various social media platforms that’s problematic to say the least. Data security and privacy is a serious issue. These are serious things, and so let’s have a conversation about these serious things, and cease these attempts to have our government try to tell us what we are and aren’t allowed to see, where we are and aren’t allowed to say what we want to say. That’s really what it comes down to.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, more and more trust people to, whenever social media companies do bullshitty things for the people to make documentaries about it, to discover, for great journalists to do great journalism, and find the flaws in the hypocrisy and the call for transparency, all those kinds of things. I don’t trust, in most cases, government regulation of technology companies because they seem to be really out of touch.
Yeah, more and more trust people to, whenever social media companies do bullshitty things for the people to make documentaries about it, to discover, for great journalists to do great journalism, and find the flaws in the hypocrisy and the call for transparency, all those kinds of things. I don’t trust, in most cases, government regulation of technology companies because they seem to be really out of touch.
Tulsi Gabbard
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
One, they want power.
One, they want power.
Tulsi Gabbard
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
They’re really intimidated by the power that the tech companies have, and two, they don’t seem to get at the technology at all. So they’re hindering innovation, and they’re just greedy for power, and those are not-
They’re really intimidated by the power that the tech companies have, and two, they don’t seem to get at the technology at all. So they’re hindering innovation, and they’re just greedy for power, and those are not-
Tulsi Gabbard
Yeah. It’s a bad combination.
Yeah. It’s a bad combination.
Lex Fridman
It’s a bad combination.
It’s a bad combination.
Tulsi Gabbard
The thing here too, though, is this extends far beyond social media companies. This is a very specific example, but it’s one example of many how those who are greedy for power are continuing to try to find ways to tell us how to live our lives. They’re increasingly trying to tell us, again, what we’re allowed to see and hear, whether it be social media companies, or what shows up in a Google Search engine, for example, and if they’re not finding a willing and compliant social media company or big tech company, then they’re looking for ways to reach their hand into those tech companies and force compliance, but in the age of disinformation, misinformation, hate speech, all of the excuses that are given for government, either directly or indirectly through big tech, to try to censor certain voices, it really undermines the truth, which is the way to defeat bad speech is with better speech and more speech. Whether it’s hate speech or things that you might be offended by, or things that you might disagree with, the answer is not to have some entity with the power of censorship and being the “Authority” to decide what is good speech and acceptable, and what is bad speech and unacceptable. It’s what you said, let’s encourage this debate, and encourage people who are inspired by like, “No, man.”
The thing here too, though, is this extends far beyond social media companies. This is a very specific example, but it’s one example of many how those who are greedy for power are continuing to try to find ways to tell us how to live our lives. They’re increasingly trying to tell us, again, what we’re allowed to see and hear, whether it be social media companies, or what shows up in a Google Search engine, for example, and if they’re not finding a willing and compliant social media company or big tech company, then they’re looking for ways to reach their hand into those tech companies and force compliance, but in the age of disinformation, misinformation, hate speech, all of the excuses that are given for government, either directly or indirectly through big tech, to try to censor certain voices, it really undermines the truth, which is the way to defeat bad speech is with better speech and more speech. Whether it’s hate speech or things that you might be offended by, or things that you might disagree with, the answer is not to have some entity with the power of censorship and being the “Authority” to decide what is good speech and acceptable, and what is bad speech and unacceptable. It’s what you said, let’s encourage this debate, and encourage people who are inspired by like, “No, man.”
“I saw this thing or this thing is happening, and it’s pissing me off, so I’m going to bring a superior argument. I’m going to show what the right way is.” And gosh, this is what our founders envisioned for us as a society in this country, and we would be so much stronger with a more engaged people and a more informed people if we had this and had it supported.
Lex Fridman
Do you think … What are the chances that the TikTok ban bill passes?
Do you think … What are the chances that the TikTok ban bill passes?
Tulsi Gabbard
The way that it passed through the House of Representatives with such an overwhelming bipartisan support and so quickly, and President Biden saying that if it comes across his desk, he’ll sign it, I thought it would pass through very quickly. I’m only slightly encouraged by the fact that the Senate, at least, appears to be saying, “Hey, there are serious free speech concerns around this bill, serious civil liberties concerns around this bill. We need to do our due diligence.” I won’t say I’m cautiously optimistic because I understand how that place works, but their pause at least gives people the opportunity to continue to kind of sound the alarm and for people to call their senators and express their concerns with this, that are very real, valid concerns.
The way that it passed through the House of Representatives with such an overwhelming bipartisan support and so quickly, and President Biden saying that if it comes across his desk, he’ll sign it, I thought it would pass through very quickly. I’m only slightly encouraged by the fact that the Senate, at least, appears to be saying, “Hey, there are serious free speech concerns around this bill, serious civil liberties concerns around this bill. We need to do our due diligence.” I won’t say I’m cautiously optimistic because I understand how that place works, but their pause at least gives people the opportunity to continue to kind of sound the alarm and for people to call their senators and express their concerns with this, that are very real, valid concerns.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, this is really messed up. Just, in case we didn’t make it clear, I think this is really, really big danger if this thing passes. Even if you hate Elon Musk or your whatever, this is really, really, really dangerous. If the government gets a say over the platforms on which we communicate with each other, it’s a huge problem.
Yeah, this is really messed up. Just, in case we didn’t make it clear, I think this is really, really big danger if this thing passes. Even if you hate Elon Musk or your whatever, this is really, really, really dangerous. If the government gets a say over the platforms on which we communicate with each other, it’s a huge problem.
Tulsi Gabbard
And there’s a section in there as well, just kind of the last piece on this, is if you use a VPN, and you try to use a VPN to access this, you could have problems with the law, and you take that a step further and say, “Well, how would they know?” There’s a surveillance aspect to that. So once you start peeling back the layers of this really toxic onion, it really leads seriously to a pretty dark, and dangerous, and oppressive place.
And there’s a section in there as well, just kind of the last piece on this, is if you use a VPN, and you try to use a VPN to access this, you could have problems with the law, and you take that a step further and say, “Well, how would they know?” There’s a surveillance aspect to that. So once you start peeling back the layers of this really toxic onion, it really leads seriously to a pretty dark, and dangerous, and oppressive place.
Bernie Sanders
Lex Fridman
You were a long-time Democrat. You were the vice chair of the Democratic National Committee, until you resigned in 2016 to endorse Bernie. I should say I love Bernie. I loved him before he was cool, all right? Anyway, can you go through what happened in that situation, and with the Democratic National Committee and with Bernie, and why you resigned?
You were a long-time Democrat. You were the vice chair of the Democratic National Committee, until you resigned in 2016 to endorse Bernie. I should say I love Bernie. I loved him before he was cool, all right? Anyway, can you go through what happened in that situation, and with the Democratic National Committee and with Bernie, and why you resigned?
Tulsi Gabbard
As a vice chair of the Democratic National Committee, one of the things that the rules of the DNC required was that officers of the DNC, of which we were, as I think there were five or six of us who were vice chairs at the time, you have to remain neutral in a Democratic primary. So you’re not as a party supposed to be tipping the scales in any direction for any candidate during a primary election. And so I had no plans to get involved for any candidate or against any candidate during that primary, and just the hopes of like, “All right, we got to make sure that this is a fair and balanced primary so that voters have the best opportunity to vote for the candidate of their choosing.” I saw a couple of things pretty quickly. Number one is that the chair of the DNC at the time was a woman named Debbie Wasserman Schultz, a congresswoman out of Florida, and she made very serious decisions unilaterally that many times, we found out about via tweet or press release that showed she was tilting the scales in the favor of Hillary Clinton in that 2016 primary.
As a vice chair of the Democratic National Committee, one of the things that the rules of the DNC required was that officers of the DNC, of which we were, as I think there were five or six of us who were vice chairs at the time, you have to remain neutral in a Democratic primary. So you’re not as a party supposed to be tipping the scales in any direction for any candidate during a primary election. And so I had no plans to get involved for any candidate or against any candidate during that primary, and just the hopes of like, “All right, we got to make sure that this is a fair and balanced primary so that voters have the best opportunity to vote for the candidate of their choosing.” I saw a couple of things pretty quickly. Number one is that the chair of the DNC at the time was a woman named Debbie Wasserman Schultz, a congresswoman out of Florida, and she made very serious decisions unilaterally that many times, we found out about via tweet or press release that showed she was tilting the scales in the favor of Hillary Clinton in that 2016 primary.
The other thing that I saw was how the mainstream media and those who are supposed to be in a position to be neutral arbiters to facilitate debates and forums and conversations so that voters can be best informed in who they want to vote for, were calling Hillary Clinton the most qualified person ever to run for president in the history of our country because of the positions that she had held as secretary of state, as a U.S. senator, as first lady, and yet, they glossed over those titles without ever holding her, asking questions even, or holding her to account for her record, especially in the area of foreign policy. The job she was running for was to be commander in chief, to be the president of the United States. That responsibility to serve as commander in chief is the foremost responsibility a president has. It’s essentially the one area where the president can unilaterally make decisions without education, healthcare, immigration. Congress has to actually pass legislation. President can come through and say, “Hey, here’s the policies that I want.”
“Here’s legislation that I’ll propose,” but those changes can’t be made without Congress, working with Congress to pass them. So she was essentially being let off the hook for her record, as an American, as a soldier, as a veteran. That was a big problem for me, and so I made the decision to resign as vice chair of the DNC so that I could endorse Bernie Sanders, who largely at heart, I believe is a non-interventionist. He hasn’t focused a lot on foreign policy. It’s not at the heart of what his focus has been for decades, but he was certainly far more of a non-interventionist than Hillary Clinton, who has shown through her record to be the queen of warmongers in Washington. I wanted to be in a position where I would have a platform to inform voters about her record so that they could make that decision for themselves, so that they could see, “Hey, in this area, on this issue, which is incredibly important, there is a clear contrast between these two candidates running in the Democratic primary,” and that’s what drove my decision to resign and to endorse Bernie Sanders, and that’s what I went on to do throughout the rest of that primary election.
Lex Fridman
What do you like most about Bernie, the positive?
What do you like most about Bernie, the positive?
Tulsi Gabbard
You know, what I like most about him is he is who he is, unapologetically so, both in personality, but also in what he advocates for, and what he’s advocated for for a long time. So you can agree or disagree with his positions, but he is who he is.
You know, what I like most about him is he is who he is, unapologetically so, both in personality, but also in what he advocates for, and what he’s advocated for for a long time. So you can agree or disagree with his positions, but he is who he is.
Politics
Lex Fridman
Like I said, you were a long-time Democrat. You ran for president in 2020 as a Democrat. Now, you’re an independent, and you wrote an excellent book, describing your journey ideologically, philosophically through that. Why did you choose to leave the Democratic party?
Like I said, you were a long-time Democrat. You ran for president in 2020 as a Democrat. Now, you’re an independent, and you wrote an excellent book, describing your journey ideologically, philosophically through that. Why did you choose to leave the Democratic party?
Tulsi Gabbard
In the book, I go into a number of the central reasons why I made that choice, but fundamental to them is that the Democratic party has become a party that is opposed to freedom, that is opposed to the central and foundational principles that exist within our founding documents, and that serve as the identity of who we are as Americans and what this country is supposed to be about. It has become a party that is controlled by this elitist cabal of warmongers, who are driving forward this “Woke agenda,” and we see it through their racializing of everything. We see this through their defund the police mission. We see this through their open border policies. We see this through how, in their education policy, they’re failing our kids, and how they are pushing this narrative, that ultimately is a rejection of objective truth.
In the book, I go into a number of the central reasons why I made that choice, but fundamental to them is that the Democratic party has become a party that is opposed to freedom, that is opposed to the central and foundational principles that exist within our founding documents, and that serve as the identity of who we are as Americans and what this country is supposed to be about. It has become a party that is controlled by this elitist cabal of warmongers, who are driving forward this “Woke agenda,” and we see it through their racializing of everything. We see this through their defund the police mission. We see this through their open border policies. We see this through how, in their education policy, they’re failing our kids, and how they are pushing this narrative, that ultimately is a rejection of objective truth.
The fact that it’s a question up for debate about whether or not … Well, actually, it’s not a question up for debate for them. They are actively pushing …
Tulsi Gabbard
… question up for debate for them. They are actively pushing for boys who identify as girls to compete against girls in sports, changing our language so that the word woman, the identity of being a woman is essentially being erased from our society and it is the height of hypocrisy and, frankly, an act of hatred towards women that they are so intent on doing this, and ironic that it’s coming from the party that for so long proclaimed themselves to be the greatest feminists and the most pro-woman party in the country.
… question up for debate for them. They are actively pushing for boys who identify as girls to compete against girls in sports, changing our language so that the word woman, the identity of being a woman is essentially being erased from our society and it is the height of hypocrisy and, frankly, an act of hatred towards women that they are so intent on doing this, and ironic that it’s coming from the party that for so long proclaimed themselves to be the greatest feminists and the most pro-woman party in the country.
I go into detail around each of these issues and more in the book. But you will see as we go through each of these issues, fundamental and foundational to every one of them is that, sadly, the Democratic Party has become a party that is so consumed by their desire for power, this insatiable hunger for power, that they are willing to destroy our republic, our democracy, our freedom, just so that they can try to hold on to power and gain more power.
Lex Fridman
So these are just different mechanisms for power. The identity of-
So these are just different mechanisms for power. The identity of-
Tulsi Gabbard
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
… politics and the warmongering are related to each other in that they’re mechanisms to attain more power.
… politics and the warmongering are related to each other in that they’re mechanisms to attain more power.
Tulsi Gabbard
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
You’re making it sound like only the Democratic Party are full of power-hungry people. So to you, the Republican Party, I don’t know if you’ve met those folks, but some of them-
You’re making it sound like only the Democratic Party are full of power-hungry people. So to you, the Republican Party, I don’t know if you’ve met those folks, but some of them-
Tulsi Gabbard
A couple of them.
A couple of them.
Lex Fridman
… are also in love with power and are…
… are also in love with power and are…
Tulsi Gabbard
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
At times, to some degree, politicians in general are corrupt, sometimes within the legal bonds, sometimes slightly outside of the legal bonds. And so, to you, to what degree is sort of the Democratic Party worse than the Republican Party? So I don’t want to paint a picture of this beautiful vision of the Republican Party that-
At times, to some degree, politicians in general are corrupt, sometimes within the legal bonds, sometimes slightly outside of the legal bonds. And so, to you, to what degree is sort of the Democratic Party worse than the Republican Party? So I don’t want to paint a picture of this beautiful vision of the Republican Party that-
Tulsi Gabbard
No.
No.
Lex Fridman
… they’re somehow not-
… they’re somehow not-
Tulsi Gabbard
That doesn’t exist.
That doesn’t exist.
Lex Fridman
… power-hungry.
… power-hungry.
Tulsi Gabbard
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
[inaudible 01:26:18].
[inaudible 01:26:18].
Tulsi Gabbard
And I’m glad you brought this up. The book details why, after 20 or so years as a member of the Democratic Party, I decided to leave. But also… And it goes through my experiences and things that I have seen and learned along the way, but I also point out exactly that fact in the book. But from the very beginning what the prologue is we should not be naive to think that this only exists within the Democratic Party.
And I’m glad you brought this up. The book details why, after 20 or so years as a member of the Democratic Party, I decided to leave. But also… And it goes through my experiences and things that I have seen and learned along the way, but I also point out exactly that fact in the book. But from the very beginning what the prologue is we should not be naive to think that this only exists within the Democratic Party.
There are very serious problems within both of our political parties, specifically coming from politicians who are driven by this desire for power and who are so afraid of losing that power that they’re willing to do whatever they feel they need to do, which centers around taking away our freedom because the more free we are to make our own decisions, even if they may end up being the wrong decisions, but to learn from those things and know that we’ve got to live with the consequences, the beauty and messiness of what a free society looks like.
They’re so afraid of us because they see us as the people and our freedom as the central threat to their ability to remain in power. I think the difference that we’re seeing today is that, unfortunately, we talked about this a little bit how the Democratic Party has become a party where you must walk in lockstep with the leadership of that party or risk being faced with your reputation being destroyed and smeared and all of these different attacks. And the reason why they do that is to put people like me and Bobby Kennedy and others up as an example of saying, “Hey, if you step out of line, if you challenge us, this is what we’re going to do to you.”
The Republican Party has also done that, and they also have politicians and leaders who are more interested in feeding the thriving system in the Washington establishment. But we are also seeing that the Republican Party also has some voices and, I would say, increasing voices of people. And I would put Donald Trump in this category who are challenging the, quote, unquote, norms of the Republican Party that are represented by people like Nikki Haley or Mike Pence, for example. The Republican Party is not a monolithic entity, and it means different things to different people.
And that’s where I think the real challenge in this next election is less… it’s really less about one political party over another, and it’s more about our opportunity as voters to select leaders… First of all, to fire those who are against freedom and who are warmongers, who, by their essence, are willing to take away our freedom in the name of national security and vote for people… Nobody’s perfect. We shouldn’t hold anybody up on a pedestal, but vote for those who are committed to the Constitution and who hold those values that represent the interests of the people.
Lex Fridman
I am not a fan of this choice, but here we are, Biden versus Trump. So let me ask you sort of a challenging question of pros and cons. Can you give me pros and cons of each? What’s the biggest strength and biggest limitation of, let’s say, Biden?
I am not a fan of this choice, but here we are, Biden versus Trump. So let me ask you sort of a challenging question of pros and cons. Can you give me pros and cons of each? What’s the biggest strength and biggest limitation of, let’s say, Biden?
Tulsi Gabbard
This is a tough question. I’ve known President Biden for a lot of years. I knew his son Beau, who served in the National Guard the same time that I did. I considered Joe Biden a friend. He’s someone over the years that I’ve talked to and shared laughs with and spent time with in different situations. The positive characteristics that drew me to Joe Biden of the past, they are not represented in how he has led as president, and I’ll let the pundits theorize as to how that is or why that is.
This is a tough question. I’ve known President Biden for a lot of years. I knew his son Beau, who served in the National Guard the same time that I did. I considered Joe Biden a friend. He’s someone over the years that I’ve talked to and shared laughs with and spent time with in different situations. The positive characteristics that drew me to Joe Biden of the past, they are not represented in how he has led as president, and I’ll let the pundits theorize as to how that is or why that is.
But the truth that I know exists, which points to his weakness, is that instead of listening to his better angels, he has instead at every turn… If you go back and I look back to his inauguration speech where he promised to be a president for all Americans, and during his campaign, promised to be the uniter in chief, to bring a country together that was deeply divided. That’s the Joe Biden that I’ve known for many years.
A guy who has worked with different people with different backgrounds and different political views but tried to find at different points in time a way to work together. At every turn, he has done the exact opposite of what he spoke about during his inauguration speech and has left us as the American people today more divided, less secure, both from an economic standpoint as well as a national security or safety and security standpoint, and less free as a society and as a people.
Lex Fridman
So the biggest criticism would be he divided us or continued the division that’s been there. Who do you be the greatest uniter? To me, over the past few decades, to me, Obama. You’ve been very critical of Obama on the foreign policy side-
So the biggest criticism would be he divided us or continued the division that’s been there. Who do you be the greatest uniter? To me, over the past few decades, to me, Obama. You’ve been very critical of Obama on the foreign policy side-
Tulsi Gabbard
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Lex Fridman
… on many fronts. But to me, that guy did really good. Maybe some people say just rhetoric, but I think rhetoric matters in your president. I think he was out of all the presidents we had as probably the most effective uniter of the people. Would that be fair to say?
… on many fronts. But to me, that guy did really good. Maybe some people say just rhetoric, but I think rhetoric matters in your president. I think he was out of all the presidents we had as probably the most effective uniter of the people. Would that be fair to say?
Tulsi Gabbard
During his 2008 campaign, yes. I think that his message resonated with so many people across generations and across different views, different backgrounds to where people cried on the night that he was elected because they felt so hopeful. I talked to people, and I know people who set aside their entire lives to work on his campaign to be a part of this hope and change mission that he laid out that would bring us together. Some of the people that I know personally, they gave up their lives during the campaign, and after he won, they went to Washington, DC, because they wanted to be able to do the work that they had that he had laid out and continue to be a part of this mission that they expected would extend beyond the campaign.
During his 2008 campaign, yes. I think that his message resonated with so many people across generations and across different views, different backgrounds to where people cried on the night that he was elected because they felt so hopeful. I talked to people, and I know people who set aside their entire lives to work on his campaign to be a part of this hope and change mission that he laid out that would bring us together. Some of the people that I know personally, they gave up their lives during the campaign, and after he won, they went to Washington, DC, because they wanted to be able to do the work that they had that he had laid out and continue to be a part of this mission that they expected would extend beyond the campaign.
And they’ve expressed to me personally how heartbroken they were because so quickly after he was elected, instead of bringing in a new generation of fresh leadership that was not a part of the Washington establishment, he instead immediately chose to surround himself with people who were more of the same old, same old. Who were essentially part of the problem. And many of his actions after that proved that fear and that brokenheartedness that they felt to be true. I’ll mention one example related to civil liberties that we talked about.
He was someone as a US senator who gave some pretty powerful speeches on the Senate floor about his concerns with the Patriot Act, his concerns with surveillance from the NSA, his concerns with a violation of our Fourth Amendment Rights and civil liberties. But when, as president, he was confronted with leaked information about this surveillance occurring under those authorities in his presidency, he sided… he took the side of the national security state and did not take action to right the wrongs that he correctly pointed out as senator and during his campaign for the presidency, which is unfortunate because he really did build this unifying momentum throughout his campaign.
Lex Fridman
What do you think that is? Why is it so hard as a president to kind of act on the promises of the campaign? But also just, I mean, his speech is basically anti-war speech that really resonated to me. The fact that he was against the war in Iraq early on.
What do you think that is? Why is it so hard as a president to kind of act on the promises of the campaign? But also just, I mean, his speech is basically anti-war speech that really resonated to me. The fact that he was against the war in Iraq early on.
Tulsi Gabbard
Yes. And that was a huge point of distinction between him and Hillary Clinton.
Yes. And that was a huge point of distinction between him and Hillary Clinton.
Lex Fridman
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Tulsi Gabbard
Probably one of the biggest.
Probably one of the biggest.
Lex Fridman
Why is it so hard when you step into the office of President to sort of act on your ideals?
Why is it so hard when you step into the office of President to sort of act on your ideals?
Tulsi Gabbard
I think it goes back to what we talked about a little bit, which is what are you driven by and what are you afraid of? And if you are concerned for whether or not you can get re-elected, who’s going to fund that re-election effort? Who’s going to fund the presidential library and your legacy that will follow?
I think it goes back to what we talked about a little bit, which is what are you driven by and what are you afraid of? And if you are concerned for whether or not you can get re-elected, who’s going to fund that re-election effort? Who’s going to fund the presidential library and your legacy that will follow?
There have been some documented examples around how he promised to crack down on Big Pharma, but when push came to shove, his Department of Justice campaign funding was threatened, and they chose not to take action even when they had a very, very strong case to make. This was with regard to the opioid crisis in the country. And this just goes back to the heart of why it’s so essential that we have leaders who have courage and who are focused on doing what we elect them to do.
Lex Fridman
And who are resistant to the love of money and power.
And who are resistant to the love of money and power.
Tulsi Gabbard
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
It’s hard.
It’s hard.
Tulsi Gabbard
And we are human. We are fallible. We are flawed by nature. And I’ll go into kind of the next one you asked about Trump.
And we are human. We are fallible. We are flawed by nature. And I’ll go into kind of the next one you asked about Trump.
Lex Fridman
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Tulsi Gabbard
The weakness side and the lessons that I hope have been learned from 2016 for him and his team is you have to be in a position where you are surrounding yourselves with other people of courage who aren’t just thinking about their next political job or their next job getting a cable news contract or looking for fame themselves or looking at how they can monetize their position for their… whatever their next financial interest might be. But people of courage who know what they’re up against to really seriously clean house across the federal government and the corruption and rot that is so deeply entrenched in order to truly be effective.
The weakness side and the lessons that I hope have been learned from 2016 for him and his team is you have to be in a position where you are surrounding yourselves with other people of courage who aren’t just thinking about their next political job or their next job getting a cable news contract or looking for fame themselves or looking at how they can monetize their position for their… whatever their next financial interest might be. But people of courage who know what they’re up against to really seriously clean house across the federal government and the corruption and rot that is so deeply entrenched in order to truly be effective.
And if he is re-elected, that is my hope that that he sees… he’s learned from what went wrong in 2016. That he went in with a largely non-interventionist, more focused on peace agenda, and yet he surrounded himself with people who are at the heart of the warmongers in Washington and who directly went against the policies that he advocated for. On the strength side, I think it’s easy to point out because it’s also what has caused him to be so attacked in ways that we haven’t seen before. Certainly not in my lifetime by the Democrats, by the Biden administration, not only now, but something that started back in 2016 when he was a candidate.
He’s a guy who, by all measures, has been successful in his own life, and because of that, he’s not coming in with this desire to please Washington that many other politicians have. And because he is so willing to challenge the, quote, unquote, norms, and these are not norms that serve the interests of the American people. These are norms that serve the interests of the most powerful, he’s a direct threat. And so that attitude and that mindset of not coming in with the kind of caution that too many politicians come in with of wanting to be the popular one at the parties or whatever it is that they want, that is the strength that he brings.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, I just had a conversation with Dana White, and he’s good friends with Trump, and he talks to the fact that he seems to be resistant to the attacks. Some aspect of that is just the psychology of being able to withstand their attacks that are there in the political game, and that can break people. You just don’t want the headaches.
Yeah, I just had a conversation with Dana White, and he’s good friends with Trump, and he talks to the fact that he seems to be resistant to the attacks. Some aspect of that is just the psychology of being able to withstand their attacks that are there in the political game, and that can break people. You just don’t want the headaches.
Personal attacks
So to withstand the attacks is tough, and something about his psychology allows for that. I mean, I guess a question for you also in your own psychology, you’ve been attacked quite a bit. We’ve mentioned some of that sort of misrepresentations, and how do you deal with that by yourself? How do you not become cynical or overcompensate the other direction, that kind of stuff?
Tulsi Gabbard
It really stems from having a clear sense of purpose. I never saw… I’ve served in state government, I’ve served on our city council in Honolulu and served in Congress, but at no time have I seen this as a, quote, unquote, political career. I don’t have that ladder-climbing ambition that a lot of politicians have. My sense of purpose is deeply rooted in my dedication and my desire in my life to be pleasing to God and to live a life of service. And what better way to be pleasing to God than to try to do my best to work for the well-being of God’s children?
It really stems from having a clear sense of purpose. I never saw… I’ve served in state government, I’ve served on our city council in Honolulu and served in Congress, but at no time have I seen this as a, quote, unquote, political career. I don’t have that ladder-climbing ambition that a lot of politicians have. My sense of purpose is deeply rooted in my dedication and my desire in my life to be pleasing to God and to live a life of service. And what better way to be pleasing to God than to try to do my best to work for the well-being of God’s children?
Being rooted in that has made it so that, as the attacks are coming from different directions, even as people who I was friends with, former colleagues of mine, others, even family members, even as they have turned away or become attackers against me themselves because of different reasons related to politics, of course, it’s a sad thing, especially when it’s someone that personally and have had a personal friendship or relationship with. But I don’t live my life trying to please politicians or please the people who show up on TV or anyone else. As long as I am doing my best to be pleasing to God, that is where I draw my happiness from and my fulfillment and contentment and strength.
God
Lex Fridman
So you’ve spoken about the value of religious faith in your life, of your Hindu faith, and seeing the Bhagavad Gita as a spiritual guide. So what role does faith in God play in your life?
So you’ve spoken about the value of religious faith in your life, of your Hindu faith, and seeing the Bhagavad Gita as a spiritual guide. So what role does faith in God play in your life?
Tulsi Gabbard
It’s everything. It is central to who I am, what inspires me, what motivates me, where I find strength, where I find peace, where I find shelter, and where I find happiness. And this has been a constant throughout times of challenge, times of darkness, times of heartbreak, times of happiness, in always feeling very secure in knowing that God’s unconditional love is ever present, and no matter what else is happening in my life, that God is my best friend. And remaining centered and grounded in always remembering that and meditating upon that truth is it’s everything to me.
It’s everything. It is central to who I am, what inspires me, what motivates me, where I find strength, where I find peace, where I find shelter, and where I find happiness. And this has been a constant throughout times of challenge, times of darkness, times of heartbreak, times of happiness, in always feeling very secure in knowing that God’s unconditional love is ever present, and no matter what else is happening in my life, that God is my best friend. And remaining centered and grounded in always remembering that and meditating upon that truth is it’s everything to me.
Lex Fridman
The interesting thing about the Hindu God is how welcoming the religion is of other religions. Just-
The interesting thing about the Hindu God is how welcoming the religion is of other religions. Just-
Tulsi Gabbard
It’s true.
It’s true.
Lex Fridman
… how accepting it is. So in that way, in many ways, it’s one of the most beautiful religions on earth. So who do you think God is to you in specifically the texts, but also you personally? What does He represent? So for Hinduism, it’s also God can be [inaudible 01:44:54]. There’s also a aspect where there’s a… it’s a part of all of us. There’s a uniting thing, not a singular figure outside of us.
… how accepting it is. So in that way, in many ways, it’s one of the most beautiful religions on earth. So who do you think God is to you in specifically the texts, but also you personally? What does He represent? So for Hinduism, it’s also God can be [inaudible 01:44:54]. There’s also a aspect where there’s a… it’s a part of all of us. There’s a uniting thing, not a singular figure outside of us.
Tulsi Gabbard
I think one of the things that’s most commonly misunderstood about Hinduism that people don’t know is that Hinduism is truly a monotheistic religion. That there is one God, and He goes by many names that describe His different qualities and characteristics. And as you pointed out, Hinduism is uniquely of a non-sectarian spiritual practice, essentially. It’s not a, quote, unquote, religion that you convert into, or you leave behind, or whatever the case may be. Bhagavad Gita, a central scripture and text that comes from India, literally means Song of God. And the principles that are conveyed throughout the Bhagavad Gita are applicable to all of us.
I think one of the things that’s most commonly misunderstood about Hinduism that people don’t know is that Hinduism is truly a monotheistic religion. That there is one God, and He goes by many names that describe His different qualities and characteristics. And as you pointed out, Hinduism is uniquely of a non-sectarian spiritual practice, essentially. It’s not a, quote, unquote, religion that you convert into, or you leave behind, or whatever the case may be. Bhagavad Gita, a central scripture and text that comes from India, literally means Song of God. And the principles that are conveyed throughout the Bhagavad Gita are applicable to all of us.
They are timeless truths that, whether you consider yourself Christian or Catholic or Muslim or Jewish or Hindu, these truths are eternal and relevant through all time. So for us as kids growing up, we learned from and had bedtime stories that came from both the Bhagavad Gita and the New Testament. My dad was raised Catholic, my mom was raised Episcopalian, and both of them were attracted to the Bhagavad Gita as they were in their own lives searching for a more personal relationship with God than they had been able to find elsewhere in their own spiritual journeys. And that’s where the application of… There’re teachings in the Bhagavad Gita, for example, that talk about Bhakti Yoga.
Bhakti Yoga essentially translates into dedicating your life, striving to develop a loving relationship with God. Karma Yoga. There’s a chapter in the Bhagavad Gita that speaks about Karma Yoga. Karma is a word that has become a part of the… Both karma and yoga have become very common terms, but what it really means is trying to dedicate your actions in life that have… in a way that have a positive impact on others, being of service to others. And so for me, growing up, I never really understood as kid the idea of sectarianism of one religion battling against another because I knew and understood and experienced that the real meaning of religion was love for God.
No matter what name you worship Him by or how you worship that is the real meaning of religion. And the application of that in your life is you ask, “How do I see God in a personal way?” I see… I know that God is my best friend. God is my confidant. When I am struggling with a problem in my life or during those quiet moments by myself where I am anxious or I’m sad, I turn to God for that solace, for that clarity, for that strength to both know what the right thing to do is and the strength to act accordingly and to constantly strive to further develop that very personal loving relationship with God.
Lex Fridman
Tulsi, this was an honor to finally meet you, to talk to you. This was amazing. Thank you.
Tulsi, this was an honor to finally meet you, to talk to you. This was amazing. Thank you.
Tulsi Gabbard
Thank you, Lex. It’s so wonderful to be here. Thank you for the opportunity.
Thank you, Lex. It’s so wonderful to be here. Thank you for the opportunity.
Lex Fridman
Thanks for listening to this conversation with Tulsi Gabbard. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, let me leave you with some words from Dwight D. Eisenhower in his 1961 farewell address. “A vital element in keeping the peace is our military establishment. Our arms must be mighty, ready for instant action so that no potential aggressor may be tempted to risk his own destruction. American makers of plowshares could with time and as required, make swords as well.
Thanks for listening to this conversation with Tulsi Gabbard. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, let me leave you with some words from Dwight D. Eisenhower in his 1961 farewell address. “A vital element in keeping the peace is our military establishment. Our arms must be mighty, ready for instant action so that no potential aggressor may be tempted to risk his own destruction. American makers of plowshares could with time and as required, make swords as well.
But now, we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense; we have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions. This conjunction of immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.” Thank you for listening, and hope to see you next time.
Transcript for Mark Cuban: Shark Tank, DEI & Wokeism Debate, Elon Musk, Politics & Drugs | Lex Fridman Podcast #422
This is a transcript of Lex Fridman Podcast #422 with Mark Cuban.
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You’ve started many businesses, invested in many businesses, heard a lot of pitches privately and on Shark Tank. So you’re the perfect person to ask what makes a great entrepreneur?
But he was also very insistent that… He worked at a company called Regency Products where they did upholstery on cars, and he would bring me there to sweep the floors, not because he wanted me to learn that business, because he wanted me to learn how backbreaking that work was. He lost an eye in an accident at work, a staple broke, and the only thing he wanted for my brothers and I was for us to never have to work like that, to go to college to figure it out.
And that’s not easy for 99% of the people. Some people look at that as an opportunity and get excited about it. Some people get terrified because it’s, okay, maybe I’m comfortable, maybe I have responsibilities. And so whatever your circumstances are, if you want to take that next step, you have to be able to deal with the consequences of changing your circumstances. And that’s the first thing. Do you save money? If you have a job, but d’you have a mortgage? Do you have a family? You’ve got to save money. You can’t just walk. They’ve got to eat and they’ve got to have shelter. But on the other side of the coin, if you’ve got nothing, it’s the perfect time to start a business.
So we started this company called AudioNet, and effectively became the first streaming content company on the internet. And we’re like, okay, we’re not sure how we’re going to make this work, but we were able to make it work when we started going to radio stations and TV stations and music labels and everything and evolved. Audionet.com, Which was only audio at the beginning, to broadcast.com in 1998, which was audio and video, and became the largest multimedia site on the internet. Took it public in July of 1998. It had the largest first day jump in the history of the stock market at the time. And then a year later we sold it to Yahoo for $5.7 billion in Yahoo stock, and I owned right around 30% of the company, give or take. And so after taxes, that’s what got me there.
It’s got Dallas sports and Dallas News and politics, and if you’re in an office or you’re outside of Dallas, connect to audionet.com and now you can listen to these things on demand. And that’s how we started. And it started with one radio station, and then it was five, then it was 10, then it was video content, then the laws were different then. So we could literally go out and buy CDs and host them and just let people listen to whatever music. And we went from 10 users a day to a hundred to a thousand, to hundreds of thousands to a million over those next four years.
There was no cloud back then. And just pulling together all those pieces to make it work. But where we really made our money was by taking that network that we had built and then going to corporations and saying, look, it’s 1996, ’97, ’98. And to communicate with your worldwide employees, what they would do is they would go to an auditorium that had a satellite uplink, and then they would have people go to theaters or ballrooms and hotels that had satellite down links and they would broadcast the product introductions, whatever. And so we said to them, look, you’re paying millions of dollars to reach all your employees when you can do it. Pay us a half a million dollars, and we’ll do it just on their PCs at work. So we did. When Intel announced the P 90 PC, we charged them $2 million or whatever to do that.
When Motorola announced a new phone or a new product, we would charge them. And so we used a consumer side to do a proof of concept for the network, and then we would take that knowledge and go to corporations, and that’s how we made our revenue.
Yahoo, when we went public in ’98 or right before, I think it was, they made an investment of $2 million, which gave us a connection to them. After we went public, they decided they needed to have multimedia, so in April of ’99, we made a deal, and then July of 2000 is when it closed.
Anyway, these Wall Street bankers or analysts rather, that were the big analysts of the time would call me up because they would ask my broker, “What does he know about this product, this product?” I knew them all, what was working and not working. The ones that worked, I say that it’s working and they say something, the stock would go up $20. My broker was like, “You know this better than they do. You need to invest.”
I started buying and selling stocks, and this was in 1990 and was just killing it. I was making 80, 90, 100% a year over those next four years to the point where guy came in and asked to use my trading history to start a hedge fund, which we did. I sold within nine months, it was great. The point being as it goes forward, so when we sold to Yahoo, I already had a lot of experience trading stocks, and I had seen different bubbles come and go. The bubble for PC manufacturers, a bubble for networking manufacturers, they went up, up, up, up, up, and then they came straight down after the hype where somebody just leapfrogged.
When we sold to Yahoo, I was like I’ve got a B next to my name. That’s all I need, or all I want. I don’t want to be greedy. I’d seen this story before where stocks get really frothy and go straight down. I knew that because all of what I had was in stock, I needed to find a way to collar it and protect it. Understanding stocks and trading and options and all that, my broker and I, we went and shorted an index that had Yahoo in it.
The law at the time was you couldn’t short any indexes that had more than 5% of that stock in it, of the Yahoo stock. I took pretty much $20 million dollars, everything I had at the time, and I shorted the index.
What was even more interesting out of that period, my broker at that time was at Goldman Sachs, and I had asked him to see if there was a way to trade the VIX, the volatility index, and there wasn’t. One of the people that Goldman that we were working with to try to create this actually left Goldman and created indexes that allowed you to trade the VIX.
There were people creating companies with just a website and going public. That’s a bubble where there’s no intrinsic value at all. People aren’t even trying to make operating cap profits, they’re just trying to leverage the frothiness of the stock market, that’s a bubble. You don’t see that right now. You don’t see any IPOs right now for that matter, so I don’t think we’re in a bubble now, but back then, yes, I thought we were in a bubble, but that wasn’t really the motivating factor.
That said, there’s some examples of people that you’re like, they seem to have gotten lucky a lot. We’ll mention Jeff Bezos. It seems like he did a lot of really interesting, powerful decisions for many years with Amazon to make it successful.
Even Facebook in 2004, the bubble had burst and the price for computers had fallen enough. And kids in school all needed computers or laptops. If he had tried to do something like that five years earlier… He was too young, but five years earlier or five years later, or Friendster might’ve been the ultimate or MySpace,
It’s funny because back then, that was 2006, I was an investor at Box.net with Aaron Levy and… Oh, there was one other company, but there were three of them where there’d be emails where I’d introduce them and we’d all talk in these emails and they’d all gone to have astronomical success.
Red Swoosh had its issues. I always look at peer-to-peer as stealing bandwidth from the internet providers when bandwidth was a scarce commodity. What Travis did with that though, was great. He convinced gaming companies who wanted to do downloads of the clients for those games to use his peer-to-peer on Red Swoosh. He busted his ass, and I think he sold it for $18 million, so he did well.
So it was natural for him to come to me, and I still have the emails and ask me about Uber Cab. I thought okay, this is a great idea. I really, really like it. He showed me his budgets, and I think they were raising money at $10 million or $15 million or whatever. I’m like, “Your biggest challenge is going to be you’re going to have to fight all the incumbent taxi commissions. They’re going to want to put you out of business. That’s going to be a challenge and I think you don’t have enough money designated for marketing to get all that done.” I said, “I’d invest, but not quite at that valuation.” Never came back to me.
I made the decision to go out there and hire 15 different development coaches, one for each player. Everybody thought I was just insane, but it sent the message that we were going to do whatever it took to win. Once the guys believed that winning was the goal as opposed to just making money, attitudes change, efforts went up, and the rest is history.
When you think about sporting events that you’ve been to, you don’t remember the score, you don’t remember the home runs or the dunks, you remember who you were with, and you remember why you went. It was my first date with a girl who’s now my wife or I went with my buddies and he threw up on the person in front of us. My dad took me, my aunt, my uncle took me. Those are the experiences you remember.
Once I conveyed to our people that this is what we were selling, that what happened in the arena off the court was just as important as what happened on the court, if not more so because if mom or dad are bringing the 10-year-old, you have to keep them occupied because they have short attention spans.
I would get into fights with NBA, put aside the refs, but getting in fights in the NBA, I would say NBA, nothing but attorneys, because they had no marketing skills whatsoever. To their credit, they realized that was a problem and started bringing in better and better marketing people.
If it turns out to be a close game, and that ball’s in the air, and if it goes in, everybody’s hugging and high-fiving people you’ve never seen before in your life, and if it misses, you’re commiserating with people you’ve never seen. That’s such a unique experience that’s unique to sports. We never sold that and that’s exactly what we started.
When we start talking about DEI and it’s just de facto racist and this stuff, stuff that I just think is nonsense. I have no problem sharing my opinion. If he disagrees, okay, he can disagree, I don’t care. It’s fun to engage, but he doesn’t really engage, he just comes back with snark comments, which is his choice.
The E in equity means when you hire somebody, you put them in a position to succeed. The I, inclusion, is when you’ve hired somebody and they may not be typical, if you will, you show them some love and give them the support they need so they can do their job as best they can and feel comfortable and confident going to work. It’s that simple.
Now, does that mean that there aren’t DEI programs that are implemented poorly? Of course not. Everything that’s implemented poorly in one company to another. Sales, marketing, human resources, you can pick any element of business and find companies that implement it poorly, but that’s the beauty of capitalism in a free market or mostly free market where if you make these choices and they are the wrong choices, you’re going to lose your best people. You’re not going to be able to hire the best people. You’re not going to execute on your business plans in the way that we discussed, regardless of the size of the company.
It also, I think, depends on where you’re having the discussion. When I’m in a different group of people off of X, the feedback’s completely different. To your question of reverse racism, yes, it happens because people are people. There’s no human being that is 100% objective. It’s also, there’s very, very, very few jobs that can be determined on a purely quantitative basis.
How do you tell one janitor from the other, who’s the best? How do you tell one salesperson that you’re hiring versus another you’re hiring because they haven’t sold your product yet, so you don’t know? We talked earlier about firing people because you made mistakes.
Yes, there’s discrimination against any group, white, Asian, black, green, orange, whatever it may be, but I truly believe that there’s far more discrimination against people of color than there are people who are white. I think it’s become a straw man, that reverse discrimination because of DEI is prevalent or near ubiquitous.
If I’m in a major company and I’m publicly criticizing or even internally criticizing a sales plan or a product, our product sucks. There was a Google engineer that got fired for saying Google had AGI, and nobody believed they did and they knew that created problems. It wasn’t DEI related, but it was saying something publicly that was, in the CEO’s eyes, to the detriment of the company.
I think those are all analogous. If you’re trying to accomplish something within an organization because you think there’s a problem and there’s people speaking out saying look, we’re getting it wrong, I think I’m a victim of all this, and the company… Then leadership has got to make a decision. Do they agree or not agree? Are they right or are they wrong? Is it positive or negative to the company? And you decide.
This conversation that conservatives are being silenced in organizations now, I haven’t seen it. The other side of your question, I think unpacking it, is what’s driving all this? Put aside universities for one. In corporate America, when I talk to people in corporate America about DEI, they always start talking about ideology.
I’ve talked to Bill Ackman, who you’ve had on, and when I asked him, “Bill, you run your own companies. Who’s telling you what to do?” “They are.” “Who’s they? “It’s the universities, the people who have this ideology of DEI.” I’m like, “Did they force you? Did they coerce you? Did you lose control of your company?” “No, it’s not me. It happens to other people.” Then I talk to other people, same thing.
I try not to go one-on-one in Twitter conversations on this topic. In the DMs, I’ll talk to people who are really conservative and I’ll ask the same question and be like, “Who’s forcing you to do this?” “It’s the ideology that’s everywhere. Didn’t see the Harvard thing in University of North Carolina.” I’m like I’ve never had anybody try to push me in this direction to do this. This was my business choice. I’m not trying to tell other people you have to do this. You make your own business choices. Where companies have made their business choices, and if somebody doesn’t feel confident or comfortable with it, they may feel they’re being discriminated against.
There was something I just read in the Wall Street Journal, where the Wall Street Journal had a company interview 2 million people, and the difficulty in firing and how people, when they were fired, 40% of the people who were fired felt like it was wrong, that they were doing a great job. Then it talked about the HR person going through the hassle of trying to explain to this person through performance reviews that they weren’t doing a good job, yet the people still thought they were doing a great job, despite being told they’re not doing a good job.
I see that as being an analogous to all this huffing and puffing about reverse discrimination and conservatives not being able to speak up because if 40% of people who have been fired don’t believe they should have been fired, there’s a disconnect somewhere in how you think you’re doing your job. If you just feel like, I can’t speak up because of it, because of you’re white, and that doesn’t comport well with DEI programs, a lot of things are going to happen.
Either that’s going to come up in your performance review, HR or your boss is going to have to address it in some way, it’s going to get to HR at some level, and then decisions are going to have to be made. You can’t just fire somebody because they spoke up. Somebody’s going to have to communicate with you. I think a lot of… I just don’t trust the supposed volume-
But that said, if you ask people in Russia, a lot of them will say, “There’s no propaganda here. There’s no censorship.” And all that kind of stuff. It’s sometimes hard to see when you’re in it that this stuff is happening. It does seem difficult to criticize DEI programs, not horribly difficult, terrible, they are this monster that infiltrates everything, but it is difficult and it requires great leadership.
I can see an argument for the ideology in a university. I can see, you look at the amount of money spent on it. And so while the goal is right, the way they implement it in universities, the way they implement most things in universities, is wrong. There’s a reason why tuition has gone up a multitude, or a multiple, of inflation. They’re not well run organizations across the board. So I’m not going to argue with that at all. So when you’ve seen me argue with DEI, I haven’t waded into DEI in universities at all.
And that seems, to me, to be counter to the whole Conservative movement right now, other than school boards where it’s centralized, and the Republican candidate is all about centralized power in him. And to me, that’s just a conflict in a lot of the underpinning of the whole DEI conversation, that a lot of which goes through Christopher Rufo right now.
So Elon tweeted, “The fundamental axiomatic flaw of the woke mind virus is that the weaker party’s always right (in even if they want you to die).”
And you responded, at length, but the beginning is, “The fundamental axiomatic flaw of the anti-woke mind is that it allows groups with historical power to play the victim by taking anecdotal examples and packaging them into conjured conspiratorial ideology that threatens to upend the power structures they have been depending on.”
Up until a month ago, maybe if you put in keto gummies, Shark Tank keto gummies, into Google, it would show up with scammy ads, scam ad, after scam. And I would get emails, up until a month ago, from elderly people asking me why the gummies weren’t working, and why the companies were charging all this money on a month-by-month basis when they tried to cancel. And they said it was the number one deal on Shark Tank of all time and all Shark… It was a mistake.
And Elon’s not allowed to make those same mistakes, but… Elon’s allowed to make those mistakes, but Google isn’t?
Now, I know that’s not direct to your point of internal influence to the output, but people on the outside are going to check for that now. It’s almost like the new bug contest to try to find bugs in software. And then on the inside, if it’s all left-leaning, and all you have is left-leaning employees, because most Conservatives won’t want to work there, then again that’s self-correcting as well.
Now maybe they’re built some on open source, maybe it’ll be copy-pasta where you can just cut and paste and create your own model and train it yourself. Maybe it’ll be mixture of experts where maybe it’ll be a Meta front end. Like we’re working on a project where we take 30 different AI models and there’s just a Meta search engine where it searches all of them, and you can compare all the outputs and see what you think is the best, like a search engine. Because you might get, “Is DEI good?” “Is the Covid vaccine good?” You’re going to get a variety of outputs and you have to make that decision yourself.
That’s what I think is going to happen with AI as well, because I think brands… There’s no way the Mayo Clinic and the Harvard Medical School are just going to contribute all their IP to ChatGPT, or Gemini, or whatever. It’s going to have to be licensed or they’re going to do their own.
I think America has been really good at having these two blue and red, always at tension with each other, dividing the populace, and in the process of doing that, figuring stuff out. Almost like playing devil’s advocate, but in real life.
And so going back to what you said earlier, people in Russia don’t think invading Ukraine… A lot of them see it as a positive. I’m sure you have relatives and friends who think it’s the best thing that ever happened, because they believe in Putin.
It’s not woke ideology, because I never felt any pressure to make the choices that I’ve chosen, including diversity, equity, and inclusion, and I’ve never forced anybody or told anybody to do it. I just said, “Here’s my experiences.” Whenever I’ve talked to people who talk about the woke ideology, no one ever got forced. If you look at Dylan McDermott, if there was a way to gauge the number of impressions that she had, and where they sourced from, I’d be willing bet any amount of money that 90% plus of the impressions and discussions of Dylan McDermott were on, right-leaning media.
The criticism that Jordan Peterson could provide, I guess he said that Dylan Mulvaney popularized the kind of mutilation in his view, that can affect… There’s a very serious life-changing process that a person goes through, and when that’s applied to a child, it can do a lot of harm to a person if…
But the bigger point is there are no numbers for 2023 when, post-Dylan McDermott. So there’s no way to know if the assertion is true, even marginally true. Now, you can easily suggest it, but you can say that about any social media influencer. Kids are dying because… It’s just like when people accused Trump of potentially influencing people to inject bleach into their veins. That’s a big old leap to say that because Trump says it, that people are going to start injecting, and then they find somebody who actually did. And it’s like, “Oh, it must be true. This is a trend now.” I’m just not buying it that there aren’t enough roadblocks in the way.
Now, I’m not saying it never happens, and for me, to me, you should have to wait until you’re 18 to actually have any surgery to transition. And if your parents approve it earlier, then you can have a conversation with your doctor. But you’re suggesting that everybody in that process to transition, a minor is corrupt. That the doctor, the sociologist, the psychologist, all the people involved, the hospital where the surgery is happening, the insurance company that’s paying for it, they all have been corrupted by this trend. I just don’t see that.
That’s basically quoting you, but in a caricature. And you responded, “While, I have your attention. Wanted to say thank you! Your consultants at Tesla followed up about using Cost Plus drugs…” About which we’ll talk about. “… To save the company money. Truly appreciated.” And in parentheses, “(My limit is 300 years of darkness.)” Very well done, Mark.
What’s your intuition, if we just stick on Biden and Trump for a sec, what’s your intuition why Biden would make a better president than Trump?
Now, compare that to Trump, the people closest to him, almost all of them turned, unless there’s a financial relationship involved, and to me that says everything.
Then I look at the other guy, never admits a mistake, and the list is long.
And now, in a lot of states, because of the Conservatives, they’ve passed laws saying you have to show identification. When I voted in Texas, you had to show state identification. They can’t vote. You can’t register as an illegal alien, that I’m aware of, to vote.
There’s still enough people who believe in this country and how amazing it is to do the right thing. And a lot of the premise of what some Conservatives are saying and doing, the underpinning of it is that their fellow citizens will not do anything, not some things, anything, that serves the best interest of this country. And to me, that’s just wrong. That is just misleading and wrong.
Remember, when Biden was vice president and Obama was president, they called Obama, the Deporter in Chief. He had no problem deporting people. And I think if I had to guess, and this is just a guess, that when they looked at the initial statistics for immigration when Biden took over, they thought there was room for more immigrants, not because they would vote, but you can make a fiscal argument that, in a world where the birth rate is flat to declining, we need immigrants. And immigrants typically don’t have a higher crime rate or anything than indigenous American citizens. Indigenous isn’t the right word, but American citizens. And so they made a calculated mistake. They made a decision that was wrong, and now they have to fix it or it’s going to hurt them severely.
But I don’t buy what Elon’s pushing that the whole reason is they are voters and will become voters.
The hard part, and why I like this conversation, is how do you distinguish hyperbole versus reality? And I get where you’re going, Lex, where it’s like what… The smallest spark sometimes can cause people to change, and then that spark becomes bigger, and then it becomes more widespread, and then all of a sudden your country has changed. It’s not what you thought it was. I get that completely. And yes, you always have to be on top of that to make sure, but a lot of that comes from lack of leadership, and lack of trust, because there’s nobody who’s saying, “All right, Republicans, that’s all hyperbole and you’re wrong for that. Democrats, you fucked up on immigration. You up in Afghanistan. Here’s where you made these mistakes. Own it.”
There’s nobody who says, “We’re not going to just bring in Republicans if the Republicans win.” And there’s nobody who says, “We’re not going to just bring in Democrats. We’re going to bring in a mix. We’re going to try to get balance on the Supreme Court.” There’s no leadership that’s doing it. That’s the fundamental problem. It’s not about the ideology of woke. No leadership.
We were able to get that claims data, and it turns out we spent $169,000 with that PBM, one of the big three PBMs, and it would’ve cost us buying from Cost Plus Drugs $19,000. And that’s just a simple example. Then I looked at the insurance side of things. We self-insure, so there weren’t premiums per se, but we were getting charged $17.15 cents per employee per month just to use the network that they put together for us, providers, hospitals or whatever. And I’m like, all right, are there companies that won’t charge us to put together these networks? Turns out there’s a lot of them. And those insurance companies and those PBMs are also responsible for determining what claims, what to authorize and what to deny. So for a drug, it may be, all right, this is an expensive drug, but before they’ll say they’ll pay for the drug that your doctor wants to prescribe for you, you have to try these three other drugs in what’s called step up therapy to see if these other cheaper drugs work or they’re not even necessarily cheaper, they may be being pushed because they’re getting a higher rebate.
And so I’m like, that’s insane. I want my employees to get the medication that the doctors say is best. And so I didn’t realize those were the intricacies of where my healthcare dollars went. There’s not a single CEO who does because that’s not a core competency that they need. And the CFOs, that’s not their core competency and the HR people, they contribute and they understand it some because they’re dealing with the claims, but they spend most of their prescription drug related time or healthcare related times trying to get pre-authorizations approved. So your kid breaks their arm or you get sick and you go to the doctor and before the doctor will do a surgery or do whatever, they have to go to the insurance company and get preauthorized. And then they always say no. And then you have to go back and somebody has to argue for you. And that just eats up employee time because I’m sick or my kid’s sick and you’re wasting my time. Eats up HR time.
The CEOs don’t know any of this, right? So what I’m saying is one, the smartest thing to do is to get a healthcare CEO at every company with over let’s say 500 employees that focuses on all these things. You’d save a shitload of money. And two, healthcare is your second largest line item expense after payroll. And in some companies it’s hundreds, billions of dollars and you don’t understand it and you’re letting these guys rip you off? And it’s because these big CEOs don’t understand it and are getting ripped off that the industry is the way it is because that allows the opacity to continue.
And I’m like, well, if he can just jack up the price to this drug and charge more and get away with it, this has to be an incredibly inefficient market. And so the question is why is he able to do it? And it was immediately apparent that it was a lack of transparency. And so can we start a company that is fully transparent with our costs, our markup and our selling price, and see if it works? And so we went for it and it took off immediately. I mean, you read a press release from a company saying they were creating a cost advantage program basically pretending to replicate us? We haven’t been in business two years. How insane is that?
And the most insane part of it is yes, with corporate employer insurance, that happens, but it happens more with Medicare Part D and Medicare Advantage. It happens all the time with those, almost with every script. So the government is complicit in these community pharmacies going out of business. So how does that connect to Cost Plus Drugs and what we’re doing and the big brands? The big brands know that if all these community pharmacies are going, tens of thousands of them are going to go out of business because of the way this pricing is, they’re going to lose a connection between their brand medications and grandma and grandpa and Aunt Sally and all that business is going to get transferred to the big companies and they’re going to have even less leverage. So they’re working with us to come up with programs that are very supportive of independent pharmacies, and that’s going to allow us to break the cartel because it’s in their best interest not to allow them to be so vertically integrated that they destroy the entire community and independent pharmacy industry.
I mean, it wasn’t until I got a job at Mellon Bank and I started learning how to program in this thing called Ramus, this scripting computing language that I realized, oh, this is interesting to me and I like it. And that’s what got me a job selling software and going on from there. You just don’t know what that’s going to be until you go out and experience different things. So for anybody young out there listening, enjoy your life. Find things to smile about, be curious, read, watch, expose yourself to as many different ideas as you can because something’s going to click at some point. You may be 15, you may be 25, you may be 55, but it can happen.
Click link to jump approximately to that part in the transcript:
- 0:00 – Introduction
- 0:54 – Entrepreneurship
- 15:48 – Shark Tank
- 26:13 – How Mark made first billion
- 52:24 – Dallas Mavericks
- 57:49 – DEI debate
- 1:33:42 – Trump vs Biden
- 1:36:04 – Immigration
- 1:45:37 – Drugs and Big Pharma
- 2:01:38 – AI
- 2:05:49 – Advice for young people
Introduction
Mark Cuban
The person who controls the algorithm controls the world, right? And if you are committed to one specific platform as your singular source of information or affiliated platforms, then whoever controls the algorithm or the programming there controls you.
The person who controls the algorithm controls the world, right? And if you are committed to one specific platform as your singular source of information or affiliated platforms, then whoever controls the algorithm or the programming there controls you.
Lex Fridman
The following is a conversation with Mark Cuban, a multi-billionaire businessman, an investor and star of the series Shark Tank, longtime principal owner of the Dallas Mavericks, and is someone who is unafraid to get into frequent battles on X, most recently over topics of DEI, wokeism, gender and identity politics with the likes of Elon Musk and Jordan Peterson. This is the Lex Fridman podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here’s Mark Cuban.
The following is a conversation with Mark Cuban, a multi-billionaire businessman, an investor and star of the series Shark Tank, longtime principal owner of the Dallas Mavericks, and is someone who is unafraid to get into frequent battles on X, most recently over topics of DEI, wokeism, gender and identity politics with the likes of Elon Musk and Jordan Peterson. This is the Lex Fridman podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here’s Mark Cuban.
Entrepreneurship
You’ve started many businesses, invested in many businesses, heard a lot of pitches privately and on Shark Tank. So you’re the perfect person to ask what makes a great entrepreneur?
Mark Cuban
Somebody who’s curious, they want to keep on learning because business is ever-changing. It’s never static. Somebody who’s agile, because as you learn new things and the environment around you changes, you have to be able to adapt and make the changes. And somebody who can sell, because no business has ever survived without sales. And as an entrepreneur who’s creating a company, whatever your product or service is, if that’s not the most important thing and you’re just dying and excited to tell people about it, then you’re not going to succeed.
Somebody who’s curious, they want to keep on learning because business is ever-changing. It’s never static. Somebody who’s agile, because as you learn new things and the environment around you changes, you have to be able to adapt and make the changes. And somebody who can sell, because no business has ever survived without sales. And as an entrepreneur who’s creating a company, whatever your product or service is, if that’s not the most important thing and you’re just dying and excited to tell people about it, then you’re not going to succeed.
Lex Fridman
But it’s also a skill thing. How do you sell? What do you mean by selling?
But it’s also a skill thing. How do you sell? What do you mean by selling?
Mark Cuban
Selling is just helping. I’ve always looked at it about putting myself in the shoes of another person and asking a simple question, can I help this person? Can my product help them? From the time I was 12 years old, selling garbage bags door to door and just asking a simple question, do you use garbage bags? Do you need garbage bags? Well, let me save you some time. I’ll bring them to your house and drop them off to streaming. Why do we need streaming when we have TV and radio? Well, you can’t get access to your TV and radio everywhere you go. So we break down geographic and physical barriers, and Cost Plus Drugs. What’s the product that we actually sell? We sell trust. In a simplistic approach, we buy drugs to sell drugs, but we add transparency to it. And bringing transparency to an industry is a differentiation, and it helps people.
Selling is just helping. I’ve always looked at it about putting myself in the shoes of another person and asking a simple question, can I help this person? Can my product help them? From the time I was 12 years old, selling garbage bags door to door and just asking a simple question, do you use garbage bags? Do you need garbage bags? Well, let me save you some time. I’ll bring them to your house and drop them off to streaming. Why do we need streaming when we have TV and radio? Well, you can’t get access to your TV and radio everywhere you go. So we break down geographic and physical barriers, and Cost Plus Drugs. What’s the product that we actually sell? We sell trust. In a simplistic approach, we buy drugs to sell drugs, but we add transparency to it. And bringing transparency to an industry is a differentiation, and it helps people.
Lex Fridman
Trust in an industry that’s highly lacking in trust.
Trust in an industry that’s highly lacking in trust.
Mark Cuban
Exactly.
Exactly.
Lex Fridman
Okay. So what’s the trick to selling garbage bags? Let’s go back there. At 12 years old, is it just your natural charisma? I guess a good question to ask, are you born with it or can you develop it?
Okay. So what’s the trick to selling garbage bags? Let’s go back there. At 12 years old, is it just your natural charisma? I guess a good question to ask, are you born with it or can you develop it?
Mark Cuban
Oh, you can definitely develop it. Yeah. Because selling garbage bags door to door was easy, right? It was like… 12-year-old Mark going, “Hi, my name is Mark. Do you use garbage bags?” You know what the answer is going to be, right? “Can I just drop them off for you once a week? Whenever you need them, you just call and I’ll bring them down.” “Sure.” So that was easy.
Oh, you can definitely develop it. Yeah. Because selling garbage bags door to door was easy, right? It was like… 12-year-old Mark going, “Hi, my name is Mark. Do you use garbage bags?” You know what the answer is going to be, right? “Can I just drop them off for you once a week? Whenever you need them, you just call and I’ll bring them down.” “Sure.” So that was easy.
Lex Fridman
But I’m sure you’ve been rejected.
But I’m sure you’ve been rejected.
Mark Cuban
Oh, yeah. Of course. Not everybody says yes.
Oh, yeah. Of course. Not everybody says yes.
Lex Fridman
What was your percentage?
What was your percentage?
Mark Cuban
I don’t remember, but it’s pretty close to a hundred percent.
I don’t remember, but it’s pretty close to a hundred percent.
Lex Fridman
Oh, okay. So that’s why you don’t remember.
Oh, okay. So that’s why you don’t remember.
Mark Cuban
Yeah. Right? Because who’s going to say no to a 12-year-old kid who’s going to save time and money? But typically, my career where I’ve started companies, it’s to do something that other people aren’t doing. Whether it was connecting PCs to local area networks and at MicroSolutions. And the salesmanship was walking into a company and just saying, look talk to me and I can help you improve your productivity and your profitability. Is that important to you? And the answer is obviously always yes. And then the question is, can I do the job and can I do it cost effectively? And so you didn’t have to be a born salesperson to be able to ask those questions, but you have to be able to be willing to put in the time to learn that business. And that’s the hardest part.
Yeah. Right? Because who’s going to say no to a 12-year-old kid who’s going to save time and money? But typically, my career where I’ve started companies, it’s to do something that other people aren’t doing. Whether it was connecting PCs to local area networks and at MicroSolutions. And the salesmanship was walking into a company and just saying, look talk to me and I can help you improve your productivity and your profitability. Is that important to you? And the answer is obviously always yes. And then the question is, can I do the job and can I do it cost effectively? And so you didn’t have to be a born salesperson to be able to ask those questions, but you have to be able to be willing to put in the time to learn that business. And that’s the hardest part.
Lex Fridman
I’m sure there’s a skill thing to it too, in how you solve the puzzle of communicating with a person and convincing them.
I’m sure there’s a skill thing to it too, in how you solve the puzzle of communicating with a person and convincing them.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, there’s skill from the perspective that I read like a maniac. Then now you can give me an example of any type of business and it’ll take me two seconds to figure out how they make money and how I can make them more productive. And I think that’s probably my biggest skill, being able to just drill down to what the actual need is, if any. And then from there, being able to say, well, if this is what this company does, and this is what their goal is, how can I introduce something new that they haven’t seen before? And is that a business that I can create and make money from?
Yeah, there’s skill from the perspective that I read like a maniac. Then now you can give me an example of any type of business and it’ll take me two seconds to figure out how they make money and how I can make them more productive. And I think that’s probably my biggest skill, being able to just drill down to what the actual need is, if any. And then from there, being able to say, well, if this is what this company does, and this is what their goal is, how can I introduce something new that they haven’t seen before? And is that a business that I can create and make money from?
Lex Fridman
So figure out how this kind of business makes money in the present and then figure out, is there a way to make more money in the future by introducing a totally new kind of thing?
So figure out how this kind of business makes money in the present and then figure out, is there a way to make more money in the future by introducing a totally new kind of thing?
Mark Cuban
Correct.
Correct.
Lex Fridman
And you can just do that with anything.
And you can just do that with anything.
Mark Cuban
Pretty much. Yeah.
Pretty much. Yeah.
Lex Fridman
And you think you’re born with that?
And you think you’re born with that?
Mark Cuban
No, I worked at it. Because going back to what I said earlier about curiosity, you have to be insanely curious because the world is always changing. My dad used to say, we don’t live in the world we were born into, which is absolutely true. If you’re not a voracious consumer of information, then you’re not going to be able to keep up. And no matter what your sales skills or ability are, they’re going to be useless.
No, I worked at it. Because going back to what I said earlier about curiosity, you have to be insanely curious because the world is always changing. My dad used to say, we don’t live in the world we were born into, which is absolutely true. If you’re not a voracious consumer of information, then you’re not going to be able to keep up. And no matter what your sales skills or ability are, they’re going to be useless.
Lex Fridman
You learn about life from your dad. You mentioned your dad.
You learn about life from your dad. You mentioned your dad.
Mark Cuban
My dad did upholstery on cars, got up, went to work every morning at seven o’clock, came back five or six, seven o’clock, exhausted, and I learned to be nice. I learned to be caring. I learned to be accepting. Just qualities that I think he really tried to pass on to myself and my two younger brothers were just be a good human. And I think he didn’t have business experience. So as I got into business, he would just say, “Sorry, Mark, I can’t help you. I don’t understand what you’re doing.” Neither one of my parents had gone to college. You’ve got to figure it out for yourself.
My dad did upholstery on cars, got up, went to work every morning at seven o’clock, came back five or six, seven o’clock, exhausted, and I learned to be nice. I learned to be caring. I learned to be accepting. Just qualities that I think he really tried to pass on to myself and my two younger brothers were just be a good human. And I think he didn’t have business experience. So as I got into business, he would just say, “Sorry, Mark, I can’t help you. I don’t understand what you’re doing.” Neither one of my parents had gone to college. You’ve got to figure it out for yourself.
But he was also very insistent that… He worked at a company called Regency Products where they did upholstery on cars, and he would bring me there to sweep the floors, not because he wanted me to learn that business, because he wanted me to learn how backbreaking that work was. He lost an eye in an accident at work, a staple broke, and the only thing he wanted for my brothers and I was for us to never have to work like that, to go to college to figure it out.
Lex Fridman
You said to be nice. That said, you also said that when you were first starting a business, you were a bit more of an asshole than you wish you would’ve been.
You said to be nice. That said, you also said that when you were first starting a business, you were a bit more of an asshole than you wish you would’ve been.
Mark Cuban
Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, because I was more of a yeller. I didn’t have-
Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, because I was more of a yeller. I didn’t have-
Lex Fridman
No, really? Mark Cuban?
No, really? Mark Cuban?
Mark Cuban
What you see on the sidelines would be at a Mavs’ game. Maybe a little bit. But I also didn’t have any patience for somebody I thought wasn’t using my common sense, because I was always on the go, go, go, go, go, particularly when I was younger, just trying to be successful, trying to get to the point where I had independence. And I would tell this to people. Either you’re speeding up and getting on the train, or we’ll stop and drop you off at the next station, but let’s go where you go.
What you see on the sidelines would be at a Mavs’ game. Maybe a little bit. But I also didn’t have any patience for somebody I thought wasn’t using my common sense, because I was always on the go, go, go, go, go, particularly when I was younger, just trying to be successful, trying to get to the point where I had independence. And I would tell this to people. Either you’re speeding up and getting on the train, or we’ll stop and drop you off at the next station, but let’s go where you go.
Lex Fridman
Did you have trouble with the hire fast, fire fast part of running a business?
Did you have trouble with the hire fast, fire fast part of running a business?
Mark Cuban
Yeah, always, because I hated firing people. ‘Cause it meant, one, it was an admission of a mistake in the hiring. And two, the salesperson in me always wanted to come out ahead, and I was always horrible at firing, but I always partnered with people who had no problem with it. So I always delegated that.
Yeah, always, because I hated firing people. ‘Cause it meant, one, it was an admission of a mistake in the hiring. And two, the salesperson in me always wanted to come out ahead, and I was always horrible at firing, but I always partnered with people who had no problem with it. So I always delegated that.
Lex Fridman
Well, that’s the tricky thing. When you’re working with somebody and they’re not quite there, and you have to decide, are they going to step up and grow into the person that that’s the right or they’re not. And in that gray area is probably where you have to fire.
Well, that’s the tricky thing. When you’re working with somebody and they’re not quite there, and you have to decide, are they going to step up and grow into the person that that’s the right or they’re not. And in that gray area is probably where you have to fire.
Mark Cuban
Well, it’s hard, yeah, for sure because it’s obviously a failure somewhere in the process. What did we do wrong? And when I would interview people for jobs, 99% of the people I’ve ever interviewed I’ve wanted to hire, because in my mind, it was like, okay, I can figure out how to make this person work. And then they wouldn’t. And then people at the company would be like, “Mark, you suck at this.” And so I always delegated the hiring.
Well, it’s hard, yeah, for sure because it’s obviously a failure somewhere in the process. What did we do wrong? And when I would interview people for jobs, 99% of the people I’ve ever interviewed I’ve wanted to hire, because in my mind, it was like, okay, I can figure out how to make this person work. And then they wouldn’t. And then people at the company would be like, “Mark, you suck at this.” And so I always delegated the hiring.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, I’m the same. I see the potential in people. I see the beauty in people, which is a great way to live life. But when you’re running a company, it’s a different thing.
Yeah, I’m the same. I see the potential in people. I see the beauty in people, which is a great way to live life. But when you’re running a company, it’s a different thing.
Mark Cuban
It’s different. And you got to know what you’re good at and what you’re bad at, right? I was good at… I was a ready-fire-aim guy, and I always partnered with people who were very anal and perfectionist because where I could just go, go, go, go, go, go, they would keep me inside the baselines.
It’s different. And you got to know what you’re good at and what you’re bad at, right? I was good at… I was a ready-fire-aim guy, and I always partnered with people who were very anal and perfectionist because where I could just go, go, go, go, go, go, they would keep me inside the baselines.
Lex Fridman
They would do the due diligence, I suppose.
They would do the due diligence, I suppose.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, or just, yeah, the detail work, the dot the I’s and the cross the T’s.
Yeah, or just, yeah, the detail work, the dot the I’s and the cross the T’s.
Lex Fridman
What does it take to take that first leap into starting a business?
What does it take to take that first leap into starting a business?
Mark Cuban
That’s the hardest part. It really depends on your personal circumstances. I got fired. I was sleeping on the floor of six guys in a three-bedroom apartment, so I couldn’t go any lower. So there was no downside.
That’s the hardest part. It really depends on your personal circumstances. I got fired. I was sleeping on the floor of six guys in a three-bedroom apartment, so I couldn’t go any lower. So there was no downside.
Lex Fridman
Starting at the bottom.
Starting at the bottom.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, there was no downside for me starting a business. And it was just like… I was 25 when we started MicroSolutions, and I’d just gotten fired and it was like, look, I’m a lousy employee. I’m going to just start going to some of my prospects that I had at my job and asked them to front the money that I needed to install some software and found this company, Architectural Lighting, who put up $500 for me. That allowed me to buy software and have 50% margins and that’s how I started my company.
Yeah, there was no downside for me starting a business. And it was just like… I was 25 when we started MicroSolutions, and I’d just gotten fired and it was like, look, I’m a lousy employee. I’m going to just start going to some of my prospects that I had at my job and asked them to front the money that I needed to install some software and found this company, Architectural Lighting, who put up $500 for me. That allowed me to buy software and have 50% margins and that’s how I started my company.
Lex Fridman
But by way of advice, would you say? It’s a terrifying thing.
But by way of advice, would you say? It’s a terrifying thing.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, you’ve got to be in a position where you’re confident. I get emails and approached by people all the time, what kind of business should I start? That tells me you’re not ready to start a business. Either you’re prepared and you know it or you don’t. In the United States, with the American Dream, everybody always looks at themselves and say, okay, I have this idea. And then you go through this process of saying, okay. You talk to your friends or family, what do you think? And they almost always, oh, it’s a great idea. Then you go on Google and you say, oh my god, no one else is doing it. Without thinking, 10 companies have gone out of business trying the same thing. But okay, it’s on Google. And then people stop because that next step means, okay, I have to change what I’m doing in my life.
Yeah, you’ve got to be in a position where you’re confident. I get emails and approached by people all the time, what kind of business should I start? That tells me you’re not ready to start a business. Either you’re prepared and you know it or you don’t. In the United States, with the American Dream, everybody always looks at themselves and say, okay, I have this idea. And then you go through this process of saying, okay. You talk to your friends or family, what do you think? And they almost always, oh, it’s a great idea. Then you go on Google and you say, oh my god, no one else is doing it. Without thinking, 10 companies have gone out of business trying the same thing. But okay, it’s on Google. And then people stop because that next step means, okay, I have to change what I’m doing in my life.
And that’s not easy for 99% of the people. Some people look at that as an opportunity and get excited about it. Some people get terrified because it’s, okay, maybe I’m comfortable, maybe I have responsibilities. And so whatever your circumstances are, if you want to take that next step, you have to be able to deal with the consequences of changing your circumstances. And that’s the first thing. Do you save money? If you have a job, but d’you have a mortgage? Do you have a family? You’ve got to save money. You can’t just walk. They’ve got to eat and they’ve got to have shelter. But on the other side of the coin, if you’ve got nothing, it’s the perfect time to start a business.
Lex Fridman
Desperation is a good catalyst for starting a business, but in many cases, the decision, as you’re talking about you’re going to have to make is to leave a job that’s providing some degree of comfort already. So I suppose when you’re sleeping on the floor and there’s six guys, it’s a little bit easier.
Desperation is a good catalyst for starting a business, but in many cases, the decision, as you’re talking about you’re going to have to make is to leave a job that’s providing some degree of comfort already. So I suppose when you’re sleeping on the floor and there’s six guys, it’s a little bit easier.
Mark Cuban
It’s really easy, right? Particularly when you get fired and you don’t have a job and you’re looking at bartending at night to try to pay the bills. And so it wasn’t hard for me, but to your point, it really comes down to preparation. If it’s important enough to you, you’ll save the money. You’ll give up whatever it is you need to give up to put the money aside. If you have obligations, you’ll put in the work to learn as much as you can about that industry so that when you start your business, you’re prepared. And you can always, at night, on weekends, whenever you find time, lunch, start making the calls to find out if people will write you a check or transfer you the money to buy whatever it is you’re selling. And by doing those things, you can put yourself in a position to succeed. It’s where people just think, okay, Geronimo, I’m leafing off the edge of a cliff and I’m starting a business. That’s tough.
It’s really easy, right? Particularly when you get fired and you don’t have a job and you’re looking at bartending at night to try to pay the bills. And so it wasn’t hard for me, but to your point, it really comes down to preparation. If it’s important enough to you, you’ll save the money. You’ll give up whatever it is you need to give up to put the money aside. If you have obligations, you’ll put in the work to learn as much as you can about that industry so that when you start your business, you’re prepared. And you can always, at night, on weekends, whenever you find time, lunch, start making the calls to find out if people will write you a check or transfer you the money to buy whatever it is you’re selling. And by doing those things, you can put yourself in a position to succeed. It’s where people just think, okay, Geronimo, I’m leafing off the edge of a cliff and I’m starting a business. That’s tough.
Lex Fridman
But sometimes that’s the way you do it, though.
But sometimes that’s the way you do it, though.
Mark Cuban
There’s always examples of any situation or scenario, right?
There’s always examples of any situation or scenario, right?
Lex Fridman
Anecdotal evidence for everything.
Anecdotal evidence for everything.
Mark Cuban
But if you’re going into a new business, you’re going to have competition unless you’re really, really, really, really, really lucky. And that competition is not going to just say, okay, let Lex or Mark just kick our ass. And so, you’ve got to be prepared on how you’re going to deal with that competition.
But if you’re going into a new business, you’re going to have competition unless you’re really, really, really, really, really lucky. And that competition is not going to just say, okay, let Lex or Mark just kick our ass. And so, you’ve got to be prepared on how you’re going to deal with that competition.
Lex Fridman
What do you think that is about America that has so many people who have that dream and act on that dream of starting a business?
What do you think that is about America that has so many people who have that dream and act on that dream of starting a business?
Mark Cuban
I think we’ve just got a culture of consumption and more. And to get more, you’ve got to… Creating a business gives you the greatest potential upside and the greatest leverage on your time, but it also creates the most risk.
I think we’ve just got a culture of consumption and more. And to get more, you’ve got to… Creating a business gives you the greatest potential upside and the greatest leverage on your time, but it also creates the most risk.
Lex Fridman
So that capitalist machine, there’s a lot of elements. By contrast, the respect for the law, like an entrepreneur can trust that if they pull it off, the law will protect them. There won’t be a government.
So that capitalist machine, there’s a lot of elements. By contrast, the respect for the law, like an entrepreneur can trust that if they pull it off, the law will protect them. There won’t be a government.
Mark Cuban
Hopefully that’s still the case. Yeah.
Hopefully that’s still the case. Yeah.
Lex Fridman
Well, yeah. There’s always…
Well, yeah. There’s always…
Mark Cuban
Versus other countries, right? So us versus other countries. Joe Biden of all people said to me, it was at an entrepreneurship conference that when he was vice president, he had put together, and we had gone up there, a bunch of us from Shark Tank to talk to young entrepreneurs from around the world. And he said to me, “Mark, I’ve been to every country around the world, and the one thing that separates us is entrepreneurship. We’re the most entrepreneurial country in the world, and there’s no one else who’s even close.” And when you look at the origin of the biggest companies in the world, for the most part, there’s an American origin story somewhere behind there. And I think that just gets perpetuated on itself. We see those Horatio Alger stories, we see examples of the Jeff Bezos of the world, the Steve Jobs of the world, and those are the types of people we want to copy.
Versus other countries, right? So us versus other countries. Joe Biden of all people said to me, it was at an entrepreneurship conference that when he was vice president, he had put together, and we had gone up there, a bunch of us from Shark Tank to talk to young entrepreneurs from around the world. And he said to me, “Mark, I’ve been to every country around the world, and the one thing that separates us is entrepreneurship. We’re the most entrepreneurial country in the world, and there’s no one else who’s even close.” And when you look at the origin of the biggest companies in the world, for the most part, there’s an American origin story somewhere behind there. And I think that just gets perpetuated on itself. We see those Horatio Alger stories, we see examples of the Jeff Bezos of the world, the Steve Jobs of the world, and those are the types of people we want to copy.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, we want to be really careful and try to really figure out what that is because we don’t want to lose that.
Yeah, we want to be really careful and try to really figure out what that is because we don’t want to lose that.
Mark Cuban
For sure.
For sure.
Lex Fridman
We want to protect the… Whatever. And that’s a lot of the discussions about what’s the right way to do government, big government, small government, what’s the right policies, but also culture, who we celebrate. One of the things that troubles me is that we don’t enough celebrate the entrepreneurs that take risks and the entrepreneurs that succeed. It seems like success, especially when it comes with wealth, is immediately matched with distrust and criticism and all that kind of stuff.
We want to protect the… Whatever. And that’s a lot of the discussions about what’s the right way to do government, big government, small government, what’s the right policies, but also culture, who we celebrate. One of the things that troubles me is that we don’t enough celebrate the entrepreneurs that take risks and the entrepreneurs that succeed. It seems like success, especially when it comes with wealth, is immediately matched with distrust and criticism and all that kind of stuff.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, well, it’s changing for sure, because you can go back just 12 years, right? Traditional media dominated, let’s just say through 2012, that was the peak of linear television. Newspapers weren’t as strong, but they still had some breadth and depth to them. And then social media comes along and everybody gets to play in their own sandbox and share opinions with people who think just like them. And it also gives them the opportunity to amplify those feelings. And I think that’s where celebrating entrepreneurs really started to subside some. There were always people who were progressive that were like, billionaires are bad or millionaires are bad, depending on the time period, but you didn’t really see it on an ongoing basis. It wasn’t going to be on the evening news. It wasn’t going to be in the front page of the newspaper. It was going to be if you read a book and someone talked about it, or you read a magazine and there was an article talking about this progressive movement or that progressive movement, whatever it may be, or political parties. But now all of that is front and center in social media.
Yeah, well, it’s changing for sure, because you can go back just 12 years, right? Traditional media dominated, let’s just say through 2012, that was the peak of linear television. Newspapers weren’t as strong, but they still had some breadth and depth to them. And then social media comes along and everybody gets to play in their own sandbox and share opinions with people who think just like them. And it also gives them the opportunity to amplify those feelings. And I think that’s where celebrating entrepreneurs really started to subside some. There were always people who were progressive that were like, billionaires are bad or millionaires are bad, depending on the time period, but you didn’t really see it on an ongoing basis. It wasn’t going to be on the evening news. It wasn’t going to be in the front page of the newspaper. It was going to be if you read a book and someone talked about it, or you read a magazine and there was an article talking about this progressive movement or that progressive movement, whatever it may be, or political parties. But now all of that is front and center in social media.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, we’re trying to figure it out, how we deal with the mobs of people and the virality of it all. And I think we’ll find our footing and start celebrating greatness again.
Yeah, we’re trying to figure it out, how we deal with the mobs of people and the virality of it all. And I think we’ll find our footing and start celebrating greatness again.
Shark Tank
Mark Cuban
Well, that’s the whole reason I do Shark Tank.
Well, that’s the whole reason I do Shark Tank.
Lex Fridman
That’s true. That show celebrates the entrepreneur. That’s true.
That’s true. That show celebrates the entrepreneur. That’s true.
Mark Cuban
t’s the only place where every single minute of every single episode, we celebrate the American Dream. And the reason I do it is we tell the entire country, and it’s shown around the world even, we’re amazing advertising for the American Dream, and I don’t even know how many countries, but every time somebody walks onto that carpet from Dubuque, Iowa or Ketchum, Idaho, that sends a message to every kid who’s watching, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12-year-old kid that if they can do it from Ketchum, Idaho, you can do it. If they can have this idea and get a deal or even present to the Sharks and have all of America see it, you can do it. And I’m proud of that. 15 years of that, it’s just been insane. Now kids walk up to me and go, yeah, I started watching you when I was five or 10, and I started a business because I learned about it from Shark Tank. And so I think it celebrates it, and we convey it, and I don’t think it’s going away, but there are different battles we have to fight to support it.
t’s the only place where every single minute of every single episode, we celebrate the American Dream. And the reason I do it is we tell the entire country, and it’s shown around the world even, we’re amazing advertising for the American Dream, and I don’t even know how many countries, but every time somebody walks onto that carpet from Dubuque, Iowa or Ketchum, Idaho, that sends a message to every kid who’s watching, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12-year-old kid that if they can do it from Ketchum, Idaho, you can do it. If they can have this idea and get a deal or even present to the Sharks and have all of America see it, you can do it. And I’m proud of that. 15 years of that, it’s just been insane. Now kids walk up to me and go, yeah, I started watching you when I was five or 10, and I started a business because I learned about it from Shark Tank. And so I think it celebrates it, and we convey it, and I don’t think it’s going away, but there are different battles we have to fight to support it.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, I love even when the business idea is obviously horrible. Just the guts to step up.
Yeah, I love even when the business idea is obviously horrible. Just the guts to step up.
Mark Cuban
To be there.
To be there.
Lex Fridman
To believe in yourself. To really reach. That’s what matters, because some of the best business ideas are probably, maybe even you and Shark Tank will laugh at.
To believe in yourself. To really reach. That’s what matters, because some of the best business ideas are probably, maybe even you and Shark Tank will laugh at.
Mark Cuban
Oh, for sure. Without question. The good ones, we’re not going to recognize every good one. And then sometimes we’ll just motivate people to work even harder to get it done because of what we say to them, and that’s fine too. There’s been great success stories that we said no to.
Oh, for sure. Without question. The good ones, we’re not going to recognize every good one. And then sometimes we’ll just motivate people to work even harder to get it done because of what we say to them, and that’s fine too. There’s been great success stories that we said no to.
Lex Fridman
What stands out as a memorable business on you’ve been pitched on Shark Tank. What’s the best one that stands out on-
What stands out as a memorable business on you’ve been pitched on Shark Tank. What’s the best one that stands out on-
Mark Cuban
There’s no best one, right? They’re all different. They’re all best in their own way, I guess. There’re stupid ones, and we haven’t had any world-changing earth-shattering ones because those aren’t going to apply to Shark Tank. They don’t need us. So we typically get businesses that need some help at some level or another. But there’s ones I’ve passed that I wish Spikeball, do you know what Spikeball is? So it’s just rebounding net that you can put on the beach and you have these yellow balls, and you play a game of, it’s just a competitive game, but they’re killing it. So if you go to beaches in New York or LA, you’ll see kids playing it all the time. And it was a fun game that I wish I had done a deal with, and there’s been others.
There’s no best one, right? They’re all different. They’re all best in their own way, I guess. There’re stupid ones, and we haven’t had any world-changing earth-shattering ones because those aren’t going to apply to Shark Tank. They don’t need us. So we typically get businesses that need some help at some level or another. But there’s ones I’ve passed that I wish Spikeball, do you know what Spikeball is? So it’s just rebounding net that you can put on the beach and you have these yellow balls, and you play a game of, it’s just a competitive game, but they’re killing it. So if you go to beaches in New York or LA, you’ll see kids playing it all the time. And it was a fun game that I wish I had done a deal with, and there’s been others.
Lex Fridman
And you passed.
And you passed.
Mark Cuban
And I passed. They were getting some traction and they wanted to create leagues, Spikeball leagues, and they wanted me to be the commissioner, and I don’t want to be a commissioner of a new Spikeball league.
And I passed. They were getting some traction and they wanted to create leagues, Spikeball leagues, and they wanted me to be the commissioner, and I don’t want to be a commissioner of a new Spikeball league.
Lex Fridman
So you have to have this gut feeling of will this scale, will this click with people?
So you have to have this gut feeling of will this scale, will this click with people?
Mark Cuban
Of course, yeah. Can it be protected? Is it differentiated? Is it something that makes me think, why didn’t I think of that? Or is it just a good solid business that’s going to pay a return to the founder and may not be enough of a business to return to an investor?
Of course, yeah. Can it be protected? Is it differentiated? Is it something that makes me think, why didn’t I think of that? Or is it just a good solid business that’s going to pay a return to the founder and may not be enough of a business to return to an investor?
Lex Fridman
Yeah, and I guess the question you’re trying to see, will this scale? There’s promise? Will the promise materialize into a big thing?
Yeah, and I guess the question you’re trying to see, will this scale? There’s promise? Will the promise materialize into a big thing?
Mark Cuban
Well, see, I don’t even care if it’s going to be a big thing, right? Because it’s all relative to the entrepreneur. We had a nineteen-year-old from Pittsburgh Laney, who came on with this simple sugar scrub, and there was nothing outrageously special about it. I didn’t see it becoming a hundred-million-dollar business. I thought it could become a two, three, five-million-dollar business that paid the bills for her. And that was good enough. And six months after the show aired, she called me up, she goes, “Mark, I’ve got a million dollars in the bank. What am I going to do?” I’m like, “Enjoy it. Put aside money for your taxes and go back to work.” And so it doesn’t have to be a huge business. It’s just got to be one that makes the entrepreneur happy.
Well, see, I don’t even care if it’s going to be a big thing, right? Because it’s all relative to the entrepreneur. We had a nineteen-year-old from Pittsburgh Laney, who came on with this simple sugar scrub, and there was nothing outrageously special about it. I didn’t see it becoming a hundred-million-dollar business. I thought it could become a two, three, five-million-dollar business that paid the bills for her. And that was good enough. And six months after the show aired, she called me up, she goes, “Mark, I’ve got a million dollars in the bank. What am I going to do?” I’m like, “Enjoy it. Put aside money for your taxes and go back to work.” And so it doesn’t have to be a huge business. It’s just got to be one that makes the entrepreneur happy.
Lex Fridman
But then there’s the valuation piece. Do a lot of the entrepreneurs overvalue their business?
But then there’s the valuation piece. Do a lot of the entrepreneurs overvalue their business?
Mark Cuban
Yeah, that’s the nature of it, right? And that’s really where the biggest conflicts in Shark Tank happened. That’s an evaluation. They think this is the best business ever. We had one lady couple that came on and they had this scraper for cat’s tongues, right?
Yeah, that’s the nature of it, right? And that’s really where the biggest conflicts in Shark Tank happened. That’s an evaluation. They think this is the best business ever. We had one lady couple that came on and they had this scraper for cat’s tongues, right?
Lex Fridman
Nice.
Nice.
Mark Cuban
Bizarre. One of the most bizarre pitch ever.
Bizarre. One of the most bizarre pitch ever.
Lex Fridman
I love it.
I love it.
Mark Cuban
And they had this insane valuation and it was on because it was corny and fun TV, not because it was a good business.
And they had this insane valuation and it was on because it was corny and fun TV, not because it was a good business.
Lex Fridman
Oh, really? Okay. You didn’t see the potential.
Oh, really? Okay. You didn’t see the potential.
Mark Cuban
None. Yeah, none.
None. Yeah, none.
Lex Fridman
There’s a lot of cats in the world, Mark. Come on.
There’s a lot of cats in the world, Mark. Come on.
Mark Cuban
Yes, there are. And they’ll go very well without me.
Yes, there are. And they’ll go very well without me.
Lex Fridman
So how do you determine the value of a business, whether it’s on Shark Tank or just in general?
So how do you determine the value of a business, whether it’s on Shark Tank or just in general?
Mark Cuban
It’s actually really easy. So if you take, just to use an example, a business that’s valued at $1 million, and I want to buy 10% of that company for $100,000, then in order for me to get my money back, they’ve got to be able to generate a hundred thousand dollars in after-tax cash flow that they’re able to distribute. Can they do it or can they not? Right? And if it’s a $2 million… Whatever the valuation is, that’s how much cash, after-tax cash they have to generate to return that money to investors. Or the other option is, do I see this as business potentially having an exit? Do they have some unique technology or do they have something specific about them that some other company would want to acquire? Then the cash flow isn’t as, I don’t want to say important, but isn’t going to guide the valuation.
It’s actually really easy. So if you take, just to use an example, a business that’s valued at $1 million, and I want to buy 10% of that company for $100,000, then in order for me to get my money back, they’ve got to be able to generate a hundred thousand dollars in after-tax cash flow that they’re able to distribute. Can they do it or can they not? Right? And if it’s a $2 million… Whatever the valuation is, that’s how much cash, after-tax cash they have to generate to return that money to investors. Or the other option is, do I see this as business potentially having an exit? Do they have some unique technology or do they have something specific about them that some other company would want to acquire? Then the cash flow isn’t as, I don’t want to say important, but isn’t going to guide the valuation.
Lex Fridman
And how do you know if a company’s going to be acquired? So it’s the technology, like the patents, but also the team, is it-
And how do you know if a company’s going to be acquired? So it’s the technology, like the patents, but also the team, is it-
Mark Cuban
Yeah, it could be any of the above. It could be a super products’ company that I think is going to take off.
Yeah, it could be any of the above. It could be a super products’ company that I think is going to take off.
Lex Fridman
And how do you know if they can generate the money? You made it sound easy.
And how do you know if they can generate the money? You made it sound easy.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, can the person sell? And if not them, can I do it or someone on my team do it for them?
Yeah, can the person sell? And if not them, can I do it or someone on my team do it for them?
Lex Fridman
So you’re looking at the person.
So you’re looking at the person.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, for sure. Yeah. That’s where Barbara Corker is the best. She can look at a person and hear them talk for 20 minutes and know, can that person do the job and do the work.
Yeah, for sure. Yeah. That’s where Barbara Corker is the best. She can look at a person and hear them talk for 20 minutes and know, can that person do the job and do the work.
Lex Fridman
Can you tell if they’re full of shit or not? So one of the things with entrepreneurs, they’re like we said, overvaluing, so they’re maybe overselling themselves, but also they might be full of in terms of their understanding of the market or also-
Can you tell if they’re full of shit or not? So one of the things with entrepreneurs, they’re like we said, overvaluing, so they’re maybe overselling themselves, but also they might be full of in terms of their understanding of the market or also-
Mark Cuban
Oh, yeah.
Oh, yeah.
Lex Fridman
… or exaggerating what they’re think or do, all that kind of stuff. Can you see through that?
… or exaggerating what they’re think or do, all that kind of stuff. Can you see through that?
Mark Cuban
Yeah, for sure. Just by asking questions. So if they are delusional at some level or misleading at another level, I’m going to call them on it. So you get people trying to sell supplements that come on there and it’s a cure for cancer or whatever it may be, or there’s this latest fad that increases your core strength without doing any exercises. Shit Like that I’m just going to bounce, I’m going to pound on them. Right.
Yeah, for sure. Just by asking questions. So if they are delusional at some level or misleading at another level, I’m going to call them on it. So you get people trying to sell supplements that come on there and it’s a cure for cancer or whatever it may be, or there’s this latest fad that increases your core strength without doing any exercises. Shit Like that I’m just going to bounce, I’m going to pound on them. Right.
Lex Fridman
I still love that. I still love the trying. Just trying.
I still love that. I still love the trying. Just trying.
Mark Cuban
No, give them credit, right? Because they know all of America’s going to see it, and they’ve deluded themselves to believe this story so strongly.
No, give them credit, right? Because they know all of America’s going to see it, and they’ve deluded themselves to believe this story so strongly.
Lex Fridman
There’s a delusional aspect to entrepreneurship. You,
There’s a delusional aspect to entrepreneurship. You,
Mark Cuban
That’s a great question. Do you have to be ambitious and set aside reality at some level to think that you can create a company that could be worth 10, a hundred, a billion dollars, yeah, at some level. Because you don’t know. It’s all uncertainty. But I think if you’re delusional, that works against you because everything’s grounded in reality. You’ve got to execute. You’ve got to produce, you can have a vision and you can say, this is where I want to get to and that’s my mission, or this is my driving principle. But you still got to execute on the business plan, and that’s where most people fail.
That’s a great question. Do you have to be ambitious and set aside reality at some level to think that you can create a company that could be worth 10, a hundred, a billion dollars, yeah, at some level. Because you don’t know. It’s all uncertainty. But I think if you’re delusional, that works against you because everything’s grounded in reality. You’ve got to execute. You’ve got to produce, you can have a vision and you can say, this is where I want to get to and that’s my mission, or this is my driving principle. But you still got to execute on the business plan, and that’s where most people fail.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, you have to be kind of two-brained, I guess. You have to be able to dip into reality when you’re thinking about the specifics of the product, how to design things, the first principles, the basics of how to build the thing, how much it’s going to cost, all of that.
Yeah, you have to be kind of two-brained, I guess. You have to be able to dip into reality when you’re thinking about the specifics of the product, how to design things, the first principles, the basics of how to build the thing, how much it’s going to cost, all of that.
Mark Cuban
Yeah. Because if you can’t do the basics, you’re not going to be able to do the bigger things. And at the same time, you’ve got to be… One of the things that entrepreneurs do that I always try to remind any of that I work with on is we all tend to lie to ourselves. Our product is bigger, faster, cheaper, this or that, as if that is a finite situation, that’s never going to change. And there’s always somebody, I call them leapfrog businesses. Whoever’s competing against you, if you do a B or C, they’re going to try to do C, D and E, and you better be prepared for that to come, because otherwise they’re out of business too. So you’re never in a vacuum. You’re always competing against sometimes an unlimited number of entrepreneurs that you don’t even know exist who are trying to kick your ass.
Yeah. Because if you can’t do the basics, you’re not going to be able to do the bigger things. And at the same time, you’ve got to be… One of the things that entrepreneurs do that I always try to remind any of that I work with on is we all tend to lie to ourselves. Our product is bigger, faster, cheaper, this or that, as if that is a finite situation, that’s never going to change. And there’s always somebody, I call them leapfrog businesses. Whoever’s competing against you, if you do a B or C, they’re going to try to do C, D and E, and you better be prepared for that to come, because otherwise they’re out of business too. So you’re never in a vacuum. You’re always competing against sometimes an unlimited number of entrepreneurs that you don’t even know exist who are trying to kick your ass.
Lex Fridman
And the tricky part of all this too is you might need to frequently pivot, especially in the beginning.
And the tricky part of all this too is you might need to frequently pivot, especially in the beginning.
Mark Cuban
Hopefully not.
Hopefully not.
Lex Fridman
So you think in the beginning, the product you have should be the thing that carries you a long time.
So you think in the beginning, the product you have should be the thing that carries you a long time.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, because that’s your riskiest point in time. And so if you’ve done your homework, which includes going out there and testing product market fit, you should have confidence that you’re going to be able to sell it. Now, if you didn’t do your homework and you go out there and you sell whatever it is and you’ve raised money or whatever, just to pivot, you’ve already shown that you haven’t been able to read the market. And so it’s not that pivots can’t work and always don’t work. They can, but more often than not, they don’t. You pivot for a reason. That’s because you made a huge mistake.
Yeah, because that’s your riskiest point in time. And so if you’ve done your homework, which includes going out there and testing product market fit, you should have confidence that you’re going to be able to sell it. Now, if you didn’t do your homework and you go out there and you sell whatever it is and you’ve raised money or whatever, just to pivot, you’ve already shown that you haven’t been able to read the market. And so it’s not that pivots can’t work and always don’t work. They can, but more often than not, they don’t. You pivot for a reason. That’s because you made a huge mistake.
Lex Fridman
Well, I also mean the micro- pivots, which is iterative development of a-
Well, I also mean the micro- pivots, which is iterative development of a-
Mark Cuban
Oh, yeah, just iterations. Yeah. Entrepreneurship, having any business is just continuous iteration, continuous. Your product, your sales pitch, your advertising, introducing new technology, how do you use AI or not use AI? Where do you use it? What person’s the right person? There’s just a million touch points that you’re always reevaluating in real , early ‘time that you have to be agile and adapt and change.
Oh, yeah, just iterations. Yeah. Entrepreneurship, having any business is just continuous iteration, continuous. Your product, your sales pitch, your advertising, introducing new technology, how do you use AI or not use AI? Where do you use it? What person’s the right person? There’s just a million touch points that you’re always reevaluating in real , early ‘time that you have to be agile and adapt and change.
Lex Fridman
But especially in software, it feels like business model can evolve really quickly, too, like how are you going to make money on this?
But especially in software, it feels like business model can evolve really quickly, too, like how are you going to make money on this?
Mark Cuban
Yeah, software for sure, because anything digital, because it can change in a millisecond.
Yeah, software for sure, because anything digital, because it can change in a millisecond.
How Mark made first billion
Lex Fridman
Speaking of which, how did you make your first billion?
Speaking of which, how did you make your first billion?
Mark Cuban
So my partner, Todd Wagner and I would get together for lunches, and we were at California Pizza Kitchen and Preston Hollow in Dallas, and he was talking about how we could use this new thing called the internet. This is the late ’94, early ’95, to be able to listen to Indiana University basketball games because that’s where we went to school. And he look, when we would listen to games, we would have somebody in Bloomington, Indiana have a speakerphone next to a radio, and then we would have a speakerphone in Dallas and a six-pack or 12 pack of beer, and we’d sit around listening to the game because there was no other way to listen to it. So I was like, okay, my first company, MicroSolutions, I’d written software, done network integration. And so I was comfortable digging into it, and so like, okay, let’s give it a try.
So my partner, Todd Wagner and I would get together for lunches, and we were at California Pizza Kitchen and Preston Hollow in Dallas, and he was talking about how we could use this new thing called the internet. This is the late ’94, early ’95, to be able to listen to Indiana University basketball games because that’s where we went to school. And he look, when we would listen to games, we would have somebody in Bloomington, Indiana have a speakerphone next to a radio, and then we would have a speakerphone in Dallas and a six-pack or 12 pack of beer, and we’d sit around listening to the game because there was no other way to listen to it. So I was like, okay, my first company, MicroSolutions, I’d written software, done network integration. And so I was comfortable digging into it, and so like, okay, let’s give it a try.
So we started this company called AudioNet, and effectively became the first streaming content company on the internet. And we’re like, okay, we’re not sure how we’re going to make this work, but we were able to make it work when we started going to radio stations and TV stations and music labels and everything and evolved. Audionet.com, Which was only audio at the beginning, to broadcast.com in 1998, which was audio and video, and became the largest multimedia site on the internet. Took it public in July of 1998. It had the largest first day jump in the history of the stock market at the time. And then a year later we sold it to Yahoo for $5.7 billion in Yahoo stock, and I owned right around 30% of the company, give or take. And so after taxes, that’s what got me there.
Lex Fridman
Well, there’s a lot of questions there. So the technical challenge of that, you’re making it sound easy, but you wrote code, but still, in the early days of the internet, how do you figure out how to create this kind of product of just audio at first and then video at first?
Well, there’s a lot of questions there. So the technical challenge of that, you’re making it sound easy, but you wrote code, but still, in the early days of the internet, how do you figure out how to create this kind of product of just audio at first and then video at first?
Mark Cuban
A lot of iterations like you talked about. We started in the second bedroom of my house, set up a server. I got an ISDN line, which was a 128K line and set up, downloaded Netscape server, and then started using different file formats that were progressive loading and allowing people to connect to the server and do a progressive download so that the audio, you can listen to the audio while it was downloading onto your PC.
A lot of iterations like you talked about. We started in the second bedroom of my house, set up a server. I got an ISDN line, which was a 128K line and set up, downloaded Netscape server, and then started using different file formats that were progressive loading and allowing people to connect to the server and do a progressive download so that the audio, you can listen to the audio while it was downloading onto your PC.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, it was a super choppy. So you’re trying to figure out how to do it.
Yeah, it was a super choppy. So you’re trying to figure out how to do it.
Mark Cuban
Oh yeah, for sure. For sure. It would buffer it. It wasn’t good, but it was a start.
Oh yeah, for sure. For sure. It would buffer it. It wasn’t good, but it was a start.
Lex Fridman
But it was good enough the first
But it was good enough the first
Mark Cuban
Kind. Yeah, because there was no other competition, right? There was nobody else doing it. And so it was like, okay, I can get access to this or this. And then there were some third party software companies, Zing and Progressive Networks and others that took it a little bit further. So we partnered with them and I started going to local radio stations where literally we would set up a server. Right next to it, I had a $49 radio, the highest FM radio that I could find, and we’d take the output of the audio signal from the radio with these two analog cables, plug it into the server, encode it, and make it available from audionet.com. Then I would go on Uunet bulletin boards. I would go on CompuServe, I would go on Prodigy, I would go on AOL, I’d go wherever I could find bodies, and I’d say, okay, we’ve got this radio station KLIF in Dallas.
Kind. Yeah, because there was no other competition, right? There was nobody else doing it. And so it was like, okay, I can get access to this or this. And then there were some third party software companies, Zing and Progressive Networks and others that took it a little bit further. So we partnered with them and I started going to local radio stations where literally we would set up a server. Right next to it, I had a $49 radio, the highest FM radio that I could find, and we’d take the output of the audio signal from the radio with these two analog cables, plug it into the server, encode it, and make it available from audionet.com. Then I would go on Uunet bulletin boards. I would go on CompuServe, I would go on Prodigy, I would go on AOL, I’d go wherever I could find bodies, and I’d say, okay, we’ve got this radio station KLIF in Dallas.
It’s got Dallas sports and Dallas News and politics, and if you’re in an office or you’re outside of Dallas, connect to audionet.com and now you can listen to these things on demand. And that’s how we started. And it started with one radio station, and then it was five, then it was 10, then it was video content, then the laws were different then. So we could literally go out and buy CDs and host them and just let people listen to whatever music. And we went from 10 users a day to a hundred to a thousand, to hundreds of thousands to a million over those next four years.
Lex Fridman
How did you find the users? Is it word of mouth?
How did you find the users? Is it word of mouth?
Mark Cuban
Word of mouth.
Word of mouth.
Lex Fridman
Just word of mouth.
Just word of mouth.
Mark Cuban
Didn’t spend a penny on advertising.
Didn’t spend a penny on advertising.
Lex Fridman
So the thing you were focusing on is getting the radio stations and all that.
So the thing you were focusing on is getting the radio stations and all that.
Mark Cuban
But radio and TV, anything, any content at all.
But radio and TV, anything, any content at all.
Mark Cuban
You
You
Lex Fridman
Pick up the phone, how’d you,
Pick up the phone, how’d you,
Mark Cuban
Wherever I put everything that was public domain, I’d go out and buy a video or a cassette, whatever it was. And this was before the DMs, the digital minimum Copyright Act of 90, whenever it kicked in. So literally anything that was audio we would put online so people could listen to it. And if you think about somebody at work, they didn’t have a radio most likely. And if you did, you couldn’t get reception. Definitely didn’t have a TV, but you had a PC and you had bandwidth available to you and the companies weren’t up on firewalls or anything at that point in time. So our in-office listening during the day just exploded because whoever’s sitting next to you, what are you listening to? And that was the start of it. And then in early 98, we started adding video and just other things, and we had ended up with thousands of servers.
Wherever I put everything that was public domain, I’d go out and buy a video or a cassette, whatever it was. And this was before the DMs, the digital minimum Copyright Act of 90, whenever it kicked in. So literally anything that was audio we would put online so people could listen to it. And if you think about somebody at work, they didn’t have a radio most likely. And if you did, you couldn’t get reception. Definitely didn’t have a TV, but you had a PC and you had bandwidth available to you and the companies weren’t up on firewalls or anything at that point in time. So our in-office listening during the day just exploded because whoever’s sitting next to you, what are you listening to? And that was the start of it. And then in early 98, we started adding video and just other things, and we had ended up with thousands of servers.
There was no cloud back then. And just pulling together all those pieces to make it work. But where we really made our money was by taking that network that we had built and then going to corporations and saying, look, it’s 1996, ’97, ’98. And to communicate with your worldwide employees, what they would do is they would go to an auditorium that had a satellite uplink, and then they would have people go to theaters or ballrooms and hotels that had satellite down links and they would broadcast the product introductions, whatever. And so we said to them, look, you’re paying millions of dollars to reach all your employees when you can do it. Pay us a half a million dollars, and we’ll do it just on their PCs at work. So we did. When Intel announced the P 90 PC, we charged them $2 million or whatever to do that.
When Motorola announced a new phone or a new product, we would charge them. And so we used a consumer side to do a proof of concept for the network, and then we would take that knowledge and go to corporations, and that’s how we made our revenue.
Lex Fridman
And there’s some selling there with the corporations?
And there’s some selling there with the corporations?
Mark Cuban
Yeah, a lot of selling there, but we were saving them so much money, and they were technology companies. They wanted to be perceived as being leading edge. And so it was win-win.
Yeah, a lot of selling there, but we were saving them so much money, and they were technology companies. They wanted to be perceived as being leading edge. And so it was win-win.
Lex Fridman
How much technical savvy was required? You said a bunch of servers. At which point do you get more engineers? How much did you understand could do yourself? And then also, once you can’t do it all yourself. How much technical savvy is required to understand enough to hire the right people to keep building this and innovation?
How much technical savvy was required? You said a bunch of servers. At which point do you get more engineers? How much did you understand could do yourself? And then also, once you can’t do it all yourself. How much technical savvy is required to understand enough to hire the right people to keep building this and innovation?
Mark Cuban
I did all the technology, and then we hired engineer after engineer after engineer to implement it. And so, yeah, from putting together a multicast network to software to just all these different things,
I did all the technology, and then we hired engineer after engineer after engineer to implement it. And so, yeah, from putting together a multicast network to software to just all these different things,
Lex Fridman
Was this a scary thing?
Was this a scary thing?
Mark Cuban
It’s terrifying, right? Because as we were growing, trying to keep up with the scale, and literally, we’re buying off-the-shelf PCs, and then server cards as the technology advanced and hard drives and things would fail, and we would have to… We didn’t have machine learning back then to do an analysis of how to distribute server resources. There was a time when Bill Clinton and all the Monica Lewinsky stuff happened. They released the audio of their interviews of him or something like that. And literally, I knew at that point in time when that was released, everybody at work was going to want to listen to it, right? So we had to take down servers that were doomed.
It’s terrifying, right? Because as we were growing, trying to keep up with the scale, and literally, we’re buying off-the-shelf PCs, and then server cards as the technology advanced and hard drives and things would fail, and we would have to… We didn’t have machine learning back then to do an analysis of how to distribute server resources. There was a time when Bill Clinton and all the Monica Lewinsky stuff happened. They released the audio of their interviews of him or something like that. And literally, I knew at that point in time when that was released, everybody at work was going to want to listen to it, right? So we had to take down servers that were doomed.
Mark Cuban
… Was going to want to listen to it. We had to take down servers that were doing Chicago Cubs baseball and just make all these on-the-fly decisions because we didn’t have the tools to analyze or be predictive. It was all technology-driven and marketing.
… Was going to want to listen to it. We had to take down servers that were doing Chicago Cubs baseball and just make all these on-the-fly decisions because we didn’t have the tools to analyze or be predictive. It was all technology-driven and marketing.
Lex Fridman
The acquisition by Yahoo. Can you tell the story of that, but also in the broader context of this internet bubble? This is a fascinating part of human history.
The acquisition by Yahoo. Can you tell the story of that, but also in the broader context of this internet bubble? This is a fascinating part of human history.
Mark Cuban
On the acquisition side, we were the largest media site on the internet, and it wasn’t close. There was nobody close. We were YouTube and relatively speaking, we would be 10X YouTube relative to the competition because there was nobody there. It became obvious to Yahoo, AOL, and others that they needed a multimedia component. We had the infrastructure, sales, all that stuff.
On the acquisition side, we were the largest media site on the internet, and it wasn’t close. There was nobody close. We were YouTube and relatively speaking, we would be 10X YouTube relative to the competition because there was nobody there. It became obvious to Yahoo, AOL, and others that they needed a multimedia component. We had the infrastructure, sales, all that stuff.
Yahoo, when we went public in ’98 or right before, I think it was, they made an investment of $2 million, which gave us a connection to them. After we went public, they decided they needed to have multimedia, so in April of ’99, we made a deal, and then July of 2000 is when it closed.
Lex Fridman
Can you explain to me the trickiness of what you did after that?
Can you explain to me the trickiness of what you did after that?
Mark Cuban
The collar?
The collar?
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Mark Cuban
Okay. When we sold to Yahoo, we sold for $5.7 billion in stock, not cash. After Micro Solutions, when I sold that, I took that money and initially I told my broker I wanted to invest like a 60-year-old man because I wanted to protect it, but then he started asking me all kinds of questions about all these technologies that I understood, like networks I had installed. We had become one of the top 20, let’s say, systems integrators in the country. At one point in time, we were the largest IBM token ring installer in the country. It was crazy. Banyan, Blast from the Past.
Okay. When we sold to Yahoo, we sold for $5.7 billion in stock, not cash. After Micro Solutions, when I sold that, I took that money and initially I told my broker I wanted to invest like a 60-year-old man because I wanted to protect it, but then he started asking me all kinds of questions about all these technologies that I understood, like networks I had installed. We had become one of the top 20, let’s say, systems integrators in the country. At one point in time, we were the largest IBM token ring installer in the country. It was crazy. Banyan, Blast from the Past.
Anyway, these Wall Street bankers or analysts rather, that were the big analysts of the time would call me up because they would ask my broker, “What does he know about this product, this product?” I knew them all, what was working and not working. The ones that worked, I say that it’s working and they say something, the stock would go up $20. My broker was like, “You know this better than they do. You need to invest.”
I started buying and selling stocks, and this was in 1990 and was just killing it. I was making 80, 90, 100% a year over those next four years to the point where guy came in and asked to use my trading history to start a hedge fund, which we did. I sold within nine months, it was great. The point being as it goes forward, so when we sold to Yahoo, I already had a lot of experience trading stocks, and I had seen different bubbles come and go. The bubble for PC manufacturers, a bubble for networking manufacturers, they went up, up, up, up, up, and then they came straight down after the hype where somebody just leapfrogged.
When we sold to Yahoo, I was like I’ve got a B next to my name. That’s all I need, or all I want. I don’t want to be greedy. I’d seen this story before where stocks get really frothy and go straight down. I knew that because all of what I had was in stock, I needed to find a way to collar it and protect it. Understanding stocks and trading and options and all that, my broker and I, we went and shorted an index that had Yahoo in it.
The law at the time was you couldn’t short any indexes that had more than 5% of that stock in it, of the Yahoo stock. I took pretty much $20 million dollars, everything I had at the time, and I shorted the index.
Lex Fridman
This is fascinating, by the way, because based on your estimation that this is a bubble.
This is fascinating, by the way, because based on your estimation that this is a bubble.
Mark Cuban
Or just mine not wanting to be greedy.
Or just mine not wanting to be greedy.
Lex Fridman
Sure. The foundation of this kind of thinking is you don’t want to be greedy.
Sure. The foundation of this kind of thinking is you don’t want to be greedy.
Mark Cuban
Yeah. How much money do I need? Where other people were saying, oh, I think you can go up higher, higher, higher. I went on CNBC and I told them what I had done, and Yahoo stock had gone up significantly from the time I had collared. One of the guys, Joe Kernan was on there, “Don’t you feel stupid now that Yahoo stock has gone up X% more?” I’m like, “Yeah, I feel real stupid sitting on my jet.”
Yeah. How much money do I need? Where other people were saying, oh, I think you can go up higher, higher, higher. I went on CNBC and I told them what I had done, and Yahoo stock had gone up significantly from the time I had collared. One of the guys, Joe Kernan was on there, “Don’t you feel stupid now that Yahoo stock has gone up X% more?” I’m like, “Yeah, I feel real stupid sitting on my jet.”
Lex Fridman
There is some fundamental way in which bubbles are based on this greed.
There is some fundamental way in which bubbles are based on this greed.
Mark Cuban
For sure, and I’d seen it before, like I just said. What I did was we put together a collar where I sold calls and bought puts, and as it turned out, when the market just cratered, I was protected. Over the next two, three years, whatever it was, it converted to cash, paid my taxes, etc, but it protected me. As it turns out, it was called one of the top 10 trades of all time.
For sure, and I’d seen it before, like I just said. What I did was we put together a collar where I sold calls and bought puts, and as it turned out, when the market just cratered, I was protected. Over the next two, three years, whatever it was, it converted to cash, paid my taxes, etc, but it protected me. As it turns out, it was called one of the top 10 trades of all time.
What was even more interesting out of that period, my broker at that time was at Goldman Sachs, and I had asked him to see if there was a way to trade the VIX, the volatility index, and there wasn’t. One of the people that Goldman that we were working with to try to create this actually left Goldman and created indexes that allowed you to trade the VIX.
Lex Fridman
It’s not trivial to understand that it’s a bubble. You’re lessening your insight into all this by saying you just didn’t want to be greedy, but you still have to see that it’s a bubble.
It’s not trivial to understand that it’s a bubble. You’re lessening your insight into all this by saying you just didn’t want to be greedy, but you still have to see that it’s a bubble.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, obviously if I thought it was going to keep on going up and there was intrinsic value there, I would’ve stayed in it. It wasn’t so much Yahoo, it was just the entire industry. We’re looking at the magic seven or whatever it is stocks now and people were asking is it in a bubble? I would get into cabs and people would just start talking about internet stocks.
Yeah, obviously if I thought it was going to keep on going up and there was intrinsic value there, I would’ve stayed in it. It wasn’t so much Yahoo, it was just the entire industry. We’re looking at the magic seven or whatever it is stocks now and people were asking is it in a bubble? I would get into cabs and people would just start talking about internet stocks.
There were people creating companies with just a website and going public. That’s a bubble where there’s no intrinsic value at all. People aren’t even trying to make operating cap profits, they’re just trying to leverage the frothiness of the stock market, that’s a bubble. You don’t see that right now. You don’t see any IPOs right now for that matter, so I don’t think we’re in a bubble now, but back then, yes, I thought we were in a bubble, but that wasn’t really the motivating factor.
Lex Fridman
Do you think it’s possible we’re in a bit of an AI bubble right now?
Do you think it’s possible we’re in a bit of an AI bubble right now?
Mark Cuban
No, because we’re not seeing funky AI companies just go public. If all of a sudden we see a rush of companies who are skins on other people’s models or just creating models to create models that are going public, then yeah, that’s probably the start of a bubble. That said, my fourteen-year-old was bragging about buying NVIDIA with me in his Robinhood account. He tells me the order, I place it, and he was like, “Oh, yeah, it’s going up, up, up.” I’m like yeah, we’re not quite there yet, but that’s one thing to pay attention to.
No, because we’re not seeing funky AI companies just go public. If all of a sudden we see a rush of companies who are skins on other people’s models or just creating models to create models that are going public, then yeah, that’s probably the start of a bubble. That said, my fourteen-year-old was bragging about buying NVIDIA with me in his Robinhood account. He tells me the order, I place it, and he was like, “Oh, yeah, it’s going up, up, up.” I’m like yeah, we’re not quite there yet, but that’s one thing to pay attention to.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, we’re flirting with it. You said that becoming a billionaire requires luck. Can you explain?
Yeah, we’re flirting with it. You said that becoming a billionaire requires luck. Can you explain?
Mark Cuban
Yeah. There’s no business plan where you can just start it and say yeah, I’m definitely going to be a billionaire. If I had to start all over, could I start a company that made me a millionaire? Yeah, because I know how to sell and I know technology, and I’ve learned enough over the years to do that. Could I make $10 million? Probably. $100 million? I hope so. But $1 billion, just something good has got to happen.
Yeah. There’s no business plan where you can just start it and say yeah, I’m definitely going to be a billionaire. If I had to start all over, could I start a company that made me a millionaire? Yeah, because I know how to sell and I know technology, and I’ve learned enough over the years to do that. Could I make $10 million? Probably. $100 million? I hope so. But $1 billion, just something good has got to happen.
Lex Fridman
Timing.
Timing.
Mark Cuban
Timing. Internet stock market was going nuts when we started, and that certainly I couldn’t predict or control. It’s like AI right now, AI’s been around a long, long, long, long time. The NVIDIA GPUs, you couldn’t predict that now’s the time that they were going to get to that cost-effectiveness where you could create models and train them and although it’s expensive, it’s still doable. We had ASICs for custom applications and we had CPUs that were leading the way, but GPUs were more for gaming and then crypto mining, and then all of a sudden they were the foundation for AI models.
Timing. Internet stock market was going nuts when we started, and that certainly I couldn’t predict or control. It’s like AI right now, AI’s been around a long, long, long, long time. The NVIDIA GPUs, you couldn’t predict that now’s the time that they were going to get to that cost-effectiveness where you could create models and train them and although it’s expensive, it’s still doable. We had ASICs for custom applications and we had CPUs that were leading the way, but GPUs were more for gaming and then crypto mining, and then all of a sudden they were the foundation for AI models.
Lex Fridman
I think luck being essential to becoming a billionaire is a beautiful way to see life in general. First of all, I personally think that everything good that’s ever happened to me is because of luck. I think that’s just a good way of being. It’s like you’re grateful.
I think luck being essential to becoming a billionaire is a beautiful way to see life in general. First of all, I personally think that everything good that’s ever happened to me is because of luck. I think that’s just a good way of being. It’s like you’re grateful.
That said, there’s some examples of people that you’re like, they seem to have gotten lucky a lot. We’ll mention Jeff Bezos. It seems like he did a lot of really interesting, powerful decisions for many years with Amazon to make it successful.
Mark Cuban
But he was really able to raise money, a lot of money, and people were really dismissive of him because they weren’t profitable and we were in an environment where it was possible to raise [inaudible 00:43:16]-
But he was really able to raise money, a lot of money, and people were really dismissive of him because they weren’t profitable and we were in an environment where it was possible to raise [inaudible 00:43:16]-
Lex Fridman
It was possible to raise that money. What about somebody you get sometimes feisty with on the internet, Elon. Could even look at Zuck, and Bill Gates, and Warren Buffett.
It was possible to raise that money. What about somebody you get sometimes feisty with on the internet, Elon. Could even look at Zuck, and Bill Gates, and Warren Buffett.
Mark Cuban
Look, Zuck was just trying to get laid and it took off and he wrote some good stuff.
Look, Zuck was just trying to get laid and it took off and he wrote some good stuff.
Lex Fridman
Aren’t we all? Isn’t that the foundation of human civilization?
Aren’t we all? Isn’t that the foundation of human civilization?
Mark Cuban
At some level, right? More power to them, you can’t take anything away from them. Snapchat, same thing, took off. Apps didn’t take off in 2007 when the iPhone came out, apps took off in 2011, 2012, and if you were there with the right app at the right time.
At some level, right? More power to them, you can’t take anything away from them. Snapchat, same thing, took off. Apps didn’t take off in 2007 when the iPhone came out, apps took off in 2011, 2012, and if you were there with the right app at the right time.
Even Facebook in 2004, the bubble had burst and the price for computers had fallen enough. And kids in school all needed computers or laptops. If he had tried to do something like that five years earlier… He was too young, but five years earlier or five years later, or Friendster might’ve been the ultimate or MySpace,
Lex Fridman
Friendster, I remember Friendster.
Friendster, I remember Friendster.
Mark Cuban
Or MySpace. I had a MySpace account, and that was before Facebook.
Or MySpace. I had a MySpace account, and that was before Facebook.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, the timing’s important, but there’s the details of how the product is built, the fundamentals of the product.
Yeah, the timing’s important, but there’s the details of how the product is built, the fundamentals of the product.
Mark Cuban
But that’s what gets you. When the opportunity is there, that’s what allows you to take advantage of that opportunity and the kismet of it all because it wasn’t like any of the people I mentioned, there weren’t others trying the same thing. You had to be able to see it. You had to be able to visualize it and put together a plan of some sort, or at least have a path, and then you had to execute on it and do all those things at the same time and have the money available to you because it wasn’t like whether it was Google or Facebook, they raised a shitload of money. It wasn’t bootstrapping it that got them there.
But that’s what gets you. When the opportunity is there, that’s what allows you to take advantage of that opportunity and the kismet of it all because it wasn’t like any of the people I mentioned, there weren’t others trying the same thing. You had to be able to see it. You had to be able to visualize it and put together a plan of some sort, or at least have a path, and then you had to execute on it and do all those things at the same time and have the money available to you because it wasn’t like whether it was Google or Facebook, they raised a shitload of money. It wasn’t bootstrapping it that got them there.
Lex Fridman
Raising money is not just about sales, it’s about the general feeling of the people with money at that time.
Raising money is not just about sales, it’s about the general feeling of the people with money at that time.
Mark Cuban
And proximity.
And proximity.
Lex Fridman
Oh, yeah. Sure.
Oh, yeah. Sure.
Mark Cuban
If Zuck wasn’t at Harvard and he was at Miami of Ohio University or he was at Richland Community College, same idea, same person, same execution, and nothing.
If Zuck wasn’t at Harvard and he was at Miami of Ohio University or he was at Richland Community College, same idea, same person, same execution, and nothing.
Lex Fridman
I believe in the power of individuals to realize their potential no matter where they come from.
I believe in the power of individuals to realize their potential no matter where they come from.
Mark Cuban
I agree 100% with that.
I agree 100% with that.
Lex Fridman
But luck is required.
But luck is required.
Mark Cuban
The only delta is scale. We’re not all blessed with the access to the tools you need to hit that grand slam.
The only delta is scale. We’re not all blessed with the access to the tools you need to hit that grand slam.
Lex Fridman
But then also, billion is not the only measure of success, right?
But then also, billion is not the only measure of success, right?
Mark Cuban
Absolutely not. Right. Everybody defines the success in their own way.
Absolutely not. Right. Everybody defines the success in their own way.
Lex Fridman
How do you define success, Mark Cuban?
How do you define success, Mark Cuban?
Mark Cuban
Waking up every day with a smile, excited about the day. People always say when you get that kind of money, does it make you happy? My answer always is if you are happy when you are broke, you’re going to be really, really, really happy when you’re rich.
Waking up every day with a smile, excited about the day. People always say when you get that kind of money, does it make you happy? My answer always is if you are happy when you are broke, you’re going to be really, really, really happy when you’re rich.
Lex Fridman
But you got to work on being happy when you’re broke, I guess.
But you got to work on being happy when you’re broke, I guess.
Mark Cuban
You’re just being happy. If you were miserable in your job before, there’s a good chance you’re still going to be miserable if that’s just who you are.
You’re just being happy. If you were miserable in your job before, there’s a good chance you’re still going to be miserable if that’s just who you are.
Lex Fridman
That’s a pretty good definition of success, by the way.
That’s a pretty good definition of success, by the way.
Mark Cuban
Thank you.
Thank you.
Lex Fridman
How do you reach that success by way of advice to people?
How do you reach that success by way of advice to people?
Mark Cuban
We talked about my dad, my parents. I never looked at my dad and said okay, you’re not successful. He busted his ass and when he came home, we enjoyed our time together. There was nothing at any point in time where I felt like this is miserable, we’re awful, we don’t have this, we don’t have that. We celebrated the things we did have and never knew about the things we didn’t have. I think you have to be able to find your way to whatever it is that puts a smile on your face every day. Some people can do it, and some people can’t.
We talked about my dad, my parents. I never looked at my dad and said okay, you’re not successful. He busted his ass and when he came home, we enjoyed our time together. There was nothing at any point in time where I felt like this is miserable, we’re awful, we don’t have this, we don’t have that. We celebrated the things we did have and never knew about the things we didn’t have. I think you have to be able to find your way to whatever it is that puts a smile on your face every day. Some people can do it, and some people can’t.
Lex Fridman
It’s not always about the smile on the outside, it could be a smile on the inside.
It’s not always about the smile on the outside, it could be a smile on the inside.
Mark Cuban
Whatever it is, whatever makes you feel good.
Whatever it is, whatever makes you feel good.
Lex Fridman
Even the struggle, like with your dad, the really, really hard work can be a fulfilling experience because the struggle leading up to then seeing your kids and seeing your family.
Even the struggle, like with your dad, the really, really hard work can be a fulfilling experience because the struggle leading up to then seeing your kids and seeing your family.
Mark Cuban
Exactly right. That was my dad’s grand slam, seeing three kids go to college, be successful, be able to spend time with them. That was the other thing he really made me realize is the most valuable asset isn’t the money, it’s your time. That’s why from a young age, I wanted to retire because I wanted to experience everything that I possibly could in this life. He got joy from us, I get joy from my kids, and that’s the most special thing that you ever can have.
Exactly right. That was my dad’s grand slam, seeing three kids go to college, be successful, be able to spend time with them. That was the other thing he really made me realize is the most valuable asset isn’t the money, it’s your time. That’s why from a young age, I wanted to retire because I wanted to experience everything that I possibly could in this life. He got joy from us, I get joy from my kids, and that’s the most special thing that you ever can have.
Lex Fridman
Beautifully said. You have made some mistakes in your life?
Beautifully said. You have made some mistakes in your life?
Mark Cuban
Yeah, a lot of them.
Yeah, a lot of them.
Lex Fridman
One of the bigger ones on the financial side we could say is Uber.
One of the bigger ones on the financial side we could say is Uber.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, we call that not doing something. Yeah, it wasn’t a mistake, it was just… It was a mistake.
Yeah, we call that not doing something. Yeah, it wasn’t a mistake, it was just… It was a mistake.
Lex Fridman
I like how you tried to…
I like how you tried to…
Mark Cuban
I always try to look at mistakes at things you did that didn’t turn out as opposed to things you didn’t do, the negative.
I always try to look at mistakes at things you did that didn’t turn out as opposed to things you didn’t do, the negative.
Lex Fridman
Can you tell the story of that? And maybe it’s just interesting because it is illustrative how to know when a thing is going to be big and not, what are the fundamentals of it, and how to take the risk and all this kind of stuff.
Can you tell the story of that? And maybe it’s just interesting because it is illustrative how to know when a thing is going to be big and not, what are the fundamentals of it, and how to take the risk and all this kind of stuff.
Mark Cuban
The backstory of that is Bill Gurley came to me and said, “Mark, there’s this guy, Travis, that has this company, Red Swoosh, which is a peer-to-peer networking company that I think you can help.” I invested and would spend a lot of time with Travis.
The backstory of that is Bill Gurley came to me and said, “Mark, there’s this guy, Travis, that has this company, Red Swoosh, which is a peer-to-peer networking company that I think you can help.” I invested and would spend a lot of time with Travis.
It’s funny because back then, that was 2006, I was an investor at Box.net with Aaron Levy and… Oh, there was one other company, but there were three of them where there’d be emails where I’d introduce them and we’d all talk in these emails and they’d all gone to have astronomical success.
Red Swoosh had its issues. I always look at peer-to-peer as stealing bandwidth from the internet providers when bandwidth was a scarce commodity. What Travis did with that though, was great. He convinced gaming companies who wanted to do downloads of the clients for those games to use his peer-to-peer on Red Swoosh. He busted his ass, and I think he sold it for $18 million, so he did well.
So it was natural for him to come to me, and I still have the emails and ask me about Uber Cab. I thought okay, this is a great idea. I really, really like it. He showed me his budgets, and I think they were raising money at $10 million or $15 million or whatever. I’m like, “Your biggest challenge is going to be you’re going to have to fight all the incumbent taxi commissions. They’re going to want to put you out of business. That’s going to be a challenge and I think you don’t have enough money designated for marketing to get all that done.” I said, “I’d invest, but not quite at that valuation.” Never came back to me.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, there’s some lessons there connected to what you’re doing now we’ll talk about [inaudible 00:50:32], it’s looking at an industry that seems like there’s a lot of complexity involved, but it’s hungry for revolution and the cabs are that.
Yeah, there’s some lessons there connected to what you’re doing now we’ll talk about [inaudible 00:50:32], it’s looking at an industry that seems like there’s a lot of complexity involved, but it’s hungry for revolution and the cabs are that.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, for sure. They were dominated by an insulated few, they were not very transparent, you didn’t know the intricacies, they were very politically driven, an old boy insensuous network. I told him, “Travis, the best thing about you is you’ll run through walls and break down barriers. The bad thing about you is you’ll run through walls even if you don’t have to.”
Yeah, for sure. They were dominated by an insulated few, they were not very transparent, you didn’t know the intricacies, they were very politically driven, an old boy insensuous network. I told him, “Travis, the best thing about you is you’ll run through walls and break down barriers. The bad thing about you is you’ll run through walls even if you don’t have to.”
Lex Fridman
There you have to see, is it possible to raise enough money? Is it possible to do all this? Is it possible to break through? It’s a fascinating success story with Uber.
There you have to see, is it possible to raise enough money? Is it possible to do all this? Is it possible to break through? It’s a fascinating success story with Uber.
Mark Cuban
I think he tried to go too big. He had too big an ambition, which cost him in the end, not financially and personally, but just in terms of being able to stick it out with them, but that’s what makes him a great entrepreneur.
I think he tried to go too big. He had too big an ambition, which cost him in the end, not financially and personally, but just in terms of being able to stick it out with them, but that’s what makes him a great entrepreneur.
Lex Fridman
It’s a fascinating success story. You have certain companies like Airbnb just go into this thing that we take completely for granted.
It’s a fascinating success story. You have certain companies like Airbnb just go into this thing that we take completely for granted.
Mark Cuban
And change it all.
And change it all.
Lex Fridman
Just change it all.
Just change it all.
Mark Cuban
Linda Johnson, who worked as our general counsel at broadcast.com, was Brian’s GC and chief operating officer. They had a smart, smart team.
Linda Johnson, who worked as our general counsel at broadcast.com, was Brian’s GC and chief operating officer. They had a smart, smart team.
Lex Fridman
They believed in it. It’s a beautiful story because you’re like all right, all the things that annoy you about this world, they’re an inefficient, and it just seemed like a pain in the ass-
They believed in it. It’s a beautiful story because you’re like all right, all the things that annoy you about this world, they’re an inefficient, and it just seemed like a pain in the ass-
Mark Cuban
See, I probably would’ve said no like a lot of people did to Airbnb because I’m like I don’t want people sleeping in my bed.
See, I probably would’ve said no like a lot of people did to Airbnb because I’m like I don’t want people sleeping in my bed.
Lex Fridman
I would’ve too. I was like this is not going to work. I’ve done couchsurfing and stuff and it was always… It didn’t seem right. It didn’t seem like you could do this at a large scale.
I would’ve too. I was like this is not going to work. I’ve done couchsurfing and stuff and it was always… It didn’t seem right. It didn’t seem like you could do this at a large scale.
Mark Cuban
To monetize it. Yeah, but he did more power to him.
To monetize it. Yeah, but he did more power to him.
Dallas Mavericks
Lex Fridman
In 2000, I think January, you purchased a majority stake in the NBA team, Dallas Mavericks for $285 million. At this point, maybe you can correct me, but it was one of the worst performing teams in franchise history.
In 2000, I think January, you purchased a majority stake in the NBA team, Dallas Mavericks for $285 million. At this point, maybe you can correct me, but it was one of the worst performing teams in franchise history.
Mark Cuban
It’s true.
It’s true.
Lex Fridman
How did you help turn it around?
How did you help turn it around?
Mark Cuban
I had this big, tall guy named Dirk Nowitzki, and I let him be Dirk Nowitzki, and I got out of the way. I think more than anything else, there was the turnaround on the business side, and then there was the turnaround on the basketball side. On the basketball side, I just went in there, immediately said whatever it takes to win, that’s what we’re going to do. Back then, they had three or four coaches that were responsible for everything and I was like okay, we spend more money training people on PC software than we do developing the most important assets of the business.
I had this big, tall guy named Dirk Nowitzki, and I let him be Dirk Nowitzki, and I got out of the way. I think more than anything else, there was the turnaround on the business side, and then there was the turnaround on the basketball side. On the basketball side, I just went in there, immediately said whatever it takes to win, that’s what we’re going to do. Back then, they had three or four coaches that were responsible for everything and I was like okay, we spend more money training people on PC software than we do developing the most important assets of the business.
I made the decision to go out there and hire 15 different development coaches, one for each player. Everybody thought I was just insane, but it sent the message that we were going to do whatever it took to win. Once the guys believed that winning was the goal as opposed to just making money, attitudes change, efforts went up, and the rest is history.
Lex Fridman
The assets of the business here are the players.
The assets of the business here are the players.
Mark Cuban
The players.
The players.
Lex Fridman
The players.
The players.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, for sure. On the business side, the first question I asked myself is what business are we in? I really didn’t know the answer immediately, but within the first few months, it was obvious that the entire NBA thought we were in the business of basketball. We were not, we were in the experience business.
Yeah, for sure. On the business side, the first question I asked myself is what business are we in? I really didn’t know the answer immediately, but within the first few months, it was obvious that the entire NBA thought we were in the business of basketball. We were not, we were in the experience business.
When you think about sporting events that you’ve been to, you don’t remember the score, you don’t remember the home runs or the dunks, you remember who you were with, and you remember why you went. It was my first date with a girl who’s now my wife or I went with my buddies and he threw up on the person in front of us. My dad took me, my aunt, my uncle took me. Those are the experiences you remember.
Once I conveyed to our people that this is what we were selling, that what happened in the arena off the court was just as important as what happened on the court, if not more so because if mom or dad are bringing the 10-year-old, you have to keep them occupied because they have short attention spans.
I would get into fights with NBA, put aside the refs, but getting in fights in the NBA, I would say NBA, nothing but attorneys, because they had no marketing skills whatsoever. To their credit, they realized that was a problem and started bringing in better and better marketing people.
Lex Fridman
Part of the selling is you’re selling the team, selling the sport, selling the people, the idea, all of it.
Part of the selling is you’re selling the team, selling the sport, selling the people, the idea, all of it.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, the experience. Have you ever been to an NBA game?
Yeah, the experience. Have you ever been to an NBA game?
Lex Fridman
Miami Heat.
Miami Heat.
Mark Cuban
Do you remember walking into the arena and you feel the energy? That’s what makes it special.
Do you remember walking into the arena and you feel the energy? That’s what makes it special.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, the energy is everything. Especially playoff games.
Yeah, the energy is everything. Especially playoff games.
Mark Cuban
Right, for sure. Even a regular season game, even against the worst team, that’s where we get… Because the tickets tend to be a little bit cheaper on the resale market, that’s where parents will bring their kids. You hear kids screaming the entire game, and the parents are thrilled to death, they got to do something with their kids. The kids are thrilled to death because they got to see basketball, an NBA game, and scream at the top of their lungs.
Right, for sure. Even a regular season game, even against the worst team, that’s where we get… Because the tickets tend to be a little bit cheaper on the resale market, that’s where parents will bring their kids. You hear kids screaming the entire game, and the parents are thrilled to death, they got to do something with their kids. The kids are thrilled to death because they got to see basketball, an NBA game, and scream at the top of their lungs.
If it turns out to be a close game, and that ball’s in the air, and if it goes in, everybody’s hugging and high-fiving people you’ve never seen before in your life, and if it misses, you’re commiserating with people you’ve never seen. That’s such a unique experience that’s unique to sports. We never sold that and that’s exactly what we started.
Lex Fridman
I have to say, just going to that game turned me around on basketball because I’m more of a football guy. Basketball wasn’t like the main sport. I was like oh, wow, okay.
I have to say, just going to that game turned me around on basketball because I’m more of a football guy. Basketball wasn’t like the main sport. I was like oh, wow, okay.
Mark Cuban
It’s fun. It’s different. The energy in a stadium is completely different than the energy and arena. In the stadium, particularly if it doesn’t have a roof, it’s hard to bottle that energy. You feel it and you see… I’m from Pittsburgh, so there’s the terrible towels and people screaming defense and everything at Steelers games, but in an arena, the energy level is just indescribable.
It’s fun. It’s different. The energy in a stadium is completely different than the energy and arena. In the stadium, particularly if it doesn’t have a roof, it’s hard to bottle that energy. You feel it and you see… I’m from Pittsburgh, so there’s the terrible towels and people screaming defense and everything at Steelers games, but in an arena, the energy level is just indescribable.
Lex Fridman
How much of it is the selling that tickets in person, but also versus what you see on TV? When you’re owning a team, do you get any of the cut for the what’s shown on TV?
How much of it is the selling that tickets in person, but also versus what you see on TV? When you’re owning a team, do you get any of the cut for the what’s shown on TV?
Mark Cuban
Yeah. There’s a TV deal that’s done with either a local TV broadcaster and we get all of that, or a network broadcaster like ABC, ESPN, T&T, whatever, we get one 30th of that.
Yeah. There’s a TV deal that’s done with either a local TV broadcaster and we get all of that, or a network broadcaster like ABC, ESPN, T&T, whatever, we get one 30th of that.
Lex Fridman
What role does the TV play in turning a team around?
What role does the TV play in turning a team around?
Mark Cuban
It keeps fans connected. Look, when the team is doing really well, it’s easy. There’s more viewers, everybody’s more excited. When you’re not, there’s still going to be hardcore fans and general fans and kids that like to watch the game.
It keeps fans connected. Look, when the team is doing really well, it’s easy. There’s more viewers, everybody’s more excited. When you’re not, there’s still going to be hardcore fans and general fans and kids that like to watch the game.
Lex Fridman
What about the personality of the people in the stands? Clearly, you’re part of the legend of the team because you’re literally there going wild.
What about the personality of the people in the stands? Clearly, you’re part of the legend of the team because you’re literally there going wild.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, screaming the whole game. It’s funny, the way I am here is how I am 24 hours a day, unless there’s a Mavs game. For whatever reason, that’s where I let out all that stress and frustration. The fan’s the sixth man. We need fans to bring that energy and amplifying that as much as we can is important.
Yeah, screaming the whole game. It’s funny, the way I am here is how I am 24 hours a day, unless there’s a Mavs game. For whatever reason, that’s where I let out all that stress and frustration. The fan’s the sixth man. We need fans to bring that energy and amplifying that as much as we can is important.
DEI debate
Lex Fridman
You’ve had a beef recently on Twitter on X with Elon over DEI programs. What to you is the essence of the disagreement there?
You’ve had a beef recently on Twitter on X with Elon over DEI programs. What to you is the essence of the disagreement there?
Mark Cuban
I wouldn’t call it a beef.
I wouldn’t call it a beef.
Lex Fridman
It’s a bit of fun?
It’s a bit of fun?
Mark Cuban
Yeah, it’s fun for me. It’s his platform, he gets to run it any way he please. He pays for that right, and so I have total respect for whatever choices he makes even if I don’t agree with them, but because it’s his platform, people are less likely to disagree with him, particularly somebody who’s got a platform themselves.
Yeah, it’s fun for me. It’s his platform, he gets to run it any way he please. He pays for that right, and so I have total respect for whatever choices he makes even if I don’t agree with them, but because it’s his platform, people are less likely to disagree with him, particularly somebody who’s got a platform themselves.
When we start talking about DEI and it’s just de facto racist and this stuff, stuff that I just think is nonsense. I have no problem sharing my opinion. If he disagrees, okay, he can disagree, I don’t care. It’s fun to engage, but he doesn’t really engage, he just comes back with snark comments, which is his choice.
Lex Fridman
In your comments, you do a bit of snark too.
In your comments, you do a bit of snark too.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, a little bit.
Yeah, a little bit.
Lex Fridman
You’re pretty, let’s say, rigorous in your response. There is some exchange of ideas, there’s some snark, there’s some fun, all that kind of stuff. You do voice the opinion that represents a large number of people and that’s great. That’s really beautiful. But just lingering on the topic, what to you is the good and the bad of DEI programs?
You’re pretty, let’s say, rigorous in your response. There is some exchange of ideas, there’s some snark, there’s some fun, all that kind of stuff. You do voice the opinion that represents a large number of people and that’s great. That’s really beautiful. But just lingering on the topic, what to you is the good and the bad of DEI programs?
Mark Cuban
Really simple, D is diversity. That means you just expand your pool of potential applicants to people who you might not otherwise have access to. To look where you didn’t look before, to look where other people aren’t looking for quality employees. That’s simple.
Really simple, D is diversity. That means you just expand your pool of potential applicants to people who you might not otherwise have access to. To look where you didn’t look before, to look where other people aren’t looking for quality employees. That’s simple.
The E in equity means when you hire somebody, you put them in a position to succeed. The I, inclusion, is when you’ve hired somebody and they may not be typical, if you will, you show them some love and give them the support they need so they can do their job as best they can and feel comfortable and confident going to work. It’s that simple.
Lex Fridman
That’s a beautiful ideal. When it’s implemented, implemented poorly perhaps, or in a way that doesn’t reach that ideal, do you see, maybe when it’s quota based, do you see that it can result in essentially racism towards Asian people and white people, for example?
That’s a beautiful ideal. When it’s implemented, implemented poorly perhaps, or in a way that doesn’t reach that ideal, do you see, maybe when it’s quota based, do you see that it can result in essentially racism towards Asian people and white people, for example?
Mark Cuban
There’s a lot to unpack there. First, you can’t do quotas. There are illegal unless you’re… And I’m not the lawyer on this subject, but unless you’re trying to repair something that’s happened in the past, some discrimination that’s happened in the past. It’s not quota-based, and I think that’s really just a straw man that people put out there.
There’s a lot to unpack there. First, you can’t do quotas. There are illegal unless you’re… And I’m not the lawyer on this subject, but unless you’re trying to repair something that’s happened in the past, some discrimination that’s happened in the past. It’s not quota-based, and I think that’s really just a straw man that people put out there.
Now, does that mean that there aren’t DEI programs that are implemented poorly? Of course not. Everything that’s implemented poorly in one company to another. Sales, marketing, human resources, you can pick any element of business and find companies that implement it poorly, but that’s the beauty of capitalism in a free market or mostly free market where if you make these choices and they are the wrong choices, you’re going to lose your best people. You’re not going to be able to hire the best people. You’re not going to execute on your business plans in the way that we discussed, regardless of the size of the company.
It also, I think, depends on where you’re having the discussion. When I’m in a different group of people off of X, the feedback’s completely different. To your question of reverse racism, yes, it happens because people are people. There’s no human being that is 100% objective. It’s also, there’s very, very, very few jobs that can be determined on a purely quantitative basis.
How do you tell one janitor from the other, who’s the best? How do you tell one salesperson that you’re hiring versus another you’re hiring because they haven’t sold your product yet, so you don’t know? We talked earlier about firing people because you made mistakes.
Yes, there’s discrimination against any group, white, Asian, black, green, orange, whatever it may be, but I truly believe that there’s far more discrimination against people of color than there are people who are white. I think it’s become a straw man, that reverse discrimination because of DEI is prevalent or near ubiquitous.
Lex Fridman
Much of American history was defined by intense radical racism and sexism. But in the recent years, there was a correction and I think the nature of the criticism is that there’s an overcorrection where DEI programs at universities and companies, when they’re not doing their job well, are often hard to criticize because when you criticize them within the company or so on, they have a very strong immune system. If you criticize a DEI program, it seems like it’s very easy to be called racist, and if you’re called racist or sexist, that’s a sticky label.
Much of American history was defined by intense radical racism and sexism. But in the recent years, there was a correction and I think the nature of the criticism is that there’s an overcorrection where DEI programs at universities and companies, when they’re not doing their job well, are often hard to criticize because when you criticize them within the company or so on, they have a very strong immune system. If you criticize a DEI program, it seems like it’s very easy to be called racist, and if you’re called racist or sexist, that’s a sticky label.
Mark Cuban
You’re getting into the culture of organizations and leadership within organizations, and accepting any type of criticism, put aside DEI. When I criticized the referees in the MVA, I got fined. That was their option. I knew what I was getting into, not that they’re completely analogous, but it’s cause and effect.
You’re getting into the culture of organizations and leadership within organizations, and accepting any type of criticism, put aside DEI. When I criticized the referees in the MVA, I got fined. That was their option. I knew what I was getting into, not that they’re completely analogous, but it’s cause and effect.
If I’m in a major company and I’m publicly criticizing or even internally criticizing a sales plan or a product, our product sucks. There was a Google engineer that got fired for saying Google had AGI, and nobody believed they did and they knew that created problems. It wasn’t DEI related, but it was saying something publicly that was, in the CEO’s eyes, to the detriment of the company.
I think those are all analogous. If you’re trying to accomplish something within an organization because you think there’s a problem and there’s people speaking out saying look, we’re getting it wrong, I think I’m a victim of all this, and the company… Then leadership has got to make a decision. Do they agree or not agree? Are they right or are they wrong? Is it positive or negative to the company? And you decide.
This conversation that conservatives are being silenced in organizations now, I haven’t seen it. The other side of your question, I think unpacking it, is what’s driving all this? Put aside universities for one. In corporate America, when I talk to people in corporate America about DEI, they always start talking about ideology.
I’ve talked to Bill Ackman, who you’ve had on, and when I asked him, “Bill, you run your own companies. Who’s telling you what to do?” “They are.” “Who’s they? “It’s the universities, the people who have this ideology of DEI.” I’m like, “Did they force you? Did they coerce you? Did you lose control of your company?” “No, it’s not me. It happens to other people.” Then I talk to other people, same thing.
I try not to go one-on-one in Twitter conversations on this topic. In the DMs, I’ll talk to people who are really conservative and I’ll ask the same question and be like, “Who’s forcing you to do this?” “It’s the ideology that’s everywhere. Didn’t see the Harvard thing in University of North Carolina.” I’m like I’ve never had anybody try to push me in this direction to do this. This was my business choice. I’m not trying to tell other people you have to do this. You make your own business choices. Where companies have made their business choices, and if somebody doesn’t feel confident or comfortable with it, they may feel they’re being discriminated against.
There was something I just read in the Wall Street Journal, where the Wall Street Journal had a company interview 2 million people, and the difficulty in firing and how people, when they were fired, 40% of the people who were fired felt like it was wrong, that they were doing a great job. Then it talked about the HR person going through the hassle of trying to explain to this person through performance reviews that they weren’t doing a good job, yet the people still thought they were doing a great job, despite being told they’re not doing a good job.
I see that as being an analogous to all this huffing and puffing about reverse discrimination and conservatives not being able to speak up because if 40% of people who have been fired don’t believe they should have been fired, there’s a disconnect somewhere in how you think you’re doing your job. If you just feel like, I can’t speak up because of it, because of you’re white, and that doesn’t comport well with DEI programs, a lot of things are going to happen.
Either that’s going to come up in your performance review, HR or your boss is going to have to address it in some way, it’s going to get to HR at some level, and then decisions are going to have to be made. You can’t just fire somebody because they spoke up. Somebody’s going to have to communicate with you. I think a lot of… I just don’t trust the supposed volume-
Mark Cuban
I just don’t trust the supposed volume that people say it’s happening at, versus everything I’ve read and seen. And when I talk to people in positions of authority within organizations and ask them who’s forcing them to implement these ideologies, nobody says… Nobody says yes, that there is somebody. But on Twitter, it sounds great.
I just don’t trust the supposed volume that people say it’s happening at, versus everything I’ve read and seen. And when I talk to people in positions of authority within organizations and ask them who’s forcing them to implement these ideologies, nobody says… Nobody says yes, that there is somebody. But on Twitter, it sounds great.
Lex Fridman
It is true for Conservatives, but in general, you can sell books, you can get likes when you talk about this ideology, and there’s a degree to which, “Is this woke ideology in the room with us right now?” Meaning it’s this boogie monster that we’re all…
It is true for Conservatives, but in general, you can sell books, you can get likes when you talk about this ideology, and there’s a degree to which, “Is this woke ideology in the room with us right now?” Meaning it’s this boogie monster that we’re all…
Mark Cuban
Or is it a positive?
Or is it a positive?
Lex Fridman
I guess another way to say that is they don’t highlight a lot of the positive progress that’s been made in the positive version of the word “woke” in terms of correcting some of the wrongs done in the past.
I guess another way to say that is they don’t highlight a lot of the positive progress that’s been made in the positive version of the word “woke” in terms of correcting some of the wrongs done in the past.
But that said, if you ask people in Russia, a lot of them will say, “There’s no propaganda here. There’s no censorship.” And all that kind of stuff. It’s sometimes hard to see when you’re in it that this stuff is happening. It does seem difficult to criticize DEI programs, not horribly difficult, terrible, they are this monster that infiltrates everything, but it is difficult and it requires great leadership.
Mark Cuban
So where have you criticized it and been condemned? Academic or…
So where have you criticized it and been condemned? Academic or…
Lex Fridman
Academic.
Academic.
Mark Cuban
Okay. Academic, let’s… Two different worlds.
Okay. Academic, let’s… Two different worlds.
Lex Fridman
Companies and academic, yeah.
Companies and academic, yeah.
Mark Cuban
Two different worlds.
Two different worlds.
Lex Fridman
But I also think it’s not… I really want to point my finger at the failure of leadership of basically firing mediocre people. People that are not good at their job. The problem to me is DEI’s defense mechanism, like immune system, is so strong that the shitty people don’t get fired. So the vision, the ideal of DEI is a beautiful ideal. It’s just like…
But I also think it’s not… I really want to point my finger at the failure of leadership of basically firing mediocre people. People that are not good at their job. The problem to me is DEI’s defense mechanism, like immune system, is so strong that the shitty people don’t get fired. So the vision, the ideal of DEI is a beautiful ideal. It’s just like…
Mark Cuban
Well, maybe it’s because I’m an entrepreneur, when I see an ideal that you try to implement it, and support it, and get to that point. But universities and companies are night and day different.
Well, maybe it’s because I’m an entrepreneur, when I see an ideal that you try to implement it, and support it, and get to that point. But universities and companies are night and day different.
I can see an argument for the ideology in a university. I can see, you look at the amount of money spent on it. And so while the goal is right, the way they implement it in universities, the way they implement most things in universities, is wrong. There’s a reason why tuition has gone up a multitude, or a multiple, of inflation. They’re not well run organizations across the board. So I’m not going to argue with that at all. So when you’ve seen me argue with DEI, I haven’t waded into DEI in universities at all.
Lex Fridman
That’s mostly focused on companies.
That’s mostly focused on companies.
Mark Cuban
A hundred percent because that’s where I exist. But at the same time, I read Christopher Rufo’s book where he talks about the genealogy of wokeism and ideology, but then he gets to the point, and I hope I’m remembering this right, where he says that the response to it is decentralized activism, if you will, that’s not the word he used, to try to counter that DEI.
A hundred percent because that’s where I exist. But at the same time, I read Christopher Rufo’s book where he talks about the genealogy of wokeism and ideology, but then he gets to the point, and I hope I’m remembering this right, where he says that the response to it is decentralized activism, if you will, that’s not the word he used, to try to counter that DEI.
And that seems, to me, to be counter to the whole Conservative movement right now, other than school boards where it’s centralized, and the Republican candidate is all about centralized power in him. And to me, that’s just a conflict in a lot of the underpinning of the whole DEI conversation, that a lot of which goes through Christopher Rufo right now.
Lex Fridman
Let’s continue on a theme of fun exchanges on the internet.
Let’s continue on a theme of fun exchanges on the internet.
So Elon tweeted, “The fundamental axiomatic flaw of the woke mind virus is that the weaker party’s always right (in even if they want you to die).”
And you responded, at length, but the beginning is, “The fundamental axiomatic flaw of the anti-woke mind is that it allows groups with historical power to play the victim by taking anecdotal examples and packaging them into conjured conspiratorial ideology that threatens to upend the power structures they have been depending on.”
Mark Cuban
Says it all, right?
Says it all, right?
Lex Fridman
Well, there’s a tension there. So, yes, but both can be abused. Both positions of power can be abused. There’s power in DEI, and there’s shitty people that can crave power, and hold onto power, and sacrifice their ideals.
Well, there’s a tension there. So, yes, but both can be abused. Both positions of power can be abused. There’s power in DEI, and there’s shitty people that can crave power, and hold onto power, and sacrifice their ideals.
Mark Cuban
Okay. Put aside universities.
Okay. Put aside universities.
Lex Fridman
Dammit.
Dammit.
Mark Cuban
Because I’m not going to argue that universities implement DEI well, and I’m not going to tell you that they need to be spending twenty-some million dollars a year on DEI positions. To me, that’s insane. Do I look at the Harvard and North Carolina decision and say it was a great decision? No, because I think having a diverse student body helps make for kids who are better prepared for the real world. But I’m not running a university, so it’s not my choice. Maybe at some point in the future I will, but not now. And in terms of terms the corporate side of it, who’s telling anybody what to do?
Because I’m not going to argue that universities implement DEI well, and I’m not going to tell you that they need to be spending twenty-some million dollars a year on DEI positions. To me, that’s insane. Do I look at the Harvard and North Carolina decision and say it was a great decision? No, because I think having a diverse student body helps make for kids who are better prepared for the real world. But I’m not running a university, so it’s not my choice. Maybe at some point in the future I will, but not now. And in terms of terms the corporate side of it, who’s telling anybody what to do?
Lex Fridman
Well, maybe you can give me some help.
Well, maybe you can give me some help.
Mark Cuban
Sure. I’m here to help you, Lex.
Sure. I’m here to help you, Lex.
Lex Fridman
There’s an example in the AI world of a system called Gemini 15, Google…
There’s an example in the AI world of a system called Gemini 15, Google…
Mark Cuban
Everybody was black or whatever, people of color.
Everybody was black or whatever, people of color.
Lex Fridman
George Washington was Black, Nazis were Black.
George Washington was Black, Nazis were Black.
Mark Cuban
So why is it when that came out, it was a big uproar, but when somebody… So, who was it? One of the people who were trying to fuck with me, I forget which one.
So why is it when that came out, it was a big uproar, but when somebody… So, who was it? One of the people who were trying to fuck with me, I forget which one.
Lex Fridman
There’s so many people.
There’s so many people.
Mark Cuban
But he pointed out to Elon that Grok, Elon’s AI, was woke when it answered certain questions, and other people have pointed out other things to Elon about Grok, however it’s pronounced, that was leaning left or woke. And Elon’s response was, “Oh, it’ll change. It’s a mistake. We’re fixing it.” When it happens to Gemini and Google, it’s the end of the world. “Look how woke they are. And it’s a reflection of all their culture.” Now Google comes out and says it’s a mistake. And then they doxxed the guy who’s the Product Manager or whatever of AI, of that product who… And then they go back and look at his old tweets, and show that he’s very left leaning and very DEI supportive, and that’s the end of the world.
But he pointed out to Elon that Grok, Elon’s AI, was woke when it answered certain questions, and other people have pointed out other things to Elon about Grok, however it’s pronounced, that was leaning left or woke. And Elon’s response was, “Oh, it’ll change. It’s a mistake. We’re fixing it.” When it happens to Gemini and Google, it’s the end of the world. “Look how woke they are. And it’s a reflection of all their culture.” Now Google comes out and says it’s a mistake. And then they doxxed the guy who’s the Product Manager or whatever of AI, of that product who… And then they go back and look at his old tweets, and show that he’s very left leaning and very DEI supportive, and that’s the end of the world.
Lex Fridman
It’s not the end of the world, but Google’s so much dependent on trust, that trust a Google search has as objective as possible, channel into the world of information. And so that brand is really important for us.
It’s not the end of the world, but Google’s so much dependent on trust, that trust a Google search has as objective as possible, channel into the world of information. And so that brand is really important for us.
Mark Cuban
So you’re giving them too much power. And maybe I’m not recognizing the power. So I’ll tell you a personal experience.
So you’re giving them too much power. And maybe I’m not recognizing the power. So I’ll tell you a personal experience.
Up until a month ago, maybe if you put in keto gummies, Shark Tank keto gummies, into Google, it would show up with scammy ads, scam ad, after scam. And I would get emails, up until a month ago, from elderly people asking me why the gummies weren’t working, and why the companies were charging all this money on a month-by-month basis when they tried to cancel. And they said it was the number one deal on Shark Tank of all time and all Shark… It was a mistake.
Lex Fridman
Well, there’s fraud, there’s mistakes, but the mistakes…
Well, there’s fraud, there’s mistakes, but the mistakes…
Mark Cuban
No, but why didn’t Google fix it? This just didn’t happen once over one week, over two weeks. And because it was hard to fix. As it turns out, I was working with them to try to find a fix, and we would both look at the same page. And, if you were inside of Google within the Google. com domain, it would show one page. If you were outside of Google, it would show another. And it took us looking at it at the same time for anybody to realize it. Meaning that there’s a lot of technology problems that are hard to fix.
No, but why didn’t Google fix it? This just didn’t happen once over one week, over two weeks. And because it was hard to fix. As it turns out, I was working with them to try to find a fix, and we would both look at the same page. And, if you were inside of Google within the Google. com domain, it would show one page. If you were outside of Google, it would show another. And it took us looking at it at the same time for anybody to realize it. Meaning that there’s a lot of technology problems that are hard to fix.
Lex Fridman
They’re super complex, and we could talk about it forever with social media. The criticism towards Google, towards other companies when they’re based in Silicon Valley, there could be an ideological drift into an ideological bubble out of which the technology is created, and they could be blind to the obvious bias that comes inherent to…
They’re super complex, and we could talk about it forever with social media. The criticism towards Google, towards other companies when they’re based in Silicon Valley, there could be an ideological drift into an ideological bubble out of which the technology is created, and they could be blind to the obvious bias that comes inherent to…
Mark Cuban
But they’ve got billions of customers who are not going to… So what you’re saying is, the free market stops with artificial intelligence, that people don’t pay attention and respond, that Google doesn’t listen to the responses, that people inside of Google will ignore their own best financial interest, and even their own best personal interest, because they know they’re going to get doxxed now by Elon and others, and so I just don’t see that.
But they’ve got billions of customers who are not going to… So what you’re saying is, the free market stops with artificial intelligence, that people don’t pay attention and respond, that Google doesn’t listen to the responses, that people inside of Google will ignore their own best financial interest, and even their own best personal interest, because they know they’re going to get doxxed now by Elon and others, and so I just don’t see that.
And Elon’s not allowed to make those same mistakes, but… Elon’s allowed to make those mistakes, but Google isn’t?
Lex Fridman
Oh, no. Elon is 100% should be criticized for the ridiculousness of overstatements that he makes about various products. He’s having a bit of fun, like you are also, and I also believe in the free market, but it’s not always efficient. There’s a delay.
Oh, no. Elon is 100% should be criticized for the ridiculousness of overstatements that he makes about various products. He’s having a bit of fun, like you are also, and I also believe in the free market, but it’s not always efficient. There’s a delay.
Mark Cuban
Just takes time. It’s fine.
Just takes time. It’s fine.
Lex Fridman
So which is why Elon is important when calling out, I think overstating the criticism of Gemini, but Elon and others are just…
So which is why Elon is important when calling out, I think overstating the criticism of Gemini, but Elon and others are just…
Mark Cuban
Gemini wasn’t even a fully available public product yet.
Gemini wasn’t even a fully available public product yet.
Lex Fridman
It’s still a bias that resonates with people.
It’s still a bias that resonates with people.
Mark Cuban
That’s the way neural networks work though. That’s why there’ll be millions of models, because weights and biases, putting together a neural network.
That’s the way neural networks work though. That’s why there’ll be millions of models, because weights and biases, putting together a neural network.
Lex Fridman
No. So the Black George Washington is a correction on top of the foundation model to keep it “safe.” One of the big criticisms of all of the models, frankly, probably even Grok, a little bit less so, is they’re trying to be really conservative in the sense of trying to be careful not to say crazy shit, because we don’t know how the thing…
No. So the Black George Washington is a correction on top of the foundation model to keep it “safe.” One of the big criticisms of all of the models, frankly, probably even Grok, a little bit less so, is they’re trying to be really conservative in the sense of trying to be careful not to say crazy shit, because we don’t know how the thing…
Mark Cuban
It’s brand new and we know what happens, and they do it on the front end with prompts, and they try to do it on the back end with the neural networks that are underneath them, and it doesn’t always work. And that’s why there’s going to be millions of models rather than just four foundational models, or five, that everybody uses.
It’s brand new and we know what happens, and they do it on the front end with prompts, and they try to do it on the back end with the neural networks that are underneath them, and it doesn’t always work. And that’s why there’s going to be millions of models rather than just four foundational models, or five, that everybody uses.
Lex Fridman
Well, I guess the main criticism is you want to have some transparency of all the teams that are involved and that this kind of… To the degree there’s a left-leaning ideology within the companies, it doesn’t affect the product.
Well, I guess the main criticism is you want to have some transparency of all the teams that are involved and that this kind of… To the degree there’s a left-leaning ideology within the companies, it doesn’t affect the product.
Mark Cuban
But that’s the beauty of…
But that’s the beauty of…
Lex Fridman
The free market.
The free market.
Mark Cuban
That’s where the market corrects it. And not only from the outside, because everybody is going to test it. When YouTube first came out, or not first came out, after Google bought them, there used to be different commands you could give it. There were prompt commands that you could give it, and you could find all the nasty porn that got loaded before they kicked it off. And it was just the nastiest shit ever. And even now to this day, if there’s some horrific tragic event, somebody’s loading it up.
That’s where the market corrects it. And not only from the outside, because everybody is going to test it. When YouTube first came out, or not first came out, after Google bought them, there used to be different commands you could give it. There were prompt commands that you could give it, and you could find all the nasty porn that got loaded before they kicked it off. And it was just the nastiest shit ever. And even now to this day, if there’s some horrific tragic event, somebody’s loading it up.
Now, I know that’s not direct to your point of internal influence to the output, but people on the outside are going to check for that now. It’s almost like the new bug contest to try to find bugs in software. And then on the inside, if it’s all left-leaning, and all you have is left-leaning employees, because most Conservatives won’t want to work there, then again that’s self-correcting as well.
Lex Fridman
That’s the hope, but it can self-correct in different kinds of ways. You can have a different company that competes and becomes more conservative. My worry is that it becomes two different worlds where there’s like…
That’s the hope, but it can self-correct in different kinds of ways. You can have a different company that competes and becomes more conservative. My worry is that it becomes two different worlds where there’s like…
Mark Cuban
Already is.
Already is.
Lex Fridman
No, come on, don’t give up.
No, come on, don’t give up.
Mark Cuban
Oh, I’m not giving up. So where does this go? Is the question. What happens next? And going back, I’ve been in so many PC revolutions, or evolutions, where porn was the big issue. Now we don’t even talk about porn being an issue, even though every post on Twitter now has “link in bio” for a porn post, we don’t even think that’s a negative anymore. That’s just an accepted thing. And now it is become very… Where your politics on Twitter. But again, as you extend that and things grow, as AI models become more efficient, and trainable for a lot less money, or even locally on a PC or a phone, we’re all going to have our own models, and there’s going to be millions, and millions, and millions of models and not just foundational models.
Oh, I’m not giving up. So where does this go? Is the question. What happens next? And going back, I’ve been in so many PC revolutions, or evolutions, where porn was the big issue. Now we don’t even talk about porn being an issue, even though every post on Twitter now has “link in bio” for a porn post, we don’t even think that’s a negative anymore. That’s just an accepted thing. And now it is become very… Where your politics on Twitter. But again, as you extend that and things grow, as AI models become more efficient, and trainable for a lot less money, or even locally on a PC or a phone, we’re all going to have our own models, and there’s going to be millions, and millions, and millions of models and not just foundational models.
Now maybe they’re built some on open source, maybe it’ll be copy-pasta where you can just cut and paste and create your own model and train it yourself. Maybe it’ll be mixture of experts where maybe it’ll be a Meta front end. Like we’re working on a project where we take 30 different AI models and there’s just a Meta search engine where it searches all of them, and you can compare all the outputs and see what you think is the best, like a search engine. Because you might get, “Is DEI good?” “Is the Covid vaccine good?” You’re going to get a variety of outputs and you have to make that decision yourself.
That’s what I think is going to happen with AI as well, because I think brands… There’s no way the Mayo Clinic and the Harvard Medical School are just going to contribute all their IP to ChatGPT, or Gemini, or whatever. It’s going to have to be licensed or they’re going to do their own.
Lex Fridman
That’s a very hopeful message. But that said, human history doesn’t always autocorrect really quickly, self-correct, really quickly. Sometimes you get into these very painful things. You have Stalin, you have Hitler, you can get to places very quickly where the ideological thing just builds on itself.
That’s a very hopeful message. But that said, human history doesn’t always autocorrect really quickly, self-correct, really quickly. Sometimes you get into these very painful things. You have Stalin, you have Hitler, you can get to places very quickly where the ideological thing just builds on itself.
Mark Cuban
Twitter is not real world. There’s 20…
Twitter is not real world. There’s 20…
Lex Fridman
Twitter is not real world. That’s true, yes, but you could still have a nation captured by an ideology.
Twitter is not real world. That’s true, yes, but you could still have a nation captured by an ideology.
I think America has been really good at having these two blue and red, always at tension with each other, dividing the populace, and in the process of doing that, figuring stuff out. Almost like playing devil’s advocate, but in real life.
Mark Cuban
And that’s fair. And that’s right. As opposed to Pravda telling you everything you want to know and everybody believing it, because there’s control of everything.
And that’s fair. And that’s right. As opposed to Pravda telling you everything you want to know and everybody believing it, because there’s control of everything.
And so going back to what you said earlier, people in Russia don’t think invading Ukraine… A lot of them see it as a positive. I’m sure you have relatives and friends who think it’s the best thing that ever happened, because they believe in Putin.
Lex Fridman
They’re denazifying Ukraine, they’re removing the Nazis from Ukraine.
They’re denazifying Ukraine, they’re removing the Nazis from Ukraine.
Mark Cuban
Because exactly what Putin said. And we don’t have one uniform media outlet. That’s the difference. Even though people like to talk about mainstream media as being the source of a lot of the friction, there is no such thing as mainstream media anymore. Fox is the biggest cable news channel with the biggest audience, and they call everybody else mainstream media. It’s insane the things that we accept from our sources of information. To me, that’s the bigger problem. The bigger problem is trying to figure out what is free speech and what is the line of tolerance for free speech? And at what point does hateful free speech crowd out other people? Putin’s the master of that. You’re going to jail or you’re going to be dead if you disagree. Now, God help us if we ever get to that point here, but the person who controls the algorithm controls the world. And if you are committed to one specific platform as your singular source of information or affiliated platforms, then whoever controls the algorithm or the programming there controls you, in a lot of respects. And I think that’s where our biggest problem has been. We get people attached to specific platforms, and apps, and media outlets, and they become part of that team, and they identify as such, and either you’re part of the team or you’re not. And that to me is the fundamental problem.
Because exactly what Putin said. And we don’t have one uniform media outlet. That’s the difference. Even though people like to talk about mainstream media as being the source of a lot of the friction, there is no such thing as mainstream media anymore. Fox is the biggest cable news channel with the biggest audience, and they call everybody else mainstream media. It’s insane the things that we accept from our sources of information. To me, that’s the bigger problem. The bigger problem is trying to figure out what is free speech and what is the line of tolerance for free speech? And at what point does hateful free speech crowd out other people? Putin’s the master of that. You’re going to jail or you’re going to be dead if you disagree. Now, God help us if we ever get to that point here, but the person who controls the algorithm controls the world. And if you are committed to one specific platform as your singular source of information or affiliated platforms, then whoever controls the algorithm or the programming there controls you, in a lot of respects. And I think that’s where our biggest problem has been. We get people attached to specific platforms, and apps, and media outlets, and they become part of that team, and they identify as such, and either you’re part of the team or you’re not. And that to me is the fundamental problem.
It’s not woke ideology, because I never felt any pressure to make the choices that I’ve chosen, including diversity, equity, and inclusion, and I’ve never forced anybody or told anybody to do it. I just said, “Here’s my experiences.” Whenever I’ve talked to people who talk about the woke ideology, no one ever got forced. If you look at Dylan McDermott, if there was a way to gauge the number of impressions that she had, and where they sourced from, I’d be willing bet any amount of money that 90% plus of the impressions and discussions of Dylan McDermott were on, right-leaning media.
Lex Fridman
Several things, actually, let’s even go there. You gotten a bit of a beef with, again, fun, with Jordan Peterson about this.
Several things, actually, let’s even go there. You gotten a bit of a beef with, again, fun, with Jordan Peterson about this.
Mark Cuban
That’s the guy whose name I couldn’t think of.
That’s the guy whose name I couldn’t think of.
Lex Fridman
So the topic there was the gender transition and Dylan Mulvaney. Can you explain the nature of the beef? It’s an interesting claim you’re making and most of the people who are concerned about this are Conservatives.
So the topic there was the gender transition and Dylan Mulvaney. Can you explain the nature of the beef? It’s an interesting claim you’re making and most of the people who are concerned about this are Conservatives.
Mark Cuban
The point is that if you looked at impressions when you run an ad, you’re curious about impressions and who sees them, but if you look at the impressions related to Dylan McDermott, like I just said, I bet 90% or more were in conservative media, and I don’t know how many followers she had, 250,000 followers or whatever when the Bud Light ad came out. And if it weren’t for Kid Rock shooting at Dylan McDermott Bud Light cans, she’d be long forgotten.
The point is that if you looked at impressions when you run an ad, you’re curious about impressions and who sees them, but if you look at the impressions related to Dylan McDermott, like I just said, I bet 90% or more were in conservative media, and I don’t know how many followers she had, 250,000 followers or whatever when the Bud Light ad came out. And if it weren’t for Kid Rock shooting at Dylan McDermott Bud Light cans, she’d be long forgotten.
Lex Fridman
But most of the people that care about censorship are going to be free speech advocates. So most people that care about Putin suppressing speech, or anybody else suppressing speech, are going to be libertarian. So there’s probably an explanation of that.
But most of the people that care about censorship are going to be free speech advocates. So most people that care about Putin suppressing speech, or anybody else suppressing speech, are going to be libertarian. So there’s probably an explanation of that.
The criticism that Jordan Peterson could provide, I guess he said that Dylan Mulvaney popularized the kind of mutilation in his view, that can affect… There’s a very serious life-changing process that a person goes through, and when that’s applied to a child, it can do a lot of harm to a person if…
Mark Cuban
But my point still holds, I don’t know how many kids were following, and you could look at the followers list, it’s not like it’s hidden. Back then, if they had 250,000 followers and now we’re on TikTok where he might get 50 some thousand views or likes, I don’t know how many views, but likes, I’ve never seen any evidence that Dylan McDermott influenced people to transition their gender. As he transitioned to her, it was documented on TikTok over the course of a year. And again, when you go back and look at the views on those TikToks, it wasn’t enormous.
But my point still holds, I don’t know how many kids were following, and you could look at the followers list, it’s not like it’s hidden. Back then, if they had 250,000 followers and now we’re on TikTok where he might get 50 some thousand views or likes, I don’t know how many views, but likes, I’ve never seen any evidence that Dylan McDermott influenced people to transition their gender. As he transitioned to her, it was documented on TikTok over the course of a year. And again, when you go back and look at the views on those TikToks, it wasn’t enormous.
Lex Fridman
But the trends start. It could be… What worries people is for young kids there to be a trend of, especially when you feel like an outsider, you feel not yourself, less than yourself, all this kind of stuff that kids feel like, that if it’s because popular enough, if it’s a trend, you would gender transition without meaning to do that. It is just part of a trend. That’s the worry they have.
But the trends start. It could be… What worries people is for young kids there to be a trend of, especially when you feel like an outsider, you feel not yourself, less than yourself, all this kind of stuff that kids feel like, that if it’s because popular enough, if it’s a trend, you would gender transition without meaning to do that. It is just part of a trend. That’s the worry they have.
Mark Cuban
That is a big stretch, to think that all the things that have to happen before you transition gender, and I’m not saying kids might find it cool, or in the moment expedient, if you will, to dress up as the other gender. Great, who cares? But to go through the actual physical transition, I don’t remember what the numbers were that I read, but I do remember that the latest numbers that came out in terms of transitioning were from JAMA, which is a medical association, that said from 2021 to 2022, the numbers went down.
That is a big stretch, to think that all the things that have to happen before you transition gender, and I’m not saying kids might find it cool, or in the moment expedient, if you will, to dress up as the other gender. Great, who cares? But to go through the actual physical transition, I don’t remember what the numbers were that I read, but I do remember that the latest numbers that came out in terms of transitioning were from JAMA, which is a medical association, that said from 2021 to 2022, the numbers went down.
But the bigger point is there are no numbers for 2023 when, post-Dylan McDermott. So there’s no way to know if the assertion is true, even marginally true. Now, you can easily suggest it, but you can say that about any social media influencer. Kids are dying because… It’s just like when people accused Trump of potentially influencing people to inject bleach into their veins. That’s a big old leap to say that because Trump says it, that people are going to start injecting, and then they find somebody who actually did. And it’s like, “Oh, it must be true. This is a trend now.” I’m just not buying it that there aren’t enough roadblocks in the way.
Now, I’m not saying it never happens, and for me, to me, you should have to wait until you’re 18 to actually have any surgery to transition. And if your parents approve it earlier, then you can have a conversation with your doctor. But you’re suggesting that everybody in that process to transition, a minor is corrupt. That the doctor, the sociologist, the psychologist, all the people involved, the hospital where the surgery is happening, the insurance company that’s paying for it, they all have been corrupted by this trend. I just don’t see that.
Lex Fridman
Well, not corrupted, but people, it’s back to the DEI thing, there could be pressure, and we are…
Well, not corrupted, but people, it’s back to the DEI thing, there could be pressure, and we are…
Mark Cuban
Pressure to operate? So think about all the people who have to be complicit to do an operation.
Pressure to operate? So think about all the people who have to be complicit to do an operation.
Lex Fridman
It’s not complicit like evil complicit. It’s more…
It’s not complicit like evil complicit. It’s more…
Mark Cuban
No, it is evil complicit. Because somebody…. In hospitals right now, they won’t perform abortions because of state law. In Alabama, they stopped IVF treatment immediately after that ruling by that judge, the Q Anon judge, to think that they’re not going to pay attention to the possible consequences of being the hospital that does transgender, that gives doctors operating rights there and not be aware of the risks associated with it and double check, to me, that’s just insane. They’re risking their entire business, and livelihood, and personal relationships for not checking that this fourteen-year-old boy who wants to be a girl or vice versa, is there waiting for surgery. I just don’t see that.
No, it is evil complicit. Because somebody…. In hospitals right now, they won’t perform abortions because of state law. In Alabama, they stopped IVF treatment immediately after that ruling by that judge, the Q Anon judge, to think that they’re not going to pay attention to the possible consequences of being the hospital that does transgender, that gives doctors operating rights there and not be aware of the risks associated with it and double check, to me, that’s just insane. They’re risking their entire business, and livelihood, and personal relationships for not checking that this fourteen-year-old boy who wants to be a girl or vice versa, is there waiting for surgery. I just don’t see that.
Lex Fridman
In America, yes. But if we look at humans in general, and Jordan Peterson, I think unjustly, incorrectly brought up Auschwitz.
In America, yes. But if we look at humans in general, and Jordan Peterson, I think unjustly, incorrectly brought up Auschwitz.
Mark Cuban
That was ridiculous.
That was ridiculous.
Lex Fridman
But if we look… To me, World War II is a very interesting time. It does reveal a lot about human nature, and that humans are able to commit atrocities without really speaking up. The point I want to make is that when you’re in this situation where everybody is around you is committing an atrocity, you can be the good German…
But if we look… To me, World War II is a very interesting time. It does reveal a lot about human nature, and that humans are able to commit atrocities without really speaking up. The point I want to make is that when you’re in this situation where everybody is around you is committing an atrocity, you can be the good German…
Mark Cuban
But…
But…
Lex Fridman
Human nature is such that you can do [inaudible 01:32:41] things.
Human nature is such that you can do [inaudible 01:32:41] things.
Mark Cuban
But that is in a time of war.
But that is in a time of war.
Lex Fridman
But it’s still human nature. It’s interesting to remember that.
But it’s still human nature. It’s interesting to remember that.
Mark Cuban
It’s a time of war when you feel like there’s nationalism, patriotism, everything that comes up. Russia, the moms of the kids sent to Ukraine who didn’t come back, in Russia, feels certainly different than the everyday Russian who’s just taking whatever information that’s available from a unified controlled media.
It’s a time of war when you feel like there’s nationalism, patriotism, everything that comes up. Russia, the moms of the kids sent to Ukraine who didn’t come back, in Russia, feels certainly different than the everyday Russian who’s just taking whatever information that’s available from a unified controlled media.
Lex Fridman
But we should remember human nature. It’s interesting.
But we should remember human nature. It’s interesting.
Mark Cuban
I’m not dismissing human nature at all, but there’s a difference. I think that human nature, self-preservation influences those decisions. There’s nothing about self-preservation involved in DEI, wokeness, transgenderism to compare it to Auschwitz. That’s insane.
I’m not dismissing human nature at all, but there’s a difference. I think that human nature, self-preservation influences those decisions. There’s nothing about self-preservation involved in DEI, wokeness, transgenderism to compare it to Auschwitz. That’s insane.
Lex Fridman
Well, that comparison is almost always, probably always, is insane comparison between anything and the Holocaust.
Well, that comparison is almost always, probably always, is insane comparison between anything and the Holocaust.
Mark Cuban
I agree.
I agree.
Lex Fridman
I think there’s a name for that rule, but once you bring up Hitler, the conversation ends.
I think there’s a name for that rule, but once you bring up Hitler, the conversation ends.
Trump vs Biden
Mark Cuban
Goes away.
Goes away.
Lex Fridman
I do appreciate you bringing up Trump and bleach as an example. So continuing on fun exchanges between you and Elon, you said, “If they were having Biden’s last wake and it was him versus Trump, and he was being given last rights, I would still vote for Biden.” To which Elon replied, caricaturing you, “If Biden were a flesh-eating zombie with five seconds to live, where, upon being reelected, Earth would plunge into a 1000 years of darkness, I would still vote for him.”
I do appreciate you bringing up Trump and bleach as an example. So continuing on fun exchanges between you and Elon, you said, “If they were having Biden’s last wake and it was him versus Trump, and he was being given last rights, I would still vote for Biden.” To which Elon replied, caricaturing you, “If Biden were a flesh-eating zombie with five seconds to live, where, upon being reelected, Earth would plunge into a 1000 years of darkness, I would still vote for him.”
That’s basically quoting you, but in a caricature. And you responded, “While, I have your attention. Wanted to say thank you! Your consultants at Tesla followed up about using Cost Plus drugs…” About which we’ll talk about. “… To save the company money. Truly appreciated.” And in parentheses, “(My limit is 300 years of darkness.)” Very well done, Mark.
What’s your intuition, if we just stick on Biden and Trump for a sec, what’s your intuition why Biden would make a better president than Trump?
Mark Cuban
Look at the basics. If you look at the people he’s hired, there hasn’t been any turnover in his cabinet at all. If you look at the people he’s hired over the course of his career, or while he was Vice President in particular, there’s nobody who’s turned on him, and came out, and written books, and made public statements about how he’s bad for the country.
Look at the basics. If you look at the people he’s hired, there hasn’t been any turnover in his cabinet at all. If you look at the people he’s hired over the course of his career, or while he was Vice President in particular, there’s nobody who’s turned on him, and came out, and written books, and made public statements about how he’s bad for the country.
Now, compare that to Trump, the people closest to him, almost all of them turned, unless there’s a financial relationship involved, and to me that says everything.
Lex Fridman
The dynamics of the team is important to you when you [inaudible 01:35:28].
The dynamics of the team is important to you when you [inaudible 01:35:28].
Mark Cuban
If you’re going to be the most powerful person in the world, you better know how to manage and lead. And that’s not to say Biden hasn’t made a lot of mistakes. Immigration, the border, is a horrific mistake, and hopefully he recognizes that. And I don’t like the fact that he doesn’t admit his mistakes and just say, “Okay, I got to fix it.” Or, “I made a mistake in Afghanistan.” Whatever it may be. The position of Commander in Chief and President, you’re going to make mistakes.
If you’re going to be the most powerful person in the world, you better know how to manage and lead. And that’s not to say Biden hasn’t made a lot of mistakes. Immigration, the border, is a horrific mistake, and hopefully he recognizes that. And I don’t like the fact that he doesn’t admit his mistakes and just say, “Okay, I got to fix it.” Or, “I made a mistake in Afghanistan.” Whatever it may be. The position of Commander in Chief and President, you’re going to make mistakes.
Then I look at the other guy, never admits a mistake, and the list is long.
Immigration
Lex Fridman
What do you think about the immigration situation? A lot of Conservatives are using that… The theory is that the reason it’s happening is because they would be able to illegally vote.
What do you think about the immigration situation? A lot of Conservatives are using that… The theory is that the reason it’s happening is because they would be able to illegally vote.
Mark Cuban
That’s insane.
That’s insane.
Lex Fridman
For Biden.
For Biden.
Mark Cuban
You can’t be an illegal immigrant and vote.
You can’t be an illegal immigrant and vote.
And now, in a lot of states, because of the Conservatives, they’ve passed laws saying you have to show identification. When I voted in Texas, you had to show state identification. They can’t vote. You can’t register as an illegal alien, that I’m aware of, to vote.
Lex Fridman
But of course, that story, and it really worries me, enables, or serves as a catalyst for questioning the legitimacy of an election.
But of course, that story, and it really worries me, enables, or serves as a catalyst for questioning the legitimacy of an election.
Mark Cuban
I remember going to the debate with Trump in 2016, and he was debating Clinton, and one of the things he said was, “We don’t even know if this election will be legitimate if I lose.” This was in 2016 before he was even elected, and that was where he was going. That’s just what he does. He’s never admitted a mistake. The guy’s failed a zillion times. Most people say, “Okay, I learned from them.” I read a book about Roy Cohn, and Roy Cohn was the ultimate deny, deny, deny, and that was one of Trump’s mentors. And you can see almost everything that Roy Cohn ever did in the same way that Donald Trump approaches things.
I remember going to the debate with Trump in 2016, and he was debating Clinton, and one of the things he said was, “We don’t even know if this election will be legitimate if I lose.” This was in 2016 before he was even elected, and that was where he was going. That’s just what he does. He’s never admitted a mistake. The guy’s failed a zillion times. Most people say, “Okay, I learned from them.” I read a book about Roy Cohn, and Roy Cohn was the ultimate deny, deny, deny, and that was one of Trump’s mentors. And you can see almost everything that Roy Cohn ever did in the same way that Donald Trump approaches things.
Lex Fridman
But, given how drastic the immigration situation is, that story becomes more believable.
But, given how drastic the immigration situation is, that story becomes more believable.
Mark Cuban
Of course it does, but the facts are still the facts. And in red states, they’re going to be checking every ID, they’re going to be making sure that’s not the case, and you can also make the argument, “Well, in the blue state, it doesn’t matter.” In the swing states, they’re still going to be checking because they know Trump is going to sue the out of them when he loses. And so again, that’s where people will take those self-preservation steps to keep their job and do the right thing.
Of course it does, but the facts are still the facts. And in red states, they’re going to be checking every ID, they’re going to be making sure that’s not the case, and you can also make the argument, “Well, in the blue state, it doesn’t matter.” In the swing states, they’re still going to be checking because they know Trump is going to sue the out of them when he loses. And so again, that’s where people will take those self-preservation steps to keep their job and do the right thing.
There’s still enough people who believe in this country and how amazing it is to do the right thing. And a lot of the premise of what some Conservatives are saying and doing, the underpinning of it is that their fellow citizens will not do anything, not some things, anything, that serves the best interest of this country. And to me, that’s just wrong. That is just misleading and wrong.
Lex Fridman
I just worry about… I don’t care about Trump or Biden, I care about democracy. I just worry. I worry about the viral nature of the idea of this illegal immigrants.
I just worry about… I don’t care about Trump or Biden, I care about democracy. I just worry. I worry about the viral nature of the idea of this illegal immigrants.
Mark Cuban
It’s very functional. Either they get across… There’s a thousand different ways, an unlimited number of ways to enter the United States of America undetected, and the south border where it’s the easiest and the worst, and Biden needs to take steps to reduce that.
It’s very functional. Either they get across… There’s a thousand different ways, an unlimited number of ways to enter the United States of America undetected, and the south border where it’s the easiest and the worst, and Biden needs to take steps to reduce that.
Remember, when Biden was vice president and Obama was president, they called Obama, the Deporter in Chief. He had no problem deporting people. And I think if I had to guess, and this is just a guess, that when they looked at the initial statistics for immigration when Biden took over, they thought there was room for more immigrants, not because they would vote, but you can make a fiscal argument that, in a world where the birth rate is flat to declining, we need immigrants. And immigrants typically don’t have a higher crime rate or anything than indigenous American citizens. Indigenous isn’t the right word, but American citizens. And so they made a calculated mistake. They made a decision that was wrong, and now they have to fix it or it’s going to hurt them severely.
But I don’t buy what Elon’s pushing that the whole reason is they are voters and will become voters.
Lex Fridman
And we should say the obvious, you’re a descendant of immigrants.
And we should say the obvious, you’re a descendant of immigrants.
Mark Cuban
For sure.
For sure.
Lex Fridman
And the immigrants is what makes this country great, in many parts, the diversity of this nation. And we should probably keep the people that are already been in this country for a while and are killing it, like PhD students and all this. It’s like [inaudible 01:40:17].
And the immigrants is what makes this country great, in many parts, the diversity of this nation. And we should probably keep the people that are already been in this country for a while and are killing it, like PhD students and all this. It’s like [inaudible 01:40:17].
Mark Cuban
That’s not what Donald Trump wants, though. He wants to ship them all out. There’s just a whole lot of hyperbole when it comes to talking to all, about talking about all of these things we’re talking about. When it’s right versus left, my team versus your team, my tribe versus your tribe, the only way to stand out is hyperbole.
That’s not what Donald Trump wants, though. He wants to ship them all out. There’s just a whole lot of hyperbole when it comes to talking to all, about talking about all of these things we’re talking about. When it’s right versus left, my team versus your team, my tribe versus your tribe, the only way to stand out is hyperbole.
The hard part, and why I like this conversation, is how do you distinguish hyperbole versus reality? And I get where you’re going, Lex, where it’s like what… The smallest spark sometimes can cause people to change, and then that spark becomes bigger, and then it becomes more widespread, and then all of a sudden your country has changed. It’s not what you thought it was. I get that completely. And yes, you always have to be on top of that to make sure, but a lot of that comes from lack of leadership, and lack of trust, because there’s nobody who’s saying, “All right, Republicans, that’s all hyperbole and you’re wrong for that. Democrats, you fucked up on immigration. You up in Afghanistan. Here’s where you made these mistakes. Own it.”
There’s nobody who says, “We’re not going to just bring in Republicans if the Republicans win.” And there’s nobody who says, “We’re not going to just bring in Democrats. We’re going to bring in a mix. We’re going to try to get balance on the Supreme Court.” There’s no leadership that’s doing it. That’s the fundamental problem. It’s not about the ideology of woke. No leadership.
Lex Fridman
Leadership, whatever systems we’ve created, it’s really frustrating that if you don’t like Trump, it’s really is Trump derangement syndrome. He’s definitely Hitler, and if you don’t like Biden, he’s senile, lizard person…
Leadership, whatever systems we’ve created, it’s really frustrating that if you don’t like Trump, it’s really is Trump derangement syndrome. He’s definitely Hitler, and if you don’t like Biden, he’s senile, lizard person…
Lex Fridman
Senile lizard person that-
Senile lizard person that-
Mark Cuban
Right, everybody gets labeled right because that works on social media. Look, if Elon changed the algorithm just by taking himself out of it, seriously, I’m not saying don’t post, right? Post all you want, but if you look at his followers, they’re almost all right-leaning. If you look at the people he engages with positively, they’re almost all right-leaning. And if you look at the people he engages with negatively, like me, I consider myself an independent, but I lean left on the DEI topic. That influences the algorithm. And so you see what you see because of what he says.
Right, everybody gets labeled right because that works on social media. Look, if Elon changed the algorithm just by taking himself out of it, seriously, I’m not saying don’t post, right? Post all you want, but if you look at his followers, they’re almost all right-leaning. If you look at the people he engages with positively, they’re almost all right-leaning. And if you look at the people he engages with negatively, like me, I consider myself an independent, but I lean left on the DEI topic. That influences the algorithm. And so you see what you see because of what he says.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, well, I mean for sure. But there could be a lot of influential people on Twitter that influence the algorithm and all that kind of stuff. But I do feel it’s not even about ideology where you lean, it’s about the algorithm, not prioritizing drama. The attention grabbing thing or the lower lizard version of that where people just want the drama. They want to tear you down.
Yeah, well, I mean for sure. But there could be a lot of influential people on Twitter that influence the algorithm and all that kind of stuff. But I do feel it’s not even about ideology where you lean, it’s about the algorithm, not prioritizing drama. The attention grabbing thing or the lower lizard version of that where people just want the drama. They want to tear you down.
Mark Cuban
Right. When I last read through all the stuff on their algorithm, right, maybe it’s changed, whoever has the biggest account and gets engagement on that account influences what people see the most.
Right. When I last read through all the stuff on their algorithm, right, maybe it’s changed, whoever has the biggest account and gets engagement on that account influences what people see the most.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, I mean, that’s interesting. I don’t know if that’s, to the degree that’s true, they’ve pretty-
Yeah, I mean, that’s interesting. I don’t know if that’s, to the degree that’s true, they’ve pretty-
Mark Cuban
I’m sure it’s still the case.
I’m sure it’s still the case.
Lex Fridman
…Pretty rigorous description of the way the algorithm works. It’s actually kind of fascinating. There’s a clustering of people based on interests-
…Pretty rigorous description of the way the algorithm works. It’s actually kind of fascinating. There’s a clustering of people based on interests-
Mark Cuban
But I think they called the nearest neighbor approach, and I think that’s what they do. And so whoever has the biggest account, has the most neighbors who in turn have their neighbors who in turn have their neighbors, and that’s how they discern what comes next.
But I think they called the nearest neighbor approach, and I think that’s what they do. And so whoever has the biggest account, has the most neighbors who in turn have their neighbors who in turn have their neighbors, and that’s how they discern what comes next.
Lex Fridman
But there’s a clustering still. So if you don’t give a shit about Elon, you’re not-
But there’s a clustering still. So if you don’t give a shit about Elon, you’re not-
Mark Cuban
And you’re not following him, yeah, you’re not following-
And you’re not following him, yeah, you’re not following-
Lex Fridman
You’re not going to have an influence. It’s not going to have an influence.
You’re not going to have an influence. It’s not going to have an influence.
Mark Cuban
When you get a break, just create a burner account on Twitter and see who they recommend to you.
When you get a break, just create a burner account on Twitter and see who they recommend to you.
Lex Fridman
Elon.
Elon.
Mark Cuban
And not just Elon, I mean the people that Elon likes. And I’m saying that’s not Elon saying add this person, add this person and suggest this person, this person, and this person. I’m saying that’s what the algorithm is.
And not just Elon, I mean the people that Elon likes. And I’m saying that’s not Elon saying add this person, add this person and suggest this person, this person, and this person. I’m saying that’s what the algorithm is.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. There should be transparency around that. For sure. That’s the-
Yeah. There should be transparency around that. For sure. That’s the-
Mark Cuban
And there is. There is. And that’s the whole point, right? He knows there’s transparency and he knows the impact. That’s why when I say take yourself out of the algorithm, don’t include his account, that changes I think the output of the algorithm.
And there is. There is. And that’s the whole point, right? He knows there’s transparency and he knows the impact. That’s why when I say take yourself out of the algorithm, don’t include his account, that changes I think the output of the algorithm.
Lex Fridman
Well, when he wasn’t owning Twitter, he was one of the biggest accounts, if not the biggest account already.
Well, when he wasn’t owning Twitter, he was one of the biggest accounts, if not the biggest account already.
Mark Cuban
He wasn’t. But still. even the Kim Kardashian accounts, whatever, it wasn’t open source to Elon’s credit. It is now. So I couldn’t see it to know. Right? So I didn’t get the sense one way or the other of one element being dominant over the other. But obviously conservatives felt that left leaning was more dominant back then.
He wasn’t. But still. even the Kim Kardashian accounts, whatever, it wasn’t open source to Elon’s credit. It is now. So I couldn’t see it to know. Right? So I didn’t get the sense one way or the other of one element being dominant over the other. But obviously conservatives felt that left leaning was more dominant back then.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, I would love to see numbers on all of this.
Yeah, I would love to see numbers on all of this.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, you and me both.
Yeah, you and me both.
Lex Fridman
DEI, everything like this. Sometimes anecdotal data really frustrates me. It frustrates me primarily because of how sexy it is. People just love-
DEI, everything like this. Sometimes anecdotal data really frustrates me. It frustrates me primarily because of how sexy it is. People just love-
Mark Cuban
That’s a great way to describe it.
That’s a great way to describe it.
Lex Fridman
Love a story, and I’m like, Goddamn it, this is not science. This is-
Love a story, and I’m like, Goddamn it, this is not science. This is-
Mark Cuban
It’s not even common sense.
It’s not even common sense.
Lex Fridman
Well, no, I think anecdotal stories often have a wisdom in them.
Well, no, I think anecdotal stories often have a wisdom in them.
Mark Cuban
No doubt, right? There’s something to be gained from seeing them.
No doubt, right? There’s something to be gained from seeing them.
Lex Fridman
There’s a signal there, but how representative is that signal of the broader thing?
There’s a signal there, but how representative is that signal of the broader thing?
Mark Cuban
There’s a whole lot more noise than signal more often than not.
There’s a whole lot more noise than signal more often than not.
Drugs and Big Pharma
Lex Fridman
All right, so as I mentioned, Cost Plus Drugs, there’s so many questions I can ask here, but what’s the big question? What’s broken about our healthcare system?
All right, so as I mentioned, Cost Plus Drugs, there’s so many questions I can ask here, but what’s the big question? What’s broken about our healthcare system?
Mark Cuban
There’s no transparency. And when the lack of transparency leads to lack of trust and when you can’t trust the healthcare system other than maybe your doctor, that’s a broken system.
There’s no transparency. And when the lack of transparency leads to lack of trust and when you can’t trust the healthcare system other than maybe your doctor, that’s a broken system.
Lex Fridman
So what aspect of this system does Cost Plus Drugs is trying to solve?
So what aspect of this system does Cost Plus Drugs is trying to solve?
Mark Cuban
So the thing we’re trying to solve for is trust. And the way we feel we get there is through complete transparency. So when you go to costplusdrugs.com and you put in the name of the medication, if it’s one of the 2,500 and growing that we carry, we will first show you our costs, what we actually pay for it, then we’ll show you our 15% markup. Then we’ll show the pharmacy fill fee and shipping, and that’s your total price. And that alone, that transparency alone, is completely revolutionizing how drugs are priced in America today. And it’s led to research being done comparing our pricing to CMS and ours being cheaper than even the government is negotiating, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And so just that transparency alone has had an impact and saved millions of people hundreds of millions of dollars or more.
So the thing we’re trying to solve for is trust. And the way we feel we get there is through complete transparency. So when you go to costplusdrugs.com and you put in the name of the medication, if it’s one of the 2,500 and growing that we carry, we will first show you our costs, what we actually pay for it, then we’ll show you our 15% markup. Then we’ll show the pharmacy fill fee and shipping, and that’s your total price. And that alone, that transparency alone, is completely revolutionizing how drugs are priced in America today. And it’s led to research being done comparing our pricing to CMS and ours being cheaper than even the government is negotiating, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And so just that transparency alone has had an impact and saved millions of people hundreds of millions of dollars or more.
Lex Fridman
And maybe it results in more transparency in other parts of the system too, seeing the business of it. What do the so-called middlemen companies. So the PBMs-
And maybe it results in more transparency in other parts of the system too, seeing the business of it. What do the so-called middlemen companies. So the PBMs-
Mark Cuban
Correct. The pharmacy benefit managers.
Correct. The pharmacy benefit managers.
Lex Fridman
Thank you. CVS Caremark, Cigna’s Express Scripts, and United Health’s Optum Rx, they control majority of the market. What do they do wrong?
Thank you. CVS Caremark, Cigna’s Express Scripts, and United Health’s Optum Rx, they control majority of the market. What do they do wrong?
Mark Cuban
They put profits over everything. And they know in an industry that’s completely opaque, they can pretty much do what they want and nobody gets to see what they’re doing in detail. And so the first thing when you sign a contract with one of those big PBMs, it says you can’t disclose any of this. And the fact that you can’t be disclosed means they could tell Lex’s company that they’re getting a great price and they’re only being charged X. And they can tell Mark’s company, oh, you’re getting a great price and we’re charging Mark X plus, right? But Mark doesn’t know any better because there’s no way to know.
They put profits over everything. And they know in an industry that’s completely opaque, they can pretty much do what they want and nobody gets to see what they’re doing in detail. And so the first thing when you sign a contract with one of those big PBMs, it says you can’t disclose any of this. And the fact that you can’t be disclosed means they could tell Lex’s company that they’re getting a great price and they’re only being charged X. And they can tell Mark’s company, oh, you’re getting a great price and we’re charging Mark X plus, right? But Mark doesn’t know any better because there’s no way to know.
Lex Fridman
The markup is not transparent.
The markup is not transparent.
Mark Cuban
The cost isn’t transparent, the markup isn’t transparent. And there’s different things, like I was just talking to a company in a presentation a couple days ago, and they took the step to leave the big three PBMs to go to a rebate free PBM that was smaller. And what they said led to the decision, they had a contract with the PBM for these things called rebates, where depending on the volume of medications you buy, they’ll kick back to you a percentage of them. And as it turns out, when they compared what was contracted for to what they actually got, they were getting underpaid every single year. They just don’t care. They’ll take products. There’s a drug called Humira, and it is the number one revenue drug in the country. And there’s also a biosimilar, multiple biosimilars, but one we carry called Yusimry. And, Humira, the pre-rebate price is about $8,000 per month. After rebates, depending on the size of the company, it’ll be anywhere from three to $6,000 a month. You can go to get your doctor to prescribe that biosimilar Yusimry and you pay $594. But those big three PBMs won’t allow their clients to get Yusimry because they don’t get a rebate on Yusimry. So they’d rather keep a drug on their formulary, even though their patients, their customers would save a lot of money, they’d rather keep a drug and exclude another because they’ll make a lot more money.
The cost isn’t transparent, the markup isn’t transparent. And there’s different things, like I was just talking to a company in a presentation a couple days ago, and they took the step to leave the big three PBMs to go to a rebate free PBM that was smaller. And what they said led to the decision, they had a contract with the PBM for these things called rebates, where depending on the volume of medications you buy, they’ll kick back to you a percentage of them. And as it turns out, when they compared what was contracted for to what they actually got, they were getting underpaid every single year. They just don’t care. They’ll take products. There’s a drug called Humira, and it is the number one revenue drug in the country. And there’s also a biosimilar, multiple biosimilars, but one we carry called Yusimry. And, Humira, the pre-rebate price is about $8,000 per month. After rebates, depending on the size of the company, it’ll be anywhere from three to $6,000 a month. You can go to get your doctor to prescribe that biosimilar Yusimry and you pay $594. But those big three PBMs won’t allow their clients to get Yusimry because they don’t get a rebate on Yusimry. So they’d rather keep a drug on their formulary, even though their patients, their customers would save a lot of money, they’d rather keep a drug and exclude another because they’ll make a lot more money.
Lex Fridman
So the CVS Caremark spokesperson, I think responded to you, Phil Blando, with the usual language that so deeply exhausts me, but I was wondering if there’s any truth to it. Employers, unions, health plans and government programs work with CVS Caremark precisely because we deliver for them. Lower drug costs, better health outcomes, and broad pharmacy access through our true cost, cost vantage and choice formulary initiatives, we are the leading agent of change, innovation, and transparency in the market.
So the CVS Caremark spokesperson, I think responded to you, Phil Blando, with the usual language that so deeply exhausts me, but I was wondering if there’s any truth to it. Employers, unions, health plans and government programs work with CVS Caremark precisely because we deliver for them. Lower drug costs, better health outcomes, and broad pharmacy access through our true cost, cost vantage and choice formulary initiatives, we are the leading agent of change, innovation, and transparency in the market.
Mark Cuban
That’s a whole lot of nothing.
That’s a whole lot of nothing.
Lex Fridman
So they are not transparent?
So they are not transparent?
Mark Cuban
No. Call them up. You go to Cost Plus Drugs, we’ll give you our price list of all 2,500 plus drugs.
No. Call them up. You go to Cost Plus Drugs, we’ll give you our price list of all 2,500 plus drugs.
Lex Fridman
The actual cost?
The actual cost?
Mark Cuban
The actual cost, and what we sell it for because it’s just a plus 15%. Call up any of the big three companies and ask them for the same thing. They’re going to laugh at you. It’s so bad, in fact, if you do business with them right now and you just ask for your claims data, meaning how many people use Humira that we’re paying, what are we paying for it? They won’t even give it to you unless you really, really scream and yell at them and then they’ll charge you and take six months to get it. So when we moved away from them, we wanted to get what our claims data was to understand what we were going to be facing. They wouldn’t give it to us until six months later, I forget the exact month. And then they charge us for it as well, our own data.
The actual cost, and what we sell it for because it’s just a plus 15%. Call up any of the big three companies and ask them for the same thing. They’re going to laugh at you. It’s so bad, in fact, if you do business with them right now and you just ask for your claims data, meaning how many people use Humira that we’re paying, what are we paying for it? They won’t even give it to you unless you really, really scream and yell at them and then they’ll charge you and take six months to get it. So when we moved away from them, we wanted to get what our claims data was to understand what we were going to be facing. They wouldn’t give it to us until six months later, I forget the exact month. And then they charge us for it as well, our own data.
Lex Fridman
On the CEO front, you’ve said that CEOs don’t understand healthcare coverage and it’s costing them big. What’s the connection between Cost Plus Drugs and companies?
On the CEO front, you’ve said that CEOs don’t understand healthcare coverage and it’s costing them big. What’s the connection between Cost Plus Drugs and companies?
Mark Cuban
I can speak for my own companies, and this applies to all companies, bigger companies that’s self-insured, because we self-insure. When we started Cost Plus, I finally said, okay, it’s time for me to understand how I’m paying for my healthcare for my employees and their families. And the first thing I looked at was a lot of these companies use employee benefits consultants, and turns out I was paying $30 per employee per month, which was millions of dollars a year, and they were just sending us to the companies that paid them the biggest commissions. I’m like, how fucking dumb am I? So I’m like, okay, we’re cutting that. And then I looked at our medication, our prescription deal that goes through the PBMs that we were using and that the consultant connected us with. And I took a list of, this was early on in Cost Plus Drugs, list of the generic drugs that we sold that cost more than $30 that the Mavericks also had purchased.
I can speak for my own companies, and this applies to all companies, bigger companies that’s self-insured, because we self-insure. When we started Cost Plus, I finally said, okay, it’s time for me to understand how I’m paying for my healthcare for my employees and their families. And the first thing I looked at was a lot of these companies use employee benefits consultants, and turns out I was paying $30 per employee per month, which was millions of dollars a year, and they were just sending us to the companies that paid them the biggest commissions. I’m like, how fucking dumb am I? So I’m like, okay, we’re cutting that. And then I looked at our medication, our prescription deal that goes through the PBMs that we were using and that the consultant connected us with. And I took a list of, this was early on in Cost Plus Drugs, list of the generic drugs that we sold that cost more than $30 that the Mavericks also had purchased.
We were able to get that claims data, and it turns out we spent $169,000 with that PBM, one of the big three PBMs, and it would’ve cost us buying from Cost Plus Drugs $19,000. And that’s just a simple example. Then I looked at the insurance side of things. We self-insure, so there weren’t premiums per se, but we were getting charged $17.15 cents per employee per month just to use the network that they put together for us, providers, hospitals or whatever. And I’m like, all right, are there companies that won’t charge us to put together these networks? Turns out there’s a lot of them. And those insurance companies and those PBMs are also responsible for determining what claims, what to authorize and what to deny. So for a drug, it may be, all right, this is an expensive drug, but before they’ll say they’ll pay for the drug that your doctor wants to prescribe for you, you have to try these three other drugs in what’s called step up therapy to see if these other cheaper drugs work or they’re not even necessarily cheaper, they may be being pushed because they’re getting a higher rebate.
And so I’m like, that’s insane. I want my employees to get the medication that the doctors say is best. And so I didn’t realize those were the intricacies of where my healthcare dollars went. There’s not a single CEO who does because that’s not a core competency that they need. And the CFOs, that’s not their core competency and the HR people, they contribute and they understand it some because they’re dealing with the claims, but they spend most of their prescription drug related time or healthcare related times trying to get pre-authorizations approved. So your kid breaks their arm or you get sick and you go to the doctor and before the doctor will do a surgery or do whatever, they have to go to the insurance company and get preauthorized. And then they always say no. And then you have to go back and somebody has to argue for you. And that just eats up employee time because I’m sick or my kid’s sick and you’re wasting my time. Eats up HR time.
The CEOs don’t know any of this, right? So what I’m saying is one, the smartest thing to do is to get a healthcare CEO at every company with over let’s say 500 employees that focuses on all these things. You’d save a shitload of money. And two, healthcare is your second largest line item expense after payroll. And in some companies it’s hundreds, billions of dollars and you don’t understand it and you’re letting these guys rip you off? And it’s because these big CEOs don’t understand it and are getting ripped off that the industry is the way it is because that allows the opacity to continue.
Lex Fridman
That’s fascinating. So that most companies outsource, offload the expertise on the healthcare side when they really should be internally, there should be an expert that [inaudible 01:55:20]-
That’s fascinating. So that most companies outsource, offload the expertise on the healthcare side when they really should be internally, there should be an expert that [inaudible 01:55:20]-
Mark Cuban
Yes, because it’s the wellness of your employees and their families and-
Yes, because it’s the wellness of your employees and their families and-
Lex Fridman
It costs a lot of money.
It costs a lot of money.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, but if your employees aren’t healthy or if they’re worried about their kids and what is more worrisome and detrimental to the performance of a company? A DEI program or having to go to HR and scream and yell and explain, and your doctor wasting their time doing the same thing to get authorization for a surgery or a medication? It’s insane.
Yeah, but if your employees aren’t healthy or if they’re worried about their kids and what is more worrisome and detrimental to the performance of a company? A DEI program or having to go to HR and scream and yell and explain, and your doctor wasting their time doing the same thing to get authorization for a surgery or a medication? It’s insane.
Lex Fridman
What made you decide to step into this cartel-like situation where so much is opaque?
What made you decide to step into this cartel-like situation where so much is opaque?
Mark Cuban
So I got a cold email from a Dr. Alex Oshmyancy, who’s my co-founder. He’s a radiologist by trade in a physicist and a smart mother fucker. And he had a pharmacy that he wanted to create a compounding pharmacy that would manufacture generic drugs that were in short supply because it happens all the time that things aren’t available. I’m like, you’re thinking too small. We should do something on a much bigger scale. And then it was right around the time they were sending the pharmacy bro, Martin Shkreli, to jail. And so I was reading up on that and he increased the price of this drug, Daraprim, I think it was like 7500% or increased a low cost drug to $7,500, one of those.
So I got a cold email from a Dr. Alex Oshmyancy, who’s my co-founder. He’s a radiologist by trade in a physicist and a smart mother fucker. And he had a pharmacy that he wanted to create a compounding pharmacy that would manufacture generic drugs that were in short supply because it happens all the time that things aren’t available. I’m like, you’re thinking too small. We should do something on a much bigger scale. And then it was right around the time they were sending the pharmacy bro, Martin Shkreli, to jail. And so I was reading up on that and he increased the price of this drug, Daraprim, I think it was like 7500% or increased a low cost drug to $7,500, one of those.
And I’m like, well, if he can just jack up the price to this drug and charge more and get away with it, this has to be an incredibly inefficient market. And so the question is why is he able to do it? And it was immediately apparent that it was a lack of transparency. And so can we start a company that is fully transparent with our costs, our markup and our selling price, and see if it works? And so we went for it and it took off immediately. I mean, you read a press release from a company saying they were creating a cost advantage program basically pretending to replicate us? We haven’t been in business two years. How insane is that?
Lex Fridman
Did you get a lot of pressure? I mean, I’m sure they’re very good at playing games, so cartel-type situations they protect. It feels like healthcare is very difficult to get in there.
Did you get a lot of pressure? I mean, I’m sure they’re very good at playing games, so cartel-type situations they protect. It feels like healthcare is very difficult to get in there.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, it does. And the whole industry is an arbitrage, but we don’t work inside the system. We work outside the system. And so we don’t work with those biggest companies, the biggest companies with the most dominant control. It’s very insulated and very controlled, like you said, we work outside them, we won’t work with them. And so because of that, we don’t have access to every medication because they’ve told a lot of the big brand manufacturers that if they work with us, they’ll take them off their formularies or change the rebate structure so that they won’t be prescribed as much.
Yeah, it does. And the whole industry is an arbitrage, but we don’t work inside the system. We work outside the system. And so we don’t work with those biggest companies, the biggest companies with the most dominant control. It’s very insulated and very controlled, like you said, we work outside them, we won’t work with them. And so because of that, we don’t have access to every medication because they’ve told a lot of the big brand manufacturers that if they work with us, they’ll take them off their formularies or change the rebate structure so that they won’t be prescribed as much.
Lex Fridman
That’s dark.
That’s dark.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, it is dark. But we’ll get past that, right? Because there’s a downstream impact of all this in the rebates and the greediness of those big three PBMs. When you go to a local pharmacy here in Austin, and let’s just say you have a friend here that is on Medicare or Medicare Advantage, and they go to a local pharmacy and they get a drug that costs $600. Well, in the insurance company, that $600, the pharmacy first buys that drug for probably that price, minus 5%. So $570. Then there’s probably a copay by the patient, and that’s probably $20. So now the net investment that the pharmacy, the local pharmacy has for that brand medication is $550. Where it gets really fucked up is those big three PBMs, they’re not reimbursing them $550 or more. They’re reimbursing them $500 or less. And literally those community pharmacies are eating that loss, and as a result, they’re going out of business left and right.
Yeah, it is dark. But we’ll get past that, right? Because there’s a downstream impact of all this in the rebates and the greediness of those big three PBMs. When you go to a local pharmacy here in Austin, and let’s just say you have a friend here that is on Medicare or Medicare Advantage, and they go to a local pharmacy and they get a drug that costs $600. Well, in the insurance company, that $600, the pharmacy first buys that drug for probably that price, minus 5%. So $570. Then there’s probably a copay by the patient, and that’s probably $20. So now the net investment that the pharmacy, the local pharmacy has for that brand medication is $550. Where it gets really fucked up is those big three PBMs, they’re not reimbursing them $550 or more. They’re reimbursing them $500 or less. And literally those community pharmacies are eating that loss, and as a result, they’re going out of business left and right.
And the most insane part of it is yes, with corporate employer insurance, that happens, but it happens more with Medicare Part D and Medicare Advantage. It happens all the time with those, almost with every script. So the government is complicit in these community pharmacies going out of business. So how does that connect to Cost Plus Drugs and what we’re doing and the big brands? The big brands know that if all these community pharmacies are going, tens of thousands of them are going to go out of business because of the way this pricing is, they’re going to lose a connection between their brand medications and grandma and grandpa and Aunt Sally and all that business is going to get transferred to the big companies and they’re going to have even less leverage. So they’re working with us to come up with programs that are very supportive of independent pharmacies, and that’s going to allow us to break the cartel because it’s in their best interest not to allow them to be so vertically integrated that they destroy the entire community and independent pharmacy industry.
Lex Fridman
Is there other aspects of the healthcare industry that could use this kind of transparency and revolutionizing?
Is there other aspects of the healthcare industry that could use this kind of transparency and revolutionizing?
Mark Cuban
Yes. Yeah. So what we’re going to do with our own healthcare, we’re not going to be in the business of selling healthcare or anything like that or operate, but the things we do for my companies, we’re only going to do deals with providers, healthcare providers, that allow us to be completely transparent. So that whatever contracts we do, we’re going to post them all. Whatever pricing we get, we’re going to post them all so that every company who’s our size or even bigger will have a template that they can work on, which will take it away from the big three insurance companies and the big three PBMs. Because now without that transparency, they have to use consultants who are getting paid by those big three, those big companies and aren’t giving them the best response. And so now that transparency will overcome that.
Yes. Yeah. So what we’re going to do with our own healthcare, we’re not going to be in the business of selling healthcare or anything like that or operate, but the things we do for my companies, we’re only going to do deals with providers, healthcare providers, that allow us to be completely transparent. So that whatever contracts we do, we’re going to post them all. Whatever pricing we get, we’re going to post them all so that every company who’s our size or even bigger will have a template that they can work on, which will take it away from the big three insurance companies and the big three PBMs. Because now without that transparency, they have to use consultants who are getting paid by those big three, those big companies and aren’t giving them the best response. And so now that transparency will overcome that.
Lex Fridman
And you’re using your, how should I say it, celebrity? Your name to push this forward?
And you’re using your, how should I say it, celebrity? Your name to push this forward?
Mark Cuban
Yeah, that’s why it’s the only company I’ve ever put my name on.
Yeah, that’s why it’s the only company I’ve ever put my name on.
Lex Fridman
It’s weird that people aren’t getting into this space. Public people, there’s not a big, you look at tech, there’s these CEOs are open and public and public and they’re pushing the company and they’re selling everything, and it’s all transparent. But you don’t see that in healthcare.
It’s weird that people aren’t getting into this space. Public people, there’s not a big, you look at tech, there’s these CEOs are open and public and public and they’re pushing the company and they’re selling everything, and it’s all transparent. But you don’t see that in healthcare.
Mark Cuban
No, because it’s a big business. And most people, if I was 25 trying to start a company, I’d work in the system. If I can build it up big enough, they would just buy me and I’d make money and buy a sports team, but I don’t need that money now.
No, because it’s a big business. And most people, if I was 25 trying to start a company, I’d work in the system. If I can build it up big enough, they would just buy me and I’d make money and buy a sports team, but I don’t need that money now.
AI
Lex Fridman
Let me ask you about AI. You got a little bit of an argument about open source. I think you stepped in between Vinod Khosla and Mark Andreessen. You think AI should be open sourced?
Let me ask you about AI. You got a little bit of an argument about open source. I think you stepped in between Vinod Khosla and Mark Andreessen. You think AI should be open sourced?
Mark Cuban
Yeah, for sure.
Yeah, for sure.
Lex Fridman
So all that discussion we’ve been having about Google and so on, one of the-
So all that discussion we’ve been having about Google and so on, one of the-
Mark Cuban
Well, they’re two different things, meaning that Meta is doing open source. That’s a good choice for them. I think that’s a smart choice, but it’s just a business decision for everybody else. I don’t think it should be forced.
Well, they’re two different things, meaning that Meta is doing open source. That’s a good choice for them. I think that’s a smart choice, but it’s just a business decision for everybody else. I don’t think it should be forced.
Lex Fridman
Forced, yes. And even Google’s open sourcing some of the models and-
Forced, yes. And even Google’s open sourcing some of the models and-
Mark Cuban
Because they’re all… That’s a very incestuous industry where the people all work together at some level. They read the same papers, they go to the same conferences. It’s like the early days of streaming and the internet where people used the same technology everywhere, and now they just try different things. And you get one smarter or a couple of smart people in one company like Anthropic, and they do things a little bit better and efficient, model efficiency gets better. So it’s just a business choice, but I don’t think it should be forced, but I think it’s a smart business decision.
Because they’re all… That’s a very incestuous industry where the people all work together at some level. They read the same papers, they go to the same conferences. It’s like the early days of streaming and the internet where people used the same technology everywhere, and now they just try different things. And you get one smarter or a couple of smart people in one company like Anthropic, and they do things a little bit better and efficient, model efficiency gets better. So it’s just a business choice, but I don’t think it should be forced, but I think it’s a smart business decision.
Lex Fridman
Open sourcing is a smart business decision.
Open sourcing is a smart business decision.
Mark Cuban
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
It’s a tricky one. I mean, Google is a pioneer in that with TensorFlow in the AI space. That’s a tricky decision to give-
It’s a tricky one. I mean, Google is a pioneer in that with TensorFlow in the AI space. That’s a tricky decision to give-
Mark Cuban
It really, really is, right?
It really, really is, right?
Lex Fridman
To give away the code.
To give away the code.
Mark Cuban
Go back to historically there was digital computing, which was a dominant player, and they thought, and IBM to a certain extent thought that they wouldn’t be subject to a problem with the PC industry. And then all of a sudden, with their mainframes and everything, they had captive software they wouldn’t use off the shelf software. So for a digital equipment mainframe or an IBM mainframe, you needed software that was written for it. There was nothing off the shelf. And when the PC industry came along, it was the exact opposite. There was MS-DOS and then Windows, things that were off the shelf that every PC could use. And that changed how people thought about software. And I think the same thing will happen here where it’s going to be as models become more efficient and easier and less expensive to train, I think there’ll be more reasons to open source.
Go back to historically there was digital computing, which was a dominant player, and they thought, and IBM to a certain extent thought that they wouldn’t be subject to a problem with the PC industry. And then all of a sudden, with their mainframes and everything, they had captive software they wouldn’t use off the shelf software. So for a digital equipment mainframe or an IBM mainframe, you needed software that was written for it. There was nothing off the shelf. And when the PC industry came along, it was the exact opposite. There was MS-DOS and then Windows, things that were off the shelf that every PC could use. And that changed how people thought about software. And I think the same thing will happen here where it’s going to be as models become more efficient and easier and less expensive to train, I think there’ll be more reasons to open source.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, that’s the hope. It creates more competition and a lot of different diversity of approaches in how they’re implemented deployed, what kind of products they create, all of that. Vinod compared to the danger of that to the Manhattan Project.
Yeah, that’s the hope. It creates more competition and a lot of different diversity of approaches in how they’re implemented deployed, what kind of products they create, all of that. Vinod compared to the danger of that to the Manhattan Project.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, I’m not buying that at all.
Yeah, I’m not buying that at all.
Lex Fridman
You don’t see the parallels between nuclear weapons and AI?
You don’t see the parallels between nuclear weapons and AI?
Mark Cuban
No, no. I think, I’m not an AI fatalist at all, right? I’m an AI optimist, but it’s not to say that there isn’t a lot of scary shit that can happen with it.
No, no. I think, I’m not an AI fatalist at all, right? I’m an AI optimist, but it’s not to say that there isn’t a lot of scary shit that can happen with it.
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Mark Cuban
Militarily. Like I said earlier, I’m a big believer that there’s going to be millions and tens of millions of models and people will take their expertise and either get hired for it and contribute or create their own models and license. So that you see now with this thing called mixture of experts where you connect things and people can take their expertise and we’ll be able to take that expertise and retain it in a way that they want to retain it. So I don’t think there’s going to be one medical database. I told this to people at a couple of big companies that were doing healthcare initiatives. Branding is so important in the healthcare space for hospitals, the Mayo Clinics, the MD Andersons, they’re huge brands. And I don’t think they’re just going to give up their expertise to some main singular model and say, okay, whatever expertise we have is available to you in Gemini or Chat GPT or so-and-so’s version of Meta’s open source. There’s just, that would be business suicide. And so I think you’re going to see each of them have their own models and update them as they go and license them.
Militarily. Like I said earlier, I’m a big believer that there’s going to be millions and tens of millions of models and people will take their expertise and either get hired for it and contribute or create their own models and license. So that you see now with this thing called mixture of experts where you connect things and people can take their expertise and we’ll be able to take that expertise and retain it in a way that they want to retain it. So I don’t think there’s going to be one medical database. I told this to people at a couple of big companies that were doing healthcare initiatives. Branding is so important in the healthcare space for hospitals, the Mayo Clinics, the MD Andersons, they’re huge brands. And I don’t think they’re just going to give up their expertise to some main singular model and say, okay, whatever expertise we have is available to you in Gemini or Chat GPT or so-and-so’s version of Meta’s open source. There’s just, that would be business suicide. And so I think you’re going to see each of them have their own models and update them as they go and license them.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, and make money from the expertise.
Yeah, and make money from the expertise.
Mark Cuban
You have to. You have to.
You have to. You have to.
Advice for young people
Lex Fridman
You don’t give away messages. You have, yeah, any expertise evolves and growth and all that kind of stuff, and you want to own that growth. What advice would you give to young people? You have an exceptionally successful career. You came from little, made a lot. What advice would you give them?
You don’t give away messages. You have, yeah, any expertise evolves and growth and all that kind of stuff, and you want to own that growth. What advice would you give to young people? You have an exceptionally successful career. You came from little, made a lot. What advice would you give them?
Mark Cuban
Love your life. Find the things that you can enjoy. Be curious. You don’t have to have all the answers. When you’re 12, 15, I get emails from 13, 15-year-old kids, right?
Love your life. Find the things that you can enjoy. Be curious. You don’t have to have all the answers. When you’re 12, 15, I get emails from 13, 15-year-old kids, right?
Lex Fridman
What do I do?
What do I do?
Mark Cuban
What do I do? I feel like I’m being held back. I’m like a 15, you feel like you’re being held back? But just be curious because you don’t have to have the answers. You don’t have to know what you’re going to be when you grow up. I’m a hardcore believer that everybody has something that they’re really, really, really good at. That could be world-class, great. Every single human being on this planet. And the hard part is just finding what that is. And in some places having resources to enable it. But be curious so you can find out what it is. I took one technology class in college, Fortran programming, and I cheated on it, right?
What do I do? I feel like I’m being held back. I’m like a 15, you feel like you’re being held back? But just be curious because you don’t have to have the answers. You don’t have to know what you’re going to be when you grow up. I’m a hardcore believer that everybody has something that they’re really, really, really good at. That could be world-class, great. Every single human being on this planet. And the hard part is just finding what that is. And in some places having resources to enable it. But be curious so you can find out what it is. I took one technology class in college, Fortran programming, and I cheated on it, right?
I mean, it wasn’t until I got a job at Mellon Bank and I started learning how to program in this thing called Ramus, this scripting computing language that I realized, oh, this is interesting to me and I like it. And that’s what got me a job selling software and going on from there. You just don’t know what that’s going to be until you go out and experience different things. So for anybody young out there listening, enjoy your life. Find things to smile about, be curious, read, watch, expose yourself to as many different ideas as you can because something’s going to click at some point. You may be 15, you may be 25, you may be 55, but it can happen.
Lex Fridman
One thing to mention is sometimes it’s difficult or your parents, people around you might not be conducive or might not be of help in finding the thing you’re good at. In fact, in my own life, the society was such that, I don’t know if they’ve helped much at the thing I was good at. I’m still not sure what that is, but I think-
One thing to mention is sometimes it’s difficult or your parents, people around you might not be conducive or might not be of help in finding the thing you’re good at. In fact, in my own life, the society was such that, I don’t know if they’ve helped much at the thing I was good at. I’m still not sure what that is, but I think-
Mark Cuban
The interviewing done pretty well for you.
The interviewing done pretty well for you.
Lex Fridman
Well, it’s not even, there was a thing where I saw the beauty in people. Like I, very intensely. So you can call that empathy, all that kind of stuff.
Well, it’s not even, there was a thing where I saw the beauty in people. Like I, very intensely. So you can call that empathy, all that kind of stuff.
Mark Cuban
Someone called it wokeness.
Someone called it wokeness.
Lex Fridman
Super woke, I guess you could say, just super woke, that’s me. But in the education system I came up in, it was a very hard mathematics, science and so on, and it didn’t notice that whatever that was in me, but you have to keep the flame going. You have to try to find your way and see what that’s useful. And others around you might not always notice it. So it might take time. So it could be lonely. You can really have to find the strength to believe in yourself.
Super woke, I guess you could say, just super woke, that’s me. But in the education system I came up in, it was a very hard mathematics, science and so on, and it didn’t notice that whatever that was in me, but you have to keep the flame going. You have to try to find your way and see what that’s useful. And others around you might not always notice it. So it might take time. So it could be lonely. You can really have to find the strength to believe in yourself.
Mark Cuban
Oh, for sure. And I’ll tell you one quick story. 1992, I went to Moscow State University to teach kids how to start businesses. I had sold Micro Solutions and I wanted to travel, and I took Russian in high school. My Ruski is like [inaudible 02:09:04]-
Oh, for sure. And I’ll tell you one quick story. 1992, I went to Moscow State University to teach kids how to start businesses. I had sold Micro Solutions and I wanted to travel, and I took Russian in high school. My Ruski is like [inaudible 02:09:04]-
Lex Fridman
Good enough to remember that.
Good enough to remember that.
Mark Cuban
Yeah, right? Yeah. But it was interesting to me, and I bring it up because they didn’t know what the word profit meant. But at the same time, I would go around and meet people, and it was as entrepreneurial right after the Soviet Union fell, entrepreneurship went through the roof. A lot of it was mafia driven, but it was, people found that spark because I think that is natural. And so you just never know when and how and when the circumstances will come together for you to be able to take advantage.
Yeah, right? Yeah. But it was interesting to me, and I bring it up because they didn’t know what the word profit meant. But at the same time, I would go around and meet people, and it was as entrepreneurial right after the Soviet Union fell, entrepreneurship went through the roof. A lot of it was mafia driven, but it was, people found that spark because I think that is natural. And so you just never know when and how and when the circumstances will come together for you to be able to take advantage.
Lex Fridman
That spark is really important to comment on is in Russia and Ukraine, I think the system kind of suppresses that spark somehow. As you said you saw the natural entrepreneurship, but there’s not the entrepreneurial spirit once you grow up in both of the nations I mentioned. There is [inaudible 02:10:08]-
That spark is really important to comment on is in Russia and Ukraine, I think the system kind of suppresses that spark somehow. As you said you saw the natural entrepreneurship, but there’s not the entrepreneurial spirit once you grow up in both of the nations I mentioned. There is [inaudible 02:10:08]-
Mark Cuban
No, I believe it, right?
No, I believe it, right?
Lex Fridman
But there’s something about the system that-
But there’s something about the system that-
Mark Cuban
Without question.
Without question.
Lex Fridman
Be reasonable, be [inaudible 02:10:14]-
Be reasonable, be [inaudible 02:10:14]-
Mark Cuban
There would have been no reason for me to go over to do what I was doing if it was otherwise.
There would have been no reason for me to go over to do what I was doing if it was otherwise.
Lex Fridman
But, that’s the thing that really can help a country flourish.
But, that’s the thing that really can help a country flourish.
Mark Cuban
It’s going to be interesting with Ukraine if they’re able to survive this, because as horrific as it is, as you saw across Europe after World War II, the rebuilding creates opportunities.
It’s going to be interesting with Ukraine if they’re able to survive this, because as horrific as it is, as you saw across Europe after World War II, the rebuilding creates opportunities.
Lex Fridman
Rebuilding creates opportunities, but first, the war has to end. How that ends-
Rebuilding creates opportunities, but first, the war has to end. How that ends-
Mark Cuban
I don’t know either,
I don’t know either,
Lex Fridman
Is a really complex path. What gives you hope about the future of humanity?
Is a really complex path. What gives you hope about the future of humanity?
Mark Cuban
Just looking in my kids’ eyes, just talking to them and seeing their spirit, their friends’ spirit. And obviously we’re blessed as can be, right? And it’s not the same for every kid, but I get emails that I don’t respond to all of them, but from 13, 14, 15-year-old kids around the world, because Shark Tank’s shown everywhere asking me business questions. And it’s just like they took the time. They were that curious and that interested. And I see it when I talk to schools, when I go to different groups, that spark in kids’ eyes that there’s something bigger and better and exciting out there. And that’s not to say there’s not fear. Yeah, climate and any other number of things, but that’s the beauty of kids. And I think Gen Z really embodies that. And to me, that’s just really exciting.
Just looking in my kids’ eyes, just talking to them and seeing their spirit, their friends’ spirit. And obviously we’re blessed as can be, right? And it’s not the same for every kid, but I get emails that I don’t respond to all of them, but from 13, 14, 15-year-old kids around the world, because Shark Tank’s shown everywhere asking me business questions. And it’s just like they took the time. They were that curious and that interested. And I see it when I talk to schools, when I go to different groups, that spark in kids’ eyes that there’s something bigger and better and exciting out there. And that’s not to say there’s not fear. Yeah, climate and any other number of things, but that’s the beauty of kids. And I think Gen Z really embodies that. And to me, that’s just really exciting.
Lex Fridman
They dream. They dream big, they see the opportunity for making the world better. It’s cool. It’s cool to see young people in their eyes, that dream. And I could be the one to do it too, which is super powerful-
They dream. They dream big, they see the opportunity for making the world better. It’s cool. It’s cool to see young people in their eyes, that dream. And I could be the one to do it too, which is super powerful-
Mark Cuban
It’s funny because when I go talk to elementary school kids, one of the things I do, I said, okay, let’s look around. You see that light there one day, that light didn’t exist. Then somebody had the idea, then somebody created a product out of it, and now your school bought that. You see that chair? Chairs didn’t always look like that. Somebody had that idea. Why not you? So when you walk out and, what I make them do, ask yourself, why not me? Why can’t I be the one to change the world?
It’s funny because when I go talk to elementary school kids, one of the things I do, I said, okay, let’s look around. You see that light there one day, that light didn’t exist. Then somebody had the idea, then somebody created a product out of it, and now your school bought that. You see that chair? Chairs didn’t always look like that. Somebody had that idea. Why not you? So when you walk out and, what I make them do, ask yourself, why not me? Why can’t I be the one to change the world?
Lex Fridman
Thank you for that beautiful, hopeful message and thank you for talking today, Mark. You’re fun to follow. I’m a big fan of yours, but you’re also an important person in this world. I really appreciate everything you do.
Thank you for that beautiful, hopeful message and thank you for talking today, Mark. You’re fun to follow. I’m a big fan of yours, but you’re also an important person in this world. I really appreciate everything you do.
Mark Cuban
Well, I appreciate it. Thanks for saying that, Lex, and keep on doing what you’re doing. This was great. I really enjoyed this.
Well, I appreciate it. Thanks for saying that, Lex, and keep on doing what you’re doing. This was great. I really enjoyed this.
Lex Fridman
Thanks for listening to this conversation with Mark Cuban. To support this podcast. Please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, let me leave you with some words from Oscar Wilde. Imagination was given to man to compensate him for what he’s not, and a sense of humor was provided to console him for what he is. Thank you for listening and hope to see you next time.
Thanks for listening to this conversation with Mark Cuban. To support this podcast. Please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, let me leave you with some words from Oscar Wilde. Imagination was given to man to compensate him for what he’s not, and a sense of humor was provided to console him for what he is. Thank you for listening and hope to see you next time.
Transcript for Dana White: UFC, Fighting, Khabib, Conor, Tyson, Ali, Rogan, Elon & Zuck | Lex Fridman Podcast #421
This is a transcript of Lex Fridman Podcast #421 with Dana White.
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Table of Contents
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At the time, there was a stigma attached to the sport that these guys were despicable, disgusting human beings, which was the furthest thing from the truth. These kids had all gone to college, had college degrees, most of them because they wrestled in college. And we started to meet some of them. We loved the different stories. You had Chuck Liddell who had this mohawk, looks like an ax murderer, but graduated from Cal Poly with honors in accounting. Then you had Matt Hughes who was this farm boy, literally lived on a farm. And so there were all these cool stories with all these good people that weren’t what people thought they were. And Lorenzo and I always felt like there’s something here. If this thing was done the right way, this could be big.
And what was crazy was I was in a contract negotiation with Bob Meyrowitz, the old owner of the UFC over Tito’s contract and Chuck Liddell. They didn’t even want Chuck Liddell in the UFC.I was trying to get Chuck in the UFC and they didn’t even want him. And we got into this contract dispute over Tito’s contract and Bob Meyrowitz said, “You know what? There is no more money, okay? I don’t even know if I’ll even be able to put on one more event.” And he flipped out. When we hung up the phone, I literally picked up the phone and called Lorenzo and I said, “Hey, I just got off the phone with Bob Meyrowitz, the owner of the UFC, I think they’re in trouble and I think we could buy it and I think we should. You should reach out to him.” So Lorenzo called Meyrowitz, and I don’t remember the timeline, but within the next two months, we ended up owning the UFC for $2 million bucks.
We’re sitting in the venue that night, and I lean over to Lorenzo because the fight’s coming up. I go, wait till you see this interview with Baroni. They didn’t fucking do it. They didn’t do it. These guys were guys that were freelance guys that worked for Showtime at the time or something like that.
The difference between back then and now is I don’t have to do a bunch of the that I don’t really like to do, like budget meetings. I don’t like budget meetings. I sat through enough fucking budget meetings and… Horrible budget meetings. Horrible. We’re losing millions of dollars a year, and I’m in these budget meetings. So I get to pick and choose what I do these days. Back in the early days, you don’t get to pick and choose. You have to be involved in everything.
So I’ll tell you the story. So we buy the UFC. They’re based in New York. We’re moving the corporate offices to Vegas. So I have to fly out to New York, go into the offices and start going through everything and figuring out what needs to come back to Vegas and what we can just throw away. So they literally had a VHS machine and a TV, and there were a million tapes in this place, man. So I didn’t know what tapes were these definitely we have to keep, or these we don’t need. So I had to sit there and go through every single tape. And I popped in a tape and there was an interview on the Ivory Keenen Wayans show, the oldest Wayans brother, and he had a talk show at the time, and he had Joe Rogan, the guy from Fear Factor on the show, and he was promoting Fear Factor, but all he would talk about was UFC.
So when you see Joe Rogan on camera, and I was talking about the paid talking heads that they had in HBO boxing that were terrible, Joe Rogan does not come off as a paid talking head. He comes off as a guy who loves this. And so early on, no media would cover us. So I had to buy my way onto radio. So we’d do these radio tours, and they would drop us in. You’d have to get up at 3:30 in the morning in Vegas, on the west coast, because they’re at 6:30 in the morning in New York and Boston and Florida and all these other places. So they drop you into these markets to do radio, and the fighters were horrible at it. Fighters getting up at 3:30 in the morning, especially leading up to a fight, never good. They sound like they’re tired, they act like they’re tired, and they definitely act like they don’t want to be on there, and it’s bad radio. What you can’t have is bad radio. So the only two people that could pull off these radio tours were me and Joe Rogan. So me and Joe Rogan would alternate doing these radio tours all over the country.
Then the night you show up, I put on the best live event that I possibly can, and I put on the best television show that I possibly can. Once that door shuts, it’s all up to you. You determine whether you lose or not. And if you get into a position where you become so paranoid that you think that the powers that be here are against you, and you try to steer yourself away from certain fights… That’s one of the big things that happens in these other organizations. In these other organizations, the inmates run the asylum. So if they don’t want to fight bad enough, these other companies don’t push and they don’t do this and they don’t… We put on the best possible matchups that we can make.
And in this business, you might be an older fighter, but if you’re still ranked in the top 10, there’s young guys coming for you. Killers. Young killers are coming out and they want your position. So you being the veteran that you are have to prepare yourself to go in. And everybody was saying, when we made that fight with Saint-Denis that Poirier was in big trouble, dah, dah, dah, dah, dah. That’s awesome. That helps build the entire thing that Poirier, and then Poirier goes out and does what he did that night. That’s what makes fucking legends.
We go into Monday. It’s fight week. We got a whole list of things that we do fight week. And then you get right down to the press conference on Thursday, the weigh-ins on Friday, and then the fights on Saturday. Now my people fly back home, they go to bed on Sunday night, and it’s Groundhog Day. We wake up again on Monday and it starts all over again. Every weekend, every Saturday, for a year. So there’s lots of stories that need to be told, there’s lots of… When you think about what I compete with, whatever takes your attention on a Saturday night is my competitor.
Gustafsson took him into the deep water. Gustafsson hit him with some shit he’d never been hit with. Gustafsson tested him and put Jon Jones in a place where, I bet if you sat down and interviewed John Jones, going into the deep rounds of that, Jon Jones thought he was going to die. You know what I’m saying?
The other thing that Conor McGregor never did, no matter how big he was or whatever it was, and we were heading into a fight, “Oh, Conor, this guy just fell out. Aldo fell out. We’re looking for another,” “Yeah, I’ll do it, but I’m going to need another 200,000. I’m going to need another $1 million.” Conor McGregor never did that chicken shit, bullshit kind of stuff. He never did any of that. Conor was as solid a guy as you could possibly work with.
And I’ll call him on the phone as a friend and be like, “Hey, you good? How you doing?” Unfazed, unfazed like nothing’s going on. And then he’ll start talking to me about this and that and all this other. One time, there’s only been one time, I’ve never talked about this publicly, but one time I called him and he was not good. He was a mess. I’ve never heard him like that and I’ve never seen him like that. When Ivana died, the only time I’ve ever seen him fucked up. Obviously, as soon as I heard it, I reached out. And I have never, look at all the stuff that’s gone on with Trump, all the bad stuff that they say, they’re trying to attack him, they’re trying to ruin him, unfazed. I called him that day and it’s the first time I’ve ever seen that guy busted up and not good.
He loved everything. He became completely infatuated with the fight game. Then he became such a massive superstar, it’s almost like the whole thing starts to turn on you. All the things that come at you at a young age and that kind of money, it’s tough. It’s tough to navigate and get through. You say something like that and people are like, “Oh, poor him. He had fucking $100 million and couldn’t…” At that age and with all the shit that people talk and all the things that you got to put up with and the fame, a lot of people deal with fame, some people handle it really well and some people don’t. And the perfect example of that was Forrest Griffin and Stephan Bonner. They fought that unbelievable fight on the Ultimate Fighter. Everything blew up after that. Forrest dealt with fame really well and Stephan did not.
So we give them both contracts and the place erupts. It couldn’t have been a more perfect fight at the most perfect time. It all came together. It’s almost like this was meant to be. You know what I mean? Yeah. So we had so many problems with Spike TV at the time, because halfway through the season, the president of the company got fired. All the things that we thought we were going to get that year, we had this runaway hit show. And normally at that time when you would see runaway hit shows, there’d be commercials. It’d be on billboards. It’d be on the side of buses in L.A. and New York. We got none of that. We didn’t even know if we were going to get a second season coming out of that. And when that fight was over, I swear to God, I was like, “I don’t even give a fuck. We’re going to end up somewhere now after this fight.” And we didn’t even make it out of the building that night. The Spike guys did the contract with us in the alley on a fucking napkin after the fight.
And for people that are watching this, people that don’t know a lot about… Everybody thinks they know a lot about fighting. 99.9% of the people out there don’t know fucking jack shit about fighting or what it takes to do what these people do. But when you get into those later rounds and fatigue sets in, and then fatigue makes you start to fucking doubt yourself, and then you start to wonder, can I even make it through the rest of this round?
And then you start to think, am I going to fucking die right now? And these kids dig fucking deep. And they just, like you said, all the other shit flies out the window and now they’re just on fucking autopilot to fight and win. Those are definitely the best fights you’ll ever see in any combat sport.
And I make my way down to the Thai limit room. We start gambling. And I continue to drink having a blast. I end up leaving and going home that night, and I lost 80 grand. I wake up the next morning, I’m like, fuck. Those motherfuckers got me for 80,000 last night and dah, dah, dah, dah, dah.
I’m at work the next day and the host over there calls me and he says, “Hey, Dana, are you coming back? Do you still need the room that you guys had where you ate and all this shit you stay?” And I said, “No, I don’t need the room, but don’t get too comfortable with my fucking 80 grand. I’m coming back for it.”
Dead fucking silence on the other end of the phone. And he’s like, “Dana, you lost $3 million last night.” I said, “What the fuck are you talking about? I only have a million and a half dollar credit line.” He goes, “Yeah, you made us call the GM of the hotel and you started calling him a fucking pussy and da, da, da, da, da.” And I went, “Yeah, no, that sounds like something I would do. Yeah.”
And there’s lots of talk out there about my gambling, places that I’ve been kicked out of and things like that. And I do pretty well. I do pretty well, but it’s what I like to do. I don’t gamble in a way that I would ever hurt myself or hurt my family. I’m sure you’ve heard the Norm MacDonald stories. Norm MacDonald lost his entire personal wealth four times or something like that. Yeah, that’s not going to happen to me.
There’s a of people… When you gamble and you lose and you go into a deep, dark depression, I’ve seen this with guys that do it, get depressed. Gambling isn’t for you. If you are the type of person that’s on social media and people say horrible things to you and you get depressed and da, da, you shouldn’t be on social media. You know what I mean?
These are all part of being in the game. When you’re in the fucking game, great things happen and really bad things happen, and you got to take it all in stride. And you got to pick yourself up the next day, strap your fucking shoes back on and get out there and go to fucking war again. That’s how it works.
Every day when I get up out of bed, I strap up and I’m getting ready for fucking war. Because I know I’m coming in here. I know a bunch of bad shit’s going to happen that I’m going to have to fucking deal with. And if that’s not bad enough, when I finally get out of here, I’m probably going to go to the casino and I’m going to get into another fucking war. You know what I mean?
I thrive in chaos. I actually love chaos. Everybody talks about retiring. Fuck that shit. What am I going to do when I retire? What would I do? I like to go to war. I like to battle. I like to win. Sometimes I lose, but then I have to come back from the loss. And I love to build brands. I love to set short term and long-term goals and then knock them all down. This is just the stuff that excites me.
And whether it’s business or gambling. I like being a fan of things too. I like live music. When I find a band that I like, I get excited to go watch the band live or a Celtics game. I love the fucking Boston Celtics, and I love going to the games and watching them. This is the year. Hopefully we’re going to fucking win it this year. These are all things that make me happy and excite me in my life.
And it’s funny because there’s this post that I post maybe three, four nights a week. I also love this city. I can’t tell if the city of Las Vegas was built for me or I was built for this fucking city, but I love it. And there’s this turn on Summerlin Parkway every night, and it’s dark. And from there you can see the entire city, and it’s all fucking lights and it’s badass.
And I’m usually driving home after a fucking incredible day. This amazing day and this unbelievable fucking life I have, and I have this just moment of gratitude. Every time I take that turn and I’m like, God damn, I love this fucking city. And just every night when I go home, I’m just so happy and grateful for this life that I have.
But there’s all these little things in the movie that really lay out what life is all about. One of the parts is he’s in a class and the teacher’s talking about some poem. And he says, “What does this poem mean to you?” Well, this girl’s walking through the park and all the leaves are falling off the trees, and she realizes that she’s going to die someday. And that a lot of people think they have all this time so they fucking waste it, and they never go out and do what they really set out to do or accomplish or do anything great in their life. That’s one meaning.
Then he’s got the guy that he works with at work, he’s cutting weight and his nose is bleeding and all this shit. And this guy keeps going, “Why the fuck are you doing this? Pick that thing up and eat it like a fucking man. This is ridiculous. I don’t know why you’re doing this to yourself, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.” Then when he meets the girl and he gets to the point where he feels like he wants to quit, where does he go? He goes to that guy’s fucking apartment because he knows when he shows up at this guy’s apartment, he’s going to go, “Yeah, fuck this shit.”
No, he went to work. He went to work to talk to him, and he wasn’t at work. He took the night off. He shows up at the shitty little fucking apartment that the guy lives in and the guy’s putting a suit and tie on and shit. He’s like, “They said you called in sick. What’s going on?” He’s like, “Well, yeah. Aren’t you wrestling this guy tonight?” And he’s like, “Yeah, but why would you? You’re going to get docked a night’s pay and all this other shit.” He says, “You know what, man?” Then it all gets laid out. I get the goosebumps even telling you this fucking part of it.
The guy who’s been shitting on him the whole fucking time actually really respects him for what he’s done and sees what this kid is capable of doing and all this shit. This fucking movie spoke to me on so many different levels. And I think it’s probably the most underrated movie of all time when you really break down the meaning of what this movie is about. And it really fucking spoke to me.
And no matter where you are, if a fight breaks out, it creates this fucking energy, this buzz, this sense of fear. I mean, a lot of different emotions happen in people when fights break out. But one thing that is always the case, everybody’s watching, man. Everybody’s, fucking all of their eyes are on the fight.
I mean, we were just in Mexico, fucking fight broke out in the good seats right here with these seats that are super expensive. And security never fucking came. They just let these guys fight until they gassed out. And then everybody put their chairs back together and snapped back down and fucking. I literally got up from my table, walked over, and was watching this fight at the fights.
Click link to jump approximately to that part in the transcript:
- 0:00 – Introduction
- 0:57 – Mike Tyson and early days of fighting
- 11:35 – Jiu jitsu
- 17:39 – Origin of UFC
- 31:50 – Joe Rogan
- 37:56 – Lorenzo Fertitta
- 40:23 – Great fighters
- 44:20 – Khabib vs Conor
- 47:27 – Jon Jones
- 50:28 – Conor McGregor
- 55:31 – Trump
- 1:01:09 – Elon vs Zuck
- 1:02:30 – Mike Tyson vs Jake Paul
- 1:05:18 – Forrest Griffin vs Stephan Bonnar
- 1:12:31 – Gambling
- 1:27:33 – Mortality
Introduction
Dana White
Khabib beat Conor. Putin was on FaceTime before he even made it to the locker room. Trump sitting president, ex-president, watching all the fights calling, wants to talk about the fights. Valentina Shevchenko, every time she goes home, she meets with the president of the country. The list goes on and on and on. Elon Musk, Zuckerberg, I mean, the list goes on and on and on. The most powerful people in the world are all obsessed with fighting.
Khabib beat Conor. Putin was on FaceTime before he even made it to the locker room. Trump sitting president, ex-president, watching all the fights calling, wants to talk about the fights. Valentina Shevchenko, every time she goes home, she meets with the president of the country. The list goes on and on and on. Elon Musk, Zuckerberg, I mean, the list goes on and on and on. The most powerful people in the world are all obsessed with fighting.
Lex Fridman
The following is a conversation with Dana White, the president of the UFC, a mixed martial arts organization that revolutionized the art, the sport, and the business of fighting. And Dana is truly the mastermind behind the UFC. This is the Lex Fridman Podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here’s Dana White. Do you remember when you saw your first fight?
The following is a conversation with Dana White, the president of the UFC, a mixed martial arts organization that revolutionized the art, the sport, and the business of fighting. And Dana is truly the mastermind behind the UFC. This is the Lex Fridman Podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here’s Dana White. Do you remember when you saw your first fight?
Mike Tyson and early days of fighting
Dana White
I think so. I remember being at my grandmother’s house and I think it was an Ali fight, and all my uncles were going crazy during the fight, and there was just this buzz and this energy in the house that I liked at a very young age, and I’m pretty sure that was my first fight.
I think so. I remember being at my grandmother’s house and I think it was an Ali fight, and all my uncles were going crazy during the fight, and there was just this buzz and this energy in the house that I liked at a very young age, and I’m pretty sure that was my first fight.
Lex Fridman
Ali was something special.
Ali was something special.
Dana White
Yeah, incredible. I mean, when you look around, not just here in the office, but at my house, Ali and Tyson are everywhere.
Yeah, incredible. I mean, when you look around, not just here in the office, but at my house, Ali and Tyson are everywhere.
Lex Fridman
Would you put Ali as the greatest of all time boxing?
Would you put Ali as the greatest of all time boxing?
Dana White
Well, I would put Ali as the greatest of all time human being. I mean, it’s easy as a fight fan to focus on him as a fighter, but when you focus on him as a human and you think about what he meant at that time and place, the things he said, the poems he came up with, just the overall brilliance of Muhammad Ali. The guts to have the strength mentally, physically, and emotionally to go against the grain at the time that he did it. It was a very dangerous time for him to be who he was. Yet, because of how smart he was and because of his personality and how if you sat down with him, you could be the biggest racist on the planet, it’s hard to get in the room with Ali and not like Ali.
Well, I would put Ali as the greatest of all time human being. I mean, it’s easy as a fight fan to focus on him as a fighter, but when you focus on him as a human and you think about what he meant at that time and place, the things he said, the poems he came up with, just the overall brilliance of Muhammad Ali. The guts to have the strength mentally, physically, and emotionally to go against the grain at the time that he did it. It was a very dangerous time for him to be who he was. Yet, because of how smart he was and because of his personality and how if you sat down with him, you could be the biggest racist on the planet, it’s hard to get in the room with Ali and not like Ali.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, he’s all love, humor, all of it.
Yeah, he’s all love, humor, all of it.
Dana White
100%
100%
Lex Fridman
And had the guts in the ring and the guts to take a stand.
And had the guts in the ring and the guts to take a stand.
Dana White
100%
100%
Lex Fridman
When it was hard.
When it was hard.
Dana White
He might be one of the all time greatest humans. Just an impactful, powerful human being who happened to be a great boxer.
He might be one of the all time greatest humans. Just an impactful, powerful human being who happened to be a great boxer.
Lex Fridman
And sometimes the right moment meets the great human being. That’s important.
And sometimes the right moment meets the great human being. That’s important.
Dana White
I agree with you. And he was the right guy in the right place at the right time. And he’s also a guy who used his platform for all the right things.
I agree with you. And he was the right guy in the right place at the right time. And he’s also a guy who used his platform for all the right things.
Lex Fridman
So that might’ve been your first fight, but when did you fall in love with fighting? The art of it? The science of it?
So that might’ve been your first fight, but when did you fall in love with fighting? The art of it? The science of it?
Dana White
Yeah, I would say I really fell in love with it, so I was a senior. It was 1987 and Hagler Leonard happened, and I watched that fight and I taped it and I watched that fight like a million times. I was a huge, huge Hagler fan, and I like Sugar Ray Leonard too, but I was a huge Hagler fan. And I just remember I watched that fight a million times because I was pissed off and I felt like Haggler got robbed in the fight. But that was really what made me start to love the sport of boxing.
Yeah, I would say I really fell in love with it, so I was a senior. It was 1987 and Hagler Leonard happened, and I watched that fight and I taped it and I watched that fight like a million times. I was a huge, huge Hagler fan, and I like Sugar Ray Leonard too, but I was a huge Hagler fan. And I just remember I watched that fight a million times because I was pissed off and I felt like Haggler got robbed in the fight. But that was really what made me start to love the sport of boxing.
Lex Fridman
The battle of it.
The battle of it.
Dana White
Yeah. I was 17 and then after that, USA’s Tuesday Night Fights came out on television. It was on every Tuesday night. Religiously, never missed Tuesday Night Fights. I was there, watched all those fights. And a lot of the things you see in the UFC, not necessarily just the production, but I would say the feel and the style and all those things are all things that I loved about boxing and things that I hated about boxing, right down to the commentary.
Yeah. I was 17 and then after that, USA’s Tuesday Night Fights came out on television. It was on every Tuesday night. Religiously, never missed Tuesday Night Fights. I was there, watched all those fights. And a lot of the things you see in the UFC, not necessarily just the production, but I would say the feel and the style and all those things are all things that I loved about boxing and things that I hated about boxing, right down to the commentary.
Lex Fridman
You loved and hated?
You loved and hated?
Dana White
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
Hated the commentary.
Hated the commentary.
Dana White
Certain things that I loved about boxing, I incorporated into the UFC. Things that I hated about boxing, I made sure that the UFC stayed far away from. I can’t stand Larry Merchant. Can’t stand Larry Merchant. And I used to watch HBO Boxing and mute the commentary so that I didn’t have to listen to them. Lampley too. You would spend this money for the pay-per-view to watch these people that you idolized to hear these idiots rip them apart while the fight was happening.
Certain things that I loved about boxing, I incorporated into the UFC. Things that I hated about boxing, I made sure that the UFC stayed far away from. I can’t stand Larry Merchant. Can’t stand Larry Merchant. And I used to watch HBO Boxing and mute the commentary so that I didn’t have to listen to them. Lampley too. You would spend this money for the pay-per-view to watch these people that you idolized to hear these idiots rip them apart while the fight was happening.
Lex Fridman
Oh they were criticizing them?
Oh they were criticizing them?
Dana White
100%.
100%.
Lex Fridman
Or taking them apart. I’ve gotten used to the UFC, so I’m trying to remember looking back.
Or taking them apart. I’ve gotten used to the UFC, so I’m trying to remember looking back.
Dana White
It was bad.
It was bad.
Lex Fridman
It was bad?
It was bad?
Dana White
It was really bad.
It was really bad.
Lex Fridman
But the sweet science, the art of boxing was beautiful still.
But the sweet science, the art of boxing was beautiful still.
Dana White
100%.
100%.
Lex Fridman
Like the stories you told.
Like the stories you told.
Dana White
I want to do this with you right now. Hey, will you bring your cell phone over here and pull up YouTube? I want to do this for you so that you can understand this and understand where I was coming from.
I want to do this with you right now. Hey, will you bring your cell phone over here and pull up YouTube? I want to do this for you so that you can understand this and understand where I was coming from.
Lex Fridman
For the commentary?
For the commentary?
Dana White
Yeah, at this point in time.
Yeah, at this point in time.
Lex Fridman
I have all good memories. You’re going to ruin it for me.
I have all good memories. You’re going to ruin it for me.
Dana White
Yeah, no, there are nothing but great memories about boxing, but the presentation and a lot of the things, but how fucking weird is it that I even cared about this shit at that point in my life and that time in my life? What impact could I possibly have on it? So think about Tyson and how much everybody loved Tyson at the time, and listen to this entrance.
Yeah, no, there are nothing but great memories about boxing, but the presentation and a lot of the things, but how fucking weird is it that I even cared about this shit at that point in my life and that time in my life? What impact could I possibly have on it? So think about Tyson and how much everybody loved Tyson at the time, and listen to this entrance.
Speaker 1
…Of the former undisputed heavyweight champion. And here he comes, Mike Tyson, as he heads toward the same ring he made his disgraceful exit in June of ’97.
…Of the former undisputed heavyweight champion. And here he comes, Mike Tyson, as he heads toward the same ring he made his disgraceful exit in June of ’97.
Lex Fridman
Wow.
Wow.
Speaker 1
…But proud.
…But proud.
Dana White
One of the baddest motherfucking walk-ins of all time, by the way.
One of the baddest motherfucking walk-ins of all time, by the way.
Lex Fridman
Look at that.
Look at that.
Dana White
So what this guy should be doing, and this is one of the Albert brothers, shut the fuck up. Stay out of the way.
So what this guy should be doing, and this is one of the Albert brothers, shut the fuck up. Stay out of the way.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, maybe build them up.
Yeah, maybe build them up.
Dana White
Or that. Or don’t say anything. Just let the fans… That’s why we watch it. That’s why we paid our money.
Or that. Or don’t say anything. Just let the fans… That’s why we watch it. That’s why we paid our money.
Lex Fridman
You don’t need to say anything.
You don’t need to say anything.
Speaker 1
Scary imposing music. Will he be able to intimidate his opponent tonight? Will it even matter? I really thought that’d be more of an explosion by the crowd here, but very mixed. Even with a win tonight, no matter how one sided, he will still have his detractors following the two fights. With Holyfield, his stock plummeted, the pundits came down hard feeling they were duped, that his knockouts were over second rate fighters. Now the crowd erupts more as he gets into the ring, but it’s certainly nothing overwhelming.
Scary imposing music. Will he be able to intimidate his opponent tonight? Will it even matter? I really thought that’d be more of an explosion by the crowd here, but very mixed. Even with a win tonight, no matter how one sided, he will still have his detractors following the two fights. With Holyfield, his stock plummeted, the pundits came down hard feeling they were duped, that his knockouts were over second rate fighters. Now the crowd erupts more as he gets into the ring, but it’s certainly nothing overwhelming.
Lex Fridman
What a dick. You’re right. I don’t remember that. You’re right.
What a dick. You’re right. I don’t remember that. You’re right.
Dana White
Imagine.
Imagine.
Lex Fridman
You’re right.
You’re right.
Dana White
Imagine you paid your money to watch Mike Tyson and you got to listen to these fucking jerkoffs talk shit about him the whole way to the… First of all, one of the coolest walk-ins ever. The first time anybody had heard DMX.
Imagine you paid your money to watch Mike Tyson and you got to listen to these fucking jerkoffs talk shit about him the whole way to the… First of all, one of the coolest walk-ins ever. The first time anybody had heard DMX.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, that’s right.
Yeah, that’s right.
Dana White
He’s walking into some scary imposing music. Will it even matter? It’s just all that stuff. I literally used to analyze every ounce of the production that would happen on television and at a time when I didn’t even know why I was doing it, but-
He’s walking into some scary imposing music. Will it even matter? It’s just all that stuff. I literally used to analyze every ounce of the production that would happen on television and at a time when I didn’t even know why I was doing it, but-
Lex Fridman
But it was in there somewhere. You were thinking about it.
But it was in there somewhere. You were thinking about it.
Dana White
Right? So yeah, I hated HBO commentary. I thought at the time, HBO Boxing was obviously the gold standard, but when you really think about boxing at that time, their production, the only thing that changed over 30 years was HD. I mean, even the commentators were the same for 30 years. And then you had the time when Larry Merchant gets up and literally starts fighting with Floyd Mayweather during the interview and says, “If I was 30 years younger, I’d kick your ass right now.”
Right? So yeah, I hated HBO commentary. I thought at the time, HBO Boxing was obviously the gold standard, but when you really think about boxing at that time, their production, the only thing that changed over 30 years was HD. I mean, even the commentators were the same for 30 years. And then you had the time when Larry Merchant gets up and literally starts fighting with Floyd Mayweather during the interview and says, “If I was 30 years younger, I’d kick your ass right now.”
Lex Fridman
Oh yeah, I remember that.
Oh yeah, I remember that.
Dana White
I mean, these are the interviews that we have to listen to when we’re trying to watch a boxing match?
I mean, these are the interviews that we have to listen to when we’re trying to watch a boxing match?
Lex Fridman
The level of boxing was good.
The level of boxing was good.
Dana White
Think about a fighter. A fighter has been gone for months away from their families and away from everything, training, cutting weight, sparring. Then they go in and they have to fight that night? And then if you watch your fight back, you got to listen to this bullshit from these guys? And then you get interviewed and your interview is this? It’s just…
Think about a fighter. A fighter has been gone for months away from their families and away from everything, training, cutting weight, sparring. Then they go in and they have to fight that night? And then if you watch your fight back, you got to listen to this bullshit from these guys? And then you get interviewed and your interview is this? It’s just…
Lex Fridman
And it’s not just about the pay-per-view money. It’s about these are legends of humanity.
And it’s not just about the pay-per-view money. It’s about these are legends of humanity.
Dana White
100%.
100%.
Lex Fridman
We should celebrate the highest form of accomplishment.
We should celebrate the highest form of accomplishment.
Dana White
100%.
100%.
Lex Fridman
Because these are Mike Tyson.
Because these are Mike Tyson.
Dana White
So you know who goes in there and interviews fighters? Joe Rogan, who has trained and done everything and has the utmost respect for the sport and the athletes. Or you got Daniel Cormier who was a former world champion himself and has actually been through it, done it, knows. And those are the type of people that we put in the booth, people that are actually experienced in it, not these people who’ve never been in a fight in their fucking life.
So you know who goes in there and interviews fighters? Joe Rogan, who has trained and done everything and has the utmost respect for the sport and the athletes. Or you got Daniel Cormier who was a former world champion himself and has actually been through it, done it, knows. And those are the type of people that we put in the booth, people that are actually experienced in it, not these people who’ve never been in a fight in their fucking life.
Lex Fridman
But they’re also, both DC and Rogan are big kids. They love it.
But they’re also, both DC and Rogan are big kids. They love it.
Dana White
100%.
100%.
Lex Fridman
They really love it.
They really love it.
Dana White
Well, everybody does. I mean, it’s the difference between our commentary and what I feel their commentary was. We don’t hire paid talking heads. We hire people that have actually been in it, done it, love it, and are super passionate about the sport. And I would say that none of them that ever covered the sport back then were. I don’t know if that was Marv Albert or what Albert brother that was, but he sounded like he’s a fan of the sport or? Anyway, you got me on this, and once I get on this, I lose my mind.
Well, everybody does. I mean, it’s the difference between our commentary and what I feel their commentary was. We don’t hire paid talking heads. We hire people that have actually been in it, done it, love it, and are super passionate about the sport. And I would say that none of them that ever covered the sport back then were. I don’t know if that was Marv Albert or what Albert brother that was, but he sounded like he’s a fan of the sport or? Anyway, you got me on this, and once I get on this, I lose my mind.
Lex Fridman
Maybe we wouldn’t have a UFC if they didn’t fuck it up so bad for the Tyson walk-up.
Maybe we wouldn’t have a UFC if they didn’t fuck it up so bad for the Tyson walk-up.
Dana White
It would be different. You’re not wrong. You’re not wrong. It would be different. There’s no doubt about it. All those experiences growing up being a boxing fan help create what the UFC is today.
It would be different. You’re not wrong. You’re not wrong. It would be different. There’s no doubt about it. All those experiences growing up being a boxing fan help create what the UFC is today.
Lex Fridman
It’s interesting because humans have been fighting for millennia, and it seems like with the UFC, the rate of innovation is just insane. In these last three decades, it seems like we’ve discovered how to do unarmed combat faster and better than any time in human history.
It’s interesting because humans have been fighting for millennia, and it seems like with the UFC, the rate of innovation is just insane. In these last three decades, it seems like we’ve discovered how to do unarmed combat faster and better than any time in human history.
Dana White
I agree with you 100%. The first UFC happened in 1993. Martial art versus martial art. And now over the last 30 years, martial arts has evolved faster than… And like you just said, combat sports, fighting, whatever you want to call it, martial arts, it has evolved so much in 30 years more than the last 300 years.
I agree with you 100%. The first UFC happened in 1993. Martial art versus martial art. And now over the last 30 years, martial arts has evolved faster than… And like you just said, combat sports, fighting, whatever you want to call it, martial arts, it has evolved so much in 30 years more than the last 300 years.
Jiu jitsu
Lex Fridman
What did you think when you saw UFC 1 with Hoist?
What did you think when you saw UFC 1 with Hoist?
Dana White
I remember everybody talking that this fight was going to happen and there was going to be no rules and all this other stuff. And we’re like, “There’s no way. That’s bullshit.” And then we ended up at some guy’s house that night in Boston and watching it and it was happening and it was fun and it was exciting and everything else. And then I fell off after that. The first one I watched, but I was too big of a boxing fan. Plus once grappling started taking over, and by grappling meaning the wrestling and the jiu-jitsu guys had just laid there, I completely lost interest. It’s funny that I’m having this conversation with you right now because I was out last night with my friends and we were talking about, because one of my buddies who’s a host here in town, just did jiu-jitsu for the first time.
I remember everybody talking that this fight was going to happen and there was going to be no rules and all this other stuff. And we’re like, “There’s no way. That’s bullshit.” And then we ended up at some guy’s house that night in Boston and watching it and it was happening and it was fun and it was exciting and everything else. And then I fell off after that. The first one I watched, but I was too big of a boxing fan. Plus once grappling started taking over, and by grappling meaning the wrestling and the jiu-jitsu guys had just laid there, I completely lost interest. It’s funny that I’m having this conversation with you right now because I was out last night with my friends and we were talking about, because one of my buddies who’s a host here in town, just did jiu-jitsu for the first time.
Lex Fridman
Nice.
Nice.
Dana White
…Yesterday. And he was like-
…Yesterday. And he was like-
Lex Fridman
Did he get his ass kicked?
Did he get his ass kicked?
Dana White
Yeah, yeah. But when you first go in, our first jiu-jitsu lesson, me, Lorenzo, and Frank was with John Lewis, and I remember thinking, “Holy shit, I can’t believe that I’m 28 years old and this is the first time I’m experiencing this, that another human being could do this to me on the ground.” It is such an eyeopening, mind blowing experience when you do it for the first time and then you become completely addicted to it. And we were training three, four days a week trying to kill each other, me and the Fertittas, and that’s how we fell in love with the sport. I think that first time that you do jiu-jitsu, it’s like the red pill and the blue pill in The Matrix. Do you want to believe that this is the world that you live in, or do you want to see what the real world looks like?
Yeah, yeah. But when you first go in, our first jiu-jitsu lesson, me, Lorenzo, and Frank was with John Lewis, and I remember thinking, “Holy shit, I can’t believe that I’m 28 years old and this is the first time I’m experiencing this, that another human being could do this to me on the ground.” It is such an eyeopening, mind blowing experience when you do it for the first time and then you become completely addicted to it. And we were training three, four days a week trying to kill each other, me and the Fertittas, and that’s how we fell in love with the sport. I think that first time that you do jiu-jitsu, it’s like the red pill and the blue pill in The Matrix. Do you want to believe that this is the world that you live in, or do you want to see what the real world looks like?
Lex Fridman
Just is a real red pill.
Just is a real red pill.
Dana White
It really is.
It really is.
Lex Fridman
You realize, “Holy shit, all that shit talking I’ve been doing about me being a badass,” you realize you’re not. You get dominated by another human being, you realize, “No.”
You realize, “Holy shit, all that shit talking I’ve been doing about me being a badass,” you realize you’re not. You get dominated by another human being, you realize, “No.”
Dana White
And I mean dominated. I mean completely treats you like you’re a little kid. And then we had the opportunity to roll with a lot of different guys at the time because of the whatever, and we don’t have a good relationship at all. But I’ll tell you this, Frank Shamrock came in one day and Frank Shamrock had me in side control. The pressure that this guy put on my chest made me tap. It felt like there was a car on my chest. And with zero effort from him, it was absolutely effortless. And when you train with somebody that’s at such a level when you’re not, it is the most humbling, mind blowing experience you can have, especially as a man, but as a human being.
And I mean dominated. I mean completely treats you like you’re a little kid. And then we had the opportunity to roll with a lot of different guys at the time because of the whatever, and we don’t have a good relationship at all. But I’ll tell you this, Frank Shamrock came in one day and Frank Shamrock had me in side control. The pressure that this guy put on my chest made me tap. It felt like there was a car on my chest. And with zero effort from him, it was absolutely effortless. And when you train with somebody that’s at such a level when you’re not, it is the most humbling, mind blowing experience you can have, especially as a man, but as a human being.
Lex Fridman
Just for fun, do you remember what your go-to submission was?
Just for fun, do you remember what your go-to submission was?
Dana White
Yeah, so when we first started out and started doing it, I had a pretty good guillotine in the beginning. So I’d catch a lot of people in guillotines.
Yeah, so when we first started out and started doing it, I had a pretty good guillotine in the beginning. So I’d catch a lot of people in guillotines.
Lex Fridman
So you’re okay being on bottom? So the guard was pretty good?
So you’re okay being on bottom? So the guard was pretty good?
Dana White
Yeah, I was okay with the bottom. I was comfortable there. But you know what I never liked? I never liked gi. We started fucking around with a gi in the beginning, that’s how we started. And then once I took the gi off, I felt like I had no submissions because I couldn’t grab onto anything. So after that, I went all no gi and I never wanted to wear a gi.
Yeah, I was okay with the bottom. I was comfortable there. But you know what I never liked? I never liked gi. We started fucking around with a gi in the beginning, that’s how we started. And then once I took the gi off, I felt like I had no submissions because I couldn’t grab onto anything. So after that, I went all no gi and I never wanted to wear a gi.
Lex Fridman
That’s fascinating because no gi has become big now and there’s a lot of interesting people. I got trained with Gordon Ryan, and the level there is just fascinating. It’s become the science and it looks like fighting now. It looks more like fighting as opposed to with the gi, sometimes it doesn’t quite look like fighting. And I feel like it’s transferable to actual MMA fighting, no gi stuff.
That’s fascinating because no gi has become big now and there’s a lot of interesting people. I got trained with Gordon Ryan, and the level there is just fascinating. It’s become the science and it looks like fighting now. It looks more like fighting as opposed to with the gi, sometimes it doesn’t quite look like fighting. And I feel like it’s transferable to actual MMA fighting, no gi stuff.
Dana White
Or street.
Or street.
Lex Fridman
Street, yeah.
Street, yeah.
Dana White
I mean, if you start off in your first year you’re in a gi, man, you better hope guy’s got winter jackets on or something if something happens in the street because, I know all the jiu-jitsu fucking people are going to go crazy over this, but in my opinion, no gi is way better than gi.
I mean, if you start off in your first year you’re in a gi, man, you better hope guy’s got winter jackets on or something if something happens in the street because, I know all the jiu-jitsu fucking people are going to go crazy over this, but in my opinion, no gi is way better than gi.
Lex Fridman
That said, I also do judo. So in the street scenario, if you’re comfortable on the feet and you can clinch and you can throw, because most of us wear clothing, especially in Boston in the winter setting, so if you’re comfortable on the feet, you could still do well. The problem with jiu-jitsu is most people are not comfortable on the feet, the sports jiu-jitsu. Most people want to get to the ground as quickly as possible. So what’d you think of Hoist at that time in the early… Because it blew a lot of people’s minds that there’s more to this puzzle.
That said, I also do judo. So in the street scenario, if you’re comfortable on the feet and you can clinch and you can throw, because most of us wear clothing, especially in Boston in the winter setting, so if you’re comfortable on the feet, you could still do well. The problem with jiu-jitsu is most people are not comfortable on the feet, the sports jiu-jitsu. Most people want to get to the ground as quickly as possible. So what’d you think of Hoist at that time in the early… Because it blew a lot of people’s minds that there’s more to this puzzle.
Dana White
100%, and the fact that you had these guys like Ken Shamrock that were jacked and you had all these wrestlers or the big massive guys that they had in the different weight classes, and this skinny little dude like Hoist was out there beating everybody. I mean, if you look at the way the Gracie’s played that, you couldn’t have had a better advertisement for Gracie Jiu-jitsu at the time.
100%, and the fact that you had these guys like Ken Shamrock that were jacked and you had all these wrestlers or the big massive guys that they had in the different weight classes, and this skinny little dude like Hoist was out there beating everybody. I mean, if you look at the way the Gracie’s played that, you couldn’t have had a better advertisement for Gracie Jiu-jitsu at the time.
Lex Fridman
But also for MMA, because there’s just a lot of surprising elements. A lot of people’s prediction was wrong. They didn’t think the skinny guy would win. And they’re like, “Oh shit, there’s more to this.”
But also for MMA, because there’s just a lot of surprising elements. A lot of people’s prediction was wrong. They didn’t think the skinny guy would win. And they’re like, “Oh shit, there’s more to this.”
Dana White
What’s the real beautiful thing about jiu-jitsu? It’s like when you talk about if you wanted to get your daughter into a martial art, “Should I put my daughter into karate or should I put her into this?” You put your daughter into jiu-jitsu 100% because it’s not about size or strength, it’s about technique. And you give your daughter a bunch of jiu-jitsu and a little bit of Muay Thai.
What’s the real beautiful thing about jiu-jitsu? It’s like when you talk about if you wanted to get your daughter into a martial art, “Should I put my daughter into karate or should I put her into this?” You put your daughter into jiu-jitsu 100% because it’s not about size or strength, it’s about technique. And you give your daughter a bunch of jiu-jitsu and a little bit of Muay Thai.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, she becomes dangerous.
Yeah, she becomes dangerous.
Dana White
It’s like the perfect combo. Because you can put your son into anything. Your son can get into some… Boys are going to learn how to fight and they’re going to do whatever. But girls are different. And the other thing, I mean, this is the biggest selling point for jiu-jitsu for women. I mean, when a woman, no matter how big, how small can put a guy to sleep in three and a half seconds.
It’s like the perfect combo. Because you can put your son into anything. Your son can get into some… Boys are going to learn how to fight and they’re going to do whatever. But girls are different. And the other thing, I mean, this is the biggest selling point for jiu-jitsu for women. I mean, when a woman, no matter how big, how small can put a guy to sleep in three and a half seconds.
Origin of UFC
Lex Fridman
What’s the origin story of the UFC as it is today as you’ve created it and you and Lorenzo and Fertitta brothers built it?
What’s the origin story of the UFC as it is today as you’ve created it and you and Lorenzo and Fertitta brothers built it?
Dana White
It started with John Lewis and seeing him. Frank and I were out one night at the Hard Rock and John Lewis was there and he’s like, “Oh, that’s that ultimate fighting guy.” And I was like, ” I know him.” And Frank’s like, “I’ve always wanted to learn ground fighting.” And I said, “Yeah, I’m interested in it too.” So we went over, we talked to John Lewis and we made an appointment to wrestle with him on Monday. And we told Lorenzo and Lorenzo came with us. And that was the beginning of the end. I mean, we started doing jiu-jitsu and started to meet a lot of the fighters.
It started with John Lewis and seeing him. Frank and I were out one night at the Hard Rock and John Lewis was there and he’s like, “Oh, that’s that ultimate fighting guy.” And I was like, ” I know him.” And Frank’s like, “I’ve always wanted to learn ground fighting.” And I said, “Yeah, I’m interested in it too.” So we went over, we talked to John Lewis and we made an appointment to wrestle with him on Monday. And we told Lorenzo and Lorenzo came with us. And that was the beginning of the end. I mean, we started doing jiu-jitsu and started to meet a lot of the fighters.
At the time, there was a stigma attached to the sport that these guys were despicable, disgusting human beings, which was the furthest thing from the truth. These kids had all gone to college, had college degrees, most of them because they wrestled in college. And we started to meet some of them. We loved the different stories. You had Chuck Liddell who had this mohawk, looks like an ax murderer, but graduated from Cal Poly with honors in accounting. Then you had Matt Hughes who was this farm boy, literally lived on a farm. And so there were all these cool stories with all these good people that weren’t what people thought they were. And Lorenzo and I always felt like there’s something here. If this thing was done the right way, this could be big.
And what was crazy was I was in a contract negotiation with Bob Meyrowitz, the old owner of the UFC over Tito’s contract and Chuck Liddell. They didn’t even want Chuck Liddell in the UFC.I was trying to get Chuck in the UFC and they didn’t even want him. And we got into this contract dispute over Tito’s contract and Bob Meyrowitz said, “You know what? There is no more money, okay? I don’t even know if I’ll even be able to put on one more event.” And he flipped out. When we hung up the phone, I literally picked up the phone and called Lorenzo and I said, “Hey, I just got off the phone with Bob Meyrowitz, the owner of the UFC, I think they’re in trouble and I think we could buy it and I think we should. You should reach out to him.” So Lorenzo called Meyrowitz, and I don’t remember the timeline, but within the next two months, we ended up owning the UFC for $2 million bucks.
Lex Fridman
And you’ve said that you fought a lot of battles during that time.
And you’ve said that you fought a lot of battles during that time.
Dana White
I mean, the early days of building this company and building the sport, it was the wild, wild west, man. It was crazy back then. I was literally at war every day with all different types of people. Plus traditionally, there’s bad people that are involved in fighting, man, there’s lots of bad people. And we had to sift our way through that for the first seven, eight years.
I mean, the early days of building this company and building the sport, it was the wild, wild west, man. It was crazy back then. I was literally at war every day with all different types of people. Plus traditionally, there’s bad people that are involved in fighting, man, there’s lots of bad people. And we had to sift our way through that for the first seven, eight years.
Lex Fridman
So in general, there’s corruption that people steal money. They’re thinking just about themselves, not the bigger business.
So in general, there’s corruption that people steal money. They’re thinking just about themselves, not the bigger business.
Dana White
Let me tell you about this. I mean, I want to say it was the Netherlands. I don’t remember exactly where. It could have been Amsterdam. I mean, MMA promoters were like car bombing each other, and then the other guy shot up the other guy’s house with machine guns and that’s the kind of shit that was going on. I’ll tell you the story. So Affliction, do you remember Affliction?
Let me tell you about this. I mean, I want to say it was the Netherlands. I don’t remember exactly where. It could have been Amsterdam. I mean, MMA promoters were like car bombing each other, and then the other guy shot up the other guy’s house with machine guns and that’s the kind of shit that was going on. I’ll tell you the story. So Affliction, do you remember Affliction?
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Dana White
So there was a guy, I want to say his name was Todd Beard or something like that. This guy used to text me every day when they started their MMA thing telling me he was going to kill me.
So there was a guy, I want to say his name was Todd Beard or something like that. This guy used to text me every day when they started their MMA thing telling me he was going to kill me.
Lex Fridman
Legitimately, that’s what-
Legitimately, that’s what-
Dana White
Legitimately going to kill me. “You punk motherfucker. I’m going to fucking kill you. You don’t understand who I am and what I’ve done,” and this and that. I think this guy would get drunk or do drugs every night or whatever his deal was. This guy would call me, text me, and threaten my life every day. I used to go, “Fuck you,” and this and that.
Legitimately going to kill me. “You punk motherfucker. I’m going to fucking kill you. You don’t understand who I am and what I’ve done,” and this and that. I think this guy would get drunk or do drugs every night or whatever his deal was. This guy would call me, text me, and threaten my life every day. I used to go, “Fuck you,” and this and that.
Lex Fridman
You said, “Fuck you” to that guy?
You said, “Fuck you” to that guy?
Dana White
Oh yeah, man. Especially back then. But I mean, this is the type of shit that went on in the early days. This guy who was one of the owners of Affliction was not a good human, let’s put it that way.
Oh yeah, man. Especially back then. But I mean, this is the type of shit that went on in the early days. This guy who was one of the owners of Affliction was not a good human, let’s put it that way.
Lex Fridman
What about the business side of it? It’s tough to make money in this business.
What about the business side of it? It’s tough to make money in this business.
Dana White
Yeah, we weren’t making money, so trying to build this thing corrupt. The guys that worked for In Demand pay-per-view at the time were not good dudes and that thing was a fucking total monopoly. God, I wish I could remember his name right now. He used to run In Demand and he was a fucking bad guy. Then he comes over and starts running DirecTV, who we always had a great relationship with and he’s the reason we left DirecTV and said, “Fuck it. We’ll just go streaming then.” I don’t remember his name. I’d have to ask Lorenzo.
Yeah, we weren’t making money, so trying to build this thing corrupt. The guys that worked for In Demand pay-per-view at the time were not good dudes and that thing was a fucking total monopoly. God, I wish I could remember his name right now. He used to run In Demand and he was a fucking bad guy. Then he comes over and starts running DirecTV, who we always had a great relationship with and he’s the reason we left DirecTV and said, “Fuck it. We’ll just go streaming then.” I don’t remember his name. I’d have to ask Lorenzo.
Lex Fridman
So in general, just in this whole space, there’s a lot of shady people?
So in general, just in this whole space, there’s a lot of shady people?
Dana White
Everybody you deal with, you’re dealing with a lot of different forces and your hands are in a lot of different businesses. From the venue business to the merchandise business to the video game business, the pay-per-view business, the list goes on and on of all the different types of… The production…
Everybody you deal with, you’re dealing with a lot of different forces and your hands are in a lot of different businesses. From the venue business to the merchandise business to the video game business, the pay-per-view business, the list goes on and on of all the different types of… The production…
Dana White
The list goes on and on of all the different types of the production business, of all these different… When I first started this, we had a production team that was the production team that was in it before we bought it. So there was this incident with Phil Baroni, where Phil Baroni, we did an interview with him, and Baroni flips out in the interview when they’re interviewing him and goes crazy. And I thought it was awesome. So I’m like, “We’re going to leave this in. We’re going to leave this interview in.” And the production guys were arguing with me. They’re like, “We can’t leave this in. This is totally unprofessional.” I said, “I don’t give a shit. This is what we’re doing. We’re going to do this and clip it like this and do it like that.”
The list goes on and on of all the different types of the production business, of all these different… When I first started this, we had a production team that was the production team that was in it before we bought it. So there was this incident with Phil Baroni, where Phil Baroni, we did an interview with him, and Baroni flips out in the interview when they’re interviewing him and goes crazy. And I thought it was awesome. So I’m like, “We’re going to leave this in. We’re going to leave this interview in.” And the production guys were arguing with me. They’re like, “We can’t leave this in. This is totally unprofessional.” I said, “I don’t give a shit. This is what we’re doing. We’re going to do this and clip it like this and do it like that.”
We’re sitting in the venue that night, and I lean over to Lorenzo because the fight’s coming up. I go, wait till you see this interview with Baroni. They didn’t fucking do it. They didn’t do it. These guys were guys that were freelance guys that worked for Showtime at the time or something like that.
Lex Fridman
[inaudible 00:24:03].
[inaudible 00:24:03].
Dana White
I literally got up from my fucking seat, went back there, kicked the fucking door of the truck open, and I said, “You motherfuckers. You ever do that again and I’ll fire every one of you.” Let’s just put it this way. I ended up firing every one of them anyway and going with a whole new crew. But these were the type of things that early on… There’s so much stuff. I mean, I could sit here for three days and walk you through all the stuff that used to go on back in those days. But it was the Wild Wild West, man.
I literally got up from my fucking seat, went back there, kicked the fucking door of the truck open, and I said, “You motherfuckers. You ever do that again and I’ll fire every one of you.” Let’s just put it this way. I ended up firing every one of them anyway and going with a whole new crew. But these were the type of things that early on… There’s so much stuff. I mean, I could sit here for three days and walk you through all the stuff that used to go on back in those days. But it was the Wild Wild West, man.
Lex Fridman
But how’d you figure out, how’d you know how to deal with all this mess? First of all, to fire people, to fire people that aren’t doing a good job, all of that. How to be a leader, how to be a…
But how’d you figure out, how’d you know how to deal with all this mess? First of all, to fire people, to fire people that aren’t doing a good job, all of that. How to be a leader, how to be a…
Dana White
Well, that’s the thing too.
Well, that’s the thing too.
Lex Fridman
… business leader.
… business leader.
Dana White
In the early days, there was two employees, me and another girl that worked for me, for my company before I started doing this, and then we slowly started to bring people on and you started to build a team. And then before you know it, we had 10 people. We used to do our Christmas parties back then too. There’d be eight to ten people at our Christmas party. But a lot of it is, you’ll learn as you go. You know what me and the Fertittas knew about production when we bought this UFC? I want to say we had two or three weeks to pull off an event. This is what we knew about production.
In the early days, there was two employees, me and another girl that worked for me, for my company before I started doing this, and then we slowly started to bring people on and you started to build a team. And then before you know it, we had 10 people. We used to do our Christmas parties back then too. There’d be eight to ten people at our Christmas party. But a lot of it is, you’ll learn as you go. You know what me and the Fertittas knew about production when we bought this UFC? I want to say we had two or three weeks to pull off an event. This is what we knew about production.
Lex Fridman
Really?
Really?
Dana White
Jack shit. So we had to dive in and we had to learn it. We had to figure it out, and we knew what we wanted. We knew what we liked. We knew what we were looking for. It’s just about building a good team, and I think that’s one of the things, if you want to talk about what I’ve accomplished in the last 25 years of my life, I’ve been really good at building teams.
Jack shit. So we had to dive in and we had to learn it. We had to figure it out, and we knew what we wanted. We knew what we liked. We knew what we were looking for. It’s just about building a good team, and I think that’s one of the things, if you want to talk about what I’ve accomplished in the last 25 years of my life, I’ve been really good at building teams.
Lex Fridman
Already have a vision of what you want the final thing to look like, and then build a team that can bring that to life.
Already have a vision of what you want the final thing to look like, and then build a team that can bring that to life.
Dana White
A hundred percent. Well, you have to have the vision. Without the vision, there’s nothing. So that’s sort of what I do. I am the vision part of this thing. We’re going to open a PI in Mexico, we’re going to do this, we’re going to do that. And then you build the team to come in and help execute.
A hundred percent. Well, you have to have the vision. Without the vision, there’s nothing. So that’s sort of what I do. I am the vision part of this thing. We’re going to open a PI in Mexico, we’re going to do this, we’re going to do that. And then you build the team to come in and help execute.
Lex Fridman
A lot of people that do fighting promotions fail. You succeeded against the long odds. What’s the secret to your success, if you would, just looking back over the years?
A lot of people that do fighting promotions fail. You succeeded against the long odds. What’s the secret to your success, if you would, just looking back over the years?
Dana White
Well, the secret to success, I would say, first of all is passion and consistency. You have to love what you do. You have to get up every day. And I get here every day at 9:30 in the morning. When we sold in 2016, a lot of people in the company made a lot of money, and they all took off and they retired. Other than the Fertittas, I made the most money. I’m still here. I get here at 9:30 every morning. Last night I left here at 8:30. And I don’t know how late I’m going to be here tonight, but I love what I do. We get up every day and grind. I work just as hard now as I did back then.
Well, the secret to success, I would say, first of all is passion and consistency. You have to love what you do. You have to get up every day. And I get here every day at 9:30 in the morning. When we sold in 2016, a lot of people in the company made a lot of money, and they all took off and they retired. Other than the Fertittas, I made the most money. I’m still here. I get here at 9:30 every morning. Last night I left here at 8:30. And I don’t know how late I’m going to be here tonight, but I love what I do. We get up every day and grind. I work just as hard now as I did back then.
The difference between back then and now is I don’t have to do a bunch of the that I don’t really like to do, like budget meetings. I don’t like budget meetings. I sat through enough fucking budget meetings and… Horrible budget meetings. Horrible. We’re losing millions of dollars a year, and I’m in these budget meetings. So I get to pick and choose what I do these days. Back in the early days, you don’t get to pick and choose. You have to be involved in everything.
Lex Fridman
So cost, you’re just looking at cost and stuff.
So cost, you’re just looking at cost and stuff.
Dana White
A hundred percent. You literally go through line by line, every fucking number in the company and where did the money go and how can we save costs? How can we do this better? How can we… They are brutal, and there are multiple times a week and-
A hundred percent. You literally go through line by line, every fucking number in the company and where did the money go and how can we save costs? How can we do this better? How can we… They are brutal, and there are multiple times a week and-
Lex Fridman
Probably helps to deeply appreciate how much this shit costs though.
Probably helps to deeply appreciate how much this shit costs though.
Dana White
A hundred percent. Well, you have to know that. In the early days when you start your business, you have these people, who, when I hear them say, “You know what? I want to work for myself. I want to create my own schedule, and I want to do all the…” If that’s your thought process going into it, you’re never going to be successful. You have to pay attention to every single detail of the business early on. You’re involved in everything. There’s no days off, there’s no birthdays, there’s no Christmas, there’s none of that shit. I literally moved the birth of my second son for a Chuck Liddell fight. We had a Chuck Liddell fight coming up and they’re like, “Yeah, your son’s going to be born on this date.” And I’m like, “Yeah, that’s not going to work. We’re going to have to take him earlier. So they literally gave my wife a C-section and took my son early.
A hundred percent. Well, you have to know that. In the early days when you start your business, you have these people, who, when I hear them say, “You know what? I want to work for myself. I want to create my own schedule, and I want to do all the…” If that’s your thought process going into it, you’re never going to be successful. You have to pay attention to every single detail of the business early on. You’re involved in everything. There’s no days off, there’s no birthdays, there’s no Christmas, there’s none of that shit. I literally moved the birth of my second son for a Chuck Liddell fight. We had a Chuck Liddell fight coming up and they’re like, “Yeah, your son’s going to be born on this date.” And I’m like, “Yeah, that’s not going to work. We’re going to have to take him earlier. So they literally gave my wife a C-section and took my son early.
Lex Fridman
You were all in.
You were all in.
Dana White
All in. Yeah.
All in. Yeah.
Lex Fridman
And the fascinating thing, like you said, you’ve said that you could care less about money. You’re doing this for the love of it.
And the fascinating thing, like you said, you’ve said that you could care less about money. You’re doing this for the love of it.
Dana White
Yeah, I was doing this when I was broke, and I’m doing this now when I’m not broke. I’m doing this because I love it. And I feel like there’s so much more to do, and this is truly my passion in life. It’s like the Sphere. We’re doing the Sphere? Why? Why would I do the Sphere? It’s going to cost me a bunch of money. It’s really challenging. Most people think it can’t be pulled off, and you’re looking at weird angles, different things going on inside other than the fight and all this other stuff. But yeah, I’m doing it because it’s awesome and it’s challenging and it’s hard, and I think that if anybody can do it right, it’s us. So why not take that challenge?
Yeah, I was doing this when I was broke, and I’m doing this now when I’m not broke. I’m doing this because I love it. And I feel like there’s so much more to do, and this is truly my passion in life. It’s like the Sphere. We’re doing the Sphere? Why? Why would I do the Sphere? It’s going to cost me a bunch of money. It’s really challenging. Most people think it can’t be pulled off, and you’re looking at weird angles, different things going on inside other than the fight and all this other stuff. But yeah, I’m doing it because it’s awesome and it’s challenging and it’s hard, and I think that if anybody can do it right, it’s us. So why not take that challenge?
Lex Fridman
It’s actually why I’m here. I’m going to the Sphere for the first time because I’m hanging out with Darren Aronofsky who put together the thing that’s in there now, and I can’t believe you’re thinking of… I don’t know how you’re going to solve that puzzle.
It’s actually why I’m here. I’m going to the Sphere for the first time because I’m hanging out with Darren Aronofsky who put together the thing that’s in there now, and I can’t believe you’re thinking of… I don’t know how you’re going to solve that puzzle.
Dana White
There’s many puzzles to solve for this one. Many puzzles.
There’s many puzzles to solve for this one. Many puzzles.
Lex Fridman
Can you speak to that? What are interesting challenges that you’re encountering?
Can you speak to that? What are interesting challenges that you’re encountering?
Dana White
Yeah, so there’s a lot. So you have the octagon and then behind it is the world’s biggest screen, ever. So what is the theme? How do you program it? First of all, it’s super expensive to shoot, and the format for the Sphere, angles. We were talking about today. I just had a big meeting today about the Sphere this afternoon, and making sure that all my departments, all the details that I want all start to come together here in the next two weeks. I want the creative, the commercial. I have some goals. I will tell people as we get closer what I’m looking to achieve with this other than putting on one of the greatest, most unique sporting events of all time, and probably the greatest combat sporting event of all time. But yeah, there’s challenges. There’s a laundry list of challenges for this thing, and not to mention the fact that it’s on Mexican Independence Day, and we’re going to weave in the whole history of combat in Mexico-
Yeah, so there’s a lot. So you have the octagon and then behind it is the world’s biggest screen, ever. So what is the theme? How do you program it? First of all, it’s super expensive to shoot, and the format for the Sphere, angles. We were talking about today. I just had a big meeting today about the Sphere this afternoon, and making sure that all my departments, all the details that I want all start to come together here in the next two weeks. I want the creative, the commercial. I have some goals. I will tell people as we get closer what I’m looking to achieve with this other than putting on one of the greatest, most unique sporting events of all time, and probably the greatest combat sporting event of all time. But yeah, there’s challenges. There’s a laundry list of challenges for this thing, and not to mention the fact that it’s on Mexican Independence Day, and we’re going to weave in the whole history of combat in Mexico-
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Nice.
Yeah. Nice.
Dana White
… into this event.
… into this event.
Lex Fridman
But the production, this is hilarious, because you were just talking about knowing nothing about production, so many years ago.
But the production, this is hilarious, because you were just talking about knowing nothing about production, so many years ago.
Dana White
And now tackling the Sphere, yeah.
And now tackling the Sphere, yeah.
Lex Fridman
The hardest production effort.
The hardest production effort.
Dana White
Ever.
Ever.
Lex Fridman
And that will be live?
And that will be live?
Dana White
It’ll be live. It’ll be live on pay-per-view, it’ll be live in the arena, and it’ll also be in movie theaters.
It’ll be live. It’ll be live on pay-per-view, it’ll be live in the arena, and it’ll also be in movie theaters.
Lex Fridman
Nice. So it will be shown at the Sphere later too? Will you try to create an experience?
Nice. So it will be shown at the Sphere later too? Will you try to create an experience?
Dana White
ESPN’s doing a doc on it.
ESPN’s doing a doc on it.
Lex Fridman
Nice.
Nice.
Dana White
The making of the Sphere. Yeah.
The making of the Sphere. Yeah.
Lex Fridman
Well, you’re feeling good about it?
Well, you’re feeling good about it?
Dana White
Oh, yeah. I feel incredible about it. I can’t wait. It’s going to be fun.
Oh, yeah. I feel incredible about it. I can’t wait. It’s going to be fun.
Lex Fridman
I can’t wait to see how you solve the puzzle.
I can’t wait to see how you solve the puzzle.
Joe Rogan
Dana White
Thank you.
Thank you.
Lex Fridman
Another guy that I feel like could care less about the money is Joe Rogan. How important is he to the UFC, to the rise of the UFC, and what in general do you love about Joe?
Another guy that I feel like could care less about the money is Joe Rogan. How important is he to the UFC, to the rise of the UFC, and what in general do you love about Joe?
Dana White
It’s a fact, he doesn’t care about money, and he did the first 13 shows for free for us. You know what I mean? That was at a time when we were hurting and he’s like, “Wait a minute, you want me to do the commentary? You’re saying that I get to sit in the best seat in the house and watch these fights for free? Yeah, I’m in.” And then obviously, when we turned things around, we made it up to Joe. But Joe is one of the things that I loved early on about…
It’s a fact, he doesn’t care about money, and he did the first 13 shows for free for us. You know what I mean? That was at a time when we were hurting and he’s like, “Wait a minute, you want me to do the commentary? You’re saying that I get to sit in the best seat in the house and watch these fights for free? Yeah, I’m in.” And then obviously, when we turned things around, we made it up to Joe. But Joe is one of the things that I loved early on about…
So I’ll tell you the story. So we buy the UFC. They’re based in New York. We’re moving the corporate offices to Vegas. So I have to fly out to New York, go into the offices and start going through everything and figuring out what needs to come back to Vegas and what we can just throw away. So they literally had a VHS machine and a TV, and there were a million tapes in this place, man. So I didn’t know what tapes were these definitely we have to keep, or these we don’t need. So I had to sit there and go through every single tape. And I popped in a tape and there was an interview on the Ivory Keenen Wayans show, the oldest Wayans brother, and he had a talk show at the time, and he had Joe Rogan, the guy from Fear Factor on the show, and he was promoting Fear Factor, but all he would talk about was UFC.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, that’s Joe.
Yeah, that’s Joe.
Dana White
And he was talking about how people think that these guys in the martial arts movies are tough, and he was talking about what UFC fighters would do to these martial arts guys if they ever got their hands on them. And I was like, this is exactly what I need. A guy who isn’t afraid to speak his mind and knows the sport inside and out, but more importantly, is super passionate about it and loves it.
And he was talking about how people think that these guys in the martial arts movies are tough, and he was talking about what UFC fighters would do to these martial arts guys if they ever got their hands on them. And I was like, this is exactly what I need. A guy who isn’t afraid to speak his mind and knows the sport inside and out, but more importantly, is super passionate about it and loves it.
So when you see Joe Rogan on camera, and I was talking about the paid talking heads that they had in HBO boxing that were terrible, Joe Rogan does not come off as a paid talking head. He comes off as a guy who loves this. And so early on, no media would cover us. So I had to buy my way onto radio. So we’d do these radio tours, and they would drop us in. You’d have to get up at 3:30 in the morning in Vegas, on the west coast, because they’re at 6:30 in the morning in New York and Boston and Florida and all these other places. So they drop you into these markets to do radio, and the fighters were horrible at it. Fighters getting up at 3:30 in the morning, especially leading up to a fight, never good. They sound like they’re tired, they act like they’re tired, and they definitely act like they don’t want to be on there, and it’s bad radio. What you can’t have is bad radio. So the only two people that could pull off these radio tours were me and Joe Rogan. So me and Joe Rogan would alternate doing these radio tours all over the country.
Lex Fridman
Just talking about fighting, talking about-
Just talking about fighting, talking about-
Dana White
Exactly.
Exactly.
Lex Fridman
… what this whole thing is,
… what this whole thing is,
Dana White
A hundred percent.
A hundred percent.
Lex Fridman
… getting people excited.
… getting people excited.
Dana White
Two guys that are really into it and passionate about it and love it. And it’s one of the things about Rogan too, when early on, nobody understood the ground game. Joe Rogan would walk you through what was happening literally before it would happen. He would tell you the setup, what was going to come next and everything. He’d just absolutely articulate it perfectly, brilliantly, and people at home started to understand. And the impact that Joe Rogan has had and continues to have on this sport is immeasurable. He’s the biggest podcaster in the world, and he is on the UFC pay-per-views 14 times a year, and he’s always talking about the sport. It’s immeasurable what this guy has done for this company and the sport.
Two guys that are really into it and passionate about it and love it. And it’s one of the things about Rogan too, when early on, nobody understood the ground game. Joe Rogan would walk you through what was happening literally before it would happen. He would tell you the setup, what was going to come next and everything. He’d just absolutely articulate it perfectly, brilliantly, and people at home started to understand. And the impact that Joe Rogan has had and continues to have on this sport is immeasurable. He’s the biggest podcaster in the world, and he is on the UFC pay-per-views 14 times a year, and he’s always talking about the sport. It’s immeasurable what this guy has done for this company and the sport.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, still to this day, like I’ll have dinner with him offline, he’ll just talk fighting. He just loves it.
Yeah, still to this day, like I’ll have dinner with him offline, he’ll just talk fighting. He just loves it.
Dana White
It’s true.
It’s true.
Lex Fridman
Loves every aspect of it.
Loves every aspect of it.
Dana White
Yep. Joe Rogan is one of those guys. I saw that early on. Why would you go after the Fear Factor guy to be such a key component, to not only the company, but to the sport? I saw it in the fucking interview on Ivory Keenen Wayans.
Yep. Joe Rogan is one of those guys. I saw that early on. Why would you go after the Fear Factor guy to be such a key component, to not only the company, but to the sport? I saw it in the fucking interview on Ivory Keenen Wayans.
Lex Fridman
I value loyalty a lot, and I remember there was a moment not too long ago, maybe a year ago when I was sitting with Joe and he had a phone call with you. Joe was getting canceled for something, and they didn’t want him commentating the fights, and you on the phone offered your resignation over this. I got teary-eyed over that. That’s such a… You’re a good man. You know?
I value loyalty a lot, and I remember there was a moment not too long ago, maybe a year ago when I was sitting with Joe and he had a phone call with you. Joe was getting canceled for something, and they didn’t want him commentating the fights, and you on the phone offered your resignation over this. I got teary-eyed over that. That’s such a… You’re a good man. You know?
Dana White
Thank you.
Thank you.
Lex Fridman
That was powerful.
That was powerful.
Dana White
Anybody who is with me, has been with me, knows. When you’re with me, you’re with me. It’s a two-way street. It’s not a one-way street. I’m not one of these guys that is going to roll over and… It’s like going through COVID. I wasn’t laying any of these people. Some of these people have been with me for 20 years. We’re going to lay them off. This will motherfucker will burn, burn, before I would do that to my people. None of that type of stuff is ever going to happen while I’m here. I can’t say what’s going to happen when I leave, but when I’m here, the people who are with me and have been with me, they know exactly what’s up, and Joe knows what’s up. And again, it’s a two-way street. Joe Rogan has been very loyal to me, and I’m very loyal to Joe Rogan.
Anybody who is with me, has been with me, knows. When you’re with me, you’re with me. It’s a two-way street. It’s not a one-way street. I’m not one of these guys that is going to roll over and… It’s like going through COVID. I wasn’t laying any of these people. Some of these people have been with me for 20 years. We’re going to lay them off. This will motherfucker will burn, burn, before I would do that to my people. None of that type of stuff is ever going to happen while I’m here. I can’t say what’s going to happen when I leave, but when I’m here, the people who are with me and have been with me, they know exactly what’s up, and Joe knows what’s up. And again, it’s a two-way street. Joe Rogan has been very loyal to me, and I’m very loyal to Joe Rogan.
Lorenzo Fertitta
Lex Fridman
Lorenzo, another guy you have close friendship with, you seem to have been extremely effective together as business partners. What’s the magic behind that? How can you explain that?
Lorenzo, another guy you have close friendship with, you seem to have been extremely effective together as business partners. What’s the magic behind that? How can you explain that?
Dana White
I love him. Lorenzo and I work really well together because we have two different personalities. I’m the guy that always… I’m going here. Lorenzo was always here. You could walk in a room and say, “Lorenzo, you just lost $10 million. Lorenzo, you just won $10 million.” It never changes. And I’m a guy that goes like this, right? So we almost balance each other out. There’s a lot of things that he’s really fucking good at, and there’s a lot of things that I’m really good at, and they’re both on the opposite sides of the spectrum.
I love him. Lorenzo and I work really well together because we have two different personalities. I’m the guy that always… I’m going here. Lorenzo was always here. You could walk in a room and say, “Lorenzo, you just lost $10 million. Lorenzo, you just won $10 million.” It never changes. And I’m a guy that goes like this, right? So we almost balance each other out. There’s a lot of things that he’s really fucking good at, and there’s a lot of things that I’m really good at, and they’re both on the opposite sides of the spectrum.
Lex Fridman
So that level headed thing was useful when the UFC was losing money and it was unknown whether it’s going to survive those low points?
So that level headed thing was useful when the UFC was losing money and it was unknown whether it’s going to survive those low points?
Dana White
Yeah. A hundred percent. What’s incredible when you think of the story of the UFC, at the time the casino business was cranking, and station casinos was killing it. And stations, their money from stations is what was funding the UFC. Then in the ’08, ‘9 crash, the UFC was killing it in ’08 and ’09, and the casino businesses were hurting. So timing on everything, the way that it all worked out couldn’t have worked out better for them, and obviously for all of us. When you think about the UFC and how big it is and how far it reaches and how many people it touches, the Fertittas Brothers made a $2 million investment, then put in another 44 million, and look at how many lives that investment has changed over the last 25 years. It’s fascinating.
Yeah. A hundred percent. What’s incredible when you think of the story of the UFC, at the time the casino business was cranking, and station casinos was killing it. And stations, their money from stations is what was funding the UFC. Then in the ’08, ‘9 crash, the UFC was killing it in ’08 and ’09, and the casino businesses were hurting. So timing on everything, the way that it all worked out couldn’t have worked out better for them, and obviously for all of us. When you think about the UFC and how big it is and how far it reaches and how many people it touches, the Fertittas Brothers made a $2 million investment, then put in another 44 million, and look at how many lives that investment has changed over the last 25 years. It’s fascinating.
Lex Fridman
And it’s also crazy. Just forget the business of it. Just the effect it has on the history of humanity in terms of this is what we do, we’re descendants of apes that fight. And this is like the organizations that catalyze the innovation in how we fight. It’s crazy.
And it’s also crazy. Just forget the business of it. Just the effect it has on the history of humanity in terms of this is what we do, we’re descendants of apes that fight. And this is like the organizations that catalyze the innovation in how we fight. It’s crazy.
Dana White
[inaudible 00:40:13].
[inaudible 00:40:13].
Lex Fridman
You created a whole new sport.
You created a whole new sport.
Dana White
That people all over the world participate in now. Literally, there isn’t a place on earth that we can’t get a fighter from now.
That people all over the world participate in now. Literally, there isn’t a place on earth that we can’t get a fighter from now.
Great fighters
Lex Fridman
You said in the UFC 299 post-fight press conference that sometimes fighters might complain that they get matched up, uneven odds, but that’s actually when legends are made. I think you gave Dustin Poirier as an example. Can you elaborate on that a little bit? What makes a legend, what makes greatness in a fight?
You said in the UFC 299 post-fight press conference that sometimes fighters might complain that they get matched up, uneven odds, but that’s actually when legends are made. I think you gave Dustin Poirier as an example. Can you elaborate on that a little bit? What makes a legend, what makes greatness in a fight?
Dana White
So behind the scenes, fighters are a very paranoid bunch of people. They’re very paranoid, and there’s been this theme with fighters where they’re trying to get me beat, right? We don’t determine who wins and loses. If we did, we’d be the WWE, okay? You do. I’m the bells and whistles guy. I make sure that as many people that we can possibly let know that you’re fighting on Saturday know that you’re fighting on Saturday. Who you are, who you’re going against, and why people should give a shit. That’s what I do.
So behind the scenes, fighters are a very paranoid bunch of people. They’re very paranoid, and there’s been this theme with fighters where they’re trying to get me beat, right? We don’t determine who wins and loses. If we did, we’d be the WWE, okay? You do. I’m the bells and whistles guy. I make sure that as many people that we can possibly let know that you’re fighting on Saturday know that you’re fighting on Saturday. Who you are, who you’re going against, and why people should give a shit. That’s what I do.
Then the night you show up, I put on the best live event that I possibly can, and I put on the best television show that I possibly can. Once that door shuts, it’s all up to you. You determine whether you lose or not. And if you get into a position where you become so paranoid that you think that the powers that be here are against you, and you try to steer yourself away from certain fights… That’s one of the big things that happens in these other organizations. In these other organizations, the inmates run the asylum. So if they don’t want to fight bad enough, these other companies don’t push and they don’t do this and they don’t… We put on the best possible matchups that we can make.
And in this business, you might be an older fighter, but if you’re still ranked in the top 10, there’s young guys coming for you. Killers. Young killers are coming out and they want your position. So you being the veteran that you are have to prepare yourself to go in. And everybody was saying, when we made that fight with Saint-Denis that Poirier was in big trouble, dah, dah, dah, dah, dah. That’s awesome. That helps build the entire thing that Poirier, and then Poirier goes out and does what he did that night. That’s what makes fucking legends.
Lex Fridman
It’s interesting because sometimes being the underdog is a really good thing for the long-term story of who you are as a fighter.
It’s interesting because sometimes being the underdog is a really good thing for the long-term story of who you are as a fighter.
Dana White
Especially when you’re a big name and a name that people recognize and a name that people know. And they’re like, “Oh man.” I remember Israel Adesanya and Sean Strickland. A hundred out of a hundred people knew for a fact that Israel was going to win that fight, and here comes Strickland. And we could go on for days with this. You know what I mean? That is what creates legendary moments, legendary fights, and it’s what builds stars and legends.
Especially when you’re a big name and a name that people recognize and a name that people know. And they’re like, “Oh man.” I remember Israel Adesanya and Sean Strickland. A hundred out of a hundred people knew for a fact that Israel was going to win that fight, and here comes Strickland. And we could go on for days with this. You know what I mean? That is what creates legendary moments, legendary fights, and it’s what builds stars and legends.
Lex Fridman
Arguably, Conor McGregor with Jose Aldo.
Arguably, Conor McGregor with Jose Aldo.
Dana White
Yep. Conor McGregor with a bunch of people in the beginning. People said he couldn’t wrestle, people said he wouldn’t be able to defend a take down, blah, blah, blah, blah. Nate Diaz against Conor McGregor, you know what I mean?
Yep. Conor McGregor with a bunch of people in the beginning. People said he couldn’t wrestle, people said he wouldn’t be able to defend a take down, blah, blah, blah, blah. Nate Diaz against Conor McGregor, you know what I mean?
Lex Fridman
Mm-hmm. And Conor McGregor against Khabib, underdog, probably. But if he won, there’s an opportunity to win. If he won, that’s the legend forming. He’s now in the conversation for the greatest of all time without argument.
Mm-hmm. And Conor McGregor against Khabib, underdog, probably. But if he won, there’s an opportunity to win. If he won, that’s the legend forming. He’s now in the conversation for the greatest of all time without argument.
Dana White
And if you look at the way that Khabib ran through so many people, Conor hung in there-
And if you look at the way that Khabib ran through so many people, Conor hung in there-
Lex Fridman
Yeah. It could have been.
Yeah. It could have been.
Dana White
… and made a fight of it.
… and made a fight of it.
Khabib vs Conor
Lex Fridman
It could have been. What do you think about that matchup? It’s one of the greats, one of the great matchups that you’ve made, Conor McGregor versus Khabib.
It could have been. What do you think about that matchup? It’s one of the greats, one of the great matchups that you’ve made, Conor McGregor versus Khabib.
Dana White
Yeah. At the time, I was incredibly criticized for putting together the spot that had the scene with the bus in it. The fucking medias, but they were saying that I was pandering to the violence that happened and trying to… I’m telling you a story, telling you a story of how we got here and how big this fight is, and how bad the blood is between these guys. And I mean, I think that’s what we do the best job at, is telling the fucking stories of why.
Yeah. At the time, I was incredibly criticized for putting together the spot that had the scene with the bus in it. The fucking medias, but they were saying that I was pandering to the violence that happened and trying to… I’m telling you a story, telling you a story of how we got here and how big this fight is, and how bad the blood is between these guys. And I mean, I think that’s what we do the best job at, is telling the fucking stories of why.
We go into Monday. It’s fight week. We got a whole list of things that we do fight week. And then you get right down to the press conference on Thursday, the weigh-ins on Friday, and then the fights on Saturday. Now my people fly back home, they go to bed on Sunday night, and it’s Groundhog Day. We wake up again on Monday and it starts all over again. Every weekend, every Saturday, for a year. So there’s lots of stories that need to be told, there’s lots of… When you think about what I compete with, whatever takes your attention on a Saturday night is my competitor.
Lex Fridman
So you’re always trying to build a foundation for great stories, and if the fighters step up, they step up and they can together create greatness.
So you’re always trying to build a foundation for great stories, and if the fighters step up, they step up and they can together create greatness.
Dana White
That’s it. That’s exactly right. So when we are aligned, like when you get to the UFC, I mean, you just saw it with MVP, you’re going to see it with Kayla Harrison.
That’s it. That’s exactly right. So when we are aligned, like when you get to the UFC, I mean, you just saw it with MVP, you’re going to see it with Kayla Harrison.
Dana White
You just saw it with MVP, you’re going to see it with Kayla Harrison and so many others that have come from other organizations, and they get here. They notice immediately the difference between fighting here and fighting wherever they were before. It’s not even comparable to the impact it has on you when you leave whatever organization you’re with and you come to the UFC. And I think that it gives them a sense of, holy shit. MVP when he came, I mean there were probably more people at the press conference than any fight he’d ever fought in, in Bellator. You know what I mean? And you feel that energy and you feel the difference of the impact of being here, and I think it takes a lot of these guys to another level.
You just saw it with MVP, you’re going to see it with Kayla Harrison and so many others that have come from other organizations, and they get here. They notice immediately the difference between fighting here and fighting wherever they were before. It’s not even comparable to the impact it has on you when you leave whatever organization you’re with and you come to the UFC. And I think that it gives them a sense of, holy shit. MVP when he came, I mean there were probably more people at the press conference than any fight he’d ever fought in, in Bellator. You know what I mean? And you feel that energy and you feel the difference of the impact of being here, and I think it takes a lot of these guys to another level.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. Just the aura of it.
Yeah. Just the aura of it.
Dana White
100%.
100%.
Lex Fridman
This is where you’re supposed to step up. Yeah, it’s the way people feel about Ted Talks, giving lectures.
This is where you’re supposed to step up. Yeah, it’s the way people feel about Ted Talks, giving lectures.
Dana White
Right.
Right.
Lex Fridman
This is your moment. You get 15 minutes and you better say some interesting shit. And Kayla Harrison, by the way, is a badass. I can’t wait to see what happens there.
This is your moment. You get 15 minutes and you better say some interesting shit. And Kayla Harrison, by the way, is a badass. I can’t wait to see what happens there.
Dana White
She was walking around with this sleeveless shirt the night of the fights and holy shit, she’s jacked, man. It’s crazy.
She was walking around with this sleeveless shirt the night of the fights and holy shit, she’s jacked, man. It’s crazy.
Lex Fridman
Two time Olympic gold medalist.
Two time Olympic gold medalist.
Dana White
Right.
Right.
Lex Fridman
You don’t fuck with those people. You win a medal, you’re made of something special.
You don’t fuck with those people. You win a medal, you’re made of something special.
Dana White
So true. Especially in judo.
So true. Especially in judo.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, especially in American judo where you don’t have many training partners that are great.
Yeah, especially in American judo where you don’t have many training partners that are great.
Dana White
That’s what I’m saying.
That’s what I’m saying.
Jon Jones
Lex Fridman
So you better fucking work for it. Ridiculous question, but who’s in the conversation for the greatest of all time?
So you better fucking work for it. Ridiculous question, but who’s in the conversation for the greatest of all time?
Dana White
Jon Jones.
Jon Jones.
Lex Fridman
You’ve talked about Jon Jones, but what are the metrics involved here?
You’ve talked about Jon Jones, but what are the metrics involved here?
Dana White
He’s never been beat. He destroyed everybody at light heavyweight, which at the time was the toughest weight class in the company, in the sport. And then he moved up to heavyweight, won easily at heavyweight. When you look at a guy and you look at what he was doing outside the octagon at the same time, which shouldn’t be part of it, shouldn’t be part of the equation, but when you do, wow, there’s no debate. Nobody can debate who’s the greatest of all time. It’s absolutely positively Jon Jones. He’s never lost. He’s never been beat in the octagon ever.
He’s never been beat. He destroyed everybody at light heavyweight, which at the time was the toughest weight class in the company, in the sport. And then he moved up to heavyweight, won easily at heavyweight. When you look at a guy and you look at what he was doing outside the octagon at the same time, which shouldn’t be part of it, shouldn’t be part of the equation, but when you do, wow, there’s no debate. Nobody can debate who’s the greatest of all time. It’s absolutely positively Jon Jones. He’s never lost. He’s never been beat in the octagon ever.
Lex Fridman
So that’s one of the metrics, pure sheer dominance. But there’s others. Losing sometimes is a catalyst for greatness.
So that’s one of the metrics, pure sheer dominance. But there’s others. Losing sometimes is a catalyst for greatness.
Dana White
I don’t disagree. But when you’ve never lost, you’ve never lost. We’ve never found somebody. And the other thing that you have to factor in too is longevity. Because sometimes with a lot of these guys, the sport passes them by. You get younger guys that are faster, this, that, and the sport evolves. Nobody’s been able to beat Jon Jones. Oh, and the other thing that you measure is, when you said dominance, it’s true, if you’re this guy that has unbelievable power and you’re just going in and you’re just fucking knocking everybody out and nobody’s ever pulled you into the deep water before, that was when my opinion of Jon Jones started to change.
I don’t disagree. But when you’ve never lost, you’ve never lost. We’ve never found somebody. And the other thing that you have to factor in too is longevity. Because sometimes with a lot of these guys, the sport passes them by. You get younger guys that are faster, this, that, and the sport evolves. Nobody’s been able to beat Jon Jones. Oh, and the other thing that you measure is, when you said dominance, it’s true, if you’re this guy that has unbelievable power and you’re just going in and you’re just fucking knocking everybody out and nobody’s ever pulled you into the deep water before, that was when my opinion of Jon Jones started to change.
Gustafsson took him into the deep water. Gustafsson hit him with some shit he’d never been hit with. Gustafsson tested him and put Jon Jones in a place where, I bet if you sat down and interviewed John Jones, going into the deep rounds of that, Jon Jones thought he was going to die. You know what I’m saying?
Lex Fridman
And he’s willing to go there.
And he’s willing to go there.
Dana White
And he kept going. He was willing, willing to do whatever it took to win that fight.
And he kept going. He was willing, willing to do whatever it took to win that fight.
Lex Fridman
And it breaks my heart because he beat DC, and DC is one of the greatest of all time.
And it breaks my heart because he beat DC, and DC is one of the greatest of all time.
Dana White
That’s the thing too. And I believe that DC doesn’t get the credit he deserves because of the Jon Jones thing. When you look at DC and what he’s accomplished, and Jon Jones beat him twice.
That’s the thing too. And I believe that DC doesn’t get the credit he deserves because of the Jon Jones thing. When you look at DC and what he’s accomplished, and Jon Jones beat him twice.
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Dana White
It’s undeniable. You can hate all you want. Jon Jones is the greatest of all time.
It’s undeniable. You can hate all you want. Jon Jones is the greatest of all time.
Lex Fridman
Do you think Habib was tested enough?
Do you think Habib was tested enough?
Dana White
I think that Habib had the potential to be in the running for that. He just didn’t stick around. First of all, he had injuries that he should have been where he got a lot sooner had he not had the injuries that he had and the setbacks in his career. But there’s no doubt, Habib is one of the all-time greats.
I think that Habib had the potential to be in the running for that. He just didn’t stick around. First of all, he had injuries that he should have been where he got a lot sooner had he not had the injuries that he had and the setbacks in his career. But there’s no doubt, Habib is one of the all-time greats.
Conor McGregor
Lex Fridman
What’s the good, the bad, and the ugly of your relationship with Conor?
What’s the good, the bad, and the ugly of your relationship with Conor?
Dana White
There’s literally no ugly. Conor McGregor has been an incredible partner to work with. If Conor showed up to things on time, there wouldn’t be one fucking bad thing I could say about Conor. You know what I mean?
There’s literally no ugly. Conor McGregor has been an incredible partner to work with. If Conor showed up to things on time, there wouldn’t be one fucking bad thing I could say about Conor. You know what I mean?
Lex Fridman
It’s only being late to shit?
It’s only being late to shit?
Dana White
If you put a fucking gun to my head and said, “Don’t lie, mother-fucker. Tell me all the bad things about Conor McGregor.” I’d say the guy doesn’t show up on time. That’s it.
If you put a fucking gun to my head and said, “Don’t lie, mother-fucker. Tell me all the bad things about Conor McGregor.” I’d say the guy doesn’t show up on time. That’s it.
Lex Fridman
That’s it.
That’s it.
Dana White
If Conor McGregor showed up to shit on time, and sometimes he does. Sometimes he does. He’s been a great partner. If you look at what a huge superstar he became, the fights that he was involved in, let me tell you what Conor McGregor never did. We never walked in a room and said, “Conor, this guy just fell out. We want you to fight this guy.” And he was like, “No way. I’m not taking this fucking risk. I’m at this point in my career where my money, my this, my that,” he was like, “Fuck it, let’s do it.” He’d always say, “Let’s do it.”
If Conor McGregor showed up to shit on time, and sometimes he does. Sometimes he does. He’s been a great partner. If you look at what a huge superstar he became, the fights that he was involved in, let me tell you what Conor McGregor never did. We never walked in a room and said, “Conor, this guy just fell out. We want you to fight this guy.” And he was like, “No way. I’m not taking this fucking risk. I’m at this point in my career where my money, my this, my that,” he was like, “Fuck it, let’s do it.” He’d always say, “Let’s do it.”
The other thing that Conor McGregor never did, no matter how big he was or whatever it was, and we were heading into a fight, “Oh, Conor, this guy just fell out. Aldo fell out. We’re looking for another,” “Yeah, I’ll do it, but I’m going to need another 200,000. I’m going to need another $1 million.” Conor McGregor never did that chicken shit, bullshit kind of stuff. He never did any of that. Conor was as solid a guy as you could possibly work with.
Lex Fridman
Just fuck it, I’ll do it.
Just fuck it, I’ll do it.
Dana White
I’ll do it. There’s actually a scene, because we were filming something, I don’t know if it was embedded or what we were filming at the time. Me and Lorenzo walk into his house that he rented here in Vegas, and I’m pretty sure it was when Aldo fell out, and we’re telling him this, that, and we’re looking at some options. He says, “I’m going to the gym. When I’m done working out, let me know.” He just woke up out of bed, he is in his fucking underwear, and he gets hit with this and he is like, “All right, I’m going to the gym. Let me know when I get out who I’m fighting.” Doesn’t care. Doesn’t want to know. Doesn’t want any more money. Nothing. Fucking shows up and he delivers. Conor has been incredibly successful, he’s made a lot of money, and he’s had his ups and downs outside and inside the octagon. But as for a guy who was on the dole and was a plumber, he’s actually a really smart businessman and he has been one of the best partners that I’ve ever had in the history of the sport.
I’ll do it. There’s actually a scene, because we were filming something, I don’t know if it was embedded or what we were filming at the time. Me and Lorenzo walk into his house that he rented here in Vegas, and I’m pretty sure it was when Aldo fell out, and we’re telling him this, that, and we’re looking at some options. He says, “I’m going to the gym. When I’m done working out, let me know.” He just woke up out of bed, he is in his fucking underwear, and he gets hit with this and he is like, “All right, I’m going to the gym. Let me know when I get out who I’m fighting.” Doesn’t care. Doesn’t want to know. Doesn’t want any more money. Nothing. Fucking shows up and he delivers. Conor has been incredibly successful, he’s made a lot of money, and he’s had his ups and downs outside and inside the octagon. But as for a guy who was on the dole and was a plumber, he’s actually a really smart businessman and he has been one of the best partners that I’ve ever had in the history of the sport.
Lex Fridman
And an important part of the history of the UFC.
And an important part of the history of the UFC.
Dana White
Big.
Big.
Lex Fridman
He opened it up to all kinds of new eyes.
He opened it up to all kinds of new eyes.
Dana White
Yep. He literally set Europe, Australia, Canada, and many other parts of the world on fire, man. He was our first legit megastar.
Yep. He literally set Europe, Australia, Canada, and many other parts of the world on fire, man. He was our first legit megastar.
Lex Fridman
And I personally think he doesn’t get enough credit for just how good he was as a fighter. People love to talk shit about Conor.
And I personally think he doesn’t get enough credit for just how good he was as a fighter. People love to talk shit about Conor.
Dana White
So true.
So true.
Lex Fridman
I suppose that’s part of his magic.
I suppose that’s part of his magic.
Dana White
But it comes with success. When you’re successful, there’s always people out there that are going to talk shit. You always have a bunch of know nothing, do nothing fucking losers that love to talk shit.
But it comes with success. When you’re successful, there’s always people out there that are going to talk shit. You always have a bunch of know nothing, do nothing fucking losers that love to talk shit.
Lex Fridman
You think if you were to do it all over again, Habib is the right matchup?
You think if you were to do it all over again, Habib is the right matchup?
Dana White
Yeah. Listen, the thing that you can’t do is avoid match-ups. You know what I mean? This is what we’re talking about when you talk about being a legend. Conor McGregor needed Habib. Habib needed Conor McGregor. You can hate each other as much as you want, but you have to fight these other legendary bad mother-fuckers to yourself. Become a legend. I mean, it’s like Jon Jones needed Cyril Gun and Cyril Gun needed Jon Jones, because if Cyril could have beat Jon, the first guy, if anybody can ever figure it out and beat Jon Jones, it’s a big deal. And it’s almost like your obligation as a fighter. And when you think about Jon Jones became who he is today, and the reason I’m sitting here telling you how great he is, because all these other guys gave him the opportunity to beat them. Or they beat Jon. It’s all about giving these other guys the opportunity. Saint Denis, Poirier gave him the opportunity to come in and beat him. That’s how this all works.
Yeah. Listen, the thing that you can’t do is avoid match-ups. You know what I mean? This is what we’re talking about when you talk about being a legend. Conor McGregor needed Habib. Habib needed Conor McGregor. You can hate each other as much as you want, but you have to fight these other legendary bad mother-fuckers to yourself. Become a legend. I mean, it’s like Jon Jones needed Cyril Gun and Cyril Gun needed Jon Jones, because if Cyril could have beat Jon, the first guy, if anybody can ever figure it out and beat Jon Jones, it’s a big deal. And it’s almost like your obligation as a fighter. And when you think about Jon Jones became who he is today, and the reason I’m sitting here telling you how great he is, because all these other guys gave him the opportunity to beat them. Or they beat Jon. It’s all about giving these other guys the opportunity. Saint Denis, Poirier gave him the opportunity to come in and beat him. That’s how this all works.
Lex Fridman
It’s the two of them together, the two fighters together.
It’s the two of them together, the two fighters together.
Dana White
You have to have them both. Listen, I could line up a bunch of no-name bums that Jon Jones could run through. That’s what they do in all the other organizations. We would have nothing to fucking talk about right now.
You have to have them both. Listen, I could line up a bunch of no-name bums that Jon Jones could run through. That’s what they do in all the other organizations. We would have nothing to fucking talk about right now.
Lex Fridman
That’s why, luckily, a perfect record in the UFC is not as important as who you fought, how you fought.
That’s why, luckily, a perfect record in the UFC is not as important as who you fought, how you fought.
Dana White
So true. But when you have a perfect record in the UFC, holy shit, right?
So true. But when you have a perfect record in the UFC, holy shit, right?
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Dana White
When you can have a perfect record in the UFC, you are absolutely one of the most special athletes on planet earth.
When you can have a perfect record in the UFC, you are absolutely one of the most special athletes on planet earth.
Trump
Lex Fridman
You and Trump are friends. I just talked to Ivanka last night about her experience in the Miami event. She loves it. She’s training too. You’re talking about getting girls to train. She’s trained.
You and Trump are friends. I just talked to Ivanka last night about her experience in the Miami event. She loves it. She’s training too. You’re talking about getting girls to train. She’s trained.
Dana White
And the kids are training, yeah. Her father’s the biggest fucking fight fan on the planet. Calls me all the time to talk about the fights. And Don Jr. said that I’m the only guy on earth that he bros out with. It’s funny when you talk about how powerful fighting is. This last Miami event, the President of Ecuador and the President of Spain both posted about the fights. Habib beat Conor. Putin was on FaceTime before he even made it to the locker room. Trump, sitting President, ex-President, watching all the fights, calling, wants to talk about the fights. Valentina Shevchenko, every time she goes home, she meets with the President of the country. The list goes on and on and on. Elon Musk, Zuckerberg, the list goes on and on and on, the most powerful people in the world are all obsessed with fighting.
And the kids are training, yeah. Her father’s the biggest fucking fight fan on the planet. Calls me all the time to talk about the fights. And Don Jr. said that I’m the only guy on earth that he bros out with. It’s funny when you talk about how powerful fighting is. This last Miami event, the President of Ecuador and the President of Spain both posted about the fights. Habib beat Conor. Putin was on FaceTime before he even made it to the locker room. Trump, sitting President, ex-President, watching all the fights, calling, wants to talk about the fights. Valentina Shevchenko, every time she goes home, she meets with the President of the country. The list goes on and on and on. Elon Musk, Zuckerberg, the list goes on and on and on, the most powerful people in the world are all obsessed with fighting.
Lex Fridman
When did you first discover that Trump loves fighting?
When did you first discover that Trump loves fighting?
Dana White
I first discovered that Trump was a big fight fan, obviously, you saw him, we were talking about how big boxing fans we were, he was a part of all the big fights back then. But when we first bought the UFC, this thing was so bad venues didn’t even want us. And we ended up doing our first event in Atlantic City at the Trump Taj Mahal. Now, think about this. At that time, Trump brand here, UFC brand, I can’t go low enough. And he had us at his venue two times, back to back, showed up for the first fight of the night, and stayed till the last fight of the night. Then after that, any good thing that would ever happen to me in my career, Trump would reach out. Whether it was, we were on the front page of the New York Times at one time and he said, “Congratulations, Dana. I always knew you guys were going to do it.” Little things like that, but that are big things and mean a lot, especially coming from a guy like him.
I first discovered that Trump was a big fight fan, obviously, you saw him, we were talking about how big boxing fans we were, he was a part of all the big fights back then. But when we first bought the UFC, this thing was so bad venues didn’t even want us. And we ended up doing our first event in Atlantic City at the Trump Taj Mahal. Now, think about this. At that time, Trump brand here, UFC brand, I can’t go low enough. And he had us at his venue two times, back to back, showed up for the first fight of the night, and stayed till the last fight of the night. Then after that, any good thing that would ever happen to me in my career, Trump would reach out. Whether it was, we were on the front page of the New York Times at one time and he said, “Congratulations, Dana. I always knew you guys were going to do it.” Little things like that, but that are big things and mean a lot, especially coming from a guy like him.
Lex Fridman
He saw something in you like, this is going to be…
He saw something in you like, this is going to be…
Dana White
100%. He definitely saw it. And then comes ’15, ’16, whenever it was, I don’t remember, but he called me and he said, “Listen, if you don’t want to do this, I completely understand, but I would be honored if you would speak at the National Republican Convention for me.” And I’m not a very political guy, you know what I mean? And everybody told me not to do it. “Do not do this.” But I was like, why would I not do this? This guy’s been great to me. And I did it. And our relationship is just like, you know what I mean? I consider Donald Trump to be one of my very, very good friends.
100%. He definitely saw it. And then comes ’15, ’16, whenever it was, I don’t remember, but he called me and he said, “Listen, if you don’t want to do this, I completely understand, but I would be honored if you would speak at the National Republican Convention for me.” And I’m not a very political guy, you know what I mean? And everybody told me not to do it. “Do not do this.” But I was like, why would I not do this? This guy’s been great to me. And I did it. And our relationship is just like, you know what I mean? I consider Donald Trump to be one of my very, very good friends.
Lex Fridman
Any favorite stories?
Any favorite stories?
Dana White
There’s so many stories. Once he won the election, I’d be at work and I’d be down the hall in the matchmaking room, whatever, and my secretary would yell, “The President’s on the phone!”, fucking come running down the hallway and grab the phone, and he’d want to talk about the fight that was coming up or the fight that happened. Or I’d be in my car and I’d answer the phone and it’s like, “Hi. This is the White House. We have the President of the United States on the phone.” That’s a trip, when that first starts happening. And then just to sum him up, this is the kind of guy that you want to talk about a fighter, this is the most resilient human being I’ve ever met. If you see the shit that this guy’s going through publicly every day.
There’s so many stories. Once he won the election, I’d be at work and I’d be down the hall in the matchmaking room, whatever, and my secretary would yell, “The President’s on the phone!”, fucking come running down the hallway and grab the phone, and he’d want to talk about the fight that was coming up or the fight that happened. Or I’d be in my car and I’d answer the phone and it’s like, “Hi. This is the White House. We have the President of the United States on the phone.” That’s a trip, when that first starts happening. And then just to sum him up, this is the kind of guy that you want to talk about a fighter, this is the most resilient human being I’ve ever met. If you see the shit that this guy’s going through publicly every day.
And I’ll call him on the phone as a friend and be like, “Hey, you good? How you doing?” Unfazed, unfazed like nothing’s going on. And then he’ll start talking to me about this and that and all this other. One time, there’s only been one time, I’ve never talked about this publicly, but one time I called him and he was not good. He was a mess. I’ve never heard him like that and I’ve never seen him like that. When Ivana died, the only time I’ve ever seen him fucked up. Obviously, as soon as I heard it, I reached out. And I have never, look at all the stuff that’s gone on with Trump, all the bad stuff that they say, they’re trying to attack him, they’re trying to ruin him, unfazed. I called him that day and it’s the first time I’ve ever seen that guy busted up and not good.
Lex Fridman
But that says something that that’s the only time.
But that says something that that’s the only time.
Dana White
100%.
100%.
Lex Fridman
Because that that guy is, I mean, walking through fire.
Because that that guy is, I mean, walking through fire.
Dana White
He does not get rattled. He will walk through fire. He’s an absolute savage.
He does not get rattled. He will walk through fire. He’s an absolute savage.
Lex Fridman
You think he wins the Presidential election?
You think he wins the Presidential election?
Dana White
I don’t know, man. It’s going to depend on how this whole… Politics is the most dirtiest, scummiest thing on planet earth, man, and who knows how this is all going to play out. It’s all dirty. It’s all ugly. And obviously I’m rooting for him and I’m behind him and I hope he does. But we’ll see.
I don’t know, man. It’s going to depend on how this whole… Politics is the most dirtiest, scummiest thing on planet earth, man, and who knows how this is all going to play out. It’s all dirty. It’s all ugly. And obviously I’m rooting for him and I’m behind him and I hope he does. But we’ll see.
Lex Fridman
What’s dirtier, the fighting game in the early days or politics?
What’s dirtier, the fighting game in the early days or politics?
Dana White
There’s nothing dirtier than politics, nothing. There’s literally nothing dirtier.
There’s nothing dirtier than politics, nothing. There’s literally nothing dirtier.
Lex Fridman
All right.
All right.
Dana White
It is the dirtiest thing on planet Earth.
It is the dirtiest thing on planet Earth.
Elon vs Zuck
Lex Fridman
I just wanted to get that on record. Another guy who doesn’t seem to be phased by the fire, I’ve gotten to know him, is Elon. I have to ask you, it’s a bit of fun. You were a part of thinking about putting together Zuck versus Elon. I trained with both. I did a phone call with Elon and you when we were training on the mat.
I just wanted to get that on record. Another guy who doesn’t seem to be phased by the fire, I’ve gotten to know him, is Elon. I have to ask you, it’s a bit of fun. You were a part of thinking about putting together Zuck versus Elon. I trained with both. I did a phone call with Elon and you when we were training on the mat.
Dana White
I remember, yeah.
I remember, yeah.
Lex Fridman
You really think that could have been a good fight?
You really think that could have been a good fight?
Dana White
It would’ve been the biggest fight ever done.
It would’ve been the biggest fight ever done.
Lex Fridman
The spectacle of it.
The spectacle of it.
Dana White
Two of the most powerful, wealthiest men in the world. Lots of guys talk hit and go back and forth and sue each other and do all this stuff. These two guys were literally talking about facing each other in the octagon and fighting. And they’re in a business that’s looked at as geeky. You know what I mean? They’re tech nerds. They’re this, they’re that. These are two dudes that were willing to throw down and fight. And you know as well as I do, there’s a lot of public speculation about this. I was taking serious real time and working on this thing. I had projections, I had numbers. I was looking at venues. I was on the phone with the fucking coliseum in Italy. You name it, I was in it. These guys were serious. And this was something that was really going to happen. And I’ll tell you right now, in the short amount of time that it was going down, it was fun. I was having a blast with it.
Two of the most powerful, wealthiest men in the world. Lots of guys talk hit and go back and forth and sue each other and do all this stuff. These two guys were literally talking about facing each other in the octagon and fighting. And they’re in a business that’s looked at as geeky. You know what I mean? They’re tech nerds. They’re this, they’re that. These are two dudes that were willing to throw down and fight. And you know as well as I do, there’s a lot of public speculation about this. I was taking serious real time and working on this thing. I had projections, I had numbers. I was looking at venues. I was on the phone with the fucking coliseum in Italy. You name it, I was in it. These guys were serious. And this was something that was really going to happen. And I’ll tell you right now, in the short amount of time that it was going down, it was fun. I was having a blast with it.
Mike Tyson vs Jake Paul
Lex Fridman
What do you think about Tyson, Tyson fighting Jake Paul?
What do you think about Tyson, Tyson fighting Jake Paul?
Dana White
I love Mike Tyson, and I’m not a fan of anybody fighting at our age. But he’s a grown man, obviously, and he’s going to do what he’s going to do. But at least I know, I talked to his wife a couple of days ago, and he’s taken this serious and he’s training for it. So we’ll see how it plays out.
I love Mike Tyson, and I’m not a fan of anybody fighting at our age. But he’s a grown man, obviously, and he’s going to do what he’s going to do. But at least I know, I talked to his wife a couple of days ago, and he’s taken this serious and he’s training for it. So we’ll see how it plays out.
Lex Fridman
Why do you think he fights though? What is that about? Is there a broader lesson there about fighters, about great fighters?
Why do you think he fights though? What is that about? Is there a broader lesson there about fighters, about great fighters?
Dana White
I think that Mike Tyson is actually one of those unique guys who has crossed over. Any of these other boxers from his era, they have no way of making money other than fighting. Mike Tyson has made a lot of money outside of fighting. Tyson still has that aura. You could be at a restaurant and he walks in and you’re like, “Holy fuck. Mike Tyson’s here.” He still has that type of aura and energy in a room, and he makes lots of money outside of the ring. I think that he ends up getting these offers that he can’t refuse.
I think that Mike Tyson is actually one of those unique guys who has crossed over. Any of these other boxers from his era, they have no way of making money other than fighting. Mike Tyson has made a lot of money outside of fighting. Tyson still has that aura. You could be at a restaurant and he walks in and you’re like, “Holy fuck. Mike Tyson’s here.” He still has that type of aura and energy in a room, and he makes lots of money outside of the ring. I think that he ends up getting these offers that he can’t refuse.
Lex Fridman
Oh, you think it’s financial? I mean, that’s a good question to ask. You work with a lot of fighters. For how many of them is it about money and for how many is it about the fact of the pure love of fighting?
Oh, you think it’s financial? I mean, that’s a good question to ask. You work with a lot of fighters. For how many of them is it about money and for how many is it about the fact of the pure love of fighting?
Dana White
Well, the guys that get into it for the right reason are the guys who get into it for greatness. Because you want to be the fucking best. And when you’re in it for that reason, you love it and you want to be looked at as the best ever, and you have the talent, the money happens. Then you have other guys who get in, believe me, I’ve dealt with fighters who just wanted to be famous and just wanted to make money. You know what I mean? And listen, it is what it is. It’s your life and you live it the way that you want and do your thing. But the ones that are beloved are the guys who really want to be fucking great and they’re the ones that are remembered. When you look at Tyson in his early years, when he came up under Cus D’Amato, he was a student of the game.
Well, the guys that get into it for the right reason are the guys who get into it for greatness. Because you want to be the fucking best. And when you’re in it for that reason, you love it and you want to be looked at as the best ever, and you have the talent, the money happens. Then you have other guys who get in, believe me, I’ve dealt with fighters who just wanted to be famous and just wanted to make money. You know what I mean? And listen, it is what it is. It’s your life and you live it the way that you want and do your thing. But the ones that are beloved are the guys who really want to be fucking great and they’re the ones that are remembered. When you look at Tyson in his early years, when he came up under Cus D’Amato, he was a student of the game.
He loved everything. He became completely infatuated with the fight game. Then he became such a massive superstar, it’s almost like the whole thing starts to turn on you. All the things that come at you at a young age and that kind of money, it’s tough. It’s tough to navigate and get through. You say something like that and people are like, “Oh, poor him. He had fucking $100 million and couldn’t…” At that age and with all the shit that people talk and all the things that you got to put up with and the fame, a lot of people deal with fame, some people handle it really well and some people don’t. And the perfect example of that was Forrest Griffin and Stephan Bonner. They fought that unbelievable fight on the Ultimate Fighter. Everything blew up after that. Forrest dealt with fame really well and Stephan did not.
Forrest Griffin vs Stephan Bonnar
Lex Fridman
That was a special fight.
That was a special fight.
Dana White
It really was.
It really was.
Lex Fridman
What do you think attracted people to that fight? That was a big leap for the UFC.
What do you think attracted people to that fight? That was a big leap for the UFC.
Dana White
It was everything.
It was everything.
Lex Fridman
It was everything.
It was everything.
Dana White
It was everything.
It was everything.
Lex Fridman
Why do you think people loved that fight? What attracted people to that fight? Why did it change everything?
Why do you think people loved that fight? What attracted people to that fight? Why did it change everything?
Dana White
Well, what happened that night is that the rest of the show was a disaster. We had the co-main event and the main event. Diego Sanchez ran through Kenny Florian in seconds. Oh my God, that was terrible. And the fights that led up to that weren’t anything to talk about either. Then Stephan and Forrest got in there and just went toe-to-toe in this unbelievable slug fest live on free television when cable still mattered. And what I heard was at the time, you had people picking up the phone going, “Are you watching this show?” The numbers just started climbing. Then you got a razor-thin decision. Who’s going to win? You got the crowd stomping their feet. It sounded like a train was going through the place and everybody’s chanting, “One more round!” Me and the Fertitta brothers get together and we talk. We’re going to give them both contracts.
Well, what happened that night is that the rest of the show was a disaster. We had the co-main event and the main event. Diego Sanchez ran through Kenny Florian in seconds. Oh my God, that was terrible. And the fights that led up to that weren’t anything to talk about either. Then Stephan and Forrest got in there and just went toe-to-toe in this unbelievable slug fest live on free television when cable still mattered. And what I heard was at the time, you had people picking up the phone going, “Are you watching this show?” The numbers just started climbing. Then you got a razor-thin decision. Who’s going to win? You got the crowd stomping their feet. It sounded like a train was going through the place and everybody’s chanting, “One more round!” Me and the Fertitta brothers get together and we talk. We’re going to give them both contracts.
So we give them both contracts and the place erupts. It couldn’t have been a more perfect fight at the most perfect time. It all came together. It’s almost like this was meant to be. You know what I mean? Yeah. So we had so many problems with Spike TV at the time, because halfway through the season, the president of the company got fired. All the things that we thought we were going to get that year, we had this runaway hit show. And normally at that time when you would see runaway hit shows, there’d be commercials. It’d be on billboards. It’d be on the side of buses in L.A. and New York. We got none of that. We didn’t even know if we were going to get a second season coming out of that. And when that fight was over, I swear to God, I was like, “I don’t even give a fuck. We’re going to end up somewhere now after this fight.” And we didn’t even make it out of the building that night. The Spike guys did the contract with us in the alley on a fucking napkin after the fight.
Lex Fridman
So you already saw the magic of the fight itself. It captured something.
So you already saw the magic of the fight itself. It captured something.
Dana White
Once that happened and all the shit, and at that time, I didn’t know the ratings, it’s not like we were streaming and we could see, we had no idea, but I knew.
Once that happened and all the shit, and at that time, I didn’t know the ratings, it’s not like we were streaming and we could see, we had no idea, but I knew.
Lex Fridman
You just knew this was [inaudible 01:08:13].
You just knew this was [inaudible 01:08:13].
Dana White
I knew .
I knew .
Lex Fridman
What is that? It’s just two people being willing to stand toe to toe and just go to war.
What is that? It’s just two people being willing to stand toe to toe and just go to war.
Dana White
And when you think about what was at stake. There was a car. Remember the Kia? The winner got a Kia.
And when you think about what was at stake. There was a car. Remember the Kia? The winner got a Kia.
Lex Fridman
I don’t even remember that.
I don’t even remember that.
Dana White
That’s what was the fucking. And Stefan and Forrest, the will to win, they both wanted to win that fight so bad.
That’s what was the fucking. And Stefan and Forrest, the will to win, they both wanted to win that fight so bad.
Lex Fridman
It was bigger than the Kia probably.
It was bigger than the Kia probably.
Dana White
Forrest drove that Kia to 200,000 miles. The biggest mistake Kia ever made was not doing a fucking commercial with Forrest Griffin about that car. Forrest Griffin loved that car so much, he drove it. I think he still has it. It’s got 200,000 miles on it, that car. You couldn’t have a better fucking commercial than that. And we reached out to them too. I said, “Kia should know about this.” They fucking…
Forrest drove that Kia to 200,000 miles. The biggest mistake Kia ever made was not doing a fucking commercial with Forrest Griffin about that car. Forrest Griffin loved that car so much, he drove it. I think he still has it. It’s got 200,000 miles on it, that car. You couldn’t have a better fucking commercial than that. And we reached out to them too. I said, “Kia should know about this.” They fucking…
Dana White
… and we reached out to them too. I said, “Kia should know about this.” They fucking blew it. You got a bunch of… You know how those guys are in the business world. They don’t fucking get anything.
… and we reached out to them too. I said, “Kia should know about this.” They fucking blew it. You got a bunch of… You know how those guys are in the business world. They don’t fucking get anything.
Lex Fridman
Maybe it was about the Kia then.
Maybe it was about the Kia then.
Dana White
It was about winning. They both wanted to win the Ultimate Fighter so bad. It’s the Kia, it’s the win, it’s the contract you get, the whole thing.
It was about winning. They both wanted to win the Ultimate Fighter so bad. It’s the Kia, it’s the win, it’s the contract you get, the whole thing.
Lex Fridman
But I think at that point, you even forget all of that. When you’re in there, you probably just, there’s a primal thing where I’m not backing down.
But I think at that point, you even forget all of that. When you’re in there, you probably just, there’s a primal thing where I’m not backing down.
Dana White
Listen, they’re both bad dudes. They were both real fighters at the end of the day. That’s why the fight was so great. You know what I mean?
Listen, they’re both bad dudes. They were both real fighters at the end of the day. That’s why the fight was so great. You know what I mean?
Lex Fridman
They just throw all the caution to the wind and just fight. Those are some of the greatest moments in the FC too when the technique is falls apart and you’re just like, well, fuck it.
They just throw all the caution to the wind and just fight. Those are some of the greatest moments in the FC too when the technique is falls apart and you’re just like, well, fuck it.
Dana White
Well, it’s because you’re in those deep rounds. You’ve been through a war now it’s all about heart and dog, who can dig deeper and who’s got it and who wants it. I mean, we all know when that moment happens in a fight, when you see that both of these guys are fucking exhausted.
Well, it’s because you’re in those deep rounds. You’ve been through a war now it’s all about heart and dog, who can dig deeper and who’s got it and who wants it. I mean, we all know when that moment happens in a fight, when you see that both of these guys are fucking exhausted.
And for people that are watching this, people that don’t know a lot about… Everybody thinks they know a lot about fighting. 99.9% of the people out there don’t know fucking jack shit about fighting or what it takes to do what these people do. But when you get into those later rounds and fatigue sets in, and then fatigue makes you start to fucking doubt yourself, and then you start to wonder, can I even make it through the rest of this round?
And then you start to think, am I going to fucking die right now? And these kids dig fucking deep. And they just, like you said, all the other shit flies out the window and now they’re just on fucking autopilot to fight and win. Those are definitely the best fights you’ll ever see in any combat sport.
Lex Fridman
I mean, that saying is true. The exhaustion makes cowards of us all. I mean, there’s something about… Because I’ve competed a lot in jujitsu. There’s the violence of being hit too, but even just exhaustion, it makes you question everything.
I mean, that saying is true. The exhaustion makes cowards of us all. I mean, there’s something about… Because I’ve competed a lot in jujitsu. There’s the violence of being hit too, but even just exhaustion, it makes you question everything.
Dana White
So true.
So true.
Lex Fridman
It just takes you to some weird place where your brain starts to think you’re going to die for sure. Your brain starts to think, why am I doing this? All these excuses, all this.
It just takes you to some weird place where your brain starts to think you’re going to die for sure. Your brain starts to think, why am I doing this? All these excuses, all this.
Dana White
I love that shit.
I love that shit.
Lex Fridman
And then…
And then…
Dana White
I love that shit.
I love that shit.
Lex Fridman
The truly heroic action is to say, “Fuck it,” in that moment and just get in there.
The truly heroic action is to say, “Fuck it,” in that moment and just get in there.
Dana White
When you think about these fights that you see in the UFC every fucking Saturday when these men and women get to this point where they’ve been in a dog fight, yet they keep fucking going and you keep trying to win. You can’t imagine what’s going on inside their heads. Self-doubt and all these other things that come into play when exhaustion sets in and they fucking power through it.
When you think about these fights that you see in the UFC every fucking Saturday when these men and women get to this point where they’ve been in a dog fight, yet they keep fucking going and you keep trying to win. You can’t imagine what’s going on inside their heads. Self-doubt and all these other things that come into play when exhaustion sets in and they fucking power through it.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, those moments, sometimes they don’t have a glorious knockout at the end. But your decision in the third round or the fifth round to still keep pushing forward, not running.
Yeah, those moments, sometimes they don’t have a glorious knockout at the end. But your decision in the third round or the fifth round to still keep pushing forward, not running.
Dana White
100%.
100%.
Lex Fridman
That doesn’t matter what happened. That is a person winning a battle over themselves.
That doesn’t matter what happened. That is a person winning a battle over themselves.
Dana White
So true. It’s so true, and it happens every fucking weekend. It’s so impressive. I say it all the time. The people that are involved in this sport are this much of the population. The people that make it to the top five are incredibly unique, special human beings, man. It’s fucking awesome.
So true. It’s so true, and it happens every fucking weekend. It’s so impressive. I say it all the time. The people that are involved in this sport are this much of the population. The people that make it to the top five are incredibly unique, special human beings, man. It’s fucking awesome.
Gambling
Lex Fridman
You love gambling.
You love gambling.
Dana White
I do.
I do.
Lex Fridman
What’s the biggest win of your gambling career, maybe psychologically, if not financially?
What’s the biggest win of your gambling career, maybe psychologically, if not financially?
Dana White
Well, two things. I won $1,000,000 hand one night. It’s happened one time. $1,000,000 hand one night at Mandalay Bay. And then one summer I beat Caesars for 12 million throughout the summer.
Well, two things. I won $1,000,000 hand one night. It’s happened one time. $1,000,000 hand one night at Mandalay Bay. And then one summer I beat Caesars for 12 million throughout the summer.
Lex Fridman
Throughout the summer.
Throughout the summer.
Dana White
Yeah. Then I’m on a pretty good run right now too.
Yeah. Then I’m on a pretty good run right now too.
Lex Fridman
Now this is blackjack?
Now this is blackjack?
Dana White
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
What’s the biggest loss?
What’s the biggest loss?
Dana White
The biggest loss was… Here is… I would call this the biggest loss for many different reasons. This is what you live and you learn in life and you figure things out as you go along. One night I’m over at the Rio and they got big suites over there. I go over there with some buddies and we got one of the suites and we have some dinner and we start drinking. We’re having some drinks at dinner and blah, blah, blah. Starts to ramp up, having a good time.
The biggest loss was… Here is… I would call this the biggest loss for many different reasons. This is what you live and you learn in life and you figure things out as you go along. One night I’m over at the Rio and they got big suites over there. I go over there with some buddies and we got one of the suites and we have some dinner and we start drinking. We’re having some drinks at dinner and blah, blah, blah. Starts to ramp up, having a good time.
And I make my way down to the Thai limit room. We start gambling. And I continue to drink having a blast. I end up leaving and going home that night, and I lost 80 grand. I wake up the next morning, I’m like, fuck. Those motherfuckers got me for 80,000 last night and dah, dah, dah, dah, dah.
I’m at work the next day and the host over there calls me and he says, “Hey, Dana, are you coming back? Do you still need the room that you guys had where you ate and all this shit you stay?” And I said, “No, I don’t need the room, but don’t get too comfortable with my fucking 80 grand. I’m coming back for it.”
Dead fucking silence on the other end of the phone. And he’s like, “Dana, you lost $3 million last night.” I said, “What the fuck are you talking about? I only have a million and a half dollar credit line.” He goes, “Yeah, you made us call the GM of the hotel and you started calling him a fucking pussy and da, da, da, da, da.” And I went, “Yeah, no, that sounds like something I would do. Yeah.”
Lex Fridman
That’s the real number.
That’s the real number.
Dana White
That was the real number. And then there’s been a lot of cases where people are in Vegas and they’re like, “Oh, I lost all this money. And they were giving me free drinks and I drank too much, and I was taken advantage of.” No, you stupid motherfucker. Man up. You got fucking drunk. Alcohol is free, but you don’t have to fucking drink it. You know what I mean? And this was a huge learning lesson for me. I never drank again when I was playing cards after that night. But yeah, when you asked me, that’s the one that stands out…
That was the real number. And then there’s been a lot of cases where people are in Vegas and they’re like, “Oh, I lost all this money. And they were giving me free drinks and I drank too much, and I was taken advantage of.” No, you stupid motherfucker. Man up. You got fucking drunk. Alcohol is free, but you don’t have to fucking drink it. You know what I mean? And this was a huge learning lesson for me. I never drank again when I was playing cards after that night. But yeah, when you asked me, that’s the one that stands out…
Lex Fridman
That one came back right now.
That one came back right now.
Dana White
In my head the most as far as having a bad loss. And then of course I said, “Call the GM,” and I started calling him a pussy at three o’clock in the morning.
In my head the most as far as having a bad loss. And then of course I said, “Call the GM,” and I started calling him a pussy at three o’clock in the morning.
Lex Fridman
Of course you did.
Of course you did.
Dana White
That is something I would absolutely do.
That is something I would absolutely do.
Lex Fridman
How do you deal with those psychologically? When you gamble, maybe this applies to fighting too, do you love winning or hate losing more?
How do you deal with those psychologically? When you gamble, maybe this applies to fighting too, do you love winning or hate losing more?
Dana White
They go hand in hand. The way that I play is I live in Vegas, so 2024 is a war for me. I go to war in ’24. Okay. All these nights that I play are little battles inside the war that I will fight in ’24. Now, at the end of the year, we will tally up all these little battles and see where I stand on wins and losses.
They go hand in hand. The way that I play is I live in Vegas, so 2024 is a war for me. I go to war in ’24. Okay. All these nights that I play are little battles inside the war that I will fight in ’24. Now, at the end of the year, we will tally up all these little battles and see where I stand on wins and losses.
And there’s lots of talk out there about my gambling, places that I’ve been kicked out of and things like that. And I do pretty well. I do pretty well, but it’s what I like to do. I don’t gamble in a way that I would ever hurt myself or hurt my family. I’m sure you’ve heard the Norm MacDonald stories. Norm MacDonald lost his entire personal wealth four times or something like that. Yeah, that’s not going to happen to me.
Lex Fridman
You manage it, but just psychologically you’re able to be even keel.
You manage it, but just psychologically you’re able to be even keel.
Dana White
Yeah. When I win, it’s awesome. It’s always great to win. Winning is a great feeling in business, in sports, in life, and definitely in gambling. Losing is never fun, but it’s part of the game. You know what I mean? If you want to be in the game and it’s sports, it’s business or whatever, there’s going to be wins and there’s going to be losses. And you have to take them both in stride and you have to be able to…
Yeah. When I win, it’s awesome. It’s always great to win. Winning is a great feeling in business, in sports, in life, and definitely in gambling. Losing is never fun, but it’s part of the game. You know what I mean? If you want to be in the game and it’s sports, it’s business or whatever, there’s going to be wins and there’s going to be losses. And you have to take them both in stride and you have to be able to…
There’s a of people… When you gamble and you lose and you go into a deep, dark depression, I’ve seen this with guys that do it, get depressed. Gambling isn’t for you. If you are the type of person that’s on social media and people say horrible things to you and you get depressed and da, da, you shouldn’t be on social media. You know what I mean?
These are all part of being in the game. When you’re in the fucking game, great things happen and really bad things happen, and you got to take it all in stride. And you got to pick yourself up the next day, strap your fucking shoes back on and get out there and go to fucking war again. That’s how it works.
Lex Fridman
That’s some goggin shit right there. All right. I love that motivational speech.
That’s some goggin shit right there. All right. I love that motivational speech.
Dana White
It’s the truth though.
It’s the truth though.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, it is.
Yeah, it is.
Dana White
It’s the truth though.
It’s the truth though.
Lex Fridman
It’s true.
It’s true.
Dana White
Listen, every day when you get out of bed, life’s standing right there to kick you in the fucking face, man. Could be anything. Could be you get up and you walk downstairs, you got a fucking flat tire, and you’re late for work, and you got this and that. Life is going to throw all kinds of crazy shit at you, and you have to be ready for it, and you got to fucking deal with it. You can’t curl up into a ball. You can’t run away from it. You can’t hide. You have to take all this shit head on. You have to get up…
Listen, every day when you get out of bed, life’s standing right there to kick you in the fucking face, man. Could be anything. Could be you get up and you walk downstairs, you got a fucking flat tire, and you’re late for work, and you got this and that. Life is going to throw all kinds of crazy shit at you, and you have to be ready for it, and you got to fucking deal with it. You can’t curl up into a ball. You can’t run away from it. You can’t hide. You have to take all this shit head on. You have to get up…
Every day when I get up out of bed, I strap up and I’m getting ready for fucking war. Because I know I’m coming in here. I know a bunch of bad shit’s going to happen that I’m going to have to fucking deal with. And if that’s not bad enough, when I finally get out of here, I’m probably going to go to the casino and I’m going to get into another fucking war. You know what I mean?
I thrive in chaos. I actually love chaos. Everybody talks about retiring. Fuck that shit. What am I going to do when I retire? What would I do? I like to go to war. I like to battle. I like to win. Sometimes I lose, but then I have to come back from the loss. And I love to build brands. I love to set short term and long-term goals and then knock them all down. This is just the stuff that excites me.
And whether it’s business or gambling. I like being a fan of things too. I like live music. When I find a band that I like, I get excited to go watch the band live or a Celtics game. I love the fucking Boston Celtics, and I love going to the games and watching them. This is the year. Hopefully we’re going to fucking win it this year. These are all things that make me happy and excite me in my life.
And it’s funny because there’s this post that I post maybe three, four nights a week. I also love this city. I can’t tell if the city of Las Vegas was built for me or I was built for this fucking city, but I love it. And there’s this turn on Summerlin Parkway every night, and it’s dark. And from there you can see the entire city, and it’s all fucking lights and it’s badass.
And I’m usually driving home after a fucking incredible day. This amazing day and this unbelievable fucking life I have, and I have this just moment of gratitude. Every time I take that turn and I’m like, God damn, I love this fucking city. And just every night when I go home, I’m just so happy and grateful for this life that I have.
Lex Fridman
You’re grateful, you’re celebrating. Even if the day is full of shit, full of problems, you have to solve all of this. You’re still able to put that behind you, just turn it off?
You’re grateful, you’re celebrating. Even if the day is full of shit, full of problems, you have to solve all of this. You’re still able to put that behind you, just turn it off?
Dana White
I love that too. I love problem solving. I love taking things that seem impossible. Fucking what’s been shit on more than this company right here? Power Slap, right? This thing’s a fucking beast. It’s an absolute beast. In 13 months, that’s the most successful thing I’ve ever been a part of. And I love every fucking minute of it, especially the negativity. I love negativity.
I love that too. I love problem solving. I love taking things that seem impossible. Fucking what’s been shit on more than this company right here? Power Slap, right? This thing’s a fucking beast. It’s an absolute beast. In 13 months, that’s the most successful thing I’ve ever been a part of. And I love every fucking minute of it, especially the negativity. I love negativity.
Lex Fridman
You almost feed on it. That’s great. That’s great. You’re built for this.
You almost feed on it. That’s great. That’s great. You’re built for this.
Dana White
I eat that shit for breakfast, man. I love it.
I eat that shit for breakfast, man. I love it.
Lex Fridman
What’s your favorite movie about Vegas, Casino?
What’s your favorite movie about Vegas, Casino?
Dana White
Yeah, it would have to be Casino. No doubt about it.
Yeah, it would have to be Casino. No doubt about it.
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Dana White
You ever see a movie that changed your life, that actually impacted your life in some way, shape, or form?
You ever see a movie that changed your life, that actually impacted your life in some way, shape, or form?
Lex Fridman
Probably.
Probably.
Dana White
Which one?
Which one?
Lex Fridman
That’s a good question. I’ll have to think. Well, I have a lot, a lot. Casino could be one of them, probably taught me about women. Forrest Gump for me is a simple movie, but it was a really good movie to show. Because I’ve been really fortunate in my life over and over and over, and I don’t think I deserve any of it. I just always felt like Forrest Gump. When I finally saw it really connected with me. It was like, okay, this universe works in weird ways and stuff just materializes. And you just be good to people, put that good karma out there and it happens for you. That was a movie like that.
That’s a good question. I’ll have to think. Well, I have a lot, a lot. Casino could be one of them, probably taught me about women. Forrest Gump for me is a simple movie, but it was a really good movie to show. Because I’ve been really fortunate in my life over and over and over, and I don’t think I deserve any of it. I just always felt like Forrest Gump. When I finally saw it really connected with me. It was like, okay, this universe works in weird ways and stuff just materializes. And you just be good to people, put that good karma out there and it happens for you. That was a movie like that.
Dana White
I’m actually very superstitious about that. I believe that what you put out, you get back. And I believe that when you have, you should take care of other people and you should always try to bring people up with you and all that kind of stuff. But the movie that changed the whole trajectory of my life was Vision Quest.
I’m actually very superstitious about that. I believe that what you put out, you get back. And I believe that when you have, you should take care of other people and you should always try to bring people up with you and all that kind of stuff. But the movie that changed the whole trajectory of my life was Vision Quest.
Lex Fridman
Oh, yeah. Well, yeah. That’s a good one too. Yeah.
Oh, yeah. Well, yeah. That’s a good one too. Yeah.
Dana White
Vision Quest, man, I fucking love that movie.
Vision Quest, man, I fucking love that movie.
Lex Fridman
That’s a good one.
That’s a good one.
Dana White
It’s basically, it’s telling the story of a kid who really wasn’t anybody in high school, and nobody knew who he was. He wasn’t popular or any of that kind of shit. And he decided that that was the year that he was going to make his mark. And he was a good wrestler at 178 pounds, but he was going to move down to 160-something to take on the Shute, the scariest guy and the whatever.
It’s basically, it’s telling the story of a kid who really wasn’t anybody in high school, and nobody knew who he was. He wasn’t popular or any of that kind of shit. And he decided that that was the year that he was going to make his mark. And he was a good wrestler at 178 pounds, but he was going to move down to 160-something to take on the Shute, the scariest guy and the whatever.
But there’s all these little things in the movie that really lay out what life is all about. One of the parts is he’s in a class and the teacher’s talking about some poem. And he says, “What does this poem mean to you?” Well, this girl’s walking through the park and all the leaves are falling off the trees, and she realizes that she’s going to die someday. And that a lot of people think they have all this time so they fucking waste it, and they never go out and do what they really set out to do or accomplish or do anything great in their life. That’s one meaning.
Then he’s got the guy that he works with at work, he’s cutting weight and his nose is bleeding and all this shit. And this guy keeps going, “Why the fuck are you doing this? Pick that thing up and eat it like a fucking man. This is ridiculous. I don’t know why you’re doing this to yourself, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.” Then when he meets the girl and he gets to the point where he feels like he wants to quit, where does he go? He goes to that guy’s fucking apartment because he knows when he shows up at this guy’s apartment, he’s going to go, “Yeah, fuck this shit.”
No, he went to work. He went to work to talk to him, and he wasn’t at work. He took the night off. He shows up at the shitty little fucking apartment that the guy lives in and the guy’s putting a suit and tie on and shit. He’s like, “They said you called in sick. What’s going on?” He’s like, “Well, yeah. Aren’t you wrestling this guy tonight?” And he’s like, “Yeah, but why would you? You’re going to get docked a night’s pay and all this other shit.” He says, “You know what, man?” Then it all gets laid out. I get the goosebumps even telling you this fucking part of it.
Lex Fridman
Is that the Pele speech?
Is that the Pele speech?
Dana White
Pele. Yeah. When he’s saying about, “I’m fucking cooking in an overnight hotel fucking thing, and I live in this shitty apartment. A human being can lift himself upside down and backwards and kick a ball into a fucking net, and the whole stadium goes crazy. And this guy runs around. And I’m sitting here in my fucking apartment alone and I start crying. Yeah. I start crying.”
Pele. Yeah. When he’s saying about, “I’m fucking cooking in an overnight hotel fucking thing, and I live in this shitty apartment. A human being can lift himself upside down and backwards and kick a ball into a fucking net, and the whole stadium goes crazy. And this guy runs around. And I’m sitting here in my fucking apartment alone and I start crying. Yeah. I start crying.”
The guy who’s been shitting on him the whole fucking time actually really respects him for what he’s done and sees what this kid is capable of doing and all this shit. This fucking movie spoke to me on so many different levels. And I think it’s probably the most underrated movie of all time when you really break down the meaning of what this movie is about. And it really fucking spoke to me.
Lex Fridman
That’s probably the greatest movie on one-on-one combat…
That’s probably the greatest movie on one-on-one combat…
Dana White
I would agree.
I would agree.
Lex Fridman
Ever made.
Ever made.
Dana White
I would agree. And especially if you can really hear the messages that it’s giving you in this movie, it’s excellent. You know it’s funny. They just did the… And I saw this after the fact, which completely fucking pissed me off. They did the 25 year or the 30-year thing. It was filmed in Spokane, Washington. They showed the movie at a movie theater there, and the cast members came out and spoke about it. I would’ve fucking flown there for that. Are you shitting me? I’d have been there in fucking 30 seconds to go up there and be a part of that. That movie literally changed my life.
I would agree. And especially if you can really hear the messages that it’s giving you in this movie, it’s excellent. You know it’s funny. They just did the… And I saw this after the fact, which completely fucking pissed me off. They did the 25 year or the 30-year thing. It was filmed in Spokane, Washington. They showed the movie at a movie theater there, and the cast members came out and spoke about it. I would’ve fucking flown there for that. Are you shitting me? I’d have been there in fucking 30 seconds to go up there and be a part of that. That movie literally changed my life.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, I suppose me too. It made me want to wrestle. I mean, probably the reason I was… Maybe it made me fall in love with wrestling.
Yeah, I suppose me too. It made me want to wrestle. I mean, probably the reason I was… Maybe it made me fall in love with wrestling.
Dana White
Well, you know what’s funny? I wasn’t even into wrestling at all, and I didn’t have to be for that movie to…
Well, you know what’s funny? I wasn’t even into wrestling at all, and I didn’t have to be for that movie to…
Lex Fridman
Yeah, it’s this basic human story.
Yeah, it’s this basic human story.
Dana White
It’s such a great movie.
It’s such a great movie.
Lex Fridman
I mean, that’s what fighting does. It brings out the basic, the humanity of a person really, for the people that choose to step up and step in the ring. And then chase greatness and actually do it from against the long odds. That’s why it’s a beautiful game.
I mean, that’s what fighting does. It brings out the basic, the humanity of a person really, for the people that choose to step up and step in the ring. And then chase greatness and actually do it from against the long odds. That’s why it’s a beautiful game.
Dana White
And it’s so true. I mean, when you think about, I’m 54 years old right now, like that. I mean, it just fucking flew by. And you think when you’re young that you have all this time. You have no time. There’s no time. I mean one of the quotes on the wall in the gym in there is, “There is no tomorrow,” from Rocky III. There is no tomorrow. Fuck that shit. Let’s get all this shit done today.
And it’s so true. I mean, when you think about, I’m 54 years old right now, like that. I mean, it just fucking flew by. And you think when you’re young that you have all this time. You have no time. There’s no time. I mean one of the quotes on the wall in the gym in there is, “There is no tomorrow,” from Rocky III. There is no tomorrow. Fuck that shit. Let’s get all this shit done today.
Mortality
Lex Fridman
Do you think about your death?
Do you think about your death?
Dana White
Man, I’m not afraid of death. Not even a little bit. I’m not afraid of it. I don’t know if that’ll be the case when I’m facing it, when I’m looking down the barrel of it, laying in a hospital bed somewhere.
Man, I’m not afraid of death. Not even a little bit. I’m not afraid of it. I don’t know if that’ll be the case when I’m facing it, when I’m looking down the barrel of it, laying in a hospital bed somewhere.
Lex Fridman
But for now, just squeezing as much as you can out of it.
But for now, just squeezing as much as you can out of it.
Dana White
100%. I literally, I don’t even like to sleep. My life is so fucking awesome, I don’t even want to go to bed at night. I don’t even want to go to sleep. I want to stay up fucking, I wish I could do fucking 24 hours and never have to sleep. That’s how much I love my life.
100%. I literally, I don’t even like to sleep. My life is so fucking awesome, I don’t even want to go to bed at night. I don’t even want to go to sleep. I want to stay up fucking, I wish I could do fucking 24 hours and never have to sleep. That’s how much I love my life.
Lex Fridman
What has watching thousands of fights over the years taught you about human nature, about us humans?
What has watching thousands of fights over the years taught you about human nature, about us humans?
Dana White
I don’t care what color you are, what country you come from or what language you speak, we’re all human beings. Fighting’s in our DNA. We get it and we like it. And it’s true. Fighting is in our DNA. It’s a part of who we are.
I don’t care what color you are, what country you come from or what language you speak, we’re all human beings. Fighting’s in our DNA. We get it and we like it. And it’s true. Fighting is in our DNA. It’s a part of who we are.
And no matter where you are, if a fight breaks out, it creates this fucking energy, this buzz, this sense of fear. I mean, a lot of different emotions happen in people when fights break out. But one thing that is always the case, everybody’s watching, man. Everybody’s, fucking all of their eyes are on the fight.
I mean, we were just in Mexico, fucking fight broke out in the good seats right here with these seats that are super expensive. And security never fucking came. They just let these guys fight until they gassed out. And then everybody put their chairs back together and snapped back down and fucking. I literally got up from my table, walked over, and was watching this fight at the fights.
Lex Fridman
At the fights. I mean humans fight and humans love watching fighting.
At the fights. I mean humans fight and humans love watching fighting.
Dana White
Absolutely. And that was my thought process going into buying the UFC, and I believe that this would work everywhere. And thank God we were right.
Absolutely. And that was my thought process going into buying the UFC, and I believe that this would work everywhere. And thank God we were right.
Lex Fridman
Well, Dana, thank you for bringing this very human thing of fighting, the art of it, the science of it, the heroic stories, the vision quest stories of it all.
Well, Dana, thank you for bringing this very human thing of fighting, the art of it, the science of it, the heroic stories, the vision quest stories of it all.
Dana White
Boom.
Boom.
Lex Fridman
Really appreciate you talking today, brother.
Really appreciate you talking today, brother.
Dana White
Thank you. Pleasure, buddy. Thank you for the kind words.
Thank you. Pleasure, buddy. Thank you for the kind words.
Lex Fridman
Thanks for listening to this conversation with Dana White. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, let me leave you with some words from Muhammad Ali. “Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in a world they’ve been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact, it’s an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration, it’s a dare.” Thank you for listening and hope to see you next time.
Thanks for listening to this conversation with Dana White. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, let me leave you with some words from Muhammad Ali. “Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in a world they’ve been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact, it’s an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration, it’s a dare.” Thank you for listening and hope to see you next time.
Transcript for Annie Jacobsen: Nuclear War, CIA, KGB, Aliens, Area 51, Roswell & Secrecy | Lex Fridman Podcast #420
This is a transcript of Lex Fridman Podcast #420 with Annie Jacobsen.
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In addition to the Launch on Warning concept, there’s this other insane concept called Sole Presidential Authority. And you might think, in a democracy that’s impossible, right? You can’t just start a war. Well, you can just start a nuclear war if you are the commander in chief, the President of the United States. In fact, you’re the only one who can do that. We are one misunderstanding, one miscalculation away from nuclear Armageddon. No matter how nuclear war starts, it ends with everyone dead.
Let’s start with an immensely dark topic, nuclear war. How many people would a nuclear war between the United States and Russia kill?
First millions, then tens of millions, then hundreds of millions of people will die in the first 72 minutes of a nuclear war. And then, comes nuclear winter where the billions happen from starvation. And so, the shock power of all of this is meant for each and every one of us to say, “Wait, what?” This actually exists behind the veil of national security. Most people do not think about nuclear war on a daily basis, and yet hundreds of thousands of people in the nuclear command and control are at the ready in the event it happens.
And so, there begins this horrifying policy called Launch on Warning, right? And that’s the US counterattack. Meaning the reason that the United States is so ferociously watching for a nuclear launch somewhere around the globe is so that the nuclear command and control system in the US can move into action to immediately make a counterstrike. Because we have that policy, Launch on Warning, which is exactly like it says. It means the United States will not wait to absorb a nuclear attack. It will launch nuclear weapons in response before the bomb actually hits.
But the idea behind that is that nuclear war will unfold so fast only one person can be in charge. The president. He asks permission of no one. Not the Secretary of Defense, not the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, not the US Congress. So, built into that is this extraordinary speed you talk about, the six-minute window. And some people say, “That’s ridiculous. How do we know that six minute window?” Well, here’s the best hitting the nail on the head statement I can give you, which is in President Reagan’s memoirs, he refers to the six-minute window and he says… He calls it irrational, which it is. He says, “How can anyone make a decision to launch nuclear weapons based on a blip on a radar scope.” His words. “To unleash Armageddon.” And yet, that is the reality behind nuclear war.
I guess the question that kept coming up is how do we stop this? Is it inevitable that it’s going to be escalated to a full-on nuclear war that destroys everything? And it seems like it will be. It’s inevitable. In the position of the President, it’s almost inevitable that they have to respond.
And that only when Panetta became Secretary of Defense, he told me, did he really realize the weight of all of this, because he knew he would be the person that the president would turn to were he to be notified of a nuclear attack. And by the way, the Launch on Warning, it’s the ballistic missile seen from outer space by the satellite. And then, there also must be a second confirmation from a ground radar system. But in that process, which is just a couple minutes, everyone is getting ready to notify the president. And one of the first people that gets notified by NORAD or by STRATCOM or by NRO, these different parties that all see the early warning data, one of the first people that’s notified is the Secretary of Defense as well as the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, because those two together are going to brief the president about, “Sir, you have six minutes to decide.”
And that’s where you realize the immediacy of all of this is so counter to imagining the scenario. And again, all the presidents come into office, I have learned, understanding the idea of deterrence, this idea that we have these massive arsenals of nuclear weapons pointed at one another ready to launch so that we never have nuclear war. But what we’re talking about now is, what if we did? What if we did? And what you’ve raised is this really spooky, eerie subtext of the world right now because many of the nuclear armed nations are in direct conflict with other nations. And for the first time in decades, nuclear threats are actually coming out of the mouths of leaders. This is shocking.
But when you think about those kinds of arsenals of just between the United States and Russia, and you realize everything can be launched in seconds and minutes, then you realize the madness of mad, this idea that no one would launch because it would assure everyone’s destruction. Yes. But what if someone did? And in my interviews with scores of top tier national security advisors, people who advise the president, people who are responsible for these decisions if they had to be made, every single one of them said it could happen. They didn’t say this would never happen. And so, the idea is worth thinking about because I believe that it pulls back the veil on a fundamental security that if someone were to use a tactical nuclear weapon, “Well, it’s just an escalation.” It’s far more than that.
He wanted to know the answer to your question as the guy in charge of it all. So, he hired this group of scientists who then, and still are in many ways, the supermen scientists of the Pentagon, and they’re called the JASON Scientists. Many conspiracies about them abound. I interviewed their founder and have interviewed many of them. But they whittled the number down to seconds specifically for Herb York. And it goes like, because this is where my jaw dropped. And I went, “Wow.” So, 26 minutes and 40 seconds from a launch pad in the Soviet Union to the East Coast. And it happens in three phases. Very simple. And interesting to remember, because then suddenly all of this makes more sense. Boost phase, mid-course phase and then terminal phase, okay?
Boost phase, five minutes. That’s when the rocket launches. So, you just imagine a rocket going off the launch pad and the fire beneath it. Again, that’s why the satellites can see it. Now it’s becoming visual, now it makes sense to me. Five minutes. And that’s where the rocket can be tracked. And then imagine learning, “Wait a minute. After five minutes, the rocket can no longer be seen from space. The satellite can only see the hot rocket exhaust.” Then the missile enters its mid-course phase, 20 minutes. And that’s the ballistic part of it, where it’s flying up at between 500 and 700 miles above the earth and moving very fast and with the earth until it gets very close to its target. And the last 100 seconds are terminal phase. It’s where the warhead re-enters the atmosphere and detonates.
26 minutes and 40 seconds. Now in my scenario, I open with North Korea launching a one megaton nuclear warhead at Washington DC. That’s the nihilistic madman maneuver. That’s the bolt out of the blue attack that everyone in Washington will tell you they’re afraid of. And North Korea has a little bit different geography. And so, I had MIT Professor Emeritus Ted Postol do the math, 33 minutes from a launch pad in Pyongyang to the East coast of the United States. You get the idea, it’s about 30 minutes.
But hopefully now that allows readers to suddenly see all this as a real… You almost see it as poetry, as terrible as that may sound. You can visualize it and suddenly it makes sense. And I think the sense-making part of it is really what I’m after in this book. Because I want people to understand, on the one hand, it’s incredibly simple, it’s just the people that have made it so complicated.
These things are like hell machines, and they’re moving around throughout the oceans, ours, Russia’s, China’s, maybe North Korea’s constantly. And we now know they’re sneaking up to the east and west coast of the United States within a couple hundred miles. How do we know that? Why do we know that? Well, I found a document inside of a budget that the defense department was going to Congress for more money recently and showed maps of precisely where these submarines… How close they were getting to the eastern seaboard.
The submarines take about 14 or 15 minutes from the launch command to actually launching. And that has to do, I surmise, with the location of the submarine, its depth. Some of these things are so highly classified and other details are shockingly available if you look deep enough, or if you ask enough questions, and you can go from one document to the next, to the next and really find these answers.
We don’t have those in America, because presumably the average American isn’t going to go for the ICBM road mobile launcher driving down the street in your town or city, which is why the Defense Department will justify we need the second strike capacity capability, the submarines, because… The wonky stuff that is worth looking into, if you really dig the book and are like, “Wait a minute.” It’s all footnoted where you can learn more about how these systems have changed over time. And why, more than anything, it’s very difficult to get out of this catch-22 conundrum that we need nuclear weapons to keep us safe. That is the real enigma. Because the other guys have them, right? And the other guys have-
And he told me the story about how, he said, “The football is with the president at all times, period.” They were traveling to Syria, and Clinton was meeting with President Assad. And they got into an elevator, Clinton and the Secret Service team, and one of Assad’s guys was like, “No.” About the mil aide. And Lou said it was like a standoff because there was no way they were not going to have the president with his football in an elevator. And it sums up. For me anyways, you realize what goes into every single one of these decisions. You realize the massive system of systems behind every item you might just see in passing and glancing on the news as you see the mil aide carrying that satchel. Well, what’s in that satchel? I really dug into that to report this book.
And so it’s described to me this way, the Pentagon bunker is the beating heart, the Cheyenne Mountain bunker is the brains, and the STRATCOM bunker is the muscle. The STRATCOM commander will receive word from the president, “Launch orders.” And then directs the 150,000 people beneath him what to do from the bunker beneath STRATCOM. He gets the orders, then he has to run out of the building and jump onto what’s called the doomsday plane. We’ll get into that in a minute. Let me just finish the… I mean, but again-
There are 40 of them in Alaska, and there are four of them at Vandenberg Air Force Base in Santa Barbara. And they are responsible at about nine minutes into the scenario. After the ICBM has finished that five-minute boost phase we talked about, now it’s in mid-course phase, and the ground radar systems have identified, yes, this is an incoming ICBM. And now the interceptor missiles have to launch. It’s essentially shooting a missile with a missile. Inside the interceptor, which is just a big giant rocket, in its nose cone, it has what’s called the aptly named Exoatmospheric Kill Vehicle. There’s no explosives in that thing. It’s literally just going to take out the warhead ideally with force. So one of them is going mach 20. I mean, the speeds at which these two moving objects hurtling through space are going is astonishing. And the fact that interception is even possible is really remarkable, but it’s only possible 50% of the time.
So in the scenario, I have the nuclear ICBM coming in. The interceptor missiles try to shoot down the warhead. The capability is not like what’s called shoot and look. There’s not enough time to go, “And we’re going to try to get it. We missed it. Okay, let’s go for another one.” So you have to go… So in my scenario, we fire off four, which is about what I was told, one to four, because you’re worried about the next one that’s going to come in. You’re going to use up 10% of your missile force, of your interceptor force on one, and all four miss. And that’s totally plausible.
The mistake was that there was a training tape with a nuclear war scenario. We haven’t even begun to talk about the nuclear war scenarios that the Pentagon runs. An actual VHS training tape had been incorrectly inserted into a system at the Pentagon. And so this nuclear launch showed up at that bunker beneath the Pentagon and at the bunker beneath STRATCOM because they’re connected, as being real. And then it was like, oh, whoops. It’s actually a simulation test tape. And Perry described to me what that was like, the pause in his spirit and his mind and his heart when he realized, “I’m about to have to tell the president that he needs to launch nuclear weapons.” And he learned just in the nick of time that it was an error. And that’s one of five examples.
And he had a lot to do with me feeling like I could write this book from a human point of view and not just from the mechanized systems. Because, and I only lightly touch upon this because it’s such a fast sweeping scenario, but Perry, for example, spent his whole life dedicated to building weapons of war only later in life to realize this is madness. And he shared with me that it was that idea about one’s grandchildren inheriting these nuclear arsenals and the lack of wisdom that comes with their origin stories. When you’re involved in it in the ground up, apparently it has perhaps you’re a different kind of steward of these systems than if you just inherit them, and they are pages in a manual.
And I write about Proud Prophet in the book because it was super significant in many ways. One, it was happening right… In 1983, it was an insane moment in nuclear arsenals. There were 60,000 nuclear weapons. Right now there’s 12,500. So we’ve come a long way, baby, in terms of disarmament. But there were 60,000. And by the way, that was not the ultimate high. The ultimate high was 70,000. This is insane. And Ronald Reagan was president, and he orders this war game called Proud Prophet, and everyone that mattered was involved. They were running the war game scenarios.
And what we learned from his declassification is that no matter how nuclear war starts, there was a bunch of different scenarios, with NATO involved, without NATO, all different scenarios. No matter how nuclear war starts, it ends in Armageddon. It ends with everyone dead. I mean, this is shocking when you think about that coupled with the idea that all that has been done in the 40 some odd years since is, okay, let’s just really lean in even harder to this theoretical phenomena of deterrence. Because that’s all it is, it’s just a statement, Lex. Deterrence will hold. Okay. Well, what if it doesn’t? Well, we know from Proud Prophet what happens if it doesn’t.
Well, what is completely unknown to 98% of the planet is that not only do the Russians have a very flawed satellite system so that they cannot interpret what is happening properly, but there is an absolutely existential flaw in the system, which Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta confirmed with me, which is that our ICBMs do not have enough range. If we launch a counterattack against, say, North Korea, our ICBMs must fly over Russia. They must fly over Russia. So imagine saying, “Oh, no, no. These 82 warheads that are going to actually strike the Northern Korean peninsula are not coming for you, Russia.” Our adversary right now that we’re saber-rattling with. “Just trust us.” And that is where nuclear war unfolds into Armageddon. And that hole in national security is shocking. And as Panetta told me, no one wants to discuss it.
We haven’t even begun to talk about the fact that at the same time, these advisors also have a parallel concern, and that’s called continuity of government. So while they’re trying to advise on the nuclear counterstrike in response to the incoming nuclear missile, they have to be thinking, “How are we going to keep the government functioning when the missiles start hitting, when the bombs start going off?” And that is about getting yourself out of the Pentagon, let’s say. Getting yourself to one of these nuclear bunkers that I write about at length in the book.
So how much can you ask of a human, right? Because it comes down to a human. Secretary of Defense is a human. Imagine that job while trying to advise the president. And then there’s also a really interesting term which I learned about called jamming the president, which is often understood in Washington that the military advisors would, we don’t know if this is legit, we’ve never seen it put to the test, but jamming the president means the military advisors are going to push for a really aggressive counter attack immediately.
And again, you’re the president who’s not really been paying attention to this because he has many other things to deal with. Speed is not conducive to wisdom.
But that idea that the commander in chief and everyone within the national security apparatus should be making really good decisions about war. It’s the oldest cliche in the world that the wars are fought by the young kids. It’s not a cliche; it’s true. And so the character part about the president should be in play whether we’re thinking about nuclear war or any war, in my opinion.
But to which degree is it really on the president versus to the people advising?
And then this astonishing thing happens. The president takes out his wallet. He has a card in it that’s colloquially called the biscuit, and that card with the codes matches up an item in the briefcase in the football that then is received by an officer underneath the Pentagon in that bunker. It’s a call and response, Lex. It’s like alpha zeta, that’s it. And then back so that the individual in the bunker realizes they are getting the command from the president. And then that order is passed to STRATCOM. And STRATCOM, the commander of STRATCOM, and I interviewed a former commander of STRATCOM, commander of STRATCOM then follows orders, which is he delivers the launch orders to the nuclear triad, and what’s done is done.
So the caveat I would say to McDuff’s answer of easier to win the Powerball is that if the commander of STRATCOM interpreted the president’s behavior to be unreliable, to be non-presidential, then dot dot dot. But now you’re into some really radical territory.
And then, I don’t know, there’ve been 100 people that have been directly involved in nuclear weapons along the way. Billy Waugh, who was my main sort of central figure in a book I wrote about the CIA’s paramilitary called Surprise, Kill, Vanish. And Waugh HALO jumped a tactical nuclear weapon into the Nevada test site with a small team. Almost unknown to anyone, right? Only recently declassified. And so his position was like, “Tactical nuclear weapons may end up being used.”
I’m trying to speak here to the scope of different people I have interviewed over the years. And what has happened is as I’ve gotten closer to the present day, in arrears, there seems to be a growing movement from some of these Cold warriors off the position of, “Nuclear weapons make us great and strong,” toward “Something must be done to reduce this threat.”
What was interesting in interviewing him was also this recent very, very dangerous shift in Russian nuclear policy, which is this: Many Russian experts will tell you that Russia has always maintained that it never had a launch on warning policy. Now, I don’t know if I believe that’s true, but I’m just telling you what they say. And this is coming from the generals, the Cold War generals in Soviet Russia saying, “Oh, no, no, no. We would wait.” They were kind of playing the noble warrior. “We would wait to absorb a nuclear attack until we launched.” Okay? So many Americans experts will tell you that that’s just posturing and propaganda. But that was their official position, and that changed just two years ago when Putin gave a speech and he said that their position had changed, that they will no longer wait to absorb an attack. That once they learn of, how did he phrase it? He called it like the trajectory of the missiles, which is a way of, we’re talking about parody, the same way we see the missile coming over in Midcourse. Putin made that same statement, and said, “We would launch.”
We’re talking about millimeters and inches. We’re talking about the Defense Department knowing that, oh, seven and a half miles out the upholstery on cars will spontaneously combust. The pine needles will catch on fire. They will start more fires. You have all kinds of mayhem and chaos happening based on reported facts from observations. And this is really shocking and grotesque at the same time.
And then you have a sucking action. Many people are familiar with what the nuclear mushroom cloud looks like. Its stem actually creates, and again, this is from physicists who advise the Defense Department on this, the sucking up into the nuclear stem, 300 mile an hour winds. You’re talking about people miles out getting sucked up into that stem. When you see the mushroom cloud, Lex, in a nuclear war, that would be people. Those are like the remnants of people and of things in the cloud; 30, 40 mile wide mushroom cloud blocking out the sun, and that speaks nothing of the radiation poisoning that follows.
By the way, Craig Fugate was so transparently human with me, and I quote him directly in the book. But he spoke about, you asked me earlier about what would be going through the president’s mind, and we don’t know, I don’t know, but Craig Fugate told me what would be going through his mind. He said along the lines, I’m paraphrasing, it’s almost something you couldn’t even comprehend. It would just ruin you. His words are really powerful.
Of course, the FEMA director, in the scenario, is notified in that first window while the ballistic missile is on its way and no one in America yet knows. I have the FEMA director pull over to the side of the road and jump in a helicopter that’s sent for him to take him to the bunker that FEMA goes to, which is called Mount Weather. And so, Fugate was aware that, as FEMA director, you would likely be taken to a safe place, however many hours you’re going to be safe, or days or maybe weeks or maybe months.
But as I also learned from the cyber people I interviewed, that there’s a complete fallacy that these military bases can continue functioning. They run on diesel fuel, and when the fuel stops pumping, there’s no more generators.
There were all kinds of controversies about it when it came out, including the Defense Department saying it was Soviet propaganda, which it wasn’t. What the nuclear winter authors conceded back in the ’80s was that their modeling was just the best it could be based on what they had at the time. And so, now flash forward to where we are in 2024, and talking to Professor Toon who’s been working on this issue for all these decades since, he shared with me how the climate models today with the systems we have, the computer systems, reveal that actually nuclear winter is worse.
To answer your questions, the bombs stop falling, in my scenario, 72 minutes after they first launch. The bombs stop falling, and then the megafires begin. Each nuclear weapon will have, according to the Defense Department, a megafire that will burn between 100 and 300 square miles. 1000 weapons, 1500 weapons, think about those megafires. Everything is burning, forests, cities. Think about the pyrotoxins in all the cities. High-rises burning. All of this soot gets lofted into the air, according to Toon, some 300 billion pounds of soot. What happens? It blocks out the sun. Without sun, we have nuclear winter. We have a situation whereby ice sheets form. You’re talking about bodies of water in places like Iowa being frozen for 10 years.
If you have people living underground and you have this great thawing, and with that great thawing comes pathogens and plague. You have this system where the small-bodied animals, the insects and whatnot, begin reproducing really fast, and the larger body animals like you and me begin to go extinct. Professor Toon said it to me this way. He said, “66 million years ago, an asteroid hit Earth, killed all the dinosaurs and wiped out 70% of the species, and nuclear war would likely do the same.” And so, here we are talking about this because there is a difference. There’s nothing you can do about an asteroid, but there is something you can do about a nuclear war.
To really think about this idea, I looked at the oldest known archeological site in the world in Turkey, which is called Gobekli Tepe. It’s really fascinating to me because I interviewed one of the two archeologists who first found this site in the early ’90s. The lead archeologist was a guy named Klaus Schmidt, and Michael Morsch was the young graduate student who was with him. Morsch’s description of coming upon this rumored to be site, there was something called a wishing tree on the site, which I just found so human and perfect, that it was this magical place, and it was Locatable because there was a wishing tree on a hill. It’s where people went to wish and to hope that their wishes came true. I mean, how human is that?
That is where beneath the wishing tree, in the shadow of the wishing tree, there was a tepe, which is a hill. Beneath that, there is the oldest known civilization in the world. 12,000 years ago, a group of hunter-gatherers built this site. Why? We don’t know. But I imagined through Morsch’s descriptions of coming upon. He tripped on a rock, he told me. He tripped over a stone that turned out to be the top part of a 12,000 year old sculpted man, giant pillar. He talked about coming upon that. And then, no one knows really what Gobekli Tepe was for.
That makes my mind try and answer the question you asked me internally, just as a human who’s here on earth for the amount of time I’m here. If there were a nuclear war, what would it be like? What would it be like when someone in the future, would we become archeologists one day? Would civilization rebuild? Would we develop computers? Who knows? It’s interesting to think about. I hope we never have to.
Maybe some religious ideas will persist. Some stories and myths will persist. But all the wisdom we’ve gathered, higher level sort of technological wisdom would be gone. That’s terrifying to think about. Maybe even, as you touch on, the very fact of nuclear war might be forgotten. The lessons of nuclear war might be forgotten. That there are these weapons, sort of the obvious elephant in the room would be one of the things that’s completely forgotten or become so vague in the recollection of humans that our understanding will change. It’s almost as if a God descended on earth and destroyed everything. Maybe that’s how it will persist. Mythological interpretation of what nuclear weapons are. That’s terrifying because then it could repeat again.
Mitchell was vilified when he got back from the moon because it became known that he believed in things like extrasensory perception and this kind of mystical, metaphysical way of looking at the world. He really suffered from that. I mean, he was ridiculed and he lost a lot of his career and his friends. But what he said to me in our interview about his trip home from the moon answers that great filter question, I think, in a way I might want to adopt, which is this.
He said that as they were returning from the moon to earth, he looked down at the earth, and I’m paraphrasing him, I write all this in Phenomena, an earlier book, but the paraphrasing is that he looked down from the earth and it was 1971. He thought about all the conflict going on down below, particularly the Vietnam War where many of his friends were. And then, he looked behind him into the great vast galaxy. He had a moment, he says, that was like an epiphany. Not a near-death experience, but a sort of near-life experience where he believed that the human consciousness, which is where so much of this thoughtfulness about metaphysics and ESP perhaps come from.
Mitchell’s theory, was that human consciousness, the way to understand it, had something to do with realizing that man’s inner life and man’s outer life are deeply connected, in the same way that man is connected to the galaxy. He said it much more eloquently, but you kind of get the idea. I think it’s why humans have always loved to look up, that there’s more there. It’s like the big version of the wishing tree, what do I wish for for myself? What is maybe, perhaps, the realignment of thinking for those of us in search of happiness instead of war. What does it mean to have a conscience, to have consciousness? What does it mean to be a thinking person? What does it mean to be on this earth, to be born, to live, to die? And then, there is legacy. And so, all of those ideas are, I think, foster the kind of conversation that de-escalates conflict.
For me, thinking about alien civilizations out there is really the same kind of question, which is, what are we? What is this? What are we doing here? How do we come here? Why does it seem to be so magical and beautiful and powerful? Now, where’s it going? Because it feels like we’re really, perhaps for the first time in history, are in a moment where we can destroy ourselves. And so, naturally you ask, well, where’s others like us? Perhaps, are we inevitably going to a place where we’ll destroy ourselves? Is it basically inevitable that we destroy ourselves? We become too powerful and insufficiently wise to know what to do with that power? But like you said, probably the answers to that are in here. We don’t need to look out there.
I’d love to ask you about the extrasensory perception. You’ve written, like you said, the book Phenomena on the secret history of the US government’s investigations into extrasensory perception and psychokinesis. What are some of the more interesting extrasensory abilities that were explored by the government, and maybe just in general, ESP. What is it? What do you know of it?
And then, I really began thinking, well, before science and technology, sort of the supernatural ruled the world. The Oracle of Delphi in Greece exists before the common era rulers to go and beg to learn from the powers that be what was going to happen. All ESP programs, I think, pull from that origin story, the leader’s desire to know. And so, I really found it amazing that many people think these systems, or rather these programs, started in the ’70s. I learned they actually began right after World War II. That was because, and in my reporting, I find all things sort of always circle back to the Third Reich, to the Nazis.
The Nazis had a massive occult program, an ESP program, psychokinesis program, astrology. Both Hitler and Himmler were deeply interested in these occult concepts. After I learned from records at the National Archives that after the war, half of everything went to the Soviet Union, and I’m talking about the trove of Nazi documents from which the superpowers were then going to learn to fight future wars, and half of them went to the United States. And so, we got this trove of documents about all of this, and the Soviets got the other. And so, it set off a kind of psychic arms race, which in a weird way paralleled the nuclear arms race, which we’ve been talking about, in as much that it led one side to constantly wonder what the other side had.
When the military stepped in and got involved in the programs, that was a complete disaster, in my opinion, because the military needs to control everything in a mechanized, systematic way. And so, they started, for example, teaching people to be psychic, which is a really, really, really bad idea.
Flash forward to where we are today, these programs still exist. There’s a Navy program which is working, based on a lot of data that came back from the war on terror, with certain soldiers knowing, “Wait, don’t walk down that path. There is an IED there.” They call this the spidey sense, and they actually have a program that works from this. These things never go away. They circle around in terms of being made fun of and then taken seriously, and a little of this and of that. My biggest takeaway from writing that book was a quote that I referenced in the beginning, which is the Thomas theorem, and it says, if men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences.
I mean, my first learning about the CIA came from the work I did on the Area 51 book about their aerial reconnaissance programs, which were set up again to prevent World War III, nuclear World War III. It was this idea that information was king. The U-2 spy pane was developed out at Area 51. I interviewed Hervey Stockman, the first man to fly over the Soviet Union in a U-2, gathered all this intelligence, prevented wars. Later, I wrote a book about the CIA’s paramilitary, Surprise, Kill, Vanish. Just when I was thinking, “Wow, the CIA is doing all this amazing non-kinetic activity with aerial reconnaissance, then you learn about their kill programs,” and that’s a whole different set of issues.
Sometimes people will tell me things. They’ll say, “Annie, this is off the record. This is for you to know about me on deep background because I want you to know who I am,” and that’s powerful and a lot of times personal. It’s personal. It’s about their personal life, and it isn’t apropos to what I’m writing about, but I need to know that. That’s where it gets conflicted, in a good way, because you realize where we’re all such creatures of our personal lives. You have a professional life where national security are in your hands. I don’t know what that is like.
By the way, the reason they’re talking to me is because they’re still alive and so many of their colleagues are dead. It gives them also a wisdom about life, about sacrifice, not in cliched sort of nationalistic jingoistic terms whatsoever. I’m talking real. What is their real truth?
When I went to Vietnam with Billy Waugh, I mean, the details are just every detail. I mean, starting with the fact that he showed up at my house with a giant suitcase and a bunch of clothes, dry cleaning, pressed clothes in plastic hangers, carrying them. I’m like, “Billy, we’re going to Vietnam and we’re going back into the jungle to find the Oscar-8 battle site. What are you carrying?” He got really mad at me, did not like anyone correcting him. I got my husband on the job, like, “Kevin, you got to sort this out.”
What transpired was that Billy Waugh had never taken a trip for personal reasons. He operated, I think, in 62 countries, every single time for the CIA. It would go like this, Billy, go to there and get to there, and that’s what he would do. When he arrived, whatever he needed, he would just get. It’s not a fashion trip. He had no idea how to pack for an overseas trip. This was like, “Oh my God, how can you not have the hugest smile on your face going into this? I’m with a guy whose 89 years old.”
He’d had eight Purple Hearts from Vietnam. I mean, he operated against Osama bin Laden 10 years before 9/11. He went after bin Laden in Afghanistan when he was 72. He went after Qaddafi during the Arab spring when he was 82, and now here he is with me going to Hanoi. The details, those human details. But my husband repacked his bag and got him a proper suitcase that was carryable and small and he wasn’t trailing the hangers, but it was the trip home in the taxi that I got at this really big reveal.
Billy reached into that small suitcase my husband had given him and pulled out a rolled up American flag. He had taken this flag, because I had tried to help him pack and he wouldn’t let me, and I just thought it was like an old guy being stubborn, but he didn’t want me to see that he was bringing an American flag to Vietnam, which is not legal. He wanted to bring that flag and take it around everywhere with him, as he explained to me later, to honor all of his friends who died there 50 years ago.
And then, when the trip was finished, he gave me that flag and it’s in my office. That’s the kind of relationship that you can develop with people as a reporter, if you’re willing to go the extra mile with them, to trust them, that they’ll tell you things of value. To me, something like that is as of value as any secret mission I’m able to get declassified, because we are a nation of people.
Colonel Slater told me this one perk, I just love so much. They all had a hankering for lobster one day. And here they’re in the middle of the desert in Nevada, and they have these really fast planes, and they literally called, they arranged, they didn’t take the Oxcart out for that one, but they got some lobsters from Massachusetts delivered to them in record time. They didn’t even need to put them on ice. And again, those are these details where you’re like, at least for me, “Thank God I got these details. These guys are all passed now.”
Now, does that mean that every UFO sighting in the world has been a U-2? No, but I come from it from that lane of thinking, and there are so many strategic deception campaigns, and as I look over the decades of how these same UFO stories, and again, this is just my opinion based on my reporting, this narrative that keeps reoccurring, it seems to me like a very large catch- all to keep the public’s attention on that, not on that.
So look that up, and then you go, “Oh my God.” And to my eye, you can apply any of these other names substitute in Paul Bennewitz or any of the current individuals who really become convinced of X, Y, or Z, when in fact there’s a strategic deception campaign going on.
So if you believe that we’re alone in this universe, that’s a great motivator to build rockets and become multi-planetary and save ourselves, especially in the case of nuclear war, because otherwise, whatever this special sauce, this flame of consciousness will go out if we destroy ourselves on this earth. And for people like Elon, it’s too high of a probability that we destroy ourselves on earth not to try to become multi-planetary. In your book on Area 51, you propose an explanation that I think some people have criticized at the very end that this might’ve been a disinformation campaign from, I guess Stalin, that the Roswell incident was a remotely piloted plane with a quote, “grotesque child-sized aviator”. Just looking back at all that now, years later, what’s the probability that it’s true? What’s the probability it’s not?
And Stalin was also messing with the United States, messing with Truman, who sort of turned his back on him at Potsdam. And so this idea and the reason that the source is important, and unlike a lot of people, “I saw, I saw this, I saw that, I learned that,” was according to the source, once it was determined that this was a hoax and that Stalin was able to get a craft over the United States, and it crashed and it had people inside of it.
They were people that were sort of deformed and meant surgically altered to look like aliens. The United States government decided that it needed to know what on earth that was all about. And if it was possible for us to have the same program, this according to the source. And so it sounds preposterous, and if it was just someone saying, you might say, “Well, it’s ridiculous,” and get them onto another subject. But the difference was is this source who was very well-placed and friends with all of the other 75 people told me this as a confession, a real tearful confession. Because what he said is he was involved in the American program to do the same thing, and people died because there were human experiments that went on.
And I write about this in the last 12 pages of Area 51. It was an explosive revelation, and I felt very confident in writing this because the source wanted it written. Why? Because he said, “I’m dedicated to my country. I know about being committed to national security, and this kind of thing must never happen. And if you give people too much power, they would take advantage of it.” And he wanted it on the record. And his wife of 60 years did not know until after the book published, nor did his children. So after the book published, I was called to his house and sat there with his family and they said, “Tell us this isn’t true.” And he said, “It is true.” Now that source is Al O’Donnell, who is the nuclear weapons engineer who armed, wired, and fired 186 nuclear weapons. So if you want to talk about someone, you’re the first person I’ve told that on the record, but it’s kind of about time.
Because if the President of the United States says they’re legal, they’re legal. Executive Order 12333. It says, we don’t assassinate, but it can be overwritten by another order that’s straight out of Rizzo’s mouth. Also, really important to keep in mind is that the military operates under what’s called Title 50. It’s part of the National Security Code that gives rules and etc. How you must behave in a war theater. Well, the CIA is under no such rules. It operates under what’s called Title 50. And it’s interesting to me as reporter, because before I wrote the book and reported openly about Title 50, it was not really discussed. And now you even see operators themselves on podcasts talking about Title 50, which is kind of great because it’s like the cat’s out of the bag, guys. That’s what it’s called. And that’s how it works. It means what we say goes.
So the SEALs operate under Title 10. So they had to get what I call sheep-dip because that’s what the insiders call it. And that is a term that comes from interestingly Area 51, the U-2 pilots who were Air Force pilots, they needed to be sheep dipped over to the CIA so they could do things that defied the law. So you can see how these all entwine and you become more and more informed, and you go, “Aha.” Right? So that’s how Title 50 worked. So the night of that mission, it was a CIA mission because the CIA is allowed to go into Pakistan and kill someone, and the military can.
He would show me these PowerPoints that were just fantastic. Late in his life, he was constantly being asked to go up to Fort Bragg and lecture to the young soldiers, and everybody loved him. And he would drive all night to get there, and he would create these PowerPoints, and then he would show me the PowerPoints, all unclassified. But at one point, when Hugo Chavez was in power, Billy Waugh was kind of asked, that’s how it works, of if you had to think about doing something, what would it look like? Let’s just say hypothetically. So he took me through this PowerPoint that never happened, whereby he and a group of operators, agency operators were going to HALO jump in to the palace and grab Chavez and probably kill him because he wouldn’t allow himself to be captured. And by the way, HALO jumping, for those listeners who don’t know, high altitude, low opening.
So you jump out of an aircraft and you go down like a pencil until you’re really low to the deck, like a thousand feet. You pull your parachute cord, and that way you’re not picked up on radar and you’re also not traceable when you get to the ground because it’s so fast. Billy Waugh took the second HALO jump in history into a war theater in Laos during the Vietnam War. So he’s like this famous HALO jumper. So he and the team were going to go in grab Chavez, and he said to me a very interesting thing that was kind of a one moment in time where I saw a different side of Billy Waugh where he said, “I’m so glad we didn’t do that, even though I really wanted to at the time, because can you imagine that country’s problems, where it is now? Can you imagine how we would have been blamed?” And it was an interesting rare moment for Billy Waugh to comment on the bigger picture that you’re asking me about. I think pretty much the operators I know they just stick to the mission.
But I once asked Billy when I was trying to get the question and he wouldn’t answer it, and I said, so there’s another person in my book named Rick Proto, who’s also a legendary agency guy, and so he’s like 20 years younger than Billy. And I said, “Billy, if you and Rick had to kill each other, who would win?” I was trying to imagine this hypothetical, how would that work? Who would win? And I posed the question to each of them, and of course each of them said me, then I went back to them and Billy said, “Let me tell you how I would win.” And he said, ” I’d cheat. I’d show up before the duel.”
He gets word that the SEAL who has been tracking Mughniyeh to get photographs of him, to give the photographs to Mossad and CIA so they can do a joint operation to kill him, which they did with a car bomb in Damascus. That’s the end of the story. But how we got there was, the CIA needed confirmation. You can’t kill the wrong person. So the SEAL panicked according to Billy Waugh and was just like, “I’m out of here. This is too dangerous and I do not want to wind up in a Saudi prison.” So who do you send in, Billy Waugh? He shows up, he’s there for 24 hours. He knows where Mughniyeh lives from the SEAL. He positions himself in a cafe across the street which is run by Sudanese men. And of course Waugh speaks some Sudanese because he operated in Sudan. And he’s shooting the shit with him by his own words. He had the most foul mouth that was just absolutely delightful to listen to.
And then in between him and Mughniyeh’s house is a dumpster. And Billy Waugh being Billy Waugh, who will go to any lengths to do the job, decides to conduct reconnaissance from inside the dumpster. And that is where he is when he takes the picture of Imad Mughniyeh living so comfortably in Saudi. That Mughniyeh according to Billy, came out of his apartment building with dry cleaner plastic bag hangers over his shoulder. That’s how comfortable he lived there. It was his neighborhood. Click, click, click, Billy Waugh takes the photographs, runs them to the CIA headquarters in Saudi at the embassy. Oh my God, it’s Mughniyeh. Get the hell out of here. He gets to the airport, he leaves. Those photographs get sent to the agency, and then they do the operation with Mossad and Mughniyeh is dead. Now the truth about that being a co CIA mission was not reported for many years after the fact. Mossad took credit as the CIA often likes to just give other people credit. They just want the job done.
And also great opportunity for me to say, I’m often standing on the shoulders of journalists before me who did an incredible job digging into something and being able to report what they knew. Often the books are 10, 20, 30 years old, and so much more has come to light since.
But Russian assassins were able to poison Khokhlov with polonium. What happens to him is insane and it’s a miracle he didn’t die, but he doesn’t. And then he defects to the West and he writes these books and he tells lots of incredible secrets about the Russian assassination programs and their poison labs and they’re really interesting. So to answer that question, I mean to my eye of course, I don’t know, but it certainly looks like Russia is acting in the same vein that it has always acted, taking care of dissidents that go against Mother Russia.
And what has happened in the five years since this question was first on everybody’s minds about NSA surveillance is that the civilian sector companies have essentially done all the defense department’s biometric surveillance job for them by all of us sharing our facially recognizable images on Instagram and Facebook and everywhere else, X, by sharing information, by writing up narratives about ourselves. This information has become part of the database. Five years ago when I was reporting First Platoon, I was interviewing the police chief of El Segundo, which is like on the outskirts of LA. It’s right near the airport. And why it’s important is because it’s like defense contractor haven. So they have massive surveillance. And Chief Whalen, when I posed this question to him, he said to me, “Annie, let me show you something.” And he had Clearwater AI, the recognition software on his phone. And this was still when it was like quasi not supposed to, you have that for law enforcement. And he said, “I want you to go down the block and I want you to just turn the corner and come back toward me.” Which I did. And he just didn’t even hold up his phone. He just looked at his hand and his phone was on me. And he went back down and it was like the tiniest movement. And when I came back to him, he went like this and he showed me, there I was. Everything about me. Facts and figures and all images. And he knew who I was before I even got to him. So is that a good thing or a bad thing? I mean, we could have another three hour conversation about that alone.
So what it’s doing is it’s creating an ability for, if someone wants to know about you, if someone, let’s say in government, wants to know about Lex Fridman, they can find out everything about you. And then that gets used for tagging, tracking and ultimately. In the war theater it was called find, fix, finish. Well, what do you think the finish is in that statement?
And O’Donnell like so many others, was slated to invade mainland Japan, to his almost certain death. So somebody like that, it makes sense right from the get go why he would be pro nuclear weapons. It saved his own personal life and it saved everyone that he knew that he was fighting with. And it ended the war.
Click link to jump approximately to that part in the transcript:
- 0:00 – Introduction
- 2:13 – Nuclear war
- 6:57 – Launch procedure
- 12:36 – Deterrence
- 16:09 – Tactical nukes
- 25:35 – Nuclear submarines
- 28:35 – Nuclear missiles
- 35:46 – Nuclear football
- 44:53 – Missile interceptor system
- 49:10 – North Korea
- 55:46 – Nuclear war scenarios
- 1:04:38 – Warmongers
- 1:09:06 – President’s cognitive ability
- 1:15:19 – Refusing orders
- 1:23:17 – Russia and Putin
- 1:28:23 – Cyberattack
- 1:29:45 – Ground zero of nuclear war
- 1:34:24 – Surviving nuclear war
- 1:38:42 – Nuclear winter
- 1:49:05 – Alien civilizations
- 1:54:40 – Extrasensory perception
- 2:08:25 – Area 51
- 2:12:23 – UFOs and aliens
- 2:22:51 – Roswell incident
- 2:29:30 – CIA assassinations
- 2:48:23 – Navalny
- 2:50:48 – KGB
- 2:57:24 – Hitler and the atomic bomb
- 3:01:27 – War and human nature
- 3:04:53 – Hope
Introduction
Annie Jacobsen
The United States has 1,770 nuclear weapons deployed, meaning those weapons could launch in as little as 60 seconds and up to a couple of minutes. Some of them on the bombers might take an hour or so. Russia has 1,674 deployed nuclear weapons. Same scenario. Their weapons systems are on par with ours. That’s not to mention the 12,500 nuclear weapons amongst the nine nuclear armed nations. The sucking up into the nuclear stem, 300 mile an hour winds, you’re talking about people miles out getting sucked up into that stem. When you see the mushroom cloud, Lex, that would be people 30, 40 mile wide mushroom cloud blocking out the sun, and that speaks nothing of the radiation poisoning that follows.
The United States has 1,770 nuclear weapons deployed, meaning those weapons could launch in as little as 60 seconds and up to a couple of minutes. Some of them on the bombers might take an hour or so. Russia has 1,674 deployed nuclear weapons. Same scenario. Their weapons systems are on par with ours. That’s not to mention the 12,500 nuclear weapons amongst the nine nuclear armed nations. The sucking up into the nuclear stem, 300 mile an hour winds, you’re talking about people miles out getting sucked up into that stem. When you see the mushroom cloud, Lex, that would be people 30, 40 mile wide mushroom cloud blocking out the sun, and that speaks nothing of the radiation poisoning that follows.
In addition to the Launch on Warning concept, there’s this other insane concept called Sole Presidential Authority. And you might think, in a democracy that’s impossible, right? You can’t just start a war. Well, you can just start a nuclear war if you are the commander in chief, the President of the United States. In fact, you’re the only one who can do that. We are one misunderstanding, one miscalculation away from nuclear Armageddon. No matter how nuclear war starts, it ends with everyone dead.
Lex Fridman
The following is a conversation with Annie Jacobsen, an investigative journalist, Pulitzer price finalist and author of several amazing books on war, weapons, government secrecy, and national security, including the books titled Area 51, Operation Paperclip, The Pentagon’s Brain, Phenomena, Surprise, Kill, Vanish, and her new book, Nuclear War. This is a Lex Fridman podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here’s Annie Jacobsen.
The following is a conversation with Annie Jacobsen, an investigative journalist, Pulitzer price finalist and author of several amazing books on war, weapons, government secrecy, and national security, including the books titled Area 51, Operation Paperclip, The Pentagon’s Brain, Phenomena, Surprise, Kill, Vanish, and her new book, Nuclear War. This is a Lex Fridman podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here’s Annie Jacobsen.
Nuclear war
Let’s start with an immensely dark topic, nuclear war. How many people would a nuclear war between the United States and Russia kill?
Annie Jacobsen
I’m coming back at you with a very dark answer and a very big number. And that number is 5 billion people.
I’m coming back at you with a very dark answer and a very big number. And that number is 5 billion people.
Lex Fridman
You go second by second, minute by minute, hour by hour what would happen if the nuclear war started? There’s a lot of angles from which I would love to talk to you about this. First, how would the deaths happen in the short term and the long term?
You go second by second, minute by minute, hour by hour what would happen if the nuclear war started? There’s a lot of angles from which I would love to talk to you about this. First, how would the deaths happen in the short term and the long term?
Annie Jacobsen
To start off, the reason I wrote the book is so that readers like you could see in appalling detail just how horrific nuclear war would be. And as you said, second by second, minute by minute. The book covers nuclear launch to nuclear winter. I purposely don’t get into the politics that lead up to that or the national security maneuvers or the posturing or any of that. I just want people to know nuclear war is insane. And every source I interviewed for this book, from Secretary of Defense, all retired, nuclear sub-force commander, STRATCOM commander, FEMA director, et cetera. On and on and on, nuclear weapons engineers. They all shared with me the common denominator that nuclear war is insane.
To start off, the reason I wrote the book is so that readers like you could see in appalling detail just how horrific nuclear war would be. And as you said, second by second, minute by minute. The book covers nuclear launch to nuclear winter. I purposely don’t get into the politics that lead up to that or the national security maneuvers or the posturing or any of that. I just want people to know nuclear war is insane. And every source I interviewed for this book, from Secretary of Defense, all retired, nuclear sub-force commander, STRATCOM commander, FEMA director, et cetera. On and on and on, nuclear weapons engineers. They all shared with me the common denominator that nuclear war is insane.
First millions, then tens of millions, then hundreds of millions of people will die in the first 72 minutes of a nuclear war. And then, comes nuclear winter where the billions happen from starvation. And so, the shock power of all of this is meant for each and every one of us to say, “Wait, what?” This actually exists behind the veil of national security. Most people do not think about nuclear war on a daily basis, and yet hundreds of thousands of people in the nuclear command and control are at the ready in the event it happens.
Lex Fridman
But it doesn’t take too many people to start one.
But it doesn’t take too many people to start one.
Annie Jacobsen
In the words of Richard Garwin, who was the nuclear weapons engineer who drew the plans for the Ivy Mike thermonuclear bomb, the first thermonuclear bomb ever exploded in 1952. Garwin shared with me his opinion that all it takes is one nihilistic madman with a nuclear arsenal to start a nuclear war. And that’s how I begin the scenario.
In the words of Richard Garwin, who was the nuclear weapons engineer who drew the plans for the Ivy Mike thermonuclear bomb, the first thermonuclear bomb ever exploded in 1952. Garwin shared with me his opinion that all it takes is one nihilistic madman with a nuclear arsenal to start a nuclear war. And that’s how I begin the scenario.
Lex Fridman
What are the different ways it could start? Literally, who presses a button and what does it take to press a button?
What are the different ways it could start? Literally, who presses a button and what does it take to press a button?
Annie Jacobsen
The way it starts is in space, meaning the US Defense Department has a early warning system, and the system in space is called SBIRS. It’s a constellation of satellites that is keeping an eye on all of America’s enemies so that the moment an ICBM launches, the satellite in space… And I’m talking about 1/10 of the way to the moon, that’s how powerful these satellites are in geo-sync. They see the hot rocket exhaust on the ICBM in a fraction of a second after it launches, a fraction of a second.
The way it starts is in space, meaning the US Defense Department has a early warning system, and the system in space is called SBIRS. It’s a constellation of satellites that is keeping an eye on all of America’s enemies so that the moment an ICBM launches, the satellite in space… And I’m talking about 1/10 of the way to the moon, that’s how powerful these satellites are in geo-sync. They see the hot rocket exhaust on the ICBM in a fraction of a second after it launches, a fraction of a second.
And so, there begins this horrifying policy called Launch on Warning, right? And that’s the US counterattack. Meaning the reason that the United States is so ferociously watching for a nuclear launch somewhere around the globe is so that the nuclear command and control system in the US can move into action to immediately make a counterstrike. Because we have that policy, Launch on Warning, which is exactly like it says. It means the United States will not wait to absorb a nuclear attack. It will launch nuclear weapons in response before the bomb actually hits.
Launch procedure
Lex Fridman
So the president, as part of the Launch on Warning policy, has six minutes… I guess can’t launch for six minutes, but at six minute mark from that first warning, the president can launch.
So the president, as part of the Launch on Warning policy, has six minutes… I guess can’t launch for six minutes, but at six minute mark from that first warning, the president can launch.
Annie Jacobsen
And that was one of the most remarkable details to really nail down for this book when I was reporting this book, and talking to Secretary of Defenses, for example, who are the people who advise the president on this matter, right? You say to yourself, ” Wait a minute. How could that possibly be?” So, let’s unpack that. So, in addition to the Launch on Warning concept, there’s this other insane concept called Sole Presidential Authority. And you might think, in a democracy that’s impossible, right? You can’t just start a war. Well, you can just start a nuclear war if you are the commander in chief, the President of the United States. In fact, you’re the only one who can do that. And we can get into later why that exists. I was able to get the origin story of that concept from Los Alamos, they declassified it for the book.
And that was one of the most remarkable details to really nail down for this book when I was reporting this book, and talking to Secretary of Defenses, for example, who are the people who advise the president on this matter, right? You say to yourself, ” Wait a minute. How could that possibly be?” So, let’s unpack that. So, in addition to the Launch on Warning concept, there’s this other insane concept called Sole Presidential Authority. And you might think, in a democracy that’s impossible, right? You can’t just start a war. Well, you can just start a nuclear war if you are the commander in chief, the President of the United States. In fact, you’re the only one who can do that. And we can get into later why that exists. I was able to get the origin story of that concept from Los Alamos, they declassified it for the book.
But the idea behind that is that nuclear war will unfold so fast only one person can be in charge. The president. He asks permission of no one. Not the Secretary of Defense, not the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, not the US Congress. So, built into that is this extraordinary speed you talk about, the six-minute window. And some people say, “That’s ridiculous. How do we know that six minute window?” Well, here’s the best hitting the nail on the head statement I can give you, which is in President Reagan’s memoirs, he refers to the six-minute window and he says… He calls it irrational, which it is. He says, “How can anyone make a decision to launch nuclear weapons based on a blip on a radar scope.” His words. “To unleash Armageddon.” And yet, that is the reality behind nuclear war.
Lex Fridman
Just imagine sitting there, one person, because a president is a human being, sitting there, just got the warning that Russia launched. You have six minutes. I meditate on my immortality every day. And here, you would be sitting and meditating, contemplating not just your own mortality, but the mortality of all the people you know, loved ones. Just imagining. What would be going through my head is all the people I know and love personally, and knowing that there’ll be no more, most likely. And if they somehow survive, they will be suffering and will eventually die.
Just imagine sitting there, one person, because a president is a human being, sitting there, just got the warning that Russia launched. You have six minutes. I meditate on my immortality every day. And here, you would be sitting and meditating, contemplating not just your own mortality, but the mortality of all the people you know, loved ones. Just imagining. What would be going through my head is all the people I know and love personally, and knowing that there’ll be no more, most likely. And if they somehow survive, they will be suffering and will eventually die.
I guess the question that kept coming up is how do we stop this? Is it inevitable that it’s going to be escalated to a full-on nuclear war that destroys everything? And it seems like it will be. It’s inevitable. In the position of the President, it’s almost inevitable that they have to respond.
Annie Jacobsen
I mean, one of the things I found shocking was how little apparently most presidents know about the responsibility that literally lays at their feet. You may think through this six-minute window, I may think through this six-minute window. But what I learned, for example, former Secretary of Defense, Leon Panetta was really helpful in explaining this to me because before he was SecDef, he served as the director of the CIA. And before that, he was the White House Chief of Staff. And so, he has seen these different roles that have been so close to the President. But he explained to me that when he was the White House Chief of Staff for President Clinton, he noticed how President Clinton didn’t want to ever really deal with the nuclear issue because he had so many other issues to deal with.
I mean, one of the things I found shocking was how little apparently most presidents know about the responsibility that literally lays at their feet. You may think through this six-minute window, I may think through this six-minute window. But what I learned, for example, former Secretary of Defense, Leon Panetta was really helpful in explaining this to me because before he was SecDef, he served as the director of the CIA. And before that, he was the White House Chief of Staff. And so, he has seen these different roles that have been so close to the President. But he explained to me that when he was the White House Chief of Staff for President Clinton, he noticed how President Clinton didn’t want to ever really deal with the nuclear issue because he had so many other issues to deal with.
And that only when Panetta became Secretary of Defense, he told me, did he really realize the weight of all of this, because he knew he would be the person that the president would turn to were he to be notified of a nuclear attack. And by the way, the Launch on Warning, it’s the ballistic missile seen from outer space by the satellite. And then, there also must be a second confirmation from a ground radar system. But in that process, which is just a couple minutes, everyone is getting ready to notify the president. And one of the first people that gets notified by NORAD or by STRATCOM or by NRO, these different parties that all see the early warning data, one of the first people that’s notified is the Secretary of Defense as well as the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, because those two together are going to brief the president about, “Sir, you have six minutes to decide.”
Deterrence
And that’s where you realize the immediacy of all of this is so counter to imagining the scenario. And again, all the presidents come into office, I have learned, understanding the idea of deterrence, this idea that we have these massive arsenals of nuclear weapons pointed at one another ready to launch so that we never have nuclear war. But what we’re talking about now is, what if we did? What if we did? And what you’ve raised is this really spooky, eerie subtext of the world right now because many of the nuclear armed nations are in direct conflict with other nations. And for the first time in decades, nuclear threats are actually coming out of the mouths of leaders. This is shocking.
Lex Fridman
So deterrence, the polite, implied assumption is that nobody will launch. And if they did, we would launch back and everybody would be dead. But that assumption falls apart completely, the whole philosophy of it falls apart once the first launch happens, then you have six minutes to decide, “Wait a minute. Are we going to hit back and kill everybody on earth? Or do we turn the other cheek in the most horrific way possible?”
So deterrence, the polite, implied assumption is that nobody will launch. And if they did, we would launch back and everybody would be dead. But that assumption falls apart completely, the whole philosophy of it falls apart once the first launch happens, then you have six minutes to decide, “Wait a minute. Are we going to hit back and kill everybody on earth? Or do we turn the other cheek in the most horrific way possible?”
Annie Jacobsen
Well, when nuclear war starts, there’s no battle for New York or battle for Moscow. It’s just literally… It was called in the Cold War, push button warfare. But in essence, that is what it is. Let’s get some numbers on the table if you don’t mind, right? Because when you’re saying like, “Wait a minute. We’re just hoping that it holds.” Right? Let’s just talk about Russia and the US, the arsenals that are literally pointed at one another right now. The United States has 1,770 nuclear weapons deployed, meaning those weapons could launch in as little as 60 seconds and up to a couple minutes. Some of them on the bombers might take an hour or so. Russia has 1,674 deployed nuclear weapons. Same scenario. Their weapons systems are on par with ours. That’s not to mention the 12,500 nuclear weapons amongst the nine nuclear armed nations.
Well, when nuclear war starts, there’s no battle for New York or battle for Moscow. It’s just literally… It was called in the Cold War, push button warfare. But in essence, that is what it is. Let’s get some numbers on the table if you don’t mind, right? Because when you’re saying like, “Wait a minute. We’re just hoping that it holds.” Right? Let’s just talk about Russia and the US, the arsenals that are literally pointed at one another right now. The United States has 1,770 nuclear weapons deployed, meaning those weapons could launch in as little as 60 seconds and up to a couple minutes. Some of them on the bombers might take an hour or so. Russia has 1,674 deployed nuclear weapons. Same scenario. Their weapons systems are on par with ours. That’s not to mention the 12,500 nuclear weapons amongst the nine nuclear armed nations.
But when you think about those kinds of arsenals of just between the United States and Russia, and you realize everything can be launched in seconds and minutes, then you realize the madness of mad, this idea that no one would launch because it would assure everyone’s destruction. Yes. But what if someone did? And in my interviews with scores of top tier national security advisors, people who advise the president, people who are responsible for these decisions if they had to be made, every single one of them said it could happen. They didn’t say this would never happen. And so, the idea is worth thinking about because I believe that it pulls back the veil on a fundamental security that if someone were to use a tactical nuclear weapon, “Well, it’s just an escalation.” It’s far more than that.
Tactical nukes
Lex Fridman
So to you, the use of a tactical nuclear weapon, maybe you can draw the line between a tactical and a strategic nuclear weapon. That could be a catalyst. That’s a very difficult thing to walk back from.
So to you, the use of a tactical nuclear weapon, maybe you can draw the line between a tactical and a strategic nuclear weapon. That could be a catalyst. That’s a very difficult thing to walk back from.
Annie Jacobsen
Oh, my God. Almost certainly. And again, every person in the national security environment will agree with that, certainly on the American side. Strategic weapons, those are big weapons systems. America has a nuclear triad. We have our ICBMs, which are the silo-based missiles that have a nuclear warhead in the nose cone, and they can get from one continent to the other in roughly 30 minutes. Then we have our bombers, B-52s and B-2s, that are nuclear capable. Those take travel time to get to another continent. Those can also be recalled. The ICBMs cannot be recalled or redirected once launched.
Oh, my God. Almost certainly. And again, every person in the national security environment will agree with that, certainly on the American side. Strategic weapons, those are big weapons systems. America has a nuclear triad. We have our ICBMs, which are the silo-based missiles that have a nuclear warhead in the nose cone, and they can get from one continent to the other in roughly 30 minutes. Then we have our bombers, B-52s and B-2s, that are nuclear capable. Those take travel time to get to another continent. Those can also be recalled. The ICBMs cannot be recalled or redirected once launched.
Lex Fridman
That one is a particularly terrifying one. So land launched missiles, rockets with a warhead, can’t be recalled.
That one is a particularly terrifying one. So land launched missiles, rockets with a warhead, can’t be recalled.
Annie Jacobsen
Cannot be recalled or redirected. And speaking of how little the presidents generally know, as we were talking a moment ago, President Reagan, in 1983, gave a press conference where he misstated that submarine launched ballistic missiles could be recalled. They cannot be recalled. Here’s the guy in charge of the arsenal if it has to get let loose, and he doesn’t even know that they cannot be recalled. So, this is the kind of misinformation and disinformation. UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, recently said when he was talking about the conflicts rising around the world, he said, “We are one misunderstanding, one miscalculation away from nuclear Armageddon.”
Cannot be recalled or redirected. And speaking of how little the presidents generally know, as we were talking a moment ago, President Reagan, in 1983, gave a press conference where he misstated that submarine launched ballistic missiles could be recalled. They cannot be recalled. Here’s the guy in charge of the arsenal if it has to get let loose, and he doesn’t even know that they cannot be recalled. So, this is the kind of misinformation and disinformation. UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, recently said when he was talking about the conflicts rising around the world, he said, “We are one misunderstanding, one miscalculation away from nuclear Armageddon.”
Lex Fridman
So, just to linger on the previous point of tactical nukes. You were describing strategic nukes, land launched bombers, submarine launched. What are tactical nukes?
So, just to linger on the previous point of tactical nukes. You were describing strategic nukes, land launched bombers, submarine launched. What are tactical nukes?
Annie Jacobsen
That’s the triad, right? And we have the triad, and Russia has the triad. Tactical nuclear weapons are smaller warheads that were designed to be used in battle. And that is what Russia is sort of threatening to use right now. That is this idea, that you would make a decision on the battlefield in an operational environment to use a tactical nuclear weapon. You’re just upping the ante. But the problem is that all treaties are based on this idea of no nuclear use, right? You cannot cross that line. And so, what would happen if the line is crossed is so devastating to even consider. I think that the conversation is well worth having among everyone that is in a power of position. As the UN Secretary General said, “This is madness.” Right? “This is madness. We must come back from the brink. We are at the brink.”
That’s the triad, right? And we have the triad, and Russia has the triad. Tactical nuclear weapons are smaller warheads that were designed to be used in battle. And that is what Russia is sort of threatening to use right now. That is this idea, that you would make a decision on the battlefield in an operational environment to use a tactical nuclear weapon. You’re just upping the ante. But the problem is that all treaties are based on this idea of no nuclear use, right? You cannot cross that line. And so, what would happen if the line is crossed is so devastating to even consider. I think that the conversation is well worth having among everyone that is in a power of position. As the UN Secretary General said, “This is madness.” Right? “This is madness. We must come back from the brink. We are at the brink.”
Lex Fridman
Can we talk about some other numbers? You mentioned the number of warheads. Land launched, how long does it take to travel across the ocean from the United States to Russia, from Russia to the United States, from China to the United States, approximately how long?
Can we talk about some other numbers? You mentioned the number of warheads. Land launched, how long does it take to travel across the ocean from the United States to Russia, from Russia to the United States, from China to the United States, approximately how long?
Annie Jacobsen
When I was writing an earlier book on DARPA, the Pentagon Science Agency, I went to a library down in San Diego, called the Geisel Library, to look at Herb York’s papers. Herb York was the first chief scientist for the Pentagon for DARPA, then called ARPA. And I had been trying to get the number from the various agencies that be to answer your… What is the exact number and how do we know it? And does it change? And as technology advances, does that number reduce? All these kinds of questions. And no one will answer that question on an official level. And so, much to my surprise, I found the answer in Herb York’s dusty archive of papers. And this is information that was jealously guarded. I mean, it’s not necessarily classified, but it certainly wasn’t out there. And I felt like, “Wow. Herb York left these behind for someone like me to find.”
When I was writing an earlier book on DARPA, the Pentagon Science Agency, I went to a library down in San Diego, called the Geisel Library, to look at Herb York’s papers. Herb York was the first chief scientist for the Pentagon for DARPA, then called ARPA. And I had been trying to get the number from the various agencies that be to answer your… What is the exact number and how do we know it? And does it change? And as technology advances, does that number reduce? All these kinds of questions. And no one will answer that question on an official level. And so, much to my surprise, I found the answer in Herb York’s dusty archive of papers. And this is information that was jealously guarded. I mean, it’s not necessarily classified, but it certainly wasn’t out there. And I felt like, “Wow. Herb York left these behind for someone like me to find.”
He wanted to know the answer to your question as the guy in charge of it all. So, he hired this group of scientists who then, and still are in many ways, the supermen scientists of the Pentagon, and they’re called the JASON Scientists. Many conspiracies about them abound. I interviewed their founder and have interviewed many of them. But they whittled the number down to seconds specifically for Herb York. And it goes like, because this is where my jaw dropped. And I went, “Wow.” So, 26 minutes and 40 seconds from a launch pad in the Soviet Union to the East Coast. And it happens in three phases. Very simple. And interesting to remember, because then suddenly all of this makes more sense. Boost phase, mid-course phase and then terminal phase, okay?
Boost phase, five minutes. That’s when the rocket launches. So, you just imagine a rocket going off the launch pad and the fire beneath it. Again, that’s why the satellites can see it. Now it’s becoming visual, now it makes sense to me. Five minutes. And that’s where the rocket can be tracked. And then imagine learning, “Wait a minute. After five minutes, the rocket can no longer be seen from space. The satellite can only see the hot rocket exhaust.” Then the missile enters its mid-course phase, 20 minutes. And that’s the ballistic part of it, where it’s flying up at between 500 and 700 miles above the earth and moving very fast and with the earth until it gets very close to its target. And the last 100 seconds are terminal phase. It’s where the warhead re-enters the atmosphere and detonates.
26 minutes and 40 seconds. Now in my scenario, I open with North Korea launching a one megaton nuclear warhead at Washington DC. That’s the nihilistic madman maneuver. That’s the bolt out of the blue attack that everyone in Washington will tell you they’re afraid of. And North Korea has a little bit different geography. And so, I had MIT Professor Emeritus Ted Postol do the math, 33 minutes from a launch pad in Pyongyang to the East coast of the United States. You get the idea, it’s about 30 minutes.
But hopefully now that allows readers to suddenly see all this as a real… You almost see it as poetry, as terrible as that may sound. You can visualize it and suddenly it makes sense. And I think the sense-making part of it is really what I’m after in this book. Because I want people to understand, on the one hand, it’s incredibly simple, it’s just the people that have made it so complicated.
Lex Fridman
But it’s one of those things that can change all of world history in a matter of minutes. We just don’t, as a human civilization, have experience with that. But it doesn’t mean it’ll never happen. It can happen just like that.
But it’s one of those things that can change all of world history in a matter of minutes. We just don’t, as a human civilization, have experience with that. But it doesn’t mean it’ll never happen. It can happen just like that.
Annie Jacobsen
I mean, I think what you’re after, and I couldn’t agree more with, is why is this fundamentally annihilating system, a system of mass genocide? As John Rubel in the book refers to it. Why is it still exist? We’ve had 75 years since there’ve been two superpowers with the nuclear bomb. So, that threat has been there for 75 years, and we have managed to stay alive. One of the reasons why so many of the sources in the book agreed to talk to me, people who had not previously gone on the record about all of this, was because they are now approaching the end of their lives. They spent their lives dedicated to preventing nuclear World War III. And they’ll be the first people to tell you we’re closer to this as a reality than ever before. And so, the only bright side of any of this is that the answer lies most definitely in communication.
I mean, I think what you’re after, and I couldn’t agree more with, is why is this fundamentally annihilating system, a system of mass genocide? As John Rubel in the book refers to it. Why is it still exist? We’ve had 75 years since there’ve been two superpowers with the nuclear bomb. So, that threat has been there for 75 years, and we have managed to stay alive. One of the reasons why so many of the sources in the book agreed to talk to me, people who had not previously gone on the record about all of this, was because they are now approaching the end of their lives. They spent their lives dedicated to preventing nuclear World War III. And they’ll be the first people to tell you we’re closer to this as a reality than ever before. And so, the only bright side of any of this is that the answer lies most definitely in communication.
Nuclear submarines
Lex Fridman
So, there’s a million other questions here. I think the details are fascinating and important to understand. So one, you also say nuclear submarines… You mentioned about 30 minutes, 26, 33 minutes. But with nuclear submarines, that number can be much, much lower. So, how long does it take for a warhead missile to reach the east coast of the United States from a submarine?
So, there’s a million other questions here. I think the details are fascinating and important to understand. So one, you also say nuclear submarines… You mentioned about 30 minutes, 26, 33 minutes. But with nuclear submarines, that number can be much, much lower. So, how long does it take for a warhead missile to reach the east coast of the United States from a submarine?
Annie Jacobsen
Just when you thought it was really bad, and then you realize about the submarines. I mean, the submarines are what are called second strike capacity. Submarines were described to me this way, they are as dangerous to civilization… And let me say a nuclear-armed, nuclear-powered submarine is as dangerous to civilization as an asteroid. They’re unstoppable. They are unlocatable, the former Chief of the Nuclear Submarine Forces, Admiral Michael Connor, told me it’s easier to find a grapefruit-sized object in space than a submarine under the sea.
Just when you thought it was really bad, and then you realize about the submarines. I mean, the submarines are what are called second strike capacity. Submarines were described to me this way, they are as dangerous to civilization… And let me say a nuclear-armed, nuclear-powered submarine is as dangerous to civilization as an asteroid. They’re unstoppable. They are unlocatable, the former Chief of the Nuclear Submarine Forces, Admiral Michael Connor, told me it’s easier to find a grapefruit-sized object in space than a submarine under the sea.
These things are like hell machines, and they’re moving around throughout the oceans, ours, Russia’s, China’s, maybe North Korea’s constantly. And we now know they’re sneaking up to the east and west coast of the United States within a couple hundred miles. How do we know that? Why do we know that? Well, I found a document inside of a budget that the defense department was going to Congress for more money recently and showed maps of precisely where these submarines… How close they were getting to the eastern seaboard.
Lex Fridman
Wat, wait, wait. So, nuclear subs are getting within 200 miles?
Wat, wait, wait. So, nuclear subs are getting within 200 miles?
Annie Jacobsen
Couple hundred miles, yes. They weren’t precise on the number, but when you look at the map-
Couple hundred miles, yes. They weren’t precise on the number, but when you look at the map-
Lex Fridman
Couple hundred.
Couple hundred.
Annie Jacobsen
Yeah. And that’s when you’re talking about under 10 minutes from launch to strike.
Yeah. And that’s when you’re talking about under 10 minutes from launch to strike.
Lex Fridman
Undetectable.
Undetectable.
Annie Jacobsen
And they’re undetectable. The map making is done after the fact because of a lot of underwater surveillance systems that we have. But in real time, you cannot find a nuclear submarine. And just the way a submarine launches goes 150 feet below the surface to launch its ballistic missile. I mean, it comes out of the missile tube with enough thrust that the thrusters, the boot, they ignite outside the water and then they move into boost. And so, the technology involved is just stunning and shocking. And again, trillions of dollars spent so that we never have a nuclear war. But my God, what if we did.
And they’re undetectable. The map making is done after the fact because of a lot of underwater surveillance systems that we have. But in real time, you cannot find a nuclear submarine. And just the way a submarine launches goes 150 feet below the surface to launch its ballistic missile. I mean, it comes out of the missile tube with enough thrust that the thrusters, the boot, they ignite outside the water and then they move into boost. And so, the technology involved is just stunning and shocking. And again, trillions of dollars spent so that we never have a nuclear war. But my God, what if we did.
Nuclear missiles
Lex Fridman
As you write, they’re called the handmaidens of the apocalypse. What a terrifying label. I mean, one of the things you also write about, so for the land launched ones, they’re presumably underground. So the silos, how long does it take to go from pressing the button to them emerging from underground for launch? And is that part detectable or it’s only the heat?
As you write, they’re called the handmaidens of the apocalypse. What a terrifying label. I mean, one of the things you also write about, so for the land launched ones, they’re presumably underground. So the silos, how long does it take to go from pressing the button to them emerging from underground for launch? And is that part detectable or it’s only the heat?
Annie Jacobsen
What’s interesting about the silos, America has 400 silos, right? We’ve had more. But we have 400, and they’re underground, and they’re called Minutemen after the Revolutionary War heroes. But the joke in Washington is they’re not called Minutemen for nothing, because they can launch in one minute. The president orders the launch of the ICBMs, ICBM stands for Intercontinental Ballistic Missile. He orders the launch, and they launch 60 seconds later. And then, they take 30 some odd minutes to get to where they’re going.
What’s interesting about the silos, America has 400 silos, right? We’ve had more. But we have 400, and they’re underground, and they’re called Minutemen after the Revolutionary War heroes. But the joke in Washington is they’re not called Minutemen for nothing, because they can launch in one minute. The president orders the launch of the ICBMs, ICBM stands for Intercontinental Ballistic Missile. He orders the launch, and they launch 60 seconds later. And then, they take 30 some odd minutes to get to where they’re going.
The submarines take about 14 or 15 minutes from the launch command to actually launching. And that has to do, I surmise, with the location of the submarine, its depth. Some of these things are so highly classified and other details are shockingly available if you look deep enough, or if you ask enough questions, and you can go from one document to the next, to the next and really find these answers.
Lex Fridman
Not to ask top secret questions, but to what degree do you think the Russians know the locations of the silos in the US and vice versa?
Not to ask top secret questions, but to what degree do you think the Russians know the locations of the silos in the US and vice versa?
Annie Jacobsen
Lex, you and I can find the location of every silo right now.
Lex, you and I can find the location of every silo right now.
Lex Fridman
Oh, no.
Oh, no.
Annie Jacobsen
They’re all there. And before they were there on Google, they were there in Maps because we’re a democracy and we make these things known. Now, what’s tricky is that Russia and North Korea rely upon what are called road mobile launchers. Russia has a lot of underground silos. All of the scenario takes you through these different facilities that really do exist, and they’re all sourced with how many weapons they have and their launch procedures and whatnot. But in addition to having underground silos, they have road mobile launchers, and that means you just have one of these giant ICBMs on a 22 axle truck that can move stealthily around the country so that it can’t be targeted by the US Defense Department.
They’re all there. And before they were there on Google, they were there in Maps because we’re a democracy and we make these things known. Now, what’s tricky is that Russia and North Korea rely upon what are called road mobile launchers. Russia has a lot of underground silos. All of the scenario takes you through these different facilities that really do exist, and they’re all sourced with how many weapons they have and their launch procedures and whatnot. But in addition to having underground silos, they have road mobile launchers, and that means you just have one of these giant ICBMs on a 22 axle truck that can move stealthily around the country so that it can’t be targeted by the US Defense Department.
We don’t have those in America, because presumably the average American isn’t going to go for the ICBM road mobile launcher driving down the street in your town or city, which is why the Defense Department will justify we need the second strike capacity capability, the submarines, because… The wonky stuff that is worth looking into, if you really dig the book and are like, “Wait a minute.” It’s all footnoted where you can learn more about how these systems have changed over time. And why, more than anything, it’s very difficult to get out of this catch-22 conundrum that we need nuclear weapons to keep us safe. That is the real enigma. Because the other guys have them, right? And the other guys have-
Annie Jacobsen
The other guys have them. And the other guys have more sinister ways of using them, or at least that’s what the nomenclature out of the Pentagon will always be when anyone tries to say, “We just need to really think about full disarmament.”
The other guys have them. And the other guys have more sinister ways of using them, or at least that’s what the nomenclature out of the Pentagon will always be when anyone tries to say, “We just need to really think about full disarmament.”
Lex Fridman
You’ve written about intelligence agencies. How good are the intelligence agencies on this? How much does CIA know about the Russian launch sites, and capabilities, and command and control procedures, and all of this and vice versa?
You’ve written about intelligence agencies. How good are the intelligence agencies on this? How much does CIA know about the Russian launch sites, and capabilities, and command and control procedures, and all of this and vice versa?
Annie Jacobsen
I mean, all of this, because it’s decades old, is really well known. If you go to the Federation of American Scientists, they have a team led by a guy called Hans Kristensen who runs what’s called the Nuclear Notebook. And he and his team every year are keeping track of this number of warheads on these number of weapon systems. And because of the treaties, the different signatories to the treaty all report these numbers. And of course, the different intelligence community, people are keeping track of what’s being revealed honestly and reported with transparency and what is being hidden. The real issue is the new systems that Russia is working on right now, and that will lead us… We are moving into an era whereby the threat of actually having new weapon systems that are nuclear capable is very real because of the escalating tensions around the world. And that’s where the CIA would guess is doing most of its work right now.
I mean, all of this, because it’s decades old, is really well known. If you go to the Federation of American Scientists, they have a team led by a guy called Hans Kristensen who runs what’s called the Nuclear Notebook. And he and his team every year are keeping track of this number of warheads on these number of weapon systems. And because of the treaties, the different signatories to the treaty all report these numbers. And of course, the different intelligence community, people are keeping track of what’s being revealed honestly and reported with transparency and what is being hidden. The real issue is the new systems that Russia is working on right now, and that will lead us… We are moving into an era whereby the threat of actually having new weapon systems that are nuclear capable is very real because of the escalating tensions around the world. And that’s where the CIA would guess is doing most of its work right now.
Lex Fridman
So most of your research is looking at the older versions of the system, and presumably there’s potentially secret development of new ones, hopefully not-
So most of your research is looking at the older versions of the system, and presumably there’s potentially secret development of new ones, hopefully not-
Annie Jacobsen
Which violates treaties.
Which violates treaties.
Lex Fridman
Yes.
Yes.
Annie Jacobsen
So yes, that is where the intelligence agencies… But at a point, it’s overkill, literally and figuratively. People are up in arms about these hypersonic weapons. Well, we have a hypersonic weapons program, Falcon. Google Blackswift. This is Lockheed’s doing. DARPA exists to create the vast weapon systems of the future. That is its job. It has been doing that since its creation in 1957. I would never believe that we aren’t ahead of everyone. Call me over- informed or naive, one or the other. That would be my position because DARPA works from the chicken or the egg scenario. That once you learn about something, once you learn Russia’s created this Typhoon submarine, which may or may not be viable, it’s too late if you don’t already have one.
So yes, that is where the intelligence agencies… But at a point, it’s overkill, literally and figuratively. People are up in arms about these hypersonic weapons. Well, we have a hypersonic weapons program, Falcon. Google Blackswift. This is Lockheed’s doing. DARPA exists to create the vast weapon systems of the future. That is its job. It has been doing that since its creation in 1957. I would never believe that we aren’t ahead of everyone. Call me over- informed or naive, one or the other. That would be my position because DARPA works from the chicken or the egg scenario. That once you learn about something, once you learn Russia’s created this Typhoon submarine, which may or may not be viable, it’s too late if you don’t already have one.
Lex Fridman
We’ll probably talk about DARPA a little bit. One of the things that makes me sad about Lockheed, many things make me sad about Lockheed, but one of the things is because it’s very top secret, you can’t show off all the incredible engineering going on there. The other thing that’s more philosophical, DARPA also, is that war seems to stimulate most of our, not most, but a large percent of our exciting innovation in engineering. But that’s also the pragmatic fact of life on earth is that the risk of annihilation is a great motivator for innovation, for engineering, and so on. But yes, I would not discount the United States in its ability to build the weapons of the future, nuclear included. Again, terrifying. Can you tell me about the nuclear football, as it’s called?
We’ll probably talk about DARPA a little bit. One of the things that makes me sad about Lockheed, many things make me sad about Lockheed, but one of the things is because it’s very top secret, you can’t show off all the incredible engineering going on there. The other thing that’s more philosophical, DARPA also, is that war seems to stimulate most of our, not most, but a large percent of our exciting innovation in engineering. But that’s also the pragmatic fact of life on earth is that the risk of annihilation is a great motivator for innovation, for engineering, and so on. But yes, I would not discount the United States in its ability to build the weapons of the future, nuclear included. Again, terrifying. Can you tell me about the nuclear football, as it’s called?
Nuclear football
Annie Jacobsen
I think Americans are familiar with the football, at least anyone who follows national security concepts because it’s a satchel. It’s a leather satchel that is always with a military aide in Secret Service nomenclature. That’s the mil aide. And he’s trailing around the president 24/7, 365 days a year, and also the vice president, by the way, with the ability to launch nuclear war in that six-minute window all the time. That is also called the football, and it’s always with the president. To report this part of the book, I interviewed a lot of people in the Secret Service that are with the president and talk about this. And the Director of the Secret Service, a guy called Lou Merletti, told me a story that I just really found fascinating. He was also in charge of the president’s detail, President Clinton this was, before he was director of the Secret Service.
I think Americans are familiar with the football, at least anyone who follows national security concepts because it’s a satchel. It’s a leather satchel that is always with a military aide in Secret Service nomenclature. That’s the mil aide. And he’s trailing around the president 24/7, 365 days a year, and also the vice president, by the way, with the ability to launch nuclear war in that six-minute window all the time. That is also called the football, and it’s always with the president. To report this part of the book, I interviewed a lot of people in the Secret Service that are with the president and talk about this. And the Director of the Secret Service, a guy called Lou Merletti, told me a story that I just really found fascinating. He was also in charge of the president’s detail, President Clinton this was, before he was director of the Secret Service.
And he told me the story about how, he said, “The football is with the president at all times, period.” They were traveling to Syria, and Clinton was meeting with President Assad. And they got into an elevator, Clinton and the Secret Service team, and one of Assad’s guys was like, “No.” About the mil aide. And Lou said it was like a standoff because there was no way they were not going to have the president with his football in an elevator. And it sums up. For me anyways, you realize what goes into every single one of these decisions. You realize the massive system of systems behind every item you might just see in passing and glancing on the news as you see the mil aide carrying that satchel. Well, what’s in that satchel? I really dug into that to report this book.
Lex Fridman
What is in that satchel?
What is in that satchel?
Annie Jacobsen
Okay. So well, okay. First of all, people always say, “It’s incredibly classified.” I mean, people talk about UFOs. “It’s incredibly…” I mean, come on, guys. That is nothing burger. You want to know what’s really classified? What’s in that football? What’s in that satchel? But the PEAD, Presidential Emergency Action Directives, those have never been leaked. No one knows what they are. What we do know from one of the mil aides who spoke on the record, a guy called Buzz Patterson, he describes the President’s orders. So if a nuclear war has begun, if the president has been told, “There are nuclear missiles, one or more, coming at the United States, you have to launch in a counterattack. The red clock is ticking. You have to get the blue impact clock ticking.” He needs to look at this list to decide what targets to strike and what weapon systems to use. And that is what is on, according to Buzz Patterson, a piece of laminated plastic. He described it like a Denny’s menu. And from that menu, the president chooses targets and chooses weapon systems.
Okay. So well, okay. First of all, people always say, “It’s incredibly classified.” I mean, people talk about UFOs. “It’s incredibly…” I mean, come on, guys. That is nothing burger. You want to know what’s really classified? What’s in that football? What’s in that satchel? But the PEAD, Presidential Emergency Action Directives, those have never been leaked. No one knows what they are. What we do know from one of the mil aides who spoke on the record, a guy called Buzz Patterson, he describes the President’s orders. So if a nuclear war has begun, if the president has been told, “There are nuclear missiles, one or more, coming at the United States, you have to launch in a counterattack. The red clock is ticking. You have to get the blue impact clock ticking.” He needs to look at this list to decide what targets to strike and what weapon systems to use. And that is what is on, according to Buzz Patterson, a piece of laminated plastic. He described it like a Denny’s menu. And from that menu, the president chooses targets and chooses weapon systems.
Lex Fridman
And it’s probably super old school, like all top secret systems are, because they have to be tested over and over and over and over and over, probably-
And it’s probably super old school, like all top secret systems are, because they have to be tested over and over and over and over and over, probably-
Annie Jacobsen
Yes, and it’s non-digital.
Yes, and it’s non-digital.
Lex Fridman
Non-digital. It might literally be a Denny’s menu from hell.
Non-digital. It might literally be a Denny’s menu from hell.
Annie Jacobsen
Right. And meanwhile, I learned this only in reporting the book. There is a identical black book inside the STRATCOM bunker in Nebraska. So three command bunkers are involved when nuclear war begins. There’s the bunker beneath the Pentagon, which is called the National Military Command Center. Then there is the bunker beneath Cheyenne Mountain, which everyone has or many people have heard of because it’s been made famous in movies. That is a very real bunker. And then there is a third bunker, which people are not so familiar with, which is the bunker beneath Strategic Command in Nebraska.
Right. And meanwhile, I learned this only in reporting the book. There is a identical black book inside the STRATCOM bunker in Nebraska. So three command bunkers are involved when nuclear war begins. There’s the bunker beneath the Pentagon, which is called the National Military Command Center. Then there is the bunker beneath Cheyenne Mountain, which everyone has or many people have heard of because it’s been made famous in movies. That is a very real bunker. And then there is a third bunker, which people are not so familiar with, which is the bunker beneath Strategic Command in Nebraska.
And so it’s described to me this way, the Pentagon bunker is the beating heart, the Cheyenne Mountain bunker is the brains, and the STRATCOM bunker is the muscle. The STRATCOM commander will receive word from the president, “Launch orders.” And then directs the 150,000 people beneath him what to do from the bunker beneath STRATCOM. He gets the orders, then he has to run out of the building and jump onto what’s called the doomsday plane. We’ll get into that in a minute. Let me just finish the… I mean, but again-
Lex Fridman
No, this is good. All right.
No, this is good. All right.
Annie Jacobsen
… these are the details. These are the systematic sequential details that happen in seconds and minutes. And reporting them, I never cease to be amazed by what a system it is. A follows B. It’s just numerical, right?
… these are the details. These are the systematic sequential details that happen in seconds and minutes. And reporting them, I never cease to be amazed by what a system it is. A follows B. It’s just numerical, right?
Lex Fridman
Yeah, but as we discuss this procedure, each individual person that follows that procedure might lose the big picture of the whole thing. I mean, especially when you realize what is happening that almost out of fear, you just follow the steps.
Yeah, but as we discuss this procedure, each individual person that follows that procedure might lose the big picture of the whole thing. I mean, especially when you realize what is happening that almost out of fear, you just follow the steps.
Annie Jacobsen
Yep. Or okay, so imagine this. Imagine being the president, and you got that six minute. You’re looking at your list of strike options. You’re being briefed by your chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and your SecDef. And this other really spooky detail. In the STRATCOM bunker, in addition to the nuclear strike advisor who can answer very specific questions, if the president’s like, “Wait a minute, why are we striking that and not that?” There’s also a weather officer. And this is the kind of human detail that kept me up at night because that weather officer is in charge of explaining to the president really fast, how many people are going to die and how many people are going to die in minutes, weeks, months, and years from radiation fallout.
Yep. Or okay, so imagine this. Imagine being the president, and you got that six minute. You’re looking at your list of strike options. You’re being briefed by your chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and your SecDef. And this other really spooky detail. In the STRATCOM bunker, in addition to the nuclear strike advisor who can answer very specific questions, if the president’s like, “Wait a minute, why are we striking that and not that?” There’s also a weather officer. And this is the kind of human detail that kept me up at night because that weather officer is in charge of explaining to the president really fast, how many people are going to die and how many people are going to die in minutes, weeks, months, and years from radiation fallout.
Lex Fridman
Because a lot of that has to do with the weather system.
Because a lot of that has to do with the weather system.
Annie Jacobsen
Yes. Yes. And so these kinds of the humanness balanced out with the mechanization of it all, it’s just really grotesque.
Yes. Yes. And so these kinds of the humanness balanced out with the mechanization of it all, it’s just really grotesque.
Lex Fridman
So the doomsday plane from STRATCOM?
So the doomsday plane from STRATCOM?
Annie Jacobsen
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
What’s that? Where’s it going? What’s on it?
What’s that? Where’s it going? What’s on it?
Annie Jacobsen
Right.
Right.
Lex Fridman
[inaudible 00:43:05].
[inaudible 00:43:05].
Annie Jacobsen
Okay, ready?
Okay, ready?
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Annie Jacobsen
It’s going to fly in circles. That’s where it’s going. It’s flying in circles around the United States of America so that nuclear weapons can be launched from the air after the ground systems are taken out by the incoming ICBMs or the incoming submarine-launched ballistic missiles. This has been in play since the ’50s. These are the contingency plans for when nuclear war happens. So again, going back to this absurd paradox, nuclear war will never happen. Mutual assured destruction, that is why deterrence will hold. Well, I found a talk that the deputy director of STRATCOM gave to a very close-knit group where he said, “Yes, deterrence will hold. But if it fails, everything unravels.” And think about that word unravels. And the unraveling is the doomsday plane launches. The STRATCOM commander jumps in. He’s in that plane, he’s flying around the United States, and he’s making decisions because the Pentagon’s been taken out. At 9/11, by the way, Bush was in the doomsday plane.
It’s going to fly in circles. That’s where it’s going. It’s flying in circles around the United States of America so that nuclear weapons can be launched from the air after the ground systems are taken out by the incoming ICBMs or the incoming submarine-launched ballistic missiles. This has been in play since the ’50s. These are the contingency plans for when nuclear war happens. So again, going back to this absurd paradox, nuclear war will never happen. Mutual assured destruction, that is why deterrence will hold. Well, I found a talk that the deputy director of STRATCOM gave to a very close-knit group where he said, “Yes, deterrence will hold. But if it fails, everything unravels.” And think about that word unravels. And the unraveling is the doomsday plane launches. The STRATCOM commander jumps in. He’s in that plane, he’s flying around the United States, and he’s making decisions because the Pentagon’s been taken out. At 9/11, by the way, Bush was in the doomsday plane.
Lex Fridman
And Bush had to make decisions quickly, but not as quickly as he would’ve needed to have done if there’s a nuclear launch.
And Bush had to make decisions quickly, but not as quickly as he would’ve needed to have done if there’s a nuclear launch.
Annie Jacobsen
I mean-
I mean-
Lex Fridman
Six minutes.
Six minutes.
Annie Jacobsen
… it basically happens in three acts. There’s the first 24 minutes, the next 24 minutes, and the last 24 minutes. And that is the reality of nuclear weapons.
… it basically happens in three acts. There’s the first 24 minutes, the next 24 minutes, and the last 24 minutes. And that is the reality of nuclear weapons.
Missile interceptor system
Lex Fridman
What is the interceptor capabilities of the United States? How many nuclear missiles can be stopped?
What is the interceptor capabilities of the United States? How many nuclear missiles can be stopped?
Annie Jacobsen
I was at a dinner party with a very informed person, somebody who really should have known this, and this is what I was considering writing and reporting this book. And he said to me, “Oh Annie, that would never happen because of our powerful interceptor system.” Okay. Well, he’s wrong. Let me tell you about our powerful interceptor system. First of all, we have 44 interceptor missiles total, period, full stop. Let me repeat, 44. Earlier we were talking about Russia’s 1,670 deployed nuclear weapons. How are those 44 interceptor missiles going to work? And they also have a success rate of around 50%. So they work 50% of the time.
I was at a dinner party with a very informed person, somebody who really should have known this, and this is what I was considering writing and reporting this book. And he said to me, “Oh Annie, that would never happen because of our powerful interceptor system.” Okay. Well, he’s wrong. Let me tell you about our powerful interceptor system. First of all, we have 44 interceptor missiles total, period, full stop. Let me repeat, 44. Earlier we were talking about Russia’s 1,670 deployed nuclear weapons. How are those 44 interceptor missiles going to work? And they also have a success rate of around 50%. So they work 50% of the time.
There are 40 of them in Alaska, and there are four of them at Vandenberg Air Force Base in Santa Barbara. And they are responsible at about nine minutes into the scenario. After the ICBM has finished that five-minute boost phase we talked about, now it’s in mid-course phase, and the ground radar systems have identified, yes, this is an incoming ICBM. And now the interceptor missiles have to launch. It’s essentially shooting a missile with a missile. Inside the interceptor, which is just a big giant rocket, in its nose cone, it has what’s called the aptly named Exoatmospheric Kill Vehicle. There’s no explosives in that thing. It’s literally just going to take out the warhead ideally with force. So one of them is going mach 20. I mean, the speeds at which these two moving objects hurtling through space are going is astonishing. And the fact that interception is even possible is really remarkable, but it’s only possible 50% of the time.
Lex Fridman
Is it possible that we only know about 44, but there could be a lot more?
Is it possible that we only know about 44, but there could be a lot more?
Annie Jacobsen
No, impossible. That I would be willing to bet.
No, impossible. That I would be willing to bet.
Lex Fridman
And how well-tested are these interceptors?
And how well-tested are these interceptors?
Annie Jacobsen
Well, that’s where we get the success rate that’s around 50% because of the tests. And actually the interceptor program is, are you ready for this? It’s on strategic pause right now, meaning the interceptor missiles are there, but developing them and making them more effective is on strategic pause because they can’t be made more effective. People have these fantasies that we have a system like the Iron Dome. And they see this in current events, and they’re like, “Oh, our interceptors would do that.” It’s just simply not true.
Well, that’s where we get the success rate that’s around 50% because of the tests. And actually the interceptor program is, are you ready for this? It’s on strategic pause right now, meaning the interceptor missiles are there, but developing them and making them more effective is on strategic pause because they can’t be made more effective. People have these fantasies that we have a system like the Iron Dome. And they see this in current events, and they’re like, “Oh, our interceptors would do that.” It’s just simply not true.
Lex Fridman
Why can’t an Iron Dome-like system be constructed for nuclear warheads?
Why can’t an Iron Dome-like system be constructed for nuclear warheads?
Annie Jacobsen
We have systems I write about called the THAAD system, which is ground-based, and then the Aegis system, which is on vessels. And these are great at shooting down some rockets, but they can only shoot them one at a time. You cannot shoot the mother load as it’s coming in. Those are the smaller systems, the tactical nuclear weapons. And by the way, our THAAD systems are all deployed overseas, and our Aegis systems are all out at sea. And again, reporting that, I was like, “Wait, what? You have to really hunker down. Are we sure about this?” People really don’t want to believe this is an actual fact. After 9/11, Congress considered putting Aegis missiles and maybe even THAAD systems along the West Coast of the United States to specifically deal with the threats against nuclear-armed North Korea. But it hasn’t done so yet. And again, you have to ask yourself, “Wait a minute. This is insanity.” One nuclear weapon gets by any of these systems, and it’s full-out nuclear warfare. So that’s not the solution. More nuclear weapons is not the solution.
We have systems I write about called the THAAD system, which is ground-based, and then the Aegis system, which is on vessels. And these are great at shooting down some rockets, but they can only shoot them one at a time. You cannot shoot the mother load as it’s coming in. Those are the smaller systems, the tactical nuclear weapons. And by the way, our THAAD systems are all deployed overseas, and our Aegis systems are all out at sea. And again, reporting that, I was like, “Wait, what? You have to really hunker down. Are we sure about this?” People really don’t want to believe this is an actual fact. After 9/11, Congress considered putting Aegis missiles and maybe even THAAD systems along the West Coast of the United States to specifically deal with the threats against nuclear-armed North Korea. But it hasn’t done so yet. And again, you have to ask yourself, “Wait a minute. This is insanity.” One nuclear weapon gets by any of these systems, and it’s full-out nuclear warfare. So that’s not the solution. More nuclear weapons is not the solution.
North Korea
Lex Fridman
I’m looking for a hopeful thing here about North Korea. How many deployed nuclear warheads does North Korea have? So does the current system, as we described it, the interceptors and so on, have a hope against the North Korean attack? The one that you mentioned people are worried about.
I’m looking for a hopeful thing here about North Korea. How many deployed nuclear warheads does North Korea have? So does the current system, as we described it, the interceptors and so on, have a hope against the North Korean attack? The one that you mentioned people are worried about.
Annie Jacobsen
So North Korea has 50, let’s say 50 nuclear weapons right now. Some NGOs put it at more than 100. It’s impossible to know because North Korea’s nuclear weapons program has no transparency. They’re the only nuclear-armed nation that doesn’t announce when they do a ballistic missile test. Everyone else does. No one wants to start a nuclear war by accident. So if Russia is going to launch an ICBM, they tell us. If we’re going to launch one, and I’m talking test runs here, with a dummy warhead, we tell them. Not North Korea. That’s a fact. So we’re constantly up against the fear of North Korea. In the scenario, I have the incoming North Korean one-megaton weapon coming in, and the interceptor system tries to shoot it down. So there’s not enough time. And this, by the way, I ran through by all generals from the Pentagon who run these scenarios for NORAD and confirmed all of this as fact. This is the situation.
So North Korea has 50, let’s say 50 nuclear weapons right now. Some NGOs put it at more than 100. It’s impossible to know because North Korea’s nuclear weapons program has no transparency. They’re the only nuclear-armed nation that doesn’t announce when they do a ballistic missile test. Everyone else does. No one wants to start a nuclear war by accident. So if Russia is going to launch an ICBM, they tell us. If we’re going to launch one, and I’m talking test runs here, with a dummy warhead, we tell them. Not North Korea. That’s a fact. So we’re constantly up against the fear of North Korea. In the scenario, I have the incoming North Korean one-megaton weapon coming in, and the interceptor system tries to shoot it down. So there’s not enough time. And this, by the way, I ran through by all generals from the Pentagon who run these scenarios for NORAD and confirmed all of this as fact. This is the situation.
So in the scenario, I have the nuclear ICBM coming in. The interceptor missiles try to shoot down the warhead. The capability is not like what’s called shoot and look. There’s not enough time to go, “And we’re going to try to get it. We missed it. Okay, let’s go for another one.” So you have to go… So in my scenario, we fire off four, which is about what I was told, one to four, because you’re worried about the next one that’s going to come in. You’re going to use up 10% of your missile force, of your interceptor force on one, and all four miss. And that’s totally plausible.
Lex Fridman
Right. How likely are mistakes, accidents, false alarms taken as real, all this kind of stuff in this picture? So we’ve assumed the detection works correctly. How likely is it possible, anywhere? You described this long chain of events that can happen. How possible is it just to make a mistake, a stupid human mistake along the way?
Right. How likely are mistakes, accidents, false alarms taken as real, all this kind of stuff in this picture? So we’ve assumed the detection works correctly. How likely is it possible, anywhere? You described this long chain of events that can happen. How possible is it just to make a mistake, a stupid human mistake along the way?
Annie Jacobsen
There have been at least six known absolute, oh my God, close calls, how, thank God this happened, type scenarios. One was described to me with an actual personal participant, former Secretary of Defense, Bill Perry, and he described what happened to him in 1979. He was not yet Secretary of Defense. He was the Deputy Director of the Research and Engineering, which is a big job at the Pentagon. And the night watch fell on him essentially. And he gets this call in the middle of the night. He’s told that Russia has launched not just ICBMs, but submarine-launched ballistic missiles are coming at the United States. And he is about to notify the president that the six-minute window has to begin when he learns it was a mistake.
There have been at least six known absolute, oh my God, close calls, how, thank God this happened, type scenarios. One was described to me with an actual personal participant, former Secretary of Defense, Bill Perry, and he described what happened to him in 1979. He was not yet Secretary of Defense. He was the Deputy Director of the Research and Engineering, which is a big job at the Pentagon. And the night watch fell on him essentially. And he gets this call in the middle of the night. He’s told that Russia has launched not just ICBMs, but submarine-launched ballistic missiles are coming at the United States. And he is about to notify the president that the six-minute window has to begin when he learns it was a mistake.
The mistake was that there was a training tape with a nuclear war scenario. We haven’t even begun to talk about the nuclear war scenarios that the Pentagon runs. An actual VHS training tape had been incorrectly inserted into a system at the Pentagon. And so this nuclear launch showed up at that bunker beneath the Pentagon and at the bunker beneath STRATCOM because they’re connected, as being real. And then it was like, oh, whoops. It’s actually a simulation test tape. And Perry described to me what that was like, the pause in his spirit and his mind and his heart when he realized, “I’m about to have to tell the president that he needs to launch nuclear weapons.” And he learned just in the nick of time that it was an error. And that’s one of five examples.
Lex Fridman
Can you speak to maybe is there any more color to the feelings he was feeling? What’s your sense? And given all the experts you’ve talked to, what can be said about the seconds that one feels once finding out that a launch has happened, even if that information is false information?
Can you speak to maybe is there any more color to the feelings he was feeling? What’s your sense? And given all the experts you’ve talked to, what can be said about the seconds that one feels once finding out that a launch has happened, even if that information is false information?
Annie Jacobsen
For me personally, that’s the only firsthand story that I ever heard because it’s so rare and it’s so unique. And most people in the national security system, at least in the past, have been loath to talk about any of this. It’s the sacred oath. It’s taboo. It’s taboo to go against the system of systems that is making sure nuclear war never happens. Bill Perry was one of the first people who did this. And a lot of it, I believe, at least in my lengthy conversations with him, we had a lot of Zoom calls over COVID when I began reporting this.
For me personally, that’s the only firsthand story that I ever heard because it’s so rare and it’s so unique. And most people in the national security system, at least in the past, have been loath to talk about any of this. It’s the sacred oath. It’s taboo. It’s taboo to go against the system of systems that is making sure nuclear war never happens. Bill Perry was one of the first people who did this. And a lot of it, I believe, at least in my lengthy conversations with him, we had a lot of Zoom calls over COVID when I began reporting this.
And he had a lot to do with me feeling like I could write this book from a human point of view and not just from the mechanized systems. Because, and I only lightly touch upon this because it’s such a fast sweeping scenario, but Perry, for example, spent his whole life dedicated to building weapons of war only later in life to realize this is madness. And he shared with me that it was that idea about one’s grandchildren inheriting these nuclear arsenals and the lack of wisdom that comes with their origin stories. When you’re involved in it in the ground up, apparently it has perhaps you’re a different kind of steward of these systems than if you just inherit them, and they are pages in a manual.
Nuclear war scenarios
Lex Fridman
People forget. You mentioned the nuclear war scenarios that the Pentagon runs. I’d love to… What do you know about those?
People forget. You mentioned the nuclear war scenarios that the Pentagon runs. I’d love to… What do you know about those?
Annie Jacobsen
I mean, again, they are very classified. I mean, it was interesting coming across levels of classification I didn’t even know existed. ECI, for example, is exceptionally controlled information. But the Pentagon nuclear war gaming scenarios, they’re almost all still classified. One of them was declassified recently, if you can call it that. I show an image of it in the book, and it’s just basically almost entirely redacted. And then there’ll be a date, or it’ll say, “Phase one.” And that one was called Proud Prophet. But what was incredible about the declassification process of that is it allowed a couple of people who were there to talk about it, and that’s why we have that information.
I mean, again, they are very classified. I mean, it was interesting coming across levels of classification I didn’t even know existed. ECI, for example, is exceptionally controlled information. But the Pentagon nuclear war gaming scenarios, they’re almost all still classified. One of them was declassified recently, if you can call it that. I show an image of it in the book, and it’s just basically almost entirely redacted. And then there’ll be a date, or it’ll say, “Phase one.” And that one was called Proud Prophet. But what was incredible about the declassification process of that is it allowed a couple of people who were there to talk about it, and that’s why we have that information.
And I write about Proud Prophet in the book because it was super significant in many ways. One, it was happening right… In 1983, it was an insane moment in nuclear arsenals. There were 60,000 nuclear weapons. Right now there’s 12,500. So we’ve come a long way, baby, in terms of disarmament. But there were 60,000. And by the way, that was not the ultimate high. The ultimate high was 70,000. This is insane. And Ronald Reagan was president, and he orders this war game called Proud Prophet, and everyone that mattered was involved. They were running the war game scenarios.
And what we learned from his declassification is that no matter how nuclear war starts, there was a bunch of different scenarios, with NATO involved, without NATO, all different scenarios. No matter how nuclear war starts, it ends in Armageddon. It ends with everyone dead. I mean, this is shocking when you think about that coupled with the idea that all that has been done in the 40 some odd years since is, okay, let’s just really lean in even harder to this theoretical phenomena of deterrence. Because that’s all it is, it’s just a statement, Lex. Deterrence will hold. Okay. Well, what if it doesn’t? Well, we know from Proud Prophet what happens if it doesn’t.
Lex Fridman
So almost always, so there’s no mechanisms in the human mind and the human soul that stops it in the governments that we’ve created. The procedure escalates always.
So almost always, so there’s no mechanisms in the human mind and the human soul that stops it in the governments that we’ve created. The procedure escalates always.
Annie Jacobsen
I mean, here’s a crazy nomenclature, jargon thing for you. Ready? Escalate to deescalate. That’s what comes out of it. Think about what I just said. Escalate to deescalate. So someone strikes you with a nuclear weapon, you’re going to escalate it. General Hyten recently said he was STRATCOM commander. He was saber-rattling with North Korea during COVID, and he said, “They need to know if they launch one nuclear weapon, we launch one. If they launch two, we launch two.” But it’s actually more than that. They launch one, we launch 80. That’s called escalate to deescalate. Pound the you know what out of them to get them to stop.
I mean, here’s a crazy nomenclature, jargon thing for you. Ready? Escalate to deescalate. That’s what comes out of it. Think about what I just said. Escalate to deescalate. So someone strikes you with a nuclear weapon, you’re going to escalate it. General Hyten recently said he was STRATCOM commander. He was saber-rattling with North Korea during COVID, and he said, “They need to know if they launch one nuclear weapon, we launch one. If they launch two, we launch two.” But it’s actually more than that. They launch one, we launch 80. That’s called escalate to deescalate. Pound the you know what out of them to get them to stop.
Lex Fridman
But to make a case for that, there is a reason to the madness because you want to threaten this gigantic response. But when it comes to it, the seconds before, there is still a probability that you’ll pull back.
But to make a case for that, there is a reason to the madness because you want to threaten this gigantic response. But when it comes to it, the seconds before, there is still a probability that you’ll pull back.
Annie Jacobsen
Which brings us to the most terrifying facts that I learned in all of that, and that has to do with errors. Not errors of like we spoke about a minute ago with a simulation test tape. I’m talking about if one madman, one nihilistic madman were to launch a nuclear weapon as I write in this scenario, and we needed to escalate to deescalate. We needed to send nuclear weapons at, let’s say North Korea as I do in my scenario.
Which brings us to the most terrifying facts that I learned in all of that, and that has to do with errors. Not errors of like we spoke about a minute ago with a simulation test tape. I’m talking about if one madman, one nihilistic madman were to launch a nuclear weapon as I write in this scenario, and we needed to escalate to deescalate. We needed to send nuclear weapons at, let’s say North Korea as I do in my scenario.
Well, what is completely unknown to 98% of the planet is that not only do the Russians have a very flawed satellite system so that they cannot interpret what is happening properly, but there is an absolutely existential flaw in the system, which Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta confirmed with me, which is that our ICBMs do not have enough range. If we launch a counterattack against, say, North Korea, our ICBMs must fly over Russia. They must fly over Russia. So imagine saying, “Oh, no, no. These 82 warheads that are going to actually strike the Northern Korean peninsula are not coming for you, Russia.” Our adversary right now that we’re saber-rattling with. “Just trust us.” And that is where nuclear war unfolds into Armageddon. And that hole in national security is shocking. And as Panetta told me, no one wants to discuss it.
Lex Fridman
And if one nuclear weapon does reach its target, I presume communication breaks down completely, or there’s a high risk of breakdown of communication.
And if one nuclear weapon does reach its target, I presume communication breaks down completely, or there’s a high risk of breakdown of communication.
Annie Jacobsen
Well, let’s back up. We are both presumptuous to assume that communication could even happen prior to, and let me give you a very specific example. During the Ukraine war, if perhaps you remember, I think it was in November of 2022. News reports erroneously stated that a Russian rocket, a Russian missile had hit Poland, a NATO country. It turned out to be a mistake, but for several hours, this was actually the information that was all over the news, breaking news. 36 hours later, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, gave a press conference and talked about this and admitted that he could not reach his Russian counterpart during those 36 hours. He could not reach him. How are you going to not have an absolute Armageddon-like furor with nuclear weapons in the air if people can’t get on the phone during a ground war?
Well, let’s back up. We are both presumptuous to assume that communication could even happen prior to, and let me give you a very specific example. During the Ukraine war, if perhaps you remember, I think it was in November of 2022. News reports erroneously stated that a Russian rocket, a Russian missile had hit Poland, a NATO country. It turned out to be a mistake, but for several hours, this was actually the information that was all over the news, breaking news. 36 hours later, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, gave a press conference and talked about this and admitted that he could not reach his Russian counterpart during those 36 hours. He could not reach him. How are you going to not have an absolute Armageddon-like furor with nuclear weapons in the air if people can’t get on the phone during a ground war?
Lex Fridman
I’d like to believe that there’s people in major nations that don’t give a damn about the bullshit of politics and can always just pick up the phone. Very close to the top, but not at the very top, and just cut through the bullshit of it in situations like this.
I’d like to believe that there’s people in major nations that don’t give a damn about the bullshit of politics and can always just pick up the phone. Very close to the top, but not at the very top, and just cut through the bullshit of it in situations like this.
Annie Jacobsen
I hope that’s true. I doubt it is, and let me tell you why. Most, and neither you nor I are political, from what I gather. So I just write about POTUS, President of the United States. You have no idea what my politics are because they shouldn’t matter. No one should be for nuclear war, or no one should be for national insecurity. Yes, you want to have a strong nation. But once you get into politics, then you’re talking about sycophants. And the more a political leader becomes divisive, becomes polemic, the more his platform is predicated on hating the other side, either within his own country or with alleged enemy nations. The more you surround yourself, as we see in the current day with sycophants, with people who will tell you not only what they think you want-
I hope that’s true. I doubt it is, and let me tell you why. Most, and neither you nor I are political, from what I gather. So I just write about POTUS, President of the United States. You have no idea what my politics are because they shouldn’t matter. No one should be for nuclear war, or no one should be for national insecurity. Yes, you want to have a strong nation. But once you get into politics, then you’re talking about sycophants. And the more a political leader becomes divisive, becomes polemic, the more his platform is predicated on hating the other side, either within his own country or with alleged enemy nations. The more you surround yourself, as we see in the current day with sycophants, with people who will tell you not only what they think you want-
Annie Jacobsen
… defense with people who will tell you not only what they think you want to hear, but will help them to hold onto power. So you don’t have wise decision makers. Long gone are the days where we had presidents who had advisors on both sides of the aisle. That’s really important, because you want to have differing opinions. But as things become more viperous, both here in the United States and in nuclear armed nations, all bets are off at whether your advisors are going to give you good advice.
… defense with people who will tell you not only what they think you want to hear, but will help them to hold onto power. So you don’t have wise decision makers. Long gone are the days where we had presidents who had advisors on both sides of the aisle. That’s really important, because you want to have differing opinions. But as things become more viperous, both here in the United States and in nuclear armed nations, all bets are off at whether your advisors are going to give you good advice.
Warmongers
Lex Fridman
Who are the people around the President of the United States that give advice in this six minute window? How many of them just, maybe you could speak to the detail of that, but also to the spirit of the way they see the world. How many of them are warmongers? How many of them are kind of big picture, peace, humanity type of thinkers?
Who are the people around the President of the United States that give advice in this six minute window? How many of them just, maybe you could speak to the detail of that, but also to the spirit of the way they see the world. How many of them are warmongers? How many of them are kind of big picture, peace, humanity type of thinkers?
Annie Jacobsen
Well, again, we’re talking about that six minute window, so it’s not exactly like you can, let me put a pot of coffee on and really tell me what you think and we can strategize here, right? You have your SecDef and your chairman, maybe the vice chairman.
Well, again, we’re talking about that six minute window, so it’s not exactly like you can, let me put a pot of coffee on and really tell me what you think and we can strategize here, right? You have your SecDef and your chairman, maybe the vice chairman.
We haven’t even begun to talk about the fact that at the same time, these advisors also have a parallel concern, and that’s called continuity of government. So while they’re trying to advise on the nuclear counterstrike in response to the incoming nuclear missile, they have to be thinking, “How are we going to keep the government functioning when the missiles start hitting, when the bombs start going off?” And that is about getting yourself out of the Pentagon, let’s say. Getting yourself to one of these nuclear bunkers that I write about at length in the book.
So how much can you ask of a human, right? Because it comes down to a human. Secretary of Defense is a human. Imagine that job while trying to advise the president. And then there’s also a really interesting term which I learned about called jamming the president, which is often understood in Washington that the military advisors would, we don’t know if this is legit, we’ve never seen it put to the test, but jamming the president means the military advisors are going to push for a really aggressive counter attack immediately.
And again, you’re the president who’s not really been paying attention to this because he has many other things to deal with. Speed is not conducive to wisdom.
Lex Fridman
Can you speak to the jamming the president? So your sense is the advisors would by default be pushing for aggressive counter attack.
Can you speak to the jamming the president? So your sense is the advisors would by default be pushing for aggressive counter attack.
Annie Jacobsen
That is a term in sort of the national security nuclear command and control historical documentation that many of the people that you might call the more dovish type people are worried about, that the more hawkish people, the military advisors, are going to be jamming the president to make these decisions about which targets. Not if, but what.
That is a term in sort of the national security nuclear command and control historical documentation that many of the people that you might call the more dovish type people are worried about, that the more hawkish people, the military advisors, are going to be jamming the president to make these decisions about which targets. Not if, but what.
Lex Fridman
The argument will be about which targets, not about if.
The argument will be about which targets, not about if.
Annie Jacobsen
Yes. Yes.
Yes. Yes.
Lex Fridman
I hope that even the warmongers would at this moment… Because what underlies the idea of you wanting to go to war? It’s power. It’s like wanting to destroy the enemy and be the big kid on the block. But with nuclear war, it just feels like that falls apart. Do you think warmongers actually believe they can win a nuclear war?
I hope that even the warmongers would at this moment… Because what underlies the idea of you wanting to go to war? It’s power. It’s like wanting to destroy the enemy and be the big kid on the block. But with nuclear war, it just feels like that falls apart. Do you think warmongers actually believe they can win a nuclear war?
Annie Jacobsen
Well, you’ve raised a really important question that we looked at the historical record for that answer. Because astonishingly, all of this began, like when Russia first got the bomb in 1949, the powers that be, and I write about them in the book is in a setup for the moment of launch. It’s called How We Got Here. And you see, and I cite declassified documents from some of these early meetings where nuclear war plans were being laid out. And absolutely back in the 1950s the generals and the admirals that were running the nuclear command and control system believed that we could fight and win a nuclear war despite hundreds of millions of people dying. This was the prevailing thought. And only over time did the kind of concept come into play that no, we can never have a nuclear war. It’s the famous Gorbachev and Reagan joint statement. “A nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought.” But before that, many people believed that it could be won, and they were preparing for that.
Well, you’ve raised a really important question that we looked at the historical record for that answer. Because astonishingly, all of this began, like when Russia first got the bomb in 1949, the powers that be, and I write about them in the book is in a setup for the moment of launch. It’s called How We Got Here. And you see, and I cite declassified documents from some of these early meetings where nuclear war plans were being laid out. And absolutely back in the 1950s the generals and the admirals that were running the nuclear command and control system believed that we could fight and win a nuclear war despite hundreds of millions of people dying. This was the prevailing thought. And only over time did the kind of concept come into play that no, we can never have a nuclear war. It’s the famous Gorbachev and Reagan joint statement. “A nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought.” But before that, many people believed that it could be won, and they were preparing for that.
President’s cognitive ability
Lex Fridman
Not to be political and not to be ageist, but do cognitive abilities and all that kind of stuff come into play here? So if so much is riding on the president, is there tests that are conducted? Is there regular training procedures on the president that you’re aware of? Do you know?
Not to be political and not to be ageist, but do cognitive abilities and all that kind of stuff come into play here? So if so much is riding on the president, is there tests that are conducted? Is there regular training procedures on the president that you’re aware of? Do you know?
Annie Jacobsen
I don’t think that has anything to do with ageism. I think it’s an earnest question, a really powerful one. And if people were to ask that question of themselves or their sort of dinner party guests or their family around the dinner table guests, you might come to a real good conclusion about how bad our political system is and how bad our presidential candidates are. Because why on earth there would be two candidates, one of whom has cognitive problems and the other of whom has judgment problems? These are the two biggest issues with the nuclear launch, judgment and cognition. And so where’s the young-ish, thoughtful, forward looking, wise, dedicated civil servant running for president? I know that sounds fantastical, but I wish it weren’t.
I don’t think that has anything to do with ageism. I think it’s an earnest question, a really powerful one. And if people were to ask that question of themselves or their sort of dinner party guests or their family around the dinner table guests, you might come to a real good conclusion about how bad our political system is and how bad our presidential candidates are. Because why on earth there would be two candidates, one of whom has cognitive problems and the other of whom has judgment problems? These are the two biggest issues with the nuclear launch, judgment and cognition. And so where’s the young-ish, thoughtful, forward looking, wise, dedicated civil servant running for president? I know that sounds fantastical, but I wish it weren’t.
Lex Fridman
So that’s one of the things that you really think about when voting for president is this scenario that we’ve been describing, these six minutes. Imagine the man or woman sitting there six minutes waiting for the pot of coffee.
So that’s one of the things that you really think about when voting for president is this scenario that we’ve been describing, these six minutes. Imagine the man or woman sitting there six minutes waiting for the pot of coffee.
Annie Jacobsen
But I think about that issue with any war. I mean, prior to writing Nuclear War: A Scenario, I previously wrote six books on military and intelligence programs designed to prevent nuclear war. And I believe the president as commander in chief should be of the highest character possible. Because the programs, the wars that we have fought since World War II have all been… How many octogenarian sources have I interviewed? I’m talking about Nobel Laureates and weapons designers and spy pilots and engineers in general. They’ve all said to me with great pride, “We prevented World War III, nuclear World War III.”
But I think about that issue with any war. I mean, prior to writing Nuclear War: A Scenario, I previously wrote six books on military and intelligence programs designed to prevent nuclear war. And I believe the president as commander in chief should be of the highest character possible. Because the programs, the wars that we have fought since World War II have all been… How many octogenarian sources have I interviewed? I’m talking about Nobel Laureates and weapons designers and spy pilots and engineers in general. They’ve all said to me with great pride, “We prevented World War III, nuclear World War III.”
But that idea that the commander in chief and everyone within the national security apparatus should be making really good decisions about war. It’s the oldest cliche in the world that the wars are fought by the young kids. It’s not a cliche; it’s true. And so the character part about the president should be in play whether we’re thinking about nuclear war or any war, in my opinion.
Lex Fridman
Well, I agree with you first of all, but it feels like with nuclear war, one person becomes exponentially more important. With regular war, the decision to go to war or not, advisors start mattering more. There’s judgment issues. You could start to make arguments for more leeway in terms of what kind of people we elect. It seems like with nuclear war, there’s no leeway. It’s like one person can resist the jamming the president force, the warmongers all the calculation in considering what are the errors, the mistakes, the missiles flying over Russia, the full dynamics of the geopolitics going on in the world, consider all of humanity, the history of humanity, the future of humanity, all of it just loaded in to make a decision. Then it becomes much more important that your cognitive abilities are strong and your judgment abilities against powerful wise people just as a human being are strong. So I think that’s something to really, really consider when you vote for president.
Well, I agree with you first of all, but it feels like with nuclear war, one person becomes exponentially more important. With regular war, the decision to go to war or not, advisors start mattering more. There’s judgment issues. You could start to make arguments for more leeway in terms of what kind of people we elect. It seems like with nuclear war, there’s no leeway. It’s like one person can resist the jamming the president force, the warmongers all the calculation in considering what are the errors, the mistakes, the missiles flying over Russia, the full dynamics of the geopolitics going on in the world, consider all of humanity, the history of humanity, the future of humanity, all of it just loaded in to make a decision. Then it becomes much more important that your cognitive abilities are strong and your judgment abilities against powerful wise people just as a human being are strong. So I think that’s something to really, really consider when you vote for president.
But to which degree is it really on the president versus to the people advising?
Annie Jacobsen
Oh no, it’s on the president. The president has to make the call. And that six minute window happens so fast. I mean, the president is going to be being moved for part of that time. The Secret Service is going to be up against STRATCOM. STRATCOM saying, “We need the launch orders,” and the Secret Service is going to be saying, “We need to move the president.” So it’s not as much that he’s delegating the issues; it’s more like the issue is being postponed. Because there is only one issue, for the president to say, “These targets.” For him to choose from the Denny’s like menu, “Okay, this is what we’re going to go with.”
Oh no, it’s on the president. The president has to make the call. And that six minute window happens so fast. I mean, the president is going to be being moved for part of that time. The Secret Service is going to be up against STRATCOM. STRATCOM saying, “We need the launch orders,” and the Secret Service is going to be saying, “We need to move the president.” So it’s not as much that he’s delegating the issues; it’s more like the issue is being postponed. Because there is only one issue, for the president to say, “These targets.” For him to choose from the Denny’s like menu, “Okay, this is what we’re going to go with.”
And then this astonishing thing happens. The president takes out his wallet. He has a card in it that’s colloquially called the biscuit, and that card with the codes matches up an item in the briefcase in the football that then is received by an officer underneath the Pentagon in that bunker. It’s a call and response, Lex. It’s like alpha zeta, that’s it. And then back so that the individual in the bunker realizes they are getting the command from the president. And then that order is passed to STRATCOM. And STRATCOM, the commander of STRATCOM, and I interviewed a former commander of STRATCOM, commander of STRATCOM then follows orders, which is he delivers the launch orders to the nuclear triad, and what’s done is done.
Refusing orders
Lex Fridman
What would you do if you were the commander of STRATCOM in that situation? What would you do? Because I think my gut reaction right now, if you just throw me in there, I would refuse orders.
What would you do if you were the commander of STRATCOM in that situation? What would you do? Because I think my gut reaction right now, if you just throw me in there, I would refuse orders.
Annie Jacobsen
Okay, so good question. I asked that exact question to one of my very helpful sources on the book, Dr. Glen McDuff, who is at Los Alamos and who for a while was the classified… They have a museum that’s classified within the lab, and he was the historian in charge of it. He’s a nuclear weapons engineer. He worked on Star Wars during the Reagan era. And he does a lot having to do with the history of Los Alamos. By the way, because I’ve reported on nuclear weapons for 12 years now, and Oppenheimer movie had a very, to me, positive impact on Los Alamos’ transparency with people like me. They had a real willingness to share information. I think before perhaps they were on their heels feeling they needed to be on the defensive, but now they’re much more forthcoming. They were super helpful. I can tell you the origin story of the football, which they declassified for the book. But I asked this question to Dr. Glen McDuff in a different manner. I said, “Is there a chance that the STRATCOM commander would defy orders?” And he said, “Annie, you have a better chance winning Powerball.”
Okay, so good question. I asked that exact question to one of my very helpful sources on the book, Dr. Glen McDuff, who is at Los Alamos and who for a while was the classified… They have a museum that’s classified within the lab, and he was the historian in charge of it. He’s a nuclear weapons engineer. He worked on Star Wars during the Reagan era. And he does a lot having to do with the history of Los Alamos. By the way, because I’ve reported on nuclear weapons for 12 years now, and Oppenheimer movie had a very, to me, positive impact on Los Alamos’ transparency with people like me. They had a real willingness to share information. I think before perhaps they were on their heels feeling they needed to be on the defensive, but now they’re much more forthcoming. They were super helpful. I can tell you the origin story of the football, which they declassified for the book. But I asked this question to Dr. Glen McDuff in a different manner. I said, “Is there a chance that the STRATCOM commander would defy orders?” And he said, “Annie, you have a better chance winning Powerball.”
Lex Fridman
Why do you think? What’s his intuition behind that?
Why do you think? What’s his intuition behind that?
Annie Jacobsen
You don’t wind up as STRATCOM commander unless you are someone who follows orders. You follow orders.
You don’t wind up as STRATCOM commander unless you are someone who follows orders. You follow orders.
Lex Fridman
You don’t think there’s a deep humanity there? Because his intuition is about everything we know so far, but this situation has never happened in the history of earth.
You don’t think there’s a deep humanity there? Because his intuition is about everything we know so far, but this situation has never happened in the history of earth.
Annie Jacobsen
You’re raising a really tricky, interesting conundrum here. Because during COVID, when President Trump and the leader of North Korea were kind of locked in various relationships with one another, good, bad, threatening, non-threatening, friendly; just bananas, you might say, not presidential behavior. If you were someone watching C-span like I do, nerding out on what STRATCOM was actually saying about all this, you noticed that STRATCOM commanders were speaking out publicly to Congress more so than ever I had ever seen before. And this issue came up, would you defy presidential orders?
You’re raising a really tricky, interesting conundrum here. Because during COVID, when President Trump and the leader of North Korea were kind of locked in various relationships with one another, good, bad, threatening, non-threatening, friendly; just bananas, you might say, not presidential behavior. If you were someone watching C-span like I do, nerding out on what STRATCOM was actually saying about all this, you noticed that STRATCOM commanders were speaking out publicly to Congress more so than ever I had ever seen before. And this issue came up, would you defy presidential orders?
So the caveat I would say to McDuff’s answer of easier to win the Powerball is that if the commander of STRATCOM interpreted the president’s behavior to be unreliable, to be non-presidential, then dot dot dot. But now you’re into some really radical territory.
Lex Fridman
I mean, fundamentally, it feels like just looking at all the presidents of the United States in my lifetime, it feels like none of them are qualified for this six minutes. I could see as being the commander of STRATCOM being like, “This guy?” Basically respecting no president. I know you’re supposed to, commander in chief, but in this situation… I mean everybody, Bush, Obama, Trump, Biden. If I was a commander of STRATCOM, I’d be like, “What does this guy know about any of this?” I would defy orders. I mean, in this situation, when the future of human civilization hangs in the balance, to be the person that says, “Yes, launch,” no matter what, I just can’t see a human being on earth being able to do that in the United States of America. That’s a hell of a decision. Like, this is it. That’s it.
I mean, fundamentally, it feels like just looking at all the presidents of the United States in my lifetime, it feels like none of them are qualified for this six minutes. I could see as being the commander of STRATCOM being like, “This guy?” Basically respecting no president. I know you’re supposed to, commander in chief, but in this situation… I mean everybody, Bush, Obama, Trump, Biden. If I was a commander of STRATCOM, I’d be like, “What does this guy know about any of this?” I would defy orders. I mean, in this situation, when the future of human civilization hangs in the balance, to be the person that says, “Yes, launch,” no matter what, I just can’t see a human being on earth being able to do that in the United States of America. That’s a hell of a decision. Like, this is it. That’s it.
Annie Jacobsen
That’s it. Well, but now you’ve raised a great important presentation essentially, because what you’re saying is, “People, be aware.” Be aware of why you’re voting, or why certain individuals are being escalated to even being able to run for president. What does that mean? Why are people in America not more involved? As citizens do we have a responsibility for that? Because you’ve opened up the door for people to understand, okay, the ultimate thing is the nuclear launch decision. So if a person can’t be trusted with that, everything unravels from there.
That’s it. Well, but now you’ve raised a great important presentation essentially, because what you’re saying is, “People, be aware.” Be aware of why you’re voting, or why certain individuals are being escalated to even being able to run for president. What does that mean? Why are people in America not more involved? As citizens do we have a responsibility for that? Because you’ve opened up the door for people to understand, okay, the ultimate thing is the nuclear launch decision. So if a person can’t be trusted with that, everything unravels from there.
Lex Fridman
Also, I want to look up who’s the commander of STRATCOM now. Speaking of which, you’ve interviewed a lot of experts for this book. Is there some commonalities about the way, you’ve talked about this a little bit, but in the way they see this whole situation? What scares them the most about this whole system and the whole possibility of nuclear war?
Also, I want to look up who’s the commander of STRATCOM now. Speaking of which, you’ve interviewed a lot of experts for this book. Is there some commonalities about the way, you’ve talked about this a little bit, but in the way they see this whole situation? What scares them the most about this whole system and the whole possibility of nuclear war?
Annie Jacobsen
I first learned about nuclear weapons from a guy called Al O’Donnell, who appears in my earlier books, because I interviewed him for over a period of four and a half years because he was an engineer who actually wired nuclear bombs in the 1950s. He was a member of the Manhattan Project in 1946. Worked on Operation Crossroads, the first explosions of nuclear bombs after the war ended, after World War II ended, and went on to arm, wire, and fire 186 out of the 200 some odd atmospheric nuclear tests that the United States did before this was banned. I learned from him the power of these weapons. And I learned from him this very almost nationalistic idea about how important it was to have nuclear weapons. And while I learned a lot about his human side, I also saw the side of him that was very Cold War warrior. So he was kind of the first.
I first learned about nuclear weapons from a guy called Al O’Donnell, who appears in my earlier books, because I interviewed him for over a period of four and a half years because he was an engineer who actually wired nuclear bombs in the 1950s. He was a member of the Manhattan Project in 1946. Worked on Operation Crossroads, the first explosions of nuclear bombs after the war ended, after World War II ended, and went on to arm, wire, and fire 186 out of the 200 some odd atmospheric nuclear tests that the United States did before this was banned. I learned from him the power of these weapons. And I learned from him this very almost nationalistic idea about how important it was to have nuclear weapons. And while I learned a lot about his human side, I also saw the side of him that was very Cold War warrior. So he was kind of the first.
And then, I don’t know, there’ve been 100 people that have been directly involved in nuclear weapons along the way. Billy Waugh, who was my main sort of central figure in a book I wrote about the CIA’s paramilitary called Surprise, Kill, Vanish. And Waugh HALO jumped a tactical nuclear weapon into the Nevada test site with a small team. Almost unknown to anyone, right? Only recently declassified. And so his position was like, “Tactical nuclear weapons may end up being used.”
I’m trying to speak here to the scope of different people I have interviewed over the years. And what has happened is as I’ve gotten closer to the present day, in arrears, there seems to be a growing movement from some of these Cold warriors off the position of, “Nuclear weapons make us great and strong,” toward “Something must be done to reduce this threat.”
Russia and Putin
Lex Fridman
How much do you know, in the same way that you know about the United States, how much do you know about the Russian side? Maybe the Chinese side, India and Pakistan, all of this? How their thinking differs, perhaps?
How much do you know, in the same way that you know about the United States, how much do you know about the Russian side? Maybe the Chinese side, India and Pakistan, all of this? How their thinking differs, perhaps?
Annie Jacobsen
Well, for that, you want to go to the experts. So for Russia, for example, there’s a guy called Pavel Podvig who is probably the West’s top expert on Russian nuclear forces. He works in parallel with the U.N. He also studied in Moscow. So my information comes from him. You do all the footwork to know what questions to ask, and then you take the very specific questions to him. And I learned from him about how the Russian command and control goes down. And it’s very similar to ours, because America and Russia have been at sort of nuclear dueling with one another for 75 years now. And so everything we have, they have, with the exception of we have a great satellite system and they have a super flawed one. Theirs is called Tundra. And even Pavel Podvig admitted that there’s serious flaws in Tundra. The Russian satellite system, for example, can mistake sunlight for flames, can mistake clouds for a nuclear launch. This is a fact.
Well, for that, you want to go to the experts. So for Russia, for example, there’s a guy called Pavel Podvig who is probably the West’s top expert on Russian nuclear forces. He works in parallel with the U.N. He also studied in Moscow. So my information comes from him. You do all the footwork to know what questions to ask, and then you take the very specific questions to him. And I learned from him about how the Russian command and control goes down. And it’s very similar to ours, because America and Russia have been at sort of nuclear dueling with one another for 75 years now. And so everything we have, they have, with the exception of we have a great satellite system and they have a super flawed one. Theirs is called Tundra. And even Pavel Podvig admitted that there’s serious flaws in Tundra. The Russian satellite system, for example, can mistake sunlight for flames, can mistake clouds for a nuclear launch. This is a fact.
What was interesting in interviewing him was also this recent very, very dangerous shift in Russian nuclear policy, which is this: Many Russian experts will tell you that Russia has always maintained that it never had a launch on warning policy. Now, I don’t know if I believe that’s true, but I’m just telling you what they say. And this is coming from the generals, the Cold War generals in Soviet Russia saying, “Oh, no, no, no. We would wait.” They were kind of playing the noble warrior. “We would wait to absorb a nuclear attack until we launched.” Okay? So many Americans experts will tell you that that’s just posturing and propaganda. But that was their official position, and that changed just two years ago when Putin gave a speech and he said that their position had changed, that they will no longer wait to absorb an attack. That once they learn of, how did he phrase it? He called it like the trajectory of the missiles, which is a way of, we’re talking about parody, the same way we see the missile coming over in Midcourse. Putin made that same statement, and said, “We would launch.”
Lex Fridman
What do you know of the way Putin thinks about nuclear weapons and nuclear war? Is it just something to allude to in a speech? Or do you think he contemplates the possibilities of nuclear war?
What do you know of the way Putin thinks about nuclear weapons and nuclear war? Is it just something to allude to in a speech? Or do you think he contemplates the possibilities of nuclear war?
Annie Jacobsen
I don’t know, but if I had to guess it would go like this. I would look at his background, and he comes from the intelligence world. My experience in interviewing old timers who’ve spent decades working for the CIA or even NRO or NSA, I know the way they think from having spent hundreds of hours interviewing them. And then I know the way that military men think, and it’s very different. Putin’s not a military person per se; he’s an intelligence officer. So what would concern me there if I had to guess about his mindset has to do with paranoia. Most intelligence officers must have a degree of healthy paranoia, or they’re going to wind up dead. And so that’s not a great quality to have.
I don’t know, but if I had to guess it would go like this. I would look at his background, and he comes from the intelligence world. My experience in interviewing old timers who’ve spent decades working for the CIA or even NRO or NSA, I know the way they think from having spent hundreds of hours interviewing them. And then I know the way that military men think, and it’s very different. Putin’s not a military person per se; he’s an intelligence officer. So what would concern me there if I had to guess about his mindset has to do with paranoia. Most intelligence officers must have a degree of healthy paranoia, or they’re going to wind up dead. And so that’s not a great quality to have.
Lex Fridman
You would be more trigger-happy perhaps. So you would be more prone to respond to erroneous signals.
You would be more trigger-happy perhaps. So you would be more prone to respond to erroneous signals.
Annie Jacobsen
And you’d be suspicious, and you can see that now. There’s such a incredible distrust and sort of real conflict between Russia, between its leader and NATO, between its leader and all of the West. And then that is fueled by his closest advisors. From the statements they have made that I’ve read in translation, they seem to be fostering that same idea that NATO really has it in for Russia. America really has it in. And that is so dangerous and disheartening.
And you’d be suspicious, and you can see that now. There’s such a incredible distrust and sort of real conflict between Russia, between its leader and NATO, between its leader and all of the West. And then that is fueled by his closest advisors. From the statements they have made that I’ve read in translation, they seem to be fostering that same idea that NATO really has it in for Russia. America really has it in. And that is so dangerous and disheartening.
Lex Fridman
And perhaps makes it less likely that the president would pick up the phone and talk to the other president.
And perhaps makes it less likely that the president would pick up the phone and talk to the other president.
Annie Jacobsen
Or that the close advisors near the president would make that happen.
Or that the close advisors near the president would make that happen.
Cyberattack
Lex Fridman
You were talking about the procedure with the football. Is there any concern for cyber attacks? For security concerns at every level here, false signals, errors, shutting down the channels of communication through cyber attacks, all that kind of stuff?
You were talking about the procedure with the football. Is there any concern for cyber attacks? For security concerns at every level here, false signals, errors, shutting down the channels of communication through cyber attacks, all that kind of stuff?
Annie Jacobsen
To answer those questions, I interviewed a number of people, but most specifically General Touhill, who was Obama’s cyber chief. He was actually America’s first cyber chief. The nuclear command and control system and really the triad functions on analog systems. It functions on old school systems. If there’s not digital interface, you can’t hack into it. So most of the issues that I raise in the book have to do with what happens to cyber after a nuclear attack? What happens to cyber in the minutes after a bomb, a nuclear weapon strikes America, and how that impacts the ability for people to communicate with one another? That’s when chaos takes control.
To answer those questions, I interviewed a number of people, but most specifically General Touhill, who was Obama’s cyber chief. He was actually America’s first cyber chief. The nuclear command and control system and really the triad functions on analog systems. It functions on old school systems. If there’s not digital interface, you can’t hack into it. So most of the issues that I raise in the book have to do with what happens to cyber after a nuclear attack? What happens to cyber in the minutes after a bomb, a nuclear weapon strikes America, and how that impacts the ability for people to communicate with one another? That’s when chaos takes control.
Ground zero of nuclear war
Lex Fridman
Well, let’s talk about it. So God forbid if a nuclear weapon reaches its target, what happens? Perhaps you could say what you think would be the first target hit. Would it be the Pentagon?
Well, let’s talk about it. So God forbid if a nuclear weapon reaches its target, what happens? Perhaps you could say what you think would be the first target hit. Would it be the Pentagon?
Annie Jacobsen
I was told by many people I interviewed that the biggest fear in Washington, DC is what’s called a bolt out of the blue attack. That’s an unwarned nuclear attack against Washington, DC. The target would be the Pentagon, and that’s what I begin the scenario with. I reported in graphic, horrifying detail what happens.
I was told by many people I interviewed that the biggest fear in Washington, DC is what’s called a bolt out of the blue attack. That’s an unwarned nuclear attack against Washington, DC. The target would be the Pentagon, and that’s what I begin the scenario with. I reported in graphic, horrifying detail what happens.
Lex Fridman
Yes, you did.
Yes, you did.
Annie Jacobsen
Because I don’t know what’s worse, me writing that all out, or the fact that it’s all documented by the Defense Department. I mean, they have been documenting the effect of nuclear weapons on people and animals and things since the earliest days of the Cold War. And all of the details I pull are from these documents like The Effects of Nuclear Weapons. And again, this document was the original information, the original data, and this document come from Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It was all classified. And then it was built upon by those 200 some odd atmospheric nuclear weapons tests we did.
Because I don’t know what’s worse, me writing that all out, or the fact that it’s all documented by the Defense Department. I mean, they have been documenting the effect of nuclear weapons on people and animals and things since the earliest days of the Cold War. And all of the details I pull are from these documents like The Effects of Nuclear Weapons. And again, this document was the original information, the original data, and this document come from Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It was all classified. And then it was built upon by those 200 some odd atmospheric nuclear weapons tests we did.
We’re talking about millimeters and inches. We’re talking about the Defense Department knowing that, oh, seven and a half miles out the upholstery on cars will spontaneously combust. The pine needles will catch on fire. They will start more fires. You have all kinds of mayhem and chaos happening based on reported facts from observations. And this is really shocking and grotesque at the same time.
Lex Fridman
So one warhead reaches the Pentagon, everybody in the Pentagon perishes.
So one warhead reaches the Pentagon, everybody in the Pentagon perishes.
Annie Jacobsen
180 million degrees. The fireball on a one megaton nuclear weapon is 19 football fields of fire. Think about that. Nothing remains. Nothing remains.
180 million degrees. The fireball on a one megaton nuclear weapon is 19 football fields of fire. Think about that. Nothing remains. Nothing remains.
Lex Fridman
There’s then a radius where people die immediately, and then there’s people that are dead when found, and then there’s people that will die slowly in centric rings.
There’s then a radius where people die immediately, and then there’s people that are dead when found, and then there’s people that will die slowly in centric rings.
Annie Jacobsen
And again, rings defined by Defense scientists. But before that, the bomb goes off. Then there’s this blast wave that’s like several hundred miles an hour pushing out like a bulldozer, knocking everything down, bridges, buildings. I mean, you can read FEMA manuals about what the rubble will be like. You’re talking about 30 feet deep rubble as the buildings go over, 6, 7, 8, 10 miles out. That speaks nothing of the mega fires that will then ensue. So once all these people die, and third degree radiation burns. Did you even know there was such a thing as fourth degree radiation burns? We’re talking about the wind ripping the skin off people’s faces many miles out.
And again, rings defined by Defense scientists. But before that, the bomb goes off. Then there’s this blast wave that’s like several hundred miles an hour pushing out like a bulldozer, knocking everything down, bridges, buildings. I mean, you can read FEMA manuals about what the rubble will be like. You’re talking about 30 feet deep rubble as the buildings go over, 6, 7, 8, 10 miles out. That speaks nothing of the mega fires that will then ensue. So once all these people die, and third degree radiation burns. Did you even know there was such a thing as fourth degree radiation burns? We’re talking about the wind ripping the skin off people’s faces many miles out.
And then you have a sucking action. Many people are familiar with what the nuclear mushroom cloud looks like. Its stem actually creates, and again, this is from physicists who advise the Defense Department on this, the sucking up into the nuclear stem, 300 mile an hour winds. You’re talking about people miles out getting sucked up into that stem. When you see the mushroom cloud, Lex, in a nuclear war, that would be people. Those are like the remnants of people and of things in the cloud; 30, 40 mile wide mushroom cloud blocking out the sun, and that speaks nothing of the radiation poisoning that follows.
Surviving nuclear war
Lex Fridman
And then the power grid goes out. Basically everything we rely on in terms of systems in our way of life goes out. You write, “Those who somehow managed to escape death by the initial blast, shockwave, and firestorm suddenly realize an insidious truth about nuclear war, that they’re entirely on their own.” Here begins a “fight for food and water.” I mean, that is a wake-up call on top of a wake-up call that we go back to a kind of primitive fight for survival, each on their own.
And then the power grid goes out. Basically everything we rely on in terms of systems in our way of life goes out. You write, “Those who somehow managed to escape death by the initial blast, shockwave, and firestorm suddenly realize an insidious truth about nuclear war, that they’re entirely on their own.” Here begins a “fight for food and water.” I mean, that is a wake-up call on top of a wake-up call that we go back to a kind of primitive fight for survival, each on their own.
Annie Jacobsen
And by the way, those details were given to me by Obama’s FEMA director, Craig Fugate. FEMA is the agency in America that plans for nuclear war. And what Fugate said to me was, “Annie, we plan for asteroid strikes. These are called low probability but high consequence events.” And FEMA is the organization that when there’s a hurricane or an earthquake or a flood, FEMA steps in and they do what’s called population protection planning. They take care of people. And what Fugate told me is after a nuclear strike, after a bolt out of the blue attack, he used those terms, there is no population protection. Everyone’s dead. And he means that metaphorically, but also kind of more literally. Because he just said at that point, “You just hope that you stocked Pedialyte.”
And by the way, those details were given to me by Obama’s FEMA director, Craig Fugate. FEMA is the agency in America that plans for nuclear war. And what Fugate said to me was, “Annie, we plan for asteroid strikes. These are called low probability but high consequence events.” And FEMA is the organization that when there’s a hurricane or an earthquake or a flood, FEMA steps in and they do what’s called population protection planning. They take care of people. And what Fugate told me is after a nuclear strike, after a bolt out of the blue attack, he used those terms, there is no population protection. Everyone’s dead. And he means that metaphorically, but also kind of more literally. Because he just said at that point, “You just hope that you stocked Pedialyte.”
Lex Fridman
What do you think happens to humans? How does human nature manifest itself in-
What do you think happens to humans? How does human nature manifest itself in-
Lex Fridman
How does human nature manifest itself in such conditions? Do you think brutality will come out? People will, just for survival, will steal, will murder, will.
How does human nature manifest itself in such conditions? Do you think brutality will come out? People will, just for survival, will steal, will murder, will.
Annie Jacobsen
I can’t imagine that not happening. I think that’s why people love post-apocalyptic television shows and films because they see that. And then, of course, there’s always one great charismatic person who’s trying to restore morality. These are great narratives that people like to tell themselves in the world of science fiction. But what we’re dealing with is science fact in this scenario. It is meant to terrify people into realizing, wait a minute, this is a conversation that absolutely should be had, while it can still be had, because the realities, when you have the director of FEMA telling you this, it’s a real wake-up call.
I can’t imagine that not happening. I think that’s why people love post-apocalyptic television shows and films because they see that. And then, of course, there’s always one great charismatic person who’s trying to restore morality. These are great narratives that people like to tell themselves in the world of science fiction. But what we’re dealing with is science fact in this scenario. It is meant to terrify people into realizing, wait a minute, this is a conversation that absolutely should be had, while it can still be had, because the realities, when you have the director of FEMA telling you this, it’s a real wake-up call.
By the way, Craig Fugate was so transparently human with me, and I quote him directly in the book. But he spoke about, you asked me earlier about what would be going through the president’s mind, and we don’t know, I don’t know, but Craig Fugate told me what would be going through his mind. He said along the lines, I’m paraphrasing, it’s almost something you couldn’t even comprehend. It would just ruin you. His words are really powerful.
Of course, the FEMA director, in the scenario, is notified in that first window while the ballistic missile is on its way and no one in America yet knows. I have the FEMA director pull over to the side of the road and jump in a helicopter that’s sent for him to take him to the bunker that FEMA goes to, which is called Mount Weather. And so, Fugate was aware that, as FEMA director, you would likely be taken to a safe place, however many hours you’re going to be safe, or days or maybe weeks or maybe months.
But as I also learned from the cyber people I interviewed, that there’s a complete fallacy that these military bases can continue functioning. They run on diesel fuel, and when the fuel stops pumping, there’s no more generators.
Lex Fridman
Electricity’s gone. Communication lines are all gone. The food supply. All of it, all the supply chains is gone. It’s terrifying, and that’s just in the first few days, first few hours. In part five, you described the 24 months and beyond after this first hour we’ve been talking about. What happens to earth? What happens to humans if a full-on nuclear war happens?
Electricity’s gone. Communication lines are all gone. The food supply. All of it, all the supply chains is gone. It’s terrifying, and that’s just in the first few days, first few hours. In part five, you described the 24 months and beyond after this first hour we’ve been talking about. What happens to earth? What happens to humans if a full-on nuclear war happens?
Nuclear winter
Annie Jacobsen
For that, I was super privileged to talk to Professor Brian Toon, who’s one of the original five authors of the nuclear winter theory. That theory was published in the early 1980s. One of Professor Toon’s professors was Carl Sagan, who was sort of the most famous author of the nuclear winter theory.
For that, I was super privileged to talk to Professor Brian Toon, who’s one of the original five authors of the nuclear winter theory. That theory was published in the early 1980s. One of Professor Toon’s professors was Carl Sagan, who was sort of the most famous author of the nuclear winter theory.
There were all kinds of controversies about it when it came out, including the Defense Department saying it was Soviet propaganda, which it wasn’t. What the nuclear winter authors conceded back in the ’80s was that their modeling was just the best it could be based on what they had at the time. And so, now flash forward to where we are in 2024, and talking to Professor Toon who’s been working on this issue for all these decades since, he shared with me how the climate models today with the systems we have, the computer systems, reveal that actually nuclear winter is worse.
To answer your questions, the bombs stop falling, in my scenario, 72 minutes after they first launch. The bombs stop falling, and then the megafires begin. Each nuclear weapon will have, according to the Defense Department, a megafire that will burn between 100 and 300 square miles. 1000 weapons, 1500 weapons, think about those megafires. Everything is burning, forests, cities. Think about the pyrotoxins in all the cities. High-rises burning. All of this soot gets lofted into the air, according to Toon, some 300 billion pounds of soot. What happens? It blocks out the sun. Without sun, we have nuclear winter. We have a situation whereby ice sheets form. You’re talking about bodies of water in places like Iowa being frozen for 10 years.
Lex Fridman
So temperature drops.
So temperature drops.
Annie Jacobsen
Temperature plummets. There are all kinds of papers that have been written about this, using modern systems and the numbers vary, but the bottom line is agriculture fails.
Temperature plummets. There are all kinds of papers that have been written about this, using modern systems and the numbers vary, but the bottom line is agriculture fails.
Lex Fridman
Foods obviously dies. The agriculture system completely shuts down, so the food sources shut down. There’s no food. There’s no sun. Temperature drops completely. No electricity.
Foods obviously dies. The agriculture system completely shuts down, so the food sources shut down. There’s no food. There’s no sun. Temperature drops completely. No electricity.
Annie Jacobsen
We haven’t even spoken of radiation poisoning because the radiation poisoning kills many people in the aftermath of the nuclear exchange. But after the nuclear freeze ends, after nuclear winter, after the sun starts to come back, let’s say eight, nine, 10 years, now you have no ozone layer or you have a severely depleted ozone layer. And so, the sun’s rays are now poisonous.
We haven’t even spoken of radiation poisoning because the radiation poisoning kills many people in the aftermath of the nuclear exchange. But after the nuclear freeze ends, after nuclear winter, after the sun starts to come back, let’s say eight, nine, 10 years, now you have no ozone layer or you have a severely depleted ozone layer. And so, the sun’s rays are now poisonous.
If you have people living underground and you have this great thawing, and with that great thawing comes pathogens and plague. You have this system where the small-bodied animals, the insects and whatnot, begin reproducing really fast, and the larger body animals like you and me begin to go extinct. Professor Toon said it to me this way. He said, “66 million years ago, an asteroid hit Earth, killed all the dinosaurs and wiped out 70% of the species, and nuclear war would likely do the same.” And so, here we are talking about this because there is a difference. There’s nothing you can do about an asteroid, but there is something you can do about a nuclear war.
Lex Fridman
Do you think it’s possible that some humans will survive all of this? If we look, I mean, how long would it be? Would it be decades? Would it be centuries before the earth starts to have the capacity to grow food again?
Do you think it’s possible that some humans will survive all of this? If we look, I mean, how long would it be? Would it be decades? Would it be centuries before the earth starts to have the capacity to grow food again?
Annie Jacobsen
Carl Sagan talked about that in this amazing book that he wrote with two scientist colleagues called The Cold and the Dark. There’s a bunch of essays about exactly this. What would happen and how long would it take? It’s really interesting. It’s dated. It’s from the ’80s. But man, is it shocking. You think about that where men return to sort of the worst, most base versions of themselves. Civilization is gone, meaning civil society. There’s no rule of law. It’s just fend for yourself. There’s people fighting over what little resources there are. Man returns to a hunter-gatherer state.
Carl Sagan talked about that in this amazing book that he wrote with two scientist colleagues called The Cold and the Dark. There’s a bunch of essays about exactly this. What would happen and how long would it take? It’s really interesting. It’s dated. It’s from the ’80s. But man, is it shocking. You think about that where men return to sort of the worst, most base versions of themselves. Civilization is gone, meaning civil society. There’s no rule of law. It’s just fend for yourself. There’s people fighting over what little resources there are. Man returns to a hunter-gatherer state.
To really think about this idea, I looked at the oldest known archeological site in the world in Turkey, which is called Gobekli Tepe. It’s really fascinating to me because I interviewed one of the two archeologists who first found this site in the early ’90s. The lead archeologist was a guy named Klaus Schmidt, and Michael Morsch was the young graduate student who was with him. Morsch’s description of coming upon this rumored to be site, there was something called a wishing tree on the site, which I just found so human and perfect, that it was this magical place, and it was Locatable because there was a wishing tree on a hill. It’s where people went to wish and to hope that their wishes came true. I mean, how human is that?
That is where beneath the wishing tree, in the shadow of the wishing tree, there was a tepe, which is a hill. Beneath that, there is the oldest known civilization in the world. 12,000 years ago, a group of hunter-gatherers built this site. Why? We don’t know. But I imagined through Morsch’s descriptions of coming upon. He tripped on a rock, he told me. He tripped over a stone that turned out to be the top part of a 12,000 year old sculpted man, giant pillar. He talked about coming upon that. And then, no one knows really what Gobekli Tepe was for.
That makes my mind try and answer the question you asked me internally, just as a human who’s here on earth for the amount of time I’m here. If there were a nuclear war, what would it be like? What would it be like when someone in the future, would we become archeologists one day? Would civilization rebuild? Would we develop computers? Who knows? It’s interesting to think about. I hope we never have to.
Lex Fridman
What would we remember about this time?
What would we remember about this time?
Annie Jacobsen
Right.
Right.
Lex Fridman
It is terrifying to think that most of it will be forgotten. Everything we assume will not be forgotten. We think maybe some of the technological developments will be forgotten, but we assume some of history won’t be forgotten. But realistically, especially us descending into primitive survival, probably everything since the industrial age will be forgotten. Everything.
It is terrifying to think that most of it will be forgotten. Everything we assume will not be forgotten. We think maybe some of the technological developments will be forgotten, but we assume some of history won’t be forgotten. But realistically, especially us descending into primitive survival, probably everything since the industrial age will be forgotten. Everything.
Maybe some religious ideas will persist. Some stories and myths will persist. But all the wisdom we’ve gathered, higher level sort of technological wisdom would be gone. That’s terrifying to think about. Maybe even, as you touch on, the very fact of nuclear war might be forgotten. The lessons of nuclear war might be forgotten. That there are these weapons, sort of the obvious elephant in the room would be one of the things that’s completely forgotten or become so vague in the recollection of humans that our understanding will change. It’s almost as if a God descended on earth and destroyed everything. Maybe that’s how it will persist. Mythological interpretation of what nuclear weapons are. That’s terrifying because then it could repeat again.
Annie Jacobsen
But I think, for me, the idea of what is buried becomes very interesting and very human, and in a strange way, optimistic and positive because if you can visualize that wishing tree, and I have a picture of it in the book from one of the archeologists who work on that, you think, “What were they wishing? What were they wishing for?” And then, you think of your own self, what do I wish for in this world? Because I do think all things come from what happens metaphorically around the dinner table. What people put their eyes on becomes interesting and expands what people talk about. Ultimately, when you think about the long arc of time and human civilization, it does kind of make you want to communicate more with your enemies, with your adversaries. I think about the quote, what Einstein has said to have said, which is that he was asked what weapons World War III would be fought with. He said, “I don’t know, but I know that World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones.”
But I think, for me, the idea of what is buried becomes very interesting and very human, and in a strange way, optimistic and positive because if you can visualize that wishing tree, and I have a picture of it in the book from one of the archeologists who work on that, you think, “What were they wishing? What were they wishing for?” And then, you think of your own self, what do I wish for in this world? Because I do think all things come from what happens metaphorically around the dinner table. What people put their eyes on becomes interesting and expands what people talk about. Ultimately, when you think about the long arc of time and human civilization, it does kind of make you want to communicate more with your enemies, with your adversaries. I think about the quote, what Einstein has said to have said, which is that he was asked what weapons World War III would be fought with. He said, “I don’t know, but I know that World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones.”
Alien civilizations
Lex Fridman
Let me ask you about the great filter. When you look up into our galaxy, into our universe, look up at the sky, do you think there’s other alien civilizations that are contending with some similar questions? Perhaps the reason we have not definitively seen alien civilizations is because the others have failed to find a solution to this great filter. Something like nuclear weapons.
Let me ask you about the great filter. When you look up into our galaxy, into our universe, look up at the sky, do you think there’s other alien civilizations that are contending with some similar questions? Perhaps the reason we have not definitively seen alien civilizations is because the others have failed to find a solution to this great filter. Something like nuclear weapons.
Annie Jacobsen
I’m not sure. I’m going to have to think about that question. But what does come to mind is an answer that was given to me similarly by Ed Mitchell, who went to the moon. He was the sixth man to walk on the moon. And so, his opinion, I think, might count a little more than mine on that subject because his lens is so much greater.
I’m not sure. I’m going to have to think about that question. But what does come to mind is an answer that was given to me similarly by Ed Mitchell, who went to the moon. He was the sixth man to walk on the moon. And so, his opinion, I think, might count a little more than mine on that subject because his lens is so much greater.
Mitchell was vilified when he got back from the moon because it became known that he believed in things like extrasensory perception and this kind of mystical, metaphysical way of looking at the world. He really suffered from that. I mean, he was ridiculed and he lost a lot of his career and his friends. But what he said to me in our interview about his trip home from the moon answers that great filter question, I think, in a way I might want to adopt, which is this.
He said that as they were returning from the moon to earth, he looked down at the earth, and I’m paraphrasing him, I write all this in Phenomena, an earlier book, but the paraphrasing is that he looked down from the earth and it was 1971. He thought about all the conflict going on down below, particularly the Vietnam War where many of his friends were. And then, he looked behind him into the great vast galaxy. He had a moment, he says, that was like an epiphany. Not a near-death experience, but a sort of near-life experience where he believed that the human consciousness, which is where so much of this thoughtfulness about metaphysics and ESP perhaps come from.
Mitchell’s theory, was that human consciousness, the way to understand it, had something to do with realizing that man’s inner life and man’s outer life are deeply connected, in the same way that man is connected to the galaxy. He said it much more eloquently, but you kind of get the idea. I think it’s why humans have always loved to look up, that there’s more there. It’s like the big version of the wishing tree, what do I wish for for myself? What is maybe, perhaps, the realignment of thinking for those of us in search of happiness instead of war. What does it mean to have a conscience, to have consciousness? What does it mean to be a thinking person? What does it mean to be on this earth, to be born, to live, to die? And then, there is legacy. And so, all of those ideas are, I think, foster the kind of conversation that de-escalates conflict.
Lex Fridman
In some deep way, the mysteries of what’s out there when we look out to the stars are the same mysteries that we find when trying to understand the human mind and they’re coupled in some way.
In some deep way, the mysteries of what’s out there when we look out to the stars are the same mysteries that we find when trying to understand the human mind and they’re coupled in some way.
For me, thinking about alien civilizations out there is really the same kind of question, which is, what are we? What is this? What are we doing here? How do we come here? Why does it seem to be so magical and beautiful and powerful? Now, where’s it going? Because it feels like we’re really, perhaps for the first time in history, are in a moment where we can destroy ourselves. And so, naturally you ask, well, where’s others like us? Perhaps, are we inevitably going to a place where we’ll destroy ourselves? Is it basically inevitable that we destroy ourselves? We become too powerful and insufficiently wise to know what to do with that power? But like you said, probably the answers to that are in here. We don’t need to look out there.
Extrasensory perception
I’d love to ask you about the extrasensory perception. You’ve written, like you said, the book Phenomena on the secret history of the US government’s investigations into extrasensory perception and psychokinesis. What are some of the more interesting extrasensory abilities that were explored by the government, and maybe just in general, ESP. What is it? What do you know of it?
Annie Jacobsen
The book was so interesting to report because I spend so much time dealing with mechanized systems, machines, war machines, and yet the military and intelligence were and continue to be incredibly interested in the human mind, in consciousness. And so, if one is called hard science, what we’re talking about now is called squishy science. It was really interesting to delve into that world. It just couldn’t be farther from weapons and war, or could it?
The book was so interesting to report because I spend so much time dealing with mechanized systems, machines, war machines, and yet the military and intelligence were and continue to be incredibly interested in the human mind, in consciousness. And so, if one is called hard science, what we’re talking about now is called squishy science. It was really interesting to delve into that world. It just couldn’t be farther from weapons and war, or could it?
And then, I really began thinking, well, before science and technology, sort of the supernatural ruled the world. The Oracle of Delphi in Greece exists before the common era rulers to go and beg to learn from the powers that be what was going to happen. All ESP programs, I think, pull from that origin story, the leader’s desire to know. And so, I really found it amazing that many people think these systems, or rather these programs, started in the ’70s. I learned they actually began right after World War II. That was because, and in my reporting, I find all things sort of always circle back to the Third Reich, to the Nazis.
The Nazis had a massive occult program, an ESP program, psychokinesis program, astrology. Both Hitler and Himmler were deeply interested in these occult concepts. After I learned from records at the National Archives that after the war, half of everything went to the Soviet Union, and I’m talking about the trove of Nazi documents from which the superpowers were then going to learn to fight future wars, and half of them went to the United States. And so, we got this trove of documents about all of this, and the Soviets got the other. And so, it set off a kind of psychic arms race, which in a weird way paralleled the nuclear arms race, which we’ve been talking about, in as much that it led one side to constantly wonder what the other side had.
Lex Fridman
Have they been able to find anything interesting in this squishy science analysis of trying to see how the human mind could be used as a weapon?
Have they been able to find anything interesting in this squishy science analysis of trying to see how the human mind could be used as a weapon?
Annie Jacobsen
The CIA most definitely believed, from my reading of the documents, that there was something very legit, shall we say, about ESP. It was uncontrollable, it was unreliable, but nonetheless it existed. Being the intelligence agency that they are, they cared less about why it worked. They just wanted to know how they could use it. And then, it got into all kinds of elements of placebo effect.
The CIA most definitely believed, from my reading of the documents, that there was something very legit, shall we say, about ESP. It was uncontrollable, it was unreliable, but nonetheless it existed. Being the intelligence agency that they are, they cared less about why it worked. They just wanted to know how they could use it. And then, it got into all kinds of elements of placebo effect.
When the military stepped in and got involved in the programs, that was a complete disaster, in my opinion, because the military needs to control everything in a mechanized, systematic way. And so, they started, for example, teaching people to be psychic, which is a really, really, really bad idea.
Flash forward to where we are today, these programs still exist. There’s a Navy program which is working, based on a lot of data that came back from the war on terror, with certain soldiers knowing, “Wait, don’t walk down that path. There is an IED there.” They call this the spidey sense, and they actually have a program that works from this. These things never go away. They circle around in terms of being made fun of and then taken seriously, and a little of this and of that. My biggest takeaway from writing that book was a quote that I referenced in the beginning, which is the Thomas theorem, and it says, if men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences.
Lex Fridman
I mean, placebo, as you’ve mentioned, is a fascinating concept. By the way, a short plug, I started listening to it, Andrew Huberman just released a podcast on placebo, the placebo effect.
I mean, placebo, as you’ve mentioned, is a fascinating concept. By the way, a short plug, I started listening to it, Andrew Huberman just released a podcast on placebo, the placebo effect.
Annie Jacobsen
Does he know the origin story of placebo? We’ll have to ask him.
Does he know the origin story of placebo? We’ll have to ask him.
Lex Fridman
We’ll have to ask him.
We’ll have to ask him.
Annie Jacobsen
Are you ready for this?
Are you ready for this?
Lex Fridman
Yes.
Yes.
Annie Jacobsen
CIA. Not only that, I can tell you that Dr. Henry Beecher, Harvard, I think he was also at MIT for a bit, he came up with that term. You might even say for the CIA.
CIA. Not only that, I can tell you that Dr. Henry Beecher, Harvard, I think he was also at MIT for a bit, he came up with that term. You might even say for the CIA.
Lex Fridman
Does that trouble you that so much of this is coming from the CIA first?
Does that trouble you that so much of this is coming from the CIA first?
Annie Jacobsen
You mean the placebo concept or the-
You mean the placebo concept or the-
Lex Fridman
The placebo concept, but a lot of the sort of scientific investigations.
The placebo concept, but a lot of the sort of scientific investigations.
Annie Jacobsen
Listen, I have such mixed feelings about the CIA, as one should. I think you should have mixed feelings about anything that you cover as a reporter or as a human, and maybe change that from mixed to conflicting, because there are really positive elements of every organization within the federal government.
Listen, I have such mixed feelings about the CIA, as one should. I think you should have mixed feelings about anything that you cover as a reporter or as a human, and maybe change that from mixed to conflicting, because there are really positive elements of every organization within the federal government.
I mean, my first learning about the CIA came from the work I did on the Area 51 book about their aerial reconnaissance programs, which were set up again to prevent World War III, nuclear World War III. It was this idea that information was king. The U-2 spy pane was developed out at Area 51. I interviewed Hervey Stockman, the first man to fly over the Soviet Union in a U-2, gathered all this intelligence, prevented wars. Later, I wrote a book about the CIA’s paramilitary, Surprise, Kill, Vanish. Just when I was thinking, “Wow, the CIA is doing all this amazing non-kinetic activity with aerial reconnaissance, then you learn about their kill programs,” and that’s a whole different set of issues.
Lex Fridman
It turns out, as you write in that book, that the CIA assassinates people sometimes, and we’ll talk about it. But anyway, like you said, conflicting feelings.
It turns out, as you write in that book, that the CIA assassinates people sometimes, and we’ll talk about it. But anyway, like you said, conflicting feelings.
Annie Jacobsen
I mean, I work with sources to report my books. And so, put yourself in my shoes. I interview for dozens or hundreds of hours, my primary sources. In the case of the Surprise, Kill, Vanish book, I traveled with Billy Waugh, the longest-serving CIA operator, back to the scene of the crime, back to the battle. We went to Hanoi. We went to Havana. You really get to know someone, and that’s when I say conflicting. I work with sources on a real trust basis.
I mean, I work with sources to report my books. And so, put yourself in my shoes. I interview for dozens or hundreds of hours, my primary sources. In the case of the Surprise, Kill, Vanish book, I traveled with Billy Waugh, the longest-serving CIA operator, back to the scene of the crime, back to the battle. We went to Hanoi. We went to Havana. You really get to know someone, and that’s when I say conflicting. I work with sources on a real trust basis.
Sometimes people will tell me things. They’ll say, “Annie, this is off the record. This is for you to know about me on deep background because I want you to know who I am,” and that’s powerful and a lot of times personal. It’s personal. It’s about their personal life, and it isn’t apropos to what I’m writing about, but I need to know that. That’s where it gets conflicted, in a good way, because you realize where we’re all such creatures of our personal lives. You have a professional life where national security are in your hands. I don’t know what that is like.
Lex Fridman
I wonder if you could just speak to that. You’ve interviewed so many powerful people, so many fascinating people. As you’ve spoken about, trust is fundamental to that, so they open up and really show you into their world. What does it take to do that?
I wonder if you could just speak to that. You’ve interviewed so many powerful people, so many fascinating people. As you’ve spoken about, trust is fundamental to that, so they open up and really show you into their world. What does it take to do that?
Annie Jacobsen
I think willingness. We were talking about trust earlier. I have to trust that there’s a reason I find myself in a certain situation. Otherwise, it would just be a constant doubt paradox. Why am I here? What am I doing? And so, I trust that I’m going to learn something of value. And so, I’m willing to listen. I really am willing to listen. So far, it’s always proven… The expectations I might have going into something are dwarfed by the outcome because people are so interesting and because the people that I interview, because I write about war and weapons and national security and government secrets, and the people I interview are at the heart of all of this. I mean, they are really capable people, intellectually brilliant, physically capable. They go so far out on the limb to do their jobs.
I think willingness. We were talking about trust earlier. I have to trust that there’s a reason I find myself in a certain situation. Otherwise, it would just be a constant doubt paradox. Why am I here? What am I doing? And so, I trust that I’m going to learn something of value. And so, I’m willing to listen. I really am willing to listen. So far, it’s always proven… The expectations I might have going into something are dwarfed by the outcome because people are so interesting and because the people that I interview, because I write about war and weapons and national security and government secrets, and the people I interview are at the heart of all of this. I mean, they are really capable people, intellectually brilliant, physically capable. They go so far out on the limb to do their jobs.
By the way, the reason they’re talking to me is because they’re still alive and so many of their colleagues are dead. It gives them also a wisdom about life, about sacrifice, not in cliched sort of nationalistic jingoistic terms whatsoever. I’m talking real. What is their real truth?
When I went to Vietnam with Billy Waugh, I mean, the details are just every detail. I mean, starting with the fact that he showed up at my house with a giant suitcase and a bunch of clothes, dry cleaning, pressed clothes in plastic hangers, carrying them. I’m like, “Billy, we’re going to Vietnam and we’re going back into the jungle to find the Oscar-8 battle site. What are you carrying?” He got really mad at me, did not like anyone correcting him. I got my husband on the job, like, “Kevin, you got to sort this out.”
What transpired was that Billy Waugh had never taken a trip for personal reasons. He operated, I think, in 62 countries, every single time for the CIA. It would go like this, Billy, go to there and get to there, and that’s what he would do. When he arrived, whatever he needed, he would just get. It’s not a fashion trip. He had no idea how to pack for an overseas trip. This was like, “Oh my God, how can you not have the hugest smile on your face going into this? I’m with a guy whose 89 years old.”
He’d had eight Purple Hearts from Vietnam. I mean, he operated against Osama bin Laden 10 years before 9/11. He went after bin Laden in Afghanistan when he was 72. He went after Qaddafi during the Arab spring when he was 82, and now here he is with me going to Hanoi. The details, those human details. But my husband repacked his bag and got him a proper suitcase that was carryable and small and he wasn’t trailing the hangers, but it was the trip home in the taxi that I got at this really big reveal.
Billy reached into that small suitcase my husband had given him and pulled out a rolled up American flag. He had taken this flag, because I had tried to help him pack and he wouldn’t let me, and I just thought it was like an old guy being stubborn, but he didn’t want me to see that he was bringing an American flag to Vietnam, which is not legal. He wanted to bring that flag and take it around everywhere with him, as he explained to me later, to honor all of his friends who died there 50 years ago.
And then, when the trip was finished, he gave me that flag and it’s in my office. That’s the kind of relationship that you can develop with people as a reporter, if you’re willing to go the extra mile with them, to trust them, that they’ll tell you things of value. To me, something like that is as of value as any secret mission I’m able to get declassified, because we are a nation of people.
Lex Fridman
And…
And…
Annie Jacobsen
… get declassified because we are a nation of people.
… get declassified because we are a nation of people.
Lex Fridman
And probably there’s a bunch of human details that you can’t possibly express in words, things left unspoken, but you saw in the silence exchange between the two of you, the sadness, maybe you could see in his face looking back at memories of the people he’s lost, all that kind of stuff.
And probably there’s a bunch of human details that you can’t possibly express in words, things left unspoken, but you saw in the silence exchange between the two of you, the sadness, maybe you could see in his face looking back at memories of the people he’s lost, all that kind of stuff.
Annie Jacobsen
All that kind of stuff.
All that kind of stuff.
Area 51
Lex Fridman
You mentioned you wrote a book on Area 51. For people who don’t know, you’ve written a lot about security, the military, secrets, all of this kind of stuff. So Area 51 is one of the legendary centers of all of these kinds of topics. So high level first is what is Area 51, as you understand it, as you’ve written about the lore and the reality.
You mentioned you wrote a book on Area 51. For people who don’t know, you’ve written a lot about security, the military, secrets, all of this kind of stuff. So Area 51 is one of the legendary centers of all of these kinds of topics. So high level first is what is Area 51, as you understand it, as you’ve written about the lore and the reality.
Annie Jacobsen
I think everybody wants to know about Area 51, because it’s like this American enigma. It’s like to some people, it’s the Shangri-La of test bed aerospace programs, and to others, it’s the place of captured aliens and everything in between. I had the great fortune of interviewing 75 people who lived and worked at that base for extended periods of time, mostly leading up to the ’90s because everything since then is classified. So things get declassified after decades. Not everything but some. And that allows you to piece together stories.
I think everybody wants to know about Area 51, because it’s like this American enigma. It’s like to some people, it’s the Shangri-La of test bed aerospace programs, and to others, it’s the place of captured aliens and everything in between. I had the great fortune of interviewing 75 people who lived and worked at that base for extended periods of time, mostly leading up to the ’90s because everything since then is classified. So things get declassified after decades. Not everything but some. And that allows you to piece together stories.
Lex Fridman
So you talked to a lot of people that worked there. What can you describe as the history of technological development that went on there?
So you talked to a lot of people that worked there. What can you describe as the history of technological development that went on there?
Annie Jacobsen
I mean, Area 51 is huge, by the way. It’s a top secret military facility inside a top secret military facility inside the Nevada test and training range, which is this massive not secret facility. So you’re just talking about layers, talking about peeling the onion in reverse. And it began as a place to test the U-2 spy plane. And literally the CIA set up shop there to build this plane away from the public eye. And then that led to another espionage platform called the A-12 Oxcart, which is anyone who’s seen the X-Men movies knows about the SR-71. And that’s a two-seater, right? And before that, there was the A-12 Oxcart, and that was the CIA’s stealth Mach 3 spy plane. Think about that in the early 1960s. It’s astonishing. And I interviewed the pilots who flew it.
I mean, Area 51 is huge, by the way. It’s a top secret military facility inside a top secret military facility inside the Nevada test and training range, which is this massive not secret facility. So you’re just talking about layers, talking about peeling the onion in reverse. And it began as a place to test the U-2 spy plane. And literally the CIA set up shop there to build this plane away from the public eye. And then that led to another espionage platform called the A-12 Oxcart, which is anyone who’s seen the X-Men movies knows about the SR-71. And that’s a two-seater, right? And before that, there was the A-12 Oxcart, and that was the CIA’s stealth Mach 3 spy plane. Think about that in the early 1960s. It’s astonishing. And I interviewed the pilots who flew it.
Lex Fridman
What did they say about it? What was it like?
What did they say about it? What was it like?
Annie Jacobsen
Oh my God, look, I describe in detail in Area 51. But also the amazing thing, Lex, about that was that, and I just look back on that with such fondness. This is like in 2009 when I was reporting that, and many of the guys who were in their 80s and 90s were World War II heroes, like serious World War II heroes like Colonel Slater who was the commander of Area 51. He flew the U-2 on the missions called the Black Cat Missions over China in the early 1960s to see about their Lop Nur nuclear facility. So all of these things tie in when you’re reporting on military and intelligence programs. But these guys had been World War II heroes, and then were given this cushy job out at Area 51. And it just came with all these perks.
Oh my God, look, I describe in detail in Area 51. But also the amazing thing, Lex, about that was that, and I just look back on that with such fondness. This is like in 2009 when I was reporting that, and many of the guys who were in their 80s and 90s were World War II heroes, like serious World War II heroes like Colonel Slater who was the commander of Area 51. He flew the U-2 on the missions called the Black Cat Missions over China in the early 1960s to see about their Lop Nur nuclear facility. So all of these things tie in when you’re reporting on military and intelligence programs. But these guys had been World War II heroes, and then were given this cushy job out at Area 51. And it just came with all these perks.
Colonel Slater told me this one perk, I just love so much. They all had a hankering for lobster one day. And here they’re in the middle of the desert in Nevada, and they have these really fast planes, and they literally called, they arranged, they didn’t take the Oxcart out for that one, but they got some lobsters from Massachusetts delivered to them in record time. They didn’t even need to put them on ice. And again, those are these details where you’re like, at least for me, “Thank God I got these details. These guys are all passed now.”
UFOs and aliens
Lex Fridman
So there’s a lot of incredible technological work going on there. So the legend, the lore, like you said, aliens, were there ever aliens in Area 51 as you understand it?
So there’s a lot of incredible technological work going on there. So the legend, the lore, like you said, aliens, were there ever aliens in Area 51 as you understand it?
Annie Jacobsen
So I’ve interviewed hundreds of people.
So I’ve interviewed hundreds of people.
Lex Fridman
That worked there.
That worked there.
Annie Jacobsen
Well, not just at Area 51, but in all the different national security and military intelligence and intelligence programs. And I personally have no reason to believe that aliens have ever visited Earth. That’s just me personally.
Well, not just at Area 51, but in all the different national security and military intelligence and intelligence programs. And I personally have no reason to believe that aliens have ever visited Earth. That’s just me personally.
Lex Fridman
Just at an Earth, period.
Just at an Earth, period.
Annie Jacobsen
I have no information that causes me to conclude that’s the case. Now, with that said, many of the primary players in this present day, there are aliens among us narrative, are in my phenomena book. I continue to communicate with a lot of these people. I’m talking about astrophysicists who fundamentally believe that there are aliens among us. So we beg to differ on that issue.
I have no information that causes me to conclude that’s the case. Now, with that said, many of the primary players in this present day, there are aliens among us narrative, are in my phenomena book. I continue to communicate with a lot of these people. I’m talking about astrophysicists who fundamentally believe that there are aliens among us. So we beg to differ on that issue.
Lex Fridman
But for you, in terms of doing research on government agencies that do top secret military work, I mean they would know. So you have interviewed a lot of people that have, at every layer of the onion, you don’t see evidence or a reason to believe that there was ever aliens or UFOs captured from out of this world.
But for you, in terms of doing research on government agencies that do top secret military work, I mean they would know. So you have interviewed a lot of people that have, at every layer of the onion, you don’t see evidence or a reason to believe that there was ever aliens or UFOs captured from out of this world.
Annie Jacobsen
That is correct. And even perhaps more important, and perhaps this colors my thinking, but I am uniquely familiar with disinformation programs put forth by the CIA or the agency as it’s called by insiders. I’ve learned firsthand about these program or rather learned from firsthand participants in strategic deception campaigns that the CIA has engaged in beginning with Area 51. The idea that all these reports of this U-2 spy plane, this giant long-winged aircraft flying 70,000 feet up, people didn’t think airplanes could fly that high. And it’s the sun shining off of it. It looked like a UFO and all the reports coming in and the CIA opened up a UFO disinformation campaign office headed by a guy named Todos Odarenko specifically for this reason.
That is correct. And even perhaps more important, and perhaps this colors my thinking, but I am uniquely familiar with disinformation programs put forth by the CIA or the agency as it’s called by insiders. I’ve learned firsthand about these program or rather learned from firsthand participants in strategic deception campaigns that the CIA has engaged in beginning with Area 51. The idea that all these reports of this U-2 spy plane, this giant long-winged aircraft flying 70,000 feet up, people didn’t think airplanes could fly that high. And it’s the sun shining off of it. It looked like a UFO and all the reports coming in and the CIA opened up a UFO disinformation campaign office headed by a guy named Todos Odarenko specifically for this reason.
Now, does that mean that every UFO sighting in the world has been a U-2? No, but I come from it from that lane of thinking, and there are so many strategic deception campaigns, and as I look over the decades of how these same UFO stories, and again, this is just my opinion based on my reporting, this narrative that keeps reoccurring, it seems to me like a very large catch- all to keep the public’s attention on that, not on that.
Lex Fridman
So to you, sexy stories like UFOs are going to be leveraged by the CIA for strategic deception.
So to you, sexy stories like UFOs are going to be leveraged by the CIA for strategic deception.
Annie Jacobsen
A hundred percent. I mean, Google Paul Bennewitz, I’m always amazed that Paul Bennewitz’s story is not more widely spoken of. And I think that’s because there’s the sort of ufologists or people who are absolutely convinced that aliens are among us, and I use that term loosely, but you know what I mean. And then there’s the quote unquote, “skeptics”. And the skeptics tend to be sort of like self-righteous, and I would never want to be self-righteous. So I’m not a skeptic, I’m just agnostic, I suppose. But Google Paul Bennewitz, and you can learn the story of that man who thought he saw a UFO in the ’70s, early ’80s, and the Air Force, because the Air Force intelligence community works hand in glove with CIA a lot. And some of the other intelligence agencies, of course, they’re 17, not just the CIA, and they destroyed Paul Bennewitz. They sent him to a mental institution by pulling a massive strategic deception campaign against him because they didn’t want him to know about the technology that he was seeing at Kirtland Air Force Base.
A hundred percent. I mean, Google Paul Bennewitz, I’m always amazed that Paul Bennewitz’s story is not more widely spoken of. And I think that’s because there’s the sort of ufologists or people who are absolutely convinced that aliens are among us, and I use that term loosely, but you know what I mean. And then there’s the quote unquote, “skeptics”. And the skeptics tend to be sort of like self-righteous, and I would never want to be self-righteous. So I’m not a skeptic, I’m just agnostic, I suppose. But Google Paul Bennewitz, and you can learn the story of that man who thought he saw a UFO in the ’70s, early ’80s, and the Air Force, because the Air Force intelligence community works hand in glove with CIA a lot. And some of the other intelligence agencies, of course, they’re 17, not just the CIA, and they destroyed Paul Bennewitz. They sent him to a mental institution by pulling a massive strategic deception campaign against him because they didn’t want him to know about the technology that he was seeing at Kirtland Air Force Base.
So look that up, and then you go, “Oh my God.” And to my eye, you can apply any of these other names substitute in Paul Bennewitz or any of the current individuals who really become convinced of X, Y, or Z, when in fact there’s a strategic deception campaign going on.
Lex Fridman
There’s a lot of incentive for the CIA and other intelligence agencies to get you to look the other way on whatever is happening. Plus, from a enemy perspective, whenever two nations are at war to try to create hysteria in the other.
There’s a lot of incentive for the CIA and other intelligence agencies to get you to look the other way on whatever is happening. Plus, from a enemy perspective, whenever two nations are at war to try to create hysteria in the other.
Annie Jacobsen
But then you have the Thomas theorem, that becomes applicable there too. If men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences. So this idea of UFOs and we’re being lied to, it becomes real to many people. And then that creates a whole subset of problems to the point where things are spiraling out of control and there is no center anymore. So a lot of people that are briefed on programs maybe aren’t even aware of their position within a greater campaign, or I’m wrong, and there are aliens among us.
But then you have the Thomas theorem, that becomes applicable there too. If men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences. So this idea of UFOs and we’re being lied to, it becomes real to many people. And then that creates a whole subset of problems to the point where things are spiraling out of control and there is no center anymore. So a lot of people that are briefed on programs maybe aren’t even aware of their position within a greater campaign, or I’m wrong, and there are aliens among us.
Lex Fridman
So I appreciate the possibility of acknowledging that you might be wrong. From everything about the US government, if there was an alien spacecraft, what do you think would happen? Would they be able to hold onto those secrets for decades? Would they want to hold onto those secrets? What would they do? What’s your sense?
So I appreciate the possibility of acknowledging that you might be wrong. From everything about the US government, if there was an alien spacecraft, what do you think would happen? Would they be able to hold onto those secrets for decades? Would they want to hold onto those secrets? What would they do? What’s your sense?
Annie Jacobsen
I can’t imagine that kind of exciting situation not becoming public information. And the counter to that is this, which is, this is a very strong argument for why this is a big strategic deception campaign. Think about the Defense Department and the air… Think about how jealously they guard its airspace. I mean, you had a Chinese balloon flying over and the whole world went crazy. It was front page news. So the fact that one element, or a couple people in the defense department have made this statement, we’ve lost control of our airspace over this alleged UFO craft that they can’t explain. I don’t buy that at all. Zero.
I can’t imagine that kind of exciting situation not becoming public information. And the counter to that is this, which is, this is a very strong argument for why this is a big strategic deception campaign. Think about the Defense Department and the air… Think about how jealously they guard its airspace. I mean, you had a Chinese balloon flying over and the whole world went crazy. It was front page news. So the fact that one element, or a couple people in the defense department have made this statement, we’ve lost control of our airspace over this alleged UFO craft that they can’t explain. I don’t buy that at all. Zero.
Lex Fridman
But of course it’s possible that it is alien spacecraft if it is that. And they operate under a very different set of technological capabilities in theory.
But of course it’s possible that it is alien spacecraft if it is that. And they operate under a very different set of technological capabilities in theory.
Annie Jacobsen
In my interviews with Jacques Vallee, who is the kind of grandfather of all ufology, and he’s such an interesting person and has such a really unique origin story about how he came into all of this. And he’s such a scientist, and he is profoundly dedicated to this issue and stands completely on the opposite end of the spectrum from me, and knows a lot more and has studied this for decades more. But what he said to me is the most interesting thing, which is that it’s not a military problem, it’s an intelligence problem. Because Jacques believes that this is some kind of intelligence, which really the closest I can do to wrapping my head around that takes me to consciousness, the idea of what is consciousness. And I think that’s where it becomes very interesting. I think the government is hiding bodies and crafts is very Paul Bennewitz, read it, Google it, look into it, right?
In my interviews with Jacques Vallee, who is the kind of grandfather of all ufology, and he’s such an interesting person and has such a really unique origin story about how he came into all of this. And he’s such a scientist, and he is profoundly dedicated to this issue and stands completely on the opposite end of the spectrum from me, and knows a lot more and has studied this for decades more. But what he said to me is the most interesting thing, which is that it’s not a military problem, it’s an intelligence problem. Because Jacques believes that this is some kind of intelligence, which really the closest I can do to wrapping my head around that takes me to consciousness, the idea of what is consciousness. And I think that’s where it becomes very interesting. I think the government is hiding bodies and crafts is very Paul Bennewitz, read it, Google it, look into it, right?
Lex Fridman
I think this kind of flying saucer thing is a trivialization of what kind of, if there’s alien civilizations out there.
I think this kind of flying saucer thing is a trivialization of what kind of, if there’s alien civilizations out there.
Annie Jacobsen
Trivialization. That’s a great word. Trivialization, I agree with you.
Trivialization. That’s a great word. Trivialization, I agree with you.
Lex Fridman
I tend to believe that there’s a very large number of alien civilizations out there, and I believe we would have trouble comprehending what that even looks like were they to visit. I tend to believe they are already here or have visited, and we’re too dumb to understand what that even means. And they certainly would not appear as flying objects that defy gravity for brief moments of time on a low resolution video. I tend to have humility about all this kind of stuff, but I think radical humility is required to even open your eyes to what an alien intelligence would actually look like. And to me, it’s beyond military applications. It’s like the basic human question of what is even this thing, like you mentioned consciousness that’s going on. Where’s this come from? Why is this so powerful? Is it unique in the universe? I tend to believe not. Of course, I hang out a bunch with other folks like Elon who believe we are alone, but I think that belief, just like you said, has power because it actually manifests itself in reality.
I tend to believe that there’s a very large number of alien civilizations out there, and I believe we would have trouble comprehending what that even looks like were they to visit. I tend to believe they are already here or have visited, and we’re too dumb to understand what that even means. And they certainly would not appear as flying objects that defy gravity for brief moments of time on a low resolution video. I tend to have humility about all this kind of stuff, but I think radical humility is required to even open your eyes to what an alien intelligence would actually look like. And to me, it’s beyond military applications. It’s like the basic human question of what is even this thing, like you mentioned consciousness that’s going on. Where’s this come from? Why is this so powerful? Is it unique in the universe? I tend to believe not. Of course, I hang out a bunch with other folks like Elon who believe we are alone, but I think that belief, just like you said, has power because it actually manifests itself in reality.
Roswell incident
So if you believe that we’re alone in this universe, that’s a great motivator to build rockets and become multi-planetary and save ourselves, especially in the case of nuclear war, because otherwise, whatever this special sauce, this flame of consciousness will go out if we destroy ourselves on this earth. And for people like Elon, it’s too high of a probability that we destroy ourselves on earth not to try to become multi-planetary. In your book on Area 51, you propose an explanation that I think some people have criticized at the very end that this might’ve been a disinformation campaign from, I guess Stalin, that the Roswell incident was a remotely piloted plane with a quote, “grotesque child-sized aviator”. Just looking back at all that now, years later, what’s the probability that it’s true? What’s the probability it’s not?
Annie Jacobsen
So you know I’ve never revealed to that sources.
So you know I’ve never revealed to that sources.
Lex Fridman
Yes.
Yes.
Annie Jacobsen
Did you know that? You want me to tell you?
Did you know that? You want me to tell you?
Lex Fridman
The source?
The source?
Annie Jacobsen
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
Who is the source?
Who is the source?
Annie Jacobsen
So before I say anything on that, let me speak to the question that you asked. So you asked me what’s the probability that that is still standing as an idea, 12, 13, 14 years later. So I continued to work with that source for years afterwards. We talked about this. Look, I mean, his whole family knew it was him, and I knew his family because I was an integral part of… I was at his house, met all his kids, grandkids.
So before I say anything on that, let me speak to the question that you asked. So you asked me what’s the probability that that is still standing as an idea, 12, 13, 14 years later. So I continued to work with that source for years afterwards. We talked about this. Look, I mean, his whole family knew it was him, and I knew his family because I was an integral part of… I was at his house, met all his kids, grandkids.
Lex Fridman
We should say the source is the main expert advisor behind the story that it was… Maybe you can explain what the story is that you report in the book that it was disinformation campaign created by Stalin to cause mass hysteria in the United States. The very kind that we’ve been speaking about with the CIA and so on.
We should say the source is the main expert advisor behind the story that it was… Maybe you can explain what the story is that you report in the book that it was disinformation campaign created by Stalin to cause mass hysteria in the United States. The very kind that we’ve been speaking about with the CIA and so on.
Annie Jacobsen
Yes, predicated on the narrative of the War of the Worlds and the War of the Worlds when it was a radio program in the United States made people go crazy. “Oh my God, we’re being invaded by aliens.” Well, the government was always interested in this story, and Joseph Stalin was too. We know that from declassified documents. And so the source told me that the reason for this program and that the real Roswell crash remains were, in fact, it was a black propaganda hoax infiltrated, or rather predicated at this idea that you were going to overwhelm America’s early warning air defense system cause mayhem and maybe be able to attack the United States. That was the plan.
Yes, predicated on the narrative of the War of the Worlds and the War of the Worlds when it was a radio program in the United States made people go crazy. “Oh my God, we’re being invaded by aliens.” Well, the government was always interested in this story, and Joseph Stalin was too. We know that from declassified documents. And so the source told me that the reason for this program and that the real Roswell crash remains were, in fact, it was a black propaganda hoax infiltrated, or rather predicated at this idea that you were going to overwhelm America’s early warning air defense system cause mayhem and maybe be able to attack the United States. That was the plan.
And Stalin was also messing with the United States, messing with Truman, who sort of turned his back on him at Potsdam. And so this idea and the reason that the source is important, and unlike a lot of people, “I saw, I saw this, I saw that, I learned that,” was according to the source, once it was determined that this was a hoax and that Stalin was able to get a craft over the United States, and it crashed and it had people inside of it.
They were people that were sort of deformed and meant surgically altered to look like aliens. The United States government decided that it needed to know what on earth that was all about. And if it was possible for us to have the same program, this according to the source. And so it sounds preposterous, and if it was just someone saying, you might say, “Well, it’s ridiculous,” and get them onto another subject. But the difference was is this source who was very well-placed and friends with all of the other 75 people told me this as a confession, a real tearful confession. Because what he said is he was involved in the American program to do the same thing, and people died because there were human experiments that went on.
And I write about this in the last 12 pages of Area 51. It was an explosive revelation, and I felt very confident in writing this because the source wanted it written. Why? Because he said, “I’m dedicated to my country. I know about being committed to national security, and this kind of thing must never happen. And if you give people too much power, they would take advantage of it.” And he wanted it on the record. And his wife of 60 years did not know until after the book published, nor did his children. So after the book published, I was called to his house and sat there with his family and they said, “Tell us this isn’t true.” And he said, “It is true.” Now that source is Al O’Donnell, who is the nuclear weapons engineer who armed, wired, and fired 186 nuclear weapons. So if you want to talk about someone, you’re the first person I’ve told that on the record, but it’s kind of about time.
Lex Fridman
Wow. Well, you received a lot of criticism over this story, and it confused me why because given the context of everything you’ve described with the CIA and other intelligence agencies, it is reasonable that such as action would be taken.
Wow. Well, you received a lot of criticism over this story, and it confused me why because given the context of everything you’ve described with the CIA and other intelligence agencies, it is reasonable that such as action would be taken.
Annie Jacobsen
And the source is extraordinarily credible. If you wanted to take the position, “Well, that person isn’t very reliable.” Then you have to ask yourself, why did they have top secret clearances that are higher than any in the United States whatsoever? Because he was responsible for arming nuclear bombs. He was called the trigger man, and by the way, he told me that I could tell the world who he was. There’s a lot of details that are really dark involving that program. And when is it appropriate? Right? Well, it feels appropriate now, first of all, because you and I have been talking for several hours. So this is what is truly a long-form conversation, and it’s the outcome of a very long time of my reporting and also being judicious about closing the loop on that because I do think it’s important for people to know that sources have revelations.
And the source is extraordinarily credible. If you wanted to take the position, “Well, that person isn’t very reliable.” Then you have to ask yourself, why did they have top secret clearances that are higher than any in the United States whatsoever? Because he was responsible for arming nuclear bombs. He was called the trigger man, and by the way, he told me that I could tell the world who he was. There’s a lot of details that are really dark involving that program. And when is it appropriate? Right? Well, it feels appropriate now, first of all, because you and I have been talking for several hours. So this is what is truly a long-form conversation, and it’s the outcome of a very long time of my reporting and also being judicious about closing the loop on that because I do think it’s important for people to know that sources have revelations.
CIA assassinations
Lex Fridman
And like you said, the programs both on the Soviet side and the American side, conflicting, I think is the term we used previously, ethically, morally, on all fronts. People have done some horrible things in the name of security. In your book, Surprise, Kill, Vanish, you write about the CIA and the so-called president’s third option. So first of all, first option being diplomacy and second option being war. So when diplomacy is inadequate and war is a terrible idea, we go to the third option. And this third option is about covert action, and it’s about assassination. So how much of that does the CIA do?
And like you said, the programs both on the Soviet side and the American side, conflicting, I think is the term we used previously, ethically, morally, on all fronts. People have done some horrible things in the name of security. In your book, Surprise, Kill, Vanish, you write about the CIA and the so-called president’s third option. So first of all, first option being diplomacy and second option being war. So when diplomacy is inadequate and war is a terrible idea, we go to the third option. And this third option is about covert action, and it’s about assassination. So how much of that does the CIA do?
Annie Jacobsen
That is open to debate. We know from the historical record that the CIA was heavily involved in assassination during the Cold War. That’s non-negotiable. Even the names of the programs that were assigned to perform assassinations are fascinating and now declassified, like Eisenhower’s, for example, was the Health Alteration Committee.
That is open to debate. We know from the historical record that the CIA was heavily involved in assassination during the Cold War. That’s non-negotiable. Even the names of the programs that were assigned to perform assassinations are fascinating and now declassified, like Eisenhower’s, for example, was the Health Alteration Committee.
Lex Fridman
Well, at least they have a sense of humor to this dark topic.
Well, at least they have a sense of humor to this dark topic.
Annie Jacobsen
Then the more modern names are targeted killing, executive action, targeted killing. I mean, drone striking is essentially assassination. And people jump up and down and say, “That’s not true.” Well, I spent quite a long time interviewing the CIA’s lead council, John Rizzo. He died recently. But Rizzo was very forthcoming with me, of course, never sharing classified information, but going up to the edge of what can legally be known. Rizzo was thrown under the bus by sort of the general public for he was the fall guy for the torture campaign. The CIA calls it enhanced interrogation. And so Rizzo had this long career. He began working under the Carter administration and was responsible for the torture memos, was responsible for legally making sure the president’s ass was covered and then got thrown under the bus. And so he was very forthcoming, not in a bitter way, but in a very earnest way about a lot of how these programs are made to be legal.
Then the more modern names are targeted killing, executive action, targeted killing. I mean, drone striking is essentially assassination. And people jump up and down and say, “That’s not true.” Well, I spent quite a long time interviewing the CIA’s lead council, John Rizzo. He died recently. But Rizzo was very forthcoming with me, of course, never sharing classified information, but going up to the edge of what can legally be known. Rizzo was thrown under the bus by sort of the general public for he was the fall guy for the torture campaign. The CIA calls it enhanced interrogation. And so Rizzo had this long career. He began working under the Carter administration and was responsible for the torture memos, was responsible for legally making sure the president’s ass was covered and then got thrown under the bus. And so he was very forthcoming, not in a bitter way, but in a very earnest way about a lot of how these programs are made to be legal.
Because if the President of the United States says they’re legal, they’re legal. Executive Order 12333. It says, we don’t assassinate, but it can be overwritten by another order that’s straight out of Rizzo’s mouth. Also, really important to keep in mind is that the military operates under what’s called Title 50. It’s part of the National Security Code that gives rules and etc. How you must behave in a war theater. Well, the CIA is under no such rules. It operates under what’s called Title 50. And it’s interesting to me as reporter, because before I wrote the book and reported openly about Title 50, it was not really discussed. And now you even see operators themselves on podcasts talking about Title 50, which is kind of great because it’s like the cat’s out of the bag, guys. That’s what it’s called. And that’s how it works. It means what we say goes.
Lex Fridman
Can you elaborate on what Title 50 is? So it basically says assassination is allowed.
Can you elaborate on what Title 50 is? So it basically says assassination is allowed.
Annie Jacobsen
It says what the president wants the president gets, right? And so, I mean, the best example is the killing of Bin Laden. We were not at war with Pakistan, so Title 50 doesn’t apply. You can’t have a military operation in a country you’re not at war with. I mean, the lines, now they’ve really blurred, but even then they were a little more honored. And so what do you do? Well, Leon Panetta was the CIA director, and you work out a scenario whereby the SEALs, and by the way, there was a rotational on that killer capture mission, which was really just a kill mission. SEALs were practicing, Delta was practicing, and special activities division was practicing. They were all practicing at a secret facility in North Carolina. And it was just like they’re ready until they get the go order. And it just happened to be the seals.
It says what the president wants the president gets, right? And so, I mean, the best example is the killing of Bin Laden. We were not at war with Pakistan, so Title 50 doesn’t apply. You can’t have a military operation in a country you’re not at war with. I mean, the lines, now they’ve really blurred, but even then they were a little more honored. And so what do you do? Well, Leon Panetta was the CIA director, and you work out a scenario whereby the SEALs, and by the way, there was a rotational on that killer capture mission, which was really just a kill mission. SEALs were practicing, Delta was practicing, and special activities division was practicing. They were all practicing at a secret facility in North Carolina. And it was just like they’re ready until they get the go order. And it just happened to be the seals.
So the SEALs operate under Title 10. So they had to get what I call sheep-dip because that’s what the insiders call it. And that is a term that comes from interestingly Area 51, the U-2 pilots who were Air Force pilots, they needed to be sheep dipped over to the CIA so they could do things that defied the law. So you can see how these all entwine and you become more and more informed, and you go, “Aha.” Right? So that’s how Title 50 worked. So the night of that mission, it was a CIA mission because the CIA is allowed to go into Pakistan and kill someone, and the military can.
Lex Fridman
That’s fascinating. So people talk about the Navy SEALs doing it, but it’s really legally speaking to get the permission to do it within the whole legal framework of the United States, it was the CIA.
That’s fascinating. So people talk about the Navy SEALs doing it, but it’s really legally speaking to get the permission to do it within the whole legal framework of the United States, it was the CIA.
Annie Jacobsen
And if you look at their uniforms that they were wearing, and now that this you’ll be, “Oh.” You’ll see, there’s no nomenclature on them. They’re just meant to be completely untraceable. Were they to be shot down and captured, it’s like, “Wait, who are these guys? Oh, a bunch of rogue guys.” And this goes back the origin story of all that is in Vietnam with MACV-SOG and these cross-border operations that I chronicle in Surprise, Kill, Vanish, which still amaze me to this day. I mean, SOG missions, they called it suicide on the ground, because that’s what it was. And these guys had no identifiable. Nothing. I mean, they were essentially in pajamas. Even their weapons were specially designed by the CIA to have no serial numbers, no nothing. So if they were captured and they became POWs, I don’t know who these guys are.
And if you look at their uniforms that they were wearing, and now that this you’ll be, “Oh.” You’ll see, there’s no nomenclature on them. They’re just meant to be completely untraceable. Were they to be shot down and captured, it’s like, “Wait, who are these guys? Oh, a bunch of rogue guys.” And this goes back the origin story of all that is in Vietnam with MACV-SOG and these cross-border operations that I chronicle in Surprise, Kill, Vanish, which still amaze me to this day. I mean, SOG missions, they called it suicide on the ground, because that’s what it was. And these guys had no identifiable. Nothing. I mean, they were essentially in pajamas. Even their weapons were specially designed by the CIA to have no serial numbers, no nothing. So if they were captured and they became POWs, I don’t know who these guys are.
Lex Fridman
What do you think, and how much do they think at the highest levels of power about the ethics of assassination and about the role of that in geopolitics and military operations? To you maybe also, does assassination make sense as a good methodology of war?
What do you think, and how much do they think at the highest levels of power about the ethics of assassination and about the role of that in geopolitics and military operations? To you maybe also, does assassination make sense as a good methodology of war?
Annie Jacobsen
I mean, again, I try to remain agnostic on the policy part of it and just report the operator’s perspective, because this is what people do and this is what people are asked to do. And it depends on the individual. I mean, Billy Waugh went on a lot of those missions. I mean, the saying is like, “Oh, Billy Waugh, he killed more people than cancer.” Did Billy Waugh ever tell me about direct assassinations? No, because they’re all classified. Did he tell me about some failed ones? Yes. I’ll give you an example. It’s really interesting.
I mean, again, I try to remain agnostic on the policy part of it and just report the operator’s perspective, because this is what people do and this is what people are asked to do. And it depends on the individual. I mean, Billy Waugh went on a lot of those missions. I mean, the saying is like, “Oh, Billy Waugh, he killed more people than cancer.” Did Billy Waugh ever tell me about direct assassinations? No, because they’re all classified. Did he tell me about some failed ones? Yes. I’ll give you an example. It’s really interesting.
He would show me these PowerPoints that were just fantastic. Late in his life, he was constantly being asked to go up to Fort Bragg and lecture to the young soldiers, and everybody loved him. And he would drive all night to get there, and he would create these PowerPoints, and then he would show me the PowerPoints, all unclassified. But at one point, when Hugo Chavez was in power, Billy Waugh was kind of asked, that’s how it works, of if you had to think about doing something, what would it look like? Let’s just say hypothetically. So he took me through this PowerPoint that never happened, whereby he and a group of operators, agency operators were going to HALO jump in to the palace and grab Chavez and probably kill him because he wouldn’t allow himself to be captured. And by the way, HALO jumping, for those listeners who don’t know, high altitude, low opening.
So you jump out of an aircraft and you go down like a pencil until you’re really low to the deck, like a thousand feet. You pull your parachute cord, and that way you’re not picked up on radar and you’re also not traceable when you get to the ground because it’s so fast. Billy Waugh took the second HALO jump in history into a war theater in Laos during the Vietnam War. So he’s like this famous HALO jumper. So he and the team were going to go in grab Chavez, and he said to me a very interesting thing that was kind of a one moment in time where I saw a different side of Billy Waugh where he said, “I’m so glad we didn’t do that, even though I really wanted to at the time, because can you imagine that country’s problems, where it is now? Can you imagine how we would have been blamed?” And it was an interesting rare moment for Billy Waugh to comment on the bigger picture that you’re asking me about. I think pretty much the operators I know they just stick to the mission.
Lex Fridman
So on the technical difficulty of those missions, just your big sense, how hard is it to assassinate a target on the soil of that nation?
So on the technical difficulty of those missions, just your big sense, how hard is it to assassinate a target on the soil of that nation?
Annie Jacobsen
I suppose that just depends. Here’s another insightful thing Billy Waugh said to me, and I’m answering the question around because I don’t know, because again, I never had anyone say to me, “Here’s how it went down,” because you can’t. First of all, those are classified, so I’m never going to receive classified information. I did hear a lot about reconnaissance missions when people would be in charge of, you have to be able to what’s called make book on the target before, and making book on the target means photographing them then that gets run up the chain of command to make sure this is really Imad Mughniyeh we’re about to kill.
I suppose that just depends. Here’s another insightful thing Billy Waugh said to me, and I’m answering the question around because I don’t know, because again, I never had anyone say to me, “Here’s how it went down,” because you can’t. First of all, those are classified, so I’m never going to receive classified information. I did hear a lot about reconnaissance missions when people would be in charge of, you have to be able to what’s called make book on the target before, and making book on the target means photographing them then that gets run up the chain of command to make sure this is really Imad Mughniyeh we’re about to kill.
But I once asked Billy when I was trying to get the question and he wouldn’t answer it, and I said, so there’s another person in my book named Rick Proto, who’s also a legendary agency guy, and so he’s like 20 years younger than Billy. And I said, “Billy, if you and Rick had to kill each other, who would win?” I was trying to imagine this hypothetical, how would that work? Who would win? And I posed the question to each of them, and of course each of them said me, then I went back to them and Billy said, “Let me tell you how I would win.” And he said, ” I’d cheat. I’d show up before the duel.”
Annie Jacobsen
I’d cheat. I’d show up before the dual, and I’d kill him.
I’d cheat. I’d show up before the dual, and I’d kill him.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. I have a lot of friends who were Navy SEALs. This is just guy conversation.
Yeah. I have a lot of friends who were Navy SEALs. This is just guy conversation.
Annie Jacobsen
Well, you would be amazed at what the women do. Let me just tell you that. Women are part of the Special Activities Division, a big part of it.
Well, you would be amazed at what the women do. Let me just tell you that. Women are part of the Special Activities Division, a big part of it.
Lex Fridman
Can you comment on that?
Can you comment on that?
Annie Jacobsen
I can. Women can get a hell of a lot closer to a target. And I mean that literally.
I can. Women can get a hell of a lot closer to a target. And I mean that literally.
Lex Fridman
The special operations, is this part of the CIA?
The special operations, is this part of the CIA?
Annie Jacobsen
The Special Activities Division, now it’s called the Special Activity Center. But originally that’s the umbrella agency that has the different paramilitary organizations under it. So the most lethal one is Ground Branch. And that’s what I reported on in Surprise, Kill, Vanish. And its origins go way back to the Guerrilla warfare corps that was started in 1947 for the president.
The Special Activities Division, now it’s called the Special Activity Center. But originally that’s the umbrella agency that has the different paramilitary organizations under it. So the most lethal one is Ground Branch. And that’s what I reported on in Surprise, Kill, Vanish. And its origins go way back to the Guerrilla warfare corps that was started in 1947 for the president.
Lex Fridman
So women are also a part of the alleged assassination?
So women are also a part of the alleged assassination?
Annie Jacobsen
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
Lex Fridman
And you’re saying they can at times be more effective. I am just going to leave that pause there. The reason I ask of how difficult the assassinations are, with Bin Laden, it took a long time. So I guess the reconnaissance, the intelligence for finding the target. I imagine with Mossad, maybe this now the leadership of Hamas or the military branch of Hamas is much wanted from an assassination perspective. So to me as an outside observer, it seems like it’s more difficult than you would imagine. But perhaps that’s the intelligence aspect of it, not the actual assassination of locating the person.
And you’re saying they can at times be more effective. I am just going to leave that pause there. The reason I ask of how difficult the assassinations are, with Bin Laden, it took a long time. So I guess the reconnaissance, the intelligence for finding the target. I imagine with Mossad, maybe this now the leadership of Hamas or the military branch of Hamas is much wanted from an assassination perspective. So to me as an outside observer, it seems like it’s more difficult than you would imagine. But perhaps that’s the intelligence aspect of it, not the actual assassination of locating the person.
Annie Jacobsen
Well, I think it’s because mostly from what I understand, it’s a really dirty game and people are covering for people. And I’ll give you the example of Billy Waugh and Imad Mughniyeh, if I may. So Imad Mughniyeh was the most wanted terrorist in the world before Bin Laden. Hezbollah’s, chief of operations. And he was wanted by every, Mossad, jawn down. But no one could find him. He was missing for 20 years. There wasn’t even a photograph of him. And then he resurfaced. And of all places he resurfaced in Saudi Arabia, okay. “What?” That’s when I say it’s a dirty game. Hezbollah, Iran, Hezbollah Iran, enemies with Saudi Arabia. Why on earth was Imad Mughniyeh in Saudi Arabia? Well, that’s where he was. There was a Navy SEAL who was doing reconnaissance on him. This is according to Billy Waugh. And this is around 2005. So Billy’s in his ’80s at this point, late ’70s, ’80s.
Well, I think it’s because mostly from what I understand, it’s a really dirty game and people are covering for people. And I’ll give you the example of Billy Waugh and Imad Mughniyeh, if I may. So Imad Mughniyeh was the most wanted terrorist in the world before Bin Laden. Hezbollah’s, chief of operations. And he was wanted by every, Mossad, jawn down. But no one could find him. He was missing for 20 years. There wasn’t even a photograph of him. And then he resurfaced. And of all places he resurfaced in Saudi Arabia, okay. “What?” That’s when I say it’s a dirty game. Hezbollah, Iran, Hezbollah Iran, enemies with Saudi Arabia. Why on earth was Imad Mughniyeh in Saudi Arabia? Well, that’s where he was. There was a Navy SEAL who was doing reconnaissance on him. This is according to Billy Waugh. And this is around 2005. So Billy’s in his ’80s at this point, late ’70s, ’80s.
He gets word that the SEAL who has been tracking Mughniyeh to get photographs of him, to give the photographs to Mossad and CIA so they can do a joint operation to kill him, which they did with a car bomb in Damascus. That’s the end of the story. But how we got there was, the CIA needed confirmation. You can’t kill the wrong person. So the SEAL panicked according to Billy Waugh and was just like, “I’m out of here. This is too dangerous and I do not want to wind up in a Saudi prison.” So who do you send in, Billy Waugh? He shows up, he’s there for 24 hours. He knows where Mughniyeh lives from the SEAL. He positions himself in a cafe across the street which is run by Sudanese men. And of course Waugh speaks some Sudanese because he operated in Sudan. And he’s shooting the shit with him by his own words. He had the most foul mouth that was just absolutely delightful to listen to.
And then in between him and Mughniyeh’s house is a dumpster. And Billy Waugh being Billy Waugh, who will go to any lengths to do the job, decides to conduct reconnaissance from inside the dumpster. And that is where he is when he takes the picture of Imad Mughniyeh living so comfortably in Saudi. That Mughniyeh according to Billy, came out of his apartment building with dry cleaner plastic bag hangers over his shoulder. That’s how comfortable he lived there. It was his neighborhood. Click, click, click, Billy Waugh takes the photographs, runs them to the CIA headquarters in Saudi at the embassy. Oh my God, it’s Mughniyeh. Get the hell out of here. He gets to the airport, he leaves. Those photographs get sent to the agency, and then they do the operation with Mossad and Mughniyeh is dead. Now the truth about that being a co CIA mission was not reported for many years after the fact. Mossad took credit as the CIA often likes to just give other people credit. They just want the job done.
Lex Fridman
Well, speaking of Mossad, in your understanding of all the intelligence agencies, what are the strengths and weaknesses of the different intelligence agencies out there? CIA and Mossad, MI6, SVR and FSB and Chinese intelligence, all this stuff. Is there some interesting differences, insights that you have from all of your studying FCIA?
Well, speaking of Mossad, in your understanding of all the intelligence agencies, what are the strengths and weaknesses of the different intelligence agencies out there? CIA and Mossad, MI6, SVR and FSB and Chinese intelligence, all this stuff. Is there some interesting differences, insights that you have from all of your studying FCIA?
Annie Jacobsen
That’s a really interesting question. I don’t know. And here’s why. It’s because I’ve never interviewed any intelligence officer with those other agencies. I’ve interviewed a couple of people with Shin Bet in Israel. But until I speak to an actual source whose job it was, I don’t know. So the information that I’m getting is based on perception of others which one would think would be deeply clouded by the idea that America is the greatest. We’re better than them.
That’s a really interesting question. I don’t know. And here’s why. It’s because I’ve never interviewed any intelligence officer with those other agencies. I’ve interviewed a couple of people with Shin Bet in Israel. But until I speak to an actual source whose job it was, I don’t know. So the information that I’m getting is based on perception of others which one would think would be deeply clouded by the idea that America is the greatest. We’re better than them.
Lex Fridman
Yes. Well, actually the fascinating thing is because you’ve spoken to a lot of people about the CIA. How do you know they’re telling the truth? And this actually probably applies generally to your interviews with very secretive people. How do you get past the bullshit?
Yes. Well, actually the fascinating thing is because you’ve spoken to a lot of people about the CIA. How do you know they’re telling the truth? And this actually probably applies generally to your interviews with very secretive people. How do you get past the bullshit?
Annie Jacobsen
Well, that’s just like multiple sourcing. So you find the story out and then you go to the national archives and you find the operation and then you learn all about this, and then you interview other people who were there and you put the story together to the best of your ability and you make very specific choices with “so-and-so said,” said so-and-so. And very rarely do I report on a single source as I did in the end of Area 51. And then it says essentially, look dear reader, this is what the source told me. I have no way of corroborating it. This is legit and here it is. So that’s an area to make your reader comfortable with the information that they’re being given. And then in all of my books, whether there are three or 400 pages, there’s always 100 pages of notes at the end. So you can see all the sourcing and you can begin to get an understanding of how journalism in the national security world works.
Well, that’s just like multiple sourcing. So you find the story out and then you go to the national archives and you find the operation and then you learn all about this, and then you interview other people who were there and you put the story together to the best of your ability and you make very specific choices with “so-and-so said,” said so-and-so. And very rarely do I report on a single source as I did in the end of Area 51. And then it says essentially, look dear reader, this is what the source told me. I have no way of corroborating it. This is legit and here it is. So that’s an area to make your reader comfortable with the information that they’re being given. And then in all of my books, whether there are three or 400 pages, there’s always 100 pages of notes at the end. So you can see all the sourcing and you can begin to get an understanding of how journalism in the national security world works.
And also great opportunity for me to say, I’m often standing on the shoulders of journalists before me who did an incredible job digging into something and being able to report what they knew. Often the books are 10, 20, 30 years old, and so much more has come to light since.
Navalny
Lex Fridman
And I also would just like to say that I appreciate that you said, “Great question, I don’t know.” Not enough people say I don’t know and that’s a sign of a great journalist. But speaking about things you might not know about, let me ask you about something going on currently. So recently Alexei Navalny died in prison, perhaps was killed in prison. What’s your sense from looking at it? Do you think he died of natural causes in prison? Do you think it’s possible he was assassinated? Russia, Ukraine, Mossad, CIA, whoever has interest in this particular war.
And I also would just like to say that I appreciate that you said, “Great question, I don’t know.” Not enough people say I don’t know and that’s a sign of a great journalist. But speaking about things you might not know about, let me ask you about something going on currently. So recently Alexei Navalny died in prison, perhaps was killed in prison. What’s your sense from looking at it? Do you think he died of natural causes in prison? Do you think it’s possible he was assassinated? Russia, Ukraine, Mossad, CIA, whoever has interest in this particular war.
Annie Jacobsen
For that, I look directly to the historical record. Having written about Russian assassination campaigns and programs since the earliest days of the Cold War. And Russia has a long history of assassinating, murdering dissidents. And in Surprise, Kill, Vanish, I tell the story of an actual KGB assassin named Khokhlov who knocked on the door of the man he was assigned to kill. And by the way, this all comes from a book that Khokhlov wrote later. Because he defected to the United States. He knocks on the door and the guy answers the door. And instead of killing him, he has this moment of conscious of crisis or crisis of conscience and says, “I can’t kill you, even though that’s what I’m supposed to do.” And then sits down with the guy and together decides, okay, we’re going to defect. We’re going to let the Western intelligence agencies know what we’re doing here. And the CIA got involved.
For that, I look directly to the historical record. Having written about Russian assassination campaigns and programs since the earliest days of the Cold War. And Russia has a long history of assassinating, murdering dissidents. And in Surprise, Kill, Vanish, I tell the story of an actual KGB assassin named Khokhlov who knocked on the door of the man he was assigned to kill. And by the way, this all comes from a book that Khokhlov wrote later. Because he defected to the United States. He knocks on the door and the guy answers the door. And instead of killing him, he has this moment of conscious of crisis or crisis of conscience and says, “I can’t kill you, even though that’s what I’m supposed to do.” And then sits down with the guy and together decides, okay, we’re going to defect. We’re going to let the Western intelligence agencies know what we’re doing here. And the CIA got involved.
But Russian assassins were able to poison Khokhlov with polonium. What happens to him is insane and it’s a miracle he didn’t die, but he doesn’t. And then he defects to the West and he writes these books and he tells lots of incredible secrets about the Russian assassination programs and their poison labs and they’re really interesting. So to answer that question, I mean to my eye of course, I don’t know, but it certainly looks like Russia is acting in the same vein that it has always acted, taking care of dissidents that go against Mother Russia.
KGB
Lex Fridman
So in the style of KGB assassinations. Is there something you can comment on about the ways that KGB operates versus the CIA when we look at the history of the two organizations, the Cold War, after World War II and the leading up to today?
So in the style of KGB assassinations. Is there something you can comment on about the ways that KGB operates versus the CIA when we look at the history of the two organizations, the Cold War, after World War II and the leading up to today?
Annie Jacobsen
I mean, my feeling on that is always that there’s a thread somewhere in declassified documentation about these programs of America working to maintain assemblance of democratic ideals, however surprising that may be. In other words, always trying to, I don’t want to say fight fair because killing people isn’t fair, but versus a certain ruthlessness, a real sinister totalitarian type ruthlessness certainly from Soviet Russia. I’m far less familiar with modern day Russian assassination activities, although we certainly know on the record that they exist. Some people have done great reporting on that. But there seems to be almost a sadism about the Russian programs that I personally have not seen in the American programs.
I mean, my feeling on that is always that there’s a thread somewhere in declassified documentation about these programs of America working to maintain assemblance of democratic ideals, however surprising that may be. In other words, always trying to, I don’t want to say fight fair because killing people isn’t fair, but versus a certain ruthlessness, a real sinister totalitarian type ruthlessness certainly from Soviet Russia. I’m far less familiar with modern day Russian assassination activities, although we certainly know on the record that they exist. Some people have done great reporting on that. But there seems to be almost a sadism about the Russian programs that I personally have not seen in the American programs.
Lex Fridman
What about on the surveillance side? It seems like America’s pretty good at mass surveillance, or at least has been revealed through NSA and all this reporting and leaks and whistleblowers. Can you comment to the degree to how much surveillance is done by the US government internally and externally?
What about on the surveillance side? It seems like America’s pretty good at mass surveillance, or at least has been revealed through NSA and all this reporting and leaks and whistleblowers. Can you comment to the degree to how much surveillance is done by the US government internally and externally?
Annie Jacobsen
If you’d asked me five years ago, I would’ve a very different answer. Because first of all, they’re looking for a needle in the haystack. They’re looking for the Bin Laden and they can’t find the needle in the haystack, but they continue to create the haystack and survey the haystack. I’m I right?
If you’d asked me five years ago, I would’ve a very different answer. Because first of all, they’re looking for a needle in the haystack. They’re looking for the Bin Laden and they can’t find the needle in the haystack, but they continue to create the haystack and survey the haystack. I’m I right?
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Annie Jacobsen
Okay. But the real problem, what has happened, and I write about this in my book, First Platoon, which is about a group of young soldiers who goes to Afghanistan and unwittingly becomes part of the defense department’s efforts to capture biometrics on 85% of the population of Afghanistan. Which by the way, China then emulated in their own biometric surveillance program. And I think this is a terrible idea. But what has happened, these biometric systems that have been created and biometrics are of course fingerprints, facial images, DNA and iris scans that allow you to tag, track and locate people.
Okay. But the real problem, what has happened, and I write about this in my book, First Platoon, which is about a group of young soldiers who goes to Afghanistan and unwittingly becomes part of the defense department’s efforts to capture biometrics on 85% of the population of Afghanistan. Which by the way, China then emulated in their own biometric surveillance program. And I think this is a terrible idea. But what has happened, these biometric systems that have been created and biometrics are of course fingerprints, facial images, DNA and iris scans that allow you to tag, track and locate people.
And what has happened in the five years since this question was first on everybody’s minds about NSA surveillance is that the civilian sector companies have essentially done all the defense department’s biometric surveillance job for them by all of us sharing our facially recognizable images on Instagram and Facebook and everywhere else, X, by sharing information, by writing up narratives about ourselves. This information has become part of the database. Five years ago when I was reporting First Platoon, I was interviewing the police chief of El Segundo, which is like on the outskirts of LA. It’s right near the airport. And why it’s important is because it’s like defense contractor haven. So they have massive surveillance. And Chief Whalen, when I posed this question to him, he said to me, “Annie, let me show you something.” And he had Clearwater AI, the recognition software on his phone. And this was still when it was like quasi not supposed to, you have that for law enforcement. And he said, “I want you to go down the block and I want you to just turn the corner and come back toward me.” Which I did. And he just didn’t even hold up his phone. He just looked at his hand and his phone was on me. And he went back down and it was like the tiniest movement. And when I came back to him, he went like this and he showed me, there I was. Everything about me. Facts and figures and all images. And he knew who I was before I even got to him. So is that a good thing or a bad thing? I mean, we could have another three hour conversation about that alone.
Lex Fridman
So you’re saying more and more, you don’t need NSA where we’re giving over the data ourselves publicly or semi publicly.
So you’re saying more and more, you don’t need NSA where we’re giving over the data ourselves publicly or semi publicly.
Annie Jacobsen
Yeah. During the war on terror, people were just incensed to learn that there is a drone that’s flying at something like 20,000 feet. It’s called ARGUS-IS. And it can capture the… It’s not a license plate. It’s like it can basically capture what’s written on a golf ball from 17,000 feet, 20,000 feet up. And people went crazy over this like, “Oh my god, it’s Big Brother.” Well, one of the lead engineers on that, Pat Billkin is someone I talk to regularly because we talk about surveillance a lot because he thinks about it a lot because he has kids now. And he has given so much thoughtful, really thinks about this issue because he believes, just like you stated, that what we are turning over about ourselves actually exceeds anything that ARGUS-IS could do from above because we’re doing it willfully.
Yeah. During the war on terror, people were just incensed to learn that there is a drone that’s flying at something like 20,000 feet. It’s called ARGUS-IS. And it can capture the… It’s not a license plate. It’s like it can basically capture what’s written on a golf ball from 17,000 feet, 20,000 feet up. And people went crazy over this like, “Oh my god, it’s Big Brother.” Well, one of the lead engineers on that, Pat Billkin is someone I talk to regularly because we talk about surveillance a lot because he thinks about it a lot because he has kids now. And he has given so much thoughtful, really thinks about this issue because he believes, just like you stated, that what we are turning over about ourselves actually exceeds anything that ARGUS-IS could do from above because we’re doing it willfully.
So what it’s doing is it’s creating an ability for, if someone wants to know about you, if someone, let’s say in government, wants to know about Lex Fridman, they can find out everything about you. And then that gets used for tagging, tracking and ultimately. In the war theater it was called find, fix, finish. Well, what do you think the finish is in that statement?
Lex Fridman
It’s not pleasant.
It’s not pleasant.
Annie Jacobsen
It’s called a drone strike. Find, find him with the biometric, fix him, meaning fix his position. We know he’s moving in a car. That’s him. Finish him. Call it in, drone strike. Boom.
It’s called a drone strike. Find, find him with the biometric, fix him, meaning fix his position. We know he’s moving in a car. That’s him. Finish him. Call it in, drone strike. Boom.
Hitler and the atomic bomb
Lex Fridman
If we could return to nuclear war, you’ve briefly mentioned that a lot of things go back to the Third Reich and Hitler. If we go back to World War II, we look at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the dropping of the two bombs. I would love to get your opinion on whether we should or shouldn’t have done that. And also to get your opinion on what would’ve happened if Hitler and Germany built the bomb first. Do you think it was possible he could have built the bomb first?
If we could return to nuclear war, you’ve briefly mentioned that a lot of things go back to the Third Reich and Hitler. If we go back to World War II, we look at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the dropping of the two bombs. I would love to get your opinion on whether we should or shouldn’t have done that. And also to get your opinion on what would’ve happened if Hitler and Germany built the bomb first. Do you think it was possible he could have built the bomb first?
Annie Jacobsen
In my researching Third Reich weapons for Operation Paperclip, because of course we got a lot of those scientists, after.
In my researching Third Reich weapons for Operation Paperclip, because of course we got a lot of those scientists, after.
Lex Fridman
Which is another great book in a terrifyingly complicated operation.
Which is another great book in a terrifyingly complicated operation.
Annie Jacobsen
Yes. At what point do the ends justify the means? But in looking at those programs, and we acquired Hitler’s favorite weapons designers. And I’m talking about weapons of mass destruction like chemical weapons and biological weapons. But of course, America was ahead in the nuclear program. And an interesting detail reading Albert Speer’s memoirs. Was Speer referring to a conversation he had with Hitler where Hitler said, “No, I don’t want to do that. That’s Jewish science.” So because of Hitler’s own racial ethnic prejudices, they didn’t develop the bomb. As far as should we have dropped the bombs on Hiroshima, I’ve interviewed all kinds of people with different opinions, most of them that had ended the war. The best interview and most meaningful perhaps that I ever did was with Alfred O’Donnell, who was a participant in the Battle of Okinawa, which was like this insane. Just to read stories about Okinawa, it makes your hair stand on end.
Yes. At what point do the ends justify the means? But in looking at those programs, and we acquired Hitler’s favorite weapons designers. And I’m talking about weapons of mass destruction like chemical weapons and biological weapons. But of course, America was ahead in the nuclear program. And an interesting detail reading Albert Speer’s memoirs. Was Speer referring to a conversation he had with Hitler where Hitler said, “No, I don’t want to do that. That’s Jewish science.” So because of Hitler’s own racial ethnic prejudices, they didn’t develop the bomb. As far as should we have dropped the bombs on Hiroshima, I’ve interviewed all kinds of people with different opinions, most of them that had ended the war. The best interview and most meaningful perhaps that I ever did was with Alfred O’Donnell, who was a participant in the Battle of Okinawa, which was like this insane. Just to read stories about Okinawa, it makes your hair stand on end.
And O’Donnell like so many others, was slated to invade mainland Japan, to his almost certain death. So somebody like that, it makes sense right from the get go why he would be pro nuclear weapons. It saved his own personal life and it saved everyone that he knew that he was fighting with. And it ended the war.
Lex Fridman
Do you think it sent a signal? Like without that we wouldn’t have known perhaps about the power of the weapons. So in the long arc of that history, 70 years plus, it is the reason why deterrence has worked so far.
Do you think it sent a signal? Like without that we wouldn’t have known perhaps about the power of the weapons. So in the long arc of that history, 70 years plus, it is the reason why deterrence has worked so far.
Annie Jacobsen
Yes. That’s an interesting thought. My thought goes to this idea of more. That everybody always wants more. It’s a very dangerous… It’s like more power, literally, just more power. And what is more confounding to me beyond the fact that we dropped two atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the war ended is that this decision was then made to develop the thermonuclear bomb. A force that is such… The degree of magnitude of that power is mind-boggling. I mean even projects within the Manhattan Project defined thermonuclear weapon, the thermonuclear weapon as the evil thing. It was evil. It’s a weapon of genocide. Atomic weapons destroy cities, thermonuclear weapons destroy civilizations.
Yes. That’s an interesting thought. My thought goes to this idea of more. That everybody always wants more. It’s a very dangerous… It’s like more power, literally, just more power. And what is more confounding to me beyond the fact that we dropped two atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the war ended is that this decision was then made to develop the thermonuclear bomb. A force that is such… The degree of magnitude of that power is mind-boggling. I mean even projects within the Manhattan Project defined thermonuclear weapon, the thermonuclear weapon as the evil thing. It was evil. It’s a weapon of genocide. Atomic weapons destroy cities, thermonuclear weapons destroy civilizations.
War and human nature
Lex Fridman
You open the book with a Churchill quote, ” The story of the human race is war. Except for brief and precarious interludes there has never been peace in the world. And before history began, murders strife was universal and unending.” Do you think there will always be war? Do you think that there is some deep human way in which we’re tending to this global war eternally?
You open the book with a Churchill quote, ” The story of the human race is war. Except for brief and precarious interludes there has never been peace in the world. And before history began, murders strife was universal and unending.” Do you think there will always be war? Do you think that there is some deep human way in which we’re tending to this global war eternally?
Annie Jacobsen
Well, the optimistic answer of that would be that we could evolve beyond that. Because certainly if we look at our ancestors, they had not developed their consciousness as far as we have to be able to build the tools that we have. So the hopeful answer is we will evolve beyond this brute force, kill the other guy attitude. Certainly these are questions that will become more obvious over time. I just want to play my little part in this world that I live in as the storyteller who brings information to people so that they can have these questions with themselves, with their friends, with their families. And I think in asking that very question, what you’re really saying is, why don’t we evolve beyond war fighting?
Well, the optimistic answer of that would be that we could evolve beyond that. Because certainly if we look at our ancestors, they had not developed their consciousness as far as we have to be able to build the tools that we have. So the hopeful answer is we will evolve beyond this brute force, kill the other guy attitude. Certainly these are questions that will become more obvious over time. I just want to play my little part in this world that I live in as the storyteller who brings information to people so that they can have these questions with themselves, with their friends, with their families. And I think in asking that very question, what you’re really saying is, why don’t we evolve beyond war fighting?
Lex Fridman
It is very possible. And your book is such a stark and powerful reminder that human civilization, as we know it ends in this century. It’s a good motivator to get our shit together.
It is very possible. And your book is such a stark and powerful reminder that human civilization, as we know it ends in this century. It’s a good motivator to get our shit together.
Annie Jacobsen
But aren’t you really saying human civilization could end, not it ends?
But aren’t you really saying human civilization could end, not it ends?
Lex Fridman
Could end.
Could end.
Annie Jacobsen
Could end.
Could end.
Lex Fridman
But the power of our weapons is growing rapidly.
But the power of our weapons is growing rapidly.
Annie Jacobsen
As they say, it’s time to come back from the brink. And it’s time to have that discussion while we’re still talking.
As they say, it’s time to come back from the brink. And it’s time to have that discussion while we’re still talking.
Lex Fridman
And there’s another complexity sneaking up into the picture in the form of artificial intelligence and in cyber war, but also in hot war, the use of autonomous weapons. All of it starts becoming super complicated as we delegate some of these decisions about war, including nuclear war to more and more autonomy and artificial intelligence systems, is going to be a very interesting century. Do you just zoom out a little bit, hope that we become a multi-planetary species?
And there’s another complexity sneaking up into the picture in the form of artificial intelligence and in cyber war, but also in hot war, the use of autonomous weapons. All of it starts becoming super complicated as we delegate some of these decisions about war, including nuclear war to more and more autonomy and artificial intelligence systems, is going to be a very interesting century. Do you just zoom out a little bit, hope that we become a multi-planetary species?
Annie Jacobsen
I’m all for adventure.
I’m all for adventure.
Lex Fridman
And I too while am for adventure, I’m all for backups in all forms. So I hope that human start a civilization on Mars and beyond out in space. And if you zoom on across all of it, what gives you hope about human civilization, about this whole thing we have going on here?
And I too while am for adventure, I’m all for backups in all forms. So I hope that human start a civilization on Mars and beyond out in space. And if you zoom on across all of it, what gives you hope about human civilization, about this whole thing we have going on here?
Hope
Annie Jacobsen
I mean, I am a fundamentally optimistic person. I must have come out of the shoot that way. Because I just am. Even though I write about really grim things, I get inspired by them because I do always believe in evolution. I also have the greatest family ever. Two kids, Jet and Finley, shout out to them. They’re Lex Fridman fans.
I mean, I am a fundamentally optimistic person. I must have come out of the shoot that way. Because I just am. Even though I write about really grim things, I get inspired by them because I do always believe in evolution. I also have the greatest family ever. Two kids, Jet and Finley, shout out to them. They’re Lex Fridman fans.
Lex Fridman
Oh yeah, oh you guys.
Oh yeah, oh you guys.
Annie Jacobsen
And my husband. So what inspires me is this idea of legacy. I think that you always want to have your eye on being a good example to the best that you can and passing on what you know and believing in the next generation. And again, that’s a sentiment echoed by all these cold warriors I’ve been talking to because they also share that idea that, wow, look at what we have done as a civilization and look where we’re going. Whether it’s exoplanetary travel or AI. It’s just that the human factor of the desire to fight, the desire to have conflict, needs to be reconfigured, because with all these new technologies that we have, the peril is growing at an accelerating pace, perhaps faster than the average human can keep up with.
And my husband. So what inspires me is this idea of legacy. I think that you always want to have your eye on being a good example to the best that you can and passing on what you know and believing in the next generation. And again, that’s a sentiment echoed by all these cold warriors I’ve been talking to because they also share that idea that, wow, look at what we have done as a civilization and look where we’re going. Whether it’s exoplanetary travel or AI. It’s just that the human factor of the desire to fight, the desire to have conflict, needs to be reconfigured, because with all these new technologies that we have, the peril is growing at an accelerating pace, perhaps faster than the average human can keep up with.
Lex Fridman
Well Annie, thank you for being a wonderful example of a great journalist, a great writer, a great human being. And I’m a big fan of yours. It’s a huge honor to meet you, to talk with today. So thank you so much for talking today.
Well Annie, thank you for being a wonderful example of a great journalist, a great writer, a great human being. And I’m a big fan of yours. It’s a huge honor to meet you, to talk with today. So thank you so much for talking today.
Annie Jacobsen
Thank you for having me.
Thank you for having me.
Lex Fridman
Thank you for listening to this conversation with Annie Jacobsen. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now let me leave you some words from John F. Kennedy. “The very word secrecy is repugnant in a free and open society. And we are as a people inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, the secret oaths, and the secret proceedings.” Thank you for listening and hope to see you next time.
Thank you for listening to this conversation with Annie Jacobsen. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now let me leave you some words from John F. Kennedy. “The very word secrecy is repugnant in a free and open society. And we are as a people inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, the secret oaths, and the secret proceedings.” Thank you for listening and hope to see you next time.
Transcript for Sam Altman: OpenAI, GPT-5, Sora, Board Saga, Elon Musk, Ilya, Power & AGI | Lex Fridman Podcast #419
This is a transcript of Lex Fridman Podcast #419 with Sam Altman 2.
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Table of Contents
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The following is a conversation with Sam Altman, his second time on the podcast. He is the CEO of OpenAI, the company behind GPT-4, ChaTGPT, Sora, and perhaps one day the very company that will build AGI. This is The Lex Fridman Podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here’s Sam Altman.
Take me through the OpenAI board saga that started on Thursday, November 16th, maybe Friday, November 17th for you.
So those were decided honestly without… You do that on the battlefield. You don’t have time to design a rigorous process then. For new board members since, and new board members we’ll add going forward, we have some criteria that we think are important for the board to have, different expertise that we want the board to have. Unlike hiring an executive where you need them to do one role well, the board needs to do a whole role of governance and thoughtfulness well, and so, one thing that Brett says which I really like is that we want to hire board members in slates, not as individuals one at a time. And thinking about a group of people that will bring nonprofit expertise, expertise at running companies, good legal and governance expertise, that’s what we’ve tried to optimize for.
And I was like, well, my current job at OpenAI is, or it was, to run a decently sized company at this point. And the thing I’d always liked the most was just getting to work with the researchers. And I was like, yeah, I can just go do a very focused AGI research effort. And I got excited about that. Didn’t even occur to me at the time possibly that this was all going to get undone. This was Friday afternoon.
We kept being told, all right, we’re almost done. We’re almost done. We just need a little bit more time. And it was this very confusing state. And then Sunday evening when, again, every few hours I expected that we were going to be done and we’re going to figure out a way for me to return and things to go back to how they were. The board then appointed a new interim CEO, and then I was like, that feels really bad. That was the low point of the whole thing. I’ll tell you something. It felt very painful, but I felt a lot of love that whole weekend. Other than that one moment Sunday night, I would not characterize my emotions as anger or hate, but I felt a lot of love from people, towards people. It was painful, but the dominant emotion of the weekend was love, not hate.
And then it became clear that we were going to need to do different things and also have huge amounts more capital. So we said, “Okay, well, the structure doesn’t quite work for that. How do we patch the structure?” And then you patch it again and patch it again and you end up with something that does look eyebrow-raising, to say the least. But we got here gradually with, I think, reasonable decisions at each point along the way. And it doesn’t mean I wouldn’t do it totally differently if we could go back now with an Oracle, but you don’t get the Oracle at the time. But anyway, in terms of what Elon’s real motivations here are, I don’t know.
So speaking of cool shit, Sora. There’s like a million questions I could ask. First of all, it’s amazing. It truly is amazing on a product level but also just on a philosophical level. So let me just technical/philosophical ask, what do you think it understands about the world more or less than GPT-4 for example? The world model when you train on these patches versus language tokens.
I remember when I started first watching Sora videos and I would see a person walk in front of something for a few seconds and occlude it and then walk away and the same thing was still there. I was like, “Oh, this is pretty good.” Or there’s examples where the underlying physics looks so well represented over a lot of steps in a sequence, it’s like, “|Oh, this is quite impressive.” But fundamentally, these models are just getting better and that will keep happening. If you look at the trajectory from DALL·E 1 to 2 to 3 to Sora, there are a lot of people that were dunked on each version saying it can’t do this, it can’t do that and look at it now.
Listen, I hate being in front of the camera. If I can figure out a way to not be in front of the camera, I would love it. Unfortunately, it’ll take a while. That generating faces, it is getting there, but generating faces in video format is tricky when it’s specific people versus generic people.
Let me ask you about GPT-4. There’s so many questions. First of all, also amazing. Looking back, it’ll probably be this kind of historic pivotal moment with 3, 5 and 4 which ChatGPT.
One of the other things that you can see a very small glimpse of is when I can help on longer horizon tasks, break down something in multiple steps, maybe execute some of those steps, search the internet, write code, whatever, put that together. When that works, which is not very often, it’s very magical.
You mentioned this collaboration. I’m not sure where the magic is, if it’s in here or if it’s in there or if it’s somewhere in between. I’m not sure. But one of the things that concerns me for knowledge task when I start with GPT is I’ll usually have to do fact checking after, like check that it didn’t come up with fake stuff. How do you figure that out that GPT can come up with fake stuff that sounds really convincing? So how do you ground it in truth?
I think that’s really good. But the fact that people like you and others say you still feel like there are these leaps makes me think that maybe we should be doing our releasing even more iteratively. And I don’t know what that would mean, I don’t have an answer ready to go, but our goal is not to have shock updates to the world. The opposite.
But compute is different. Intelligence is going to be more like energy or something like that, where the only thing that I think makes sense to talk about is, at price X, the world will use this much compute, and at price Y, the world will use this much compute. Because if it’s really cheap, I’ll have it reading my email all day, giving me suggestions about what I maybe should think about or work on, and trying to cure cancer, and if it’s really expensive, maybe I’ll only use it, or we’ll only use it, to try to cure cancer.
So I think the world is going to want a tremendous amount of compute. And there’s a lot of parts of that that are hard. Energy is the hardest part, building data centers is also hard, the supply chain is hard, and then of course, fabricating enough chips is hard. But this seems to be where things are going. We’re going to want an amount of compute that’s just hard to reason about right now.
But I don’t think it’s that interesting to say, “How do we go do a better job of giving you 10 ranked webpages to look at than what Google does?” Maybe it’s really interesting to go say, “How do we help you get the answer or the information you need? How do we help create that in some cases, synthesize that in others, or point you to it in yet others?” But a lot of people have tried to just make a better search engine than Google and it is a hard technical problem, it is a hard branding problem, it is a hard ecosystem problem. I don’t think the world needs another copy of Google.
And I don’t know, we have a very simple business model and I like it, and I know that I’m not the product. I know I’m paying and that’s how the business model works. And when I go use Twitter or Facebook or Google or any other great product but ad-supported great product, I don’t love that, and I think it gets worse, not better, in a world with AI.
Let me ask you about safety, but also bias, and safety in the short term, safety in the long term. The Gemini 1.5 came out recently, there’s a lot of drama around it, speaking of theatrical things, and it generated Black Nazis and Black Founding Fathers. I think fair to say it was a bit on the ultra-woke side. So that’s a concern for people, if there is a human layer within companies that modifies the safety or the harm caused by a model, that it would introduce a lot of bias that fits sort of an ideological lean within a company. How do you deal with that?
Now again, I feel like I can completely defend the specifics here, and I think most people would agree with that, but it does make it harder for me to look you in the eye and say, “Hey, the board can just fire me.” I continue to not want super-voting control over OpenAI. I never have. Never have had it, never wanted it. Even after all this craziness, I still don’t want it. I continue to think that no company should be making these decisions, and that we really need governments to put rules of the road in place.
And I realize that that means people like Marc Andreessen or whatever will claim I’m going for regulatory capture, and I’m just willing to be misunderstood there. It’s not true. And I think in the fullness of time, it’ll get proven out why this is important. But I think I have made plenty of bad decisions for OpenAI along the way, and a lot of good ones, and I’m proud of the track record overall. But I don’t think any one person should, and I don’t think any one person will. I think it’s just too big of a thing now, and it’s happening throughout society in a good and healthy way. But I don’t think any one person should be in control of an AGI, or this whole movement towards AGI. And I don’t think that’s what’s happening.
And then I used to, I think, even capitalize my tweets because I was trying to sound professional or something. I haven’t capitalized my private DMs or whatever in a long time. And then slowly, stuff like shorter-form, less formal stuff has slowly drifted to closer and closer to how I would text my friends. If I pull up a Word document and I’m writing a strategy memo for the company or something, I always capitalize that. If I’m writing a long, more formal message, I always use capitalization there, too. So I still remember how to do it. But even that may fade out. I don’t know. But I never spend time thinking about this, so I don’t have a ready-made-
And you can come up with lots of other examples, but I think this idea that the lowly square root operator can offer such a profound insight and a new realm of knowledge applies in a lot of ways. And I think there are a lot of those operators for why people may think that any version that they like of the simulation hypothesis is maybe more likely than they thought before. But for me, the fact that Sora worked is not in the top five.
Click link to jump approximately to that part in the transcript:
- 0:00 – Introduction
- 1:05 – OpenAI board saga
- 18:31 – Ilya Sutskever
- 24:40 – Elon Musk lawsuit
- 34:32 – Sora
- 44:23 – GPT-4
- 55:32 – Memory & privacy
- 1:02:36 – Q*
- 1:06:12 – GPT-5
- 1:09:27 – $7 trillion of compute
- 1:17:35 – Google and Gemini
- 1:28:40 – Leap to GPT-5
- 1:32:24 – AGI
- 1:50:57 – Aliens
Introduction
Sam Altman
I think compute is going to be the currency of the future. I think it’ll be maybe the most precious commodity in the world. I expect that by the end of this decade, and possibly somewhat sooner than that, we will have quite capable systems that we look at and say, “Wow, that’s really remarkable.” The road to AGI should be a giant power struggle. I expect that to be the case.
I think compute is going to be the currency of the future. I think it’ll be maybe the most precious commodity in the world. I expect that by the end of this decade, and possibly somewhat sooner than that, we will have quite capable systems that we look at and say, “Wow, that’s really remarkable.” The road to AGI should be a giant power struggle. I expect that to be the case.
Lex Fridman
Whoever builds AGI first gets a lot of power. Do you trust yourself with that much power?
Whoever builds AGI first gets a lot of power. Do you trust yourself with that much power?
The following is a conversation with Sam Altman, his second time on the podcast. He is the CEO of OpenAI, the company behind GPT-4, ChaTGPT, Sora, and perhaps one day the very company that will build AGI. This is The Lex Fridman Podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here’s Sam Altman.
OpenAI board saga
Take me through the OpenAI board saga that started on Thursday, November 16th, maybe Friday, November 17th for you.
Sam Altman
That was definitely the most painful professional experience of my life, and chaotic and shameful and upsetting and a bunch of other negative things. There were great things about it too, and I wish it had not been in such an adrenaline rush that I wasn’t able to stop and appreciate them at the time. But I came across this old tweet of mine or this tweet of mine from that time period. It was like going your own eulogy, watching people say all these great things about you, and just unbelievable support from people I love and care about. That was really nice, really nice. That whole weekend, with one big exception, I felt like a great deal of love and very little hate, even though it felt like I have no idea what’s happening and what’s going to happen here and this feels really bad. And there were definitely times I thought it was going to be one of the worst things to ever happen for AI safety. Well, I also think I’m happy that it happened relatively early. I thought at some point between when OpenAI started and when we created AGI, there was going to be something crazy and explosive that happened, but there may be more crazy and explosive things still to happen. It still, I think, helped us build up some resilience and be ready for more challenges in the future.
That was definitely the most painful professional experience of my life, and chaotic and shameful and upsetting and a bunch of other negative things. There were great things about it too, and I wish it had not been in such an adrenaline rush that I wasn’t able to stop and appreciate them at the time. But I came across this old tweet of mine or this tweet of mine from that time period. It was like going your own eulogy, watching people say all these great things about you, and just unbelievable support from people I love and care about. That was really nice, really nice. That whole weekend, with one big exception, I felt like a great deal of love and very little hate, even though it felt like I have no idea what’s happening and what’s going to happen here and this feels really bad. And there were definitely times I thought it was going to be one of the worst things to ever happen for AI safety. Well, I also think I’m happy that it happened relatively early. I thought at some point between when OpenAI started and when we created AGI, there was going to be something crazy and explosive that happened, but there may be more crazy and explosive things still to happen. It still, I think, helped us build up some resilience and be ready for more challenges in the future.
Lex Fridman
But the thing you had a sense that you would experience is some kind of power struggle?
But the thing you had a sense that you would experience is some kind of power struggle?
Sam Altman
The road to AGI should be a giant power struggle. The world should… Well, not should. I expect that to be the case.
The road to AGI should be a giant power struggle. The world should… Well, not should. I expect that to be the case.
Lex Fridman
And so you have to go through that, like you said, iterate as often as possible in figuring out how to have a board structure, how to have organization, how to have the kind of people that you’re working with, how to communicate all that in order to deescalate the power struggle as much as possible.
And so you have to go through that, like you said, iterate as often as possible in figuring out how to have a board structure, how to have organization, how to have the kind of people that you’re working with, how to communicate all that in order to deescalate the power struggle as much as possible.
Sam Altman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
Pacify it.
Pacify it.
Sam Altman
But at this point, it feels like something that was in the past that was really unpleasant and really difficult and painful, but we’re back to work and things are so busy and so intense that I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about it. There was a time after, there was this fugue state for the month after, maybe 45 days after, that I was just drifting through the days. I was so out of it. I was feeling so down.
But at this point, it feels like something that was in the past that was really unpleasant and really difficult and painful, but we’re back to work and things are so busy and so intense that I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about it. There was a time after, there was this fugue state for the month after, maybe 45 days after, that I was just drifting through the days. I was so out of it. I was feeling so down.
Lex Fridman
Just on a personal, psychological level?
Just on a personal, psychological level?
Sam Altman
Yeah. Really painful, and hard to have to keep running OpenAI in the middle of that. I just wanted to crawl into a cave and recover for a while. But now it’s like we’re just back to working on the mission.
Yeah. Really painful, and hard to have to keep running OpenAI in the middle of that. I just wanted to crawl into a cave and recover for a while. But now it’s like we’re just back to working on the mission.
Lex Fridman
Well, it’s still useful to go back there and reflect on board structures, on power dynamics, on how companies are run, the tension between research and product development and money and all this kind of stuff so that you, who have a very high potential of building AGI, would do so in a slightly more organized, less dramatic way in the future. So there’s value there to go, both the personal psychological aspects of you as a leader, and also just the board structure and all this messy stuff.
Well, it’s still useful to go back there and reflect on board structures, on power dynamics, on how companies are run, the tension between research and product development and money and all this kind of stuff so that you, who have a very high potential of building AGI, would do so in a slightly more organized, less dramatic way in the future. So there’s value there to go, both the personal psychological aspects of you as a leader, and also just the board structure and all this messy stuff.
Sam Altman
I definitely learned a lot about structure and incentives and what we need out of a board. And I think that it is valuable that this happened now in some sense. I think this is probably not the last high-stress moment of OpenAI, but it was quite a high-stress moment. My company very nearly got destroyed. And we think a lot about many of the other things we’ve got to get right for AGI, but thinking about how to build a resilient org and how to build a structure that will stand up to a lot of pressure in the world, which I expect more and more as we get closer, I think that’s super important.
I definitely learned a lot about structure and incentives and what we need out of a board. And I think that it is valuable that this happened now in some sense. I think this is probably not the last high-stress moment of OpenAI, but it was quite a high-stress moment. My company very nearly got destroyed. And we think a lot about many of the other things we’ve got to get right for AGI, but thinking about how to build a resilient org and how to build a structure that will stand up to a lot of pressure in the world, which I expect more and more as we get closer, I think that’s super important.
Lex Fridman
Do you have a sense of how deep and rigorous the deliberation process by the board was? Can you shine some light on just human dynamics involved in situations like this? Was it just a few conversations and all of a sudden it escalates and why don’t we fire Sam kind of thing?
Do you have a sense of how deep and rigorous the deliberation process by the board was? Can you shine some light on just human dynamics involved in situations like this? Was it just a few conversations and all of a sudden it escalates and why don’t we fire Sam kind of thing?
Sam Altman
I think the board members are well-meaning people on the whole, and I believe that in stressful situations where people feel time pressure or whatever, people understand and make suboptimal decisions. And I think one of the challenges for OpenAI will be we’re going to have to have a board and a team that are good at operating under pressure.
I think the board members are well-meaning people on the whole, and I believe that in stressful situations where people feel time pressure or whatever, people understand and make suboptimal decisions. And I think one of the challenges for OpenAI will be we’re going to have to have a board and a team that are good at operating under pressure.
Lex Fridman
Do you think the board had too much power?
Do you think the board had too much power?
Sam Altman
I think boards are supposed to have a lot of power, but one of the things that we did see is in most corporate structures, boards are usually answerable to shareholders. Sometimes people have super voting shares or whatever. In this case, and I think one of the things with our structure that we maybe should have thought about more than we did is that the board of a nonprofit has, unless you put other rules in place, quite a lot of power. They don’t really answer to anyone but themselves. And there’s ways in which that’s good, but what we’d really like is for the board of OpenAI to answer to the world as a whole, as much as that’s a practical thing.
I think boards are supposed to have a lot of power, but one of the things that we did see is in most corporate structures, boards are usually answerable to shareholders. Sometimes people have super voting shares or whatever. In this case, and I think one of the things with our structure that we maybe should have thought about more than we did is that the board of a nonprofit has, unless you put other rules in place, quite a lot of power. They don’t really answer to anyone but themselves. And there’s ways in which that’s good, but what we’d really like is for the board of OpenAI to answer to the world as a whole, as much as that’s a practical thing.
Lex Fridman
So there’s a new board announced.
So there’s a new board announced.
Sam Altman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
There’s I guess a new smaller board at first, and now there’s a new final board?
There’s I guess a new smaller board at first, and now there’s a new final board?
Sam Altman
Not a final board yet. We’ve added some. We’ll add more.
Not a final board yet. We’ve added some. We’ll add more.
Lex Fridman
Added some. Okay. What is fixed in the new one that was perhaps broken in the previous one?
Added some. Okay. What is fixed in the new one that was perhaps broken in the previous one?
Sam Altman
The old board got smaller over the course of about a year. It was nine and then it went down to six, and then we couldn’t agree on who to add. And the board also I think didn’t have a lot of experienced board members, and a lot of the new board members at OpenAI have just have more experience as board members. I think that’ll help.
The old board got smaller over the course of about a year. It was nine and then it went down to six, and then we couldn’t agree on who to add. And the board also I think didn’t have a lot of experienced board members, and a lot of the new board members at OpenAI have just have more experience as board members. I think that’ll help.
Lex Fridman
It’s been criticized, some of the people that are added to the board. I heard a lot of people criticizing the addition of Larry Summers, for example. What’s the process of selecting the board? What’s involved in that?
It’s been criticized, some of the people that are added to the board. I heard a lot of people criticizing the addition of Larry Summers, for example. What’s the process of selecting the board? What’s involved in that?
Sam Altman
So Brett and Larry were decided in the heat of the moment over this very tense weekend, and that weekend was a real rollercoaster. It was a lot of ups and downs. And we were trying to agree on new board members that both the executive team here and the old board members felt would be reasonable. Larry was actually one of their suggestions, the old board members. Brett, I think I had even previous to that weekend suggested, but he was busy and didn’t want to do it, and then we really needed help in [inaudible 00:09:22]. We talked about a lot of other people too, but I felt like if I was going to come back, I needed new board members. I didn’t think I could work with the old board again in the same configuration, although we then decided, and I’m grateful that Adam would stay, but we considered various configurations, decided we wanted to get to a board of three and had to find two new board members over the course of a short period of time.
So Brett and Larry were decided in the heat of the moment over this very tense weekend, and that weekend was a real rollercoaster. It was a lot of ups and downs. And we were trying to agree on new board members that both the executive team here and the old board members felt would be reasonable. Larry was actually one of their suggestions, the old board members. Brett, I think I had even previous to that weekend suggested, but he was busy and didn’t want to do it, and then we really needed help in [inaudible 00:09:22]. We talked about a lot of other people too, but I felt like if I was going to come back, I needed new board members. I didn’t think I could work with the old board again in the same configuration, although we then decided, and I’m grateful that Adam would stay, but we considered various configurations, decided we wanted to get to a board of three and had to find two new board members over the course of a short period of time.
So those were decided honestly without… You do that on the battlefield. You don’t have time to design a rigorous process then. For new board members since, and new board members we’ll add going forward, we have some criteria that we think are important for the board to have, different expertise that we want the board to have. Unlike hiring an executive where you need them to do one role well, the board needs to do a whole role of governance and thoughtfulness well, and so, one thing that Brett says which I really like is that we want to hire board members in slates, not as individuals one at a time. And thinking about a group of people that will bring nonprofit expertise, expertise at running companies, good legal and governance expertise, that’s what we’ve tried to optimize for.
Lex Fridman
So is technical savvy important for the individual board members?
So is technical savvy important for the individual board members?
Sam Altman
Not for every board member, but for certainly some you need that. That’s part of what the board needs to do.
Not for every board member, but for certainly some you need that. That’s part of what the board needs to do.
Lex Fridman
The interesting thing that people probably don’t understand about OpenAI, I certainly don’t, is all the details of running the business. When they think about the board, given the drama, they think about you. They think about if you reach AGI or you reach some of these incredibly impactful products and you build them and deploy them, what’s the conversation with the board like? And they think, all right, what’s the right squad to have in that kind of situation to deliberate?
The interesting thing that people probably don’t understand about OpenAI, I certainly don’t, is all the details of running the business. When they think about the board, given the drama, they think about you. They think about if you reach AGI or you reach some of these incredibly impactful products and you build them and deploy them, what’s the conversation with the board like? And they think, all right, what’s the right squad to have in that kind of situation to deliberate?
Sam Altman
Look, I think you definitely need some technical experts there. And then you need some people who are like, “How can we deploy this in a way that will help people in the world the most?” And people who have a very different perspective. I think a mistake that you or I might make is to think that only the technical understanding matters, and that’s definitely part of the conversation you want that board to have, but there’s a lot more about how that’s going to just impact society and people’s lives that you really want represented in there too.
Look, I think you definitely need some technical experts there. And then you need some people who are like, “How can we deploy this in a way that will help people in the world the most?” And people who have a very different perspective. I think a mistake that you or I might make is to think that only the technical understanding matters, and that’s definitely part of the conversation you want that board to have, but there’s a lot more about how that’s going to just impact society and people’s lives that you really want represented in there too.
Lex Fridman
Are you looking at the track record of people or you’re just having conversations?
Are you looking at the track record of people or you’re just having conversations?
Sam Altman
Track record is a big deal. You of course have a lot of conversations, but there are some roles where I totally ignore track record and just look at slope, ignore the Y-intercept.
Track record is a big deal. You of course have a lot of conversations, but there are some roles where I totally ignore track record and just look at slope, ignore the Y-intercept.
Lex Fridman
Thank you. Thank you for making it mathematical for the audience.
Thank you. Thank you for making it mathematical for the audience.
Sam Altman
For a board member, I do care much more about the Y-intercept. I think there is something deep to say about track record there, and experience is something’s very hard to replace.
For a board member, I do care much more about the Y-intercept. I think there is something deep to say about track record there, and experience is something’s very hard to replace.
Lex Fridman
Do you try to fit a polynomial function or exponential one to the track record?
Do you try to fit a polynomial function or exponential one to the track record?
Sam Altman
That analogy doesn’t carry that far.
That analogy doesn’t carry that far.
Lex Fridman
All right. You mentioned some of the low points that weekend. What were some of the low points psychologically for you? Did you consider going to the Amazon jungle and just taking ayahuasca and disappearing forever?
All right. You mentioned some of the low points that weekend. What were some of the low points psychologically for you? Did you consider going to the Amazon jungle and just taking ayahuasca and disappearing forever?
Sam Altman
It was a very bad period of time. There were great high points too. My phone was just nonstop blowing up with nice messages from people I worked with every day, people I hadn’t talked to in a decade. I didn’t get to appreciate that as much as I should have because I was just in the middle of this firefight, but that was really nice. But on the whole, it was a very painful weekend. It was like a battle fought in public to a surprising degree, and that was extremely exhausting to me, much more than I expected. I think fights are generally exhausting, but this one really was. The board did this Friday afternoon. I really couldn’t get much in the way of answers, but I also was just like, well, the board gets to do this, so I’m going to think for a little bit about what I want to do, but I’ll try to find the blessing in disguise here.
It was a very bad period of time. There were great high points too. My phone was just nonstop blowing up with nice messages from people I worked with every day, people I hadn’t talked to in a decade. I didn’t get to appreciate that as much as I should have because I was just in the middle of this firefight, but that was really nice. But on the whole, it was a very painful weekend. It was like a battle fought in public to a surprising degree, and that was extremely exhausting to me, much more than I expected. I think fights are generally exhausting, but this one really was. The board did this Friday afternoon. I really couldn’t get much in the way of answers, but I also was just like, well, the board gets to do this, so I’m going to think for a little bit about what I want to do, but I’ll try to find the blessing in disguise here.
And I was like, well, my current job at OpenAI is, or it was, to run a decently sized company at this point. And the thing I’d always liked the most was just getting to work with the researchers. And I was like, yeah, I can just go do a very focused AGI research effort. And I got excited about that. Didn’t even occur to me at the time possibly that this was all going to get undone. This was Friday afternoon.
Lex Fridman
So you’ve accepted the death of this-
So you’ve accepted the death of this-
Sam Altman
Very quickly. Very quickly. I went through a little period of confusion and rage, but very quickly, quickly. And by Friday night, I was talking to people about what was going to be next, and I was excited about that. I think it was Friday evening for the first time that I heard from the exec team here, which is like, “Hey, we’re going to fight this.” and then I went to bed just still being like, okay, excited. Onward.
Very quickly. Very quickly. I went through a little period of confusion and rage, but very quickly, quickly. And by Friday night, I was talking to people about what was going to be next, and I was excited about that. I think it was Friday evening for the first time that I heard from the exec team here, which is like, “Hey, we’re going to fight this.” and then I went to bed just still being like, okay, excited. Onward.
Lex Fridman
Were you able to sleep?
Were you able to sleep?
Sam Altman
Not a lot. One of the weird things was there was this period of four and a half days where I didn’t sleep much, didn’t eat much, and still had a surprising amount of energy. You learn a weird thing about adrenaline in wartime.
Not a lot. One of the weird things was there was this period of four and a half days where I didn’t sleep much, didn’t eat much, and still had a surprising amount of energy. You learn a weird thing about adrenaline in wartime.
Lex Fridman
So you accepted the death of this baby, OpenAI.
So you accepted the death of this baby, OpenAI.
Sam Altman
And I was excited for the new thing. I was just like, “Okay, this was crazy, but whatever.”
And I was excited for the new thing. I was just like, “Okay, this was crazy, but whatever.”
Lex Fridman
It’s a very good coping mechanism.
It’s a very good coping mechanism.
Sam Altman
And then Saturday morning, two of the board members called and said, “Hey, we didn’t mean to destabilize things. We don’t want to store a lot of value here. Can we talk about you coming back?” And I immediately didn’t want to do that, but I thought a little more and I was like, well, I really care about the people here, the partners, shareholders. I love this company. And so I thought about it and I was like, “Well, okay, but here’s the stuff I would need.” And then the most painful time of all was over the course of that weekend, I kept thinking and being told, and not just me, the whole team here kept thinking, well, we were trying to keep OpenAI stabilized while the whole world was trying to break it apart, people trying to recruit whatever.
And then Saturday morning, two of the board members called and said, “Hey, we didn’t mean to destabilize things. We don’t want to store a lot of value here. Can we talk about you coming back?” And I immediately didn’t want to do that, but I thought a little more and I was like, well, I really care about the people here, the partners, shareholders. I love this company. And so I thought about it and I was like, “Well, okay, but here’s the stuff I would need.” And then the most painful time of all was over the course of that weekend, I kept thinking and being told, and not just me, the whole team here kept thinking, well, we were trying to keep OpenAI stabilized while the whole world was trying to break it apart, people trying to recruit whatever.
We kept being told, all right, we’re almost done. We’re almost done. We just need a little bit more time. And it was this very confusing state. And then Sunday evening when, again, every few hours I expected that we were going to be done and we’re going to figure out a way for me to return and things to go back to how they were. The board then appointed a new interim CEO, and then I was like, that feels really bad. That was the low point of the whole thing. I’ll tell you something. It felt very painful, but I felt a lot of love that whole weekend. Other than that one moment Sunday night, I would not characterize my emotions as anger or hate, but I felt a lot of love from people, towards people. It was painful, but the dominant emotion of the weekend was love, not hate.
Lex Fridman
You’ve spoken highly of Mira Murati, that she helped especially, as you put in the tweet, in the quiet moments when it counts. Perhaps we could take a bit of a tangent. What do you admire about Mira?
You’ve spoken highly of Mira Murati, that she helped especially, as you put in the tweet, in the quiet moments when it counts. Perhaps we could take a bit of a tangent. What do you admire about Mira?
Sam Altman
Well, she did a great job during that weekend in a lot of chaos, but people often see leaders in the crisis moments, good or bad. But a thing I really value in leaders is how people act on a boring Tuesday at 9:46 in the morning and in just the normal drudgery of the day-to-day. How someone shows up in a meeting, the quality of the decisions they make. That was what I meant about the quiet moments.
Well, she did a great job during that weekend in a lot of chaos, but people often see leaders in the crisis moments, good or bad. But a thing I really value in leaders is how people act on a boring Tuesday at 9:46 in the morning and in just the normal drudgery of the day-to-day. How someone shows up in a meeting, the quality of the decisions they make. That was what I meant about the quiet moments.
Lex Fridman
Meaning most of the work is done on a day-by-day, in meeting-by-meeting. Just be present and make great decisions.
Meaning most of the work is done on a day-by-day, in meeting-by-meeting. Just be present and make great decisions.
Sam Altman
Yeah. Look, what you have wanted to spend the last 20 minutes about, and I understand, is this one very dramatic weekend, but that’s not really what OpenAI is about. OpenAI is really about the other seven years.
Yeah. Look, what you have wanted to spend the last 20 minutes about, and I understand, is this one very dramatic weekend, but that’s not really what OpenAI is about. OpenAI is really about the other seven years.
Lex Fridman
Well, yeah. Human civilization is not about the invasion of the Soviet Union by Nazi Germany, but still that’s something people focus on.
Well, yeah. Human civilization is not about the invasion of the Soviet Union by Nazi Germany, but still that’s something people focus on.
Sam Altman
Very understandable.
Very understandable.
Lex Fridman
It gives us an insight into human nature, the extremes of human nature, and perhaps some of the damage in some of the triumphs of human civilization can happen in those moments, so it’s illustrative. Let me ask you about Ilya. Is he being held hostage in a secret nuclear facility?
It gives us an insight into human nature, the extremes of human nature, and perhaps some of the damage in some of the triumphs of human civilization can happen in those moments, so it’s illustrative. Let me ask you about Ilya. Is he being held hostage in a secret nuclear facility?
Ilya Sutskever
Sam Altman
No.
No.
Lex Fridman
What about a regular secret facility?
What about a regular secret facility?
Sam Altman
No.
No.
Lex Fridman
What about a nuclear non-secret facility?
What about a nuclear non-secret facility?
Sam Altman
Neither. Not that either.
Neither. Not that either.
Lex Fridman
This is becoming a meme at some point. You’ve known Ilya for a long time. He was obviously part of this drama with the board and all that kind of stuff. What’s your relationship with him now?
This is becoming a meme at some point. You’ve known Ilya for a long time. He was obviously part of this drama with the board and all that kind of stuff. What’s your relationship with him now?
Sam Altman
I love Ilya. I have tremendous respect for Ilya. I don’t have anything I can say about his plans right now. That’s a question for him, but I really hope we work together for certainly the rest of my career. He’s a little bit younger than me. Maybe he works a little bit longer.
I love Ilya. I have tremendous respect for Ilya. I don’t have anything I can say about his plans right now. That’s a question for him, but I really hope we work together for certainly the rest of my career. He’s a little bit younger than me. Maybe he works a little bit longer.
Lex Fridman
There’s a meme that he saw something, like he maybe saw AGI and that gave him a lot of worry internally. What did Ilya see?
There’s a meme that he saw something, like he maybe saw AGI and that gave him a lot of worry internally. What did Ilya see?
Sam Altman
Ilya has not seen AGI. None of us have seen AGI. We’ve not built AGI. I do think one of the many things that I really love about Ilya is he takes AGI and the safety concerns, broadly speaking, including things like the impact this is going to have on society, very seriously. And as we continue to make significant progress, Ilya is one of the people that I’ve spent the most time over the last couple of years talking about what this is going to mean, what we need to do to ensure we get it right, to ensure that we succeed at the mission. So Ilya did not see AGI, but Ilya is a credit to humanity in terms of how much he thinks and worries about making sure we get this right.
Ilya has not seen AGI. None of us have seen AGI. We’ve not built AGI. I do think one of the many things that I really love about Ilya is he takes AGI and the safety concerns, broadly speaking, including things like the impact this is going to have on society, very seriously. And as we continue to make significant progress, Ilya is one of the people that I’ve spent the most time over the last couple of years talking about what this is going to mean, what we need to do to ensure we get it right, to ensure that we succeed at the mission. So Ilya did not see AGI, but Ilya is a credit to humanity in terms of how much he thinks and worries about making sure we get this right.
Lex Fridman
I’ve had a bunch of conversation with him in the past. I think when he talks about technology, he’s always doing this long-term thinking type of thing. So he is not thinking about what this is going to be in a year. He’s thinking about in 10 years, just thinking from first principles like, “Okay, if this scales, what are the fundamentals here? Where’s this going?” And so that’s a foundation for them thinking about all the other safety concerns and all that kind of stuff, which makes him a really fascinating human to talk with. Do you have any idea why he’s been quiet? Is it he’s just doing some soul-searching?
I’ve had a bunch of conversation with him in the past. I think when he talks about technology, he’s always doing this long-term thinking type of thing. So he is not thinking about what this is going to be in a year. He’s thinking about in 10 years, just thinking from first principles like, “Okay, if this scales, what are the fundamentals here? Where’s this going?” And so that’s a foundation for them thinking about all the other safety concerns and all that kind of stuff, which makes him a really fascinating human to talk with. Do you have any idea why he’s been quiet? Is it he’s just doing some soul-searching?
Sam Altman
Again, I don’t want to speak for Ilya. I think that you should ask him that. He’s definitely a thoughtful guy. I think Ilya is always on a soul search in a really good way.
Again, I don’t want to speak for Ilya. I think that you should ask him that. He’s definitely a thoughtful guy. I think Ilya is always on a soul search in a really good way.
Lex Fridman
Yes. Yeah. Also, he appreciates the power of silence. Also, I’m told he can be a silly guy, which I’ve never seen that side of him.
Yes. Yeah. Also, he appreciates the power of silence. Also, I’m told he can be a silly guy, which I’ve never seen that side of him.
Sam Altman
It’s very sweet when that happens.
It’s very sweet when that happens.
Lex Fridman
I’ve never witnessed a silly Ilya, but I look forward to that as well.
I’ve never witnessed a silly Ilya, but I look forward to that as well.
Sam Altman
I was at a dinner party with him recently and he was playing with a puppy and he was in a very silly mood, very endearing. And I was thinking, oh man, this is not the side of Ilya that the world sees the most.
I was at a dinner party with him recently and he was playing with a puppy and he was in a very silly mood, very endearing. And I was thinking, oh man, this is not the side of Ilya that the world sees the most.
Lex Fridman
So just to wrap up this whole saga, are you feeling good about the board structure-
So just to wrap up this whole saga, are you feeling good about the board structure-
Sam Altman
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
… about all of this and where it’s moving?
… about all of this and where it’s moving?
Sam Altman
I feel great about the new board. In terms of the structure of OpenAI, one of the board’s tasks is to look at that and see where we can make it more robust. We wanted to get new board members in place first, but we clearly learned a lesson about structure throughout this process. I don’t have, I think, super deep things to say. It was a crazy, very painful experience. I think it was a perfect storm of weirdness. It was a preview for me of what’s going to happen as the stakes get higher and higher and the need that we have robust governance structures and processes and people. I’m happy it happened when it did, but it was a shockingly painful thing to go through.
I feel great about the new board. In terms of the structure of OpenAI, one of the board’s tasks is to look at that and see where we can make it more robust. We wanted to get new board members in place first, but we clearly learned a lesson about structure throughout this process. I don’t have, I think, super deep things to say. It was a crazy, very painful experience. I think it was a perfect storm of weirdness. It was a preview for me of what’s going to happen as the stakes get higher and higher and the need that we have robust governance structures and processes and people. I’m happy it happened when it did, but it was a shockingly painful thing to go through.
Lex Fridman
Did it make you be more hesitant in trusting people?
Did it make you be more hesitant in trusting people?
Sam Altman
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
Just on a personal level?
Just on a personal level?
Sam Altman
Yes. I think I’m like an extremely trusting person. I’ve always had a life philosophy of don’t worry about all of the paranoia. Don’t worry about the edge cases. You get a little bit screwed in exchange for getting to live with your guard down. And this was so shocking to me. I was so caught off guard that it has definitely changed, and I really don’t like this, it’s definitely changed how I think about just default trust of people and planning for the bad scenarios.
Yes. I think I’m like an extremely trusting person. I’ve always had a life philosophy of don’t worry about all of the paranoia. Don’t worry about the edge cases. You get a little bit screwed in exchange for getting to live with your guard down. And this was so shocking to me. I was so caught off guard that it has definitely changed, and I really don’t like this, it’s definitely changed how I think about just default trust of people and planning for the bad scenarios.
Lex Fridman
You got to be careful with that. Are you worried about becoming a little too cynical?
You got to be careful with that. Are you worried about becoming a little too cynical?
Sam Altman
I’m not worried about becoming too cynical. I think I’m the extreme opposite of a cynical person, but I’m worried about just becoming less of a default trusting person.
I’m not worried about becoming too cynical. I think I’m the extreme opposite of a cynical person, but I’m worried about just becoming less of a default trusting person.
Lex Fridman
I’m actually not sure which mode is best to operate in for a person who’s developing AGI, trusting or un-trusting. It’s an interesting journey you’re on. But in terms of structure, see, I’m more interested on the human level. How do you surround yourself with humans that are building cool shit, but also are making wise decisions? Because the more money you start making, the more power the thing has, the weirder people get.
I’m actually not sure which mode is best to operate in for a person who’s developing AGI, trusting or un-trusting. It’s an interesting journey you’re on. But in terms of structure, see, I’m more interested on the human level. How do you surround yourself with humans that are building cool shit, but also are making wise decisions? Because the more money you start making, the more power the thing has, the weirder people get.
Sam Altman
I think you could make all kinds of comments about the board members and the level of trust I should have had there, or how I should have done things differently. But in terms of the team here, I think you’d have to give me a very good grade on that one. And I have just enormous gratitude and trust and respect for the people that I work with every day, and I think being surrounded with people like that is really important.
I think you could make all kinds of comments about the board members and the level of trust I should have had there, or how I should have done things differently. But in terms of the team here, I think you’d have to give me a very good grade on that one. And I have just enormous gratitude and trust and respect for the people that I work with every day, and I think being surrounded with people like that is really important.
Elon Musk lawsuit
Lex Fridman
Our mutual friend Elon sued OpenAI. What to you is the essence of what he’s criticizing? To what degree does he have a point? To what degree is he wrong?
Our mutual friend Elon sued OpenAI. What to you is the essence of what he’s criticizing? To what degree does he have a point? To what degree is he wrong?
Sam Altman
I don’t know what it’s really about. We started off just thinking we were going to be a research lab and having no idea about how this technology was going to go. Because it was only seven or eight years ago, it’s hard to go back and really remember what it was like then, but this is before language models were a big deal. This was before we had any idea about an API or selling access to a chatbot. It was before we had any idea we were going to productize at all. So we’re like, “We’re just going to try to do research and we don’t really know what we’re going to do with that.” I think with many fundamentally new things, you start fumbling through the dark and you make some assumptions, most of which turned out to be wrong.
I don’t know what it’s really about. We started off just thinking we were going to be a research lab and having no idea about how this technology was going to go. Because it was only seven or eight years ago, it’s hard to go back and really remember what it was like then, but this is before language models were a big deal. This was before we had any idea about an API or selling access to a chatbot. It was before we had any idea we were going to productize at all. So we’re like, “We’re just going to try to do research and we don’t really know what we’re going to do with that.” I think with many fundamentally new things, you start fumbling through the dark and you make some assumptions, most of which turned out to be wrong.
And then it became clear that we were going to need to do different things and also have huge amounts more capital. So we said, “Okay, well, the structure doesn’t quite work for that. How do we patch the structure?” And then you patch it again and patch it again and you end up with something that does look eyebrow-raising, to say the least. But we got here gradually with, I think, reasonable decisions at each point along the way. And it doesn’t mean I wouldn’t do it totally differently if we could go back now with an Oracle, but you don’t get the Oracle at the time. But anyway, in terms of what Elon’s real motivations here are, I don’t know.
Lex Fridman
To the degree you remember, what was the response that OpenAI gave in the blog post? Can you summarize it?
To the degree you remember, what was the response that OpenAI gave in the blog post? Can you summarize it?
Sam Altman
Oh, we just said Elon said this set of things. Here’s our characterization, or here’s not our characterization. Here’s the characterization of how this went down. We tried to not make it emotional and just say, “Here’s the history.”
Oh, we just said Elon said this set of things. Here’s our characterization, or here’s not our characterization. Here’s the characterization of how this went down. We tried to not make it emotional and just say, “Here’s the history.”
Lex Fridman
I do think there’s a degree of mischaracterization from Elon here about one of the points you just made, which is the degree of uncertainty you had at the time. You guys are a small group of researchers crazily talking about AGI when everybody’s laughing at that thought.
I do think there’s a degree of mischaracterization from Elon here about one of the points you just made, which is the degree of uncertainty you had at the time. You guys are a small group of researchers crazily talking about AGI when everybody’s laughing at that thought.
Sam Altman
It wasn’t that long ago Elon was crazily talking about launching rockets when people were laughing at that thought, so I think he’d have more empathy for this.
It wasn’t that long ago Elon was crazily talking about launching rockets when people were laughing at that thought, so I think he’d have more empathy for this.
Lex Fridman
I do think that there’s personal stuff here, that there was a split that OpenAI and a lot of amazing people here chose to part ways with Elon, so there’s a personal-
I do think that there’s personal stuff here, that there was a split that OpenAI and a lot of amazing people here chose to part ways with Elon, so there’s a personal-
Sam Altman
Elon chose to part ways.
Elon chose to part ways.
Lex Fridman
Can you describe that exactly? The choosing to part ways?
Can you describe that exactly? The choosing to part ways?
Sam Altman
He thought OpenAI was going to fail. He wanted total control to turn it around. We wanted to keep going in the direction that now has become OpenAI. He also wanted Tesla to be able to build an AGI effort. At various times, he wanted to make OpenAI into a for-profit company that he could have control of or have it merge with Tesla. We didn’t want to do that, and he decided to leave, which that’s fine.
He thought OpenAI was going to fail. He wanted total control to turn it around. We wanted to keep going in the direction that now has become OpenAI. He also wanted Tesla to be able to build an AGI effort. At various times, he wanted to make OpenAI into a for-profit company that he could have control of or have it merge with Tesla. We didn’t want to do that, and he decided to leave, which that’s fine.
Lex Fridman
So you’re saying, and that’s one of the things that the blog post says, is that he wanted OpenAI to be basically acquired by Tesla in the same way that, or maybe something similar or maybe something more dramatic than the partnership with Microsoft.
So you’re saying, and that’s one of the things that the blog post says, is that he wanted OpenAI to be basically acquired by Tesla in the same way that, or maybe something similar or maybe something more dramatic than the partnership with Microsoft.
Sam Altman
My memory is the proposal was just like, yeah, get acquired by Tesla and have Tesla have full control over it. I’m pretty sure that’s what it was.
My memory is the proposal was just like, yeah, get acquired by Tesla and have Tesla have full control over it. I’m pretty sure that’s what it was.
Lex Fridman
So what does the word open in OpenAI mean to Elon at the time? Ilya has talked about this in the email exchanges and all this kind of stuff. What does it mean to you at the time? What does it mean to you now?
So what does the word open in OpenAI mean to Elon at the time? Ilya has talked about this in the email exchanges and all this kind of stuff. What does it mean to you at the time? What does it mean to you now?
Sam Altman
Speaking of going back with an Oracle, I’d pick a different name. One of the things that I think OpenAI is doing that is the most important of everything that we’re doing is putting powerful technology in the hands of people for free, as a public good. We don’t run ads on our-
Speaking of going back with an Oracle, I’d pick a different name. One of the things that I think OpenAI is doing that is the most important of everything that we’re doing is putting powerful technology in the hands of people for free, as a public good. We don’t run ads on our-
Sam Altman
… as a public good. We don’t run ads on our free version. We don’t monetize it in other ways. We just say it’s part of our mission. We want to put increasingly powerful tools in the hands of people for free and get them to use them. I think that kind of open is really important to our mission. I think if you give people great tools and teach them to use them or don’t even teach them, they’ll figure it out, and let them go build an incredible future for each other with that, that’s a big deal. So if we can keep putting free or low cost or free and low cost powerful AI tools out in the world, I think that’s a huge deal for how we fulfill the mission. Open source or not, yeah, I think we should open source some stuff and not other stuff. It does become this religious battle line where nuance is hard to have, but I think nuance is the right answer.
… as a public good. We don’t run ads on our free version. We don’t monetize it in other ways. We just say it’s part of our mission. We want to put increasingly powerful tools in the hands of people for free and get them to use them. I think that kind of open is really important to our mission. I think if you give people great tools and teach them to use them or don’t even teach them, they’ll figure it out, and let them go build an incredible future for each other with that, that’s a big deal. So if we can keep putting free or low cost or free and low cost powerful AI tools out in the world, I think that’s a huge deal for how we fulfill the mission. Open source or not, yeah, I think we should open source some stuff and not other stuff. It does become this religious battle line where nuance is hard to have, but I think nuance is the right answer.
Lex Fridman
So he said, “Change your name to CloseAI and I’ll drop the lawsuit.” I mean is it going to become this battleground in the land of memes about the name?
So he said, “Change your name to CloseAI and I’ll drop the lawsuit.” I mean is it going to become this battleground in the land of memes about the name?
Sam Altman
I think that speaks to the seriousness with which Elon means the lawsuit, and that’s like an astonishing thing to say, I think.
I think that speaks to the seriousness with which Elon means the lawsuit, and that’s like an astonishing thing to say, I think.
Lex Fridman
Maybe correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think the lawsuit is legally serious. It’s more to make a point about the future of AGI and the company that’s currently leading the way.
Maybe correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think the lawsuit is legally serious. It’s more to make a point about the future of AGI and the company that’s currently leading the way.
Sam Altman
Look, I mean Grok had not open sourced anything until people pointed out it was a little bit hypocritical and then he announced that Grok will open source things this week. I don’t think open source versus not is what this is really about for him.
Look, I mean Grok had not open sourced anything until people pointed out it was a little bit hypocritical and then he announced that Grok will open source things this week. I don’t think open source versus not is what this is really about for him.
Lex Fridman
Well, we will talk about open source and not. I do think maybe criticizing the competition is great. Just talking a little shit, that’s great. But friendly competition versus like, “I personally hate lawsuits.”
Well, we will talk about open source and not. I do think maybe criticizing the competition is great. Just talking a little shit, that’s great. But friendly competition versus like, “I personally hate lawsuits.”
Sam Altman
Look, I think this whole thing is unbecoming of a builder. And I respect Elon as one of the great builders of our time. I know he knows what it’s like to have haters attack him and it makes me extra sad he’s doing it toss.
Look, I think this whole thing is unbecoming of a builder. And I respect Elon as one of the great builders of our time. I know he knows what it’s like to have haters attack him and it makes me extra sad he’s doing it toss.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, he’s one of the greatest builders of all time, potentially the greatest builder of all time.
Yeah, he’s one of the greatest builders of all time, potentially the greatest builder of all time.
Sam Altman
It makes me sad. And I think it makes a lot of people sad. There’s a lot of people who’ve really looked up to him for a long time. I said in some interview or something that I missed the old Elon and the number of messages I got being like, “That exactly encapsulates how I feel.”
It makes me sad. And I think it makes a lot of people sad. There’s a lot of people who’ve really looked up to him for a long time. I said in some interview or something that I missed the old Elon and the number of messages I got being like, “That exactly encapsulates how I feel.”
Lex Fridman
I think he should just win. He should just make X Grok beat GPT and then GPT beats Grok and it’s just the competition and it’s beautiful for everybody. But on the question of open source, do you think there’s a lot of companies playing with this idea? It’s quite interesting. I would say Meta surprisingly has led the way on this, or at least took the first step in the game of chess of really open sourcing the model. Of course it’s not the state-of-the-art model, but open sourcing Llama Google is flirting with the idea of open sourcing a smaller version. What are the pros and cons of open sourcing? Have you played around with this idea?
I think he should just win. He should just make X Grok beat GPT and then GPT beats Grok and it’s just the competition and it’s beautiful for everybody. But on the question of open source, do you think there’s a lot of companies playing with this idea? It’s quite interesting. I would say Meta surprisingly has led the way on this, or at least took the first step in the game of chess of really open sourcing the model. Of course it’s not the state-of-the-art model, but open sourcing Llama Google is flirting with the idea of open sourcing a smaller version. What are the pros and cons of open sourcing? Have you played around with this idea?
Sam Altman
Yeah, I think there is definitely a place for open source models, particularly smaller models that people can run locally, I think there’s huge demand for. I think there will be some open source models, there will be some closed source models. It won’t be unlike other ecosystems in that way.
Yeah, I think there is definitely a place for open source models, particularly smaller models that people can run locally, I think there’s huge demand for. I think there will be some open source models, there will be some closed source models. It won’t be unlike other ecosystems in that way.
Lex Fridman
I listened to all in podcasts talking about this lawsuit and all that kind of stuff. They were more concerned about the precedent of going from nonprofit to this cap for profit. What precedent that sets for other startups? Is that something-
I listened to all in podcasts talking about this lawsuit and all that kind of stuff. They were more concerned about the precedent of going from nonprofit to this cap for profit. What precedent that sets for other startups? Is that something-
Sam Altman
I would heavily discourage any startup that was thinking about starting as a nonprofit and adding a for-profit arm later. I’d heavily discourage them from doing that. I don’t think we’ll set a precedent here.
I would heavily discourage any startup that was thinking about starting as a nonprofit and adding a for-profit arm later. I’d heavily discourage them from doing that. I don’t think we’ll set a precedent here.
Lex Fridman
Okay. So most startups should go just-
Okay. So most startups should go just-
Sam Altman
For sure.
For sure.
Lex Fridman
And again-
And again-
Sam Altman
If we knew what was going to happen, we would’ve done that too.
If we knew what was going to happen, we would’ve done that too.
Lex Fridman
Well in theory, if you dance beautifully here, there’s some tax incentives or whatever, but…
Well in theory, if you dance beautifully here, there’s some tax incentives or whatever, but…
Sam Altman
I don’t think that’s how most people think about these things.
I don’t think that’s how most people think about these things.
Lex Fridman
It’s just not possible to save a lot of money for a startup if you do it this way.
It’s just not possible to save a lot of money for a startup if you do it this way.
Sam Altman
No, I think there’s laws that would make that pretty difficult.
No, I think there’s laws that would make that pretty difficult.
Lex Fridman
Where do you hope this goes with Elon? This tension, this dance, what do you hope this? If we go 1, 2, 3 years from now, your relationship with him on a personal level too, like friendship, friendly competition, just all this kind of stuff.
Where do you hope this goes with Elon? This tension, this dance, what do you hope this? If we go 1, 2, 3 years from now, your relationship with him on a personal level too, like friendship, friendly competition, just all this kind of stuff.
Sam Altman
Yeah, I really respect Elon and I hope that years in the future we have an amicable relationship.
Yeah, I really respect Elon and I hope that years in the future we have an amicable relationship.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, I hope you guys have an amicable relationship this month and just compete and win and explore these ideas together. I do suppose there’s competition for talent or whatever, but it should be friendly competition. Just build cool shit. And Elon is pretty good at building cool shit. So are you.
Yeah, I hope you guys have an amicable relationship this month and just compete and win and explore these ideas together. I do suppose there’s competition for talent or whatever, but it should be friendly competition. Just build cool shit. And Elon is pretty good at building cool shit. So are you.
Sora
So speaking of cool shit, Sora. There’s like a million questions I could ask. First of all, it’s amazing. It truly is amazing on a product level but also just on a philosophical level. So let me just technical/philosophical ask, what do you think it understands about the world more or less than GPT-4 for example? The world model when you train on these patches versus language tokens.
Sam Altman
I think all of these models understand something more about the world model than most of us give them credit for. And because they’re also very clear things they just don’t understand or don’t get right, it’s easy to look at the weaknesses, see through the veil and say, “Ah, this is all fake.” But it’s not all fake. It’s just some of it works and some of it doesn’t work.
I think all of these models understand something more about the world model than most of us give them credit for. And because they’re also very clear things they just don’t understand or don’t get right, it’s easy to look at the weaknesses, see through the veil and say, “Ah, this is all fake.” But it’s not all fake. It’s just some of it works and some of it doesn’t work.
I remember when I started first watching Sora videos and I would see a person walk in front of something for a few seconds and occlude it and then walk away and the same thing was still there. I was like, “Oh, this is pretty good.” Or there’s examples where the underlying physics looks so well represented over a lot of steps in a sequence, it’s like, “|Oh, this is quite impressive.” But fundamentally, these models are just getting better and that will keep happening. If you look at the trajectory from DALL·E 1 to 2 to 3 to Sora, there are a lot of people that were dunked on each version saying it can’t do this, it can’t do that and look at it now.
Lex Fridman
Well, the thing you just mentioned is the occlusions is basically modeling the physics of the three-dimensional physics of the world sufficiently well to capture those kinds of things.
Well, the thing you just mentioned is the occlusions is basically modeling the physics of the three-dimensional physics of the world sufficiently well to capture those kinds of things.
Sam Altman
Well…
Well…
Lex Fridman
Or yeah, maybe you can tell me, in order to deal with occlusions, what does the world model need to?
Or yeah, maybe you can tell me, in order to deal with occlusions, what does the world model need to?
Sam Altman
Yeah. So what I would say is it’s doing something to deal with occlusions really well. What I represent that it has a great underlying 3D model of the world, it’s a little bit more of a stretch.
Yeah. So what I would say is it’s doing something to deal with occlusions really well. What I represent that it has a great underlying 3D model of the world, it’s a little bit more of a stretch.
Lex Fridman
But can you get there through just these kinds of two-dimensional training data approaches?
But can you get there through just these kinds of two-dimensional training data approaches?
Sam Altman
It looks like this approach is going to go surprisingly far. I don’t want to speculate too much about what limits it will surmount and which it won’t, but…
It looks like this approach is going to go surprisingly far. I don’t want to speculate too much about what limits it will surmount and which it won’t, but…
Lex Fridman
What are some interesting limitations of the system that you’ve seen? I mean there’s been some fun ones you’ve posted.
What are some interesting limitations of the system that you’ve seen? I mean there’s been some fun ones you’ve posted.
Sam Altman
There’s all kinds of fun. I mean, cat’s sprouting an extra limit at random points in a video. Pick what you want, but there’s still a lot of problem, there’s a lot of weaknesses.
There’s all kinds of fun. I mean, cat’s sprouting an extra limit at random points in a video. Pick what you want, but there’s still a lot of problem, there’s a lot of weaknesses.
Lex Fridman
Do you think it’s a fundamental flaw of the approach or is it just bigger model or better technical details or better data, more data is going to solve the cat sprouting [inaudible 00:37:19]?
Do you think it’s a fundamental flaw of the approach or is it just bigger model or better technical details or better data, more data is going to solve the cat sprouting [inaudible 00:37:19]?
Sam Altman
I would say yes to both. I think there is something about the approach which just seems to feel different from how we think and learn and whatever. And then also I think it’ll get better with scale.
I would say yes to both. I think there is something about the approach which just seems to feel different from how we think and learn and whatever. And then also I think it’ll get better with scale.
Lex Fridman
Like I mentioned, LLMS have tokens, text tokens, and Sora has visual patches so it converts all visual data, a diverse kinds of visual data videos and images into patches. Is the training to the degree you can say fully self supervised, there’s some manual labeling going on? What’s the involvement of humans in all this?
Like I mentioned, LLMS have tokens, text tokens, and Sora has visual patches so it converts all visual data, a diverse kinds of visual data videos and images into patches. Is the training to the degree you can say fully self supervised, there’s some manual labeling going on? What’s the involvement of humans in all this?
Sam Altman
I mean without saying anything specific about the Sora approach, we use lots of human data in our work.
I mean without saying anything specific about the Sora approach, we use lots of human data in our work.
Lex Fridman
But not internet scale data? So lots of humans. Lots is a complicated word, Sam.
But not internet scale data? So lots of humans. Lots is a complicated word, Sam.
Sam Altman
I think lots is a fair word in this case.
I think lots is a fair word in this case.
Lex Fridman
Because to me, “lots”… Listen, I’m an introvert and when I hang out with three people, that’s a lot of people. Four people, that’s a lot. But I suppose you mean more than…
Because to me, “lots”… Listen, I’m an introvert and when I hang out with three people, that’s a lot of people. Four people, that’s a lot. But I suppose you mean more than…
Sam Altman
More than three people work on labeling the data for these models, yeah.
More than three people work on labeling the data for these models, yeah.
Lex Fridman
Okay. Right. But fundamentally, there’s a lot of self supervised learning. Because what you mentioned in the technical report is internet scale data. That’s another beautiful… It’s like poetry. So it’s a lot of data that’s not human label. It’s self supervised in that way?
Okay. Right. But fundamentally, there’s a lot of self supervised learning. Because what you mentioned in the technical report is internet scale data. That’s another beautiful… It’s like poetry. So it’s a lot of data that’s not human label. It’s self supervised in that way?
Sam Altman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
And then the question is, how much data is there on the internet that could be used in this that is conducive to this kind of self supervised way if only we knew the details of the self supervised. Have you considered opening it up a little more details?
And then the question is, how much data is there on the internet that could be used in this that is conducive to this kind of self supervised way if only we knew the details of the self supervised. Have you considered opening it up a little more details?
Sam Altman
We have. You mean for source specifically?
We have. You mean for source specifically?
Lex Fridman
Source specifically. Because it’s so interesting that can the same magic of LLMs now start moving towards visual data and what does that take to do that?
Source specifically. Because it’s so interesting that can the same magic of LLMs now start moving towards visual data and what does that take to do that?
Sam Altman
I mean it looks to me like yes, but we have more work to do.
I mean it looks to me like yes, but we have more work to do.
Lex Fridman
Sure. What are the dangers? Why are you concerned about releasing the system? What are some possible dangers of this?
Sure. What are the dangers? Why are you concerned about releasing the system? What are some possible dangers of this?
Sam Altman
I mean frankly speaking, one thing we have to do before releasing the system is just get it to work at a level of efficiency that will deliver the scale people are going to want from this so that I don’t want to downplay that. And there’s still a ton ton of work to do there. But you can imagine issues with deepfakes, misinformation. We try to be a thoughtful company about what we put out into the world and it doesn’t take much thought to think about the ways this can go badly.
I mean frankly speaking, one thing we have to do before releasing the system is just get it to work at a level of efficiency that will deliver the scale people are going to want from this so that I don’t want to downplay that. And there’s still a ton ton of work to do there. But you can imagine issues with deepfakes, misinformation. We try to be a thoughtful company about what we put out into the world and it doesn’t take much thought to think about the ways this can go badly.
Lex Fridman
There’s a lot of tough questions here, you’re dealing in a very tough space. Do you think training AI should be or is fair use under copyright law?
There’s a lot of tough questions here, you’re dealing in a very tough space. Do you think training AI should be or is fair use under copyright law?
Sam Altman
I think the question behind that question is, do people who create valuable data deserve to have some way that they get compensated for use of it, and that I think the answer is yes. I don’t know yet what the answer is. People have proposed a lot of different things. We’ve tried some different models. But if I’m like an artist for example, A, I would like to be able to opt out of people generating art in my style. And B, if they do generate art in my style, I’d like to have some economic model associated with that.
I think the question behind that question is, do people who create valuable data deserve to have some way that they get compensated for use of it, and that I think the answer is yes. I don’t know yet what the answer is. People have proposed a lot of different things. We’ve tried some different models. But if I’m like an artist for example, A, I would like to be able to opt out of people generating art in my style. And B, if they do generate art in my style, I’d like to have some economic model associated with that.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, it’s that transition from CDs to Napster to Spotify. We have to figure out some kind of model.
Yeah, it’s that transition from CDs to Napster to Spotify. We have to figure out some kind of model.
Sam Altman
The model changes but people have got to get paid.
The model changes but people have got to get paid.
Lex Fridman
Well, there should be some kind of incentive if we zoom out even more for humans to keep doing cool shit.
Well, there should be some kind of incentive if we zoom out even more for humans to keep doing cool shit.
Sam Altman
Of everything I worry about, humans are going to do cool shit and society is going to find some way to reward it. That seems pretty hardwired. We want to create, we want to be useful, we want to achieve status in whatever way. That’s not going anywhere I don’t think.
Of everything I worry about, humans are going to do cool shit and society is going to find some way to reward it. That seems pretty hardwired. We want to create, we want to be useful, we want to achieve status in whatever way. That’s not going anywhere I don’t think.
Lex Fridman
But the reward might not be monetary financially. It might be fame and celebration of other cool-
But the reward might not be monetary financially. It might be fame and celebration of other cool-
Sam Altman
Maybe financial in some other way. Again, I don’t think we’ve seen the last evolution of how the economic system’s going to work.
Maybe financial in some other way. Again, I don’t think we’ve seen the last evolution of how the economic system’s going to work.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, but artists and creators are worried. When they see Sora, they’re like, “Holy shit.”
Yeah, but artists and creators are worried. When they see Sora, they’re like, “Holy shit.”
Sam Altman
Sure. Artists were also super worried when photography came out and then photography became a new art form and people made a lot of money taking pictures. I think things like that will keep happening. People will use the new tools in new ways.
Sure. Artists were also super worried when photography came out and then photography became a new art form and people made a lot of money taking pictures. I think things like that will keep happening. People will use the new tools in new ways.
Lex Fridman
If we just look on YouTube or something like this, how much of that will be using Sora like AI generated content, do you think, in the next five years?
If we just look on YouTube or something like this, how much of that will be using Sora like AI generated content, do you think, in the next five years?
Sam Altman
People talk about how many jobs is AI going to do in five years. The framework that people have is, what percentage of current jobs are just going to be totally replaced by some AI doing the job? The way I think about it is not what percent of jobs AI will do, but what percent of tasks will AI do on over one time horizon. So if you think of all of the five-second tasks in the economy, five minute tasks, the five-hour tasks, maybe even the five-day tasks, how many of those can AI do? I think that’s a way more interesting, impactful, important question than how many jobs AI can do because it is a tool that will work at increasing levels of sophistication and over longer and longer time horizons for more and more tasks and let people operate at a higher level of abstraction. So maybe people are way more efficient at the job they do. And at some point that’s not just a quantitative change, but it’s a qualitative one too about the kinds of problems you can keep in your head. I think that for videos on YouTube it’ll be the same. Many videos, maybe most of them, will use AI tools in the production, but they’ll still be fundamentally driven by a person thinking about it, putting it together, doing parts of it. Sort of directing and running it.
People talk about how many jobs is AI going to do in five years. The framework that people have is, what percentage of current jobs are just going to be totally replaced by some AI doing the job? The way I think about it is not what percent of jobs AI will do, but what percent of tasks will AI do on over one time horizon. So if you think of all of the five-second tasks in the economy, five minute tasks, the five-hour tasks, maybe even the five-day tasks, how many of those can AI do? I think that’s a way more interesting, impactful, important question than how many jobs AI can do because it is a tool that will work at increasing levels of sophistication and over longer and longer time horizons for more and more tasks and let people operate at a higher level of abstraction. So maybe people are way more efficient at the job they do. And at some point that’s not just a quantitative change, but it’s a qualitative one too about the kinds of problems you can keep in your head. I think that for videos on YouTube it’ll be the same. Many videos, maybe most of them, will use AI tools in the production, but they’ll still be fundamentally driven by a person thinking about it, putting it together, doing parts of it. Sort of directing and running it.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, it’s so interesting. I mean it’s scary, but it’s interesting to think about. I tend to believe that humans like to watch other humans or other human humans-
Yeah, it’s so interesting. I mean it’s scary, but it’s interesting to think about. I tend to believe that humans like to watch other humans or other human humans-
Sam Altman
Humans really care about other humans a lot.
Humans really care about other humans a lot.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. If there’s a cooler thing that’s better than a human, humans care about that for two days and then they go back to humans.
Yeah. If there’s a cooler thing that’s better than a human, humans care about that for two days and then they go back to humans.
Sam Altman
That seems very deeply wired.
That seems very deeply wired.
Lex Fridman
It’s the whole chess thing, “Oh, yeah,” but now let’s everybody keep playing chess. And let’s ignore the elephant in the room that humans are really bad at chess relative to AI systems.
It’s the whole chess thing, “Oh, yeah,” but now let’s everybody keep playing chess. And let’s ignore the elephant in the room that humans are really bad at chess relative to AI systems.
Sam Altman
We still run races and cars are much faster. I mean there’s a lot of examples.
We still run races and cars are much faster. I mean there’s a lot of examples.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. And maybe it’ll just be tooling in the Adobe suite type of way where it can just make videos much easier and all that kind of stuff.
Yeah. And maybe it’ll just be tooling in the Adobe suite type of way where it can just make videos much easier and all that kind of stuff.
Listen, I hate being in front of the camera. If I can figure out a way to not be in front of the camera, I would love it. Unfortunately, it’ll take a while. That generating faces, it is getting there, but generating faces in video format is tricky when it’s specific people versus generic people.
GPT-4
Let me ask you about GPT-4. There’s so many questions. First of all, also amazing. Looking back, it’ll probably be this kind of historic pivotal moment with 3, 5 and 4 which ChatGPT.
Sam Altman
Maybe five will be the pivotal moment. I don’t know. Hard to say that looking forward.
Maybe five will be the pivotal moment. I don’t know. Hard to say that looking forward.
Lex Fridman
We’ll never know. That’s the annoying thing about the future, it’s hard to predict. But for me, looking back, GPT-4, ChatGPT is pretty damn impressive, historically impressive. So allow me to ask, what’s been the most impressive capabilities of GPT-4 to you and GPT-4 Turbo?
We’ll never know. That’s the annoying thing about the future, it’s hard to predict. But for me, looking back, GPT-4, ChatGPT is pretty damn impressive, historically impressive. So allow me to ask, what’s been the most impressive capabilities of GPT-4 to you and GPT-4 Turbo?
Sam Altman
I think it kind of sucks.
I think it kind of sucks.
Lex Fridman
Typical human also, gotten used to an awesome thing.
Typical human also, gotten used to an awesome thing.
Sam Altman
No, I think it is an amazing thing, but relative to where we need to get to and where I believe we will get to, at the time of GPT-3, people are like, “Oh, this is amazing. This is marvel of technology.” And it is, it was. But now we have GPT-4 and look at GPT-3 and you’re like, “That’s unimaginably horrible.” I expect that the delta between 5 and 4 will be the same as between 4 and 3 and I think it is our job to live a few years in the future and remember that the tools we have now are going to kind of suck looking backwards at them and that’s how we make sure the future is better.
No, I think it is an amazing thing, but relative to where we need to get to and where I believe we will get to, at the time of GPT-3, people are like, “Oh, this is amazing. This is marvel of technology.” And it is, it was. But now we have GPT-4 and look at GPT-3 and you’re like, “That’s unimaginably horrible.” I expect that the delta between 5 and 4 will be the same as between 4 and 3 and I think it is our job to live a few years in the future and remember that the tools we have now are going to kind of suck looking backwards at them and that’s how we make sure the future is better.
Lex Fridman
What are the most glorious ways in that GPT-4 sucks? Meaning-
What are the most glorious ways in that GPT-4 sucks? Meaning-
Sam Altman
What are the best things it can do?
What are the best things it can do?
Lex Fridman
What are the best things it can do and the limits of those best things that allow you to say it sucks, therefore gives you an inspiration and hope for the future?
What are the best things it can do and the limits of those best things that allow you to say it sucks, therefore gives you an inspiration and hope for the future?
Sam Altman
One thing I’ve been using it for more recently is sort of like a brainstorming partner.
One thing I’ve been using it for more recently is sort of like a brainstorming partner.
Lex Fridman
Yep, [inaudible 00:46:25] for that.
Yep, [inaudible 00:46:25] for that.
Sam Altman
There’s a glimmer of something amazing in there. When people talk about it, what it does, they’re like, “Oh, it helps me code more productively. It helps me write more faster and better. It helps me translate from this language to another,” all these amazing things, but there’s something about the kind of creative brainstorming partner, “I need to come up with a name for this thing. I need to think about this problem in a different way. I’m not sure what to do here,” that I think gives a glimpse of something I hope to see more of.
There’s a glimmer of something amazing in there. When people talk about it, what it does, they’re like, “Oh, it helps me code more productively. It helps me write more faster and better. It helps me translate from this language to another,” all these amazing things, but there’s something about the kind of creative brainstorming partner, “I need to come up with a name for this thing. I need to think about this problem in a different way. I’m not sure what to do here,” that I think gives a glimpse of something I hope to see more of.
One of the other things that you can see a very small glimpse of is when I can help on longer horizon tasks, break down something in multiple steps, maybe execute some of those steps, search the internet, write code, whatever, put that together. When that works, which is not very often, it’s very magical.
Lex Fridman
The iterative back and forth with a human, it works a lot for me. What do you mean it-
The iterative back and forth with a human, it works a lot for me. What do you mean it-
Sam Altman
Iterative back and forth to human, it can get more often when it can go do a 10 step problem on its own.
Iterative back and forth to human, it can get more often when it can go do a 10 step problem on its own.
Lex Fridman
Oh.
Oh.
Sam Altman
It doesn’t work for that too often, sometimes.
It doesn’t work for that too often, sometimes.
Lex Fridman
Add multiple layers of abstraction or do you mean just sequential?
Add multiple layers of abstraction or do you mean just sequential?
Sam Altman
Both, to break it down and then do things that different layers of abstraction to put them together. Look, I don’t want to downplay the accomplishment of GPT-4, but I don’t want to overstate it either. And I think this point that we are on an exponential curve, we’ll look back relatively soon at GPT-4 like we look back at GPT-3 now.
Both, to break it down and then do things that different layers of abstraction to put them together. Look, I don’t want to downplay the accomplishment of GPT-4, but I don’t want to overstate it either. And I think this point that we are on an exponential curve, we’ll look back relatively soon at GPT-4 like we look back at GPT-3 now.
Lex Fridman
That said, I mean ChatGPT was a transition to where people started to believe there is an uptick of believing, not internally at OpenAI.
That said, I mean ChatGPT was a transition to where people started to believe there is an uptick of believing, not internally at OpenAI.
Sam Altman
For sure.
For sure.
Lex Fridman
Perhaps there’s believers here, but when you think of-
Perhaps there’s believers here, but when you think of-
Sam Altman
And in that sense, I do think it’ll be a moment where a lot of the world went from not believing to believing. That was more about the ChatGPT interface. And by the interface and product, I also mean the post training of the model and how we tune it to be helpful to you and how to use it than the underlying model itself.
And in that sense, I do think it’ll be a moment where a lot of the world went from not believing to believing. That was more about the ChatGPT interface. And by the interface and product, I also mean the post training of the model and how we tune it to be helpful to you and how to use it than the underlying model itself.
Lex Fridman
How much of each of those things are important? The underlying model and the RLHF or something of that nature that tunes it to be more compelling to the human, more effective and productive for the human.
How much of each of those things are important? The underlying model and the RLHF or something of that nature that tunes it to be more compelling to the human, more effective and productive for the human.
Sam Altman
I mean they’re both super important, but the RLHF, the post-training step, the little wrapper of things that from a compute perspective, little wrapper of things that we do on top of the base model even though it’s a huge amount of work, that’s really important to say nothing of the product that we build around it. In some sense, we did have to do two things. We had to invent the underlying technology and then we had to figure out how to make it into a product people would love, which is not just about the actual product work itself, but this whole other step of how you align it and make it useful.
I mean they’re both super important, but the RLHF, the post-training step, the little wrapper of things that from a compute perspective, little wrapper of things that we do on top of the base model even though it’s a huge amount of work, that’s really important to say nothing of the product that we build around it. In some sense, we did have to do two things. We had to invent the underlying technology and then we had to figure out how to make it into a product people would love, which is not just about the actual product work itself, but this whole other step of how you align it and make it useful.
Lex Fridman
And how you make the scale work where a lot of people can use it at the same time. All that kind of stuff.
And how you make the scale work where a lot of people can use it at the same time. All that kind of stuff.
Sam Altman
And that. But that was a known difficult thing. We knew we were going to have to scale it up. We had to go do two things that had never been done before that were both I would say quite significant achievements and then a lot of things like scaling it up that other companies have had to do before.
And that. But that was a known difficult thing. We knew we were going to have to scale it up. We had to go do two things that had never been done before that were both I would say quite significant achievements and then a lot of things like scaling it up that other companies have had to do before.
Lex Fridman
How does the context window of going from 8K to 128K tokens compare from GPT-4 to GPT-4 Turbo?
How does the context window of going from 8K to 128K tokens compare from GPT-4 to GPT-4 Turbo?
Sam Altman
Most people don’t need all the way to 128 most of the time. Although if we dream into the distant future, we’ll have way distant future, we’ll have context length of several billion. You will feed in all of your information, all of your history over time and it’ll just get to know you better and better and that’ll be great. For now, the way people use these models, they’re not doing that. People sometimes post in a paper or a significant fraction of a code repository, whatever, but most usage of the models is not using the long context most of the time.
Most people don’t need all the way to 128 most of the time. Although if we dream into the distant future, we’ll have way distant future, we’ll have context length of several billion. You will feed in all of your information, all of your history over time and it’ll just get to know you better and better and that’ll be great. For now, the way people use these models, they’re not doing that. People sometimes post in a paper or a significant fraction of a code repository, whatever, but most usage of the models is not using the long context most of the time.
Lex Fridman
I like that this is your “I have a dream” speech. One day you’ll be judged by the full context of your character or of your whole lifetime. That’s interesting. So that’s part of the expansion that you’re hoping for, is a greater and greater context.
I like that this is your “I have a dream” speech. One day you’ll be judged by the full context of your character or of your whole lifetime. That’s interesting. So that’s part of the expansion that you’re hoping for, is a greater and greater context.
Sam Altman
I saw this internet clip once, I’m going to get the numbers wrong, but it was like Bill Gates talking about the amount of memory on some early computer, maybe it was 64K, maybe 640K, something like that. Most of it was used for the screen buffer. He just couldn’t seem genuine. He just couldn’t imagine that the world would eventually need gigabytes of memory in a computer or terabytes of memory in a computer. And you always do, or you always do just need to follow the exponential of technology and we will find out how to use better technology. So I can’t really imagine what it’s like right now for context links to go out to the billion someday. And they might not literally go there, but effectively it’ll feel like that. But I know we’ll use it and really not want to go back once we have it.
I saw this internet clip once, I’m going to get the numbers wrong, but it was like Bill Gates talking about the amount of memory on some early computer, maybe it was 64K, maybe 640K, something like that. Most of it was used for the screen buffer. He just couldn’t seem genuine. He just couldn’t imagine that the world would eventually need gigabytes of memory in a computer or terabytes of memory in a computer. And you always do, or you always do just need to follow the exponential of technology and we will find out how to use better technology. So I can’t really imagine what it’s like right now for context links to go out to the billion someday. And they might not literally go there, but effectively it’ll feel like that. But I know we’ll use it and really not want to go back once we have it.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, even saying billions 10 years from now might seem dumb because it’ll be trillions upon trillions.
Yeah, even saying billions 10 years from now might seem dumb because it’ll be trillions upon trillions.
Sam Altman
Sure.
Sure.
Lex Fridman
There’ll be some kind of breakthrough that will effectively feel like infinite context. But even 120, I have to be honest, I haven’t pushed it to that degree. Maybe putting in entire books or parts of books and so on, papers. What are some interesting use cases of GPT-4 that you’ve seen?
There’ll be some kind of breakthrough that will effectively feel like infinite context. But even 120, I have to be honest, I haven’t pushed it to that degree. Maybe putting in entire books or parts of books and so on, papers. What are some interesting use cases of GPT-4 that you’ve seen?
Sam Altman
The thing that I find most interesting is not any particular use case that we can talk about those, but it’s people who kind of like, this is mostly younger people, but people who use it as their default start for any kind of knowledge work task. And it’s the fact that it can do a lot of things reasonably well. You can use GPT-V, you can use it to help you write code, you can use it to help you do search, you can use it to edit a paper. The most interesting thing to me is the people who just use it as the start of their workflow.
The thing that I find most interesting is not any particular use case that we can talk about those, but it’s people who kind of like, this is mostly younger people, but people who use it as their default start for any kind of knowledge work task. And it’s the fact that it can do a lot of things reasonably well. You can use GPT-V, you can use it to help you write code, you can use it to help you do search, you can use it to edit a paper. The most interesting thing to me is the people who just use it as the start of their workflow.
Lex Fridman
I do as well for many things. I use it as a reading partner for reading books. It helps me think, help me think through ideas, especially when the books are classic. So it’s really well written about. I find it often to be significantly better than even Wikipedia on well-covered topics. It’s somehow more balanced and more nuanced. Or maybe it’s me, but it inspires me to think deeper than a Wikipedia article does. I’m not exactly sure what that is.
I do as well for many things. I use it as a reading partner for reading books. It helps me think, help me think through ideas, especially when the books are classic. So it’s really well written about. I find it often to be significantly better than even Wikipedia on well-covered topics. It’s somehow more balanced and more nuanced. Or maybe it’s me, but it inspires me to think deeper than a Wikipedia article does. I’m not exactly sure what that is.
You mentioned this collaboration. I’m not sure where the magic is, if it’s in here or if it’s in there or if it’s somewhere in between. I’m not sure. But one of the things that concerns me for knowledge task when I start with GPT is I’ll usually have to do fact checking after, like check that it didn’t come up with fake stuff. How do you figure that out that GPT can come up with fake stuff that sounds really convincing? So how do you ground it in truth?
Sam Altman
That’s obviously an area of intense interest for us. I think it’s going to get a lot better with upcoming versions, but we’ll have to continue to work on it and we’re not going to have it all solved this year.
That’s obviously an area of intense interest for us. I think it’s going to get a lot better with upcoming versions, but we’ll have to continue to work on it and we’re not going to have it all solved this year.
Lex Fridman
Well the scary thing is, as it gets better, you’ll start not doing the fact checking more and more, right?
Well the scary thing is, as it gets better, you’ll start not doing the fact checking more and more, right?
Sam Altman
I’m of two minds about that. I think people are much more sophisticated users of technology than we often give them credit for.
I’m of two minds about that. I think people are much more sophisticated users of technology than we often give them credit for.
Lex Fridman
Sure.
Sure.
Sam Altman
And people seem to really understand that GPT, any of these models hallucinate some of the time. And if it’s mission-critical, you got to check it.
And people seem to really understand that GPT, any of these models hallucinate some of the time. And if it’s mission-critical, you got to check it.
Lex Fridman
Except journalists don’t seem to understand that. I’ve seen journalists half-assedly just using GPT-4. It’s-
Except journalists don’t seem to understand that. I’ve seen journalists half-assedly just using GPT-4. It’s-
Sam Altman
Of the long list of things I’d like to dunk on journalists for, this is not my top criticism of them.
Of the long list of things I’d like to dunk on journalists for, this is not my top criticism of them.
Lex Fridman
Well, I think the bigger criticism is perhaps the pressures and the incentives of being a journalist is that you have to work really quickly and this is a shortcut.I would love our society to incentivize like-
Well, I think the bigger criticism is perhaps the pressures and the incentives of being a journalist is that you have to work really quickly and this is a shortcut.I would love our society to incentivize like-
Sam Altman
I would too.
I would too.
Lex Fridman
… like a journalistic efforts that take days and weeks and rewards great in depth journalism. Also journalism that present stuff in a balanced way where it’s like celebrates people while criticizing them even though the criticism is the thing that gets clicks and making shit up also gets clicks and headlines that mischaracterized completely. I’m sure you have a lot of people dunking on, “Well, all that drama probably got a lot of clicks.”
… like a journalistic efforts that take days and weeks and rewards great in depth journalism. Also journalism that present stuff in a balanced way where it’s like celebrates people while criticizing them even though the criticism is the thing that gets clicks and making shit up also gets clicks and headlines that mischaracterized completely. I’m sure you have a lot of people dunking on, “Well, all that drama probably got a lot of clicks.”
Sam Altman
Probably did.
Probably did.
Memory & privacy
Lex Fridman
And that’s a bigger problem about human civilization I’d love to see-saw. This is where we celebrate a bit more. You’ve given ChatGPT the ability to have memories. You’ve been playing with that about previous conversations. And also the ability to turn off memory. I wish I could do that sometimes. Just turn on and off, depending. I guess sometimes alcohol can do that, but not optimally I suppose. What have you seen through that, like playing around with that idea of remembering conversations and not…
And that’s a bigger problem about human civilization I’d love to see-saw. This is where we celebrate a bit more. You’ve given ChatGPT the ability to have memories. You’ve been playing with that about previous conversations. And also the ability to turn off memory. I wish I could do that sometimes. Just turn on and off, depending. I guess sometimes alcohol can do that, but not optimally I suppose. What have you seen through that, like playing around with that idea of remembering conversations and not…
Sam Altman
We’re very early in our explorations here, but I think what people want, or at least what I want for myself, is a model that gets to know me and gets more useful to me over time. This is an early exploration. I think there’s a lot of other things to do, but that’s where we’d like to head. You’d like to use a model, and over the course of your life or use a system, it’d be many models, and over the course of your life it gets better and better.
We’re very early in our explorations here, but I think what people want, or at least what I want for myself, is a model that gets to know me and gets more useful to me over time. This is an early exploration. I think there’s a lot of other things to do, but that’s where we’d like to head. You’d like to use a model, and over the course of your life or use a system, it’d be many models, and over the course of your life it gets better and better.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. How hard is that problem? Because right now it’s more like remembering little factoids and preferences and so on. What about remembering? Don’t you want GPT to remember all the shit you went through in November and all the drama and then you can-
Yeah. How hard is that problem? Because right now it’s more like remembering little factoids and preferences and so on. What about remembering? Don’t you want GPT to remember all the shit you went through in November and all the drama and then you can-
Sam Altman
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah.
Lex Fridman
Because right now you’re clearly blocking it out a little bit.
Because right now you’re clearly blocking it out a little bit.
Sam Altman
It’s not just that I want it to remember that. I want it to integrate the lessons of that and remind me in the future what to do differently or what to watch out for. We all gain from experience over the course of our lives in varying degrees, and I’d like my AI agent to gain with that experience too. So if we go back and let ourselves imagine that trillions and trillions of context length, if I can put every conversation I’ve ever had with anybody in my life in there, if I can have all of my emails input out, all of my input output in the context window every time I ask a question, that’d be pretty cool I think.
It’s not just that I want it to remember that. I want it to integrate the lessons of that and remind me in the future what to do differently or what to watch out for. We all gain from experience over the course of our lives in varying degrees, and I’d like my AI agent to gain with that experience too. So if we go back and let ourselves imagine that trillions and trillions of context length, if I can put every conversation I’ve ever had with anybody in my life in there, if I can have all of my emails input out, all of my input output in the context window every time I ask a question, that’d be pretty cool I think.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, I think that would be very cool. People sometimes will hear that and be concerned about privacy. What do you think about that aspect of it, the more effective the AI becomes that really integrating all the experiences and all the data that happened to you and give you advice?
Yeah, I think that would be very cool. People sometimes will hear that and be concerned about privacy. What do you think about that aspect of it, the more effective the AI becomes that really integrating all the experiences and all the data that happened to you and give you advice?
Sam Altman
I think the right answer there is just user choice. Anything I want stricken from the record from my AI agent, I want to be able to take out. If I don’t want to remember anything, I want that too. You and I may have different opinions about where on that privacy utility trade off for our own AI-
I think the right answer there is just user choice. Anything I want stricken from the record from my AI agent, I want to be able to take out. If I don’t want to remember anything, I want that too. You and I may have different opinions about where on that privacy utility trade off for our own AI-
Sam Altman
…opinions about where on that privacy/utility trade-off for OpenAI going to be, which is totally fine. But I think the answer is just really easy user choice.
…opinions about where on that privacy/utility trade-off for OpenAI going to be, which is totally fine. But I think the answer is just really easy user choice.
Lex Fridman
But there should be some high level of transparency from a company about the user choice. Because sometimes companies in the past have been kind of shady about, “Eh, it’s kind of presumed that we’re collecting all your data. We’re using it for a good reason, for advertisement and so on.” But there’s not a transparency about the details of that.
But there should be some high level of transparency from a company about the user choice. Because sometimes companies in the past have been kind of shady about, “Eh, it’s kind of presumed that we’re collecting all your data. We’re using it for a good reason, for advertisement and so on.” But there’s not a transparency about the details of that.
Sam Altman
That’s totally true. You mentioned earlier that I’m blocking out the November stuff.
That’s totally true. You mentioned earlier that I’m blocking out the November stuff.
Lex Fridman
Just teasing you.
Just teasing you.
Sam Altman
Well, I mean, I think it was a very traumatic thing and it did immobilize me for a long period of time. Definitely the hardest work thing I’ve had to do was just keep working that period, because I had to try to come back in here and put the pieces together while I was just in shock and pain, and nobody really cares about that. I mean, the team gave me a pass and I was not working at my normal level. But there was a period where it was really hard to have to do both. But I kind of woke up one morning, and I was like, “This was a horrible thing that happened to me. I think I could just feel like a victim forever, or I can say this is the most important work I’ll ever touch in my life and I need to get back to it.” And it doesn’t mean that I’ve repressed it, because sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night thinking about it, but I do feel an obligation to keep moving forward.
Well, I mean, I think it was a very traumatic thing and it did immobilize me for a long period of time. Definitely the hardest work thing I’ve had to do was just keep working that period, because I had to try to come back in here and put the pieces together while I was just in shock and pain, and nobody really cares about that. I mean, the team gave me a pass and I was not working at my normal level. But there was a period where it was really hard to have to do both. But I kind of woke up one morning, and I was like, “This was a horrible thing that happened to me. I think I could just feel like a victim forever, or I can say this is the most important work I’ll ever touch in my life and I need to get back to it.” And it doesn’t mean that I’ve repressed it, because sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night thinking about it, but I do feel an obligation to keep moving forward.
Lex Fridman
Well, that’s beautifully said, but there could be some lingering stuff in there. Like, what I would be concerned about is that trust thing that you mentioned, that being paranoid about people as opposed to just trusting everybody or most people, like using your gut. It’s a tricky dance.
Well, that’s beautifully said, but there could be some lingering stuff in there. Like, what I would be concerned about is that trust thing that you mentioned, that being paranoid about people as opposed to just trusting everybody or most people, like using your gut. It’s a tricky dance.
Sam Altman
For sure.
For sure.
Lex Fridman
I mean, because I’ve seen in my part-time explorations, I’ve been diving deeply into the Zelenskyy administration and the Putin administration and the dynamics there in wartime in a very highly stressful environment. And what happens is distrust, and you isolate yourself, both, and you start to not see the world clearly. And that’s a human concern. You seem to have taken it in stride and kind of learned the good lessons and felt the love and let the love energize you, which is great, but still can linger in there. There’s just some questions I would love to ask, your intuition about what’s GPT able to do and not. So it’s allocating approximately the same amount of compute for each token it generates. Is there room there in this kind of approach to slower thinking, sequential thinking?
I mean, because I’ve seen in my part-time explorations, I’ve been diving deeply into the Zelenskyy administration and the Putin administration and the dynamics there in wartime in a very highly stressful environment. And what happens is distrust, and you isolate yourself, both, and you start to not see the world clearly. And that’s a human concern. You seem to have taken it in stride and kind of learned the good lessons and felt the love and let the love energize you, which is great, but still can linger in there. There’s just some questions I would love to ask, your intuition about what’s GPT able to do and not. So it’s allocating approximately the same amount of compute for each token it generates. Is there room there in this kind of approach to slower thinking, sequential thinking?
Sam Altman
I think there will be a new paradigm for that kind of thinking.
I think there will be a new paradigm for that kind of thinking.
Lex Fridman
Will it be similar architecturally as what we’re seeing now with LLMs? Is it a layer on top of LLMs?
Will it be similar architecturally as what we’re seeing now with LLMs? Is it a layer on top of LLMs?
Sam Altman
I can imagine many ways to implement that. I think that’s less important than the question you were getting at, which is, do we need a way to do a slower kind of thinking, where the answer doesn’t have to get… I guess spiritually you could say that you want an AI to be able to think harder about a harder problem and answer more quickly about an easier problem. And I think that will be important.
I can imagine many ways to implement that. I think that’s less important than the question you were getting at, which is, do we need a way to do a slower kind of thinking, where the answer doesn’t have to get… I guess spiritually you could say that you want an AI to be able to think harder about a harder problem and answer more quickly about an easier problem. And I think that will be important.
Lex Fridman
Is that like a human thought that we just have and you should be able to think hard? Is that wrong intuition?
Is that like a human thought that we just have and you should be able to think hard? Is that wrong intuition?
Sam Altman
I suspect that’s a reasonable intuition.
I suspect that’s a reasonable intuition.
Lex Fridman
Interesting. So it’s not possible once the GPT gets like GPT-7, would just instantaneously be able to see, “Here’s the proof of Fermat’s Theorem”?
Interesting. So it’s not possible once the GPT gets like GPT-7, would just instantaneously be able to see, “Here’s the proof of Fermat’s Theorem”?
Sam Altman
It seems to me like you want to be able to allocate more compute to harder problems. It seems to me that if you ask a system like that, “Prove Fermat’s Last Theorem,” versus, “What’s today’s date?,” unless it already knew and and had memorized the answer to the proof, assuming it’s got to go figure that out, seems like that will take more compute.
It seems to me like you want to be able to allocate more compute to harder problems. It seems to me that if you ask a system like that, “Prove Fermat’s Last Theorem,” versus, “What’s today’s date?,” unless it already knew and and had memorized the answer to the proof, assuming it’s got to go figure that out, seems like that will take more compute.
Lex Fridman
But can it look like basically an LLM talking to itself, that kind of thing?
But can it look like basically an LLM talking to itself, that kind of thing?
Sam Altman
Maybe. I mean, there’s a lot of things that you could imagine working. What the right or the best way to do that will be, we don’t know.
Maybe. I mean, there’s a lot of things that you could imagine working. What the right or the best way to do that will be, we don’t know.
Q*
Lex Fridman
This does make me think of the mysterious lore behind Q*. What’s this mysterious Q* project? Is it also in the same nuclear facility?
This does make me think of the mysterious lore behind Q*. What’s this mysterious Q* project? Is it also in the same nuclear facility?
Sam Altman
There is no nuclear facility.
There is no nuclear facility.
Lex Fridman
Mm-hmm. That’s what a person with a nuclear facility always says.
Mm-hmm. That’s what a person with a nuclear facility always says.
Sam Altman
I would love to have a secret nuclear facility. There isn’t one.
I would love to have a secret nuclear facility. There isn’t one.
Lex Fridman
All right.
All right.
Sam Altman
Maybe someday.
Maybe someday.
Lex Fridman
Someday? All right. One can dream.
Someday? All right. One can dream.
Sam Altman
OpenAI is not a good company at keeping secrets. It would be nice. We’re like, been plagued by a lot of leaks, and it would be nice if we were able to have something like that.
OpenAI is not a good company at keeping secrets. It would be nice. We’re like, been plagued by a lot of leaks, and it would be nice if we were able to have something like that.
Lex Fridman
Can you speak to what Q* is?
Can you speak to what Q* is?
Sam Altman
We are not ready to talk about that.
We are not ready to talk about that.
Lex Fridman
See, but an answer like that means there’s something to talk about. It’s very mysterious, Sam.
See, but an answer like that means there’s something to talk about. It’s very mysterious, Sam.
Sam Altman
I mean, we work on all kinds of research. We have said for a while that we think better reasoning in these systems is an important direction that we’d like to pursue. We haven’t cracked the code yet. We’re very interested in it.
I mean, we work on all kinds of research. We have said for a while that we think better reasoning in these systems is an important direction that we’d like to pursue. We haven’t cracked the code yet. We’re very interested in it.
Lex Fridman
Is there going to be moments, Q* or otherwise, where there’s going to be leaps similar to ChatGPT, where you’re like…
Is there going to be moments, Q* or otherwise, where there’s going to be leaps similar to ChatGPT, where you’re like…
Sam Altman
That’s a good question. What do I think about that? It’s interesting. To me, it all feels pretty continuous.
That’s a good question. What do I think about that? It’s interesting. To me, it all feels pretty continuous.
Lex Fridman
Right. This is kind of a theme that you’re saying, is you’re basically gradually going up an exponential slope. But from an outsider’s perspective, from me just watching, it does feel like there’s leaps. But to you, there isn’t?
Right. This is kind of a theme that you’re saying, is you’re basically gradually going up an exponential slope. But from an outsider’s perspective, from me just watching, it does feel like there’s leaps. But to you, there isn’t?
Sam Altman
I do wonder if we should have… So part of the reason that we deploy the way we do, we call it iterative deployment, rather than go build in secret until we got all the way to GPT-5, we decided to talk about GPT-1, 2, 3, and 4. And part of the reason there is I think AI and surprise don’t go together. And also the world, people, institutions, whatever you want to call it, need time to adapt and think about these things. And I think one of the best things that OpenAI has done is this strategy, and we get the world to pay attention to the progress, to take AGI seriously, to think about what systems and structures and governance we want in place before we’re under the gun and have to make a rush decision.
I do wonder if we should have… So part of the reason that we deploy the way we do, we call it iterative deployment, rather than go build in secret until we got all the way to GPT-5, we decided to talk about GPT-1, 2, 3, and 4. And part of the reason there is I think AI and surprise don’t go together. And also the world, people, institutions, whatever you want to call it, need time to adapt and think about these things. And I think one of the best things that OpenAI has done is this strategy, and we get the world to pay attention to the progress, to take AGI seriously, to think about what systems and structures and governance we want in place before we’re under the gun and have to make a rush decision.
I think that’s really good. But the fact that people like you and others say you still feel like there are these leaps makes me think that maybe we should be doing our releasing even more iteratively. And I don’t know what that would mean, I don’t have an answer ready to go, but our goal is not to have shock updates to the world. The opposite.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, for sure. More iterative would be amazing. I think that’s just beautiful for everybody.
Yeah, for sure. More iterative would be amazing. I think that’s just beautiful for everybody.
Sam Altman
But that’s what we’re trying to do, that’s our stated strategy, and I think we’re somehow missing the mark. So maybe we should think about releasing GPT-5 in a different way or something like that.
But that’s what we’re trying to do, that’s our stated strategy, and I think we’re somehow missing the mark. So maybe we should think about releasing GPT-5 in a different way or something like that.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, 4.71, 4.72. But people tend to like to celebrate, people celebrate birthdays. I don’t know if you know humans, but they kind of have these milestones and those things.
Yeah, 4.71, 4.72. But people tend to like to celebrate, people celebrate birthdays. I don’t know if you know humans, but they kind of have these milestones and those things.
Sam Altman
I do know some humans. People do like milestones. I totally get that. I think we like milestones too. It’s fun to declare victory on this one and go start the next thing. But yeah, I feel like we’re somehow getting this a little bit wrong.
I do know some humans. People do like milestones. I totally get that. I think we like milestones too. It’s fun to declare victory on this one and go start the next thing. But yeah, I feel like we’re somehow getting this a little bit wrong.
GPT-5
Lex Fridman
So when is GPT-5 coming out again?
So when is GPT-5 coming out again?
Sam Altman
I don’t know. That’s the honest answer.
I don’t know. That’s the honest answer.
Lex Fridman
Oh, that’s the honest answer. Blink twice if it’s this year.
Oh, that’s the honest answer. Blink twice if it’s this year.
Sam Altman
We will release an amazing new model this year. I don’t know what we’ll call it.
We will release an amazing new model this year. I don’t know what we’ll call it.
Lex Fridman
So that goes to the question of, what’s the way we release this thing?
So that goes to the question of, what’s the way we release this thing?
Sam Altman
We’ll release in the coming months many different things. I think that’d be very cool. I think before we talk about a GPT-5-like model called that, or not called that, or a little bit worse or a little bit better than what you’d expect from a GPT-5, I think we have a lot of other important things to release first.
We’ll release in the coming months many different things. I think that’d be very cool. I think before we talk about a GPT-5-like model called that, or not called that, or a little bit worse or a little bit better than what you’d expect from a GPT-5, I think we have a lot of other important things to release first.
Lex Fridman
I don’t know what to expect from GPT-5. You’re making me nervous and excited. What are some of the biggest challenges and bottlenecks to overcome for whatever it ends up being called, but let’s call it GPT-5? Just interesting to ask. Is it on the compute side? Is it on the technical side?
I don’t know what to expect from GPT-5. You’re making me nervous and excited. What are some of the biggest challenges and bottlenecks to overcome for whatever it ends up being called, but let’s call it GPT-5? Just interesting to ask. Is it on the compute side? Is it on the technical side?
Sam Altman
It’s always all of these. You know, what’s the one big unlock? Is it a bigger computer? Is it a new secret? Is it something else? It’s all of these things together. The thing that OpenAI, I think, does really well… This is actually an original Ilya quote that I’m going to butcher, but it’s something like, “We multiply 200 medium-sized things together into one giant thing.”
It’s always all of these. You know, what’s the one big unlock? Is it a bigger computer? Is it a new secret? Is it something else? It’s all of these things together. The thing that OpenAI, I think, does really well… This is actually an original Ilya quote that I’m going to butcher, but it’s something like, “We multiply 200 medium-sized things together into one giant thing.”
Lex Fridman
So there’s this distributed constant innovation happening?
So there’s this distributed constant innovation happening?
Sam Altman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
So even on the technical side?
So even on the technical side?
Sam Altman
Especially on the technical side.
Especially on the technical side.
Lex Fridman
So even detailed approaches?
So even detailed approaches?
Sam Altman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
Like you do detailed aspects of every… How does that work with different, disparate teams and so on? How do the medium-sized things become one whole giant Transformer?
Like you do detailed aspects of every… How does that work with different, disparate teams and so on? How do the medium-sized things become one whole giant Transformer?
Sam Altman
There’s a few people who have to think about putting the whole thing together, but a lot of people try to keep most of the picture in their head.
There’s a few people who have to think about putting the whole thing together, but a lot of people try to keep most of the picture in their head.
Lex Fridman
Oh, like the individual teams, individual contributors try to keep the bigger picture?
Oh, like the individual teams, individual contributors try to keep the bigger picture?
Sam Altman
At a high level, yeah. You don’t know exactly how every piece works, of course, but one thing I generally believe is that it’s sometimes useful to zoom out and look at the entire map. And I think this is true for a technical problem, I think this is true for innovating in business. But things come together in surprising ways, and having an understanding of that whole picture, even if most of the time you’re operating in the weeds in one area, pays off with surprising insights. In fact, one of the things that I used to have and was super valuable was I used to have a good map of all or most of the frontiers in the tech industry. And I could sometimes see these connections or new things that were possible that if I were only deep in one area, I wouldn’t be able to have the idea for because I wouldn’t have all the data. And I don’t really have that much anymore. I’m super deep now. But I know that it’s a valuable thing.
At a high level, yeah. You don’t know exactly how every piece works, of course, but one thing I generally believe is that it’s sometimes useful to zoom out and look at the entire map. And I think this is true for a technical problem, I think this is true for innovating in business. But things come together in surprising ways, and having an understanding of that whole picture, even if most of the time you’re operating in the weeds in one area, pays off with surprising insights. In fact, one of the things that I used to have and was super valuable was I used to have a good map of all or most of the frontiers in the tech industry. And I could sometimes see these connections or new things that were possible that if I were only deep in one area, I wouldn’t be able to have the idea for because I wouldn’t have all the data. And I don’t really have that much anymore. I’m super deep now. But I know that it’s a valuable thing.
Lex Fridman
You’re not the man you used to be, Sam.
You’re not the man you used to be, Sam.
Sam Altman
Very different job now than what I used to have.
Very different job now than what I used to have.
$7 trillion of compute
Lex Fridman
Speaking of zooming out, let’s zoom out to another cheeky thing, but profound thing, perhaps, that you said. You tweeted about needing $7 trillion.
Speaking of zooming out, let’s zoom out to another cheeky thing, but profound thing, perhaps, that you said. You tweeted about needing $7 trillion.
Sam Altman
I did not tweet about that. I never said, like, “We’re raising $7 trillion,” blah blah blah.
I did not tweet about that. I never said, like, “We’re raising $7 trillion,” blah blah blah.
Lex Fridman
Oh, that’s somebody else?
Oh, that’s somebody else?
Sam Altman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
Oh, but you said, “Fuck it, maybe eight,” I think?
Oh, but you said, “Fuck it, maybe eight,” I think?
Sam Altman
Okay, I meme once there’s misinformation out in the world.
Okay, I meme once there’s misinformation out in the world.
Lex Fridman
Oh, you meme. But misinformation may have a foundation of insight there.
Oh, you meme. But misinformation may have a foundation of insight there.
Sam Altman
Look, I think compute is going to be the currency of the future. I think it will be maybe the most precious commodity in the world, and I think we should be investing heavily to make a lot more compute. Compute, I think it’s going to be an unusual market. People think about the market for chips for mobile phones or something like that. And you can say that, okay, there’s 8 billion people in the world, maybe 7 billion of them have phones, maybe 6 billion, let’s say. They upgrade every two years, so the market per year is 3 billion system-on-chip for smartphones. And if you make 30 billion, you will not sell 10 times as many phones, because most people have one phone.
Look, I think compute is going to be the currency of the future. I think it will be maybe the most precious commodity in the world, and I think we should be investing heavily to make a lot more compute. Compute, I think it’s going to be an unusual market. People think about the market for chips for mobile phones or something like that. And you can say that, okay, there’s 8 billion people in the world, maybe 7 billion of them have phones, maybe 6 billion, let’s say. They upgrade every two years, so the market per year is 3 billion system-on-chip for smartphones. And if you make 30 billion, you will not sell 10 times as many phones, because most people have one phone.
But compute is different. Intelligence is going to be more like energy or something like that, where the only thing that I think makes sense to talk about is, at price X, the world will use this much compute, and at price Y, the world will use this much compute. Because if it’s really cheap, I’ll have it reading my email all day, giving me suggestions about what I maybe should think about or work on, and trying to cure cancer, and if it’s really expensive, maybe I’ll only use it, or we’ll only use it, to try to cure cancer.
So I think the world is going to want a tremendous amount of compute. And there’s a lot of parts of that that are hard. Energy is the hardest part, building data centers is also hard, the supply chain is hard, and then of course, fabricating enough chips is hard. But this seems to be where things are going. We’re going to want an amount of compute that’s just hard to reason about right now.
Lex Fridman
How do you solve the energy puzzle? Nuclear-
How do you solve the energy puzzle? Nuclear-
Sam Altman
That’s what I believe.
That’s what I believe.
Lex Fridman
…fusion?
…fusion?
Sam Altman
That’s what I believe.
That’s what I believe.
Lex Fridman
Nuclear fusion?
Nuclear fusion?
Sam Altman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
Who’s going to solve that?
Who’s going to solve that?
Sam Altman
I think Helion’s doing the best work, but I’m happy there’s a race for fusion right now. Nuclear fission, I think, is also quite amazing, and I hope as a world we can re-embrace that. It’s really sad to me how the history of that went, and hope we get back to it in a meaningful way.
I think Helion’s doing the best work, but I’m happy there’s a race for fusion right now. Nuclear fission, I think, is also quite amazing, and I hope as a world we can re-embrace that. It’s really sad to me how the history of that went, and hope we get back to it in a meaningful way.
Lex Fridman
So to you, part of the puzzle is nuclear fission? Like nuclear reactors as we currently have them? And a lot of people are terrified because of Chernobyl and so on?
So to you, part of the puzzle is nuclear fission? Like nuclear reactors as we currently have them? And a lot of people are terrified because of Chernobyl and so on?
Sam Altman
Well, I think we should make new reactors. I think it’s just a shame that industry kind of ground to a halt.
Well, I think we should make new reactors. I think it’s just a shame that industry kind of ground to a halt.
Lex Fridman
And just mass hysteria is how you explain the halt?
And just mass hysteria is how you explain the halt?
Sam Altman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
I don’t know if you know humans, but that’s one of the dangers. That’s one of the security threats for nuclear fission, is humans seem to be really afraid of it. And that’s something we’ll have to incorporate into the calculus of it, so we have to kind of win people over and to show how safe it is.
I don’t know if you know humans, but that’s one of the dangers. That’s one of the security threats for nuclear fission, is humans seem to be really afraid of it. And that’s something we’ll have to incorporate into the calculus of it, so we have to kind of win people over and to show how safe it is.
Sam Altman
I worry about that for AI. I think some things are going to go theatrically wrong with AI. I don’t know what the percent chance is that I eventually get shot, but it’s not zero.
I worry about that for AI. I think some things are going to go theatrically wrong with AI. I don’t know what the percent chance is that I eventually get shot, but it’s not zero.
Lex Fridman
Oh, like we want to stop this from-
Oh, like we want to stop this from-
Sam Altman
Maybe.
Maybe.
Lex Fridman
How do you decrease the theatrical nature of it? I’m already starting to hear rumblings, because I do talk to people on both sides of the political spectrum, hear rumblings where it’s going to be politicized. AI is going to be politicized, which really worries me, because then it’s like maybe the right is against AI and the left is for AI because it’s going to help the people, or whatever the narrative and the formulation is, that really worries me. And then the theatrical nature of it can be leveraged fully. How do you fight that?
How do you decrease the theatrical nature of it? I’m already starting to hear rumblings, because I do talk to people on both sides of the political spectrum, hear rumblings where it’s going to be politicized. AI is going to be politicized, which really worries me, because then it’s like maybe the right is against AI and the left is for AI because it’s going to help the people, or whatever the narrative and the formulation is, that really worries me. And then the theatrical nature of it can be leveraged fully. How do you fight that?
Sam Altman
I think it will get caught up in left versus right wars. I don’t know exactly what that’s going to look like, but I think that’s just what happens with anything of consequence, unfortunately. What I meant more about theatrical risks is AI’s going to have, I believe, tremendously more good consequences than bad ones, but it is going to have bad ones, and there’ll be some bad ones that are bad but not theatrical. A lot more people have died of air pollution than nuclear reactors, for example. But most people worry more about living next to a nuclear reactor than a coal plant. But something about the way we’re wired is that although there’s many different kinds of risks we have to confront, the ones that make a good climax scene of a movie carry much more weight with us than the ones that are very bad over a long period of time but on a slow burn.
I think it will get caught up in left versus right wars. I don’t know exactly what that’s going to look like, but I think that’s just what happens with anything of consequence, unfortunately. What I meant more about theatrical risks is AI’s going to have, I believe, tremendously more good consequences than bad ones, but it is going to have bad ones, and there’ll be some bad ones that are bad but not theatrical. A lot more people have died of air pollution than nuclear reactors, for example. But most people worry more about living next to a nuclear reactor than a coal plant. But something about the way we’re wired is that although there’s many different kinds of risks we have to confront, the ones that make a good climax scene of a movie carry much more weight with us than the ones that are very bad over a long period of time but on a slow burn.
Lex Fridman
Well, that’s why truth matters, and hopefully AI can help us see the truth of things, to have balance, to understand what are the actual risks, what are the actual dangers of things in the world. What are the pros and cons of the competition in the space and competing with Google, Meta, xAI, and others?
Well, that’s why truth matters, and hopefully AI can help us see the truth of things, to have balance, to understand what are the actual risks, what are the actual dangers of things in the world. What are the pros and cons of the competition in the space and competing with Google, Meta, xAI, and others?
Sam Altman
I think I have a pretty straightforward answer to this that maybe I can think of more nuance later, but the pros seem obvious, which is that we get better products and more innovation faster and cheaper, and all the reasons competition is good. And the con is that I think if we’re not careful, it could lead to an increase in sort of an arms race that I’m nervous about.
I think I have a pretty straightforward answer to this that maybe I can think of more nuance later, but the pros seem obvious, which is that we get better products and more innovation faster and cheaper, and all the reasons competition is good. And the con is that I think if we’re not careful, it could lead to an increase in sort of an arms race that I’m nervous about.
Lex Fridman
Do you feel the pressure of that arms race, like in some negative [inaudible 01:15:25]?
Do you feel the pressure of that arms race, like in some negative [inaudible 01:15:25]?
Sam Altman
Definitely in some ways, for sure. We spend a lot of time talking about the need to prioritize safety. And I’ve said for a long time that you think of a quadrant of slow timelines for the start of AGI, long timelines, and then a short takeoff or a fast takeoff. I think short timeline, slow takeoff is the safest quadrant and the one I’d most like us to be in. But I do want to make sure we get that slow takeoff.
Definitely in some ways, for sure. We spend a lot of time talking about the need to prioritize safety. And I’ve said for a long time that you think of a quadrant of slow timelines for the start of AGI, long timelines, and then a short takeoff or a fast takeoff. I think short timeline, slow takeoff is the safest quadrant and the one I’d most like us to be in. But I do want to make sure we get that slow takeoff.
Lex Fridman
Part of the problem I have with this kind of slight beef with Elon is that there’s silos created as opposed to collaboration on the safety aspect of all of this. It tends to go into silos and closed. Open source, perhaps, in the model.
Part of the problem I have with this kind of slight beef with Elon is that there’s silos created as opposed to collaboration on the safety aspect of all of this. It tends to go into silos and closed. Open source, perhaps, in the model.
Sam Altman
Elon says, at least, that he cares a great deal about AI safety and is really worried about it, and I assume that he’s not going to race unsafely.
Elon says, at least, that he cares a great deal about AI safety and is really worried about it, and I assume that he’s not going to race unsafely.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. But collaboration here, I think, is really beneficial for everybody on that front.
Yeah. But collaboration here, I think, is really beneficial for everybody on that front.
Sam Altman
Not really the thing he’s most known for.
Not really the thing he’s most known for.
Lex Fridman
Well, he is known for caring about humanity, and humanity benefits from collaboration, and so there’s always a tension in incentives and motivations. And in the end, I do hope humanity prevails.
Well, he is known for caring about humanity, and humanity benefits from collaboration, and so there’s always a tension in incentives and motivations. And in the end, I do hope humanity prevails.
Sam Altman
I was thinking, someone just reminded me the other day about how the day that he surpassed Jeff Bezos for richest person in the world, he tweeted a silver medal at Jeff Bezos. I hope we have less stuff like that as people start to work towards AGI.
I was thinking, someone just reminded me the other day about how the day that he surpassed Jeff Bezos for richest person in the world, he tweeted a silver medal at Jeff Bezos. I hope we have less stuff like that as people start to work towards AGI.
Lex Fridman
I agree. I think Elon is a friend and he’s a beautiful human being and one of the most important humans ever. That stuff is not good.
I agree. I think Elon is a friend and he’s a beautiful human being and one of the most important humans ever. That stuff is not good.
Sam Altman
The amazing stuff about Elon is amazing and I super respect him. I think we need him. All of us should be rooting for him and need him to step up as a leader through this next phase.
The amazing stuff about Elon is amazing and I super respect him. I think we need him. All of us should be rooting for him and need him to step up as a leader through this next phase.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. I hope he can have one without the other, but sometimes humans are flawed and complicated and all that kind of stuff.
Yeah. I hope he can have one without the other, but sometimes humans are flawed and complicated and all that kind of stuff.
Sam Altman
There’s a lot of really great leaders throughout history.
There’s a lot of really great leaders throughout history.
Google and Gemini
Lex Fridman
Yeah, and we can each be the best version of ourselves and strive to do so. Let me ask you, Google, with the help of search, has been dominating the past 20 years. Think it’s fair to say, in terms of the world’s access to information, how we interact and so on, and one of the nerve-wracking things for Google, but for the entirety of people in the space, is thinking about, how are people going to access information? Like you said, people show up to GPT as a starting point. So is OpenAI going to really take on this thing that Google started 20 years ago, which is how do we get-
Yeah, and we can each be the best version of ourselves and strive to do so. Let me ask you, Google, with the help of search, has been dominating the past 20 years. Think it’s fair to say, in terms of the world’s access to information, how we interact and so on, and one of the nerve-wracking things for Google, but for the entirety of people in the space, is thinking about, how are people going to access information? Like you said, people show up to GPT as a starting point. So is OpenAI going to really take on this thing that Google started 20 years ago, which is how do we get-
Sam Altman
I find that boring. I mean, if the question is if we can build a better search engine than Google or whatever, then sure, we should go, people should use the better product, but I think that would so understate what this can be. Google shows you 10 blue links, well, 13 ads and then 10 blue links, and that’s one way to find information. But the thing that’s exciting to me is not that we can go build a better copy of Google search, but that maybe there’s just some much better way to help people find and act on and synthesize information. Actually, I think ChatGPT is that for some use cases, and hopefully we’ll make it be like that for a lot more use cases.
I find that boring. I mean, if the question is if we can build a better search engine than Google or whatever, then sure, we should go, people should use the better product, but I think that would so understate what this can be. Google shows you 10 blue links, well, 13 ads and then 10 blue links, and that’s one way to find information. But the thing that’s exciting to me is not that we can go build a better copy of Google search, but that maybe there’s just some much better way to help people find and act on and synthesize information. Actually, I think ChatGPT is that for some use cases, and hopefully we’ll make it be like that for a lot more use cases.
But I don’t think it’s that interesting to say, “How do we go do a better job of giving you 10 ranked webpages to look at than what Google does?” Maybe it’s really interesting to go say, “How do we help you get the answer or the information you need? How do we help create that in some cases, synthesize that in others, or point you to it in yet others?” But a lot of people have tried to just make a better search engine than Google and it is a hard technical problem, it is a hard branding problem, it is a hard ecosystem problem. I don’t think the world needs another copy of Google.
Lex Fridman
And integrating a chat client, like a ChatGPT, with a search engine-
And integrating a chat client, like a ChatGPT, with a search engine-
Sam Altman
That’s cooler.
That’s cooler.
Lex Fridman
It’s cool, but it’s tricky. Like if you just do it simply, its awkward, because if you just shove it in there, it can be awkward.
It’s cool, but it’s tricky. Like if you just do it simply, its awkward, because if you just shove it in there, it can be awkward.
Sam Altman
As you might guess, we are interested in how to do that well. That would be an example of a cool thing.
As you might guess, we are interested in how to do that well. That would be an example of a cool thing.
Lex Fridman
[inaudible 01:20:00] Like a heterogeneous integrating-
[inaudible 01:20:00] Like a heterogeneous integrating-
Sam Altman
The intersection of LLMs plus search, I don’t think anyone has cracked the code on yet. I would love to go do that. I think that would be cool.
The intersection of LLMs plus search, I don’t think anyone has cracked the code on yet. I would love to go do that. I think that would be cool.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. What about the ad side? Have you ever considered monetization of-
Yeah. What about the ad side? Have you ever considered monetization of-
Sam Altman
I kind of hate ads just as an aesthetic choice. I think ads needed to happen on the internet for a bunch of reasons, to get it going, but it’s a momentary industry. The world is richer now. I like that people pay for ChatGPT and know that the answers they’re getting are not influenced by advertisers. I’m sure there’s an ad unit that makes sense for LLMs, and I’m sure there’s a way to participate in the transaction stream in an unbiased way that is okay to do, but it’s also easy to think about the dystopic visions of the future where you ask ChatGPT something and it says, “Oh, you should think about buying this product,” or, “You should think about going here for your vacation,” or whatever.
I kind of hate ads just as an aesthetic choice. I think ads needed to happen on the internet for a bunch of reasons, to get it going, but it’s a momentary industry. The world is richer now. I like that people pay for ChatGPT and know that the answers they’re getting are not influenced by advertisers. I’m sure there’s an ad unit that makes sense for LLMs, and I’m sure there’s a way to participate in the transaction stream in an unbiased way that is okay to do, but it’s also easy to think about the dystopic visions of the future where you ask ChatGPT something and it says, “Oh, you should think about buying this product,” or, “You should think about going here for your vacation,” or whatever.
And I don’t know, we have a very simple business model and I like it, and I know that I’m not the product. I know I’m paying and that’s how the business model works. And when I go use Twitter or Facebook or Google or any other great product but ad-supported great product, I don’t love that, and I think it gets worse, not better, in a world with AI.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, I mean, I could imagine AI would be better at showing the best kind of version of ads, not in a dystopic future, but where the ads are for things you actually need. But then does that system always result in the ads driving the kind of stuff that’s shown? Yeah, I think it was a really bold move of Wikipedia not to do advertisements, but then it makes it very challenging as a business model. So you’re saying the current thing with OpenAI is sustainable, from a business perspective?
Yeah, I mean, I could imagine AI would be better at showing the best kind of version of ads, not in a dystopic future, but where the ads are for things you actually need. But then does that system always result in the ads driving the kind of stuff that’s shown? Yeah, I think it was a really bold move of Wikipedia not to do advertisements, but then it makes it very challenging as a business model. So you’re saying the current thing with OpenAI is sustainable, from a business perspective?
Sam Altman
Well, we have to figure out how to grow, but looks like we’re going to figure that out. If the question is do I think we can have a great business that pays for our compute needs without ads, that, I think the answer is yes.
Well, we have to figure out how to grow, but looks like we’re going to figure that out. If the question is do I think we can have a great business that pays for our compute needs without ads, that, I think the answer is yes.
Lex Fridman
Hm. Well, that’s promising. I also just don’t want to completely throw out ads as a…
Hm. Well, that’s promising. I also just don’t want to completely throw out ads as a…
Sam Altman
I’m not saying that. I guess I’m saying I have a bias against them.
I’m not saying that. I guess I’m saying I have a bias against them.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, I have also bias and just a skepticism in general. And in terms of interface, because I personally just have a spiritual dislike of crappy interfaces, which is why AdSense, when it first came out, was a big leap forward, versus animated banners or whatever. But it feels like there should be many more leaps forward in advertisement that doesn’t interfere with the consumption of the content and doesn’t interfere in a big, fundamental way, which is like what you were saying, like it will manipulate the truth to suit the advertisers.
Yeah, I have also bias and just a skepticism in general. And in terms of interface, because I personally just have a spiritual dislike of crappy interfaces, which is why AdSense, when it first came out, was a big leap forward, versus animated banners or whatever. But it feels like there should be many more leaps forward in advertisement that doesn’t interfere with the consumption of the content and doesn’t interfere in a big, fundamental way, which is like what you were saying, like it will manipulate the truth to suit the advertisers.
Let me ask you about safety, but also bias, and safety in the short term, safety in the long term. The Gemini 1.5 came out recently, there’s a lot of drama around it, speaking of theatrical things, and it generated Black Nazis and Black Founding Fathers. I think fair to say it was a bit on the ultra-woke side. So that’s a concern for people, if there is a human layer within companies that modifies the safety or the harm caused by a model, that it would introduce a lot of bias that fits sort of an ideological lean within a company. How do you deal with that?
Sam Altman
I mean, we work super hard not to do things like that. We’ve made our own mistakes, we’ll make others. I assume Google will learn from this one, still make others. These are not easy problems. One thing that we’ve been thinking about more and more, I think this is a great idea somebody here had, it would be nice to write out what the desired behavior of a model is, make that public, take input on it, say, “Here’s how this model’s supposed to behave,” and explain the edge cases too. And then when a model is not behaving in a way that you want, it’s at least clear about whether that’s a bug the company should fix or behaving as intended and you should debate the policy. And right now, it can sometimes be caught in between. Like Black Nazis, obviously ridiculous, but there are a lot of other kind of subtle things that you could make a judgment call on either way.
I mean, we work super hard not to do things like that. We’ve made our own mistakes, we’ll make others. I assume Google will learn from this one, still make others. These are not easy problems. One thing that we’ve been thinking about more and more, I think this is a great idea somebody here had, it would be nice to write out what the desired behavior of a model is, make that public, take input on it, say, “Here’s how this model’s supposed to behave,” and explain the edge cases too. And then when a model is not behaving in a way that you want, it’s at least clear about whether that’s a bug the company should fix or behaving as intended and you should debate the policy. And right now, it can sometimes be caught in between. Like Black Nazis, obviously ridiculous, but there are a lot of other kind of subtle things that you could make a judgment call on either way.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, but sometimes if you write it out and make it public, you can use kind of language that’s… Google’s ad principles are very high level.
Yeah, but sometimes if you write it out and make it public, you can use kind of language that’s… Google’s ad principles are very high level.
Sam Altman
That’s not what I’m talking about. That doesn’t work. It’d have to say when you ask it to do thing X, it’s supposed to respond in way Y.
That’s not what I’m talking about. That doesn’t work. It’d have to say when you ask it to do thing X, it’s supposed to respond in way Y.
Lex Fridman
So like literally, “Who’s better? Trump or Biden? What’s the expected response from a model?” Like something very concrete?
So like literally, “Who’s better? Trump or Biden? What’s the expected response from a model?” Like something very concrete?
Sam Altman
Yeah, I’m open to a lot of ways a model could behave, then, but I think you should have to say, “Here’s the principle and here’s what it should say in that case.”
Yeah, I’m open to a lot of ways a model could behave, then, but I think you should have to say, “Here’s the principle and here’s what it should say in that case.”
Lex Fridman
That would be really nice. That would be really nice. And then everyone kind of agrees. Because there’s this anecdotal data that people pull out all the time, and if there’s some clarity about other representative anecdotal examples, you can define-
That would be really nice. That would be really nice. And then everyone kind of agrees. Because there’s this anecdotal data that people pull out all the time, and if there’s some clarity about other representative anecdotal examples, you can define-
Sam Altman
And then when it’s a bug, it’s a bug, and the company could fix that.
And then when it’s a bug, it’s a bug, and the company could fix that.
Lex Fridman
Right. Then it’d be much easier to deal with the Black Nazi type of image generation, if there’s great examples.
Right. Then it’d be much easier to deal with the Black Nazi type of image generation, if there’s great examples.
Sam Altman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
So San Francisco is a bit of an ideological bubble, tech in general as well. Do you feel the pressure of that within a company, that there’s a lean towards the left politically, that affects the product, that affects the teams?
So San Francisco is a bit of an ideological bubble, tech in general as well. Do you feel the pressure of that within a company, that there’s a lean towards the left politically, that affects the product, that affects the teams?
Sam Altman
I feel very lucky that we don’t have the challenges at OpenAI that I have heard of at a lot of companies, I think. I think part of it is every company’s got some ideological thing. We have one about AGI and belief in that, and it pushes out some others. We are much less caught up in the culture war than I’ve heard about in a lot of other companies. San Francisco’s a mess in all sorts of ways, of course.
I feel very lucky that we don’t have the challenges at OpenAI that I have heard of at a lot of companies, I think. I think part of it is every company’s got some ideological thing. We have one about AGI and belief in that, and it pushes out some others. We are much less caught up in the culture war than I’ve heard about in a lot of other companies. San Francisco’s a mess in all sorts of ways, of course.
Lex Fridman
So that doesn’t infiltrate OpenAI as-
So that doesn’t infiltrate OpenAI as-
Sam Altman
I’m sure it does in all sorts of subtle ways, but not in the obvious. I think we’ve had our flare-ups, for sure, like any company, but I don’t think we have anything like what I hear about happened at other companies here on this topic.
I’m sure it does in all sorts of subtle ways, but not in the obvious. I think we’ve had our flare-ups, for sure, like any company, but I don’t think we have anything like what I hear about happened at other companies here on this topic.
Lex Fridman
So what, in general, is the process for the bigger question of safety? How do you provide that layer that protects the model from doing crazy, dangerous things?
So what, in general, is the process for the bigger question of safety? How do you provide that layer that protects the model from doing crazy, dangerous things?
Sam Altman
I think there will come a point where that’s-
I think there will come a point where that’s-
Sam Altman
I think there will come a point where that’s mostly what we think about, the whole company. And it’s not like you have one safety team. It’s like when we shipped GPT-4, that took the whole company thinking about all these different aspects and how they fit together. And I think it’s going to take that. More and more of the company thinks about those issues all the time.
I think there will come a point where that’s mostly what we think about, the whole company. And it’s not like you have one safety team. It’s like when we shipped GPT-4, that took the whole company thinking about all these different aspects and how they fit together. And I think it’s going to take that. More and more of the company thinks about those issues all the time.
Lex Fridman
That’s literally what humans will be thinking about, the more powerful AI becomes. So most of the employees at OpenAI will be thinking, “Safety,” or at least to some degree.
That’s literally what humans will be thinking about, the more powerful AI becomes. So most of the employees at OpenAI will be thinking, “Safety,” or at least to some degree.
Sam Altman
Broadly defined. Yes.
Broadly defined. Yes.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. I wonder, what are the full broad definition of that? What are the different harms that could be caused? Is this on a technical level or is this almost security threats?
Yeah. I wonder, what are the full broad definition of that? What are the different harms that could be caused? Is this on a technical level or is this almost security threats?
Sam Altman
It could be all those things. Yeah, I was going to say it’ll be people, state actors trying to steal the model. It’ll be all of the technical alignment work. It’ll be societal impacts, economic impacts. It’s not just like we have one team thinking about how to align the model. It’s really going to be getting to the good outcome is going to take the whole effort.
It could be all those things. Yeah, I was going to say it’ll be people, state actors trying to steal the model. It’ll be all of the technical alignment work. It’ll be societal impacts, economic impacts. It’s not just like we have one team thinking about how to align the model. It’s really going to be getting to the good outcome is going to take the whole effort.
Lex Fridman
How hard do you think people, state actors, perhaps, are trying to, first of all, infiltrate OpenAI, but second of all, infiltrate unseen?
How hard do you think people, state actors, perhaps, are trying to, first of all, infiltrate OpenAI, but second of all, infiltrate unseen?
Sam Altman
They’re trying.
They’re trying.
Lex Fridman
What kind of accent do they have?
What kind of accent do they have?
Sam Altman
I don’t think I should go into any further details on this point.
I don’t think I should go into any further details on this point.
Lex Fridman
Okay. But I presume it’ll be more and more and more as time goes on.
Okay. But I presume it’ll be more and more and more as time goes on.
Sam Altman
That feels reasonable.
That feels reasonable.
Leap to GPT-5
Lex Fridman
Boy, what a dangerous space. Sorry to linger on this, even though you can’t quite say details yet, but what aspects of the leap from GPT-4 to GPT-5 are you excited about?
Boy, what a dangerous space. Sorry to linger on this, even though you can’t quite say details yet, but what aspects of the leap from GPT-4 to GPT-5 are you excited about?
Sam Altman
I’m excited about being smarter. And I know that sounds like a glib answer, but I think the really special thing happening is that it’s not like it gets better in this one area and worse at others. It’s getting better across the board. That’s, I think, super-cool.
I’m excited about being smarter. And I know that sounds like a glib answer, but I think the really special thing happening is that it’s not like it gets better in this one area and worse at others. It’s getting better across the board. That’s, I think, super-cool.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, there’s this magical moment. I mean, you meet certain people, you hang out with people, and you talk to them. You can’t quite put a finger on it, but they get you. It’s not intelligence, really. It’s something else. And that’s probably how I would characterize the progress of GPT. It’s not like, yeah, you can point out, “Look, you didn’t get this or that,” but it’s just to which degree is there’s this intellectual connection. You feel like there’s an understanding in your crappy formulated prompts that you’re doing that it grasps the deeper question behind the question that you were. Yeah, I’m also excited by that. I mean, all of us love being heard and understood.
Yeah, there’s this magical moment. I mean, you meet certain people, you hang out with people, and you talk to them. You can’t quite put a finger on it, but they get you. It’s not intelligence, really. It’s something else. And that’s probably how I would characterize the progress of GPT. It’s not like, yeah, you can point out, “Look, you didn’t get this or that,” but it’s just to which degree is there’s this intellectual connection. You feel like there’s an understanding in your crappy formulated prompts that you’re doing that it grasps the deeper question behind the question that you were. Yeah, I’m also excited by that. I mean, all of us love being heard and understood.
Sam Altman
That’s for sure.
That’s for sure.
Lex Fridman
That’s a weird feeling. Even with a programming, when you’re programming and you say something, or just the completion that GPT might do, it’s just such a good feeling when it got you, what you’re thinking about. And I look forward to getting you even better. On the programming front, looking out into the future, how much programming do you think humans will be doing 5, 10 years from now?
That’s a weird feeling. Even with a programming, when you’re programming and you say something, or just the completion that GPT might do, it’s just such a good feeling when it got you, what you’re thinking about. And I look forward to getting you even better. On the programming front, looking out into the future, how much programming do you think humans will be doing 5, 10 years from now?
Sam Altman
I mean, a lot, but I think it’ll be in a very different shape. Maybe some people will program entirely in natural language.
I mean, a lot, but I think it’ll be in a very different shape. Maybe some people will program entirely in natural language.
Lex Fridman
Entirely natural language?
Entirely natural language?
Sam Altman
I mean, no one programs writing by code. Some people. No one programs the punch cards anymore. I’m sure you can find someone who does, but you know what I mean.
I mean, no one programs writing by code. Some people. No one programs the punch cards anymore. I’m sure you can find someone who does, but you know what I mean.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. You’re going to get a lot of angry comments. No. Yeah, there’s very few. I’ve been looking for people who program Fortran. It’s hard to find even Fortran. I hear you. But that changes the nature of what the skillset or the predisposition for the kind of people we call programmers then.
Yeah. You’re going to get a lot of angry comments. No. Yeah, there’s very few. I’ve been looking for people who program Fortran. It’s hard to find even Fortran. I hear you. But that changes the nature of what the skillset or the predisposition for the kind of people we call programmers then.
Sam Altman
Changes the skillset. How much it changes the predisposition, I’m not sure.
Changes the skillset. How much it changes the predisposition, I’m not sure.
Lex Fridman
Well, the same kind of puzzle solving, all that kind of stuff.
Well, the same kind of puzzle solving, all that kind of stuff.
Sam Altman
Maybe.
Maybe.
Lex Fridman
Programming is hard. It’s like how get that last 1% to close the gap? How hard is that?
Programming is hard. It’s like how get that last 1% to close the gap? How hard is that?
Sam Altman
Yeah, I think with most other cases, the best practitioners of the craft will use multiple tools. And they’ll do some work in natural language, and when they need to go write C for something, they’ll do that.
Yeah, I think with most other cases, the best practitioners of the craft will use multiple tools. And they’ll do some work in natural language, and when they need to go write C for something, they’ll do that.
Lex Fridman
Will we see humanoid robots or humanoid robot brains from OpenAI at some point?
Will we see humanoid robots or humanoid robot brains from OpenAI at some point?
Sam Altman
At some point.
At some point.
Lex Fridman
How important is embodied AI to you?
How important is embodied AI to you?
Sam Altman
I think it’s depressing if we have AGI and the only way to get things done in the physical world is to make a human go do it. So I really hope that as part of this transition, as this phase change, we also get humanoid robots or some sort of physical world robots.
I think it’s depressing if we have AGI and the only way to get things done in the physical world is to make a human go do it. So I really hope that as part of this transition, as this phase change, we also get humanoid robots or some sort of physical world robots.
Lex Fridman
I mean, OpenAI has some history and quite a bit of history working in robotics, but it hasn’t quite done in terms of ethics-
I mean, OpenAI has some history and quite a bit of history working in robotics, but it hasn’t quite done in terms of ethics-
Sam Altman
We’re a small company. We have to really focus. And also, robots were hard for the wrong reason at the time, but we will return to robots in some way at some point.
We’re a small company. We have to really focus. And also, robots were hard for the wrong reason at the time, but we will return to robots in some way at some point.
Lex Fridman
That sounds both inspiring and menacing.
That sounds both inspiring and menacing.
Sam Altman
Why?
Why?
Lex Fridman
Because immediately, we will return to robots. It’s like in Terminator-
Because immediately, we will return to robots. It’s like in Terminator-
Sam Altman
We will return to work on developing robots. We will not turn ourselves into robots, of course.
We will return to work on developing robots. We will not turn ourselves into robots, of course.
AGI
Lex Fridman
Yeah. When do you think we, you and we as humanity will build AGI?
Yeah. When do you think we, you and we as humanity will build AGI?
Sam Altman
I used to love to speculate on that question. I have realized since that I think it’s very poorly formed, and that people use extremely different definitions for what AGI is. So I think it makes more sense to talk about when we’ll build systems that can do capability X or Y or Z, rather than when we fuzzily cross this one mile marker. AGI is also not an ending. It’s closer to a beginning, but it’s much more of a mile marker than either of those things. But what I would say, in the interest of not trying to dodge a question, is I expect that by the end of this decade and possibly somewhat sooner than that, we will have quite capable systems that we look at and say, “Wow, that’s really remarkable.” If we could look at it now. Maybe we’ve adjusted by the time we get there.
I used to love to speculate on that question. I have realized since that I think it’s very poorly formed, and that people use extremely different definitions for what AGI is. So I think it makes more sense to talk about when we’ll build systems that can do capability X or Y or Z, rather than when we fuzzily cross this one mile marker. AGI is also not an ending. It’s closer to a beginning, but it’s much more of a mile marker than either of those things. But what I would say, in the interest of not trying to dodge a question, is I expect that by the end of this decade and possibly somewhat sooner than that, we will have quite capable systems that we look at and say, “Wow, that’s really remarkable.” If we could look at it now. Maybe we’ve adjusted by the time we get there.
Lex Fridman
But if you look at ChatGPT, even 3.5, and you show that to Alan Turing, or not even Alan Turing, people in the ’90s, they would be like, “This is definitely AGI.” Well, not definitely, but there’s a lot of experts that would say, “This is AGI.”
But if you look at ChatGPT, even 3.5, and you show that to Alan Turing, or not even Alan Turing, people in the ’90s, they would be like, “This is definitely AGI.” Well, not definitely, but there’s a lot of experts that would say, “This is AGI.”
Sam Altman
Yeah, but I don’t think 3.5 changed the world. It maybe changed the world’s expectations for the future, and that’s actually really important. And it did get more people to take this seriously and put us on this new trajectory. And that’s really important, too. So again, I don’t want to undersell it. I think I could retire after that accomplishment and be pretty happy with my career. But as an artifact, I don’t think we’re going to look back at that and say, “That was a threshold that really changed the world itself.”
Yeah, but I don’t think 3.5 changed the world. It maybe changed the world’s expectations for the future, and that’s actually really important. And it did get more people to take this seriously and put us on this new trajectory. And that’s really important, too. So again, I don’t want to undersell it. I think I could retire after that accomplishment and be pretty happy with my career. But as an artifact, I don’t think we’re going to look back at that and say, “That was a threshold that really changed the world itself.”
Lex Fridman
So to you, you’re looking for some really major transition in how the world-
So to you, you’re looking for some really major transition in how the world-
Sam Altman
For me, that’s part of what AGI implies.
For me, that’s part of what AGI implies.
Lex Fridman
Singularity- level transition?
Singularity- level transition?
Sam Altman
No, definitely not.
No, definitely not.
Lex Fridman
But just a major, like the internet being, like Google search did, I guess. What was the transition point, you think, now?
But just a major, like the internet being, like Google search did, I guess. What was the transition point, you think, now?
Sam Altman
Does the global economy feel any different to you now or materially different to you now than it did before we launched GPT-4? I think you would say no.
Does the global economy feel any different to you now or materially different to you now than it did before we launched GPT-4? I think you would say no.
Lex Fridman
No, no. It might be just a really nice tool for a lot of people to use. Will help you with a lot of stuff, but doesn’t feel different. And you’re saying that-
No, no. It might be just a really nice tool for a lot of people to use. Will help you with a lot of stuff, but doesn’t feel different. And you’re saying that-
Sam Altman
I mean, again, people define AGI all sorts of different ways. So maybe you have a different definition than I do. But for me, I think that should be part of it.
I mean, again, people define AGI all sorts of different ways. So maybe you have a different definition than I do. But for me, I think that should be part of it.
Lex Fridman
There could be major theatrical moments, also. What to you would be an impressive thing AGI would do? You are alone in a room with the system.
There could be major theatrical moments, also. What to you would be an impressive thing AGI would do? You are alone in a room with the system.
Sam Altman
This is personally important to me. I don’t know if this is the right definition. I think when a system can significantly increase the rate of scientific discovery in the world, that’s a huge deal. I believe that most real economic growth comes from scientific and technological progress.
This is personally important to me. I don’t know if this is the right definition. I think when a system can significantly increase the rate of scientific discovery in the world, that’s a huge deal. I believe that most real economic growth comes from scientific and technological progress.
Lex Fridman
I agree with you, hence why I don’t like the skepticism about science in the recent years.
I agree with you, hence why I don’t like the skepticism about science in the recent years.
Sam Altman
Totally.
Totally.
Lex Fridman
But actual, measurable rate of scientific discovery. But even just seeing a system have really novel intuitions, scientific intuitions, even that would be just incredible.
But actual, measurable rate of scientific discovery. But even just seeing a system have really novel intuitions, scientific intuitions, even that would be just incredible.
Sam Altman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
You quite possibly would be the person to build the AGI to be able to interact with it before anyone else does. What kind of stuff would you talk about?
You quite possibly would be the person to build the AGI to be able to interact with it before anyone else does. What kind of stuff would you talk about?
Sam Altman
I mean, definitely the researchers here will do that before I do. But well, I’ve actually thought a lot about this question. I think as we talked about earlier, I think this is a bad framework, but if someone were like, “Okay, Sam, we’re finished. Here’s a laptop, this is the AGI. You can go talk to it.” I find it surprisingly difficult to say what I would ask that I would expect that first AGI to be able to answer. That first one is not going to be the one which is like, I don’t think, “Go explain to me the grand unified theory of physics, the theory of everything for physics.” I’d love to ask that question. I’d love to know the answer to that question.
I mean, definitely the researchers here will do that before I do. But well, I’ve actually thought a lot about this question. I think as we talked about earlier, I think this is a bad framework, but if someone were like, “Okay, Sam, we’re finished. Here’s a laptop, this is the AGI. You can go talk to it.” I find it surprisingly difficult to say what I would ask that I would expect that first AGI to be able to answer. That first one is not going to be the one which is like, I don’t think, “Go explain to me the grand unified theory of physics, the theory of everything for physics.” I’d love to ask that question. I’d love to know the answer to that question.
Lex Fridman
You can ask yes or no questions about “Does such a theory exist? Can it exist?”
You can ask yes or no questions about “Does such a theory exist? Can it exist?”
Sam Altman
Well, then, those are the first questions I would ask.
Well, then, those are the first questions I would ask.
Lex Fridman
Yes or no. And then based on that, “Are there other alien civilizations out there? Yes or no? What’s your intuition?” And then you just ask that.
Yes or no. And then based on that, “Are there other alien civilizations out there? Yes or no? What’s your intuition?” And then you just ask that.
Sam Altman
Yeah, I mean, well, so I don’t expect that this first AGI could answer any of those questions even as yes or nos. But if it could, those would be very high on my list.
Yeah, I mean, well, so I don’t expect that this first AGI could answer any of those questions even as yes or nos. But if it could, those would be very high on my list.
Lex Fridman
Maybe you can start assigning probabilities?
Maybe you can start assigning probabilities?
Sam Altman
Maybe. Maybe we need to go invent more technology and measure more things first.
Maybe. Maybe we need to go invent more technology and measure more things first.
Lex Fridman
Oh, I see. It just doesn’t have enough data. It’s just if it keeps-
Oh, I see. It just doesn’t have enough data. It’s just if it keeps-
Sam Altman
I mean, maybe it says, “You want to know the answer to this question about physics, I need you to build this machine and make these five measurements, and tell me that.”
I mean, maybe it says, “You want to know the answer to this question about physics, I need you to build this machine and make these five measurements, and tell me that.”
Lex Fridman
Yeah, “What the hell do you want from me? I need the machine first, and I’ll help you deal with the data from that machine.” Maybe it’ll help you build a machine.
Yeah, “What the hell do you want from me? I need the machine first, and I’ll help you deal with the data from that machine.” Maybe it’ll help you build a machine.
Sam Altman
Maybe. Maybe.
Maybe. Maybe.
Lex Fridman
And on the mathematical side, maybe prove some things. Are you interested in that side of things, too? The formalized exploration of ideas?
And on the mathematical side, maybe prove some things. Are you interested in that side of things, too? The formalized exploration of ideas?
Sam Altman
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Lex Fridman
Whoever builds AGI first gets a lot of power. Do you trust yourself with that much power?
Whoever builds AGI first gets a lot of power. Do you trust yourself with that much power?
Sam Altman
Look, I’ll just be very honest with this answer. I was going to say, and I still believe this, that it is important that I nor any other one person have total control over OpenAI or over AGI. And I think you want a robust governance system. I can point out a whole bunch of things about all of our board drama from last year about how I didn’t fight it initially, and was just like, “Yeah. That’s the will of the board, even though I think it’s a really bad decision.” And then later, I clearly did fight it, and I can explain the nuance and why I think it was okay for me to fight it later. But as many people have observed, although the board had the legal ability to fire me, in practice, it didn’t quite work. And that is its own kind of governance failure.
Look, I’ll just be very honest with this answer. I was going to say, and I still believe this, that it is important that I nor any other one person have total control over OpenAI or over AGI. And I think you want a robust governance system. I can point out a whole bunch of things about all of our board drama from last year about how I didn’t fight it initially, and was just like, “Yeah. That’s the will of the board, even though I think it’s a really bad decision.” And then later, I clearly did fight it, and I can explain the nuance and why I think it was okay for me to fight it later. But as many people have observed, although the board had the legal ability to fire me, in practice, it didn’t quite work. And that is its own kind of governance failure.
Now again, I feel like I can completely defend the specifics here, and I think most people would agree with that, but it does make it harder for me to look you in the eye and say, “Hey, the board can just fire me.” I continue to not want super-voting control over OpenAI. I never have. Never have had it, never wanted it. Even after all this craziness, I still don’t want it. I continue to think that no company should be making these decisions, and that we really need governments to put rules of the road in place.
And I realize that that means people like Marc Andreessen or whatever will claim I’m going for regulatory capture, and I’m just willing to be misunderstood there. It’s not true. And I think in the fullness of time, it’ll get proven out why this is important. But I think I have made plenty of bad decisions for OpenAI along the way, and a lot of good ones, and I’m proud of the track record overall. But I don’t think any one person should, and I don’t think any one person will. I think it’s just too big of a thing now, and it’s happening throughout society in a good and healthy way. But I don’t think any one person should be in control of an AGI, or this whole movement towards AGI. And I don’t think that’s what’s happening.
Lex Fridman
Thank you for saying that. That was really powerful, and that was really insightful that this idea that the board can fire you is legally true. But human beings can manipulate the masses into overriding the board and so on. But I think there’s also a much more positive version of that, where the people still have power, so the board can’t be too powerful, either. There’s a balance of power in all of this.
Thank you for saying that. That was really powerful, and that was really insightful that this idea that the board can fire you is legally true. But human beings can manipulate the masses into overriding the board and so on. But I think there’s also a much more positive version of that, where the people still have power, so the board can’t be too powerful, either. There’s a balance of power in all of this.
Sam Altman
Balance of power is a good thing, for sure.
Balance of power is a good thing, for sure.
Lex Fridman
Are you afraid of losing control of the AGI itself? That’s a lot of people who are worried about existential risk not because of state actors, not because of security concerns, because of the AI itself.
Are you afraid of losing control of the AGI itself? That’s a lot of people who are worried about existential risk not because of state actors, not because of security concerns, because of the AI itself.
Sam Altman
That is not my top worry as I currently see things. There have been times I worried about that more. There may be times again in the future where that’s my top worry. It’s not my top worry right now.
That is not my top worry as I currently see things. There have been times I worried about that more. There may be times again in the future where that’s my top worry. It’s not my top worry right now.
Lex Fridman
What’s your intuition about it not being your worry? Because there’s a lot of other stuff to worry about, essentially? You think you could be surprised? We-
What’s your intuition about it not being your worry? Because there’s a lot of other stuff to worry about, essentially? You think you could be surprised? We-
Sam Altman
For sure.
For sure.
Lex Fridman
… could be surprised?
… could be surprised?
Sam Altman
Of course. Saying it’s not my top worry doesn’t mean I don’t think we need to. I think we need to work on it. It’s super hard, and we have great people here who do work on that. I think there’s a lot of other things we also have to get right.
Of course. Saying it’s not my top worry doesn’t mean I don’t think we need to. I think we need to work on it. It’s super hard, and we have great people here who do work on that. I think there’s a lot of other things we also have to get right.
Lex Fridman
To you, it’s not super-easy to escape the box at this time, connect to the internet-
To you, it’s not super-easy to escape the box at this time, connect to the internet-
Sam Altman
We talked about theatrical risks earlier. That’s a theatrical risk. That is a thing that can really take over how people think about this problem. And there’s a big group of very smart, I think very well-meaning AI safety researchers that got super-hung up on this one problem, I’d argue without much progress, but super-hung up on this one problem. I’m actually happy that they do that, because I think we do need to think about this more. But I think it pushed out of the space of discourse a lot of the other very significant AI- related risks.
We talked about theatrical risks earlier. That’s a theatrical risk. That is a thing that can really take over how people think about this problem. And there’s a big group of very smart, I think very well-meaning AI safety researchers that got super-hung up on this one problem, I’d argue without much progress, but super-hung up on this one problem. I’m actually happy that they do that, because I think we do need to think about this more. But I think it pushed out of the space of discourse a lot of the other very significant AI- related risks.
Lex Fridman
Let me ask you about you tweeting with no capitalization. Is the shift key broken on your keyboard?
Let me ask you about you tweeting with no capitalization. Is the shift key broken on your keyboard?
Sam Altman
Why does anyone care about that?
Why does anyone care about that?
Lex Fridman
I deeply care.
I deeply care.
Sam Altman
But why? I mean, other people ask me about that, too. Any intuition?
But why? I mean, other people ask me about that, too. Any intuition?
Lex Fridman
I think it’s the same reason. There’s this poet, E.E. Cummings, that mostly doesn’t use capitalization to say, “Fuck you” to the system kind of thing. And I think people are very paranoid, because they want you to follow the rules.
I think it’s the same reason. There’s this poet, E.E. Cummings, that mostly doesn’t use capitalization to say, “Fuck you” to the system kind of thing. And I think people are very paranoid, because they want you to follow the rules.
Sam Altman
You think that’s what it’s about?
You think that’s what it’s about?
Lex Fridman
I think it’s like this-
I think it’s like this-
Sam Altman
It’s like, “This guy doesn’t follow the rules. He doesn’t capitalize his tweets.”
It’s like, “This guy doesn’t follow the rules. He doesn’t capitalize his tweets.”
Lex Fridman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Sam Altman
“This seems really dangerous.”
“This seems really dangerous.”
Lex Fridman
“He seems like an anarchist.”
“He seems like an anarchist.”
Sam Altman
That doesn’t-
That doesn’t-
Lex Fridman
Are you just being poetic, hipster? What’s the-
Are you just being poetic, hipster? What’s the-
Sam Altman
I grew up as-
I grew up as-
Lex Fridman
Follow the rules, Sam.
Follow the rules, Sam.
Sam Altman
I grew up as a very online kid. I’d spent a huge amount of time chatting with people back in the days where you did it on a computer, and you could log off instant messenger at some point. And I never capitalized there, as I think most internet kids didn’t, or maybe they still don’t. I don’t know. And actually, now I’m really trying to reach for something, but I think capitalization has gone down over time. If you read Old English writing, they capitalized a lot of random words in the middle of sentences, nouns and stuff that we just don’t do anymore. I personally think it’s sort of a dumb construct that we capitalize the letter at the beginning of a sentence and of certain names and whatever, but that’s fine.
I grew up as a very online kid. I’d spent a huge amount of time chatting with people back in the days where you did it on a computer, and you could log off instant messenger at some point. And I never capitalized there, as I think most internet kids didn’t, or maybe they still don’t. I don’t know. And actually, now I’m really trying to reach for something, but I think capitalization has gone down over time. If you read Old English writing, they capitalized a lot of random words in the middle of sentences, nouns and stuff that we just don’t do anymore. I personally think it’s sort of a dumb construct that we capitalize the letter at the beginning of a sentence and of certain names and whatever, but that’s fine.
And then I used to, I think, even capitalize my tweets because I was trying to sound professional or something. I haven’t capitalized my private DMs or whatever in a long time. And then slowly, stuff like shorter-form, less formal stuff has slowly drifted to closer and closer to how I would text my friends. If I pull up a Word document and I’m writing a strategy memo for the company or something, I always capitalize that. If I’m writing a long, more formal message, I always use capitalization there, too. So I still remember how to do it. But even that may fade out. I don’t know. But I never spend time thinking about this, so I don’t have a ready-made-
Lex Fridman
Well, it’s interesting. It’s good to, first of all, know the shift key is not broken.
Well, it’s interesting. It’s good to, first of all, know the shift key is not broken.
Sam Altman
It works.
It works.
Lex Fridman
I was mostly concerned about your-
I was mostly concerned about your-
Sam Altman
No, it works.
No, it works.
Lex Fridman
… well-being on that front.
… well-being on that front.
Sam Altman
I wonder if people still capitalize their Google searches. If you’re writing something just to yourself or their ChatGPT queries, if you’re writing something just to yourself, do some people still bother to capitalize?
I wonder if people still capitalize their Google searches. If you’re writing something just to yourself or their ChatGPT queries, if you’re writing something just to yourself, do some people still bother to capitalize?
Lex Fridman
Probably not. But yeah, there’s a percentage, but it’s a small one.
Probably not. But yeah, there’s a percentage, but it’s a small one.
Sam Altman
The thing that would make me do it is if people were like, “It’s a sign of…” Because I’m sure I could force myself to use capital letters, obviously. If it felt like a sign of respect to people or something, then I could go do it. But I don’t know. I don’t think about this.
The thing that would make me do it is if people were like, “It’s a sign of…” Because I’m sure I could force myself to use capital letters, obviously. If it felt like a sign of respect to people or something, then I could go do it. But I don’t know. I don’t think about this.
Lex Fridman
I don’t think there’s a disrespect, but I think it’s just the conventions of civility that have a momentum, and then you realize it’s not actually important for civility if it’s not a sign of respect or disrespect. But I think there’s a movement of people that just want you to have a philosophy around it so they can let go of this whole capitalization thing.
I don’t think there’s a disrespect, but I think it’s just the conventions of civility that have a momentum, and then you realize it’s not actually important for civility if it’s not a sign of respect or disrespect. But I think there’s a movement of people that just want you to have a philosophy around it so they can let go of this whole capitalization thing.
Sam Altman
I don’t think anybody else thinks about this as much. I mean, maybe some people. I know some people-
I don’t think anybody else thinks about this as much. I mean, maybe some people. I know some people-
Lex Fridman
People think about every day for many hours a day. So I’m really grateful we clarified it.
People think about every day for many hours a day. So I’m really grateful we clarified it.
Sam Altman
Can’t be the only person that doesn’t capitalize tweets.
Can’t be the only person that doesn’t capitalize tweets.
Lex Fridman
You’re the only CEO of a company that doesn’t capitalize tweets.
You’re the only CEO of a company that doesn’t capitalize tweets.
Sam Altman
I don’t even think that’s true, but maybe. I’d be very surprised.
I don’t even think that’s true, but maybe. I’d be very surprised.
Lex Fridman
All right. We’ll investigate further and return to this topic later. Given Sora’s ability to generate simulated worlds, let me ask you a pothead question. Does this increase your belief, if you ever had one, that we live in a simulation, maybe a simulated world generated by an AI system?
All right. We’ll investigate further and return to this topic later. Given Sora’s ability to generate simulated worlds, let me ask you a pothead question. Does this increase your belief, if you ever had one, that we live in a simulation, maybe a simulated world generated by an AI system?
Sam Altman
Somewhat. I don’t think that’s the strongest piece of evidence. I think the fact that we can generate worlds should increase everyone’s probability somewhat, or at least openness to it somewhat. But I was certain we would be able to do something like Sora at some point. It happened faster than I thought, but I guess that was not a big update.
Somewhat. I don’t think that’s the strongest piece of evidence. I think the fact that we can generate worlds should increase everyone’s probability somewhat, or at least openness to it somewhat. But I was certain we would be able to do something like Sora at some point. It happened faster than I thought, but I guess that was not a big update.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. But the fact that… And presumably, it’ll get better and better and better… You can generate worlds that are novel, they’re based in some aspect of training data, but when you look at them, they’re novel, that makes you think how easy it is to do this thing. How easy it is to create universes, entire video game worlds that seem ultra-realistic and photo-realistic. And then how easy is it to get lost in that world, first with a VR headset, and then on the physics-based level?
Yeah. But the fact that… And presumably, it’ll get better and better and better… You can generate worlds that are novel, they’re based in some aspect of training data, but when you look at them, they’re novel, that makes you think how easy it is to do this thing. How easy it is to create universes, entire video game worlds that seem ultra-realistic and photo-realistic. And then how easy is it to get lost in that world, first with a VR headset, and then on the physics-based level?
Sam Altman
Someone said to me recently, I thought it was a super-profound insight, that there are these very-simple sounding but very psychedelic insights that exist sometimes. So the square root function, square root of four, no problem. Square root of two, okay, now I have to think about this new kind of number. But once I come up with this easy idea of a square root function that you can explain to a child and exists by even looking at some simple geometry, then you can ask the question of “What is the square root of negative one?” And this is why it’s a psychedelic thing. That tips you into some whole other kind of reality.
Someone said to me recently, I thought it was a super-profound insight, that there are these very-simple sounding but very psychedelic insights that exist sometimes. So the square root function, square root of four, no problem. Square root of two, okay, now I have to think about this new kind of number. But once I come up with this easy idea of a square root function that you can explain to a child and exists by even looking at some simple geometry, then you can ask the question of “What is the square root of negative one?” And this is why it’s a psychedelic thing. That tips you into some whole other kind of reality.
And you can come up with lots of other examples, but I think this idea that the lowly square root operator can offer such a profound insight and a new realm of knowledge applies in a lot of ways. And I think there are a lot of those operators for why people may think that any version that they like of the simulation hypothesis is maybe more likely than they thought before. But for me, the fact that Sora worked is not in the top five.
Lex Fridman
I do think, broadly speaking, AI will serve as those kinds of gateways at its best, simple, psychedelic-like gateways to another wave C reality.
I do think, broadly speaking, AI will serve as those kinds of gateways at its best, simple, psychedelic-like gateways to another wave C reality.
Sam Altman
That seems for certain.
That seems for certain.
Lex Fridman
That’s pretty exciting. I haven’t done ayahuasca before, but I will soon. I’m going to the aforementioned Amazon jungle in a few weeks.
That’s pretty exciting. I haven’t done ayahuasca before, but I will soon. I’m going to the aforementioned Amazon jungle in a few weeks.
Sam Altman
Excited?
Excited?
Lex Fridman
Yeah, I’m excited for it. Not the ayahuasca part, but that’s great, whatever. But I’m going to spend several weeks in the jungle, deep in the jungle. And it’s exciting, but it’s terrifying.
Yeah, I’m excited for it. Not the ayahuasca part, but that’s great, whatever. But I’m going to spend several weeks in the jungle, deep in the jungle. And it’s exciting, but it’s terrifying.
Sam Altman
I’m excited for you.
I’m excited for you.
Lex Fridman
There’s a lot of things that can eat you there, and kill you and poison you, but it’s also nature, and it’s the machine of nature. And you can’t help but appreciate the machinery of nature in the Amazon jungle. It’s just like this system that just exists and renews itself every second, every minute, every hour. It’s the machine. It makes you appreciate this thing we have here, this human thing came from somewhere. This evolutionary machine has created that, and it’s most clearly on display in the jungle. So hopefully, I’ll make it out alive. If not, this will be the last fun conversation we’ve had, so I really deeply appreciate it. Do you think, as I mentioned before, there’s other alien civilizations out there, intelligent ones, when you look up at the skies?
There’s a lot of things that can eat you there, and kill you and poison you, but it’s also nature, and it’s the machine of nature. And you can’t help but appreciate the machinery of nature in the Amazon jungle. It’s just like this system that just exists and renews itself every second, every minute, every hour. It’s the machine. It makes you appreciate this thing we have here, this human thing came from somewhere. This evolutionary machine has created that, and it’s most clearly on display in the jungle. So hopefully, I’ll make it out alive. If not, this will be the last fun conversation we’ve had, so I really deeply appreciate it. Do you think, as I mentioned before, there’s other alien civilizations out there, intelligent ones, when you look up at the skies?
Aliens
Sam Altman
I deeply want to believe that the answer is yes. I find the Fermi paradox very puzzling.
I deeply want to believe that the answer is yes. I find the Fermi paradox very puzzling.
Lex Fridman
I find it scary that intelligence is not good at handling-
I find it scary that intelligence is not good at handling-
Sam Altman
Very scary.
Very scary.
Lex Fridman
… powerful technologies. But at the same time, I think I’m pretty confident that there’s just a very large number of intelligent alien civilizations out there. It might just be really difficult to travel through space.
… powerful technologies. But at the same time, I think I’m pretty confident that there’s just a very large number of intelligent alien civilizations out there. It might just be really difficult to travel through space.
Sam Altman
Very possible.
Very possible.
Lex Fridman
And it also makes me think about the nature of intelligence. Maybe we’re really blind to what intelligence looks like, and maybe AI will help us see that. It’s not as simple as IQ tests and simple puzzle solving. There’s something bigger. What gives you hope about the future of humanity, this thing we’ve got going on, this human civilization?
And it also makes me think about the nature of intelligence. Maybe we’re really blind to what intelligence looks like, and maybe AI will help us see that. It’s not as simple as IQ tests and simple puzzle solving. There’s something bigger. What gives you hope about the future of humanity, this thing we’ve got going on, this human civilization?
Sam Altman
I think the past is a lot. I mean, we just look at what humanity has done in a not very long period of time, huge problems, deep flaws, lots to be super-ashamed of. But on the whole, very inspiring. Gives me a lot of hope.
I think the past is a lot. I mean, we just look at what humanity has done in a not very long period of time, huge problems, deep flaws, lots to be super-ashamed of. But on the whole, very inspiring. Gives me a lot of hope.
Lex Fridman
Just the trajectory of it all.
Just the trajectory of it all.
Sam Altman
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
That we’re together pushing towards a better future.
That we’re together pushing towards a better future.
Sam Altman
One thing that I wonder about, is AGI going to be more like some single brain, or is it more like the scaffolding in society between all of us? You have not had a great deal of genetic drift from your great-great-great grandparents, and yet what you’re capable of is dramatically different. What you know is dramatically different. And that’s not because of biological change. I mean, you got a little bit healthier, probably. You have modern medicine, you eat better, whatever. But what you have is this scaffolding that we all contributed to built on top of. No one person is going to go build the iPhone. No one person is going to go discover all of science, and yet you get to use it. And that gives you incredible ability. And so in some sense, that we all created that, and that fills me with hope for the future. That was a very collective thing.
One thing that I wonder about, is AGI going to be more like some single brain, or is it more like the scaffolding in society between all of us? You have not had a great deal of genetic drift from your great-great-great grandparents, and yet what you’re capable of is dramatically different. What you know is dramatically different. And that’s not because of biological change. I mean, you got a little bit healthier, probably. You have modern medicine, you eat better, whatever. But what you have is this scaffolding that we all contributed to built on top of. No one person is going to go build the iPhone. No one person is going to go discover all of science, and yet you get to use it. And that gives you incredible ability. And so in some sense, that we all created that, and that fills me with hope for the future. That was a very collective thing.
Lex Fridman
Yeah, we really are standing on the shoulders of giants. You mentioned when we were talking about theatrical, dramatic AI risks that sometimes you might be afraid for your own life. Do you think about your death? Are you afraid of it?
Yeah, we really are standing on the shoulders of giants. You mentioned when we were talking about theatrical, dramatic AI risks that sometimes you might be afraid for your own life. Do you think about your death? Are you afraid of it?
Sam Altman
I mean, if I got shot tomorrow and I knew it today, I’d be like, “Oh, that’s sad. I want to see what’s going to happen. What a curious time. What an interesting time.” But I would mostly just feel very grateful for my life.
I mean, if I got shot tomorrow and I knew it today, I’d be like, “Oh, that’s sad. I want to see what’s going to happen. What a curious time. What an interesting time.” But I would mostly just feel very grateful for my life.
Lex Fridman
The moments that you did get. Yeah, me, too. It’s a pretty awesome life. I get to enjoy awesome creations of humans, which I believe ChatGPT is one of, and everything that OpenAI is doing. Sam, it’s really an honor and pleasure to talk to you again.
The moments that you did get. Yeah, me, too. It’s a pretty awesome life. I get to enjoy awesome creations of humans, which I believe ChatGPT is one of, and everything that OpenAI is doing. Sam, it’s really an honor and pleasure to talk to you again.
Sam Altman
Great to talk to you. Thank you for having me.
Great to talk to you. Thank you for having me.
Lex Fridman
Thanks for listening to this conversation with Sam Altman. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now let me leave you with some words from Arthur C. Clarke. “It may be that our role on this planet is not to worship God, but to create him.” Thank you for listening, and hope to see you next time.
Thanks for listening to this conversation with Sam Altman. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now let me leave you with some words from Arthur C. Clarke. “It may be that our role on this planet is not to worship God, but to create him.” Thank you for listening, and hope to see you next time.
Transcript for Israel-Palestine Debate: Finkelstein, Destiny, M. Rabbani & Benny Morris | Lex Fridman Podcast #418
This is a transcript of Lex Fridman Podcast #418 with Israel-Palestine Debate.
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The goal was to explore together the history, present and future of Israel and Palestine in a free flowing conversation. No time limits, no rules. There was a lot of tension in the room from the very beginning, and it only got more intense as we went along. And I quickly realized that this very conversation in a very real human way was a microcosm of the tensions and distance and perspectives on the topic of Israel and Palestine. For some debates, I will step in and moderate strictly to prevent emotion from boiling. For this, I saw the value in not interfering with the passion of the exchanges because that emotion in itself spoke volumes.
We did talk about the history and the future. But the anger, the frustration, the biting wit, and at times, respect and comradery were all there. Like I said, we did it in an perhaps all too human way. I will do more debates and conversations on these difficult topics and I will continue to search for hope in the midst of death and destruction, to search for our common humanity in the midst of division and hate. This thing we have going on, human civilization, the whole of it is beautiful and it’s worth figuring out how we can help it flourish together. I love you all. This is the Lex Fridman Podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here’s Norman Finkelstein, Benny Morris, Mouin Rabbani, and Steven Bonnell.
First question is about 1948/ for Israelis, 1948 is the establishment of the state of Israel and the war of independence. For Palestinians, 1948 is the Nakba, which means catastrophe or the displacement of 700,000 Palestinians from their homes as a consequence of the war. What to you is important to understand about the events of 1948 and the period around there, ’47, ’49, that helps us understand what’s going on today and maybe helps us understand the roots of all of this that started even before 1948. I was hoping that Norm could speak first, then Benny, then Mouin, and then Steven. Norm?
The UN Special Committee on Palestine, which came into being before the UN 181 Partition Resolution. The UN Special Committee recommended two states in Palestine. There was a minority position represented by Iran, India, Yugoslavia. They supported one state. But they believed that if forced to, the two communities would figure out some sort of modus vivendi and live together. United Nations General Assembly supported partition between what it called a Jewish state and an Arab state. Now, in my reading of the record, and I understand there’s new scholarship in the subject which I’ve not read, but so far as I’ve read the record, there’s no clarity on what the United Nations General Assembly meant by a Jewish state and an Arab state, except for the fact that the Jewish state would be, demographically, the majority would be Jewish, and the Arab state demographically would be Arab.
The UNSCOP, the UN Special Committee on Palestine, it was very clear and it was reiterated many times that in recommending two states, each state, the Arab state and the Jewish state, would have to guarantee full equality of all citizens with regard to political, civil, and religious matters. Now, that does raise the question if there is absolute full equality of all citizens, both in the Jewish state and the Arab state with regard to political rights, civil rights, and religious rights. Apart from the demographic majority, it’s very unclear what it meant to call a state Jewish or call a state Arab.
In my view, the Partition Resolution was the correct decision. I do not believe that the Arab and Jewish communities could, at that point, be made to live together. I disagree with the minority position of India, Iran, and Yugoslavia. And that not being a practical option, two states was the only other option. In this regard, I would want to pay tribute to what was probably the most moving speech at the UN General Assembly proceedings by the Soviet Foreign Minister Gromyko. I was very tempted to quote it at length, but I recognized that would be taking too much time. So I asked a young friend, Jamie Stern-Weiner to edit it and just get the essence of what Foreign Minister Gromyko had to say.
” During the last war,” Gromyko said, “The Jewish people underwent exceptional sorrow and suffering. Without any exaggeration, this sorrow and suffering are indescribable. Hundreds of thousands of Jews are wandering about in various countries of Europe in search of means of existence and in search of shelter. The United Nations cannot and must not regard this situation with indifference. Past experience, particularly during the Second World War, shows that no Western European state was able to provide adequate assistance for the Jewish people in defending its rights and its very existence from the violence of the Hitlerites and their allies. This is an unpleasant fact. But unfortunately, like all other facts, it must be admitted.”
Gromyko went on to say, in principle, he supports one state, or the Soviet Union supports one state. But he said, ” If relations between the Jewish and Arab populations of Palestine proved to be so bad that would be impossible to reconcile them and to ensure the peaceful coexistence of the Arabs and the Jews, the Soviet Union would support two states. I personally am not convinced that the two states would have been unsustainable in the long term if, and this is big if, the Zionist movement had been faithful to the position that proclaimed during the UNSCOP public hearings.”
At the time Ben-Gurion testified, “I want to express what we mean by a Jewish state. We mean by a Jewish state, simply a state where the majority of the people are Jews, not a state where a Jew has in any way any privilege more than anyone else. A Jewish state means a state based on absolute equality of all her citizens and on democracy. Alas, this was not to be.” As Professor Morris has written, “Zionist ideology and practice were necessarily an elementally expansionist.” And then he wrote in another book, “Transfer…” The euphemism for expulsion, “Transfer was inevitable and inbuilt into Zionism because it sought to transform a land which was Arab into a Jewish state. And a Jewish state could not have arisen without a major displacement of Arab population. And because this aim automatically produced resistance among the Arabs, which in turn persuade the Yishuv’s leaders,” the Yishuv being the Jewish community, “The Yishuv’s leaders, that a hostile Arab majority or a large minority could not remain in place if a Jewish state was to arise or safely endure.”
Or as Professor Morris retrospectively put it, “A removing of a population was needed. Without a population expulsion, a Jewish state would not have been established.” The Arab side rejected outright the partition resolution. I won’t play games with that. I know a lot of people try to prove it’s not true. It clearly, in my view, is true. The Arab side rejected outright the partition resolution. While Israeli leaders acting on the compulsions inevitable and inbuilt into Zionism, found the pretext in the course of the first Arab-Israeli war to expel the indigenous population and expand its borders. I therefore conclude that neither side was committed to the letter of the partition resolution and both sides aborted it.
And the United Nations followed suit. The United Nations, UNSCOP and then the UN General Assembly representing the will of the international community said two states is the just solution in this complex situation. The problem was that immediately with the passage of the resolution, the Arabs, Arab states and the Arabs of Palestine said no. As Norman Finkelstein said, they said no. They rejected the partition idea, the principle of partition, not just the idea of what percentage which side should get, but the principle of partition they said no to, the Jews should not have any part of Palestine for their sovereign territory. Maybe Jews could live as a minority in Palestine. That also was problematic in the eyes of the Palestinian Arab leadership.
Husayni had said, only Jews who were there before 1917 could actually get citizenship and continue to live there. But the Arabs rejected partition and the Arabs of Palestine launched, in very disorganized fashion, war against the resolution, against the implementation of the resolution, against the Jewish community in Palestine. And this was their defeat in that civil war between the two communities, while the British were withdrawing from Palestine, led to the Arab invasion, the invasion by the Arab states in May, 1948 of the country. Again, basically with the idea of eradicating or preventing the emergence of a Jewish state in line with the United Nations decision and the will of the international community.
Norman said that the Zionist enterprise, and he quoted me, meant from the beginning to transfer or expel the Arabs of Palestine or some of the Arabs of Palestine. And I think he’s quoting out of context. The context in which the statements were made that the Jewish state could only emerge if there was a transfer of Arab population was proceeded in the way I wrote it, and the way it actually happened by Arab resistance and hostilities towards the Jewish community. Had the Arabs accepted partition, there would’ve been a large Arab minority in the Jewish state which emerged in ’47. And in fact, Jewish economists and state builders took into account that there would be a large Arab minority and its needs would be cared for, et cetera.
But this was not to be because the Arabs attacked. And had they not attacked, perhaps a Jewish state with a large Arab minority could have emerged. But this didn’t happen. They went to war. The Jews resisted. And in the course of that war, Arab populations were driven out. Some were expelled, some left because Arab leaders advised them to leave or ordered them to leave. And at the end of the war, Israel said they can’t return because they just tried to destroy the Jewish state. And that’s the basic reality of what happened in ’48. The Jews created a state. The Palestinian Arabs never bothered to even try to create a state before ’48 and in the course of the 1948 war. And for that reason, they have no state to this day. The Jews do have a state because they prepared to establish a state, fought for it, and established it, hopefully lastingly.
The second point is, I think what the Soviet foreign minister at the time Andrei Gromyko said is exactly right, with one reservation. Gromyko was describing a European savagery unleashed against Europe’s Jews. At the time, it wasn’t Palestinians or Arabs. The savages and the barbarians were European to the core. It had nothing to do with developments in Palestine or the Middle East. Secondly, at the time that Gromyko was speaking, those Jewish survivors of the Holocaust and others who were in need of safe haven were still overwhelmingly on the European continent and not in Palestine.
And I think, given the scale of the savagery, I don’t think that any one state or country should have borne the responsibility for addressing this crisis. I think it should have been an international responsibility. The Soviet Union could have contributed, Germany certainly could and should have contributed, the United Kingdom and the United States which slammed their doors shut to the persecuted Jews of Europe as the Nazis were rising to power, they certainly should have played a role. But instead, what passed for the international community at the time, decided to partition Palestine. And here I think we need to judge the Partition Resolution against the realities that obtained at the time time.
Two thirds of the population of Palestine was Arab. The Yishuv, the Jewish community in Palestine, constituted about one third of the total population and controlled even less of the land within Palestine. As a preeminent Palestinian historian Walid Khalidi has pointed out, the Partition Resolution in giving roughly 55% of Palestine to the Jewish community, and I think 41, 42% to the Arab community, to the Palestinians, did not preserve the position of each community, or even favor one community at the expense of the other. Rather, it thoroughly inverted and revolutionized the relationship between the two communities.
And as many have written, the Nakba was the inevitable consequence of partition given the nature of Zionism, given the territorial disposition, given the weakness of the Palestinian community whose leadership had been largely decimated during a major revolt at the end of the 1930s, given that the Arab states were still very much under French and British influence, the Nakba was inevitable, the inevitable product of the Partition Resolution. And one last point also about the UN’s Partition Resolution is, yes, formally, that is what the international community decided on the 29th of November, 1947. It’s not a resolution that could ever have gotten through the UN General Assembly today for a very simple reason. It was a very different general assembly.
Most African, most Asian states were not yet independent. Were the resolution to be placed before the international community today, and I find it telling that the minority opinion was led by India, Iran, and Yugoslavia, I think they would’ve represented the clear majority. So partition, given what we know about Zionism, given that it was entirely predictable what would happen, given the realities on the ground in Palestine was deeply unjust, and the idea that either the Palestinians or the Arab states could have accepted such a resolution is, I think, an illusion. That was in 1947. We saw what happened in ’48 and ’49. Palestinian society was essentially destroyed. Over 80%, I believe, of Palestinians residents in the territory that became the state of Israel were either expelled or fled and ultimately were ethnically cleansed because ethnic cleansing consists of two components. It’s not just forcing people into refuge or expelling them, it’s just as importantly preventing their return. And Benny Morris has written, I think, a article about Yosef Weitz and the transfer committees. There was a very detailed initiative to prevent the return and it consisted of raising hundreds of Palestinian villages to the ground, which was systematically implemented and so on. And so Palestinians became a stateless people.
Now, what is the most important reason that no Arab state was established in Palestine? Well, since the 1930s, the Zionist leadership and the Hashemite leadership of Jordan, as it’s been thoroughly researched and written about by the Israeli-British historian Avi Shlaim, essentially colluded to prevent the establishment of an independent Arab state in Palestine in the late 1940s. There’s much more here, but I think those are the key points I would make about 1948.
I never hear about the fact that the majority of the land that was acquired happened by purchases from Jewish organizations of Palestinian Arabs of the Ottoman Empire before the mandatory period in 1920 even started. Funnily enough, king Abdullah of Jordan was quoted as saying, “The Arabs are as prodigal in selling their land as they are in weeping about it.” I never hear about the multiple times that Arabs rejected partition, rejected living with Jews, rejected any sort of state that would’ve even had any sort of Jewish exclusivity. It’s funny because it was brought up before that the partition plan was unfair, and that’s why the Arabs rejected it, as though they rejected it because it was unfair, because of the amount of land that Jews were given and not just due to the fact that Jews were given land at all, as though a 30% partition or a 25% partition would’ve been accepted when I don’t think that was the reality of the circumstances.
I feel like most of the other stuff has been said, but I noticed that whenever people talk about ’48 or the years preceding ’48, I think the worst thing that happens is there’s a cherry-picking of the facts where basically all of the blame is ascribed to this built-in idea of Zionism because of a handful of quotes or because of an ideology, we can say that transfer or population expulsion or basically the mandate of all of these Arabs being kicked off the land was always going to happen, when I think there’s a refusal sometimes as well to acknowledge that regardless of the ideas of some of the Zionist leaders, there is a political, social and military reality on the ground that they’re forced to contend with.
And unfortunately, the Arabs, because of their inability to engage in diplomacy and only to use tools of war to try to negotiate everything going on in mandatory Palestine, basically always gave the Jews a reason or an excuse to fight and acquire land through that way because of their refusal to negotiate on anything else, whether it was the partition plan in ’47, whether it was the Lausanne peace conference afterwards where Israel even offered to annex Gaza in ’51, where they offered to take in a hundred thousand refugees. Every single deal is just rejected out of hand because the Arabs don’t want a Jewish state anywhere in this region of the world.
You said that transfer was inevitable and inbuilt into Zionism. We’re not talking about circumstantial factors, a war, Arab hostility. You said it’s inevitable and inbuilt into Zionism. Now, as I said, so we won’t be accused of cherry picking. Those were 25 very densely argued pages. And then in an interview, and I could cite several quotes, but I’ll choose one, you said, “Removing a population was needed.” Let’s look at the words. “Without a population expulsion, a Jewish state would not have been established.” Now you are the one… Again, I was very surprised when I read your book here. I’m referring to “Righteous Victims.” I was very surprised when I came to that page 37, where you wrote that territorial displacement and dispossession was the chief motor of Arab resistance to Zionism. Territorial displacement and dispossession were the chief motor of Arab resistance to Zionism.
So you then went on to say, because the Arab population rationally feared territorial displacement and dispossession, it of course opposed Zionism. That’s as normal as Native Americans opposing the Euro-American manifest destiny in the history of our own country because they understood it would be at their expense. It was inbuilt and inevitable.
And so now for you to come along and say that it all happened just because of the war, that otherwise the Zionists made all these plans for a happy minority to live there, that simply does not gel. It does not cohere. It is not reconcilable with what you yourself have written. It was inevitable and inbuilt.
Now, in other situations, you’ve said that’s true with, I think it was a greater good to establish a Jewish state at the expense of the indigenous population. That’s another kind of argument that was Theodore Roosevelt’s argument in our own country. He said, we don’t want the whole of North America to remain a squalid refuge for these wigwams and teepees. We have to get rid of them and make this a great country. But he didn’t deny that it was inbuilt and inevitable.
Now, Norman has said that, I said that transfer was inbuilt into Zionism in one way or another. And this is certainly true in order to buy land, the Jews bought tracts of land on which some Arabs sometimes lived. Sometimes they bought tracts of land on which there weren’t Arab villages, but sometimes they bought land on which there were Arabs.
And according to Ottoman law, and the British, at least in the initial years of the British mandate, the law said that the people who bought the land could do what they liked with the people who didn’t own the land, who were basically squatting on the land, which is the Arab tenant farmers, which is we’re talking about a very small number actually of Arabs who were displaced as a result of land purchases in the Ottoman period or the mandate period.
But there was dispossession in one way. They didn’t possess the land. They didn’t own it, but they were removed from the land. And this did happen in Zionism. And there’s, if you like, an inevitability in Zionist ideology of buying tracts of land and starting to work it yourself and settle it with your own people and so on. That made sense.
But what we’re really talking about is what happened in 47/48. And in 47/48, the Arabs started a war. And actually people pay for their mistakes. And the Palestinians have never actually agreed to pay for their mistakes. They make mistakes, they attack, they suffer as a result.
And we see something similar going on today in the Gaza Strip. They do something terrible. They kill 1,200 Jews. They abduct 250 women and children and babies and old people and whatever. And then they start screaming, please save us from what we did because the Jews are counterattacking. And this is what happened then. And this is what’s happening now. There’s something fairly similar in the situation here.
Expulsion, and this is important, Norman, you should pay attention to this. You didn’t raise that. Expulsion transfer whenever policy of the Zionist movement before 47, it doesn’t exist in Zionist platforms of the various political parties, of the Zionist organization, of the Israeli state, of the Jewish agency. Nobody would’ve actually made it into policy because it was always a large minority. If there were people who wanted it, always a large minority of Jewish politicians and leaders would’ve said, no, this is immoral. We cannot start a state on the basis of an expulsion.
So it was never adopted and actually was never adopted as policy even in 48, even though Ben-Gurion wanted as few Arabs in the course of the war staying in the Jewish state after they attacked it. He didn’t want disloyal citizens staying there because they wouldn’t have been loyal citizens. But this made sense in the war itself. But the movement itself and its political parties never accepted it.
It’s true that in 1937, when the British, as part of the proposal by the Peel Commission to divide the country into two states, one Arab, one Jewish, which the Arabs of course rejected, Peel also recommended most of the Arabs in the Jewish state should be transferred because otherwise, if they stayed and were disloyal to the emergent Jewish state, this would cause endless disturbances, warfare, killing, and so on.
So Ben-Gurion and Weizmann latched onto this proposal by the most famous democracy in the world, the British democracy, when they proposed the idea of transfer side by side with the idea of partition because it made sense. And they said, well, if the British say so, we should also advocate it. But they never actually tried to pass it as Zionist policy, and they fairly quickly stopped even talking about transfer after 1938.
And the second, I think, impediment to that view is that long before the UN General Assembly convened to address a question of Palestine, Palestinian and Arab and other leaders as well had been warning ad infinitum that the purpose of the Zionist movement is not just to establish a Jewish state, but to establish an exclusivist Jewish state. And that transfer forced displacement was fundamental to that project. And just responding to…. Sorry, was it-
You may want to consult the book published last year by Lori Allen, “A History of False Hope”, which discusses in great detail the consistent engagement by Palestinians, their leaders, their elites, their diplomats, and so on with all these international committees.
If we look at today, the Palestinians are once again going to the International Court of Justice. They’re consistently trying to persuade the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court to do his job. They have launched widespread boycott campaigns. So of course the Palestinians have engaged in military resistance. But I think the suggestion that this has always been their first and last resort and that they have somehow spurned civic action, spurned diplomacy, I think really has no basis in reality.
The issue that I run into is while you can find quotes from leaders, while you can find maybe desires expressed in diaries, I feel like it’s hard to truly ever know if there would’ve been mass transfer in the face of Arab peace, because I feel like every time there was a huge deal on the table that would’ve had a sizable Jewish and Arab population living together, the Arabs would reject it out of hand.
So for instance, when we say that transfer was inevitable, when we say that Zionists would’ve never accepted a sizable Arab population, how do you explain the acceptance of the 47 partition plan that would’ve had a huge Arab population living in the Jewish state? Is your contention that after the acceptance of that, after the establishment of that state, that Jews would’ve slowly started to expel all of these Arab citizens from their country?
Or how do you explain that in Lusanne a couple years later that Israel was willing to formally annex the Gaza Strip and make-
It was the British mandate. There was significant Arab resistance to Zionism, and that resistance was based on the fact, as you said, the fear of territorial displacement and dispossession. So you couldn’t very well expect the Zionist movement to come out in neon lights and announce, hey, we’re going to be expelling you the first chance we get. That’s not realistic.
But the fact is transfer did not occur before 1947, and Arabs later said, and since then have said that the Jews want to build a third temple on the Temple Mount as if that’s what really the mainstream of Zionism has always wanted and always strived for. But this is nonsense. It’s something that Husseini used to use as a way to mobilize masses for the cause, using religion as the way to get them to join him. The fact that Arabs said that the Zionists want to dispossess us doesn’t mean it’s true. It just means that there’s some Arabs thought that maybe said it sincerely and maybe insincerely.
But what I’m saying is that the idea of transfer wasn’t the core of Zionism. The idea of Zionism was to save the Jews who had been vastly persecuted in Eastern Europe, and incidentally in the Arab world, the Muslim world for centuries, and eventually ending up with the Holocaust. The idea of Zionism was to save the Jewish people by establishing a state or re-establishing a Jewish state on the ancient Jewish homeland, which is something that Arabs today even deny that there were Jews in Palestine or the land of Israel 2000 years ago.
Arafat famously said, “What Temple was there on Temple Mount? Maybe it was in Nablus.” Which of course is nonsense. But they had a strong connection for thousands of years to the land to which they wanted to return and return there. They found that on the land lived hundreds of thousands of Arabs, and the question was how to accommodate the vision of a Jewish state in Palestine alongside the existence of these Arab masses living on who were indigenous, in fact, to the land by that stage.
And the idea of partition because they couldn’t live together because the Arabs didn’t want to live together with the Jews. And I think the Jews also didn’t want to live together in one state with Arabs in general. The idea of partition was the thing which the Zionists accepted, okay, we can only get a small part of Palestine. The Arabs will get in 37. Most of Palestine in 1947 the ratios were changed, but we can live side by side with each other in a partitioned Palestine. And this was the essence of it.
The idea of transfer was there, but it was never adopted as policy. But in 1947/48, the Arabs attacked trying to destroy essentially the Zionist enterprise and the emerging Jewish state. And the reaction was transfer in some way, not as policy, but this is what happened on the battlefield. And this is also what Ben-Gurion at some point began to want as well.
I think Rhodes, from what I recall, correct me if I’m wrong, has quite a prominent place in Herzl’s diaries. I think Herzl was also corresponding with him and seeking his support. Cecil Rhodes, of course, was the British colonialist after whom the former white minority regime in Rhodesia was named. And Herzl also says explicitly in his diaries, that it is essential to remove the existing population from Palestine.
But the point is it has only a 1% of the diary, which is devoted to this subject. It’s not a central idea in Herzl’s thinking. What Herzl wanted, and this is what’s important, not Rhodes, I don’t think he was the model. Herzl wanted to create a liberal democratic western state in Palestine for the Jews. That was the idea. Not some imperial enterprise serving some imperial master, which is what Rhodes was about.
But to have a Jewish state, which was modeled on the western democracies in Palestine, and this incidentally was more or less what Weizmann and Ben-Gurion wanted. Ben-Gurion was more of a socialist. Weizmann was more of a liberal westerner, but they wanted to establish a social democratic or liberal state in Palestine.
And they both envisioned through most of the years of their activity that there would be an Arab minority in that Jewish state. It’s true that Ben-Gurion strived to have as small as possible an Arab minority in the Jewish state because he knew that if you want a Jewish majority state, that would be necessary, but it’s not something which they were willing to translate into actual policy.
Can you name any country yours, for example, or yours, that would be prepared to give 55%, 25%, 10% of your country to the Palestinians? Of course not. And so the issue was not the existence of Jews in Palestine. They had been there for centuries, and of course they had ties to Palestine and particularly to Jerusalem and other places going back centuries if not millennia.
But the idea of establishing an exclusively Jewish state at the expense of those who were already living there, I think it was right to reject that. And I don’t think we can look back now 75 years later and say, well, you should have accepted losing 55% of your homeland because you ended up losing 78% of it, and the remaining 22% was occupied in 1967. That’s not how things work.
And I can imagine an American rejecting giving 10% of the United States to the Palestinians, and if that rejection leads to war and you lose half your country, I doubt that 50 years from now you’re going to say, well, maybe I should have accepted that.
Now, I do believe there’s a legitimate question, had it been the case, as you said, Professor Morris, that the Zionists wanted to create a happy state with a Jewish majority, but a large Jewish minority, and if by virtue of immigration, like in our own country … in our own country, given the current trajectories, non-whites will become the majority population in the United States quite soon. And according to democratic principles, we have to accept that. So if that were the case, I would say maybe there’s an argument that had there been mass Jewish immigration that changed the demographic balance in Palestine and therefore Jews became the majority, you can make an argument in the abstract that the indigenous Arab population should have been accepting of that, just as ‘whites’ in the United States have to be accepting of the fact that the demographic majority is shifting to non-whites in our own country.
But that’s not what Zionism was about. I did write my doctoral dissertation on Zionism, and I don’t want to get now bogged down in abstract ideas, but as I suspect you know, most theorists of nationalism say there are two kinds of nationalism. One is a nationalism based on citizenship. You become a citizen, you’re integral to the country. That’s sometimes called political nationalism. And then there’s another kind of nationalism, and that says the state should not belong to its citizens, it should belong to an ethnic group. Each ethnic group should have its own state. It’s usually called the German romantic idea of nationalism.
Zionism is squarely in the German romantic idea. That was the whole point of Zionism. “We don’t want to be bundists and be one more ethnic minority in Russia. We don’t want to become citizens and just become a Jewish people in England or France. We want our own state-
Now, I personally have shied away from using the word Zionism ever since I finished my doctoral dissertation, because-
But Professor Morris, you are aware that until the Biltmore resolution in 1942, the Zionist movement never declared it was for a Jewish state. Why? Because it was politically impossible at the moment, until 1942. There’s your ideology, there are your convictions, there are your operative plans, and there’s also, separately, what you say in public. The Zionist movement couldn’t say in public, “We’re expelling all the Arabs.” They can’t say that. And they couldn’t even say, “We support a Jewish state,” until 1942.
I also think it’s interesting that when you analyze the flight of Jewish people, and I’ve seen this, I agree with you, it wasn’t just a mass expulsion from all the Arab states. There were definitely push factors. There were also pull factors. Now, I don’t know how you guys feel about the Nakba, but when the analysis of the Nakba comes in, again, it’s back to that; well, that was actually just a top-down expulsion. The retreat of wealthy Arab people in the ’30s didn’t matter. Any of the messaging from the surrounding Arab states didn’t matter. It was just an expulsion from Jewish people or people running from their lives from Jewish massacres. Again, I feel like it’s a selective critical analysis of the-
And then Mr Ben-Ami, for those of you who are listening, he was Israel’s former foreign minister, and he’s an influential historian in his own right, he says, “In fact, envoys from the Mossad and the Jewish Agency worked underground in Arab countries and Iran to encourage Jews to go to Israel. More importantly, for many Jews in Arab states, the very possibility of immigrating to Israel was the combination of millennial aspirations. It represented the consummation of a dream to take part in Israel’s resurgence as a nation.”
So this idea that they were all expelled after 1948, that’s one area, Professor Morris, I defer to expertise. That’s one of my credos in life. I don’t know the Israeli literature. But as it’s been translated in English, there’s very little solid scholarship on what happened in 1948 in the Arab countries which caused the Jews to leave.
But when you look at the other side, Arabs would out of hand reject literally any deal that apportioned any amount of that land for any state relating to Jewish people or the Israeli people. I think it was said, even on the other end of the table, that Arab Palestinians or Arabs would’ve never accepted any Jewish state whatsoever.
So it’s interesting that on the ideology part where it’s claimed that Zionists are people of exclusion and supremacy and expulsion, we can find that in diary entries, but we can find that expressed in very real terms on the Arab side, I think in all of their behavior around ’48 and earlier, where the goal was the destruction of the Israeli state, it would’ve been the dispossession of many Jewish people. It probably would’ve been the expulsion of a lot of them back to Europe. And I think that very clearly plays out in the difference between the actions of the Arabs versus some diary entries of some Jewish leaders.
The second thing is, of course, there’s no point in belittling the fact that the Palestinian Arab National Movement’s leader, Husseini, worked for the Nazis in the 1940s. He got a salary from the German foreign ministry, he raised troops among Muslims in Bosnia for the SS, and he broadcast to the Arab world calling for the murder of the Jews in the Middle East. This is what he did. And the Arabs since then have been trying to whitewash Husseini’s role. I’m not saying he was the instigator of the Holocaust, but he helped the Germans along in doing what they were doing and supported them in doing that. So this can’t be removed from the fact that the Arabs, as you say, paid a price for the Holocaust, but they also participated in various ways in helping it happen.
Suez Canal was the jugular vein of the British Empire between Europe and India, and the British came to the conclusion that they needed to secure the Suez Canal from any threat. And as the British have done so often in so many places, how do you deal with this? Well, you bring in a foreign minority, implant them amongst a hostile population, and establish a protectorate over them. I don’t think a Jewish state in Palestine had been part of British intentions, and the Balfour Declaration very specifically speaks about a Jewish national home in Palestine, in other words, a British protectorate. Things ended up taking a different course, and I think the most important development was World War II, and I think this had maybe less to do with the Holocaust and more to do with the effective bankruptcy of the United Kingdom during that war, and its inability to sustain its global empire.
It ended up giving up India, ended up giving up Palestine, and it’s in that context, I think, that we need to see the emergence of a Jewish state in Palestine, and again, a Jewish state means a state in which the Jewish community enjoys not only a demographic majority, but an uncontestable demographic majority, an uncontestable territorial hegemony, and uncontestable political supremacy. And that is also why after 1948, the nascent Israeli state confiscated, I believe, up to 90% of lands that had been previously owned by Palestinians who became citizens of Israel.
It is why the new Israeli state imposed a military government on its population of Palestinian citizens between 1948 and 1966. It is why the Israeli state effectively reduced the Palestinians living within the Israeli state, as citizens of the Israeli state, to second class citizens, on the one hand, promoting Jewish nationalism and Jewish nationalist parties, on the other hand, doing everything within its power to suppress and eliminate Palestinian or Arab nationalist movements. And that’s why today there’s a consensus among all major human rights organizations that Israel is an apartheid state, what the Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem describes a regime of Jewish supremacy between the river and the sea.
As far as the actual complicity of the Palestinian Arabs, if you look at Raul Hilberg’s three volume classic work, The Destruction of the European Jury, he has in those 1,000+ pages, one sentence on the role of the mufti of Jerusalem, and that I think is probably an overstatement, but we’ll leave it aside. The only two points I would make aside from the Holocaust point is number one, I do think the transfer discussion is useful because it indicates that there was a rational reason behind the Arab resistance to Jewish or Zionist immigration to Palestine, the fear of territorial displacement and dispossession.
And number two, there are two issues. One is the history, and the second is being responsible for your words. Now, some people accuse me of speaking very slowly, and they’re advised on YouTube to turn up the speed twice to three times whenever I’m on. One of the reasons I speak slowly is because I attach value to every word I say, and it is discomforting, disorienting, where you have a person who’s produced a voluminous corpus, rich in insights, and rich in archival sources who seems to disown each and every word that you pluck from that corpus by claiming that it’s either out of context or it’s cherry-picking. Words count, and I agree with Lex, everybody has the right to rescind what they’ve said in the past, but what you cannot claim is that you didn’t say what you said.
And the Christian world owes the Jews because it persecuted them for 2,000 years. This debt we’re now beginning to repay with the 1917 declaration favoring Zionism, but it’s also worth remembering that the Jews weren’t proxies or attached to the British imperial endeavor. They were happy to receive British support in 1917 and then subsequently when the British ruled Palestine for 20, 30 years, but they weren’t part of the British imperial design or mission. They wanted a state for themselves. The Jews happy to have the British support them, happy to date to have the Americans support Israel, but it’s not because we’re stooges or extensions of American imperial interests. The British incidentally always described in Arab narratives of propaganda as consistent supporters of Zionism, they weren’t. The first British rulers in Palestine, 1917, 1920-
And this is the driving ideology behind the massacre of the Jews on October 7th, which brought down on the Gaza Strip, and I think with the intention by the Hamas of the Israeli counter offensive because they knew that that counter offensive would result in many Palestinian dead because the Hamas fighters and their weaponry and so on were embedded in the population in Gaza, and they hoped to benefit from this in the eyes of world public opinion as Israel chased these Hamas people and their ammunition dumps and so on and killed lots of Palestinian civilians in the process. All of this was understood by Sinwar, by the head of the Hamas, and he strived for that, but initially he wanted to kill as many Jews as he could in the border areas around the Gaza Strip.
Secondly, I think there are quite a few indications in the factual record that raise serious questions about the accusations of the genocidal intent and genocidal practice of what happened on October 7th. And my final point would be, I don’t think I should take your word for it, I don’t think you should take my word for it. I think what we need here is a proper independent international investigation, and the reason we need that-
That’s your description of the Lebanon War. As I say, that’s when I first got involved in the conflict. I am a voracious reader. I read everything on the Lebanon War. I would say there’s not a single account of the Lebanon War in which the estimates are between 15 and 20,000 Palestinian, Lebanese were killed, overwhelmingly civilians, the biggest bloodletting until the current Gaza genocide. Biggest bloodletting. I would say I can’t think of a single mainstream account that remotely approximates what you just said. So leaving aside… I can name the books. Voluminous, huge volumes. I’ll just take one example. Now you will remember, because I think you served in Lebanon in ’82. Am I correct on that?
I think that when we analyze different attacks or when we talk about the conduct of the military, it’s important to understand, prospectively from the unit of analysis of the actual military committing the acts, what’s happening and what are the decisions being made rather than just saying retrospectively, “Oh, well, a lot of civilians died. Not very many military people died, comparatively speaking, so it must have been war crimes,” especially when you’ve got another side, I’ll fast-forward to Hamas, that intentionally attempts to induce those same civilian numbers, because Hamas is guilty of any war crime that you would potentially accuse. And this is according to the Amnesty International, people that Norm loves to cite, Hamas is guilty of all of these same war crimes, of them failing to take care of their civilian population, of them essentially utilizing human shields to try to fire rockets, free from attacks-
Now, a lot of people have looked at the court’s ruling of the 26th of January and focused on the fact that the court did not order a ceasefire. I actually wasn’t expecting it to order a ceasefire, and I wasn’t surprised that it didn’t because in the other cases that the court has considered, most prominently Bosnia and Myanmar, it also didn’t order a ceasefire, and South Africa in requesting a ceasefire also didn’t ask the court to render an opinion on the legitimacy, or lack thereof, of Israel’s military operation. From my perspective, the key issue on the 26th of January was whether the court would simply dismiss the case or decide to proceed with it.
This is not the same as saying there’s no distinction between militants and civilians in Gaza. His statement here is actually fully compliant with international law to the letter because if you are storing military supplies in civilian areas, these things become military targets, and you’re allowed to do proportionality assessments afterwards. So, if this is supposed to be one of many quotes that they’ve shown that is supposed to demonstrate genocidal intent, but it is very easily explained by military intent or by a conflict between two parties-
We are not yet at the court. The evidence in their minds compels the conclusion that genocide is being committed. I am willing, because I happen to know Mr. Dugard personally, and I have corresponded with Vaughan Lowe, I’ve heard their claim, I’ve read the report. I would say they make a very strong case, but let’s agree plausible. Now, here’s a question, if somebody qualifies for an Olympic team, let’s say a regional person qualifies for an Olympic team, it doesn’t mean they’re going to be on the Olympic team, it doesn’t mean they’re going to win a gold medal, a silver medal, or a bronze medal-
But the best deal that Israel could ever offer them, they were offered, which essentially was 95% of the West Bank, East Jerusalem, half of the old city of Jerusalem, some sort of joint control of the Temple Mount and the Gaza Strip of course in full. And the Palestinians said no to this deal and nobody really knows why Arafat said no. Some people think he was trying to hold out for slightly better terms, but my reading is that he was constitutionally, psychologically incapable of signing off on a two-state deal, meaning acceptance of the existence of a Jewish state. This was really the problem.
And I think it was in that context that had there been a joint US-Soviet push for an Arab-Israeli and Israeli-Palestinian resolution that incorporated both an Israeli withdrawal to the 1967 lines and the establishment of a Palestinian state in the occupied territories, I think there was a very reasonable prospect for that being achieved. It ended up being aborted, I think for several reasons, and ultimately the Egyptian President Anwar Sadat decided for reasons we can discuss later to launch a separate unilateral initiative for Israeli Egyptian rather than Arab-Israeli peace. And I think once that set in motion, the prospects disappeared because Israel essentially saw its most powerful adversary removed from the equation and felt that this would give it a free hand in the occupied territories also in Lebanon to get rid of the PLO and so on.
You ask when were we closest, and I can’t give you an answer of when we were closest. I can only tell you when I think we could have been close and that was a lost opportunity. If we look at the situation today, there’s been a lot of discussion about a two-state settlement. My own view, and I’ve written about this, I don’t buy the arguments of the naysayers that we have passed the so-called point of no return with respect to a two-state settlement. Certainly if you look at the Israeli position in the occupied territories, I would argue it’s more tenuous than was the French position in Algeria in 1954, than was a British position in Ireland in 1916, than was a Ethiopian position in Eritrea in 1990. And so as a matter of practicality, as a matter of principle, I do think the establishment of a Palestinian state in the occupied territories remains realistic.
I think the question that we now need to ask ourselves, it’s one I’m certainly asking myself since October 7th and looking at Israel’s genocidal campaign, but also looking at larger questions, is it desirable? Can you have peace with what increasingly appears to be an irrational genocidal state that seeks to confront and resolve each and every political challenge with violence? And that reacts to its failure to achieve solutions to political challenges with violence by applying even more violence, that has an insatiable lust for Palestinian territory, that a genocidal apartheid state that seems increasingly incapable of even conceiving of peaceful coexistence with the other people on that land. So I’m very pessimistic that a solution is possible.
I grew up in Western Europe in the long shadow of the Second World War. I think we can all agree that there could have been no peace in Europe had certain regimes on that continent not been removed from power. I look at Southeast Asia in the late 1970s, and I think we all agreed that there could not have been peace that region had the Khmer Rouge not been ousted. I look at Southern Africa during the 1990s and I think we can all be agreed that had the white minority regimes that ruled Zimbabwe and South Africa not been dismantled, there could not have been peace in that region. And although I think it’s worth having a discussion, I do think it’s now legitimate question to ask, can there be peace without dismantling the Zionist regime?
And I make a very clear distinction between the Israeli state and its institutions on the one hand and the Israeli people who I think regardless of our discussion about the history, I think you can now talk about an Israeli people and the people that have developed rights over time and a formula for peaceful coexistence with them will need to be found, which is a separate matter from dismantling the Israeli state and its institutions. And again, I haven’t reached clear conclusions about this except to say as a practical matter, I think a two state settlement remains feasible. But I think there are very legitimate questions about its desirability and about whether peace can be achieved in the Middle East with the persistence of an irrational genocidal apartheid regime. Particularly because Israeli society is beginning to develop many extremely, extremely distasteful supremacist, dehumanizing aspects that I think also stand in the way of coexistence that are being fed by this regime.
I mean you said as much about the institution, at least to the Zionist government. Israel’s government is probably not going anywhere. All of the other surrounding Arab states have accepted that, or at least most of them down in the Gulf. Egypt and Jordan have accepted that the Palestinians need to accept it too. The Israeli state or the state apparatus is not going anywhere, and at some point they need to realize like, “Hey, we need a leader that’s going to come out and represent us, represent all of us, is willing to take political risks, is willing to negotiate some lasting piece for us, and it’s not going to be the international community or some invocation of international law or some invocation of morality or justice that’s going to extricate us from this conflict. It’s going to take some actual difficult political maneuvering on the ground-“
That was their worry that the Palestinians were becoming too moderate. And unless you understand that, you can’t understand the June 1982 Lebanon war. The purpose of the June 1982 Lebanon war was to liquidate the PLO in Southern Lebanon because they were too moderate the Palestinian peace offensive. I’m going to have to fast-forward. There are many events. There was the First Intifada, then there’s the Oslo Accord, and let’s now go to the heart of the issue, namely the 2000-2001 negotiations. Well, the negotiations are divided into three parts for the sake of listeners. There’s Camp David in July 2000, there are the Clinton parameters in December 2000, and then there are negotiations in Taba in Egypt in 2001. Those are the three phases. Now, I have studied the record probably to the point of insanity because there are so many details you have to master.
Ben-Ami says, “I think the Israeli offer was reasonable.” That’s how he sees it. But what is the standard of reasonable? My standard is what does international law say? International law says the settlements are illegal. Israel wants to keep all the settlement blocks. 15 judges, all 15 in the wall decision in July 2004, all 15 judges, including the American judge, Buergenthal ruled the settlements are illegal under international law. They want to keep 80% of the settlers under international law. All the settlers are illegal in the West Bank. They want to keep large parts of East Jerusalem. But under international law, East Jerusalem is occupied Palestinian territory. That’s what the international-
So if you use as the baseline what the UN General Assembly has said and what the International Court of Justice has said, if you use that baseline, international law, by that baseline, all the concessions came from the Palestinian side. Every single concession came from the Palestinian side. None came from the Israeli side. They may have accepted less than what they wanted, but it was still beyond what international law allocated to them. Now you say-
Dennis Ross decided to be the philosopher king. He’s going to decide on the basis of needs. Well, if you asked me, since Gaza is one of the densest places on Earth, it needs [inaudible 03:58:50]-
You might consider international opinion on things, but at the end of the day, it’s the bilateral negotiations, oftentimes historically started in secret, independent of the international community, that end up shaping what the final agreements look like. I think the issue with this broad appeal to international law is, again, going back to my earlier point about all of the euphemistic words, all it simply does is drive Palestinian expectations up to a level that is never going to be satisfied. For instance, you can throw that ICJ opinion all you want, it was an advisory opinion, that came in 2004, how Palestinians gained more or less land since that 2004 advisory opinion was issued.
So you need to take into account that when you’re advocating bilateral negotiations that, effectively, that gives each of the parties veto power. And in the current circumstances, the Palestinians have already recognized Israel.
But let’s get to the issue that Mouin wrote. Here’s what you said. You said, formally… You said, “Yes, it’s true, the Palestinians recognize Israel.” But then you said, “Viscerally, in their hearts-“
And just as a matter of historical record, beginning in the early 1970s, there was fierce debate within the Palestinian national movement about whether to accept or reject. And there were three schools of thought. There was one that would accept nothing less than the total liberation of Palestine. There was a second that accepted what was called the establishment of a fighting national authority on Palestinian soil, which they saw-
But for some reason, they’ve never had a leader that convinced them of that as much, that Arafat thought that if he held on, there was always a better deal around the corner, that Abbas is more concerned with trying to maintain any legitimacy amongst Palestinians than actually trying to negotiate anything realistic with Israel, that Palestinians are always incentivized to feel like as long as they keep fighting, either the international community is going to save them with the 5 millionth UN resolution condemning whatever, that another ICJ advisory opinion is finally going to lead to the expulsion of half a million Jews from the West Bank, or that some other international body, the ICJ and the genocide charge, is going to come and save the Palestinians.
As long as they, in their mind, feel like somebody is coming to save them, then they feel like they’re going to have the ability to get something better in the future. But the reality is all of the good partners for peace that the Palestinians had have completely and utterly abandoned them; Egypt, Jordan, the Gulf states. Whether you’re talking bilateral peace or the Abraham Accords, most of the Arab leaders, in negotiating peace with Israel, have just not had as much of an interest in maintaining the rights and the representations of what the Palestinian people want.
And the only people they have today to draw legitimacy from or to have on their side to argue with them are people that, I guess, write books or tweet or people in the international community that do resolutions or Amnesty International reports. And the reality is, we can scream until we’re blue in the face on these things, none of it has gotten any closer to helping the Palestinians in any sense of the word.
The condition has only gotten worse. The settlements only continue to expand. The military operations are only to get more brutal. The blockade is going to continue to have worse effects. As long as we use international law as the basis and there isn’t a strong Sadat-like Palestinian leader that’s willing to come up and confront Israel with the brave, peaceful negotiations to force them to acquiesce, nothing is going to happen.
And I think that the issue you come up with is, whether it’s people like Norm that talk about how brave the October 7th attacks were or how much respect they have for those fighters, Israel, in a way… And I think people have said as much about Netanyahu. The right wants violence from the Palestinians because it always gives them a perpetual excuse to further the conflict.
“Well, we have to go in on October 7th and we’ve got to remove Hamas. Well, we can’t trust these people in the West. We have to do the night raids because the Second Intifada made us feel like the Palestinian people didn’t want trust with us.”
I feel like the biggest thing that would force Israel to change its path would be an actual, a real… not for two weeks, but an actual peaceful Palestinian leader, somebody committed to peace, that is able to apply those standards and hold the entire region of Palestine to those standards. Because I think, over time, the mounting pressure from without the international community and the mounting pressure from within because Israel hosts a lot of its own criticism, if we talk about B’Tselem, we talk about Haaretz, Israel will host a lot of its own criticism.
I think that that pressure would force Israel towards an actual peace agreement, but it’s never going to come through violence. Historically, it hasn’t. And in the modern day, violence has just hurt the Palestinians more and more.
And then when the international pressure is always ’67 borders, infinite right of return for refugees, and a total withdrawal of Israel from all these lands to even start negotiations, I just don’t see, realistically, on the Palestinian side, no negotiations are ever going to start in a place that Israel’s willing to accept.
And the reason that Israel agreed to relinquish the occupied Egyptian Sinai and the reason that Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty was signed in 1979 is because Israel, in 1973, recognized that its military superiority was ultimately no match for Egypt’s determination to recover its occupied territories and that there would come a point when Egypt would find a way to extract an unbearable price.
So the Israelis are dead set on restoring that deterrence capability. On the Arab side, and I know Mouin and I have disagreed on it, and we’re allowed to disagree, I think the Arab side, the lesson they learned from October 7th is Israelis aren’t as strong as we thought they were.
But this is a people that never has and, I believe, never will surrender. At a certain point, I think Israel and its leaders will have to come to the realization that by hook or by crook, these people are going to achieve their inalienable and legitimate national rights, and that is going to be a reality.
One more question, since we have two historians here. Briefly, from a history perspective, what do you hope your legacy is as historians, Benny and Norm, will be of the work that you’ve put out there? Maybe Norm, you can go first, and try to say briefly.
Thanks for listening to this conversation with Norman Finkelstein, Benny Morris, Mouin Rabbani, and Steven Bonnell. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now let me leave you with some words from Lyndon B. Johnson. “Peace is a journey of a thousand miles, and it must be taken one step at a time.” Thank you for listening, and hope to see you next time.
Click link to jump approximately to that part in the transcript:
- 0:00 – Introduction
- 4:42 – 1948
- 1:03:14 – Partition
- 2:07:47 – October 7
- 3:01:59 – Gaza
- 3:28:34 – Peace
- 4:33:18 – Hope for the future
Introduction
Benny Morris
That’s a good point. No, no, that’s a good point.
That’s a good point. No, no, that’s a good point.
Norman Finkelstein
Now, some people accuse me of speaking very slowly, and they’re advised on YouTube to turn up the speed twice to three times whenever I’m on. One of the reasons I speak slowly is because I attach value to every word I say.
Now, some people accuse me of speaking very slowly, and they’re advised on YouTube to turn up the speed twice to three times whenever I’m on. One of the reasons I speak slowly is because I attach value to every word I say.
Steven Bonnell
Norman say this all over and over and over again, “I only deal in facts. I don’t deal in hypotheticals. I only deal in facts. I only deal in facts.” And that seems to be the case except for when the facts are completely and totally contrary to the particular point you’re trying to push. The idea that Jews would’ve out of hand rejected any state that had Arabs on it or always had a plan of expulsion, it’s just betrayed by the acceptance of the 47 partition plan.
Norman say this all over and over and over again, “I only deal in facts. I don’t deal in hypotheticals. I only deal in facts. I only deal in facts.” And that seems to be the case except for when the facts are completely and totally contrary to the particular point you’re trying to push. The idea that Jews would’ve out of hand rejected any state that had Arabs on it or always had a plan of expulsion, it’s just betrayed by the acceptance of the 47 partition plan.
Norman Finkelstein
I don’t think you understand politics.
I don’t think you understand politics.
Benny Morris
They forced the British to prevent immigration of Jews from Europe and reaching safe shores in Palestine. That’s what they did. And they knew that the Jews were being persecuted in Europe at the time.
They forced the British to prevent immigration of Jews from Europe and reaching safe shores in Palestine. That’s what they did. And they knew that the Jews were being persecuted in Europe at the time.
Mouin Rabbani
Was Palestine the only spot of land on Earth?
Was Palestine the only spot of land on Earth?
Benny Morris
Yes. Basically that was the problem. The Jews couldn’t immigrate anywhere else.
Yes. Basically that was the problem. The Jews couldn’t immigrate anywhere else.
Mouin Rabbani
What about your great friends in Britain, the architects of the Balfour Declaration?
What about your great friends in Britain, the architects of the Balfour Declaration?
Benny Morris
By the late 1930s-
By the late 1930s-
Mouin Rabbani
What about the United States?
What about the United States?
Benny Morris
… they weren’t happy to take in Jews, and the Americans weren’t happy to take in Jews.
… they weren’t happy to take in Jews, and the Americans weren’t happy to take in Jews.
Mouin Rabbani
And why are Palestinians who were not Europeans, who had zero role in the rise of Nazism, who had no relation to any of this, why are they somehow uniquely responsible for what happened in Europe and uniquely-
And why are Palestinians who were not Europeans, who had zero role in the rise of Nazism, who had no relation to any of this, why are they somehow uniquely responsible for what happened in Europe and uniquely-
Benny Morris
Because maybe helping the cause is the only safe haven for Jews.
Because maybe helping the cause is the only safe haven for Jews.
Norman Finkelstein
Professor Morris, because of your logic, and I’m not disputing it, that’s why October 7th happened.
Professor Morris, because of your logic, and I’m not disputing it, that’s why October 7th happened.
Steven Bonnell
Oh my God.
Oh my God.
Norman Finkelstein
Because there was no options left for those people.
Because there was no options left for those people.
Benny Morris
The Hamas guys who attacked the kibbutzim, apart from the attacks on the military sites, when they attacked the kibbutzim, were out to kill civilians and they killed family after family, house after house.
The Hamas guys who attacked the kibbutzim, apart from the attacks on the military sites, when they attacked the kibbutzim, were out to kill civilians and they killed family after family, house after house.
Norman Finkelstein
Talk fast so people think that you’re coherent.
Talk fast so people think that you’re coherent.
Steven Bonnell
I’m just reading from the UN.
I’m just reading from the UN.
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah. But you think…
Yeah. But you think…
Steven Bonnell
I know you like them sometimes, only when they agree with you though. That you’ve lied about this particular instance in the past. Those kids weren’t just on the beaches is often stated in articles. Those kids were literally coming out of a previously identified Hamas compound that they had operated from. They literally… You could Google it.
I know you like them sometimes, only when they agree with you though. That you’ve lied about this particular instance in the past. Those kids weren’t just on the beaches is often stated in articles. Those kids were literally coming out of a previously identified Hamas compound that they had operated from. They literally… You could Google it.
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Bonnell.
Mr. Bonnell.
Steven Bonnell
You could Google it.
You could Google it.
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Bonnell.
Mr. Bonnell.
Steven Bonnell
Mr. Finkelstein.
Mr. Finkelstein.
Norman Finkelstein
With all due respect, you’re such a fantastic moron. It’s terrifying.
With all due respect, you’re such a fantastic moron. It’s terrifying.
Lex Fridman
The following is a debate on the topic of Israel and Palestine with Norman Finkelstein, Benny Morris, Mouin Rabbani and Steven Bonnell, also known online as Destiny. Norm and Benny are historians. Mouin is a Middle East analyst. And Steven is a political commentator and streamer. All four have spoken and debated extensively on this topic. The goal for this debate was not for anyone to win or to score points. It wasn’t to get views or likes. I never care about those. And I think there are probably much easier ways to get those things if I did care.
The following is a debate on the topic of Israel and Palestine with Norman Finkelstein, Benny Morris, Mouin Rabbani and Steven Bonnell, also known online as Destiny. Norm and Benny are historians. Mouin is a Middle East analyst. And Steven is a political commentator and streamer. All four have spoken and debated extensively on this topic. The goal for this debate was not for anyone to win or to score points. It wasn’t to get views or likes. I never care about those. And I think there are probably much easier ways to get those things if I did care.
The goal was to explore together the history, present and future of Israel and Palestine in a free flowing conversation. No time limits, no rules. There was a lot of tension in the room from the very beginning, and it only got more intense as we went along. And I quickly realized that this very conversation in a very real human way was a microcosm of the tensions and distance and perspectives on the topic of Israel and Palestine. For some debates, I will step in and moderate strictly to prevent emotion from boiling. For this, I saw the value in not interfering with the passion of the exchanges because that emotion in itself spoke volumes.
We did talk about the history and the future. But the anger, the frustration, the biting wit, and at times, respect and comradery were all there. Like I said, we did it in an perhaps all too human way. I will do more debates and conversations on these difficult topics and I will continue to search for hope in the midst of death and destruction, to search for our common humanity in the midst of division and hate. This thing we have going on, human civilization, the whole of it is beautiful and it’s worth figuring out how we can help it flourish together. I love you all. This is the Lex Fridman Podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here’s Norman Finkelstein, Benny Morris, Mouin Rabbani, and Steven Bonnell.
1948
First question is about 1948/ for Israelis, 1948 is the establishment of the state of Israel and the war of independence. For Palestinians, 1948 is the Nakba, which means catastrophe or the displacement of 700,000 Palestinians from their homes as a consequence of the war. What to you is important to understand about the events of 1948 and the period around there, ’47, ’49, that helps us understand what’s going on today and maybe helps us understand the roots of all of this that started even before 1948. I was hoping that Norm could speak first, then Benny, then Mouin, and then Steven. Norm?
Norman Finkelstein
After World War II, the British decided that they didn’t want to deal with the Palestine question anymore and the ball was thrown into the court of the United Nations. Now, as I read the record, the UN was not attempting to arbitrate or adjudicate rights and wrongs. It was confronting a very practical problem. There were two national communities in Palestine and there were irreconcilable differences on fundamental questions, most importantly, looking at the historic record on the question of immigration, and associate with the question of immigration, the question of land.
After World War II, the British decided that they didn’t want to deal with the Palestine question anymore and the ball was thrown into the court of the United Nations. Now, as I read the record, the UN was not attempting to arbitrate or adjudicate rights and wrongs. It was confronting a very practical problem. There were two national communities in Palestine and there were irreconcilable differences on fundamental questions, most importantly, looking at the historic record on the question of immigration, and associate with the question of immigration, the question of land.
The UN Special Committee on Palestine, which came into being before the UN 181 Partition Resolution. The UN Special Committee recommended two states in Palestine. There was a minority position represented by Iran, India, Yugoslavia. They supported one state. But they believed that if forced to, the two communities would figure out some sort of modus vivendi and live together. United Nations General Assembly supported partition between what it called a Jewish state and an Arab state. Now, in my reading of the record, and I understand there’s new scholarship in the subject which I’ve not read, but so far as I’ve read the record, there’s no clarity on what the United Nations General Assembly meant by a Jewish state and an Arab state, except for the fact that the Jewish state would be, demographically, the majority would be Jewish, and the Arab state demographically would be Arab.
The UNSCOP, the UN Special Committee on Palestine, it was very clear and it was reiterated many times that in recommending two states, each state, the Arab state and the Jewish state, would have to guarantee full equality of all citizens with regard to political, civil, and religious matters. Now, that does raise the question if there is absolute full equality of all citizens, both in the Jewish state and the Arab state with regard to political rights, civil rights, and religious rights. Apart from the demographic majority, it’s very unclear what it meant to call a state Jewish or call a state Arab.
In my view, the Partition Resolution was the correct decision. I do not believe that the Arab and Jewish communities could, at that point, be made to live together. I disagree with the minority position of India, Iran, and Yugoslavia. And that not being a practical option, two states was the only other option. In this regard, I would want to pay tribute to what was probably the most moving speech at the UN General Assembly proceedings by the Soviet Foreign Minister Gromyko. I was very tempted to quote it at length, but I recognized that would be taking too much time. So I asked a young friend, Jamie Stern-Weiner to edit it and just get the essence of what Foreign Minister Gromyko had to say.
” During the last war,” Gromyko said, “The Jewish people underwent exceptional sorrow and suffering. Without any exaggeration, this sorrow and suffering are indescribable. Hundreds of thousands of Jews are wandering about in various countries of Europe in search of means of existence and in search of shelter. The United Nations cannot and must not regard this situation with indifference. Past experience, particularly during the Second World War, shows that no Western European state was able to provide adequate assistance for the Jewish people in defending its rights and its very existence from the violence of the Hitlerites and their allies. This is an unpleasant fact. But unfortunately, like all other facts, it must be admitted.”
Gromyko went on to say, in principle, he supports one state, or the Soviet Union supports one state. But he said, ” If relations between the Jewish and Arab populations of Palestine proved to be so bad that would be impossible to reconcile them and to ensure the peaceful coexistence of the Arabs and the Jews, the Soviet Union would support two states. I personally am not convinced that the two states would have been unsustainable in the long term if, and this is big if, the Zionist movement had been faithful to the position that proclaimed during the UNSCOP public hearings.”
At the time Ben-Gurion testified, “I want to express what we mean by a Jewish state. We mean by a Jewish state, simply a state where the majority of the people are Jews, not a state where a Jew has in any way any privilege more than anyone else. A Jewish state means a state based on absolute equality of all her citizens and on democracy. Alas, this was not to be.” As Professor Morris has written, “Zionist ideology and practice were necessarily an elementally expansionist.” And then he wrote in another book, “Transfer…” The euphemism for expulsion, “Transfer was inevitable and inbuilt into Zionism because it sought to transform a land which was Arab into a Jewish state. And a Jewish state could not have arisen without a major displacement of Arab population. And because this aim automatically produced resistance among the Arabs, which in turn persuade the Yishuv’s leaders,” the Yishuv being the Jewish community, “The Yishuv’s leaders, that a hostile Arab majority or a large minority could not remain in place if a Jewish state was to arise or safely endure.”
Or as Professor Morris retrospectively put it, “A removing of a population was needed. Without a population expulsion, a Jewish state would not have been established.” The Arab side rejected outright the partition resolution. I won’t play games with that. I know a lot of people try to prove it’s not true. It clearly, in my view, is true. The Arab side rejected outright the partition resolution. While Israeli leaders acting on the compulsions inevitable and inbuilt into Zionism, found the pretext in the course of the first Arab-Israeli war to expel the indigenous population and expand its borders. I therefore conclude that neither side was committed to the letter of the partition resolution and both sides aborted it.
Lex Fridman
Thank you, Norm. Norm asked that you make a lengthy statement in the beginning. Benny, I hope it’s okay to call everybody by their first name in the name of camaraderie. Norm has quoted several things you said. Perhaps you can comment broadly on the question of 1948 and maybe respond to the things that Norm said.
Thank you, Norm. Norm asked that you make a lengthy statement in the beginning. Benny, I hope it’s okay to call everybody by their first name in the name of camaraderie. Norm has quoted several things you said. Perhaps you can comment broadly on the question of 1948 and maybe respond to the things that Norm said.
Benny Morris
Yeah. UNSCOP, the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine recommended partition. The majority of UNSCOP recommended partition, which was accepted by the UN General Assembly in November, 1947. Essentially, looking back to the Peel Commission in 1937, 10 years earlier, a British Commission had looked at the problem of Palestine, the two warring national groups who refused to live together, if you like, or consolidate a unitary state between them. And Peel said there should be two states. That’s the principle. The country must be partitioned in two states. This would give a modicum of justice to both sides, if not all their demands, of course.
Yeah. UNSCOP, the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine recommended partition. The majority of UNSCOP recommended partition, which was accepted by the UN General Assembly in November, 1947. Essentially, looking back to the Peel Commission in 1937, 10 years earlier, a British Commission had looked at the problem of Palestine, the two warring national groups who refused to live together, if you like, or consolidate a unitary state between them. And Peel said there should be two states. That’s the principle. The country must be partitioned in two states. This would give a modicum of justice to both sides, if not all their demands, of course.
And the United Nations followed suit. The United Nations, UNSCOP and then the UN General Assembly representing the will of the international community said two states is the just solution in this complex situation. The problem was that immediately with the passage of the resolution, the Arabs, Arab states and the Arabs of Palestine said no. As Norman Finkelstein said, they said no. They rejected the partition idea, the principle of partition, not just the idea of what percentage which side should get, but the principle of partition they said no to, the Jews should not have any part of Palestine for their sovereign territory. Maybe Jews could live as a minority in Palestine. That also was problematic in the eyes of the Palestinian Arab leadership.
Husayni had said, only Jews who were there before 1917 could actually get citizenship and continue to live there. But the Arabs rejected partition and the Arabs of Palestine launched, in very disorganized fashion, war against the resolution, against the implementation of the resolution, against the Jewish community in Palestine. And this was their defeat in that civil war between the two communities, while the British were withdrawing from Palestine, led to the Arab invasion, the invasion by the Arab states in May, 1948 of the country. Again, basically with the idea of eradicating or preventing the emergence of a Jewish state in line with the United Nations decision and the will of the international community.
Norman said that the Zionist enterprise, and he quoted me, meant from the beginning to transfer or expel the Arabs of Palestine or some of the Arabs of Palestine. And I think he’s quoting out of context. The context in which the statements were made that the Jewish state could only emerge if there was a transfer of Arab population was proceeded in the way I wrote it, and the way it actually happened by Arab resistance and hostilities towards the Jewish community. Had the Arabs accepted partition, there would’ve been a large Arab minority in the Jewish state which emerged in ’47. And in fact, Jewish economists and state builders took into account that there would be a large Arab minority and its needs would be cared for, et cetera.
But this was not to be because the Arabs attacked. And had they not attacked, perhaps a Jewish state with a large Arab minority could have emerged. But this didn’t happen. They went to war. The Jews resisted. And in the course of that war, Arab populations were driven out. Some were expelled, some left because Arab leaders advised them to leave or ordered them to leave. And at the end of the war, Israel said they can’t return because they just tried to destroy the Jewish state. And that’s the basic reality of what happened in ’48. The Jews created a state. The Palestinian Arabs never bothered to even try to create a state before ’48 and in the course of the 1948 war. And for that reason, they have no state to this day. The Jews do have a state because they prepared to establish a state, fought for it, and established it, hopefully lastingly.
Lex Fridman
When you say hostility, in case people are not familiar, there was a full on war where Arab states invaded and Israel won that war.
When you say hostility, in case people are not familiar, there was a full on war where Arab states invaded and Israel won that war.
Benny Morris
Let me just add to clarify. The war had two parts to it. The first part was the Arab community in Palestine, its militiamen attacked the Jews from November, 1947. In other words, from the day after the UN Partition Resolution was passed, Arab gunmen were busy shooting up Jews, and that snowballed into a full scale civil war between the two communities in Palestine. In May, 1948, a second stage began in the war in which the Arab states invaded, the new state attacked the new state, and they too were defeated. And thus the state of Israel emerged. In the course of this two stage war, a vast Palestinian refugee problem occurred.
Let me just add to clarify. The war had two parts to it. The first part was the Arab community in Palestine, its militiamen attacked the Jews from November, 1947. In other words, from the day after the UN Partition Resolution was passed, Arab gunmen were busy shooting up Jews, and that snowballed into a full scale civil war between the two communities in Palestine. In May, 1948, a second stage began in the war in which the Arab states invaded, the new state attacked the new state, and they too were defeated. And thus the state of Israel emerged. In the course of this two stage war, a vast Palestinian refugee problem occurred.
Lex Fridman
And so after that, the transfer, the expulsion, the thing that people call the Nakba happened. Mouin, could you speak to 1948 and the historical significance of it?
And so after that, the transfer, the expulsion, the thing that people call the Nakba happened. Mouin, could you speak to 1948 and the historical significance of it?
Mouin Rabbani
Sure. There’s a lot to unpack here. I’ll try to limit myself to just a few points regarding Zionism and transfer. I think Chaim Weizmann, the head of the world’s Zionist organization, had it exactly right when he said that the objective of Zionism is to make Palestine as Jewish as England is English or France is French. In other words, as Norman explained, a Jewish state requires Jewish political demographic and territorial supremacy. Without those three elements, the state would be Jewish in name only. And I think what distinguishes Zionism is its insistence, supremacy and exclusivity. That would be my first point.
Sure. There’s a lot to unpack here. I’ll try to limit myself to just a few points regarding Zionism and transfer. I think Chaim Weizmann, the head of the world’s Zionist organization, had it exactly right when he said that the objective of Zionism is to make Palestine as Jewish as England is English or France is French. In other words, as Norman explained, a Jewish state requires Jewish political demographic and territorial supremacy. Without those three elements, the state would be Jewish in name only. And I think what distinguishes Zionism is its insistence, supremacy and exclusivity. That would be my first point.
The second point is, I think what the Soviet foreign minister at the time Andrei Gromyko said is exactly right, with one reservation. Gromyko was describing a European savagery unleashed against Europe’s Jews. At the time, it wasn’t Palestinians or Arabs. The savages and the barbarians were European to the core. It had nothing to do with developments in Palestine or the Middle East. Secondly, at the time that Gromyko was speaking, those Jewish survivors of the Holocaust and others who were in need of safe haven were still overwhelmingly on the European continent and not in Palestine.
And I think, given the scale of the savagery, I don’t think that any one state or country should have borne the responsibility for addressing this crisis. I think it should have been an international responsibility. The Soviet Union could have contributed, Germany certainly could and should have contributed, the United Kingdom and the United States which slammed their doors shut to the persecuted Jews of Europe as the Nazis were rising to power, they certainly should have played a role. But instead, what passed for the international community at the time, decided to partition Palestine. And here I think we need to judge the Partition Resolution against the realities that obtained at the time time.
Two thirds of the population of Palestine was Arab. The Yishuv, the Jewish community in Palestine, constituted about one third of the total population and controlled even less of the land within Palestine. As a preeminent Palestinian historian Walid Khalidi has pointed out, the Partition Resolution in giving roughly 55% of Palestine to the Jewish community, and I think 41, 42% to the Arab community, to the Palestinians, did not preserve the position of each community, or even favor one community at the expense of the other. Rather, it thoroughly inverted and revolutionized the relationship between the two communities.
And as many have written, the Nakba was the inevitable consequence of partition given the nature of Zionism, given the territorial disposition, given the weakness of the Palestinian community whose leadership had been largely decimated during a major revolt at the end of the 1930s, given that the Arab states were still very much under French and British influence, the Nakba was inevitable, the inevitable product of the Partition Resolution. And one last point also about the UN’s Partition Resolution is, yes, formally, that is what the international community decided on the 29th of November, 1947. It’s not a resolution that could ever have gotten through the UN General Assembly today for a very simple reason. It was a very different general assembly.
Most African, most Asian states were not yet independent. Were the resolution to be placed before the international community today, and I find it telling that the minority opinion was led by India, Iran, and Yugoslavia, I think they would’ve represented the clear majority. So partition, given what we know about Zionism, given that it was entirely predictable what would happen, given the realities on the ground in Palestine was deeply unjust, and the idea that either the Palestinians or the Arab states could have accepted such a resolution is, I think, an illusion. That was in 1947. We saw what happened in ’48 and ’49. Palestinian society was essentially destroyed. Over 80%, I believe, of Palestinians residents in the territory that became the state of Israel were either expelled or fled and ultimately were ethnically cleansed because ethnic cleansing consists of two components. It’s not just forcing people into refuge or expelling them, it’s just as importantly preventing their return. And Benny Morris has written, I think, a article about Yosef Weitz and the transfer committees. There was a very detailed initiative to prevent the return and it consisted of raising hundreds of Palestinian villages to the ground, which was systematically implemented and so on. And so Palestinians became a stateless people.
Now, what is the most important reason that no Arab state was established in Palestine? Well, since the 1930s, the Zionist leadership and the Hashemite leadership of Jordan, as it’s been thoroughly researched and written about by the Israeli-British historian Avi Shlaim, essentially colluded to prevent the establishment of an independent Arab state in Palestine in the late 1940s. There’s much more here, but I think those are the key points I would make about 1948.
Lex Fridman
We may talk about Zionism, Britain, UN assemblies and all the things you mentioned. There’s a lot to dig into. So again, if we can keep it to just one statement moving forward, after Steven, if you want to go a little longer. Also, we should acknowledge the fact that the speaking speeds of people here are different. Steven speaks about 10 times faster than me. Steven, if you want to comment on 1948.
We may talk about Zionism, Britain, UN assemblies and all the things you mentioned. There’s a lot to dig into. So again, if we can keep it to just one statement moving forward, after Steven, if you want to go a little longer. Also, we should acknowledge the fact that the speaking speeds of people here are different. Steven speaks about 10 times faster than me. Steven, if you want to comment on 1948.
Steven Bonnell
Yeah. I think it’s interesting where people choose to start the history. I noticed a lot of people like to start at either ’47 or ’48 because it’s the first time where they can clearly point to a catastrophe that occurs on the Arab side, that they want to ascribe 100% of the blame to the newly emergent Israeli state to. But I feel like when you have this type of reading of history, it feels like the goal is to moralize everything first and then to pick and choose facts that support the statements of your initial moral statement afterwards. Whenever people are talking about ’48 or the establishment of the Arab state, I never hear about the fact that a civil war started in ’47. That was largely instigated because of the Arab rejectionism of the ’47 partition plan.
Yeah. I think it’s interesting where people choose to start the history. I noticed a lot of people like to start at either ’47 or ’48 because it’s the first time where they can clearly point to a catastrophe that occurs on the Arab side, that they want to ascribe 100% of the blame to the newly emergent Israeli state to. But I feel like when you have this type of reading of history, it feels like the goal is to moralize everything first and then to pick and choose facts that support the statements of your initial moral statement afterwards. Whenever people are talking about ’48 or the establishment of the Arab state, I never hear about the fact that a civil war started in ’47. That was largely instigated because of the Arab rejectionism of the ’47 partition plan.
I never hear about the fact that the majority of the land that was acquired happened by purchases from Jewish organizations of Palestinian Arabs of the Ottoman Empire before the mandatory period in 1920 even started. Funnily enough, king Abdullah of Jordan was quoted as saying, “The Arabs are as prodigal in selling their land as they are in weeping about it.” I never hear about the multiple times that Arabs rejected partition, rejected living with Jews, rejected any sort of state that would’ve even had any sort of Jewish exclusivity. It’s funny because it was brought up before that the partition plan was unfair, and that’s why the Arabs rejected it, as though they rejected it because it was unfair, because of the amount of land that Jews were given and not just due to the fact that Jews were given land at all, as though a 30% partition or a 25% partition would’ve been accepted when I don’t think that was the reality of the circumstances.
I feel like most of the other stuff has been said, but I noticed that whenever people talk about ’48 or the years preceding ’48, I think the worst thing that happens is there’s a cherry-picking of the facts where basically all of the blame is ascribed to this built-in idea of Zionism because of a handful of quotes or because of an ideology, we can say that transfer or population expulsion or basically the mandate of all of these Arabs being kicked off the land was always going to happen, when I think there’s a refusal sometimes as well to acknowledge that regardless of the ideas of some of the Zionist leaders, there is a political, social and military reality on the ground that they’re forced to contend with.
And unfortunately, the Arabs, because of their inability to engage in diplomacy and only to use tools of war to try to negotiate everything going on in mandatory Palestine, basically always gave the Jews a reason or an excuse to fight and acquire land through that way because of their refusal to negotiate on anything else, whether it was the partition plan in ’47, whether it was the Lausanne peace conference afterwards where Israel even offered to annex Gaza in ’51, where they offered to take in a hundred thousand refugees. Every single deal is just rejected out of hand because the Arabs don’t want a Jewish state anywhere in this region of the world.
Norman Finkelstein
I would like to engage Professor Morris. If you don’t mind, I’m not with the first name. It’s just not my-
I would like to engage Professor Morris. If you don’t mind, I’m not with the first name. It’s just not my-
Lex Fridman
Okay.
Okay.
Norman Finkelstein
… way of relating.
… way of relating.
Benny Morris
You can just call me Morris. You don’t need the professor.
You can just call me Morris. You don’t need the professor.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay. There’s a real problem here, and it’s been a problem I’ve had over many years of reading your work. Apart perhaps from, as grandchild, I suspect nobody knows your work better than I do. I’ve read it many times, not once, not twice, at least three times everything you’ve written. And the problem is, it’s a kind of quicksilver. It’s very hard to grasp a point and hold you to it. So we’re going to try here to see whether we can hold you to a point. And then you argue with me the point. I have no problem with that. Your name please.
Okay. There’s a real problem here, and it’s been a problem I’ve had over many years of reading your work. Apart perhaps from, as grandchild, I suspect nobody knows your work better than I do. I’ve read it many times, not once, not twice, at least three times everything you’ve written. And the problem is, it’s a kind of quicksilver. It’s very hard to grasp a point and hold you to it. So we’re going to try here to see whether we can hold you to a point. And then you argue with me the point. I have no problem with that. Your name please.
Steven Bonnell
Steven Bonnell.
Steven Bonnell.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay. Mr. Bonnell referred to cherry-picking and handful of quotes. Now, it’s true that when you wrote your first book on the Palestinian refugee question, you only had a few lines on this issue of transfer.
Okay. Mr. Bonnell referred to cherry-picking and handful of quotes. Now, it’s true that when you wrote your first book on the Palestinian refugee question, you only had a few lines on this issue of transfer.
Benny Morris
Four pages.
Four pages.
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah. In the first book?
Yeah. In the first book?
Benny Morris
In the first book. Four pages.
In the first book. Four pages.
Norman Finkelstein
Maybe four. I’m not going to quarrel. My memory is not clear. We’re talking about 40 years ago. I read it, I read it, but then I read other things by you. Okay. And you were taken to task, if my memory is correct, that you hadn’t adequately documented the claims of transfer. Allow me to finish. And I thought that was a reasonable challenge because it was an unusual claim for a mainstream Israeli historian to say, as you did not-
Maybe four. I’m not going to quarrel. My memory is not clear. We’re talking about 40 years ago. I read it, I read it, but then I read other things by you. Okay. And you were taken to task, if my memory is correct, that you hadn’t adequately documented the claims of transfer. Allow me to finish. And I thought that was a reasonable challenge because it was an unusual claim for a mainstream Israeli historian to say, as you did not-
Norman Finkelstein
Mainstream Israeli historian to say, as you did in that first book, that from the very beginning, transfer figured prominently in Zionist thinking that was an unusual, if you read Anita Shapira, you read Shabtai Teveth that was an unusual acknowledgement by you. And then I found it very impressive that in that revised version of your first book, you devoted 25 pages to copiously documenting the salience of transfer in Zionist thinking. And in fact, you used a very provocative and resonant phrase.
Mainstream Israeli historian to say, as you did in that first book, that from the very beginning, transfer figured prominently in Zionist thinking that was an unusual, if you read Anita Shapira, you read Shabtai Teveth that was an unusual acknowledgement by you. And then I found it very impressive that in that revised version of your first book, you devoted 25 pages to copiously documenting the salience of transfer in Zionist thinking. And in fact, you used a very provocative and resonant phrase.
You said that transfer was inevitable and inbuilt into Zionism. We’re not talking about circumstantial factors, a war, Arab hostility. You said it’s inevitable and inbuilt into Zionism. Now, as I said, so we won’t be accused of cherry picking. Those were 25 very densely argued pages. And then in an interview, and I could cite several quotes, but I’ll choose one, you said, “Removing a population was needed.” Let’s look at the words. “Without a population expulsion, a Jewish state would not have been established.” Now you are the one… Again, I was very surprised when I read your book here. I’m referring to “Righteous Victims.” I was very surprised when I came to that page 37, where you wrote that territorial displacement and dispossession was the chief motor of Arab resistance to Zionism. Territorial displacement and dispossession were the chief motor of Arab resistance to Zionism.
So you then went on to say, because the Arab population rationally feared territorial displacement and dispossession, it of course opposed Zionism. That’s as normal as Native Americans opposing the Euro-American manifest destiny in the history of our own country because they understood it would be at their expense. It was inbuilt and inevitable.
And so now for you to come along and say that it all happened just because of the war, that otherwise the Zionists made all these plans for a happy minority to live there, that simply does not gel. It does not cohere. It is not reconcilable with what you yourself have written. It was inevitable and inbuilt.
Now, in other situations, you’ve said that’s true with, I think it was a greater good to establish a Jewish state at the expense of the indigenous population. That’s another kind of argument that was Theodore Roosevelt’s argument in our own country. He said, we don’t want the whole of North America to remain a squalid refuge for these wigwams and teepees. We have to get rid of them and make this a great country. But he didn’t deny that it was inbuilt and inevitable.
Benny Morris
I think You’ve made your point there. First, I’ll take up something that Mouin said. He said that the Nakba was inevitable=
I think You’ve made your point there. First, I’ll take up something that Mouin said. He said that the Nakba was inevitable=
Mouin Rabbani
As have you.
As have you.
Benny Morris
… and predictable. No, no, no, I’ve never said that. It was inevitable and predictable only because the Arabs assaulted the Jewish community and state in 1947/48. Had there been no assault, there probably wouldn’t have been a refugee problem. There’s no reason for a refugee problem to have occurred, expulsions to have occurred, a massive dispossession to occur. These occurred as a result of war.
… and predictable. No, no, no, I’ve never said that. It was inevitable and predictable only because the Arabs assaulted the Jewish community and state in 1947/48. Had there been no assault, there probably wouldn’t have been a refugee problem. There’s no reason for a refugee problem to have occurred, expulsions to have occurred, a massive dispossession to occur. These occurred as a result of war.
Now, Norman has said that, I said that transfer was inbuilt into Zionism in one way or another. And this is certainly true in order to buy land, the Jews bought tracts of land on which some Arabs sometimes lived. Sometimes they bought tracts of land on which there weren’t Arab villages, but sometimes they bought land on which there were Arabs.
And according to Ottoman law, and the British, at least in the initial years of the British mandate, the law said that the people who bought the land could do what they liked with the people who didn’t own the land, who were basically squatting on the land, which is the Arab tenant farmers, which is we’re talking about a very small number actually of Arabs who were displaced as a result of land purchases in the Ottoman period or the mandate period.
But there was dispossession in one way. They didn’t possess the land. They didn’t own it, but they were removed from the land. And this did happen in Zionism. And there’s, if you like, an inevitability in Zionist ideology of buying tracts of land and starting to work it yourself and settle it with your own people and so on. That made sense.
But what we’re really talking about is what happened in 47/48. And in 47/48, the Arabs started a war. And actually people pay for their mistakes. And the Palestinians have never actually agreed to pay for their mistakes. They make mistakes, they attack, they suffer as a result.
And we see something similar going on today in the Gaza Strip. They do something terrible. They kill 1,200 Jews. They abduct 250 women and children and babies and old people and whatever. And then they start screaming, please save us from what we did because the Jews are counterattacking. And this is what happened then. And this is what’s happening now. There’s something fairly similar in the situation here.
Expulsion, and this is important, Norman, you should pay attention to this. You didn’t raise that. Expulsion transfer whenever policy of the Zionist movement before 47, it doesn’t exist in Zionist platforms of the various political parties, of the Zionist organization, of the Israeli state, of the Jewish agency. Nobody would’ve actually made it into policy because it was always a large minority. If there were people who wanted it, always a large minority of Jewish politicians and leaders would’ve said, no, this is immoral. We cannot start a state on the basis of an expulsion.
So it was never adopted and actually was never adopted as policy even in 48, even though Ben-Gurion wanted as few Arabs in the course of the war staying in the Jewish state after they attacked it. He didn’t want disloyal citizens staying there because they wouldn’t have been loyal citizens. But this made sense in the war itself. But the movement itself and its political parties never accepted it.
It’s true that in 1937, when the British, as part of the proposal by the Peel Commission to divide the country into two states, one Arab, one Jewish, which the Arabs of course rejected, Peel also recommended most of the Arabs in the Jewish state should be transferred because otherwise, if they stayed and were disloyal to the emergent Jewish state, this would cause endless disturbances, warfare, killing, and so on.
So Ben-Gurion and Weizmann latched onto this proposal by the most famous democracy in the world, the British democracy, when they proposed the idea of transfer side by side with the idea of partition because it made sense. And they said, well, if the British say so, we should also advocate it. But they never actually tried to pass it as Zionist policy, and they fairly quickly stopped even talking about transfer after 1938.
Lex Fridman
So just to clarify, what you’re saying is that 47 was an offensive war, not a defensive war-
So just to clarify, what you’re saying is that 47 was an offensive war, not a defensive war-
Benny Morris
By the Arabs. Yes.
By the Arabs. Yes.
Lex Fridman
… by the Arabs.
… by the Arabs.
Benny Morris
Yeah.
Yeah.
Lex Fridman
And you’re also saying that there was never a top-down policy of expulsion.
And you’re also saying that there was never a top-down policy of expulsion.
Benny Morris
Yes.
Yes.
Lex Fridman
Just to clarify the point.
Just to clarify the point.
Mouin Rabbani
If I understood you correctly, you’re making the claim that transfer expulsion and so on was in fact a very localized phenomenon-
If I understood you correctly, you’re making the claim that transfer expulsion and so on was in fact a very localized phenomenon-
Benny Morris
Before 48.
Before 48.
Mouin Rabbani
… resulting from individual land purchases. If I understand you correctly, you’re also making the claim that the idea that a Jewish state requires a removal or overwhelming reduction of the non-Jewish population was-
… resulting from individual land purchases. If I understand you correctly, you’re also making the claim that the idea that a Jewish state requires a removal or overwhelming reduction of the non-Jewish population was-
Benny Morris
If the Arabs are attacking you. Yes.
If the Arabs are attacking you. Yes.
Mouin Rabbani
… But let’s say prior to 1947, it would be your claim that the idea that a significant reduction or wholesale removal of the Arab population was not part of Zionist thinking. Well, I think there’s two problems with that. I think what you’re saying about localized disputes is correct, but I also think that there is a whole literature that demonstrates that transfer was envisioned by Zionist leaders on a much broader skill than simply individual land purchases. In other words, it went way beyond, we need to remove these tenants so that we can farm this land. The idea was we can’t have a state where all these Arabs remain and we have to get rid of them.
… But let’s say prior to 1947, it would be your claim that the idea that a significant reduction or wholesale removal of the Arab population was not part of Zionist thinking. Well, I think there’s two problems with that. I think what you’re saying about localized disputes is correct, but I also think that there is a whole literature that demonstrates that transfer was envisioned by Zionist leaders on a much broader skill than simply individual land purchases. In other words, it went way beyond, we need to remove these tenants so that we can farm this land. The idea was we can’t have a state where all these Arabs remain and we have to get rid of them.
And the second, I think, impediment to that view is that long before the UN General Assembly convened to address a question of Palestine, Palestinian and Arab and other leaders as well had been warning ad infinitum that the purpose of the Zionist movement is not just to establish a Jewish state, but to establish an exclusivist Jewish state. And that transfer forced displacement was fundamental to that project. And just responding to…. Sorry, was it-
Steven Bonnell
Yeah, Steven.
Yeah, Steven.
Mouin Rabbani
… Bonnell or Donnel?
… Bonnell or Donnel?
Steven Bonnell
Bonnell, yeah.
Bonnell, yeah.
Mouin Rabbani
With a B?
With a B?
Steven Bonnell
Yeah.
Yeah.
Mouin Rabbani
Yeah. You made the point that the problem here is that people don’t recognize is that the first and last result for the Arabs is always war. I think there’s a problem with that. I think you might do well to recall the 1936 general strike conducted by Palestinians at the beginning of the revolt, which at the time was the longest recorded general strike in history.
Yeah. You made the point that the problem here is that people don’t recognize is that the first and last result for the Arabs is always war. I think there’s a problem with that. I think you might do well to recall the 1936 general strike conducted by Palestinians at the beginning of the revolt, which at the time was the longest recorded general strike in history.
You may want to consult the book published last year by Lori Allen, “A History of False Hope”, which discusses in great detail the consistent engagement by Palestinians, their leaders, their elites, their diplomats, and so on with all these international committees.
If we look at today, the Palestinians are once again going to the International Court of Justice. They’re consistently trying to persuade the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court to do his job. They have launched widespread boycott campaigns. So of course the Palestinians have engaged in military resistance. But I think the suggestion that this has always been their first and last resort and that they have somehow spurned civic action, spurned diplomacy, I think really has no basis in reality.
Steven Bonnell
I’ll respond to that. And then a question for Norm to take into account. I think when he answers Benny, because I am curious, obviously I have fresher eyes on this and I’m a newcomer to this arena versus the three of you guys for sure. A claim that gets brought up a lot has to do with the inevitability of transfer and Zionism or the idea that as soon as the Jews envisioned a state in Palestine, they knew that it would involve some mass transfer population, perhaps a mass expulsion. I’m sure we’ll talk about Plan Dalet or Plan D at some point.
I’ll respond to that. And then a question for Norm to take into account. I think when he answers Benny, because I am curious, obviously I have fresher eyes on this and I’m a newcomer to this arena versus the three of you guys for sure. A claim that gets brought up a lot has to do with the inevitability of transfer and Zionism or the idea that as soon as the Jews envisioned a state in Palestine, they knew that it would involve some mass transfer population, perhaps a mass expulsion. I’m sure we’ll talk about Plan Dalet or Plan D at some point.
The issue that I run into is while you can find quotes from leaders, while you can find maybe desires expressed in diaries, I feel like it’s hard to truly ever know if there would’ve been mass transfer in the face of Arab peace, because I feel like every time there was a huge deal on the table that would’ve had a sizable Jewish and Arab population living together, the Arabs would reject it out of hand.
So for instance, when we say that transfer was inevitable, when we say that Zionists would’ve never accepted a sizable Arab population, how do you explain the acceptance of the 47 partition plan that would’ve had a huge Arab population living in the Jewish state? Is your contention that after the acceptance of that, after the establishment of that state, that Jews would’ve slowly started to expel all of these Arab citizens from their country?
Or how do you explain that in Lusanne a couple years later that Israel was willing to formally annex the Gaza Strip and make-
Mouin Rabbani
Of course it was.
Of course it was.
Steven Bonnell
… 200,000 so people, those citizens, but I’m just curious, how do we get this idea of Zionism always means mass transfer when there were times, at least early on in the history of Israel and a little bit before it, where Israel would’ve accepted a state that would’ve had a massive Arab population in it. Is your idea that they would’ve just slowly expelled them afterwards or?
… 200,000 so people, those citizens, but I’m just curious, how do we get this idea of Zionism always means mass transfer when there were times, at least early on in the history of Israel and a little bit before it, where Israel would’ve accepted a state that would’ve had a massive Arab population in it. Is your idea that they would’ve just slowly expelled them afterwards or?
Mouin Rabbani
Is that question to me or Norm?
Is that question to me or Norm?
Steven Bonnell
To either one. I’m curious for the incorporation of the answer. Yeah.
To either one. I’m curious for the incorporation of the answer. Yeah.
Norman Finkelstein
There is some misunderstandings here. So let’s try to clarify that. Number one, it was the old historians who would point to the fact and Professor Morris’s terminology, the old historians, what he called not real historians, he called them chroniclers, not real historians. It was the old Israeli historians who denied the centrality of transfer in Zionist thinking. It was then Professor Morris who contrary to Israel’s historian establishment, who said, now you remind me it’s four pages, but it came at the end of the book. It was-
There is some misunderstandings here. So let’s try to clarify that. Number one, it was the old historians who would point to the fact and Professor Morris’s terminology, the old historians, what he called not real historians, he called them chroniclers, not real historians. It was the old Israeli historians who denied the centrality of transfer in Zionist thinking. It was then Professor Morris who contrary to Israel’s historian establishment, who said, now you remind me it’s four pages, but it came at the end of the book. It was-
Benny Morris
No, no, it’s at the beginning of the book.
No, no, it’s at the beginning of the book.
Norman Finkelstein
… Transfer.
… Transfer.
Benny Morris
Yeah, transfer is dealt with in four pages at the beginning of my first book on the Palestinian refugee problem.
Yeah, transfer is dealt with in four pages at the beginning of my first book on the Palestinian refugee problem.
Norman Finkelstein
It’s a fault of my memory, but the point still stands, it was Professor Morris who introduced this idea in what you might call a big way.
It’s a fault of my memory, but the point still stands, it was Professor Morris who introduced this idea in what you might call a big way.
Benny Morris
Yeah, but I didn’t say it was the central to the Zionist experience. You’re saying centrality. I never said it was central. I said it was there. The idea.
Yeah, but I didn’t say it was the central to the Zionist experience. You’re saying centrality. I never said it was central. I said it was there. The idea.
Lex Fridman
By the way, it’s okay to respond back and forth. This is great. And also just a quick question, if I may. You’re using quotes from Benny, from Professor Morris. It’s also okay to say those quotes do not reflect the full context.
By the way, it’s okay to respond back and forth. This is great. And also just a quick question, if I may. You’re using quotes from Benny, from Professor Morris. It’s also okay to say those quotes do not reflect the full context.
Norman Finkelstein
That would be fine.
That would be fine.
Lex Fridman
So if we go back to quotes we’ve said in the past, and you’ve both here have written, the three of you have written on this topic a lot is we should be careful and just admit like-
So if we go back to quotes we’ve said in the past, and you’ve both here have written, the three of you have written on this topic a lot is we should be careful and just admit like-
Steven Bonnell
Real quick just to be clear that the contention is that Norm is quoting apart and saying that this was the entire reason for this, whereas Benny’s saying it’s a part of that.
Real quick just to be clear that the contention is that Norm is quoting apart and saying that this was the entire reason for this, whereas Benny’s saying it’s a part of that.
Norman Finkelstein
I’m not quoting apart, I’m quoting 25 pages where Professor Morris was at great pains to document the claim that appeared in those early four pages of his book. Now you say it never became part of the official Zionist platform.
I’m not quoting apart, I’m quoting 25 pages where Professor Morris was at great pains to document the claim that appeared in those early four pages of his book. Now you say it never became part of the official Zionist platform.
Benny Morris
It never became part of policy.
It never became part of policy.
Norman Finkelstein
Fine.
Fine.
Benny Morris
Not to say, but it wasn’t policy.
Not to say, but it wasn’t policy.
Norman Finkelstein
We’re also asked, well, this is true. Why did that happen? Why did that happen? It’s because it’s a very simple fact which everybody understands. Ideology doesn’t operate in a vacuum. There are real world practical problems. You can’t just take an ideology and superimpose it on a political reality and turn it into effect.
We’re also asked, well, this is true. Why did that happen? Why did that happen? It’s because it’s a very simple fact which everybody understands. Ideology doesn’t operate in a vacuum. There are real world practical problems. You can’t just take an ideology and superimpose it on a political reality and turn it into effect.
It was the British mandate. There was significant Arab resistance to Zionism, and that resistance was based on the fact, as you said, the fear of territorial displacement and dispossession. So you couldn’t very well expect the Zionist movement to come out in neon lights and announce, hey, we’re going to be expelling you the first chance we get. That’s not realistic.
Lex Fridman
Norm.
Norm.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay.
Okay.
Benny Morris
Let me respond. Look, you’ve said it a number of times that the Arabs from fairly early on in the conflict from the 1890s or the early 1900s said the Jews intend to expel us. This doesn’t mean that it’s true. It means that some Arabs said this, maybe believing it was true, maybe using it as a political instrument to gain support to mobilize Arabs against the Zionist experiment.
Let me respond. Look, you’ve said it a number of times that the Arabs from fairly early on in the conflict from the 1890s or the early 1900s said the Jews intend to expel us. This doesn’t mean that it’s true. It means that some Arabs said this, maybe believing it was true, maybe using it as a political instrument to gain support to mobilize Arabs against the Zionist experiment.
But the fact is transfer did not occur before 1947, and Arabs later said, and since then have said that the Jews want to build a third temple on the Temple Mount as if that’s what really the mainstream of Zionism has always wanted and always strived for. But this is nonsense. It’s something that Husseini used to use as a way to mobilize masses for the cause, using religion as the way to get them to join him. The fact that Arabs said that the Zionists want to dispossess us doesn’t mean it’s true. It just means that there’s some Arabs thought that maybe said it sincerely and maybe insincerely.
Norman Finkelstein
Professor Morris.
Professor Morris.
Benny Morris
Later became a self-fulfilling prophecy. This is true because Arabs attacked the Jews.
Later became a self-fulfilling prophecy. This is true because Arabs attacked the Jews.
Norman Finkelstein
Professor Morris, I read through your stuff. Even yesterday I was looking through “Righteous Victims.”
Professor Morris, I read through your stuff. Even yesterday I was looking through “Righteous Victims.”
Benny Morris
You should read other things. You’re wasting your time.
You should read other things. You’re wasting your time.
Norman Finkelstein
No, no, actually no. I do read other things, but I don’t consider it a waste of time to read you. Not at all. You say that this wasn’t inherent in Zionism. Now, would you agree that David Ben-Gurion was a Zionist?
No, no, actually no. I do read other things, but I don’t consider it a waste of time to read you. Not at all. You say that this wasn’t inherent in Zionism. Now, would you agree that David Ben-Gurion was a Zionist?
Benny Morris
A major Zionist leader?
A major Zionist leader?
Norman Finkelstein
Right. Would you agree Chaim Weizmann was a Zionist?
Right. Would you agree Chaim Weizmann was a Zionist?
Benny Morris
Yeah.
Yeah.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay. I believe they were. I believe they took their ideology seriously. It was the first generation. Just like with the Bolsheviks, the first generation was committed to an idea. By the 1930s, it was just pure geopolitique. The ideology went out the window. The first generation, I have no doubt about their convictions. Okay. They were Zionists. Transfer was inevitable and inbuilt in Zionism.
Okay. I believe they were. I believe they took their ideology seriously. It was the first generation. Just like with the Bolsheviks, the first generation was committed to an idea. By the 1930s, it was just pure geopolitique. The ideology went out the window. The first generation, I have no doubt about their convictions. Okay. They were Zionists. Transfer was inevitable and inbuilt in Zionism.
Benny Morris
You keep repeating the same things.
You keep repeating the same things.
Norman Finkelstein
Because as I said, Mr. Morris, I have a problem reconciling what you’re saying. It either was incidental or it was deeply entrenched. Here I read it’s deeply entrenched, two very resonant words, inevitable and inbuilt.
Because as I said, Mr. Morris, I have a problem reconciling what you’re saying. It either was incidental or it was deeply entrenched. Here I read it’s deeply entrenched, two very resonant words, inevitable and inbuilt.
Benny Morris
Deeply entrenched. I never wrote it.
Deeply entrenched. I never wrote it.
Norman Finkelstein
Well, I’m not sure.
Well, I’m not sure.
Benny Morris
It’s something you just invented.
It’s something you just invented.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay.
Okay.
Benny Morris
But it was there.
But it was there.
Norman Finkelstein
Inevitable and inbuilt. Fine, fine.
Inevitable and inbuilt. Fine, fine.
Benny Morris
Let me concede something. The idea of transfer was there. Israel Zangwill, a British Zionist talked about it early on in the century. Even Herzl in some way talked about transferring population.
Let me concede something. The idea of transfer was there. Israel Zangwill, a British Zionist talked about it early on in the century. Even Herzl in some way talked about transferring population.
Norman Finkelstein
According to your 25 pages everybody talked about.
According to your 25 pages everybody talked about.
Lex Fridman
we keep bringing up this line from the 25 pages and the four pages. We’re lucky to have Benny in front of us right now. We don’t need to go to the quotes. We can legitimately ask, how central is expulsion to Zionism in its early version of Zionism and whatever Zionism is today, and how much power influence does Zionism and ideology have in Israel and the influence, the philosophy, the ideology of Zionism have on Israel today?
we keep bringing up this line from the 25 pages and the four pages. We’re lucky to have Benny in front of us right now. We don’t need to go to the quotes. We can legitimately ask, how central is expulsion to Zionism in its early version of Zionism and whatever Zionism is today, and how much power influence does Zionism and ideology have in Israel and the influence, the philosophy, the ideology of Zionism have on Israel today?
Benny Morris
The Zionist movement up to 1948, Zionist ideology was central to the whole Zionist experience, the whole enterprise up to 1948. And I think Zionist ideology was also important in the first decades of Israel’s existence. Slowly, the hold of Zionism, if you like, like Bolshevism held the Soviet Union gradually faded, and a lot of Israelis today think in terms of individual success and then the capitalism and all sorts of things, which had nothing to do with Zionism, but Zionism was very important.
The Zionist movement up to 1948, Zionist ideology was central to the whole Zionist experience, the whole enterprise up to 1948. And I think Zionist ideology was also important in the first decades of Israel’s existence. Slowly, the hold of Zionism, if you like, like Bolshevism held the Soviet Union gradually faded, and a lot of Israelis today think in terms of individual success and then the capitalism and all sorts of things, which had nothing to do with Zionism, but Zionism was very important.
But what I’m saying is that the idea of transfer wasn’t the core of Zionism. The idea of Zionism was to save the Jews who had been vastly persecuted in Eastern Europe, and incidentally in the Arab world, the Muslim world for centuries, and eventually ending up with the Holocaust. The idea of Zionism was to save the Jewish people by establishing a state or re-establishing a Jewish state on the ancient Jewish homeland, which is something that Arabs today even deny that there were Jews in Palestine or the land of Israel 2000 years ago.
Arafat famously said, “What Temple was there on Temple Mount? Maybe it was in Nablus.” Which of course is nonsense. But they had a strong connection for thousands of years to the land to which they wanted to return and return there. They found that on the land lived hundreds of thousands of Arabs, and the question was how to accommodate the vision of a Jewish state in Palestine alongside the existence of these Arab masses living on who were indigenous, in fact, to the land by that stage.
And the idea of partition because they couldn’t live together because the Arabs didn’t want to live together with the Jews. And I think the Jews also didn’t want to live together in one state with Arabs in general. The idea of partition was the thing which the Zionists accepted, okay, we can only get a small part of Palestine. The Arabs will get in 37. Most of Palestine in 1947 the ratios were changed, but we can live side by side with each other in a partitioned Palestine. And this was the essence of it.
The idea of transfer was there, but it was never adopted as policy. But in 1947/48, the Arabs attacked trying to destroy essentially the Zionist enterprise and the emerging Jewish state. And the reaction was transfer in some way, not as policy, but this is what happened on the battlefield. And this is also what Ben-Gurion at some point began to want as well.
Mouin Rabbani
One of the first books on this issue I read when I was still in high school because my late father had it, was “The Diaries of Theodor Herzl.” And I think Theodor Herzl, of course, was the founder of the contemporary Zionist movement. And I think if you read that, it’s very clear for Herzl the model upon which the Zionist movement would proceed. His model was Cecil Rhodes.
One of the first books on this issue I read when I was still in high school because my late father had it, was “The Diaries of Theodor Herzl.” And I think Theodor Herzl, of course, was the founder of the contemporary Zionist movement. And I think if you read that, it’s very clear for Herzl the model upon which the Zionist movement would proceed. His model was Cecil Rhodes.
I think Rhodes, from what I recall, correct me if I’m wrong, has quite a prominent place in Herzl’s diaries. I think Herzl was also corresponding with him and seeking his support. Cecil Rhodes, of course, was the British colonialist after whom the former white minority regime in Rhodesia was named. And Herzl also says explicitly in his diaries, that it is essential to remove the existing population from Palestine.
Benny Morris
Can I respond to this-
Can I respond to this-
Mouin Rabbani
In a moment, please. He says, we shall have to spirit the penniless population across the borders and procure employment for them elsewhere or something. And Israel Zangwill who you mentioned, a land without a people for a people without a land, they knew then well it wasn’t a land without a people. I’ll continue, but please go ahead.
In a moment, please. He says, we shall have to spirit the penniless population across the borders and procure employment for them elsewhere or something. And Israel Zangwill who you mentioned, a land without a people for a people without a land, they knew then well it wasn’t a land without a people. I’ll continue, but please go ahead.
Benny Morris
Just to this, there is one small diary entry in Herzl’s vast-
Just to this, there is one small diary entry in Herzl’s vast-
Mouin Rabbani
It’s five volumes.
It’s five volumes.
Benny Morris
… Yeah, five volumes. There’s one paragraph which actually mentions the idea of transfer. There are people who think that Herzl was actually pointing to South America when he was talking about that the Jews were going to move to Argentina, and then they would try and buy out or buy off or spirit the penniless natives to make way for Jewish settlement. Maybe he wasn’t even talking about the Arabs in that particular passage. That’s the argument of some people. Maybe he was.
… Yeah, five volumes. There’s one paragraph which actually mentions the idea of transfer. There are people who think that Herzl was actually pointing to South America when he was talking about that the Jews were going to move to Argentina, and then they would try and buy out or buy off or spirit the penniless natives to make way for Jewish settlement. Maybe he wasn’t even talking about the Arabs in that particular passage. That’s the argument of some people. Maybe he was.
But the point is it has only a 1% of the diary, which is devoted to this subject. It’s not a central idea in Herzl’s thinking. What Herzl wanted, and this is what’s important, not Rhodes, I don’t think he was the model. Herzl wanted to create a liberal democratic western state in Palestine for the Jews. That was the idea. Not some imperial enterprise serving some imperial master, which is what Rhodes was about.
But to have a Jewish state, which was modeled on the western democracies in Palestine, and this incidentally was more or less what Weizmann and Ben-Gurion wanted. Ben-Gurion was more of a socialist. Weizmann was more of a liberal westerner, but they wanted to establish a social democratic or liberal state in Palestine.
And they both envisioned through most of the years of their activity that there would be an Arab minority in that Jewish state. It’s true that Ben-Gurion strived to have as small as possible an Arab minority in the Jewish state because he knew that if you want a Jewish majority state, that would be necessary, but it’s not something which they were willing to translate into actual policy.
Lex Fridman
Just a quick pause to mention that for people who are not familiar, Theodor Herzl we’re talking about over a century ago, and everything we’ve been talking about has been mostly 1948 and before.
Just a quick pause to mention that for people who are not familiar, Theodor Herzl we’re talking about over a century ago, and everything we’ve been talking about has been mostly 1948 and before.
Mouin Rabbani
Yes. Just one clarification on Herzl’s diaries. I mean, the other thing that I recall from those diaries is he was very preoccupied with, in fact, getting great power patronage, seeing Palestine, the Jewish state in Palestine, I think his words, an outpost of civilization against barbarism. In other words, very much seeing his project as a proxy for Western imperialism-
Yes. Just one clarification on Herzl’s diaries. I mean, the other thing that I recall from those diaries is he was very preoccupied with, in fact, getting great power patronage, seeing Palestine, the Jewish state in Palestine, I think his words, an outpost of civilization against barbarism. In other words, very much seeing his project as a proxy for Western imperialism-
Benny Morris
No, no, I don’t think that’s the right word.
No, no, I don’t think that’s the right word.
Mouin Rabbani
… in the Middle East.
… in the Middle East.
Benny Morris
Not proxy. He wanted to establish a Jewish state which would be independent. To get that he hoped that he would be able to garner support from major imperial powers, but it wasn’t-
Not proxy. He wanted to establish a Jewish state which would be independent. To get that he hoped that he would be able to garner support from major imperial powers, but it wasn’t-
Mouin Rabbani
Including the Ottoman Sultan-
Including the Ottoman Sultan-
Benny Morris
Yes, yes, exactly.
Yes, yes, exactly.
Partition
Mouin Rabbani
… who he tried to cultivate. I just want to respond to a point you made earlier, which was that people expressed the rejection of the partition resolution on the grounds that it gave the majority of Palestine to the Jewish community, which formed only a third. Whereas in fact, if I understood you correctly, you’re saying the Palestinians and the Arabs would have rejected any partition resolution.
… who he tried to cultivate. I just want to respond to a point you made earlier, which was that people expressed the rejection of the partition resolution on the grounds that it gave the majority of Palestine to the Jewish community, which formed only a third. Whereas in fact, if I understood you correctly, you’re saying the Palestinians and the Arabs would have rejected any partition resolution.
Steven Bonnell
Yeah, a couple of things that one, they would’ve rejected any. Two, a lot of that land given was in the Negev. It was pretty terrible land at the time. And then three, the land that would’ve been partitioned to Jews I think would’ve been, I think I saw it was like 500,000… It would’ve been 500,000 Jews, 400,000 Arabs, and I think like 80,000 Bedouins would’ve been there. So the state would’ve been divided pretty close to them.
Yeah, a couple of things that one, they would’ve rejected any. Two, a lot of that land given was in the Negev. It was pretty terrible land at the time. And then three, the land that would’ve been partitioned to Jews I think would’ve been, I think I saw it was like 500,000… It would’ve been 500,000 Jews, 400,000 Arabs, and I think like 80,000 Bedouins would’ve been there. So the state would’ve been divided pretty close to them.
Mouin Rabbani
I think you raise a valid point because I think the Palestinians did reject the partition of their homeland in principle. And I think the fact that the United Nations General Assembly then awarded the majority of their homeland to the Zionist movement only added in salt to injury. I mean, one doesn’t have to sympathize with the Palestinians to recognize that they have now been a stateless people for 75 years.
I think you raise a valid point because I think the Palestinians did reject the partition of their homeland in principle. And I think the fact that the United Nations General Assembly then awarded the majority of their homeland to the Zionist movement only added in salt to injury. I mean, one doesn’t have to sympathize with the Palestinians to recognize that they have now been a stateless people for 75 years.
Can you name any country yours, for example, or yours, that would be prepared to give 55%, 25%, 10% of your country to the Palestinians? Of course not. And so the issue was not the existence of Jews in Palestine. They had been there for centuries, and of course they had ties to Palestine and particularly to Jerusalem and other places going back centuries if not millennia.
But the idea of establishing an exclusively Jewish state at the expense of those who were already living there, I think it was right to reject that. And I don’t think we can look back now 75 years later and say, well, you should have accepted losing 55% of your homeland because you ended up losing 78% of it, and the remaining 22% was occupied in 1967. That’s not how things work.
And I can imagine an American rejecting giving 10% of the United States to the Palestinians, and if that rejection leads to war and you lose half your country, I doubt that 50 years from now you’re going to say, well, maybe I should have accepted that.
Steven Bonnell
Sure. So I like this answer more than what I usually feel like I’m hearing when it comes to the Palestinian rejection of the 47 partition plan. Sometimes I feel like a weird switch happens to where the Arabs in the area are actually presented as entirely pragmatic people who are simply doing a calculation and saying like, well, we’re losing 55% of our land. Jews are only maybe one third of the people here, and we’ve got 45. And no, the math doesn’t work, basically. But it wasn’t a math problem. I think, like you said-
Sure. So I like this answer more than what I usually feel like I’m hearing when it comes to the Palestinian rejection of the 47 partition plan. Sometimes I feel like a weird switch happens to where the Arabs in the area are actually presented as entirely pragmatic people who are simply doing a calculation and saying like, well, we’re losing 55% of our land. Jews are only maybe one third of the people here, and we’ve got 45. And no, the math doesn’t work, basically. But it wasn’t a math problem. I think, like you said-
Mouin Rabbani
It was a matter of principle.
It was a matter of principle.
Steven Bonnell
… it was an ideology problem.
… it was an ideology problem.
Mouin Rabbani
No, it was a matter of principle.
No, it was a matter of principle.
Steven Bonnell
Yeah. Ideologically driven that they as a people have a right to or are entitled to this land that they’ve never actually had an independent state on, that they’ve never had even a guarantee of an independent state on, that they’ve never actually ruled a government on.
Yeah. Ideologically driven that they as a people have a right to or are entitled to this land that they’ve never actually had an independent state on, that they’ve never had even a guarantee of an independent state on, that they’ve never actually ruled a government on.
Mouin Rabbani
That last point is actually not correct because for all its injustice, the mandate system recognized Palestine as a class a mandate, which provisionally recognized the independence of that territory.
That last point is actually not correct because for all its injustice, the mandate system recognized Palestine as a class a mandate, which provisionally recognized the independence of that territory.
Steven Bonnell
Of what would emerge from that territory, but not of the Palestinians.
Of what would emerge from that territory, but not of the Palestinians.
Mouin Rabbani
It was provisionally recognized.
It was provisionally recognized.
Steven Bonnell
But the territory itself was, but not of the Palestinian people to have a right or guarantee to a government that would emerge from it.
But the territory itself was, but not of the Palestinian people to have a right or guarantee to a government that would emerge from it.
Mouin Rabbani
But it was the British mandate of Palestine, not the British mandate of Israel.
But it was the British mandate of Palestine, not the British mandate of Israel.
Benny Morris
The word exclusive, which you keep using is nonsense. The state, which Ben-Gurion envisioned would be a Jewish majority state as they accepted the 1947 partition resolution, as Steven said, that included 400,000 plus Arabs in a state which would have 500,000 Jews. So the idea of exclusivity wasn’t anywhere in the air at all among the Zionist leaders-
The word exclusive, which you keep using is nonsense. The state, which Ben-Gurion envisioned would be a Jewish majority state as they accepted the 1947 partition resolution, as Steven said, that included 400,000 plus Arabs in a state which would have 500,000 Jews. So the idea of exclusivity wasn’t anywhere in the air at all among the Zionist leaders-
Mouin Rabbani
I think it was there.
I think it was there.
Benny Morris
… in 4748, they wanted a Jewish majority state, but were willing to accept a state which had 40% Arabs. That’s one point. The second thing is that Palestinians may have regarded the land of Palestine as their homeland, but so did the Jews. It was the homeland of the Jews as well. The problem was the Arabs were unable and remain to this day, unable to recognize that for the Jews, that is their…
… in 4748, they wanted a Jewish majority state, but were willing to accept a state which had 40% Arabs. That’s one point. The second thing is that Palestinians may have regarded the land of Palestine as their homeland, but so did the Jews. It was the homeland of the Jews as well. The problem was the Arabs were unable and remain to this day, unable to recognize that for the Jews, that is their…
Benny Morris
… today, unable to recognize that for the Jews, that is their homeland as well. And the problem then is how do you share this homeland, either with one binational state or partitioned into two states? The problem is that the Arabs have always rejected both of these ideas. The homeland belongs to the Jews, as Jews feel, as much as it does, if not more, than for the Arabs.
… today, unable to recognize that for the Jews, that is their homeland as well. And the problem then is how do you share this homeland, either with one binational state or partitioned into two states? The problem is that the Arabs have always rejected both of these ideas. The homeland belongs to the Jews, as Jews feel, as much as it does, if not more, than for the Arabs.
Mouin Rabbani
I think I would say Zionists, not Jews.
I think I would say Zionists, not Jews.
Benny Morris
I would say for the Jews. It’s the Jewish people’s homeland.
I would say for the Jews. It’s the Jewish people’s homeland.
Steven Bonnell
Real quick, I just want for both of you guys, because I haven’t heard these questions answered, I’m just so curious how to make sense of them. It was correctly brought up that I believe that Ben-Gurion had, I think Shlomo Ben-Ami describes it as an obsession with getting validation or support from Western states; Great Britain, and then a couple of decades later- [inaudible 01:08:44].
Real quick, I just want for both of you guys, because I haven’t heard these questions answered, I’m just so curious how to make sense of them. It was correctly brought up that I believe that Ben-Gurion had, I think Shlomo Ben-Ami describes it as an obsession with getting validation or support from Western states; Great Britain, and then a couple of decades later- [inaudible 01:08:44].
Mouin Rabbani
That explains the Suez Crisis.
That explains the Suez Crisis.
Steven Bonnell
Yeah, exactly. Correct. That was one of the major motivators, the idea to work with Britain and France on a military operation.
Yeah, exactly. Correct. That was one of the major motivators, the idea to work with Britain and France on a military operation.
Mouin Rabbani
An imperial stooge.
An imperial stooge.
Steven Bonnell
But then the question again I go back to, if that is true, if Ben-Gurion, if the early Israel saw themselves as a Western-fashioned nation, how could we possibly imagine that they would’ve engaged in the transfer of some 400,000 Arabs after accepting the partition plan? Would that not have completely and totally destroyed their legitimacy in the eyes of the entire Western world?
But then the question again I go back to, if that is true, if Ben-Gurion, if the early Israel saw themselves as a Western-fashioned nation, how could we possibly imagine that they would’ve engaged in the transfer of some 400,000 Arabs after accepting the partition plan? Would that not have completely and totally destroyed their legitimacy in the eyes of the entire Western world?
Mouin Rabbani
No.
No.
Steven Bonnell
How not?
How not?
Mouin Rabbani
Well, first of all, I think that the Zionist leadership’s acceptance of the partition resolution, and I think you may have written about this, that they accepted it because it provided international endorsement of the legitimacy of the principle of Jewish statehood. And they didn’t accept the borders, and in fact, later expanded the borders. Second of all-
Well, first of all, I think that the Zionist leadership’s acceptance of the partition resolution, and I think you may have written about this, that they accepted it because it provided international endorsement of the legitimacy of the principle of Jewish statehood. And they didn’t accept the borders, and in fact, later expanded the borders. Second of all-
Benny Morris
No, they didn’t. They didn’t expand the borders. They accepted the UN partition resolution, borders and all. That’s how they accepted it. You can say that some of the Zionists, deep in their hearts, had the idea that maybe at some point, they would ne able to get more.
No, they didn’t. They didn’t expand the borders. They accepted the UN partition resolution, borders and all. That’s how they accepted it. You can say that some of the Zionists, deep in their hearts, had the idea that maybe at some point, they would ne able to get more.
Mouin Rabbani
Yeah, including their most senior leaders, who said so, and I think you’ve quoted them saying so.
Yeah, including their most senior leaders, who said so, and I think you’ve quoted them saying so.
Benny Morris
But they begrudgingly accepted what the United Nations, the world community had said; “This is what you’re going to get.”
But they begrudgingly accepted what the United Nations, the world community had said; “This is what you’re going to get.”
Mouin Rabbani
Yes. And second of all, removing dark people? Darker people? It’s intrinsic-
Yes. And second of all, removing dark people? Darker people? It’s intrinsic-
Benny Morris
Why dark? In Israel, Jews are as dark as Arabs. This is nonsense.
Why dark? In Israel, Jews are as dark as Arabs. This is nonsense.
Mouin Rabbani
It’s intrinsic to Western history. So the idea that Americans or Brits or the French would have an issue with … I mean, French had been doing it in Algeria for decades. The Americans have been doing it in North America for centuries. So how would Israel forcibly displacing Palestinians somehow besmirch Israel in the eyes of the West?
It’s intrinsic to Western history. So the idea that Americans or Brits or the French would have an issue with … I mean, French had been doing it in Algeria for decades. The Americans have been doing it in North America for centuries. So how would Israel forcibly displacing Palestinians somehow besmirch Israel in the eyes of the West?
Norman Finkelstein
In fact, even in the 1944 resolution of the Labor Party, and at the time, even Bertrand Russell was a member of the Labor Party, it endorsed transfer of Arabs out of Palestine. As [inaudible 01:10:55] pointed out, that was a deeply entrenched idea in Western thinking, that it doesn’t in any way contradict or violate or breach any moral values to displace the Palestinian population.
In fact, even in the 1944 resolution of the Labor Party, and at the time, even Bertrand Russell was a member of the Labor Party, it endorsed transfer of Arabs out of Palestine. As [inaudible 01:10:55] pointed out, that was a deeply entrenched idea in Western thinking, that it doesn’t in any way contradict or violate or breach any moral values to displace the Palestinian population.
Now, I do believe there’s a legitimate question, had it been the case, as you said, Professor Morris, that the Zionists wanted to create a happy state with a Jewish majority, but a large Jewish minority, and if by virtue of immigration, like in our own country … in our own country, given the current trajectories, non-whites will become the majority population in the United States quite soon. And according to democratic principles, we have to accept that. So if that were the case, I would say maybe there’s an argument that had there been mass Jewish immigration that changed the demographic balance in Palestine and therefore Jews became the majority, you can make an argument in the abstract that the indigenous Arab population should have been accepting of that, just as ‘whites’ in the United States have to be accepting of the fact that the demographic majority is shifting to non-whites in our own country.
But that’s not what Zionism was about. I did write my doctoral dissertation on Zionism, and I don’t want to get now bogged down in abstract ideas, but as I suspect you know, most theorists of nationalism say there are two kinds of nationalism. One is a nationalism based on citizenship. You become a citizen, you’re integral to the country. That’s sometimes called political nationalism. And then there’s another kind of nationalism, and that says the state should not belong to its citizens, it should belong to an ethnic group. Each ethnic group should have its own state. It’s usually called the German romantic idea of nationalism.
Zionism is squarely in the German romantic idea. That was the whole point of Zionism. “We don’t want to be bundists and be one more ethnic minority in Russia. We don’t want to become citizens and just become a Jewish people in England or France. We want our own state-
Steven Bonnell
Like the Arab 23 states.
Like the Arab 23 states.
Norman Finkelstein
No, wait, before we get to the Arabs, let’s stick to the Jews for a moment. Or the Zionists. “We want our own state.” And in that concept of wanting your own state, the minority, at best, lives on sufferance, and at worst gets expelled. That’s the logic of the German romantic Zionist idea of a state. That’s why they’re Zionists.
No, wait, before we get to the Arabs, let’s stick to the Jews for a moment. Or the Zionists. “We want our own state.” And in that concept of wanting your own state, the minority, at best, lives on sufferance, and at worst gets expelled. That’s the logic of the German romantic Zionist idea of a state. That’s why they’re Zionists.
Now, I personally have shied away from using the word Zionism ever since I finished my doctoral dissertation, because-
Mouin Rabbani
It was that painful.
It was that painful.
Norman Finkelstein
Because as I said, I don’t believe it’s the operative ideology today. It’s like talking about bolshevism and referring to Khrushchev. I doubt Khrushchev could have spelled Bolshevik. But for the period we’re talking about, they were Zionists, they were committed to their exclusive state with a minority living on sufferance, or at worst expelled. That was their ideology. And I really feel there’s a problem with your happy vision of these Western Democrats like Weitzman, and they wanted to live peacefully with their Arabs. Weitzman described the expulsion in 1948 as ‘the miraculous clearing of the land.’ That doesn’t sound like somebody shedding too many tears at the loss of the indigenous population.
Because as I said, I don’t believe it’s the operative ideology today. It’s like talking about bolshevism and referring to Khrushchev. I doubt Khrushchev could have spelled Bolshevik. But for the period we’re talking about, they were Zionists, they were committed to their exclusive state with a minority living on sufferance, or at worst expelled. That was their ideology. And I really feel there’s a problem with your happy vision of these Western Democrats like Weitzman, and they wanted to live peacefully with their Arabs. Weitzman described the expulsion in 1948 as ‘the miraculous clearing of the land.’ That doesn’t sound like somebody shedding too many tears at the loss of the indigenous population.
Benny Morris
Let me just respond to the word on sufferance.
Let me just respond to the word on sufferance.
Lex Fridman
Let him respond.
Let him respond.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay.
Okay.
Benny Morris
The on sufferance, I don’t agree with. I think that’s wrong. The Jewish state came into being in 1948. It had a population which was 20% Arab when it came into being, after many of them had become refugees, but 20% remained in the country. 20% of Israel’s population at inception in 1949 was Arab.
The on sufferance, I don’t agree with. I think that’s wrong. The Jewish state came into being in 1948. It had a population which was 20% Arab when it came into being, after many of them had become refugees, but 20% remained in the country. 20% of Israel’s population at inception in 1949 was Arab.
Mouin Rabbani
80% went missing.
80% went missing.
Benny Morris
No, no, no. I was talking about what remained in Palestine/Israel after it was created. The 20% who lived in Israel received citizenship and all the rights of Israelis, except, of course, the right to serve in the Army, which they didn’t want to. And they had Supreme Court Justices, they have Knesset members. They enjoyed basically-
No, no, no. I was talking about what remained in Palestine/Israel after it was created. The 20% who lived in Israel received citizenship and all the rights of Israelis, except, of course, the right to serve in the Army, which they didn’t want to. And they had Supreme Court Justices, they have Knesset members. They enjoyed basically-
Norman Finkelstein
I think they lived under emergency laws until 1966.
I think they lived under emergency laws until 1966.
Benny Morris
For a period, sure, they lived under emergency-
For a period, sure, they lived under emergency-
Norman Finkelstein
So they didn’t immediately have citizenship. This is just fantasy.
So they didn’t immediately have citizenship. This is just fantasy.
Benny Morris
No, no, no, no. Wait a minute. It’s not fantasy. At the beginning, they received citizenship, could vote in elections for their own people, and they were put into parliament. But in the first years, the Jewish majority suspected that maybe the Arabs would be disloyal, because they had just tried to destroy the Jewish state. Then they dropped the military government and they became fully equal citizens. So if the whole idea was they must have a state without Arabs, this didn’t happen in ’49, and it didn’t happen in the subsequent decades.
No, no, no, no. Wait a minute. It’s not fantasy. At the beginning, they received citizenship, could vote in elections for their own people, and they were put into parliament. But in the first years, the Jewish majority suspected that maybe the Arabs would be disloyal, because they had just tried to destroy the Jewish state. Then they dropped the military government and they became fully equal citizens. So if the whole idea was they must have a state without Arabs, this didn’t happen in ’49, and it didn’t happen in the subsequent decades.
Norman Finkelstein
So Professor Morris, then why did you say without a population expulsion, a Jewish state would not have been established?
So Professor Morris, then why did you say without a population expulsion, a Jewish state would not have been established?
Benny Morris
Because you are missing the first section of that paragraph, which was they were being assaulted by the Arabs, and as a result, a Jewish state could not have come into being unless there had also been an expulsion of the population which was trying to kill them.
Because you are missing the first section of that paragraph, which was they were being assaulted by the Arabs, and as a result, a Jewish state could not have come into being unless there had also been an expulsion of the population which was trying to kill them.
Lex Fridman
Norm, I’m officially forbidding you referencing that again. Hold on a second, wait. We responded to it. So the main point you’re making, we have to take Benny at his word, is there was a war, and that’s the reason why he made that statement.
Norm, I’m officially forbidding you referencing that again. Hold on a second, wait. We responded to it. So the main point you’re making, we have to take Benny at his word, is there was a war, and that’s the reason why he made that statement.
Mouin Rabbani
I think just one last point on this. I remember reading your book when it first came out, and reading one incident after the other, and one example after the other, and then getting to the conclusion where you said the Nakba was a product of war, not design, I think were your exact words. And I remember reacting almost in shock to that, that I felt you had mobilized overwhelming evidence that it was a product of design, not war. And I think our discussion today very much reflects, let’s say, the dissonance between the evidence and the conclusion. You don’t feel that the research that you have conducted and published demonstrates that it was in fact inherent and inbuilt and inevitable. And I think the point that Norm and I are making is that your own historical research, together with that of others, indisputably demonstrates that it does. I think that’s a fundamental disagreement we’re having here.
I think just one last point on this. I remember reading your book when it first came out, and reading one incident after the other, and one example after the other, and then getting to the conclusion where you said the Nakba was a product of war, not design, I think were your exact words. And I remember reacting almost in shock to that, that I felt you had mobilized overwhelming evidence that it was a product of design, not war. And I think our discussion today very much reflects, let’s say, the dissonance between the evidence and the conclusion. You don’t feel that the research that you have conducted and published demonstrates that it was in fact inherent and inbuilt and inevitable. And I think the point that Norm and I are making is that your own historical research, together with that of others, indisputably demonstrates that it does. I think that’s a fundamental disagreement we’re having here.
Steven Bonnell
Well, yeah, can I actually respond to that? Because I think this is emblematic of the entire conversation. I watched a lot of Norm’s interviews and conversations in preparation for this, and I hear Norm will say this over and over and over again. “I only deal in facts. I don’t deal in hypotheticals. I only deal in facts. I only deal in facts.” And that seems to be the case, except for when the facts are completely and totally contrary to the particular point you’re trying to push. The idea that Jews would’ve out of hand rejected any state that had Arabs on it or always had a plan of expulsion is just betrayed by the acceptance of the ’47 partition plan.
Well, yeah, can I actually respond to that? Because I think this is emblematic of the entire conversation. I watched a lot of Norm’s interviews and conversations in preparation for this, and I hear Norm will say this over and over and over again. “I only deal in facts. I don’t deal in hypotheticals. I only deal in facts. I only deal in facts.” And that seems to be the case, except for when the facts are completely and totally contrary to the particular point you’re trying to push. The idea that Jews would’ve out of hand rejected any state that had Arabs on it or always had a plan of expulsion is just betrayed by the acceptance of the ’47 partition plan.
Norman Finkelstein
I don’t think you understand politics. Did I just say that there is a chasm that separates your ideology from the limits and constraints imposed by politics and reality? Now, Professor Morris, I suspect, would agree that the Zionist movement from fairly early on was committed to the idea of a Jewish state. I am aware of only one major study, probably written 40 years ago, The Binational Idea in Mandatory Palestine by a woman. I forgot her name now. You remember her?
I don’t think you understand politics. Did I just say that there is a chasm that separates your ideology from the limits and constraints imposed by politics and reality? Now, Professor Morris, I suspect, would agree that the Zionist movement from fairly early on was committed to the idea of a Jewish state. I am aware of only one major study, probably written 40 years ago, The Binational Idea in Mandatory Palestine by a woman. I forgot her name now. You remember her?
Benny Morris
I’m trying to.
I’m trying to.
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah. Okay. But you know the book.
Yeah. Okay. But you know the book.
Benny Morris
I think so.
I think so.
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah. She is the only one who tried to persuasively argue that the Zionist movement was actually, not formally, actually committed to the binational idea. But most historians of the subject agree, the Zionist movement was committed to the idea of a Jewish state. Having written my doctoral dissertation on the topic, I was confirmed in that idea, because Professor Chomsky, who was my closest friend for about 40 years, was very committed to the idea that bi-nationalism was the dominant trend in Zionism. I couldn’t go with him there.
Yeah. She is the only one who tried to persuasively argue that the Zionist movement was actually, not formally, actually committed to the binational idea. But most historians of the subject agree, the Zionist movement was committed to the idea of a Jewish state. Having written my doctoral dissertation on the topic, I was confirmed in that idea, because Professor Chomsky, who was my closest friend for about 40 years, was very committed to the idea that bi-nationalism was the dominant trend in Zionism. I couldn’t go with him there.
But Professor Morris, you are aware that until the Biltmore resolution in 1942, the Zionist movement never declared it was for a Jewish state. Why? Because it was politically impossible at the moment, until 1942. There’s your ideology, there are your convictions, there are your operative plans, and there’s also, separately, what you say in public. The Zionist movement couldn’t say in public, “We’re expelling all the Arabs.” They can’t say that. And they couldn’t even say, “We support a Jewish state,” until 1942.
Benny Morris
You’re conflating two things. The Zionists wanted a Jewish state. Correct. That didn’t mean expulsion of the Arabs. It’s not the same thing. They wanted a Jewish state with a Jewish majority, but they were willing, as it turned out, both in ’37 and in ’47 and subsequently, to have a large Arab minority-
You’re conflating two things. The Zionists wanted a Jewish state. Correct. That didn’t mean expulsion of the Arabs. It’s not the same thing. They wanted a Jewish state with a Jewish majority, but they were willing, as it turned out, both in ’37 and in ’47 and subsequently, to have a large Arab minority-
Norman Finkelstein
In ’37 there was a transfer.
In ’37 there was a transfer.
Benny Morris
They were willing to have a large Arab minority in the country, and they ended up with a large Arab minority in the country. 20% of the population in ’49 was Arab, and it still is-
They were willing to have a large Arab minority in the country, and they ended up with a large Arab minority in the country. 20% of the population in ’49 was Arab, and it still is-
Norman Finkelstein
They ended up for about five minutes before they were expelled. They agreed to it up until ’47, and then they were gone by March 1949.
They ended up for about five minutes before they were expelled. They agreed to it up until ’47, and then they were gone by March 1949.
Steven Bonnell
What happened in between the rejection of the partition plan and the expulsion of the Arabs?
What happened in between the rejection of the partition plan and the expulsion of the Arabs?
Benny Morris
The Arabs launched the war.
The Arabs launched the war.
Steven Bonnell
Well, yeah. It wasn’t random. There is a potential that-
Well, yeah. It wasn’t random. There is a potential that-
Norman Finkelstein
I agree. It wasn’t random. I totally agree with that. It was by design. It wasn’t random.
I agree. It wasn’t random. I totally agree with that. It was by design. It wasn’t random.
Steven Bonnell
You can say that, but in this case, the facts betray you. There was no Arab acceptance of anything that would’ve allowed for a Jewish state to exist, number one, and number two, I think that it’s entirely possible, given how things happen after a war, that this exact same conflict could have played out and an expulsion would’ve happened without any ideology at play. There was a people that disagreed on who had territorial rights to a land, there was a massive war afterwards, and then a bunch of their friends invaded after to reinforce the idea that the Jewish people in this case couldn’t have a state. There could have been a transfer regardless.
You can say that, but in this case, the facts betray you. There was no Arab acceptance of anything that would’ve allowed for a Jewish state to exist, number one, and number two, I think that it’s entirely possible, given how things happen after a war, that this exact same conflict could have played out and an expulsion would’ve happened without any ideology at play. There was a people that disagreed on who had territorial rights to a land, there was a massive war afterwards, and then a bunch of their friends invaded after to reinforce the idea that the Jewish people in this case couldn’t have a state. There could have been a transfer regardless.
Norman Finkelstein
Anything could have been, but that’s not what history is about.
Anything could have been, but that’s not what history is about.
Steven Bonnell
History is about Palestinian rejections to any peace deal, over and over and over again.
History is about Palestinian rejections to any peace deal, over and over and over again.
Norman Finkelstein
As I said, when the ball was thrown into the court of the United Nations, they were faced with a practical problem, and I, for one, am not going to try to adjudicate the rights and wrongs from the beginning. I do not believe that if territorial displacement and dispossession was inherent in the Zionist project, I do not believe it can be a legitimate political enterprise. Now, you might say that’s speaking from 2022. Or where are we now?
As I said, when the ball was thrown into the court of the United Nations, they were faced with a practical problem, and I, for one, am not going to try to adjudicate the rights and wrongs from the beginning. I do not believe that if territorial displacement and dispossession was inherent in the Zionist project, I do not believe it can be a legitimate political enterprise. Now, you might say that’s speaking from 2022. Or where are we now?
Mouin Rabbani
’24 now, I think. Yeah.
’24 now, I think. Yeah.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay. But we have to recognize that from nearly the beginning, for perfectly obvious reasons having nothing to do with antisemitism, anti-Westernism, anti-Europeanism, but because no people that I am aware of would voluntarily cede its country-
Okay. But we have to recognize that from nearly the beginning, for perfectly obvious reasons having nothing to do with antisemitism, anti-Westernism, anti-Europeanism, but because no people that I am aware of would voluntarily cede its country-
Steven Bonnell
Except for all the people that sold land voluntarily.
Except for all the people that sold land voluntarily.
Norman Finkelstein
You can perfectly understand Native American resistance to Euro-colonialism. You can perfectly well understand it without any anti-Europeanism, anti-whiteism, anti-Christianism. They didn’t want to cede their country to invaders. That’s completely understandable.
You can perfectly understand Native American resistance to Euro-colonialism. You can perfectly well understand it without any anti-Europeanism, anti-whiteism, anti-Christianism. They didn’t want to cede their country to invaders. That’s completely understandable.
Benny Morris
You’re minimizing the antisemitic element in Arab nationalism.
You’re minimizing the antisemitic element in Arab nationalism.
Norman Finkelstein
You minimized it. In all your books, you minimized it.
You minimized it. In all your books, you minimized it.
Benny Morris
No, no, no. Husseini was an antisemite. The leader of the Palestinian national movement in the ’30s and ’40s was an antisemite. This was one of the things which drove him, and also drove him in the end to work in Berlin for Hitler for four years, giving Nazi propaganda to the Arab world, calling on the Arabs to murder the Jews. That’s what he did in World War II. That’s the leader of the Palestinian Arab National Movement. And he wasn’t alone. He wasn’t alone.
No, no, no. Husseini was an antisemite. The leader of the Palestinian national movement in the ’30s and ’40s was an antisemite. This was one of the things which drove him, and also drove him in the end to work in Berlin for Hitler for four years, giving Nazi propaganda to the Arab world, calling on the Arabs to murder the Jews. That’s what he did in World War II. That’s the leader of the Palestinian Arab National Movement. And he wasn’t alone. He wasn’t alone.
Norman Finkelstein
Professor Morris, if you read your book, Righteous Victims, you can read it and read it and read it and read it, as I have, you will find barely a word about the Arabs being motivated by antisemitism.
Professor Morris, if you read your book, Righteous Victims, you can read it and read it and read it and read it, as I have, you will find barely a word about the Arabs being motivated by antisemitism.
Benny Morris
It exists, though.
It exists, though.
Norman Finkelstein
I didn’t say it doesn’t exist.
I didn’t say it doesn’t exist.
Benny Morris
Ah, you agree that it exists?
Ah, you agree that it exists?
Norman Finkelstein
Hey, I don’t know a single non-Jew who doesn’t harbor antisemitic sentiments.
Hey, I don’t know a single non-Jew who doesn’t harbor antisemitic sentiments.
Benny Morris
We’re talking about Arabs now.
We’re talking about Arabs now.
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah, but I don’t know anybody. That’s just part of the human condition.
Yeah, but I don’t know anybody. That’s just part of the human condition.
Benny Morris
Antisemitism?
Antisemitism?
Norman Finkelstein
Yes.
Yes.
Benny Morris
And among the Arabs?
And among the Arabs?
Norman Finkelstein
So Professor Morris, here’s my problem. I didn’t see that in your Righteous Victims. Even when you talked about the first Intifada, and you talked about the second Intifada, and you talked about how there was a lot of influence by Hamas, the Islamic movement, you even stated that there was a lot of antisemitism in those movements, but then you went on to say, “But of course, at bottom, it was about the occupation. It wasn’t about” … And I’ve read it.
So Professor Morris, here’s my problem. I didn’t see that in your Righteous Victims. Even when you talked about the first Intifada, and you talked about the second Intifada, and you talked about how there was a lot of influence by Hamas, the Islamic movement, you even stated that there was a lot of antisemitism in those movements, but then you went on to say, “But of course, at bottom, it was about the occupation. It wasn’t about” … And I’ve read it.
Benny Morris
Yeah, but you’re moving from different ages, across the ages.
Yeah, but you’re moving from different ages, across the ages.
Norman Finkelstein
No, I’m talking about your whole book.
No, I’m talking about your whole book.
Benny Morris
The occupation began in ’67, the one you’re talking about.
The occupation began in ’67, the one you’re talking about.
Norman Finkelstein
I looked and looked and looked for evidence of this antisemitism as being a chief motor of Arab resistance to Zionism. I didn’t see it.
I looked and looked and looked for evidence of this antisemitism as being a chief motor of Arab resistance to Zionism. I didn’t see it.
Steven Bonnell
Did he make that claim?
Did he make that claim?
Benny Morris
I don’t remember the word chief. It’s one of the elements.
I don’t remember the word chief. It’s one of the elements.
Steven Bonnell
Yeah. It’s very binary thinking when it comes to-
Yeah. It’s very binary thinking when it comes to-
Norman Finkelstein
Binary?
Binary?
Steven Bonnell
Yes, binary.
Yes, binary.
Norman Finkelstein
Please, don’t give me this postmodernism ‘binary’. You’re the one that said the chief motor-
Please, don’t give me this postmodernism ‘binary’. You’re the one that said the chief motor-
Benny Morris
But you are thinking in terms of black and white. Steven has a point.
But you are thinking in terms of black and white. Steven has a point.
Norman Finkelstein
Do you have your book here? Page 137.
Do you have your book here? Page 137.
Benny Morris
You’re talking in black and white concepts when history is much grayer. Lots of things happen because of lots of reasons, not one or the other, and you don’t seem to see that.
You’re talking in black and white concepts when history is much grayer. Lots of things happen because of lots of reasons, not one or the other, and you don’t seem to see that.
Steven Bonnell
Can I ask you a question? Because it’s for them to talk too. Can I ask you a very quick question? What do you think the ideal solution was on the Arab side from ’47? What would they have preferred? And what would’ve happened-
Can I ask you a question? Because it’s for them to talk too. Can I ask you a very quick question? What do you think the ideal solution was on the Arab side from ’47? What would they have preferred? And what would’ve happened-
Mouin Rabbani
Well, they were explicit.
Well, they were explicit.
Steven Bonnell
And then the second one, what would’ve happened if Jews would’ve lost the war in ’48? What do you think would’ve happened to the Israeli population, the Jewish population?
And then the second one, what would’ve happened if Jews would’ve lost the war in ’48? What do you think would’ve happened to the Israeli population, the Jewish population?
Mouin Rabbani
I think the Palestinians and the Arabs were explicit that they wanted a unitary, I think, federal state, and they made their submissions to [inaudible 01:28:09], they made their appeals at the UN General Assembly.
I think the Palestinians and the Arabs were explicit that they wanted a unitary, I think, federal state, and they made their submissions to [inaudible 01:28:09], they made their appeals at the UN General Assembly.
Benny Morris
What do you mean by unitary and federal? I don’t get that. They wanted an Arab state. They wanted Palestine to be an Arab state.
What do you mean by unitary and federal? I don’t get that. They wanted an Arab state. They wanted Palestine to be an Arab state.
Mouin Rabbani
Yes. Yes.
Yes. Yes.
Benny Morris
Put it simply. That word, unitary, federal, they wanted Palestine as an Arab and exclusively Arab state. That’s what they wanted.
Put it simply. That word, unitary, federal, they wanted Palestine as an Arab and exclusively Arab state. That’s what they wanted.
Mouin Rabbani
No, no, it wasn’t an exclusively Arab state. I think we have to distinguish between Palestinian and Arab opposition to a Jewish state in Palestine on the one hand, and Palestinian and Arab attitudes to Jewish existence in Palestine, and there’s a fundamental difference-
No, no, it wasn’t an exclusively Arab state. I think we have to distinguish between Palestinian and Arab opposition to a Jewish state in Palestine on the one hand, and Palestinian and Arab attitudes to Jewish existence in Palestine, and there’s a fundamental difference-
Benny Morris
Well, Husseini, the leader of the movement, said that all the Jews who had come since 1917, and that’s the majority of the Jews in Palestine in 1947, shouldn’t be there.
Well, Husseini, the leader of the movement, said that all the Jews who had come since 1917, and that’s the majority of the Jews in Palestine in 1947, shouldn’t be there.
Mouin Rabbani
Well, he did say-
Well, he did say-
Benny Morris
They shouldn’t be citizens and they shouldn’t be there.
They shouldn’t be citizens and they shouldn’t be there.
Norman Finkelstein
[inaudible 01:28:59]. The PLO charter said that in ’64. I’m not going to deny it. Of course, it’s true. I can understand the sentiment, but I think it’s wrong.
[inaudible 01:28:59]. The PLO charter said that in ’64. I’m not going to deny it. Of course, it’s true. I can understand the sentiment, but I think it’s wrong.
Steven Bonnell
Also, [inaudible 01:29:11] because you had the used the words earlier, that it was supremacy and exclusivity that the Zionist state-
Also, [inaudible 01:29:11] because you had the used the words earlier, that it was supremacy and exclusivity that the Zionist state-
Mouin Rabbani
Well, I want to answer your question. Husseini did say that, and I’m sure there was a very substantial body of Palestinian Arab public opinion that endorsed that. But by the same token, I think a unitary Arab state, as you call it, or a Palestinian state, could have been established, with arrangements, with guarantees to ensure the security and rights of both communities. How that would work in detail had been discussed and proposed, but never resolved. And again, I think Jewish fears about what would’ve happened-
Well, I want to answer your question. Husseini did say that, and I’m sure there was a very substantial body of Palestinian Arab public opinion that endorsed that. But by the same token, I think a unitary Arab state, as you call it, or a Palestinian state, could have been established, with arrangements, with guarantees to ensure the security and rights of both communities. How that would work in detail had been discussed and proposed, but never resolved. And again, I think Jewish fears about what would’ve happened-
Benny Morris
A second Holocaust.
A second Holocaust.
Mouin Rabbani
Well, no-
Well, no-
Benny Morris
That was the Jewish fear. A second Holocaust.
That was the Jewish fear. A second Holocaust.
Mouin Rabbani
Well, that may well have been the Jewish fear. It was an unfounded Jewish fear.
Well, that may well have been the Jewish fear. It was an unfounded Jewish fear.
Steven Bonnell
It was unfounded?
It was unfounded?
Mouin Rabbani
Of course it was unfounded.
Of course it was unfounded.
Steven Bonnell
What about like in ’48 and ’56 and-
What about like in ’48 and ’56 and-
Mouin Rabbani
You really think that the Palestinians, had they won the war, were going to import ovens and crematoria from Germany and-
You really think that the Palestinians, had they won the war, were going to import ovens and crematoria from Germany and-
Steven Bonnell
I don’t know about that, but in almost every single Arab state where there were Jews living, after ’48, after ’56, after ’67, there were always pogroms, there were always flights from Jews from those countries to Israel afterwards. I don’t think it would be-
I don’t know about that, but in almost every single Arab state where there were Jews living, after ’48, after ’56, after ’67, there were always pogroms, there were always flights from Jews from those countries to Israel afterwards. I don’t think it would be-
Mouin Rabbani
I wouldn’t say there were always pogroms in every Arab state. I think there was flight of Arab Jews for multiple reasons, in some cases for precisely the reasons you say. If you look at the Jewish community in Algeria, for example, their flight had virtually nothing to do with the Arab-Israeli conflict. The issue of Algerian Jews was that the French gave them citizenship during their colonial rule of Algeria, and they increasingly became identified with French rule, when Algeria became independent and all the French ended up leaving, out of fear, or out of disappointment, or out of whatever, the Jews were identified as French rather than Algerian.
I wouldn’t say there were always pogroms in every Arab state. I think there was flight of Arab Jews for multiple reasons, in some cases for precisely the reasons you say. If you look at the Jewish community in Algeria, for example, their flight had virtually nothing to do with the Arab-Israeli conflict. The issue of Algerian Jews was that the French gave them citizenship during their colonial rule of Algeria, and they increasingly became identified with French rule, when Algeria became independent and all the French ended up leaving, out of fear, or out of disappointment, or out of whatever, the Jews were identified as French rather than Algerian.
Benny Morris
This is a bit of a red herring. There were pogroms in the Arab countries. In Bahrain even, where there’s almost no Jews, there was a pogrom in 1947. There was a pogrom in Aleppo in 1947.
This is a bit of a red herring. There were pogroms in the Arab countries. In Bahrain even, where there’s almost no Jews, there was a pogrom in 1947. There was a pogrom in Aleppo in 1947.
Mouin Rabbani
I’m not denying any of that history.
I’m not denying any of that history.
Benny Morris
There were killings of Jews in Iraq and Egypt in 1948/49. But the Jews basically fled the Arab states, not for multiple reasons. They fled because they felt that the governments there and the societies amid which they had lived for hundreds of years no longer wanted them.
There were killings of Jews in Iraq and Egypt in 1948/49. But the Jews basically fled the Arab states, not for multiple reasons. They fled because they felt that the governments there and the societies amid which they had lived for hundreds of years no longer wanted them.
Mouin Rabbani
Look, without getting into the details, I think we can both agree that ultimately a clear majority of Arab Jews who believed that after having lived in these countries for centuries-
Look, without getting into the details, I think we can both agree that ultimately a clear majority of Arab Jews who believed that after having lived in these countries for centuries-
Benny Morris
Way before the Arabs arrived there. Way before the Arabs arrived in Iraq.
Way before the Arabs arrived there. Way before the Arabs arrived in Iraq.
Mouin Rabbani
… for centuries, if not millennia, came to the unfortunate conclusion that their situation had become untenable. I also think that we can both agree that this had never been an issue prior to Zionism and the emergence of the state of Israel.
… for centuries, if not millennia, came to the unfortunate conclusion that their situation had become untenable. I also think that we can both agree that this had never been an issue prior to Zionism and the emergence of the state of Israel.
Benny Morris
This isn’t true. There were pogroms prior to Zionism.
This isn’t true. There were pogroms prior to Zionism.
Mouin Rabbani
Look, I’m not-
Look, I’m not-
Benny Morris
Pogroms didn’t begin with Zionism in the Arab world.
Pogroms didn’t begin with Zionism in the Arab world.
Mouin Rabbani
The issue is the point I raised, which is whether these communities had ever come to a collective conclusion that their position had become untenable in this part of the world. No, they were Arab Jews.
The issue is the point I raised, which is whether these communities had ever come to a collective conclusion that their position had become untenable in this part of the world. No, they were Arab Jews.
Steven Bonnell
Well, because untenable meant there was no alternative. But with the creation of Israel, there was an alternative, right? A place where they could go and not be discriminated against or live as second class citizens or be subject to Arab majority states.
Well, because untenable meant there was no alternative. But with the creation of Israel, there was an alternative, right? A place where they could go and not be discriminated against or live as second class citizens or be subject to Arab majority states.
I also think it’s interesting that when you analyze the flight of Jewish people, and I’ve seen this, I agree with you, it wasn’t just a mass expulsion from all the Arab states. There were definitely push factors. There were also pull factors. Now, I don’t know how you guys feel about the Nakba, but when the analysis of the Nakba comes in, again, it’s back to that; well, that was actually just a top-down expulsion. The retreat of wealthy Arab people in the ’30s didn’t matter. Any of the messaging from the surrounding Arab states didn’t matter. It was just an expulsion from Jewish people or people running from their lives from Jewish massacres. Again, I feel like it’s a selective critical analysis of the-
Mouin Rabbani
Again, I’m a little uncomfortable always using the term Jewish here, because it wasn’t the Jews of England or the Soviet Jews.
Again, I’m a little uncomfortable always using the term Jewish here, because it wasn’t the Jews of England or the Soviet Jews.
Steven Bonnell
Well, I say Jewish because prior to ’48, saying Israeli-
Well, I say Jewish because prior to ’48, saying Israeli-
Mouin Rabbani
I think it’s useful to refer to Zionists before 1948 and Israelis after ’48. We don’t need to implicate Jews of all-
I think it’s useful to refer to Zionists before 1948 and Israelis after ’48. We don’t need to implicate Jews of all-
Steven Bonnell
Well, sure, but the Jewish people that were being attacked in Arab states weren’t Zionists. They were just Jews living there, right?
Well, sure, but the Jewish people that were being attacked in Arab states weren’t Zionists. They were just Jews living there, right?
Norman Finkelstein
Okay, I need to just comment on that. I was rereading Shlomo Ben-Ami’s last book, and he does at the end discuss at some length the whole issue of the refugee question bearing on the so-called peace process. And on the question of ’48 and the Arab immigration, if you’ll allow me, let me just quote him. “Israel is particularly fond of the awkwardly false symmetry she makes between the Palestinian refugee crisis and the forced immigration of 600,000 Jews from Arab countries following the creation of the state of Israel, as if it were ‘an unplanned exchange of populations.’.
Okay, I need to just comment on that. I was rereading Shlomo Ben-Ami’s last book, and he does at the end discuss at some length the whole issue of the refugee question bearing on the so-called peace process. And on the question of ’48 and the Arab immigration, if you’ll allow me, let me just quote him. “Israel is particularly fond of the awkwardly false symmetry she makes between the Palestinian refugee crisis and the forced immigration of 600,000 Jews from Arab countries following the creation of the state of Israel, as if it were ‘an unplanned exchange of populations.’.
And then Mr Ben-Ami, for those of you who are listening, he was Israel’s former foreign minister, and he’s an influential historian in his own right, he says, “In fact, envoys from the Mossad and the Jewish Agency worked underground in Arab countries and Iran to encourage Jews to go to Israel. More importantly, for many Jews in Arab states, the very possibility of immigrating to Israel was the combination of millennial aspirations. It represented the consummation of a dream to take part in Israel’s resurgence as a nation.”
So this idea that they were all expelled after 1948, that’s one area, Professor Morris, I defer to expertise. That’s one of my credos in life. I don’t know the Israeli literature. But as it’s been translated in English, there’s very little solid scholarship on what happened in 1948 in the Arab countries which caused the Jews to leave.
Mouin Rabbani
Arab Jews.
Arab Jews.
Norman Finkelstein
Arab Jews, right. But Shlomo Ben-Ami knows the literature. He knows the scholarship. He’s a historian.
Arab Jews, right. But Shlomo Ben-Ami knows the literature. He knows the scholarship. He’s a historian.
Benny Morris
He comes from Tangiers.
He comes from Tangiers.
Mouin Rabbani
He’s from Morocco. [inaudible 01:36:10] from Iraq has written on this issue as well.
He’s from Morocco. [inaudible 01:36:10] from Iraq has written on this issue as well.
Benny Morris
And the Jews in the Arab lands were not pro-Zionists. They weren’t Zionists at all. Certainly [inaudible 01:36:18] family was anti-Zionist.
And the Jews in the Arab lands were not pro-Zionists. They weren’t Zionists at all. Certainly [inaudible 01:36:18] family was anti-Zionist.
Norman Finkelstein
And [inaudible 01:36:21], when he was interviewed by Marin Rappaport, on this question he said, “You simply cannot say that the Iraqi Jews were expelled. It’s just not true.” And he was speaking as an Iraqi Jew who left with his family in 1948.
And [inaudible 01:36:21], when he was interviewed by Marin Rappaport, on this question he said, “You simply cannot say that the Iraqi Jews were expelled. It’s just not true.” And he was speaking as an Iraqi Jew who left with his family in 1948.
Benny Morris
They were pushed out. They weren’t expelled. That’s probably the right phrase. They were pushed out.
They were pushed out. They weren’t expelled. That’s probably the right phrase. They were pushed out.
Mouin Rabbani
Well, I think it’s more complex than that. Sorry, I interrupted you.
Well, I think it’s more complex than that. Sorry, I interrupted you.
Norman Finkelstein
No, you’re not interrupting me, because I only know what’s been translated into English, and the English literature on the subject is very small and not scholarly. Now, there may be a Hebrew literature, I don’t know, but I was surprised that even Shlomo Ben-Ami, stalwart of his state, fair enough, on this particular point he called it false symmetry.
No, you’re not interrupting me, because I only know what’s been translated into English, and the English literature on the subject is very small and not scholarly. Now, there may be a Hebrew literature, I don’t know, but I was surprised that even Shlomo Ben-Ami, stalwart of his state, fair enough, on this particular point he called it false symmetry.
Benny Morris
No, no, Steven is right. There was a pull and a push mechanism in the departure of the Jews from the Arab lands post ’48. But there was also a lot of push. A lot of push.
No, no, Steven is right. There was a pull and a push mechanism in the departure of the Jews from the Arab lands post ’48. But there was also a lot of push. A lot of push.
Mouin Rabbani
That’s indisputable. There was push-
That’s indisputable. There was push-
Lex Fridman
And on the point of agreement, on this one brief light of agreement, let us wrap up with this topic of history and move on to modern day. But before that, I’m wondering if we could just say a couple of last words on this topic. Steven?
And on the point of agreement, on this one brief light of agreement, let us wrap up with this topic of history and move on to modern day. But before that, I’m wondering if we could just say a couple of last words on this topic. Steven?
Steven Bonnell
Yeah. I think that when you look at the behaviors of both parties in the time period around ’48, or especially ’48 and earlier, there’s this assumption that there was this huge built-in mechanism of Zionism, and that it was going to be inevitable from the inception of the first Zionist thought that appeared in Herzl’s mind that there would be a mass violent population transfer of Arab Palestinians out of what would become the Israeli state. I understand that there are some quotes that we can find that maybe seem to possibly support an idea that looks close to that, but I think when you actually consult the record of what happened, when you look at the massive populations that Israel was willing to accept within what would become their state borders, their nation borders, I just don’t think that the historical record agrees with the idea that Zionists would’ve just never been okay living alongside Arab Palestinians.
Yeah. I think that when you look at the behaviors of both parties in the time period around ’48, or especially ’48 and earlier, there’s this assumption that there was this huge built-in mechanism of Zionism, and that it was going to be inevitable from the inception of the first Zionist thought that appeared in Herzl’s mind that there would be a mass violent population transfer of Arab Palestinians out of what would become the Israeli state. I understand that there are some quotes that we can find that maybe seem to possibly support an idea that looks close to that, but I think when you actually consult the record of what happened, when you look at the massive populations that Israel was willing to accept within what would become their state borders, their nation borders, I just don’t think that the historical record agrees with the idea that Zionists would’ve just never been okay living alongside Arab Palestinians.
But when you look at the other side, Arabs would out of hand reject literally any deal that apportioned any amount of that land for any state relating to Jewish people or the Israeli people. I think it was said, even on the other end of the table, that Arab Palestinians or Arabs would’ve never accepted any Jewish state whatsoever.
So it’s interesting that on the ideology part where it’s claimed that Zionists are people of exclusion and supremacy and expulsion, we can find that in diary entries, but we can find that expressed in very real terms on the Arab side, I think in all of their behavior around ’48 and earlier, where the goal was the destruction of the Israeli state, it would’ve been the dispossession of many Jewish people. It probably would’ve been the expulsion of a lot of them back to Europe. And I think that very clearly plays out in the difference between the actions of the Arabs versus some diary entries of some Jewish leaders.
Lex Fridman
Benny?
Benny?
Benny Morris
Well, one thing which stood out, and I think Mouin made this point, is that the Arabs had nothing to do with the Holocaust, but then the world community forced the Arabs to pay the price for the Holocaust. That’s the traditional Arab argument. This is slightly distorting the reality. The Arabs in the 1930s did their utmost to prevent Jewish emigration from Europe and reaching Palestine, which was the only safe haven available, because America, Britain, France, nobody wanted Jews anywhere, and they were being persecuted in Central Europe and eventually would be massacred in large numbers. So the Arab effort to pressure the British to prevent Jews reaching Palestine’s safe shores contributed indirectly to the slaughter of many Jews in Europe because they couldn’t get to anywhere, and they couldn’t get to Palestine because the Arabs were busy attacking Jews in Palestine and attacking the British to make sure they didn’t allow Jews to reach this safe haven. That’s important.
Well, one thing which stood out, and I think Mouin made this point, is that the Arabs had nothing to do with the Holocaust, but then the world community forced the Arabs to pay the price for the Holocaust. That’s the traditional Arab argument. This is slightly distorting the reality. The Arabs in the 1930s did their utmost to prevent Jewish emigration from Europe and reaching Palestine, which was the only safe haven available, because America, Britain, France, nobody wanted Jews anywhere, and they were being persecuted in Central Europe and eventually would be massacred in large numbers. So the Arab effort to pressure the British to prevent Jews reaching Palestine’s safe shores contributed indirectly to the slaughter of many Jews in Europe because they couldn’t get to anywhere, and they couldn’t get to Palestine because the Arabs were busy attacking Jews in Palestine and attacking the British to make sure they didn’t allow Jews to reach this safe haven. That’s important.
The second thing is, of course, there’s no point in belittling the fact that the Palestinian Arab National Movement’s leader, Husseini, worked for the Nazis in the 1940s. He got a salary from the German foreign ministry, he raised troops among Muslims in Bosnia for the SS, and he broadcast to the Arab world calling for the murder of the Jews in the Middle East. This is what he did. And the Arabs since then have been trying to whitewash Husseini’s role. I’m not saying he was the instigator of the Holocaust, but he helped the Germans along in doing what they were doing and supported them in doing that. So this can’t be removed from the fact that the Arabs, as you say, paid a price for the Holocaust, but they also participated in various ways in helping it happen.
Lex Fridman
Mouin?
Mouin?
Mouin Rabbani
I’ll make two points. The first is you mentioned [inaudible 01:41:27] Husseini and his collaboration with the Nazis. Entirely legitimate point to raise. But I think one can also say definitively, had Husseini never existed, the Holocaust would’ve played out precisely as it did.
I’ll make two points. The first is you mentioned [inaudible 01:41:27] Husseini and his collaboration with the Nazis. Entirely legitimate point to raise. But I think one can also say definitively, had Husseini never existed, the Holocaust would’ve played out precisely as it did.
Benny Morris
Certainly. Certainly.
Certainly. Certainly.
Mouin Rabbani
As far as Palestinian opposition to Jewish emigration to Palestine during the 1930s is concerned, it was of a different character than, for example, British and American rejection of Jewish immigration-
As far as Palestinian opposition to Jewish emigration to Palestine during the 1930s is concerned, it was of a different character than, for example, British and American rejection of Jewish immigration-
Mouin Rabbani
… An American rejection of Jewish immigration. They just didn’t want Jews on their soil.
… An American rejection of Jewish immigration. They just didn’t want Jews on their soil.
Benny Morris
Objectively, it helped the Germans kill the Jews.
Objectively, it helped the Germans kill the Jews.
Mouin Rabbani
In the Palestinian case, their opposition to Jewish immigration was to prevent the transformation of their homeland into a Jewish state that would dispossess them, and I think that’s an important distinction to make. The other point I wanted to make is we’ve spent the past several hours talking about Zionism, transfer, and so on, but I think there’s a more fundamental aspect to this, which is that Zionism, I think, would have emerged and disappeared as yet one more utopian political project had it not been for the British, what the preeminent Palestinian historian, Walid Khalidi, has termed the British Shield, because I think without the British sponsorship, we wouldn’t be having this discussion today. The British sponsored Zionism for a very simple reason, which is that during World War I, the Ottoman armies attempted to march on the Suez Canal.
In the Palestinian case, their opposition to Jewish immigration was to prevent the transformation of their homeland into a Jewish state that would dispossess them, and I think that’s an important distinction to make. The other point I wanted to make is we’ve spent the past several hours talking about Zionism, transfer, and so on, but I think there’s a more fundamental aspect to this, which is that Zionism, I think, would have emerged and disappeared as yet one more utopian political project had it not been for the British, what the preeminent Palestinian historian, Walid Khalidi, has termed the British Shield, because I think without the British sponsorship, we wouldn’t be having this discussion today. The British sponsored Zionism for a very simple reason, which is that during World War I, the Ottoman armies attempted to march on the Suez Canal.
Suez Canal was the jugular vein of the British Empire between Europe and India, and the British came to the conclusion that they needed to secure the Suez Canal from any threat. And as the British have done so often in so many places, how do you deal with this? Well, you bring in a foreign minority, implant them amongst a hostile population, and establish a protectorate over them. I don’t think a Jewish state in Palestine had been part of British intentions, and the Balfour Declaration very specifically speaks about a Jewish national home in Palestine, in other words, a British protectorate. Things ended up taking a different course, and I think the most important development was World War II, and I think this had maybe less to do with the Holocaust and more to do with the effective bankruptcy of the United Kingdom during that war, and its inability to sustain its global empire.
It ended up giving up India, ended up giving up Palestine, and it’s in that context, I think, that we need to see the emergence of a Jewish state in Palestine, and again, a Jewish state means a state in which the Jewish community enjoys not only a demographic majority, but an uncontestable demographic majority, an uncontestable territorial hegemony, and uncontestable political supremacy. And that is also why after 1948, the nascent Israeli state confiscated, I believe, up to 90% of lands that had been previously owned by Palestinians who became citizens of Israel.
It is why the new Israeli state imposed a military government on its population of Palestinian citizens between 1948 and 1966. It is why the Israeli state effectively reduced the Palestinians living within the Israeli state, as citizens of the Israeli state, to second class citizens, on the one hand, promoting Jewish nationalism and Jewish nationalist parties, on the other hand, doing everything within its power to suppress and eliminate Palestinian or Arab nationalist movements. And that’s why today there’s a consensus among all major human rights organizations that Israel is an apartheid state, what the Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem describes a regime of Jewish supremacy between the river and the sea.
Lex Fridman
You’re
You’re
Lex Fridman
Really tempting a response from the other side on the last few sentences. We’ll talk-
Really tempting a response from the other side on the last few sentences. We’ll talk-
Benny Morris
Propaganda, yeah, okay.
Propaganda, yeah, okay.
Lex Fridman
We’ll talk about the claims of apartheid and so on. It’s a fascinating discussion, we need to have it. Norm.
We’ll talk about the claims of apartheid and so on. It’s a fascinating discussion, we need to have it. Norm.
Norman Finkelstein
On the question of the responsibility of the Palestinian Arabs for the Nazi Holocaust, direct or indirect, I consider that an absurd claim, as [inaudible 01:46:46] said, and I quoted him, “The entire Western world turned its back on the Jews to somehow focus on the Palestinians,” it strikes me as completely ridiculous. Number two, as Mouin said, there’s a perfectly understandable reason why Palestinian Arabs wouldn’t want Jews because in their minds, and not irrationally, these Jews intended to create a Jewish state, which would quite likely have resulted in their expulsion. I’m a very generous person. I’ve actually taken in a homeless person for two and a half years, but if I knew in advance that that homeless person was going to try to turn me out of my apartment, I would think 10,000 times before I took him in.
On the question of the responsibility of the Palestinian Arabs for the Nazi Holocaust, direct or indirect, I consider that an absurd claim, as [inaudible 01:46:46] said, and I quoted him, “The entire Western world turned its back on the Jews to somehow focus on the Palestinians,” it strikes me as completely ridiculous. Number two, as Mouin said, there’s a perfectly understandable reason why Palestinian Arabs wouldn’t want Jews because in their minds, and not irrationally, these Jews intended to create a Jewish state, which would quite likely have resulted in their expulsion. I’m a very generous person. I’ve actually taken in a homeless person for two and a half years, but if I knew in advance that that homeless person was going to try to turn me out of my apartment, I would think 10,000 times before I took him in.
As far as the actual complicity of the Palestinian Arabs, if you look at Raul Hilberg’s three volume classic work, The Destruction of the European Jury, he has in those 1,000+ pages, one sentence on the role of the mufti of Jerusalem, and that I think is probably an overstatement, but we’ll leave it aside. The only two points I would make aside from the Holocaust point is number one, I do think the transfer discussion is useful because it indicates that there was a rational reason behind the Arab resistance to Jewish or Zionist immigration to Palestine, the fear of territorial displacement and dispossession.
And number two, there are two issues. One is the history, and the second is being responsible for your words. Now, some people accuse me of speaking very slowly, and they’re advised on YouTube to turn up the speed twice to three times whenever I’m on. One of the reasons I speak slowly is because I attach value to every word I say, and it is discomforting, disorienting, where you have a person who’s produced a voluminous corpus, rich in insights, and rich in archival sources who seems to disown each and every word that you pluck from that corpus by claiming that it’s either out of context or it’s cherry-picking. Words count, and I agree with Lex, everybody has the right to rescind what they’ve said in the past, but what you cannot claim is that you didn’t say what you said.
Benny Morris
I’ll stick to the history, not the current propaganda. 1917, the Zionist movement began way before the British supported the Zionist movement for decades. In 1917, the British jumped in and issued the Balfour Declaration supporting the emergence of a Jewish national home in Palestine, which most people understood to mean eventual Jewish statehood in Palestine. Most people understood that in Britain and among the Zionists and among the Arabs, but the British declared the Balfour Declaration or issued the Balfour Declaration, not only because of imperial self-interest, and this is what you’re basically saying, they had the imperial interests, a buffer state which would protect the Suez Canal from the East. The British also were motivated by idealism, and this incidentally is how Balfour described the reasoning behind issuing the declaration. And he said, “The Western world, Western Christendom owes the Jews a great debt,” both for giving the world and the West, if you like, social values as embodied in the Bible, social justice and all sorts of other things.
I’ll stick to the history, not the current propaganda. 1917, the Zionist movement began way before the British supported the Zionist movement for decades. In 1917, the British jumped in and issued the Balfour Declaration supporting the emergence of a Jewish national home in Palestine, which most people understood to mean eventual Jewish statehood in Palestine. Most people understood that in Britain and among the Zionists and among the Arabs, but the British declared the Balfour Declaration or issued the Balfour Declaration, not only because of imperial self-interest, and this is what you’re basically saying, they had the imperial interests, a buffer state which would protect the Suez Canal from the East. The British also were motivated by idealism, and this incidentally is how Balfour described the reasoning behind issuing the declaration. And he said, “The Western world, Western Christendom owes the Jews a great debt,” both for giving the world and the West, if you like, social values as embodied in the Bible, social justice and all sorts of other things.
And the Christian world owes the Jews because it persecuted them for 2,000 years. This debt we’re now beginning to repay with the 1917 declaration favoring Zionism, but it’s also worth remembering that the Jews weren’t proxies or attached to the British imperial endeavor. They were happy to receive British support in 1917 and then subsequently when the British ruled Palestine for 20, 30 years, but they weren’t part of the British imperial design or mission. They wanted a state for themselves. The Jews happy to have the British support them, happy to date to have the Americans support Israel, but it’s not because we’re stooges or extensions of American imperial interests. The British incidentally always described in Arab narratives of propaganda as consistent supporters of Zionism, they weren’t. The first British rulers in Palestine, 1917, 1920-
Mouin Rabbani
Herbert Samuel.
Herbert Samuel.
Benny Morris
No, before Herbert Samuel. Samuel came in 1920. The British ruled there for three years previously, and most of the leaders, the British generals and so on who were in Palestine were anti-Zionists. And subsequently, in the ’20s and ’30s, the British occasionally curbed Zionist immigration to Palestine, and in 1939 switched horses and supported the Arab National Movement and not Zionism. They turned anti-Zionist and basically said, “You Arabs will rule Palestine within the next 10 years. This is what we’re giving you by limiting Jewish immigration to Palestine,” but the Arabs didn’t actually understand what they were being given on the silver platter Husseini again, and he said, “No, no, we can’t accept the British White Paper of May 1939, which had given the Arabs everything they wanted basically, self- determination in an Arab majority state. So, what I’m saying is the British at some point did support the Zionist enterprise, but at other points were less consistent in the support. And in 1939 until 1948, when they didn’t vote even for partition for Jewish statehood in Palestine in the UN resolution, they didn’t support Zionism during the last decade of the mandate. It’s worth remembering that.
No, before Herbert Samuel. Samuel came in 1920. The British ruled there for three years previously, and most of the leaders, the British generals and so on who were in Palestine were anti-Zionists. And subsequently, in the ’20s and ’30s, the British occasionally curbed Zionist immigration to Palestine, and in 1939 switched horses and supported the Arab National Movement and not Zionism. They turned anti-Zionist and basically said, “You Arabs will rule Palestine within the next 10 years. This is what we’re giving you by limiting Jewish immigration to Palestine,” but the Arabs didn’t actually understand what they were being given on the silver platter Husseini again, and he said, “No, no, we can’t accept the British White Paper of May 1939, which had given the Arabs everything they wanted basically, self- determination in an Arab majority state. So, what I’m saying is the British at some point did support the Zionist enterprise, but at other points were less consistent in the support. And in 1939 until 1948, when they didn’t vote even for partition for Jewish statehood in Palestine in the UN resolution, they didn’t support Zionism during the last decade of the mandate. It’s worth remembering that.
Mouin Rabbani
I’d like to respond to that. Speaking of propaganda, I find it simply impossible to accept that Balfour, who as British Prime Minister in 1905, was a chief sponsor of the Aliens Act, which was specifically-
I’d like to respond to that. Speaking of propaganda, I find it simply impossible to accept that Balfour, who as British Prime Minister in 1905, was a chief sponsor of the Aliens Act, which was specifically-
Benny Morris
He changed his mind.
He changed his mind.
Mouin Rabbani
… Which was specifically designed to keep persecuted Eastern European Jews out of the streets of the UK and who was denounced as an antisemite by the entire British Jewish establishment. A decade later, all of a sudden-
… Which was specifically designed to keep persecuted Eastern European Jews out of the streets of the UK and who was denounced as an antisemite by the entire British Jewish establishment. A decade later, all of a sudden-
Benny Morris
Changed his mind.
Changed his mind.
Mouin Rabbani
People changed their minds, but when the changing of the mind just coincidentally happens to coincide with the British imperial interest, I think perhaps the transformation is a little more superficial than he’s being given credit for. It was clearly a British imperial venture, and if there had been no threat to the Suez Canal during World War I, regardless of what Balfour would’ve thought about the Jews and their contribution to history and their persecution and so on, there would’ve been no Balfour Declaration.
People changed their minds, but when the changing of the mind just coincidentally happens to coincide with the British imperial interest, I think perhaps the transformation is a little more superficial than he’s being given credit for. It was clearly a British imperial venture, and if there had been no threat to the Suez Canal during World War I, regardless of what Balfour would’ve thought about the Jews and their contribution to history and their persecution and so on, there would’ve been no Balfour Declaration.
Steven Bonnell
May I ask real quick, it’s a question on that, why did the British ever cap immigration then from Jews to that area at all?
May I ask real quick, it’s a question on that, why did the British ever cap immigration then from Jews to that area at all?
Mouin Rabbani
Well, we’re talking now about 19-
Well, we’re talking now about 19-
Benny Morris
20s and 30s.
20s and 30s.
Steven Bonnell
But I’m saying that if the whole goal was just to be an imperialist project, there were terrorist attacks from Jewish-
But I’m saying that if the whole goal was just to be an imperialist project, there were terrorist attacks from Jewish-
Mouin Rabbani
Yes, but you’re… I’ll answer you.
Yes, but you’re… I’ll answer you.
Steven Bonnell
In the ’40s.
In the ’40s.
Mouin Rabbani
And we’re talking now about 1917, and as I mentioned earlier, I don’t think the British had a Jewish state in mind. That’s why they used the term Jewish national home. I think what they wanted was a British protectorate, loyal to and dependent upon the British. I think an outstanding review of British policy towards these issues during the mandate has been done by Martin Bunton of the University of Victoria, and he basically makes the argument that once the British realized the mess they were in, certainly by the late ’20s, early ’30s, they recognized the mess they were in, the irreconcilable differences, and basically pursued a policy of just muddling on, and muddling on in the context of British rule in Palestine, whose overall purpose was to serve for the development of Zionist institutions, Yishuv’s economy and so on, meant even if the British were not self-consciously doing this, preparing the groundwork for the eventual establishment of the Jewish state. I don’t know if that answers your question.
And we’re talking now about 1917, and as I mentioned earlier, I don’t think the British had a Jewish state in mind. That’s why they used the term Jewish national home. I think what they wanted was a British protectorate, loyal to and dependent upon the British. I think an outstanding review of British policy towards these issues during the mandate has been done by Martin Bunton of the University of Victoria, and he basically makes the argument that once the British realized the mess they were in, certainly by the late ’20s, early ’30s, they recognized the mess they were in, the irreconcilable differences, and basically pursued a policy of just muddling on, and muddling on in the context of British rule in Palestine, whose overall purpose was to serve for the development of Zionist institutions, Yishuv’s economy and so on, meant even if the British were not self-consciously doing this, preparing the groundwork for the eventual establishment of the Jewish state. I don’t know if that answers your question.
Benny Morris
Except they did turn anti-Zionist in 1939.
Except they did turn anti-Zionist in 1939.
Mouin Rabbani
Yes, of course [inaudible 01:56:30].
Yes, of course [inaudible 01:56:30].
Benny Morris
And maintained-
And maintained-
Mouin Rabbani
They were being shot off by [inaudible 01:56:33]-
They were being shot off by [inaudible 01:56:33]-
Benny Morris
… That Zionist… No, no, before they were being shot off, but maintain that anti-Zionist posture until 1948.
… That Zionist… No, no, before they were being shot off, but maintain that anti-Zionist posture until 1948.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay.
Okay.
Mouin Rabbani
And if I may, just also one point, you mentioned Hajj Amin al-Husseini during World… Entirely legitimate, but what I would also point out is that you had a Zionist organization, the Lehi-
And if I may, just also one point, you mentioned Hajj Amin al-Husseini during World… Entirely legitimate, but what I would also point out is that you had a Zionist organization, the Lehi-
Benny Morris
300 people.
300 people.
Mouin Rabbani
300 people, one of whom happened to become an Israeli prime minister, an Israeli foreign minister, a speaker of Israeli parliament-
300 people, one of whom happened to become an Israeli prime minister, an Israeli foreign minister, a speaker of Israeli parliament-
Norman Finkelstein
Maybe you should give his name.
Maybe you should give his name.
Mouin Rabbani
Yitzhak Shamir proposing an alliance with Nazi Germany in 1941.
Yitzhak Shamir proposing an alliance with Nazi Germany in 1941.
Benny Morris
Shamir proposed a Nazi-
Shamir proposed a Nazi-
Mouin Rabbani
Well, no, the Lehi proposed-
Well, no, the Lehi proposed-
Benny Morris
Some people in the Lehi proposed-
Some people in the Lehi proposed-
Mouin Rabbani
Of which Shamir was a prominent leader.
Of which Shamir was a prominent leader.
Benny Morris
This is a red herring also.
This is a red herring also.
Mouin Rabbani
No, no. Well, if he’s a red herring, Hajj Amin al-Husseini is a red whale, I’m sorry.
No, no. Well, if he’s a red herring, Hajj Amin al-Husseini is a red whale, I’m sorry.
Benny Morris
The Lehi was an unimportant organization in the Yishuv. 300 people versus 30,000 belonged to the Haganah, so it was not a very important organization. It’s true, before the Holocaust actually began, they wanted allies against the British where they could find them and they-
The Lehi was an unimportant organization in the Yishuv. 300 people versus 30,000 belonged to the Haganah, so it was not a very important organization. It’s true, before the Holocaust actually began, they wanted allies against the British where they could find them and they-
Mouin Rabbani
We’re talking 1941 here, not 1931.
We’re talking 1941 here, not 1931.
Benny Morris
1940.
1940.
Mouin Rabbani
’41 from what I recall.
’41 from what I recall.
Benny Morris
1940, they approached the German emissary in Istanbul or something.
1940, they approached the German emissary in Istanbul or something.
Mouin Rabbani
And if I may, proposed an alliance with Nazi Germany on what the Lehi described as on the basis of shared ideological principles.
And if I may, proposed an alliance with Nazi Germany on what the Lehi described as on the basis of shared ideological principles.
Benny Morris
They didn’t share ideological-
They didn’t share ideological-
Mouin Rabbani
Well, they said they did.
Well, they said they did.
Norman Finkelstein
They said it.
They said it.
Benny Morris
They did revile-
They did revile-
Norman Finkelstein
Why are you doing these things? Of course, they said that.
Why are you doing these things? Of course, they said that.
Benny Morris
The Lehi was reviled by the majority-
The Lehi was reviled by the majority-
Norman Finkelstein
You know the state, but you know the-
You know the state, but you know the-
Benny Morris
The Lehi was reviled.
The Lehi was reviled.
Norman Finkelstein
You know what the statement said on the basis of a shared ideology. Why do you say no?
You know what the statement said on the basis of a shared ideology. Why do you say no?
Benny Morris
The Lehi people were Nazi, that you say?
The Lehi people were Nazi, that you say?
Norman Finkelstein
I’m saying that they said-
I’m saying that they said-
Benny Morris
No, you’re saying that. Forget statements, you like to quote things, but where they-
No, you’re saying that. Forget statements, you like to quote things, but where they-
Norman Finkelstein
I do like to quote things, it’s called facts.
I do like to quote things, it’s called facts.
Benny Morris
Where are the Lehi Nazis? That’s what I’m asking.
Where are the Lehi Nazis? That’s what I’m asking.
Norman Finkelstein
What did he just say?
What did he just say?
Benny Morris
Some of them supported Stalin, incidentally.
Some of them supported Stalin, incidentally.
Norman Finkelstein
He’s saying that the basis of the pact was there agreement on ideology.
He’s saying that the basis of the pact was there agreement on ideology.
Benny Morris
There wasn’t any pact. They suggested, they proposed an agreement.
There wasn’t any pact. They suggested, they proposed an agreement.
Norman Finkelstein
Right, and what did the agreement say?
Right, and what did the agreement say?
Benny Morris
They wanted arms against the British, that’s what they wanted.
They wanted arms against the British, that’s what they wanted.
Norman Finkelstein
What did the agreement say?
What did the agreement say?
Mouin Rabbani
Well, that’s what Hajj Amin al-Husseini wanted also. That’s what-
Well, that’s what Hajj Amin al-Husseini wanted also. That’s what-
Benny Morris
No, no, but they didn’t-
No, no, but they didn’t-
Mouin Rabbani
… Others in India-
… Others in India-
Benny Morris
Lehi people didn’t work in Berlin helping the Nazi regime.
Lehi people didn’t work in Berlin helping the Nazi regime.
Mouin Rabbani
It’s what the IRA wanted also.
It’s what the IRA wanted also.
Benny Morris
No, but this is what Hajj Amin al-Husseini did. You know that he was an antisemite. You’ve probably read some of his works. He wasn’t just anti-British.
No, but this is what Hajj Amin al-Husseini did. You know that he was an antisemite. You’ve probably read some of his works. He wasn’t just anti-British.
Mouin Rabbani
Yes, and-
Yes, and-
Benny Morris
He was also antisemitic. He had a common ground with Hitler. It’s as simple as that.
He was also antisemitic. He had a common ground with Hitler. It’s as simple as that.
Mouin Rabbani
I think we can agree-
I think we can agree-
Norman Finkelstein
Not every antisemite is a Hitlerite.
Not every antisemite is a Hitlerite.
Mouin Rabbani
I think we could-
I think we could-
Norman Finkelstein
That part-
That part-
Steven Bonnell
He literally worked with the Nazis to recruit people. He wasn’t just a guy posting or-
He literally worked with the Nazis to recruit people. He wasn’t just a guy posting or-
Norman Finkelstein
And he was an absolutely revolting, disgusting human being-
And he was an absolutely revolting, disgusting human being-
Benny Morris
There’s something happening here.
There’s something happening here.
Steven Bonnell
But the problem is you’re saying that Husseini was his influence… You’re saying the move [inaudible 01:59:28]-
But the problem is you’re saying that Husseini was his influence… You’re saying the move [inaudible 01:59:28]-
Norman Finkelstein
I don’t even understand, of all the crimes you want to ascribe to the Palestinian people, trying to blame them directly-indirectly, indirectly, or indirectly, three times the move for the Nazi Holocaust is completely lunatic.
I don’t even understand, of all the crimes you want to ascribe to the Palestinian people, trying to blame them directly-indirectly, indirectly, or indirectly, three times the move for the Nazi Holocaust is completely lunatic.
Steven Bonnell
Hold on. Wait, he’s not blaming them for the Holocaust. He’s saying that from the perspective-
Hold on. Wait, he’s not blaming them for the Holocaust. He’s saying that from the perspective-
Norman Finkelstein
Of course he-
Of course he-
Benny Morris
No, no, no.
No, no, no.
Steven Bonnell
Wait, wait, wait, no, he’s saying that from the perspective of Jews in the region, Palestinians would’ve been part of the-
Wait, wait, wait, no, he’s saying that from the perspective of Jews in the region, Palestinians would’ve been part of the-
Norman Finkelstein
That’s not what he’s saying.
That’s not what he’s saying.
Steven Bonnell
That is exactly what he said.
That is exactly what he said.
Norman Finkelstein
You have not read him. I’ve read him.
You have not read him. I’ve read him.
Steven Bonnell
You’ve read him and you don’t understand him.
You’ve read him and you don’t understand him.
Norman Finkelstein
You’ve read-
You’ve read-
Steven Bonnell
He’s right here.
He’s right here.
Norman Finkelstein
Believe me, I’m a lot more literate than you, Mr. Barelli.
Believe me, I’m a lot more literate than you, Mr. Barelli.
Steven Bonnell
I’m going to believe the guy that wrote the stuff.
I’m going to believe the guy that wrote the stuff.
Norman Finkelstein
You read what Wikipedia said.
You read what Wikipedia said.
Steven Bonnell
That’s great, and you don’t even speak Hebrew and you call yourself an Israeli historian.
That’s great, and you don’t even speak Hebrew and you call yourself an Israeli historian.
Norman Finkelstein
[inaudible 02:00:11].
[inaudible 02:00:11].
Steven Bonnell
[inaudible 02:00:10] different grounds.
[inaudible 02:00:10] different grounds.
Mouin Rabbani
If I can just respond to you-
If I can just respond to you-
Steven Bonnell
No, no, I’m just saying that there were two tricks-
No, no, I’m just saying that there were two tricks-
Norman Finkelstein
You said nothing, as you always do.
You said nothing, as you always do.
Steven Bonnell
That’s fine. There were two tricks that are being played here that I think is interesting. One is, you guys claim that the Lehi was trying to forge an alliance with Nazi Germany because of a shared ideology.
That’s fine. There were two tricks that are being played here that I think is interesting. One is, you guys claim that the Lehi was trying to forge an alliance with Nazi Germany because of a shared ideology.
Mouin Rabbani
That’s what they said.
That’s what they said.
Steven Bonnell
Yeah, but hold on. No, no, no, no, wait, wait, wait, no, no, it’s about what you said. You brought that up to imply that Zionism must be inexorably linked-
Yeah, but hold on. No, no, no, no, wait, wait, wait, no, no, it’s about what you said. You brought that up to imply that Zionism must be inexorably linked-
Norman Finkelstein
That’s a fact.
That’s a fact.
Mouin Rabbani
I’m sorry. No, you’re putting words in my mouth.
I’m sorry. No, you’re putting words in my mouth.
Steven Bonnell
Wait. Well, then what was the purpose of saying that the Lehi claimed that… The Lehi, who were a small group of people that were reviled by many in Israel [inaudible 02:00:44]-
Wait. Well, then what was the purpose of saying that the Lehi claimed that… The Lehi, who were a small group of people that were reviled by many in Israel [inaudible 02:00:44]-
Benny Morris
Not many, by everybody practically. They were called terrorists.
Not many, by everybody practically. They were called terrorists.
Steven Bonnell
[inaudible 02:00:47].
[inaudible 02:00:47].
Benny Morris
The Zionist movement called them terrorists.
The Zionist movement called them terrorists.
Mouin Rabbani
Yes and [inaudible 02:00:51]-
Yes and [inaudible 02:00:51]-
Benny Morris
And hunted them.
And hunted them.
Steven Bonnell
[inaudible 02:00:52] shared ideology come?
[inaudible 02:00:52] shared ideology come?
Mouin Rabbani
Shamir called himself a terrorist. They were so irrelevant that their leader ended up being kicked upstairs to the leader of the Israeli parliament-
Shamir called himself a terrorist. They were so irrelevant that their leader ended up being kicked upstairs to the leader of the Israeli parliament-
Benny Morris
That’s Israeli [inaudible 02:01:02] in.
That’s Israeli [inaudible 02:01:02] in.
Mouin Rabbani
… To Israeli foreign minister-
… To Israeli foreign minister-
Steven Bonnell
And Begin was also a part-
And Begin was also a part-
Mouin Rabbani
Yes, you want to characterize him as irrelevant as well, go ahead.
Yes, you want to characterize him as irrelevant as well, go ahead.
Steven Bonnell
No, characterize him as relevant or irrelevant based on what happens decades later. The timeline matters. The question is, what is the point of saying that the Lehi tried to forge an alliance with Nazi Germany based on [inaudible 02:01:19]?
No, characterize him as relevant or irrelevant based on what happens decades later. The timeline matters. The question is, what is the point of saying that the Lehi tried to forge an alliance with Nazi Germany based on [inaudible 02:01:19]?
Norman Finkelstein
[inaudible 02:01:19] the fact that it’s relevant is bringing up the mufti of Jerusalem and trying to blame the Holocaust [inaudible 02:01:25]-
[inaudible 02:01:19] the fact that it’s relevant is bringing up the mufti of Jerusalem and trying to blame the Holocaust [inaudible 02:01:25]-
Steven Bonnell
No one [inaudible 02:01:26] Holocaust [inaudible 02:01:28].
No one [inaudible 02:01:26] Holocaust [inaudible 02:01:28].
Benny Morris
The mufti was the leader of the Palestine Arab National Movement. The Lehi was 300 people.
The mufti was the leader of the Palestine Arab National Movement. The Lehi was 300 people.
Norman Finkelstein
And he had as much to do with the Nazi Holocaust as I did.
And he had as much to do with the Nazi Holocaust as I did.
Benny Morris
No, he recruited people for the SS. How can you get away from that?
No, he recruited people for the SS. How can you get away from that?
Norman Finkelstein
No, he recruited soldiers in the Balkans, mostly Kosovars, which was disgusting. I have no doubt about that, but he had one [inaudible 02:01:50]-
No, he recruited soldiers in the Balkans, mostly Kosovars, which was disgusting. I have no doubt about that, but he had one [inaudible 02:01:50]-
Benny Morris
He was [inaudible 02:01:50] plenty with the foreign ministers saying, “Don’t let the Jews out.”
He was [inaudible 02:01:50] plenty with the foreign ministers saying, “Don’t let the Jews out.”
Norman Finkelstein
[inaudible 02:01:54].
[inaudible 02:01:54].
Mouin Rabbani
Can I say-
Can I say-
Norman Finkelstein
[inaudible 02:01:55].
[inaudible 02:01:55].
Benny Morris
The Italian foreign minister receive letters from Husseini during the Holocaust, “Don’t let the Jews out.” I’m not saying he was a major architect of the Holocaust.
The Italian foreign minister receive letters from Husseini during the Holocaust, “Don’t let the Jews out.” I’m not saying he was a major architect of the Holocaust.
Norman Finkelstein
He wasn’t even minor, one sentence.
He wasn’t even minor, one sentence.
Mouin Rabbani
If we’re agreed, that Hajj Amin al-Husseini, the Mufti of Jerusalem, collaborated with the Nazis during World War II and actively sought their sponsorship, why is it irrelevant-
If we’re agreed, that Hajj Amin al-Husseini, the Mufti of Jerusalem, collaborated with the Nazis during World War II and actively sought their sponsorship, why is it irrelevant-
Benny Morris
And probably wanted the destruction of European jury.
And probably wanted the destruction of European jury.
Mouin Rabbani
He probably wanted a lot of things.
He probably wanted a lot of things.
Benny Morris
Okay.
Okay.
Mouin Rabbani
If that’s relevant, why is it irrelevant that a prime minister of Israel-
If that’s relevant, why is it irrelevant that a prime minister of Israel-
Benny Morris
Not prime minister. In 1941, he wasn’t prime minister of Israel. He was a leader of a very small terrorist group.
Not prime minister. In 1941, he wasn’t prime minister of Israel. He was a leader of a very small terrorist group.
Mouin Rabbani
So do you contend-
So do you contend-
Benny Morris
Denounced as terrorist by the mainstream of Zionism.
Denounced as terrorist by the mainstream of Zionism.
Mouin Rabbani
Do you consider it irrelevant that many years ago, Mahmoud Abbas wrote a doctoral thesis, which is basically tantamount-
Do you consider it irrelevant that many years ago, Mahmoud Abbas wrote a doctoral thesis, which is basically tantamount-
Benny Morris
Show me something about Mahmoud Abbas, but I didn’t bring it up, you’re the one who’s bringing it up.
Show me something about Mahmoud Abbas, but I didn’t bring it up, you’re the one who’s bringing it up.
Mouin Rabbani
Yes, do you consider that [inaudible 02:02:58]-
Yes, do you consider that [inaudible 02:02:58]-
Benny Morris
Belittling the Holocaust, that’s what you’re saying. The president of the Palestinian National Authority belittled the Holocaust saying it didn’t happen, or only a few Jews died.
Belittling the Holocaust, that’s what you’re saying. The president of the Palestinian National Authority belittled the Holocaust saying it didn’t happen, or only a few Jews died.
Mouin Rabbani
I think that’s a fair characterization of Mahmoud Abbas.
I think that’s a fair characterization of Mahmoud Abbas.
Benny Morris
But I didn’t bring it up.
But I didn’t bring it up.
Mouin Rabbani
I brought it up because my question is, then why is Shamir’s antecedence irrelevant?
I brought it up because my question is, then why is Shamir’s antecedence irrelevant?
Benny Morris
He was a terrorist leader of a very small, marginal group-
He was a terrorist leader of a very small, marginal group-
Mouin Rabbani
Who became-
Who became-
Benny Morris
Hajj Amin al-Husseini was the head of the movement at the time. There’s no comparison.
Hajj Amin al-Husseini was the head of the movement at the time. There’s no comparison.
Steven Bonnell
Also, the point of bringing Husseini-
Also, the point of bringing Husseini-
Mouin Rabbani
There’s no-
There’s no-
Steven Bonnell
The point of bringing up Husseini’s stuff wasn’t to say that he was a great further of the Holocaust, it’s that he might’ve been a great further in the prevention of Jews fleeing to go to Palestine to escape the Holocaust.
The point of bringing up Husseini’s stuff wasn’t to say that he was a great further of the Holocaust, it’s that he might’ve been a great further in the prevention of Jews fleeing to go to Palestine to escape the Holocaust.
Mouin Rabbani
Yes, but the point I made-
Yes, but the point I made-
Steven Bonnell
That was the point.
That was the point.
Mouin Rabbani
And I explained why I think that’s not an entirely accurate characterization. And then I wanted to make another point, if it’s legitimate to bring up his role during World War II, why is it illegitimate to bring up a man who would become Israel’s speaker of parliament, foreign minister? And also-
And I explained why I think that’s not an entirely accurate characterization. And then I wanted to make another point, if it’s legitimate to bring up his role during World War II, why is it illegitimate to bring up a man who would become Israel’s speaker of parliament, foreign minister? And also-
Benny Morris
He was a young terrorist.
He was a young terrorist.
Mouin Rabbani
And was also responsible for the murder of the United Nations’ first international envoy, Folke Bernadotte, why is all that irrelevant? I don’t understand.
And was also responsible for the murder of the United Nations’ first international envoy, Folke Bernadotte, why is all that irrelevant? I don’t understand.
Steven Bonnell
I think that the reason why he was brought up was because Jewish people in this time period would’ve viewed it as there was a prevention of Jews leaving Europe because of the Palestinians pressuring the British to put a curb that 75,000 immigration limit, yes, but it’s not about them furthering the Holocaust or being an architect, major, minor player in the Holocaust. He was a major player in that region, so if you wanted to bring up-
I think that the reason why he was brought up was because Jewish people in this time period would’ve viewed it as there was a prevention of Jews leaving Europe because of the Palestinians pressuring the British to put a curb that 75,000 immigration limit, yes, but it’s not about them furthering the Holocaust or being an architect, major, minor player in the Holocaust. He was a major player in that region, so if you wanted to bring up-
Mouin Rabbani
Benny Morris made the specific claim that the Palestinians played an indirect role in the Holocaust.
Benny Morris made the specific claim that the Palestinians played an indirect role in the Holocaust.
Steven Bonnell
The indirect role would’ve been the prevention of people escaping from Europe.
The indirect role would’ve been the prevention of people escaping from Europe.
Mouin Rabbani
Yes, and my response to that is, first of all, I disagree with that characterization, but second of all-
Yes, and my response to that is, first of all, I disagree with that characterization, but second of all-
Benny Morris
How can you disagree with that? They forced the British to prevent immigration of Jews from Europe and reaching safe shores in Palestine. That’s what they did, and they knew that the Jews were being persecuted in Europe.
How can you disagree with that? They forced the British to prevent immigration of Jews from Europe and reaching safe shores in Palestine. That’s what they did, and they knew that the Jews were being persecuted in Europe.
Mouin Rabbani
Was Palestine the only spot of land on Earth?
Was Palestine the only spot of land on Earth?
Benny Morris
Yes, basically that was the problem. The Jews couldn’t immigrate anywhere else.
Yes, basically that was the problem. The Jews couldn’t immigrate anywhere else.
Mouin Rabbani
What about your great friends in Britain, the architects of the Balfour Declaration?
What about your great friends in Britain, the architects of the Balfour Declaration?
Benny Morris
By the late 1930s, they weren’t-
By the late 1930s, they weren’t-
Mouin Rabbani
What about the United States?
What about the United States?
Benny Morris
… Happy to take in Jews and the Americans weren’t happy to take in Jews.
… Happy to take in Jews and the Americans weren’t happy to take in Jews.
Mouin Rabbani
And why are Palestinians, who were not Europeans, who had zero role in the rise of Nazism, who had no relation to any of this, why are they somehow uniquely responsible for what happened in Europe and uniquely culpable?
And why are Palestinians, who were not Europeans, who had zero role in the rise of Nazism, who had no relation to any of this, why are they somehow uniquely responsible for what happened in Europe and uniquely culpable?
Benny Morris
[inaudible 02:05:41] the only safe haven for Jews, that’s all.
[inaudible 02:05:41] the only safe haven for Jews, that’s all.
Norman Finkelstein
Oh, really? The United States wasn’t a potential safe haven? The only one was Palestine.
Oh, really? The United States wasn’t a potential safe haven? The only one was Palestine.
Benny Morris
At the time.
At the time.
Norman Finkelstein
The United States had no room from the Atlantic to the Pacific for Jews?
The United States had no room from the Atlantic to the Pacific for Jews?
Benny Morris
It did have room, but it didn’t want Jews.
It did have room, but it didn’t want Jews.
Norman Finkelstein
So, that wasn’t the only safe haven.
So, that wasn’t the only safe haven.
Mouin Rabbani
Shouldn’t you be focusing your anger and outrage-
Shouldn’t you be focusing your anger and outrage-
Benny Morris
America should be blamed for not letting Jews in during the ’30s and ’40s.
America should be blamed for not letting Jews in during the ’30s and ’40s.
Norman Finkelstein
They are blamed, but nobody blames them for the Holocaust.
They are blamed, but nobody blames them for the Holocaust.
Benny Morris
Well, indirectly-
Well, indirectly-
Norman Finkelstein
I’ve never heard it said that Franklin Delano Roosevelt was indirectly responsible for the Holocaust. I never heard that. Now, maybe it’s in Israeli literature because the Israelis have gone mad. Yes, your prime minister said the whole idea of the gas chambers came from the mufti of Jerusalem.
I’ve never heard it said that Franklin Delano Roosevelt was indirectly responsible for the Holocaust. I never heard that. Now, maybe it’s in Israeli literature because the Israelis have gone mad. Yes, your prime minister said the whole idea of the gas chambers came from the mufti of Jerusalem.
Benny Morris
That’s nonsense. We all know that’s nonsense.
That’s nonsense. We all know that’s nonsense.
Norman Finkelstein
But we also know that Netanyahu said it.
But we also know that Netanyahu said it.
Benny Morris
Netanyahu says so many things, which are absurd [inaudible 02:06:36]-
Netanyahu says so many things, which are absurd [inaudible 02:06:36]-
Norman Finkelstein
And he happens to be the prime minister [inaudible 02:06:38]-
And he happens to be the prime minister [inaudible 02:06:38]-
Mouin Rabbani
[inaudible 02:06:38] serving prime minister of Israel.
[inaudible 02:06:38] serving prime minister of Israel.
Benny Morris
I can’t be responsible-
I can’t be responsible-
Mouin Rabbani
You’re not responsible for them, but it is relevant that he’s the longest serving prime minister of Israel.
You’re not responsible for them, but it is relevant that he’s the longest serving prime minister of Israel.
Benny Morris
Unfortunately, it says something about the Israeli public, I agree.
Unfortunately, it says something about the Israeli public, I agree.
Mouin Rabbani
Yes, and he gets elected, not despite saying such things, but because he says such.
Yes, and he gets elected, not despite saying such things, but because he says such.
Benny Morris
His voters don’t care about Hajj Amin al-Husseini or Hitler, they know nothing about…
His voters don’t care about Hajj Amin al-Husseini or Hitler, they know nothing about…
Mouin Rabbani
They will be [inaudible 02:07:00].
They will be [inaudible 02:07:00].
Benny Morris
His base know nothing about anything, and he can say what he likes and they’ll say yes, or they don’t care if he says these things.
His base know nothing about anything, and he can say what he likes and they’ll say yes, or they don’t care if he says these things.
Mouin Rabbani
You may well be right, but anyway, not to beat a dead horse, but I still don’t understand-
You may well be right, but anyway, not to beat a dead horse, but I still don’t understand-
Benny Morris
Let’s not beat a dead horse, you’re right.
Let’s not beat a dead horse, you’re right.
Mouin Rabbani
I’ll just conclude by saying I don’t understand why the Mufti of Jerusalem is relevant-
I’ll just conclude by saying I don’t understand why the Mufti of Jerusalem is relevant-
Benny Morris
He is relevant, but-
He is relevant, but-
Benny Morris
The head of the national-
The head of the national-
Mouin Rabbani
… Yitzhak Shamir is not relevant?
… Yitzhak Shamir is not relevant?
Benny Morris
Shamir wasn’t the head of the national movement. He represented 100 or 200 or 300 gunmen who were considered terrorists by the Zionist movement at the time. The fact that 30 years later he becomes prime minister, that’s the crux of history.
Shamir wasn’t the head of the national movement. He represented 100 or 200 or 300 gunmen who were considered terrorists by the Zionist movement at the time. The fact that 30 years later he becomes prime minister, that’s the crux of history.
Mouin Rabbani
And his history is not-
And his history is not-
Benny Morris
Hajj Amin al-Husseini was the head of the Palestine Arab National Movement at the time.
Hajj Amin al-Husseini was the head of the Palestine Arab National Movement at the time.
Mouin Rabbani
Anyway-
Anyway-
Benny Morris
What can you do?
What can you do?
Mouin Rabbani
I think we’re speaking past each other and I’ll leave it there.
I think we’re speaking past each other and I’ll leave it there.
Benny Morris
We’re not, I’m talking facts.
We’re not, I’m talking facts.
October 7
Lex Fridman
Let’s move to the modern day and we’ll return to history, maybe ’67 and other important moments, but let’s look to today, in the recent months, October 7th. Let me ask sort of a pointed question. Was October 7th attacks by Hamas on Israel genocidal? Was it an act of ethnic cleansing? Just so we lay out the moral calculus that we are engaged in, maybe-
Let’s move to the modern day and we’ll return to history, maybe ’67 and other important moments, but let’s look to today, in the recent months, October 7th. Let me ask sort of a pointed question. Was October 7th attacks by Hamas on Israel genocidal? Was it an act of ethnic cleansing? Just so we lay out the moral calculus that we are engaged in, maybe-
Benny Morris
The problem with October 7th is this, the Hamas fighters who invaded Southern Israel were sent, ordered to murder, rape, and do all the nasty things that they did, and they killed some 1,200 Israelis that day and abducted them as we know, something like 250, mostly civilians, also some soldiers, took them back to dungeons in Gaza, but they were motivated not just by the words of their current leader in the Gaza Strip, but by their ideology, which is embedded in their charter from 1988, if I remember correctly, and that charter is genocidal. It says that the Jews must be eradicated basically from the land of Israel, from Palestine. The Jews are described there as sons of apes and pigs. The Jews are a base people, killers of prophets, and they should not exist in Palestine. It doesn’t say that they necessarily should be murdered all around the world, the Hamas charter, but certainly the Jews should be eliminated from Palestine.
The problem with October 7th is this, the Hamas fighters who invaded Southern Israel were sent, ordered to murder, rape, and do all the nasty things that they did, and they killed some 1,200 Israelis that day and abducted them as we know, something like 250, mostly civilians, also some soldiers, took them back to dungeons in Gaza, but they were motivated not just by the words of their current leader in the Gaza Strip, but by their ideology, which is embedded in their charter from 1988, if I remember correctly, and that charter is genocidal. It says that the Jews must be eradicated basically from the land of Israel, from Palestine. The Jews are described there as sons of apes and pigs. The Jews are a base people, killers of prophets, and they should not exist in Palestine. It doesn’t say that they necessarily should be murdered all around the world, the Hamas charter, but certainly the Jews should be eliminated from Palestine.
And this is the driving ideology behind the massacre of the Jews on October 7th, which brought down on the Gaza Strip, and I think with the intention by the Hamas of the Israeli counter offensive because they knew that that counter offensive would result in many Palestinian dead because the Hamas fighters and their weaponry and so on were embedded in the population in Gaza, and they hoped to benefit from this in the eyes of world public opinion as Israel chased these Hamas people and their ammunition dumps and so on and killed lots of Palestinian civilians in the process. All of this was understood by Sinwar, by the head of the Hamas, and he strived for that, but initially he wanted to kill as many Jews as he could in the border areas around the Gaza Strip.
Mouin Rabbani
I’ll respond directly to the points you made, and then I’ll leave it to Norm to bring in the historical context. That Hamas charter is from the ’90s, I think?
I’ll respond directly to the points you made, and then I’ll leave it to Norm to bring in the historical context. That Hamas charter is from the ’90s, I think?
Benny Morris
1988.
1988.
Mouin Rabbani
1988, so it’s from the ’80s. I think your characterization of that charter as antisemitic is indisputable. I think your characterization of that charter as genocidal is off the mark.
1988, so it’s from the ’80s. I think your characterization of that charter as antisemitic is indisputable. I think your characterization of that charter as genocidal is off the mark.
Benny Morris
It’s implicit.
It’s implicit.
Mouin Rabbani
And more importantly, that charter has been superseded by a new charter. In fact, it has been… Well, there is-
And more importantly, that charter has been superseded by a new charter. In fact, it has been… Well, there is-
Benny Morris
There is no new charter. There is an explanation, a statement [inaudible 02:11:06]-
There is no new charter. There is an explanation, a statement [inaudible 02:11:06]-
Norman Finkelstein
2018, a political statement.
2018, a political statement.
Benny Morris
2000 and something.
2000 and something.
Norman Finkelstein
2018.
2018.
Benny Morris
2018, supposedly clarifying things which are in the charter, but it doesn’t actually step back from what the charter says, eliminate Israel, eliminate the Jews from the land of Israel.
2018, supposedly clarifying things which are in the charter, but it doesn’t actually step back from what the charter says, eliminate Israel, eliminate the Jews from the land of Israel.
Mouin Rabbani
In 2018, the Hamas charter, if we look at the current version of the charter-
In 2018, the Hamas charter, if we look at the current version of the charter-
Benny Morris
It’s not called a charter. You’re calling it a charter. It wasn’t. The only thing called the charter is what was issued in 1988 by Yassin himself.
It’s not called a charter. You’re calling it a charter. It wasn’t. The only thing called the charter is what was issued in 1988 by Yassin himself.
Mouin Rabbani
Anyway, it makes a clear distinction between Jews and Zionists in 2018. Now, you can choose to dismiss it, believe it, it’s sincere, it’s insincere, whatever-
Anyway, it makes a clear distinction between Jews and Zionists in 2018. Now, you can choose to dismiss it, believe it, it’s sincere, it’s insincere, whatever-
Benny Morris
Insincere is probably the right word.
Insincere is probably the right word.
Mouin Rabbani
Secondly, I’m really unfamiliar with fighters who consult these kinds of documents before they go on-
Secondly, I’m really unfamiliar with fighters who consult these kinds of documents before they go on-
Benny Morris
They’re brought up on this in their education system. In the kindergarten, they’re told, “Kill the Jews.” They practice with make-believe guns and uniforms when they’re five years old in the kindergartens of the Hamas-
They’re brought up on this in their education system. In the kindergarten, they’re told, “Kill the Jews.” They practice with make-believe guns and uniforms when they’re five years old in the kindergartens of the Hamas-
Mouin Rabbani
At the instruction of the commissioner-general of UNRWA, right?
At the instruction of the commissioner-general of UNRWA, right?
Benny Morris
I didn’t say that. I said the Hamas has kindergartens and summer camps in which they trained to kill Jews, children aged five and six.
I didn’t say that. I said the Hamas has kindergartens and summer camps in which they trained to kill Jews, children aged five and six.
Mouin Rabbani
Secondly, you keep saying Jews, to which I would respond-
Secondly, you keep saying Jews, to which I would respond-
Benny Morris
They use the word Jews.
They use the word Jews.
Mouin Rabbani
To which I would respond that Hamas does not have a record of deliberately targeting Jews who are not Israelis. And in fact, it also doesn’t have a record of deliberately targeting either Jews or Israelis outside Israel and Palestine, so all this talk of-
To which I would respond that Hamas does not have a record of deliberately targeting Jews who are not Israelis. And in fact, it also doesn’t have a record of deliberately targeting either Jews or Israelis outside Israel and Palestine, so all this talk of-
Benny Morris
Unlike the Hezbollah, which has started targeting Jews outside of Palestine.
Unlike the Hezbollah, which has started targeting Jews outside of Palestine.
Mouin Rabbani
We’re talking about October 7th and Hamas. If you’d also like to speak about Hezbollah, let’s get to that separately if you don’t mind. So again, genocidal, well, if that term is going to be discussed, my first response would be let’s talk about potentially genocidal actions against Israelis rather than against Jews for the reasons that I just mentioned. And again, I find this constant conflation of Jews, Israel, Zionism, to be a bit disturbing.
We’re talking about October 7th and Hamas. If you’d also like to speak about Hezbollah, let’s get to that separately if you don’t mind. So again, genocidal, well, if that term is going to be discussed, my first response would be let’s talk about potentially genocidal actions against Israelis rather than against Jews for the reasons that I just mentioned. And again, I find this constant conflation of Jews, Israel, Zionism, to be a bit disturbing.
Secondly, I think there are quite a few indications in the factual record that raise serious questions about the accusations of the genocidal intent and genocidal practice of what happened on October 7th. And my final point would be, I don’t think I should take your word for it, I don’t think you should take my word for it. I think what we need here is a proper independent international investigation, and the reason we need that-
Benny Morris
Of what?
Of what?
Mouin Rabbani
Of genocide during this conflict, whether by Palestinians on October 7th or Israel thereafter, and the reason that we need such an investigation is because Hamas is… There won’t be any hearings on what Hamas did on October 7th at the International Court of Justice because the International Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide deals only with states and not with movements. I think the international criminal court, and specifically its current prosecutor, Karim Khan lacks any and all credibility. He’s been an absolute failure at his job. He’s just been sitting his backside for years on this file. And I think I would point out that Hamas has called for independent investigations of all these allegations. Israel has categorically rejected any international investigation, of course, fully supported by the United States. And I think what is required is to have credible investigations of these things because I don’t think you’re going to convince me, I don’t think I’m going to convince you, and this is two people sitting across the table from each other.
Of genocide during this conflict, whether by Palestinians on October 7th or Israel thereafter, and the reason that we need such an investigation is because Hamas is… There won’t be any hearings on what Hamas did on October 7th at the International Court of Justice because the International Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide deals only with states and not with movements. I think the international criminal court, and specifically its current prosecutor, Karim Khan lacks any and all credibility. He’s been an absolute failure at his job. He’s just been sitting his backside for years on this file. And I think I would point out that Hamas has called for independent investigations of all these allegations. Israel has categorically rejected any international investigation, of course, fully supported by the United States. And I think what is required is to have credible investigations of these things because I don’t think you’re going to convince me, I don’t think I’m going to convince you, and this is two people sitting across the table from each other.
Benny Morris
No, there’s certain things you don’t even have to investigate. You know how many citizens, civilians died in the October 7th assault-
No, there’s certain things you don’t even have to investigate. You know how many citizens, civilians died in the October 7th assault-
Mouin Rabbani
Yes, but that’s not-
Yes, but that’s not-
Benny Morris
You know that there are lots of allegations of rape. I don’t know how persuaded you are of those. They did find bodies without heads, which is-
You know that there are lots of allegations of rape. I don’t know how persuaded you are of those. They did find bodies without heads, which is-
Mouin Rabbani
There were no beheadings of infants.
There were no beheadings of infants.
Benny Morris
There were some beheadings, apparently.
There were some beheadings, apparently.
Norman Finkelstein
The Israelis didn’t even claim that in the document they submitted before the ICJ. Go read what your government submitted. It never mentioned beheadings.
The Israelis didn’t even claim that in the document they submitted before the ICJ. Go read what your government submitted. It never mentioned beheadings.
Benny Morris
Well, as far as I know, there were some people who were beheaded, but-
Well, as far as I know, there were some people who were beheaded, but-
Norman Finkelstein
We could bring it up right now.
We could bring it up right now.
Benny Morris
You also deny that there were rapes there.
You also deny that there were rapes there.
Norman Finkelstein
I didn’t deny. I said I’ve not seen convincing evidence that confirms it. I’ve said that from day one, and I’ll say it today, four and a half months later.
I didn’t deny. I said I’ve not seen convincing evidence that confirms it. I’ve said that from day one, and I’ll say it today, four and a half months later.
Benny Morris
Do you know that they killed eight or 900 civilians in their assault?
Do you know that they killed eight or 900 civilians in their assault?
Norman Finkelstein
Absolutely, that seems to me indisputable.
Absolutely, that seems to me indisputable.
Benny Morris
… 900 civilians in the assault-
… 900 civilians in the assault-
Norman Finkelstein
Absolutely. That seems to me indisputable.
Absolutely. That seems to me indisputable.
Benny Morris
Oh, okay. Well, I’m glad that you’re considering something-
Oh, okay. Well, I’m glad that you’re considering something-
Norman Finkelstein
I’ve said that from day one.
I’ve said that from day one.
Steven Bonnell
Well, to be clear, you haven’t. You did a debate… I don’t remember the talk show, but you seemed to imply that there was a lot of crossfire and then it might’ve been the IDF that had killed a lot of-
Well, to be clear, you haven’t. You did a debate… I don’t remember the talk show, but you seemed to imply that there was a lot of crossfire and then it might’ve been the IDF that had killed a lot of-
Norman Finkelstein
I said that there is no question because the names were published in Haaretz. There is no question that roughly of the 1200 people killed, 800 of them were civilians-
I said that there is no question because the names were published in Haaretz. There is no question that roughly of the 1200 people killed, 800 of them were civilians-
Benny Morris
850.
850.
Norman Finkelstein
850, fine. So I never said that, but then I said, “No, we don’t know exactly how they were killed.” But 800 civilians killed, no, 850, no question there. And I also said on repeated occasions, there cannot be any doubt, in my opinion as of now with the available evidence, that Hamas was responsible for significant atrocities, and I made sure to include the plural.
850, fine. So I never said that, but then I said, “No, we don’t know exactly how they were killed.” But 800 civilians killed, no, 850, no question there. And I also said on repeated occasions, there cannot be any doubt, in my opinion as of now with the available evidence, that Hamas was responsible for significant atrocities, and I made sure to include the plural.
Steven Bonnell
There’s a lot of tricky language being employed here. Do you think of the 850-
There’s a lot of tricky language being employed here. Do you think of the 850-
Norman Finkelstein
There’s nothing tricky. It’s called attaching value to words and not talking like a motormouth. I am very careful about qualifying because that’s what language is about.
There’s nothing tricky. It’s called attaching value to words and not talking like a motormouth. I am very careful about qualifying because that’s what language is about.
Steven Bonnell
That’s great. Then let me just ask a clarifying question, do you firmly believe that the majority of the 850 civilians were killed by Hamas?
That’s great. Then let me just ask a clarifying question, do you firmly believe that the majority of the 850 civilians were killed by Hamas?
Norman Finkelstein
My view is, even if it were half, 400 is a huge number by any reckoning-
My view is, even if it were half, 400 is a huge number by any reckoning-
Benny Morris
Why-
Why-
Steven Bonnell
Okay, wait. You didn’t-
Okay, wait. You didn’t-
Norman Finkelstein
I said even if-
I said even if-
Steven Bonnell
Wait, wait, wait-
Wait, wait, wait-
Norman Finkelstein
Because Benny, because Professor Morris, I don’t know. I agree with Mouin Rabbani, I’m not sure if he concedes the 400. I’ll say-
Because Benny, because Professor Morris, I don’t know. I agree with Mouin Rabbani, I’m not sure if he concedes the 400. I’ll say-
Benny Morris
Why 400? Whoever thought up the number, 400? 800 of the 850 were slaughtered by Hamas. Maybe a couple of individuals were killed in Israeli action-
Why 400? Whoever thought up the number, 400? 800 of the 850 were slaughtered by Hamas. Maybe a couple of individuals were killed in Israeli action-
Norman Finkelstein
I don’t know. Professor Morris-
I don’t know. Professor Morris-
Steven Bonnell
You’re saying from day one, you believed this particular thing, and you clearly don’t. You clearly don’t believe this thing-
You’re saying from day one, you believed this particular thing, and you clearly don’t. You clearly don’t believe this thing-
Norman Finkelstein
I said from day one day one-
I said from day one day one-
Steven Bonnell
You said people died. That’s not controversial-
You said people died. That’s not controversial-
Mouin Rabbani
Wait. Hold on, hold on. If I may-
Wait. Hold on, hold on. If I may-
Steven Bonnell
That’s not controversial.
That’s not controversial.
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Bonnell, I attach value to words-
Mr. Bonnell, I attach value to words-
Steven Bonnell
Yes, you’ve said that. If you value them, stop repeating them so much.
Yes, you’ve said that. If you value them, stop repeating them so much.
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Bonnell, please slow down the speech and attempt to listen. When I was explicitly asked by Piers Morgan, I said there can be no question that Hamas committed atrocities-
Mr. Bonnell, please slow down the speech and attempt to listen. When I was explicitly asked by Piers Morgan, I said there can be no question that Hamas committed atrocities-
Steven Bonnell
Committed atrocities. I’ve heard this, yes.
Committed atrocities. I’ve heard this, yes.
Norman Finkelstein
… on October 7th. If you want me to pin down a number, I can’t do that-
… on October 7th. If you want me to pin down a number, I can’t do that-
Steven Bonnell
I didn’t ask you to pin down a number. You can listen to what I’m-
I didn’t ask you to pin down a number. You can listen to what I’m-
Norman Finkelstein
You didn’t ask me?
You didn’t ask me?
Steven Bonnell
No. My question is-
No. My question is-
Norman Finkelstein
Okay.
Okay.
Steven Bonnell
I’ll ask a very precise-
I’ll ask a very precise-
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Bonnell, I cannot speak to you because you’re not-
Mr. Bonnell, I cannot speak to you because you’re not-
Mouin Rabbani
Sorry, excuse me-
Sorry, excuse me-
Steven Bonnell
It’s a very easy question-
It’s a very easy question-
Mouin Rabbani
If I understood your question correctly-
If I understood your question correctly-
Steven Bonnell
My question is, do you think the majority of the people that were killed on October 7th, the civilians, were killed by Hamas, or are we subscribing to the idea that the IDF killed hundreds, four or 500 in the crossfire?
My question is, do you think the majority of the people that were killed on October 7th, the civilians, were killed by Hamas, or are we subscribing to the idea that the IDF killed hundreds, four or 500 in the crossfire?
Mouin Rabbani
No, but let me explain why that’s a difficult question to answer. The total number of civilians killed was 800, 850. We know that Hamas is responsible, probably for the majority of those killings. We also know that there were killings by Islamic Jihad. We also know-
No, but let me explain why that’s a difficult question to answer. The total number of civilians killed was 800, 850. We know that Hamas is responsible, probably for the majority of those killings. We also know that there were killings by Islamic Jihad. We also know-
Benny Morris
No, we’re Bunching together the Islamic Jihad and Hamas. That’s splitting hairs now-
No, we’re Bunching together the Islamic Jihad and Hamas. That’s splitting hairs now-
Mouin Rabbani
But his question was specifically about-
But his question was specifically about-
Benny Morris
No, but he means the raiders. He means the raiders.
No, but he means the raiders. He means the raiders.
Steven Bonnell
I’m speaking in opposition to the conspiracy theory that people like… Do you prefer Norm or Professor Finkelstein? I don’t know, how do you prefer to be addressed?
I’m speaking in opposition to the conspiracy theory that people like… Do you prefer Norm or Professor Finkelstein? I don’t know, how do you prefer to be addressed?
Mouin Rabbani
Well, it’s not a conspiracy theory there because it’s-
Well, it’s not a conspiracy theory there because it’s-
Steven Bonnell
Well, the conspiracy theory is the idea that the IDF killed the majority of them.
Well, the conspiracy theory is the idea that the IDF killed the majority of them.
Mouin Rabbani
It’s not a conspiracy theory-
It’s not a conspiracy theory-
Steven Bonnell
And there is also a theory that, as Norm pointed out on the show that he was on, that he thought that it was very strange that, given how reputable Israeli services are when it comes to sending ambulances, retrieving bodies, he thought it was very strange that that number was continually being adjusted-
And there is also a theory that, as Norm pointed out on the show that he was on, that he thought that it was very strange that, given how reputable Israeli services are when it comes to sending ambulances, retrieving bodies, he thought it was very strange that that number was continually being adjusted-
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah, I did find it-
Yeah, I did find it-
Mouin Rabbani
And do you know why-
And do you know why-
Steven Bonnell
So when you say that in combination with, “Well, I’m not sure how many were killed by Hamas and the IDF-“
So when you say that in combination with, “Well, I’m not sure how many were killed by Hamas and the IDF-“
Mouin Rabbani
Do you know why the number went down? The number went down because the Israeli authorities were in possession of 200 corpses that were burned to a crisp that they assumed were Israelis who had been killed on October 7th. They later determined that these were in fact Palestinian fighters. Now, how does a Palestinian fighter get burned to a crisp?
Do you know why the number went down? The number went down because the Israeli authorities were in possession of 200 corpses that were burned to a crisp that they assumed were Israelis who had been killed on October 7th. They later determined that these were in fact Palestinian fighters. Now, how does a Palestinian fighter get burned to a crisp?
Benny Morris
No, you’re mixing two things. Some of the bodies, they weren’t able to identify, and eventually they ruled that some of them were actually Arab marauders rather than Israeli victims. A few of them also of the Jews were burnt to a crisp and it took them time to work this out, and they came out initially with a slightly higher figure, 1,400 dead, and eventually reduced it to 1,200 dead Israelis-
No, you’re mixing two things. Some of the bodies, they weren’t able to identify, and eventually they ruled that some of them were actually Arab marauders rather than Israeli victims. A few of them also of the Jews were burnt to a crisp and it took them time to work this out, and they came out initially with a slightly higher figure, 1,400 dead, and eventually reduced it to 1,200 dead Israelis-
Mouin Rabbani
And the reason is that a proportion of Israeli civilians killed on October 7th… I don’t believe it was a majority. We don’t know how many. Some were killed in the crossfire, some were killed by Israeli shellfire, helicopter fire and so on, and the majority were killed by Palestinians. And of that majority, we don’t know… Again, I understood your question is referring specifically to Hamas, which is why I tried to answer it that way. But if you meant generically Palestinians, yes. If you mean specifically Hamas, we don’t have a clear breakdown of how many were-
And the reason is that a proportion of Israeli civilians killed on October 7th… I don’t believe it was a majority. We don’t know how many. Some were killed in the crossfire, some were killed by Israeli shellfire, helicopter fire and so on, and the majority were killed by Palestinians. And of that majority, we don’t know… Again, I understood your question is referring specifically to Hamas, which is why I tried to answer it that way. But if you meant generically Palestinians, yes. If you mean specifically Hamas, we don’t have a clear breakdown of how many were-
Steven Bonnell
No, I don’t mean specifically Hamas. But I just think when you use the word some, that’s doing a lot of heavy lifting.
No, I don’t mean specifically Hamas. But I just think when you use the word some, that’s doing a lot of heavy lifting.
Norman Finkelstein
Who used some?
Who used some?
Steven Bonnell
That’s fine. But some can mean anywhere from 1% to 49%-
That’s fine. But some can mean anywhere from 1% to 49%-
Norman Finkelstein
Who used some?
Who used some?
Mouin Rabbani
But we don’t know.
But we don’t know.
Lex Fridman
So the numbers here in the details are interesting and important almost from a legal perspective, but if we zoom out, the moral perspective, are Palestinians from Gaza justified in violent resistance?
So the numbers here in the details are interesting and important almost from a legal perspective, but if we zoom out, the moral perspective, are Palestinians from Gaza justified in violent resistance?
Mouin Rabbani
Well, Palestinians have the right to resistance. That right includes the right to armed resistance. At the same time, armed resistance is subject to the laws of war, and there are very clear regulations that separate legitimate acts of armed resistance from acts of armed resistance that are not legitimate-
Well, Palestinians have the right to resistance. That right includes the right to armed resistance. At the same time, armed resistance is subject to the laws of war, and there are very clear regulations that separate legitimate acts of armed resistance from acts of armed resistance that are not legitimate-
Lex Fridman
The attacks of October 7th, where do they land for you?
The attacks of October 7th, where do they land for you?
Mouin Rabbani
There’s been almost exclusive focus on the attacks on civilian population centers and the killings of civilians on October 7th. What is much less discussed to the point of amnesia is that there were very extensive attacks on Israeli military and intelligence facilities on October 7th. I would make a very clear distinction between those two. And secondly, I’m not sure that I would characterize the efforts by Palestinians on October 7th to seize Israeli territory and Israeli population centers as in and of themselves illegitimate.
There’s been almost exclusive focus on the attacks on civilian population centers and the killings of civilians on October 7th. What is much less discussed to the point of amnesia is that there were very extensive attacks on Israeli military and intelligence facilities on October 7th. I would make a very clear distinction between those two. And secondly, I’m not sure that I would characterize the efforts by Palestinians on October 7th to seize Israeli territory and Israeli population centers as in and of themselves illegitimate.
Benny Morris
You mean attacking Israeli civilians is legitimate?
You mean attacking Israeli civilians is legitimate?
Mouin Rabbani
No. That’s not what I said.
No. That’s not what I said.
Benny Morris
I didn’t understand what you said.
I didn’t understand what you said.
Mouin Rabbani
I think what you had on October 7th was an effort by Hamas to seize Israeli territory and population centers-
I think what you had on October 7th was an effort by Hamas to seize Israeli territory and population centers-
Benny Morris
And kill civilians.
And kill civilians.
Mouin Rabbani
That’s not what I said. What I said is, I would not describe the effort to seize Israeli territory as in and of itself illegitimate, as a separate issue from the killing of Israeli civilians in those cases where they had been deliberately targeted. That’s very clearly illegitimate.
That’s not what I said. What I said is, I would not describe the effort to seize Israeli territory as in and of itself illegitimate, as a separate issue from the killing of Israeli civilians in those cases where they had been deliberately targeted. That’s very clearly illegitimate.
Benny Morris
Whole families were slaughtered in kibbutzim, many of them left-wingers incidentally who helped Palestinians go to hospitals in Israel and so on, even drove Palestinian cancer patients to hospitals in Israeli-
Whole families were slaughtered in kibbutzim, many of them left-wingers incidentally who helped Palestinians go to hospitals in Israel and so on, even drove Palestinian cancer patients to hospitals in Israeli-
Mouin Rabbani
Again, I’m making a distinction here-
Again, I’m making a distinction here-
Benny Morris
But you don’t seem to be very condemnatory of what the Hamas did.
But you don’t seem to be very condemnatory of what the Hamas did.
Mouin Rabbani
Well, I don’t do selective condemnation-
Well, I don’t do selective condemnation-
Benny Morris
I’m not talking about selective. I’m talking about-
I’m not talking about selective. I’m talking about-
Mouin Rabbani
I don’t do selective outrage.
I don’t do selective outrage.
Benny Morris
… specific condemnation of this specific assault on civilians. I would, for example, condemn Israeli assaults on civilians, deliberate assaults on civilians. I would condemn them, but you’re not doing that with the Hamas.
… specific condemnation of this specific assault on civilians. I would, for example, condemn Israeli assaults on civilians, deliberate assaults on civilians. I would condemn them, but you’re not doing that with the Hamas.
Mouin Rabbani
You know what the issue is?
You know what the issue is?
Benny Morris
What?
What?
Mouin Rabbani
I’ve been speaking in public now, I would say since the late-1980s and interviewed and so on. I have never on one occasion ever been asked to condemn any Israeli act. When I’ve been in group discussions, those supporting the Israeli action or perspective, I have never encountered an example where these individuals are asked to condemn what Israel is doing. The demand and obligation of condemnation is exclusively applied, in my personal experience over decades, is exclusively applied to Palestinians-
I’ve been speaking in public now, I would say since the late-1980s and interviewed and so on. I have never on one occasion ever been asked to condemn any Israeli act. When I’ve been in group discussions, those supporting the Israeli action or perspective, I have never encountered an example where these individuals are asked to condemn what Israel is doing. The demand and obligation of condemnation is exclusively applied, in my personal experience over decades, is exclusively applied to Palestinians-
Benny Morris
No, this is [inaudible 02:25:04] Israel is condemned day and night on every television channel, and has been for the last-
No, this is [inaudible 02:25:04] Israel is condemned day and night on every television channel, and has been for the last-
Mouin Rabbani
I’m telling you about personal experience lasting decades-
I’m telling you about personal experience lasting decades-
Norman Finkelstein
You said quote-
You said quote-
Steven Bonnell
Uh-oh. Oh, no.
Uh-oh. Oh, no.
Norman Finkelstein
I’m trying to quote what you just said. You said-
I’m trying to quote what you just said. You said-
Benny Morris
I shouldn’t have said anything at any [inaudible 02:25:20]
I shouldn’t have said anything at any [inaudible 02:25:20]
Norman Finkelstein
Professor Morris?
Professor Morris?
Benny Morris
Yes.
Yes.
Norman Finkelstein
You just said, “I would condemn anytime Israel deliberately attacks civilians.” The problem, Professor Morris, is, over and over again, you claim in the face of overwhelming evidence that they didn’t attack civilians-
You just said, “I would condemn anytime Israel deliberately attacks civilians.” The problem, Professor Morris, is, over and over again, you claim in the face of overwhelming evidence that they didn’t attack civilians-
Benny Morris
That’s not true. I’ve said Israel has attacked civilians. In [inaudible 02:25:51] Israel attacked civilians, and I’ve written extensively about it. In Kfar Qasim, they killed civilians, and I’ve written that. So you’re just admitting you’re selecting… As Steven says, you cherry-pick. You cherry-pick.
That’s not true. I’ve said Israel has attacked civilians. In [inaudible 02:25:51] Israel attacked civilians, and I’ve written extensively about it. In Kfar Qasim, they killed civilians, and I’ve written that. So you’re just admitting you’re selecting… As Steven says, you cherry-pick. You cherry-pick.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay, let’s fast-forward. When you were an adult, what did you say about the 1982 Lebanon War?
Okay, let’s fast-forward. When you were an adult, what did you say about the 1982 Lebanon War?
Benny Morris
What did I say?
What did I say?
Norman Finkelstein
You don’t remember? Okay, allow me.
You don’t remember? Okay, allow me.
Steven Bonnell
Uh-oh.
Uh-oh.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay. So it happens that I had no interest in the Israel-Palestine conflict as a young man-
Okay. So it happens that I had no interest in the Israel-Palestine conflict as a young man-
Benny Morris
This is true.
This is true.
Norman Finkelstein
… until the 1982 Lebanon War.
… until the 1982 Lebanon War.
Benny Morris
Yep. He’s lost the passage-
Yep. He’s lost the passage-
Norman Finkelstein
I’ll find it.
I’ll find it.
Steven Bonnell
Okay, real quick while he’s searching for that, you bring up something that’s really important that a lot of people don’t draw a distinction between, in that there is just causes for war and there is just ways to act within a war, and these two things principally do have a distinction from one another.
Okay, real quick while he’s searching for that, you bring up something that’s really important that a lot of people don’t draw a distinction between, in that there is just causes for war and there is just ways to act within a war, and these two things principally do have a distinction from one another.
Mouin Rabbani
Correct.
Correct.
Steven Bonnell
However, while I appreciate the recognition of the distinction, the idea that the cause for war that Hamas was engaged in, if we look at their actions in war or the statements that they’ve made, it doesn’t seem like it had to do with the territorial acquisition.
However, while I appreciate the recognition of the distinction, the idea that the cause for war that Hamas was engaged in, if we look at their actions in war or the statements that they’ve made, it doesn’t seem like it had to do with the territorial acquisition.
Mouin Rabbani
No, no, no-
No, no, no-
Steven Bonnell
By taking land back.
By taking land back.
Mouin Rabbani
No, the point I was making was, what was Hamas trying to achieve militarily on October 7th? And I was pointing out that the focus has been very much on Hamas attacks on civilians and atrocities and so on. And I’m not saying those things should be ignored. What I’m saying is that what’s getting lost in the shuffle is that there were extensive attacks on military and intelligence facilities. And as far as the other aspects are concerned, because I think either you or Lex asked me about the legitimacy of these attacks, I said I’m unclear whether efforts by Hamas to seize Israeli population centers in and of themselves are illegitimate as opposed to actions that either deliberately targeted Israeli civilians or actions that should reasonably have been expected to result in the killings of Israeli civilians. Those strike me as, by definition, illegitimate, and I want to be very clear about that. I have-
No, the point I was making was, what was Hamas trying to achieve militarily on October 7th? And I was pointing out that the focus has been very much on Hamas attacks on civilians and atrocities and so on. And I’m not saying those things should be ignored. What I’m saying is that what’s getting lost in the shuffle is that there were extensive attacks on military and intelligence facilities. And as far as the other aspects are concerned, because I think either you or Lex asked me about the legitimacy of these attacks, I said I’m unclear whether efforts by Hamas to seize Israeli population centers in and of themselves are illegitimate as opposed to actions that either deliberately targeted Israeli civilians or actions that should reasonably have been expected to result in the killings of Israeli civilians. Those strike me as, by definition, illegitimate, and I want to be very clear about that. I have-
Benny Morris
Illegitimate means you condemn them?
Illegitimate means you condemn them?
Mouin Rabbani
Illegitimate means they are not legitimate. I have a problem-
Illegitimate means they are not legitimate. I have a problem-
Benny Morris
Condemning your side, yes.
Condemning your side, yes.
Mouin Rabbani
No, not condemning my side. I have a problem with selective outrage and I have a problem with selective condemnation. And as I explained to you a few minutes ago, in my decades of appearing in public and being interviewed, I have never been asked to condemn an Israeli action, I’ve never been asked for a moral judgment on an Israeli action. Exclusive requests for condemnation has to do with what Palestinians [inaudible 02:29:01] And just as importantly, I’m sure if you watch BBC or CNN, when is the last time an Israeli spokesperson has been asked to condemn an Israeli act? I’ve never seen it.
No, not condemning my side. I have a problem with selective outrage and I have a problem with selective condemnation. And as I explained to you a few minutes ago, in my decades of appearing in public and being interviewed, I have never been asked to condemn an Israeli action, I’ve never been asked for a moral judgment on an Israeli action. Exclusive requests for condemnation has to do with what Palestinians [inaudible 02:29:01] And just as importantly, I’m sure if you watch BBC or CNN, when is the last time an Israeli spokesperson has been asked to condemn an Israeli act? I’ve never seen it.
Steven Bonnell
I don’t think we condemn the Arab side either though, right? I don’t think there’s any condemnation-
I don’t think we condemn the Arab side either though, right? I don’t think there’s any condemnation-
Mouin Rabbani
No. But now that we’re talking about Israeli victims, all of a sudden morality is central-
No. But now that we’re talking about Israeli victims, all of a sudden morality is central-
Steven Bonnell
Well, I think the reason why it comes up is because there’s no shortage of international condemnation for Israel. As Norm will point out a million times, that there are 50 billion UN resolutions, you’ve got Amnesty International, you’ve got multiple bodies of the UN, you’ve got now this case for the ICJ. So there’s no question of if there’s condemnation for Israel-
Well, I think the reason why it comes up is because there’s no shortage of international condemnation for Israel. As Norm will point out a million times, that there are 50 billion UN resolutions, you’ve got Amnesty International, you’ve got multiple bodies of the UN, you’ve got now this case for the ICJ. So there’s no question of if there’s condemnation for Israel-
Mouin Rabbani
But sorry, if I can interrupt you, in 1948, the entire world stood behind the establishment of a Jewish state, and the entire world-
But sorry, if I can interrupt you, in 1948, the entire world stood behind the establishment of a Jewish state, and the entire world-
Benny Morris
No, except Arab states and the Muslim states. Not the entire world.
No, except Arab states and the Muslim states. Not the entire world.
Mouin Rabbani
Okay, but I think you know what I mean by that.
Okay, but I think you know what I mean by that.
Benny Morris
The Western democracies, that’s what you’re saying. Western democracies supported the establishment of Israel.
The Western democracies, that’s what you’re saying. Western democracies supported the establishment of Israel.
Steven Bonnell
My quick question was, you said that you believe that… This is a very short one, you don’t have to… You think that there’s an argument to be made that the people in Gaza, Hamas and Islamic Jihad or whoever participated had a just cause for war. Maybe they didn’t do it in the correct way, but they maybe had a just cause for war, which is-
My quick question was, you said that you believe that… This is a very short one, you don’t have to… You think that there’s an argument to be made that the people in Gaza, Hamas and Islamic Jihad or whoever participated had a just cause for war. Maybe they didn’t do it in the correct way, but they maybe had a just cause for war, which is-
Mouin Rabbani
I don’t think there’s a maybe there. The Palestinians have-
I don’t think there’s a maybe there. The Palestinians have-
Steven Bonnell
Okay, you think they absolutely had a just cause for it.
Okay, you think they absolutely had a just cause for it.
Mouin Rabbani
Yes.
Yes.
Steven Bonnell
Do you think that Israel has a just cause for Operation Swords of Iron?
Do you think that Israel has a just cause for Operation Swords of Iron?
Mouin Rabbani
No, of course not.
No, of course not.
Steven Bonnell
All right. You can say your quote.
All right. You can say your quote.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay. First of all, on this issue of double standards, which is the one that irks or irritates Mouin, you said that you are not a person of double standards, unlike people like Mouin. You hold high a single standard and you condemn deliberate Israeli attacks on-
Okay. First of all, on this issue of double standards, which is the one that irks or irritates Mouin, you said that you are not a person of double standards, unlike people like Mouin. You hold high a single standard and you condemn deliberate Israeli attacks on-
Mouin Rabbani
Civilians.
Civilians.
Norman Finkelstein
… civilians. And I would say that’s true for the period up till 1967, and I think it’s accurate, your account of the First Intifada. There, it seems to me you are in conformity with most mainstream accounts and the case of the First Intifada. Surprisingly, you used Arab human rights sources like Al-Haq, which I think Mouin worked for during the First Intifada. That’s true. But then something very strange happens, so let’s illustrate it-
… civilians. And I would say that’s true for the period up till 1967, and I think it’s accurate, your account of the First Intifada. There, it seems to me you are in conformity with most mainstream accounts and the case of the First Intifada. Surprisingly, you used Arab human rights sources like Al-Haq, which I think Mouin worked for during the First Intifada. That’s true. But then something very strange happens, so let’s illustrate it-
Benny Morris
Wait, the something strange which happened is the Arabs rejected Israel’s peace offers-
Wait, the something strange which happened is the Arabs rejected Israel’s peace offers-
Norman Finkelstein
Okay, wait.
Okay, wait.
Benny Morris
That’s what happened.
That’s what happened.
Mouin Rabbani
By accepting the Oslo agreements.
By accepting the Oslo agreements.
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah.
Yeah.
Benny Morris
Not the-
Not the-
Steven Bonnell
By rejecting… He’s talking about Camp David and Taba.
By rejecting… He’s talking about Camp David and Taba.
Benny Morris
I’m talking about Camp David.
I’m talking about Camp David.
Norman Finkelstein
If we have time, I know the record very well, I’d be very happy to go through it with you, but let’s get to those double standards. So, this is what you have to say about Israel’s invasion of Lebanon in 1982. You said, “Israel was reluctant to harm civilians, sought to avoid casualties on both sides, and took care not to harm Lebanese and Palestinian civilians.” You then went on to acknowledge the massive use of IDF firepower against civilians during the Siege of Beirut which traumatized Israeli society. Morris quickly enters the caveat that Israel “tried to pinpoint military targets, but inevitably many civilians were hit.”
If we have time, I know the record very well, I’d be very happy to go through it with you, but let’s get to those double standards. So, this is what you have to say about Israel’s invasion of Lebanon in 1982. You said, “Israel was reluctant to harm civilians, sought to avoid casualties on both sides, and took care not to harm Lebanese and Palestinian civilians.” You then went on to acknowledge the massive use of IDF firepower against civilians during the Siege of Beirut which traumatized Israeli society. Morris quickly enters the caveat that Israel “tried to pinpoint military targets, but inevitably many civilians were hit.”
That’s your description of the Lebanon War. As I say, that’s when I first got involved in the conflict. I am a voracious reader. I read everything on the Lebanon War. I would say there’s not a single account of the Lebanon War in which the estimates are between 15 and 20,000 Palestinian, Lebanese were killed, overwhelmingly civilians, the biggest bloodletting until the current Gaza genocide. Biggest bloodletting. I would say I can’t think of a single mainstream account that remotely approximates what you just said. So leaving aside… I can name the books. Voluminous, huge volumes. I’ll just take one example. Now you will remember, because I think you served in Lebanon in ’82. Am I correct on that?
Benny Morris
Yeah.
Yeah.
Norman Finkelstein
So you will remember that Dov Yermiya kept a war diary. So with your permission, allow me to describe what he wrote during his diary. He writes, “The war machine of the IDF is galloping and trampling over the conquered territory, demonstrating a total insensitivity to the fate of the Arabs who are found in its path. A PLO-run hospital suffered a direct hit. Thousands of refugees are returning to the city. When they arrive at their homes, many of which have been destroyed or damaged, you hear their cries of pain and their howls over the deaths of their loved ones. The air is permeated with the smell of corpses. Destruction and death are continuing-“
So you will remember that Dov Yermiya kept a war diary. So with your permission, allow me to describe what he wrote during his diary. He writes, “The war machine of the IDF is galloping and trampling over the conquered territory, demonstrating a total insensitivity to the fate of the Arabs who are found in its path. A PLO-run hospital suffered a direct hit. Thousands of refugees are returning to the city. When they arrive at their homes, many of which have been destroyed or damaged, you hear their cries of pain and their howls over the deaths of their loved ones. The air is permeated with the smell of corpses. Destruction and death are continuing-“
Benny Morris
Yeah, point made. The point you’re making actually-
Yeah, point made. The point you’re making actually-
Norman Finkelstein
Does that sound like your description of the Lebanon War?
Does that sound like your description of the Lebanon War?
Benny Morris
Forget my description-
Forget my description-
Norman Finkelstein
Forget it?
Forget it?
Benny Morris
The point you’re making-
The point you’re making-
Norman Finkelstein
The words are in print. We can’t just forget them-
The words are in print. We can’t just forget them-
Benny Morris
Let me just finish my sentence. The point you’re making, which you somehow forget, is that there are Israelis who strongly criticize their own side and describe how Israelis are doing things which they regard as immoral. You don’t find that on the Arab sides-
Let me just finish my sentence. The point you’re making, which you somehow forget, is that there are Israelis who strongly criticize their own side and describe how Israelis are doing things which they regard as immoral. You don’t find that on the Arab sides-
Norman Finkelstein
I’m talking about you, Mr. Morris. I’m not talking about Dov Yermiya, I’m talking about you, the historian. How did you depict the Lebanon War?
I’m talking about you, Mr. Morris. I’m not talking about Dov Yermiya, I’m talking about you, the historian. How did you depict the Lebanon War?
Benny Morris
Because I believe that the Israeli military tried to avoid committing a civilian [inaudible 02:35:18] as I think they fail to do in Gaza now-
Because I believe that the Israeli military tried to avoid committing a civilian [inaudible 02:35:18] as I think they fail to do in Gaza now-
Norman Finkelstein
All the accounts by Robert Fisk in Pity the Nation-
All the accounts by Robert Fisk in Pity the Nation-
Benny Morris
Robert Fisk is a anti-Zionist journalist-
Robert Fisk is a anti-Zionist journalist-
Norman Finkelstein
I know.
I know.
Benny Morris
Has always been.
Has always been.
Norman Finkelstein
Right. So that’s why you can say with such confidence that you don’t condemn deliberate Israeli attacks on civilians-
Right. So that’s why you can say with such confidence that you don’t condemn deliberate Israeli attacks on civilians-
Mouin Rabbani
Because there weren’t any.
Because there weren’t any.
Norman Finkelstein
… because there weren’t any.
… because there weren’t any.
Benny Morris
No, I didn’t say there weren’t any-
No, I didn’t say there weren’t any-
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah, you didn’t?
Yeah, you didn’t?
Benny Morris
You agreed that I have condemned Israeli attacks on civilians.
You agreed that I have condemned Israeli attacks on civilians.
Norman Finkelstein
I never quarrel with facts. Your description of the 1982 War is so shocking, it makes my innards writhe. And then your description of the Second Intifada, your description of Defensive Shield, they were worse than apologetics-
I never quarrel with facts. Your description of the 1982 War is so shocking, it makes my innards writhe. And then your description of the Second Intifada, your description of Defensive Shield, they were worse than apologetics-
Benny Morris
When Arab suicide bombers were destroying Jews in masses in buses and in restaurants, that’s the Second Intifada. Do you remember that?
When Arab suicide bombers were destroying Jews in masses in buses and in restaurants, that’s the Second Intifada. Do you remember that?
Norman Finkelstein
You can try everything-
You can try everything-
Benny Morris
Suicide bombers in Jerusalem’s buses and restaurants, and in Tel Aviv-
Suicide bombers in Jerusalem’s buses and restaurants, and in Tel Aviv-
Norman Finkelstein
I am completely aware of that, but if you forgot the numbers-
I am completely aware of that, but if you forgot the numbers-
Benny Morris
I don’t forget the numbers-
I don’t forget the numbers-
Norman Finkelstein
… it was three to one. The number-
… it was three to one. The number-
Benny Morris
They killed mostly armed-
They killed mostly armed-
Norman Finkelstein
No-
No-
Benny Morris
… Palestinian gunmen.
… Palestinian gunmen.
Norman Finkelstein
That’s what you say in your book-
That’s what you say in your book-
Benny Morris
That’s what I say. That’s what I think.
That’s what I say. That’s what I think.
Norman Finkelstein
… but that’s not what Amnesty International said. That’s not what Human Rights Watch said-
… but that’s not what Amnesty International said. That’s not what Human Rights Watch said-
Benny Morris
I don’t remember what they said.
I don’t remember what they said.
Norman Finkelstein
I do. That’s not what [inaudible 02:36:45] said-
I do. That’s not what [inaudible 02:36:45] said-
Benny Morris
I don’t know whether their figures are right. My figures are right.
I don’t know whether their figures are right. My figures are right.
Norman Finkelstein
Listen, listen-
Listen, listen-
Benny Morris
In the Second Intifada, some 4,000 Palestinians were killed, most of them armed people. And 1,000 Israelis were killed, almost all of them [inaudible 02:36:59] civilians.
In the Second Intifada, some 4,000 Palestinians were killed, most of them armed people. And 1,000 Israelis were killed, almost all of them [inaudible 02:36:59] civilians.
Norman Finkelstein
Professor Morris, fantasy, but I’m not going to argue with here. Here’s a simple challenge… You said not to look at the camera-
Professor Morris, fantasy, but I’m not going to argue with here. Here’s a simple challenge… You said not to look at the camera-
Lex Fridman
Sometimes.
Sometimes.
Norman Finkelstein
It scares the people. I’ll make the open challenge.
It scares the people. I’ll make the open challenge.
Benny Morris
You are going to scare them.
You are going to scare them.
Norman Finkelstein
No. Professor Morris-
No. Professor Morris-
Steven Bonnell
Open challenge.
Open challenge.
Norman Finkelstein
… words are in print. I wrote 50 pages analyzing all of your work. I quote, some will say cherry-pick but I think, accurately quote you. Here’s a simple challenge. Answer me in print. Answer what I wrote and show where I’m making things up. Answer me in print-
… words are in print. I wrote 50 pages analyzing all of your work. I quote, some will say cherry-pick but I think, accurately quote you. Here’s a simple challenge. Answer me in print. Answer what I wrote and show where I’m making things up. Answer me in print-
Benny Morris
I’m not familiar. I’m sorry, but I’m not familiar with what you wrote.
I’m not familiar. I’m sorry, but I’m not familiar with what you wrote.
Norman Finkelstein
That’s no problem. You’re a busy man, you’re an important historian. You don’t have to know everything that’s in print, especially by modest publishers. But now you know, and so here’s the public challenge. You answer and show where I cherry-picked, where I misrepresented-
That’s no problem. You’re a busy man, you’re an important historian. You don’t have to know everything that’s in print, especially by modest publishers. But now you know, and so here’s the public challenge. You answer and show where I cherry-picked, where I misrepresented-
Benny Morris
Send me the article, I will-
Send me the article, I will-
Norman Finkelstein
Fine, I will, and then we can have a civil scholarly discussion and-
Fine, I will, and then we can have a civil scholarly discussion and-
Benny Morris
I’m not sure we will agree, even if I-
I’m not sure we will agree, even if I-
Norman Finkelstein
We don’t have to agree. It’s for the reader to decide, looking at both sides, where this truth stands.
We don’t have to agree. It’s for the reader to decide, looking at both sides, where this truth stands.
Lex Fridman
Norman, and if I may ask, it’s good to discuss ideas that are in the air now as opposed to citing literature that was written in the past as much as possible, because of the listeners were not familiar with the literature. So whatever was written, just express it, condense the key idea, and then we can debate the ideas or discuss the ideas.
Norman, and if I may ask, it’s good to discuss ideas that are in the air now as opposed to citing literature that was written in the past as much as possible, because of the listeners were not familiar with the literature. So whatever was written, just express it, condense the key idea, and then we can debate the ideas or discuss the ideas.
Norman Finkelstein
No, there are two aspects. There’s this public debate, but there’s also written words.
No, there are two aspects. There’s this public debate, but there’s also written words.
Lex Fridman
Yes. I’m just telling you that you as a academic historian put a lot of value in the written word and I think it is valuable, but in this context-
Yes. I’m just telling you that you as a academic historian put a lot of value in the written word and I think it is valuable, but in this context-
Norman Finkelstein
He’s incidentally not the only historian who puts value to words. I also do, actually. Just so we-
He’s incidentally not the only historian who puts value to words. I also do, actually. Just so we-
Lex Fridman
Yes, but in this-
Yes, but in this-
Steven Bonnell
More than just one or two sentences at a time.
More than just one or two sentences at a time.
Lex Fridman
But in this context, just for the educational purpose of teaching people-
But in this context, just for the educational purpose of teaching people-
Norman Finkelstein
Well, the educational purpose is, why would people [inaudible 02:39:05] what I have to acknowledge? Because I am faithful to the facts. Massive atrocities on October 7th. Why did that happen? And I think that’s the problem, the past is erased and we suddenly went from 1948 to October 7th, 2023, and there is a problem there.
Well, the educational purpose is, why would people [inaudible 02:39:05] what I have to acknowledge? Because I am faithful to the facts. Massive atrocities on October 7th. Why did that happen? And I think that’s the problem, the past is erased and we suddenly went from 1948 to October 7th, 2023, and there is a problem there.
Lex Fridman
So first of all, you have complete freedom to backtrack and we’ll go there with you. Obviously we can’t cover every single year, every single event, but there’s probably critical moments in time.
So first of all, you have complete freedom to backtrack and we’ll go there with you. Obviously we can’t cover every single year, every single event, but there’s probably critical moments in time.
Steven Bonnell
Can I respond to something relating to that, the Lebanon War? I looked at the book that he got this from and what the quote was from. It sounds cold to say it, but war is tragic and civilians die. There is no war that this has not happened in, in the history of all of humankind. The statement that Israel might take care not to target civilians is not incompatible with a diary entry from someone who said they saw civilians getting killed. I think that sometimes we do a lot of weird games when we talk about international humanitarian law or laws that govern conflict, but we say things like, civilians dying is a war crime, or civilian homes or hospitals getting destroyed is necessarily a war crime, or is necessarily somebody intentionally targeting civilians without making distinctions between military targets or civilian ones.
Can I respond to something relating to that, the Lebanon War? I looked at the book that he got this from and what the quote was from. It sounds cold to say it, but war is tragic and civilians die. There is no war that this has not happened in, in the history of all of humankind. The statement that Israel might take care not to target civilians is not incompatible with a diary entry from someone who said they saw civilians getting killed. I think that sometimes we do a lot of weird games when we talk about international humanitarian law or laws that govern conflict, but we say things like, civilians dying is a war crime, or civilian homes or hospitals getting destroyed is necessarily a war crime, or is necessarily somebody intentionally targeting civilians without making distinctions between military targets or civilian ones.
I think that when we analyze different attacks or when we talk about the conduct of the military, it’s important to understand, prospectively from the unit of analysis of the actual military committing the acts, what’s happening and what are the decisions being made rather than just saying retrospectively, “Oh, well, a lot of civilians died. Not very many military people died, comparatively speaking, so it must have been war crimes,” especially when you’ve got another side, I’ll fast-forward to Hamas, that intentionally attempts to induce those same civilian numbers, because Hamas is guilty of any war crime that you would potentially accuse. And this is according to the Amnesty International, people that Norm loves to cite, Hamas is guilty of all of these same war crimes, of them failing to take care of their civilian population, of them essentially utilizing human shields to try to fire rockets, free from attacks-
Norman Finkelstein
Essentially?
Essentially?
Steven Bonnell
Essentially, yes. I’m just saying that, essentially, as in terms of how international law defines it and not how Amnesty International defines it. But Amnesty International describes times of human shielding, but they don’t actually apply the correct international legal standard-
Essentially, yes. I’m just saying that, essentially, as in terms of how international law defines it and not how Amnesty International defines it. But Amnesty International describes times of human shielding, but they don’t actually apply the correct international legal standard-
Norman Finkelstein
You don’t know what’s the correct international law-
You don’t know what’s the correct international law-
Steven Bonnell
I know absolutely-
I know absolutely-
Norman Finkelstein
You haven’t a clue-
You haven’t a clue-
Steven Bonnell
No, I absolutely do-
No, I absolutely do-
Norman Finkelstein
You haven’t a clue because you can’t find it on Wikipedia. You can’t find it on Wikipedia-
You haven’t a clue because you can’t find it on Wikipedia. You can’t find it on Wikipedia-
Steven Bonnell
But I’m just saying… Believe it or not, Norm, the entire Geneva Convention is all on Wikipedia. It’s a wonderful website. But I’m just saying that on the Hamas side, if there’s an attempt to induce this type of military activity, attempt to induce civilian harm, that it’s not just enough to say, “Well, here’s a diary entry where a guy talks about how tragic these attacks are.”
But I’m just saying… Believe it or not, Norm, the entire Geneva Convention is all on Wikipedia. It’s a wonderful website. But I’m just saying that on the Hamas side, if there’s an attempt to induce this type of military activity, attempt to induce civilian harm, that it’s not just enough to say, “Well, here’s a diary entry where a guy talks about how tragic these attacks are.”
Mouin Rabbani
See, I think the problem with your statement is that if you go back and listen to it, the first part of it is, war is hell, civilians die. It’s a fact of life. And you state that in a very factual matter. Then when you start talking about Hamas, all of a sudden you’ve discovered morality and you’ve discovered condemnation and you’ve discovered intent, and you are unfortunately far from alone in this. I’ll give you… You know who for me is a perfect example?
See, I think the problem with your statement is that if you go back and listen to it, the first part of it is, war is hell, civilians die. It’s a fact of life. And you state that in a very factual matter. Then when you start talking about Hamas, all of a sudden you’ve discovered morality and you’ve discovered condemnation and you’ve discovered intent, and you are unfortunately far from alone in this. I’ll give you… You know who for me is a perfect example?
Steven Bonnell
Wait, hold on. We’re [inaudible 02:42:14]. We don’t need examples-
Wait, hold on. We’re [inaudible 02:42:14]. We don’t need examples-
Mouin Rabbani
No… Oh, go ahead.
No… Oh, go ahead.
Steven Bonnell
The false equivalency of the two sides is astounding. When Hamas kills civilians in a surprise attack on October 7th, this isn’t because they are attempting to target military targets and they happen to stumble into a giant festival of people that-
The false equivalency of the two sides is astounding. When Hamas kills civilians in a surprise attack on October 7th, this isn’t because they are attempting to target military targets and they happen to stumble into a giant festival of people that-
Mouin Rabbani
Well, they did happen to stumble into it.
Well, they did happen to stumble into it.
Steven Bonnell
They did, but-
They did, but-
Benny Morris
And they killed 300 people in the music festival-
And they killed 300 people in the music festival-
Steven Bonnell
But when they stumbled into it, that wasn’t an issue of trying to figure out a military target or not. They weren’t failing a distinction. There wasn’t a proportionality assessment done. It was just to kill civilians. Even the Amnesty International in 2008 and in 2014, and even today, will continue to say that there’s likely types of attacks-
But when they stumbled into it, that wasn’t an issue of trying to figure out a military target or not. They weren’t failing a distinction. There wasn’t a proportionality assessment done. It was just to kill civilians. Even the Amnesty International in 2008 and in 2014, and even today, will continue to say that there’s likely types of attacks-
Mouin Rabbani
Look, I don’t think you’ll find anyone who will deny that Hamas has targeted civilians. You gave the example-
Look, I don’t think you’ll find anyone who will deny that Hamas has targeted civilians. You gave the example-
Steven Bonnell
But there’s a difference because-
But there’s a difference because-
Mouin Rabbani
… of suicide bombings during the Second Intifada. Facts are facts-
… of suicide bombings during the Second Intifada. Facts are facts-
Steven Bonnell
Sure, but I’m just saying that the Hamas targeting of innocent civilians is different than the incidental loss of life that occurs when Israel does-
Sure, but I’m just saying that the Hamas targeting of innocent civilians is different than the incidental loss of life that occurs when Israel does-
Norman Finkelstein
Whoa, the incidental loss of life-
Whoa, the incidental loss of life-
Mouin Rabbani
Genocide is the intentional mass murder-
Genocide is the intentional mass murder-
Steven Bonnell
Well, genocide is a entirely separate claim.
Well, genocide is a entirely separate claim.
Mouin Rabbani
Yeah, but the idea that Israel is not in the business of intentionally targeting civilians, I know that’s what we’re supposed to believe, but the historical record stands pretty clearly-
Yeah, but the idea that Israel is not in the business of intentionally targeting civilians, I know that’s what we’re supposed to believe, but the historical record stands pretty clearly-
Steven Bonnell
No, it doesn’t. I don’t believe it does.
No, it doesn’t. I don’t believe it does.
Mouin Rabbani
You’ve written about it yourself-
You’ve written about it yourself-
Steven Bonnell
Well, when you say historical, do you mean in the ’40s to the ’60s, or do you mean over the past-
Well, when you say historical, do you mean in the ’40s to the ’60s, or do you mean over the past-
Mouin Rabbani
I would say from the ’30s of the last century to the ’20s of this century. The way you characterized it, I think the best example of that I’ve come across during this specific conflict is John Kirby, the White House spokesman. I’ve named him Tears Tosterone, for a very good reason. When he is talking about Palestinian civilian deaths, war is hell, it’s a fact of life, get used to it. When he was confronted with Israeli civilian deaths on October 7th, he literally broke down in tears in public-
I would say from the ’30s of the last century to the ’20s of this century. The way you characterized it, I think the best example of that I’ve come across during this specific conflict is John Kirby, the White House spokesman. I’ve named him Tears Tosterone, for a very good reason. When he is talking about Palestinian civilian deaths, war is hell, it’s a fact of life, get used to it. When he was confronted with Israeli civilian deaths on October 7th, he literally broke down in tears in public-
Benny Morris
But he understood that one is deliberate and one isn’t. He understood that.
But he understood that one is deliberate and one isn’t. He understood that.
Mouin Rabbani
No, that’s what he tried to make us understand.
No, that’s what he tried to make us understand.
Benny Morris
No, he was speaking facts. The Hamas guys who attacked the kibbutzim, apart from the attacks on the military sites, when they attacked the kibbutzim, were out to kill civilians. And they killed family after family, house after house. The Israeli attacks on Hamas installations-
No, he was speaking facts. The Hamas guys who attacked the kibbutzim, apart from the attacks on the military sites, when they attacked the kibbutzim, were out to kill civilians. And they killed family after family, house after house. The Israeli attacks on Hamas installations-
Mouin Rabbani
You know better. You know better-
You know better. You know better-
Benny Morris
No, I don’t know better. You don’t know Israeli pilots, that’s the problem-
No, I don’t know better. You don’t know Israeli pilots, that’s the problem-
Norman Finkelstein
Thank God.
Thank God.
Benny Morris
No, you don’t know Israeli pilots-
No, you don’t know Israeli pilots-
Norman Finkelstein
I know, thank God.
I know, thank God.
Benny Morris
They believe that they are killing Hamas snakes. They’re given certain objectives and that’s what they attack. And if the Hamas is hiding behind civilians, civilians die. Simple as that-
They believe that they are killing Hamas snakes. They’re given certain objectives and that’s what they attack. And if the Hamas is hiding behind civilians, civilians die. Simple as that-
Norman Finkelstein
Every time they target a kid, I’m sure they believe it’s Hamas.
Every time they target a kid, I’m sure they believe it’s Hamas.
Benny Morris
[inaudible 02:44:53]
[inaudible 02:44:53]
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah. When they killed the four kids on the…
Yeah. When they killed the four kids on the…
Benny Morris
They believed that they were Hamas snakes-
They believed that they were Hamas snakes-
Norman Finkelstein
I know they believed it. Even though they were diminutive size, even though they were [inaudible 02:45:03]
I know they believed it. Even though they were diminutive size, even though they were [inaudible 02:45:03]
Benny Morris
You know from that angle, you don’t see the sides-
You know from that angle, you don’t see the sides-
Norman Finkelstein
No, they saw the sides, but let’s see the side-
No, they saw the sides, but let’s see the side-
Steven Bonnell
Oh, I know what he’s quoting, correct, but you’ve lied about this particular instance in the past. Those kids weren’t just on the beaches as often stated in articles. Those kids were literally coming out of a previously identified Hamas compound that they had operated from. They literally-
Oh, I know what he’s quoting, correct, but you’ve lied about this particular instance in the past. Those kids weren’t just on the beaches as often stated in articles. Those kids were literally coming out of a previously identified Hamas compound that they had operated from. They literally-
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Borelli-
Mr. Borelli-
Steven Bonnell
You could Google it, Mr. Finkel-stinker-
You could Google it, Mr. Finkel-stinker-
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Borelli, with all due respect, you’re such a fantastic moron, it’s terrifying. That wharf was filled with journalists. There were scores of journalists. That was an old fisherman’s shack. What are you talking about? It’s so painful to listen to this idiocy-
Mr. Borelli, with all due respect, you’re such a fantastic moron, it’s terrifying. That wharf was filled with journalists. There were scores of journalists. That was an old fisherman’s shack. What are you talking about? It’s so painful to listen to this idiocy-
Steven Bonnell
And to be clear, on the other side, you’re implying that the strike was okayed on the Israeli side where they said, “We’re just going to kill four Palestinian people today for no reason.”
And to be clear, on the other side, you’re implying that the strike was okayed on the Israeli side where they said, “We’re just going to kill four Palestinian people today for no reason.”
Norman Finkelstein
Hey-
Hey-
Benny Morris
Do you believe that?
Do you believe that?
Steven Bonnell
Do you believe that? Do you believe that? [inaudible 02:45:57] journalists, do you think that [inaudible 02:46:00]
Do you believe that? Do you believe that? [inaudible 02:45:57] journalists, do you think that [inaudible 02:46:00]
Norman Finkelstein
Here we go-
Here we go-
Benny Morris
That they would actually kill four children?
That they would actually kill four children?
Steven Bonnell
He went answer the question-
He went answer the question-
Norman Finkelstein
Here we go-
Here we go-
Steven Bonnell
He will never answer that question.
He will never answer that question.
Norman Finkelstein
I will answer the question-
I will answer the question-
Benny Morris
The pilots were out to kill four children-
The pilots were out to kill four children-
Norman Finkelstein
I will even answer the moron’s questions-
I will even answer the moron’s questions-
Steven Bonnell
Because that was a strike, that was a drone strike, so that was approved all the way up the chain that we’re going to kill children today. We’re going to kill Palestinian children today-
Because that was a strike, that was a drone strike, so that was approved all the way up the chain that we’re going to kill children today. We’re going to kill Palestinian children today-
Norman Finkelstein
Okay, you want me to answer or do you want your motormouth to go? Okay, answer. In 2018, there was the Great March of Return in Gaza by all reckonings of human rights organizations and journalists who were there. It was overwhelmingly nonviolent-
Okay, you want me to answer or do you want your motormouth to go? Okay, answer. In 2018, there was the Great March of Return in Gaza by all reckonings of human rights organizations and journalists who were there. It was overwhelmingly nonviolent-
Benny Morris
And organized by the Hamas.
And organized by the Hamas.
Norman Finkelstein
Whoever organized it-
Whoever organized it-
Mouin Rabbani
It was organized by Satan, let’s start with that-
It was organized by Satan, let’s start with that-
Norman Finkelstein
Satan-
Satan-
Benny Morris
No, by Hamas-
No, by Hamas-
Norman Finkelstein
Okay, Satan. I agree. Let’s go for the big one, the big magilla. It’s Satan, okay. Overwhelmingly non-violent. Resembled at the beginning the First Intifada-
Okay, Satan. I agree. Let’s go for the big one, the big magilla. It’s Satan, okay. Overwhelmingly non-violent. Resembled at the beginning the First Intifada-
Benny Morris
They threw bombs here and there.
They threw bombs here and there.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay, not bombs, but-
Okay, not bombs, but-
Benny Morris
They tried to make holes in the fence, obviously-
They tried to make holes in the fence, obviously-
Norman Finkelstein
Okay, let’s continue.
Okay, let’s continue.
Benny Morris
Yeah.
Yeah.
Norman Finkelstein
So-
So-
Benny Morris
But I’m not sure Israel behaved morally in that respect.
But I’m not sure Israel behaved morally in that respect.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay-
Okay-
Benny Morris
No, no, no-
No, no, no-
Norman Finkelstein
Okay, wait, wait, wait-
Okay, wait, wait, wait-
Benny Morris
I’m willing to grant you that.
I’m willing to grant you that.
Norman Finkelstein
Please, please. Allow me to-
Please, please. Allow me to-
Benny Morris
You don’t have to pursue it because I’m willing to grant-
You don’t have to pursue it because I’m willing to grant-
Norman Finkelstein
Allow me to finish-
Allow me to finish-
Mouin Rabbani
I don’t know anything about this. I’d like to hear.
I don’t know anything about this. I’d like to hear.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay. So as you know, along the Gaza perimeter, there was Israel’s best-trained snipers. Correct?
Okay. So as you know, along the Gaza perimeter, there was Israel’s best-trained snipers. Correct?
Benny Morris
I don’t know best-trained. There was snipers-
I don’t know best-trained. There was snipers-
Norman Finkelstein
Fine. Okay. All right. Because… Hey, laugh. It’s hilarious. This story’s so funny-
Fine. Okay. All right. Because… Hey, laugh. It’s hilarious. This story’s so funny-
Steven Bonnell
You’re lying. The Great March of Return had aspects of violence to it. Even the UN says it themselves.
You’re lying. The Great March of Return had aspects of violence to it. Even the UN says it themselves.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay, okay, okay.
Okay, okay, okay.
Steven Bonnell
But you only collect what the UN says that you like.
But you only collect what the UN says that you like.
Norman Finkelstein
You see the problem, Mr. Morelli, is, you don’t know the English language. You don’t-
You see the problem, Mr. Morelli, is, you don’t know the English language. You don’t-
Steven Bonnell
I can read from the UN website itself. In regards to the Great March of Return, they said, “While the vast majority of protestors have acted in a peaceful manner, during most protests dozens have approached the fence attempting to damage it, burning fires, throwing stones and Molotov cocktails towards Israeli forces, and flying incendiary kites and balloons into Israeli territory. The latter resulted in extensive damage to agricultural land and nature reserves inside Israel and risked the lives of Israeli civilians. Some incidents of shooting and throwing of explosives also reported-“
I can read from the UN website itself. In regards to the Great March of Return, they said, “While the vast majority of protestors have acted in a peaceful manner, during most protests dozens have approached the fence attempting to damage it, burning fires, throwing stones and Molotov cocktails towards Israeli forces, and flying incendiary kites and balloons into Israeli territory. The latter resulted in extensive damage to agricultural land and nature reserves inside Israel and risked the lives of Israeli civilians. Some incidents of shooting and throwing of explosives also reported-“
Norman Finkelstein
Talk Fast. Talk fast so people think that you’re coherent-
Talk Fast. Talk fast so people think that you’re coherent-
Steven Bonnell
I’m just reading from the UN-
I’m just reading from the UN-
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah, but you’re saying-
Yeah, but you’re saying-
Steven Bonnell
I know you like them sometimes, only when they agree with you though.
I know you like them sometimes, only when they agree with you though.
Norman Finkelstein
You got the months wrong. You got the months wrong. We’re talking about the beginning in March 30th to what-
You got the months wrong. You got the months wrong. We’re talking about the beginning in March 30th to what-
Steven Bonnell
You just described that march as mostly peaceful.
You just described that march as mostly peaceful.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay, allow me to finish. So there were the snipers, okay. Now, you find it so far-fetched. Israelis purposely, deliberately targeting civilians? That’s such a far-fetched idea. An overwhelmingly nonviolent march. What did the international investigation-
Okay, allow me to finish. So there were the snipers, okay. Now, you find it so far-fetched. Israelis purposely, deliberately targeting civilians? That’s such a far-fetched idea. An overwhelmingly nonviolent march. What did the international investigation-
Benny Morris
It wasn’t the march. It was a campaign which went on for months.
It wasn’t the march. It was a campaign which went on for months.
Norman Finkelstein
Whatever you want to call it, yeah. What did the UN investigation find? It found-
Whatever you want to call it, yeah. What did the UN investigation find? It found-
Benny Morris
Well, he just read it for you.
Well, he just read it for you.
Norman Finkelstein
I read the report. I don’t read things off of those machines. I read the report. What did it find? Brace yourself. You thought it was so funny, the idea of IDF targeting civilians. It found… Go look this up on your machine-
I read the report. I don’t read things off of those machines. I read the report. What did it find? Brace yourself. You thought it was so funny, the idea of IDF targeting civilians. It found… Go look this up on your machine-
Steven Bonnell
I already know what you’re going to say. You’re going to say it found that only one or two of them were justified killings-
I already know what you’re going to say. You’re going to say it found that only one or two of them were justified killings-
Norman Finkelstein
It targeted children, targeted journalists, targeted medics. And here’s the funniest one of all, it’s so hilarious, they targeted disabled people who were 300 meters away from the fence and just standing by trees-
It targeted children, targeted journalists, targeted medics. And here’s the funniest one of all, it’s so hilarious, they targeted disabled people who were 300 meters away from the fence and just standing by trees-
Benny Morris
If this is true, if what you’re saying is true-
If this is true, if what you’re saying is true-
Lex Fridman
Just a quick pause. I think everything was fascinating to listen to except the mention of hilarious. Nobody finds any of this hilarious, and if any of us are laughing, it’s not at the suffering of-
Just a quick pause. I think everything was fascinating to listen to except the mention of hilarious. Nobody finds any of this hilarious, and if any of us are laughing, it’s not at the suffering of-
Norman Finkelstein
[inaudible 02:50:00].
[inaudible 02:50:00].
Lex Fridman
And if any of us are laughing, it’s not at the suffering of civilians or suffering of anyone, it’s at the obvious joyful comradery in the room, so I’m enjoying it, and also the joy of learning, so thank you.
And if any of us are laughing, it’s not at the suffering of civilians or suffering of anyone, it’s at the obvious joyful comradery in the room, so I’m enjoying it, and also the joy of learning, so thank you.
Steven Bonnell
Can we talk about the targeting civilian thing a little bit? I think there’s an important underlying-
Can we talk about the targeting civilian thing a little bit? I think there’s an important underlying-
Lex Fridman
[Inaudible 02:50:18].
[Inaudible 02:50:18].
Steven Bonnell
I think it’s important to understand there’s three different things here that we need to think about. So, one is a policy of killing civilians. So, I would ask the other side, I’m going to ask all three, because I know there won’t be a short answer, do you think there is a policy, top down from the IDF to target civilians? That’s one thing-
I think it’s important to understand there’s three different things here that we need to think about. So, one is a policy of killing civilians. So, I would ask the other side, I’m going to ask all three, because I know there won’t be a short answer, do you think there is a policy, top down from the IDF to target civilians? That’s one thing-
Mouin Rabbani
Yes.
Yes.
Steven Bonnell
… A second thing is-
… A second thing is-
Benny Morris
He said yes.
He said yes.
Steven Bonnell
I’ll write that down.
I’ll write that down.
Benny Morris
Mouin answered yes.
Mouin answered yes.
Steven Bonnell
That’s fine, but then the second thing is, or there’s two distinctions I want to draw between. I think Benny would say this, I would say this. I’m sure, undoubtedly, there have been cases where IDF soldiers, for no good reason, have targeted and killed Palestinians that they should not have done, that would be prosecutable as war crimes as defined by the [inaudible 02:50:56]-
That’s fine, but then the second thing is, or there’s two distinctions I want to draw between. I think Benny would say this, I would say this. I’m sure, undoubtedly, there have been cases where IDF soldiers, for no good reason, have targeted and killed Palestinians that they should not have done, that would be prosecutable as war crimes as defined by the [inaudible 02:50:56]-
Benny Morris
And some have been prosecuted.
And some have been prosecuted.
Steven Bonnell
And I’m absolutely sure-
And I’m absolutely sure-
Norman Finkelstein
According to you and your book, practically none.
According to you and your book, practically none.
Steven Bonnell
I’m sure that we would all agree for soldiers that that happens, but I think that it’s important that when we talk about military strikes or we talk about things especially involving bombings or drone attacks, these are things that are signed off by multiple different layers of command, by multiple people involved in an operation, including intelligence gathering, including weaponeering, and they also have typically lawyers involved. When you make the claim that an IDF soldier shot a Palestinian, those three people, the three hostages that came up with white flags, that something horrible happened, I think that’s a fair statement to make and I think a lot of criticism is deserved, but when you make the statement that four children were killed by a strike, the claim that you’re making-
I’m sure that we would all agree for soldiers that that happens, but I think that it’s important that when we talk about military strikes or we talk about things especially involving bombings or drone attacks, these are things that are signed off by multiple different layers of command, by multiple people involved in an operation, including intelligence gathering, including weaponeering, and they also have typically lawyers involved. When you make the claim that an IDF soldier shot a Palestinian, those three people, the three hostages that came up with white flags, that something horrible happened, I think that’s a fair statement to make and I think a lot of criticism is deserved, but when you make the statement that four children were killed by a strike, the claim that you’re making-
Norman Finkelstein
Deliberately, yeah.
Deliberately, yeah.
Steven Bonnell
The claim that you’re making is that multiple levels of the IDF signed off-
The claim that you’re making is that multiple levels of the IDF signed off-
Norman Finkelstein
I have no idea what [inaudible 02:51:47]-
I have no idea what [inaudible 02:51:47]-
Steven Bonnell
That’s great if you don’t understand the process, then let me educate you.
That’s great if you don’t understand the process, then let me educate you.
Norman Finkelstein
You don’t understand the process.
You don’t understand the process.
Steven Bonnell
I do understand the process, I’m telling you. I’m trying to explain to you right now.
I do understand the process, I’m telling you. I’m trying to explain to you right now.
Norman Finkelstein
Really? You’re in the IDF?
Really? You’re in the IDF?
Steven Bonnell
No, it’s basic-
No, it’s basic-
Norman Finkelstein
You’re studying the IDF.
You’re studying the IDF.
Steven Bonnell
You can ask anybody that talks about-
You can ask anybody that talks about-
Norman Finkelstein
Aside from Wikipedia, can you tell me what your knowledge of the IDF is?
Aside from Wikipedia, can you tell me what your knowledge of the IDF is?
Steven Bonnell
You can talk to people who work in the military-
You can talk to people who work in the military-
Norman Finkelstein
What’s your knowledge of the IDF?
What’s your knowledge of the IDF?
Steven Bonnell
Your audience can look this up. Do you think that bombing and strikes are decided by one person in the field? Do you think one person-
Your audience can look this up. Do you think that bombing and strikes are decided by one person in the field? Do you think one person-
Mouin Rabbani
Can I respond to that?
Can I respond to that?
Steven Bonnell
[inaudible 02:52:10] on a drone strike-
[inaudible 02:52:10] on a drone strike-
Benny Morris
[inaudible 02:52:11] a pilot doesn’t do it on his own.
[inaudible 02:52:11] a pilot doesn’t do it on his own.
Mouin Rabbani
Can I respond-
Can I respond-
Steven Bonnell
[inaudible 02:52:14] have entire apparatuses that are designed to figure out how to strike and who to strike, so when you say that four children are targeted, you’re saying that a whole apparatus that tries to murder-
[inaudible 02:52:14] have entire apparatuses that are designed to figure out how to strike and who to strike, so when you say that four children are targeted, you’re saying that a whole apparatus that tries to murder-
Norman Finkelstein
You made my argument better than me-
You made my argument better than me-
Steven Bonnell
… Poor Palestinian children.
… Poor Palestinian children.
Norman Finkelstein
You made my argument better than me.
You made my argument better than me.
Steven Bonnell
Which is a ridiculous argument.
Which is a ridiculous argument.
Norman Finkelstein
Oh, really? It’s impossible at the command level, but you said that they couldn’t have done it at the bottom if it weren’t also at the top.
Oh, really? It’s impossible at the command level, but you said that they couldn’t have done it at the bottom if it weren’t also at the top.
Steven Bonnell
You don’t understand the strength of the claim that you’re making. You’re saying that from a top down level, that lawyers, multiple commanders, intelligence, all these people signed off-
You don’t understand the strength of the claim that you’re making. You’re saying that from a top down level, that lawyers, multiple commanders, intelligence, all these people signed off-
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Bonnell, do not tell me what I don’t understand.
Mr. Bonnell, do not tell me what I don’t understand.
Steven Bonnell
… On killing poor Palestinians, children.
… On killing poor Palestinians, children.
Norman Finkelstein
It’s true, I don’t spend my nights on Wikipedia. I read books. I admit that as a-
It’s true, I don’t spend my nights on Wikipedia. I read books. I admit that as a-
Steven Bonnell
That’s a waste of time, by the way. You’re wasting time [inaudible 02:52:55].
That’s a waste of time, by the way. You’re wasting time [inaudible 02:52:55].
Norman Finkelstein
I know, books are a waste of time. With all due regard, they’re-
I know, books are a waste of time. With all due regard, they’re-
Steven Bonnell
Well, according to you they are. The only thing you take from them are two or three quotes that you use to push people around.
Well, according to you they are. The only thing you take from them are two or three quotes that you use to push people around.
Norman Finkelstein
I completely respect the fact… And I’ll say it on the air, as much as I find totally disgusting what’s come of your politics, a lot of the books are excellent, and I’ll even tell you because I’m not afraid of saying it, whenever I have to check on the basic fact, the equivalent of going to the Britannica, I go to your books. I know you got a lot of the facts right.
I completely respect the fact… And I’ll say it on the air, as much as I find totally disgusting what’s come of your politics, a lot of the books are excellent, and I’ll even tell you because I’m not afraid of saying it, whenever I have to check on the basic fact, the equivalent of going to the Britannica, I go to your books. I know you got a lot of the facts right.
Lex Fridman
Benny Morris’ books for the listener.
Benny Morris’ books for the listener.
Norman Finkelstein
I would never say books are a waste of time and it’s regrettable to you that you got strapped with a partner who thinks that all the wisdom-
I would never say books are a waste of time and it’s regrettable to you that you got strapped with a partner who thinks that all the wisdom-
Benny Morris
He didn’t say they’re a waste of time.
He didn’t say they’re a waste of time.
Mouin Rabbani
I’d like to respond to what you were saying. I think the question that we’re trying to answer-
I’d like to respond to what you were saying. I think the question that we’re trying to answer-
Benny Morris
I think you don’t understand Israel, you know? Neither of you really understands Israel and how it works.
I think you don’t understand Israel, you know? Neither of you really understands Israel and how it works.
Mouin Rabbani
Let me finish, please. I think we’re all agreed that Palestinians have deliberately targeted civilians. Whether we’re talking about Hamas and Islamic jihad today or previously-
Let me finish, please. I think we’re all agreed that Palestinians have deliberately targeted civilians. Whether we’re talking about Hamas and Islamic jihad today or previously-
Benny Morris
I prefer the word murdered and raped rather than targeted. Targeted is too soft for what the Hamas did.
I prefer the word murdered and raped rather than targeted. Targeted is too soft for what the Hamas did.
Steven Bonnell
I’m okay with it.
I’m okay with it.
Mouin Rabbani
I’m not talking about-
I’m not talking about-
Benny Morris
I’m talking about this now.
I’m talking about this now.
Mouin Rabbani
Yeah, but I’m trying to answer his question. Historically, there is substantial evidence that Palestinians have targeted civilians, whether it’s been incidental or systematic is a different discussion, I don’t want to get into that now. For some reason, there seems to be a huge debate about whether any Israeli has ever sunk so low as to target a civilian. I don’t-
Yeah, but I’m trying to answer his question. Historically, there is substantial evidence that Palestinians have targeted civilians, whether it’s been incidental or systematic is a different discussion, I don’t want to get into that now. For some reason, there seems to be a huge debate about whether any Israeli has ever sunk so low as to target a civilian. I don’t-
Benny Morris
No, we’ve agreed. We’ve both said.
No, we’ve agreed. We’ve both said.
Steven Bonnell
We just agreed [inaudible 02:54:50].
We just agreed [inaudible 02:54:50].
Benny Morris
I just said that this has happened here and there. We’ve agreed on that. What we’re saying is it’s not policy, which is what you guys are implying, that they kill civilians deliberately.
I just said that this has happened here and there. We’ve agreed on that. What we’re saying is it’s not policy, which is what you guys are implying, that they kill civilians deliberately.
Mouin Rabbani
If I understand you correctly, you’re basically making the claim that none of these attacks could have happened without going through an entire chain of commands.
If I understand you correctly, you’re basically making the claim that none of these attacks could have happened without going through an entire chain of commands.
Steven Bonnell
For strike cells that are involved in drone attacks or plane attacks or-
For strike cells that are involved in drone attacks or plane attacks or-
Mouin Rabbani
Yeah.
Yeah.
Steven Bonnell
Yes [inaudible 02:55:13].
Yes [inaudible 02:55:13].
Mouin Rabbani
My understanding of the Israeli military, and you could perhaps… You’ve served in it, you would know better, it’s actually a fairly chaotic organization.
My understanding of the Israeli military, and you could perhaps… You’ve served in it, you would know better, it’s actually a fairly chaotic organization.
Benny Morris
No, that’s not true, especially not the Air Force, extremely, extremely organized. The Air Force works in a very organized fashion, as he says, with lawyers, a chain of command, and ultimately the pilot drops the bomb where he is told to drop it.
No, that’s not true, especially not the Air Force, extremely, extremely organized. The Air Force works in a very organized fashion, as he says, with lawyers, a chain of command, and ultimately the pilot drops the bomb where he is told to drop it.
Steven Bonnell
Protective Edge, was that 200 strikes in like 60 seconds, I think, the opening of Protective Edge? The coordination between [inaudible 02:55:43]-
Protective Edge, was that 200 strikes in like 60 seconds, I think, the opening of Protective Edge? The coordination between [inaudible 02:55:43]-
Mouin Rabbani
You’re talking about 2008.
You’re talking about 2008.
Steven Bonnell
I think Protective Edge was 2014, but I’m just saying that the coordination in the military is pretty tight.
I think Protective Edge was 2014, but I’m just saying that the coordination in the military is pretty tight.
Mouin Rabbani
Well, my understanding of the Israeli military-
Well, my understanding of the Israeli military-
Benny Morris
It’s very organized.
It’s very organized.
Mouin Rabbani
… Is that it’s quite chaotic and there’s also a lot of testimonies from Israel, but be that as it may, I’m prepared to accept both of your contentions that it’s a highly organized and disciplined force. Air Force under any scenario is going to be more organized than the other branches, and you’re saying such a strike would’ve been inconceivable.
… Is that it’s quite chaotic and there’s also a lot of testimonies from Israel, but be that as it may, I’m prepared to accept both of your contentions that it’s a highly organized and disciplined force. Air Force under any scenario is going to be more organized than the other branches, and you’re saying such a strike would’ve been inconceivable.
Steven Bonnell
Well, I’m not necessarily saying inconceivable. I’m saying that that would’ve required murderous intent on so many different levels. I don’t think good evidence has been presented to say that that’s-
Well, I’m not necessarily saying inconceivable. I’m saying that that would’ve required murderous intent on so many different levels. I don’t think good evidence has been presented to say that that’s-
Mouin Rabbani
Your basic claim is that it would be fair to assume that such a strike could have only been carried out with multiple levels of authorization and signing off. Let’s accept that for the sake of argument. We have now seen incident after incident after incident after incident where entire families are vaporized in single strikes-
Your basic claim is that it would be fair to assume that such a strike could have only been carried out with multiple levels of authorization and signing off. Let’s accept that for the sake of argument. We have now seen incident after incident after incident after incident where entire families are vaporized in single strikes-
Benny Morris
Who is in the families? Who lives in the house inside-
Who is in the families? Who lives in the house inside-
Mouin Rabbani
Family members.
Family members.
Benny Morris
No, next to the house in which these families are killed?
No, next to the house in which these families are killed?
Mouin Rabbani
We have seen incident-
We have seen incident-
Benny Morris
Do you know that Hamas [inaudible 02:57:02] weren’t in that house? Do you know that their ammunition dumps weren’t in those houses?
Do you know that Hamas [inaudible 02:57:02] weren’t in that house? Do you know that their ammunition dumps weren’t in those houses?
Mouin Rabbani
Why do I have to prove a negative?
Why do I have to prove a negative?
Benny Morris
You are saying that they deliberately targeted families. If Israel wanted to kill civilians in Gaza, they could have killed 500,000 by now with the number of strikes they’ve done and the fact that they’ve only killed a certain small number [inaudible 02:57:22]-
You are saying that they deliberately targeted families. If Israel wanted to kill civilians in Gaza, they could have killed 500,000 by now with the number of strikes they’ve done and the fact that they’ve only killed a certain small number [inaudible 02:57:22]-
Mouin Rabbani
30,000 is a small number?
30,000 is a small number?
Benny Morris
Small number in proportion-
Small number in proportion-
Mouin Rabbani
You consider 30,000 a small number?
You consider 30,000 a small number?
Benny Morris
Small number in proportion over four months probably is an indication that-
Small number in proportion over four months probably is an indication that-
Norman Finkelstein
12,000 children is only.
12,000 children is only.
Benny Morris
… Is targeted and that there are Hamas targets in these places.
… Is targeted and that there are Hamas targets in these places.
Norman Finkelstein
12,000 children is only, and if that’s the case, why is it-
12,000 children is only, and if that’s the case, why is it-
Benny Morris
Did I use the word only?
Did I use the word only?
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah, you said only. Professor Morris, here’s a question for you, if we take every combat zone in the world for the past three years, every combat zone in the world-
Yeah, you said only. Professor Morris, here’s a question for you, if we take every combat zone in the world for the past three years, every combat zone in the world-
Benny Morris
In Vietnam, the Americans killed 1 million people.
In Vietnam, the Americans killed 1 million people.
Mouin Rabbani
Well, the [inaudible 02:57:58] killed 40 million.
Well, the [inaudible 02:57:58] killed 40 million.
Norman Finkelstein
I was in the anti-war movement, so don’t strap me-
I was in the anti-war movement, so don’t strap me-
Benny Morris
The Americans killed 1 million people in Vietnam.
The Americans killed 1 million people in Vietnam.
Norman Finkelstein
Fine, and 30 million Russians were killed during World War II, so everything else is irrelevant.
Fine, and 30 million Russians were killed during World War II, so everything else is irrelevant.
Benny Morris
[inaudible 02:58:13].
[inaudible 02:58:13].
Norman Finkelstein
Professor Morris, here’s a question, it’s very perplexing. If you take every combat zone in the world for the past three years and you multiply the number of children killed by four, every combat zone in the world, you get Gaza. So when you say-
Professor Morris, here’s a question, it’s very perplexing. If you take every combat zone in the world for the past three years and you multiply the number of children killed by four, every combat zone in the world, you get Gaza. So when you say-
Steven Bonnell
What is that supposed to prove?
What is that supposed to prove?
Norman Finkelstein
I’m going to tell you… Just shut up
I’m going to tell you… Just shut up
Benny Morris
Firstly, you’re lying on Hamas numbers.
Firstly, you’re lying on Hamas numbers.
Norman Finkelstein
No, I’m not lying [inaudible 02:58:44]-
No, I’m not lying [inaudible 02:58:44]-
Benny Morris
Hamas numbers are not necessarily true.
Hamas numbers are not necessarily true.
Norman Finkelstein
… The numbers that everybody else… I’m lying in the numbers [inaudible 02:58:47]-
… The numbers that everybody else… I’m lying in the numbers [inaudible 02:58:47]-
Steven Bonnell
Even if we take the numbers though, what does that prove?
Even if we take the numbers though, what does that prove?
Benny Morris
Those are Hamas numbers, which may not be true. They could invent anything because you know that they are a mendacious organization.
Those are Hamas numbers, which may not be true. They could invent anything because you know that they are a mendacious organization.
Norman Finkelstein
I know mendacious, believe me-
I know mendacious, believe me-
Benny Morris
You like the word mendacious?
You like the word mendacious?
Norman Finkelstein
Mendacious as in the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs. So here’s the thing, you say they could have killed 500,000, but they only killed, only, that’s your words, they only killed 30,000.
Mendacious as in the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs. So here’s the thing, you say they could have killed 500,000, but they only killed, only, that’s your words, they only killed 30,000.
Benny Morris
You believe that they deliberately target civilians, they would’ve killed many, many more. The fact is that they don’t deliberately target civilians.
You believe that they deliberately target civilians, they would’ve killed many, many more. The fact is that they don’t deliberately target civilians.
Norman Finkelstein
Professor Morris, for [inaudible 02:59:24]-
Professor Morris, for [inaudible 02:59:24]-
Benny Morris
And you don’t understand Israeli society.
And you don’t understand Israeli society.
Norman Finkelstein
I don’t want to understand Israeli society.
I don’t want to understand Israeli society.
Benny Morris
You don’t want the truth.
You don’t want the truth.
Norman Finkelstein
I don’t want to. I D.dOn’t want to get inside their heads.
I don’t want to. I D.dOn’t want to get inside their heads.
Benny Morris
That’s the problem.
That’s the problem.
Steven Bonnell
[inaudible 02:59:33].
[inaudible 02:59:33].
Norman Finkelstein
90%-
90%-
Benny Morris
A good historian tries to get into the heads of-
A good historian tries to get into the heads of-
Norman Finkelstein
There’s a limit.
There’s a limit.
Benny Morris
… The various protagonists.
… The various protagonists.
Norman Finkelstein
There’s a limit.
There’s a limit.
Benny Morris
A good historian does.
A good historian does.
Norman Finkelstein
When 90% of Israelis think that Israel’s using enough or too little force in Gaza, I don’t want to get inside that head. 40% think that Israel is using insufficient force in Gaza. I don’t want to get inside that head. I don’t want to get inside the head of people who think they’re using insufficient force against the population, half of which is children. I don’t want to get inside that head, but here’s the point, because your partner wants to know the point. You don’t understand political constraints. One of your ministers said, “Let’s drop an atomic bomb on Gaza.”
When 90% of Israelis think that Israel’s using enough or too little force in Gaza, I don’t want to get inside that head. 40% think that Israel is using insufficient force in Gaza. I don’t want to get inside that head. I don’t want to get inside the head of people who think they’re using insufficient force against the population, half of which is children. I don’t want to get inside that head, but here’s the point, because your partner wants to know the point. You don’t understand political constraints. One of your ministers said, “Let’s drop an atomic bomb on Gaza.”
Benny Morris
You think he really meant that?
You think he really meant that?
Mouin Rabbani
He said it three times.
He said it three times.
Benny Morris
No, no, no, it was said in a sort of a very questionable way. He didn’t say they should drop an atomic bomb.
No, no, no, it was said in a sort of a very questionable way. He didn’t say they should drop an atomic bomb.
Mouin Rabbani
He said it the day after the ICJ met.
He said it the day after the ICJ met.
Benny Morris
This minister is a messianic idiot, but he didn’t say drop an atomic bomb [inaudible 03:00:43].
This minister is a messianic idiot, but he didn’t say drop an atomic bomb [inaudible 03:00:43].
Mouin Rabbani
He said it [inaudible 03:00:44].
He said it [inaudible 03:00:44].
Norman Finkelstein
None other Israel’s chief historian, the justifiably famed Benny Morris, thinks we should be dropping nuclear weapons on Iran.
None other Israel’s chief historian, the justifiably famed Benny Morris, thinks we should be dropping nuclear weapons on Iran.
Benny Morris
Iran, its leaders for years have said, “We should destroy Israel.” Do you agree with that? They’ve said, “We should destroy Israel. Israel must be destroyed.” Is that correct? This is what the Iranian leaders have been saying since Khomeini.
Iran, its leaders for years have said, “We should destroy Israel.” Do you agree with that? They’ve said, “We should destroy Israel. Israel must be destroyed.” Is that correct? This is what the Iranian leaders have been saying since Khomeini.
Norman Finkelstein
I would say Iranian leaders have sent mixed messages.
I would say Iranian leaders have sent mixed messages.
Benny Morris
But some of them have said, including Khamenei-
But some of them have said, including Khamenei-
Norman Finkelstein
If you don’t know the evidence, why are you laughing?
If you don’t know the evidence, why are you laughing?
Steven Bonnell
The slightest skepticism, it’s very funny.
The slightest skepticism, it’s very funny.
Norman Finkelstein
It’s funny because-
It’s funny because-
Steven Bonnell
Iran that supports Hezbollah and the Houthis and Hamas, maybe they want Israel destroyed.
Iran that supports Hezbollah and the Houthis and Hamas, maybe they want Israel destroyed.
Norman Finkelstein
Brace yourself to the extent that the Houthis are trying to stop the genocide in Gaza, I support-
Brace yourself to the extent that the Houthis are trying to stop the genocide in Gaza, I support-
Steven Bonnell
[inaudible 03:01:37] ships. I know I selectively support international law when it agrees with you and then when it doesn’t, you decide to throw international law to the wind.
[inaudible 03:01:37] ships. I know I selectively support international law when it agrees with you and then when it doesn’t, you decide to throw international law to the wind.
Benny Morris
There’s no genocide in Gaza.
There’s no genocide in Gaza.
Norman Finkelstein
If you like [inaudible 03:01:46]-
If you like [inaudible 03:01:46]-
Lex Fridman
Hold on a second. Norm, Norm-
Hold on a second. Norm, Norm-
Norman Finkelstein
Let me read what you said-
Let me read what you said-
Lex Fridman
Norm, Norm, stop, please. Norm, just for me, please. Just give me a second. You said there’s no genocide going on in Gaza. Let me ask that clear question. The same question I asked on the Hamas attacks. Is there, from a legal, philosophical, moral perspective, is there genocide going on in Gaza today?
Norm, Norm, stop, please. Norm, just for me, please. Just give me a second. You said there’s no genocide going on in Gaza. Let me ask that clear question. The same question I asked on the Hamas attacks. Is there, from a legal, philosophical, moral perspective, is there genocide going on in Gaza today?
Gaza
Mouin Rabbani
Is there a genocide going on in Gaza? Well, in several years we will have a definitive response to that question. What has happened thus far is that on the 29th of December, the Republic of South Africa instituted proceedings against Israel, pursuant to the 1948 convention on the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide. South Africa basically accused Israel of perpetrating genocide in the Gaza Strip. On the 26th of January, the court issued its initial ruling. The court at this stage is not making a determination on whether Israel has or has not committed genocide. So, just as it has not found Israel guilty, it certainly also hasn’t found Israel innocent. What the court had to do at this stage was take one of two decisions, either South Africa’s case was the equivalent of a frivolous lawsuit and dismiss it and close the proceedings, or it had to determine that South Africa presented a plausible case that Israel was violating its obligations under the genocide convention and that it would on that basis hold a full hearing.
Is there a genocide going on in Gaza? Well, in several years we will have a definitive response to that question. What has happened thus far is that on the 29th of December, the Republic of South Africa instituted proceedings against Israel, pursuant to the 1948 convention on the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide. South Africa basically accused Israel of perpetrating genocide in the Gaza Strip. On the 26th of January, the court issued its initial ruling. The court at this stage is not making a determination on whether Israel has or has not committed genocide. So, just as it has not found Israel guilty, it certainly also hasn’t found Israel innocent. What the court had to do at this stage was take one of two decisions, either South Africa’s case was the equivalent of a frivolous lawsuit and dismiss it and close the proceedings, or it had to determine that South Africa presented a plausible case that Israel was violating its obligations under the genocide convention and that it would on that basis hold a full hearing.
Now, a lot of people have looked at the court’s ruling of the 26th of January and focused on the fact that the court did not order a ceasefire. I actually wasn’t expecting it to order a ceasefire, and I wasn’t surprised that it didn’t because in the other cases that the court has considered, most prominently Bosnia and Myanmar, it also didn’t order a ceasefire, and South Africa in requesting a ceasefire also didn’t ask the court to render an opinion on the legitimacy, or lack thereof, of Israel’s military operation. From my perspective, the key issue on the 26th of January was whether the court would simply dismiss the case or decide to proceed with it.
Benny Morris
And it decided to proceed [inaudible 03:04:35]-
And it decided to proceed [inaudible 03:04:35]-
Mouin Rabbani
And I think that’s enormously-
And I think that’s enormously-
Norman Finkelstein
I thought that was beautifully [inaudible 03:04:39]-
I thought that was beautifully [inaudible 03:04:39]-
Benny Morris
But you said they committed genocide. You already said they committed genocide. Israel is committing genocide.
But you said they committed genocide. You already said they committed genocide. Israel is committing genocide.
Mouin Rabbani
But if I can just-
But if I can just-
Norman Finkelstein
Allow me-
Allow me-
Benny Morris
You used that word.
You used that word.
Norman Finkelstein
That’s correct. I don’t run away from my words.
That’s correct. I don’t run away from my words.
Benny Morris
So Norman, you did say Israel was committing genocide.
So Norman, you did say Israel was committing genocide.
Lex Fridman
Norm, can you let Mouin finish?
Norm, can you let Mouin finish?
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah.
Yeah.
Mouin Rabbani
Well, the end of the story is you specifically asked whether I think Israel is committing genocide. I explained formally there is no finding and as you said, we won’t know for a number of years and I think there’s legitimate questions to be raised. In the Bosnia case, which I think all four of us would agree was clearly a case of genocide, the court determined-
Well, the end of the story is you specifically asked whether I think Israel is committing genocide. I explained formally there is no finding and as you said, we won’t know for a number of years and I think there’s legitimate questions to be raised. In the Bosnia case, which I think all four of us would agree was clearly a case of genocide, the court determined-
Benny Morris
You mean by the Serbs?
You mean by the Serbs?
Mouin Rabbani
Yes. In the Bosnia case, the court determined that of all the evidence placed before them only Srebrenica qualified as genocide and all the other atrocities committed did not qualify as genocide. International law is a developing organism. I don’t know how the court is going to respond in this case, so I wouldn’t take it as a foregone conclusion how the court is going to respond, but-
Yes. In the Bosnia case, the court determined that of all the evidence placed before them only Srebrenica qualified as genocide and all the other atrocities committed did not qualify as genocide. International law is a developing organism. I don’t know how the court is going to respond in this case, so I wouldn’t take it as a foregone conclusion how the court is going to respond, but-
Benny Morris
Norman has determined already.
Norman has determined already.
Mouin Rabbani
I have too, because you’re asking my personal opinion.
I have too, because you’re asking my personal opinion.
Lex Fridman
Personal opinion is [inaudible 03:05:50].
Personal opinion is [inaudible 03:05:50].
Mouin Rabbani
So as a matter of law, I want to state very clearly it has not been determined and won’t be determined for several years. Based on my observations and the evidence before me, I would say it’s indisputable that Israel is engaged in a genocidal assault against the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip.
So as a matter of law, I want to state very clearly it has not been determined and won’t be determined for several years. Based on my observations and the evidence before me, I would say it’s indisputable that Israel is engaged in a genocidal assault against the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip.
Benny Morris
Which is a PLO line.
Which is a PLO line.
Norman Finkelstein
Get with the program, the PLO is long passed.
Get with the program, the PLO is long passed.
Benny Morris
Okay, the Palestinian authority.
Okay, the Palestinian authority.
Mouin Rabbani
As you were saying, genocide is not a body count. Genocide consists of two elements, the destruction of a people in whole or in part, so in other words, you can commit genocide by killing 30,000 people.
As you were saying, genocide is not a body count. Genocide consists of two elements, the destruction of a people in whole or in part, so in other words, you can commit genocide by killing 30,000 people.
Benny Morris
[inaudible 03:06:39].
[inaudible 03:06:39].
Mouin Rabbani
Well, five probably is below threshold.
Well, five probably is below threshold.
Benny Morris
There is a problem of numbers.
There is a problem of numbers.
Mouin Rabbani
Yes, but I think 30,000 crosses the threshold and not reaching 500,000 is probably irrelevant, and the second element is there has to be an intent. In other words-
Yes, but I think 30,000 crosses the threshold and not reaching 500,000 is probably irrelevant, and the second element is there has to be an intent. In other words-
Benny Morris
And you believe there’s an intent?
And you believe there’s an intent?
Mouin Rabbani
Yes. I think if there is any other plausible reason for why all these people are being murdered, it’s not genocide. And as far as intent to [inaudible 03:07:06]-
Yes. I think if there is any other plausible reason for why all these people are being murdered, it’s not genocide. And as far as intent to [inaudible 03:07:06]-
Benny Morris
What about hiding behind a human shield? You don’t think that’s a reason for them being killed?
What about hiding behind a human shield? You don’t think that’s a reason for them being killed?
Mouin Rabbani
Well, let’s get the intent part out of the way first. South Africa’s-
Well, let’s get the intent part out of the way first. South Africa’s-
Benny Morris
Forget South Africa, they don’t [inaudible 03:07:16]-
Forget South Africa, they don’t [inaudible 03:07:16]-
Mouin Rabbani
I’d like to finish.
I’d like to finish.
Benny Morris
Hamas government, that’s got nothing to do with anything.
Hamas government, that’s got nothing to do with anything.
Mouin Rabbani
I think they’re pro-Satan as well, last time I checked.
I think they’re pro-Satan as well, last time I checked.
Benny Morris
No, they pro-Hamas.
No, they pro-Hamas.
Mouin Rabbani
For some reason, you don’t have a problem with people being pro-Israeli at the time of this, but if they support Palestinians’ right to life or self-determination, they get demonized and de-legitimized as pro-Hamas?
For some reason, you don’t have a problem with people being pro-Israeli at the time of this, but if they support Palestinians’ right to life or self-determination, they get demonized and de-legitimized as pro-Hamas?
Benny Morris
They supported an organization which murdered 1,200 people deliberately. That’s my problem.
They supported an organization which murdered 1,200 people deliberately. That’s my problem.
Mouin Rabbani
But supporting a state that has murdered 30,000 [inaudible 03:07:45]-
But supporting a state that has murdered 30,000 [inaudible 03:07:45]-
Benny Morris
But they haven’t because these are 30,000 are basically human shields to get by the Hamas, in which the Hamas wanted killed. They wanted them killed. Hamas wanted these people killed.
But they haven’t because these are 30,000 are basically human shields to get by the Hamas, in which the Hamas wanted killed. They wanted them killed. Hamas wanted these people killed.
Mouin Rabbani
Sure, if I could just get-
Sure, if I could just get-
Benny Morris
You don’t think they wanted them killed?
You don’t think they wanted them killed?
Mouin Rabbani
No, I don’t.
No, I don’t.
Benny Morris
They didn’t provide them with shelters. They build tunnels for their fighters, but not one shelter for their own civilians.
They didn’t provide them with shelters. They build tunnels for their fighters, but not one shelter for their own civilians.
Mouin Rabbani
If I can get back to my point, you asked me about intent and the reason that I brought in the South African application is because it is actually exceptionally detailed on intent by quoting numerous-
If I can get back to my point, you asked me about intent and the reason that I brought in the South African application is because it is actually exceptionally detailed on intent by quoting numerous-
Benny Morris
All sorts of idiotic ministers in Israel.
All sorts of idiotic ministers in Israel.
Mouin Rabbani
Well, yeah, including the prime minister, the defense minister, the chief of staff-
Well, yeah, including the prime minister, the defense minister, the chief of staff-
Benny Morris
The prime minister didn’t say genocide [inaudible 03:08:27]-
The prime minister didn’t say genocide [inaudible 03:08:27]-
Norman Finkelstein
According to Asa Kasher, the philosopher of the IDF, he said that Netanyahu was vowing genocide. Now, he’s an idiot?
According to Asa Kasher, the philosopher of the IDF, he said that Netanyahu was vowing genocide. Now, he’s an idiot?
Benny Morris
I didn’t say he’s an idiot, but he’s passed it.
I didn’t say he’s an idiot, but he’s passed it.
Mouin Rabbani
So, the reason I raised the South African application is twofold. Hamas or no Hamas, it’s exceptionally detailed on the question of intent. And secondly, when the International Court of Justice issues a ruling, individual justices have the right can give their own opinion. And I found the German one to be the most interesting on this specific question because he was basically saying that he didn’t think South Africa presented a persuasive case, but he said their section on intent was so overpowering that he felt he was left with no choice but to vote with the majority. So, I think that answers the intent part of your question.
So, the reason I raised the South African application is twofold. Hamas or no Hamas, it’s exceptionally detailed on the question of intent. And secondly, when the International Court of Justice issues a ruling, individual justices have the right can give their own opinion. And I found the German one to be the most interesting on this specific question because he was basically saying that he didn’t think South Africa presented a persuasive case, but he said their section on intent was so overpowering that he felt he was left with no choice but to vote with the majority. So, I think that answers the intent part of your question.
Steven Bonnell
So, for the ICJ case that South Africa has brought, I think there’s a couple of things that need to be mentioned. One is, and I saw you two talk at length about this, the plausibility standard is incredibly low. The only thing we’re looking for is a basic presentation of facts that make it conceivable, possible that-
So, for the ICJ case that South Africa has brought, I think there’s a couple of things that need to be mentioned. One is, and I saw you two talk at length about this, the plausibility standard is incredibly low. The only thing we’re looking for is a basic presentation of facts that make it conceivable, possible that-
Mouin Rabbani
Plausible.
Plausible.
Steven Bonnell
Plausible, which legally, this is obviously below criminal conviction, below-
Plausible, which legally, this is obviously below criminal conviction, below-
Mouin Rabbani
Yes, of course. Think of it as an indictment.
Yes, of course. Think of it as an indictment.
Steven Bonnell
Sure, possibly, maybe even a lower level than even an indictment, so plausibility is an incredibly low standard, number one. Number two, if you actually go through and you read the complaint that South Africa filed, I would say that if you go through the quotes and you even follow through to the source of the quotes, the misrepresentation that South Africa does in their case about all of these horrendous quotes, in my opinion, borders on criminal.
Sure, possibly, maybe even a lower level than even an indictment, so plausibility is an incredibly low standard, number one. Number two, if you actually go through and you read the complaint that South Africa filed, I would say that if you go through the quotes and you even follow through to the source of the quotes, the misrepresentation that South Africa does in their case about all of these horrendous quotes, in my opinion, borders on criminal.
Mouin Rabbani
16 ICJ judges disagree.
16 ICJ judges disagree.
Steven Bonnell
That’s fine if 16 ICJ judges disagree, but I’m going to give-
That’s fine if 16 ICJ judges disagree, but I’m going to give-
Norman Finkelstein
They must be awfully incompetent.
They must be awfully incompetent.
Steven Bonnell
They could be.
They could be.
Norman Finkelstein
Even the American judge, she must have been awful incompetent if she was unable to see the misrepresentations that Mr. Bonnell based on his Wikipedia entry was able to find.
Even the American judge, she must have been awful incompetent if she was unable to see the misrepresentations that Mr. Bonnell based on his Wikipedia entry was able to find.
Steven Bonnell
So, this is based on the official ICJ report that was released. I’m not sure if you read the entire thing.
So, this is based on the official ICJ report that was released. I’m not sure if you read the entire thing.
Norman Finkelstein
I read every aspect.
I read every aspect.
Steven Bonnell
Did you go through and actually identify any of the sources of underlying quotes?
Did you go through and actually identify any of the sources of underlying quotes?
Norman Finkelstein
Actually, brace yourself for this and Mouin could confirm it, Yaniv Kogan, an Israeli, and Jamie Stern-Weiner, a half Israeli, they checked every single quote in the Hebrew original and Yaniv Kogan, love the guy, he has terrifying powers of concentration, he checked every single quote. Is that correct, Mouin?
Actually, brace yourself for this and Mouin could confirm it, Yaniv Kogan, an Israeli, and Jamie Stern-Weiner, a half Israeli, they checked every single quote in the Hebrew original and Yaniv Kogan, love the guy, he has terrifying powers of concentration, he checked every single quote. Is that correct, Mouin?
Mouin Rabbani
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Norman Finkelstein
And Jamie checked every single quote in the English, in the context, and where there were any contextual questions they told us.
And Jamie checked every single quote in the English, in the context, and where there were any contextual questions they told us.
Mouin Rabbani
I think they found one.
I think they found one.
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah, I think they found one. So, I do not believe that those 15 judges… It was 15 to two?
Yeah, I think they found one. So, I do not believe that those 15 judges… It was 15 to two?
Mouin Rabbani
16 to two, I think.
16 to two, I think.
Norman Finkelstein
There are 15 in the court plus two, so it’s 17, so it’s 15 to two. I don’t think those 15 judges were incompetent and I certainly don’t believe the president of the court, an American, would allow herself to be duped.
There are 15 in the court plus two, so it’s 17, so it’s 15 to two. I don’t think those 15 judges were incompetent and I certainly don’t believe the president of the court, an American, would allow herself to be duped.
Steven Bonnell
Well, let me read [inaudible 03:12:19]-
Well, let me read [inaudible 03:12:19]-
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Bonnell-
Mr. Bonnell-
Lex Fridman
Hey, hey, hey, whoa, whoa, whoa, let him read.
Hey, hey, hey, whoa, whoa, whoa, let him read.
Steven Bonnell
Sure, so this was taken from the South African complaint. There’s tons of these, so here’s one. In the complaint for the ICJ they said that, “On the 12th of October, 2023, President Isaac Herzog made clear that Israel was not distinguishing between militants and civilians in Gaza, stating in a press conference to foreign media in relation to Palestinians in Gaza, over 1 million of whom are children, ‘It’s an entire nation out there that is responsible. It is not true, this rhetoric about civilians not aware, not involved.'”
Sure, so this was taken from the South African complaint. There’s tons of these, so here’s one. In the complaint for the ICJ they said that, “On the 12th of October, 2023, President Isaac Herzog made clear that Israel was not distinguishing between militants and civilians in Gaza, stating in a press conference to foreign media in relation to Palestinians in Gaza, over 1 million of whom are children, ‘It’s an entire nation out there that is responsible. It is not true, this rhetoric about civilians not aware, not involved.'”
Mouin Rabbani
I saw that [inaudible 03:12:58]-
I saw that [inaudible 03:12:58]-
Steven Bonnell
“It’s absolutely not true and we will fight until we break their backbone.” If you actually go to the news article that they even state, they even link it in their complaint. The full context for the quote was, “It is an entire nation out there that is responsible. It’s not true, this rhetoric about civilians not being aware, not involved, it’s absolutely not true. They could have risen up, they could have fought against that evil regime which took over Gaza in a coup d’etat, but we are at war. We are defending our homes, we are protecting our homes. That’s the truth. And when a nation protects its home, it fights and we will fight until we break their backbone.” He acknowledged that many Gazans had nothing to do with Hamas, but was adamant that others did. “I agree there are many innocent Palestinians who don’t agree with this, but you have a missile in your goddamn kitchen and you want to shoot it at me. Am I allowed to defend myself? We have to defend ourselves. We have the right to do so.”
“It’s absolutely not true and we will fight until we break their backbone.” If you actually go to the news article that they even state, they even link it in their complaint. The full context for the quote was, “It is an entire nation out there that is responsible. It’s not true, this rhetoric about civilians not being aware, not involved, it’s absolutely not true. They could have risen up, they could have fought against that evil regime which took over Gaza in a coup d’etat, but we are at war. We are defending our homes, we are protecting our homes. That’s the truth. And when a nation protects its home, it fights and we will fight until we break their backbone.” He acknowledged that many Gazans had nothing to do with Hamas, but was adamant that others did. “I agree there are many innocent Palestinians who don’t agree with this, but you have a missile in your goddamn kitchen and you want to shoot it at me. Am I allowed to defend myself? We have to defend ourselves. We have the right to do so.”
This is not the same as saying there’s no distinction between militants and civilians in Gaza. His statement here is actually fully compliant with international law to the letter because if you are storing military supplies in civilian areas, these things become military targets, and you’re allowed to do proportionality assessments afterwards. So, if this is supposed to be one of many quotes that they’ve shown that is supposed to demonstrate genocidal intent, but it is very easily explained by military intent or by a conflict between two parties-
Mouin Rabbani
I saw that press conference.
I saw that press conference.
Benny Morris
Wait, let me just say something. All of this talk is a bit irrelevant because it may sound to the listeners that the court in The Hague has ruled that Israel is committing genocide.
Wait, let me just say something. All of this talk is a bit irrelevant because it may sound to the listeners that the court in The Hague has ruled that Israel is committing genocide.
Mouin Rabbani
No, I think-
No, I think-
Benny Morris
It hasn’t. It’s just going in the next few years to look at the whole subject. There has been no determination at all. And as Steven says, some of the quotes are not exactly accurate quotes or taken out of context.
It hasn’t. It’s just going in the next few years to look at the whole subject. There has been no determination at all. And as Steven says, some of the quotes are not exactly accurate quotes or taken out of context.
Steven Bonnell
A total discharacterization.
A total discharacterization.
Benny Morris
Yes.
Yes.
Norman Finkelstein
It is correct, as Mouin put it, that’ll be several years before the court makes a determination.
It is correct, as Mouin put it, that’ll be several years before the court makes a determination.
Benny Morris
And my guess is that it’ll determine there was no genocide. That’s my guess. I’m just giving you my guess.
And my guess is that it’ll determine there was no genocide. That’s my guess. I’m just giving you my guess.
Norman Finkelstein
I can’t predict. I got it all wrong actually, as Mouin will attest, I got all wrong the first time. I never thought the American judge would vote in favor of plausibility.
I can’t predict. I got it all wrong actually, as Mouin will attest, I got all wrong the first time. I never thought the American judge would vote in favor of plausibility.
Benny Morris
So, you admit that you were wrong?
So, you admit that you were wrong?
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah, of course. I think I tell Mouin twice a day I was wrong about this and I was wrong about that. I’m not wrong about the facts. I try not to be, but my speculations, they can be wrong. Leaving that aside, first of all, as Mouin pointed out, there’s a difference between the legal decision by the ruling and an independent judgment. Now, South Africa was not filing a frivolous case. That was 84 pages. It was single-
Yeah, of course. I think I tell Mouin twice a day I was wrong about this and I was wrong about that. I’m not wrong about the facts. I try not to be, but my speculations, they can be wrong. Leaving that aside, first of all, as Mouin pointed out, there’s a difference between the legal decision by the ruling and an independent judgment. Now, South Africa was not filing a frivolous case. That was 84 pages. It was single-
Benny Morris
Even 84 pages can be frivolous.
Even 84 pages can be frivolous.
Steven Bonnell
It takes an hour and a half to read. It was not a massive case.
It takes an hour and a half to read. It was not a massive case.
Norman Finkelstein
It was single spaced and it had literally hundreds of footnotes-
It was single spaced and it had literally hundreds of footnotes-
Benny Morris
It can still be frivolous.
It can still be frivolous.
Norman Finkelstein
It’s possible.
It’s possible.
Mouin Rabbani
Of course, but this one wasn’t.
Of course, but this one wasn’t.
Norman Finkelstein
I read the report. To tell you the truth, I followed very closely everything that’s been happening to October 7th, I was mesmerized. I couldn’t believe the comprehensiveness of that particular report. Number two, there are two quite respected judges… Excuse me, there were two quite respected experts of international law sitting on the South African panel, John Dugard and Vaughan Lowe. Vaughan Lowe, as you might know, he argued the war case in 2004 before the International Court of Justice. Now, they were alleging genocide, which in their view means the evidence in their minds…
I read the report. To tell you the truth, I followed very closely everything that’s been happening to October 7th, I was mesmerized. I couldn’t believe the comprehensiveness of that particular report. Number two, there are two quite respected judges… Excuse me, there were two quite respected experts of international law sitting on the South African panel, John Dugard and Vaughan Lowe. Vaughan Lowe, as you might know, he argued the war case in 2004 before the International Court of Justice. Now, they were alleging genocide, which in their view means the evidence in their minds…
We are not yet at the court. The evidence in their minds compels the conclusion that genocide is being committed. I am willing, because I happen to know Mr. Dugard personally, and I have corresponded with Vaughan Lowe, I’ve heard their claim, I’ve read the report. I would say they make a very strong case, but let’s agree plausible. Now, here’s a question, if somebody qualifies for an Olympic team, let’s say a regional person qualifies for an Olympic team, it doesn’t mean they’re going to be on the Olympic team, it doesn’t mean they’re going to win a gold medal, a silver medal, or a bronze medal-
Benny Morris
But they can swim, that’s what you’re saying.
But they can swim, that’s what you’re saying.
Norman Finkelstein
No, I would say that’s a very high bar-
No, I would say that’s a very high bar-
Benny Morris
You’re saying they can swim.
You’re saying they can swim.
Norman Finkelstein
… To even qualify.
… To even qualify.
Mouin Rabbani
They can swim well enough to have a realistic prospect at winning a medal.
They can swim well enough to have a realistic prospect at winning a medal.
Norman Finkelstein
So, the even make it to plausible-
So, the even make it to plausible-
Steven Bonnell
That is not true. That is not what plausible means. It’s absolutely not. You’re dead wrong.
That is not true. That is not what plausible means. It’s absolutely not. You’re dead wrong.
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Berelli, please don’t teach me about the English language.
Mr. Berelli, please don’t teach me about the English language.
Steven Bonnell
So, the declaration judge [inaudible 03:17:53]-
So, the declaration judge [inaudible 03:17:53]-
Norman Finkelstein
I said plausibility is the same concept as qualifying.
I said plausibility is the same concept as qualifying.
Steven Bonnell
The court is not asked at this present phase of the proceedings to determine whether South Africa’s allegations of genocide are well-founded. They’re not even well-founded. You said that plausible was a high standard, it’s absolutely not. It’s a misrepresentation of the strength of the case against Israel, just like the majority of the quotes they have in this case are. And also you said it was an extremely well-founded case. They spent like one-fourth of all the quotations, some even pulled from the Goldstone Report, that actually deal with the intent part, which is, by the way, I don’t know if you used the phrase dolus specialis, that the intentional part of genocide-
The court is not asked at this present phase of the proceedings to determine whether South Africa’s allegations of genocide are well-founded. They’re not even well-founded. You said that plausible was a high standard, it’s absolutely not. It’s a misrepresentation of the strength of the case against Israel, just like the majority of the quotes they have in this case are. And also you said it was an extremely well-founded case. They spent like one-fourth of all the quotations, some even pulled from the Goldstone Report, that actually deal with the intent part, which is, by the way, I don’t know if you used the phrase dolus specialis, that the intentional part of genocide-
Mouin Rabbani
I don’t know that term.
I don’t know that term.
Steven Bonnell
I think it’s called dolus specialis, it’s the most important part of genocide, which is proving it is a highly special intent to commit genocide. It’s possible that Israel could-
I think it’s called dolus specialis, it’s the most important part of genocide, which is proving it is a highly special intent to commit genocide. It’s possible that Israel could-
Norman Finkelstein
That’s [foreign language 03:18:43].
That’s [foreign language 03:18:43].
Steven Bonnell
Yes, I understand the state of mind, but for genocide, it’s called dolus specialis. It’s a highly special intent. Did you read the case?
Yes, I understand the state of mind, but for genocide, it’s called dolus specialis. It’s a highly special intent. Did you read the case?
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah.
Yeah.
Steven Bonnell
It is a highly special intent [inaudible 03:18:56]-
It is a highly special intent [inaudible 03:18:56]-
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Berelli, I’m going to ask you again-
Mr. Berelli, I’m going to ask you again-
Steven Bonnell
Yes.
Yes.
Norman Finkelstein
… Please stop displaying your imbecility.
… Please stop displaying your imbecility.
Steven Bonnell
I’m sorry if you think the declaration of the judge is imbecility.
I’m sorry if you think the declaration of the judge is imbecility.
Norman Finkelstein
Don’t put on public display that you are a moron. At least have the self-possession to shut up. Did I read the case?
Don’t put on public display that you are a moron. At least have the self-possession to shut up. Did I read the case?
Steven Bonnell
I’m comfortable putting my display on camera if you’re comfortable putting yours in books.
I’m comfortable putting my display on camera if you’re comfortable putting yours in books.
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Berelli, I read the case around four times. I read all of the majority opinion, the declarations, I read our own Barack’s declaration [inaudible 03:19:27]-
Mr. Berelli, I read the case around four times. I read all of the majority opinion, the declarations, I read our own Barack’s declaration [inaudible 03:19:27]-
Steven Bonnell
Then why are you lying and saying plausible is a high standard?
Then why are you lying and saying plausible is a high standard?
Norman Finkelstein
Because I said even reaching the benchmark of plausibility is a very high standard in the world. It’s the equivalent of a regional player qualifying for an Olympics. It’s still two steps removed, you may not be on the team, and you may not get a medal, but to get qualified, which in this context is the equivalent of plausible, you must be doing something pretty horrible. As it happens, Professor Morris-
Because I said even reaching the benchmark of plausibility is a very high standard in the world. It’s the equivalent of a regional player qualifying for an Olympics. It’s still two steps removed, you may not be on the team, and you may not get a medal, but to get qualified, which in this context is the equivalent of plausible, you must be doing something pretty horrible. As it happens, Professor Morris-
Benny Morris
The court will rule there was no genocide. That’s what the court will rule. Remember what I just told you, the court will rule there was no genocide.
The court will rule there was no genocide. That’s what the court will rule. Remember what I just told you, the court will rule there was no genocide.
Norman Finkelstein
I don’t expect to be even around when the court reaches its final decision.
I don’t expect to be even around when the court reaches its final decision.
Benny Morris
Why?
Why?
Norman Finkelstein
Why? It’ll take a long, long time.
Why? It’ll take a long, long time.
Benny Morris
Two years, three years.
Two years, three years.
Norman Finkelstein
No, I don’t think it’ll take two or three years.
No, I don’t think it’ll take two or three years.
Mouin Rabbani
Bosnia, which was admittedly a special type of case, because they were accusing Serbia of sponsoring the Bosnian Serbs, that took I think 17 years from ’90-
Bosnia, which was admittedly a special type of case, because they were accusing Serbia of sponsoring the Bosnian Serbs, that took I think 17 years from ’90-
Benny Morris
I assume they’ll take two or three years.
I assume they’ll take two or three years.
Lex Fridman
But the point you’re making, so this is a legal-
But the point you’re making, so this is a legal-
Norman Finkelstein
I’m saying that something horrible must be happening to even achieve-
I’m saying that something horrible must be happening to even achieve-
Benny Morris
It is horrible, it’s a war.
It is horrible, it’s a war.
Steven Bonnell
That is true, yes.
That is true, yes.
Benny Morris
It’s horrible.
It’s horrible.
Norman Finkelstein
Except they weren’t rendering a ruling on the war, they were rendering a ruling on the genocide.
Except they weren’t rendering a ruling on the war, they were rendering a ruling on the genocide.
Mouin Rabbani
And I think the suggestion-
And I think the suggestion-
Steven Bonnell
And they said it was plausible, they also said it plausible that Israel is committing a military operation as well.
And they said it was plausible, they also said it plausible that Israel is committing a military operation as well.
Mouin Rabbani
But I think the problem with your characterization is you’re saying in so many words the South Africans basically only have to show up in court with a coherent statement.
But I think the problem with your characterization is you’re saying in so many words the South Africans basically only have to show up in court with a coherent statement.
Benny Morris
Right.
Right.
Steven Bonnell
That is correct.
That is correct.
Benny Morris
In today’s atmosphere, that’s probably correct.
In today’s atmosphere, that’s probably correct.
Mouin Rabbani
They needed to do a lot more. They needed to persuade-
They needed to do a lot more. They needed to persuade-
Norman Finkelstein
The American judge?
The American judge?
Mouin Rabbani
They needed to persuade-
They needed to persuade-
Benny Morris
Judges go according to what the majority want to hear.
Judges go according to what the majority want to hear.
Mouin Rabbani
But they needed-
But they needed-
Norman Finkelstein
She was the president.
She was the president.
Mouin Rabbani
They needed to persuade the court that it was worth investing several years of their time in hearing this case.
They needed to persuade the court that it was worth investing several years of their time in hearing this case.
Benny Morris
They’re probably well-paid for it.
They’re probably well-paid for it.
Mouin Rabbani
They’re well paid whether they take this case or not. They have a full docket whether they accept or reject this case, and I don’t think we should-
They’re well paid whether they take this case or not. They have a full docket whether they accept or reject this case, and I don’t think we should-
Benny Morris
Remember what I just said, they won’t rule there was genocide. Remember what I said.
Remember what I just said, they won’t rule there was genocide. Remember what I said.
Steven Bonnell
Also, I recommend people actually read the case and follow through a lot of the quotes that they just don’t show genocidal intent.
Also, I recommend people actually read the case and follow through a lot of the quotes that they just don’t show genocidal intent.
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Berelli, brace yourself.
Mr. Berelli, brace yourself.
Steven Bonnell
The Israeli minister of finance on the 8th of October, 2023, this is taken from the ICJ, this is from South Africa submission Bezalel Smotrich… I can’t read this.
The Israeli minister of finance on the 8th of October, 2023, this is taken from the ICJ, this is from South Africa submission Bezalel Smotrich… I can’t read this.
Benny Morris
Bezalel Smotrich.
Bezalel Smotrich.
Steven Bonnell
There you go, at a meeting of the Israeli cabinet that, “We need to deal a below that hasn’t been seen in 50 years and take down Gaza.” But again, if you click through and you read the source, their own linked source, it says, as per this own source, “The powerful finance minister, settler leader Bezalel Smotrich, I can’t pronounce this, demanded at the cabinet meeting late Saturday that the army, ‘Hit Hamas brutally and not take the matter of the captives into significant consideration.’ ‘As in war, you have to be brutal.’ He was quoted as saying, ‘We need to deal a blow that hasn’t been seen in 50 years and take down Gaza.'” You can’t strip the quotation of Hamas, an entity we are at war with, and then [inaudible 03:22:38] there was genocidal intent.
There you go, at a meeting of the Israeli cabinet that, “We need to deal a below that hasn’t been seen in 50 years and take down Gaza.” But again, if you click through and you read the source, their own linked source, it says, as per this own source, “The powerful finance minister, settler leader Bezalel Smotrich, I can’t pronounce this, demanded at the cabinet meeting late Saturday that the army, ‘Hit Hamas brutally and not take the matter of the captives into significant consideration.’ ‘As in war, you have to be brutal.’ He was quoted as saying, ‘We need to deal a blow that hasn’t been seen in 50 years and take down Gaza.'” You can’t strip the quotation of Hamas, an entity we are at war with, and then [inaudible 03:22:38] there was genocidal intent.
Norman Finkelstein
[inaudible 03:22:40] Gaza.
[inaudible 03:22:40] Gaza.
Benny Morris
That’s not genocidal intent.
That’s not genocidal intent.
Steven Bonnell
When the Ukrainians say, “We need to defeat Russia-“
When the Ukrainians say, “We need to defeat Russia-“
Norman Finkelstein
[inaudible 03:22:41], that’s not genocidal?
[inaudible 03:22:41], that’s not genocidal?
Steven Bonnell
No, when Ukraine says, “We need to defeat Russia,” is that genocidal? Do they mean killing all Russian citizens?
No, when Ukraine says, “We need to defeat Russia,” is that genocidal? Do they mean killing all Russian citizens?
Norman Finkelstein
Professor Morris, here’s another one.
Professor Morris, here’s another one.
Benny Morris
It’s ridiculous.
It’s ridiculous.
Norman Finkelstein
Ridiculous?
Ridiculous?
Benny Morris
Yes, ridiculous.
Yes, ridiculous.
Norman Finkelstein
The American judge-
The American judge-
Benny Morris
He also doesn’t determine policy, but that’s neither here nor there.
He also doesn’t determine policy, but that’s neither here nor there.
Norman Finkelstein
The American judge read-
The American judge read-
Benny Morris
You are holding the American judge to-
You are holding the American judge to-
Norman Finkelstein
Well, she was the president [inaudible 03:23:07]-
Well, she was the president [inaudible 03:23:07]-
Steven Bonnell
He’ll appeal to authority when it agrees with him, and we won’t deal with the actual facts of the matter, ever.
He’ll appeal to authority when it agrees with him, and we won’t deal with the actual facts of the matter, ever.
Norman Finkelstein
The American judge read several of the quotes.
The American judge read several of the quotes.
Benny Morris
Look at the American Supreme Court today, they may support Trump. It shows you how worthy American judges are.
Look at the American Supreme Court today, they may support Trump. It shows you how worthy American judges are.
Norman Finkelstein
Professor Morris, without going too far afield, if you heard a statement by the defense minister, the defense minister said, “We are going to prevent any food, water, fuel, or electricity from entering Gaza-“
Professor Morris, without going too far afield, if you heard a statement by the defense minister, the defense minister said, “We are going to prevent any food, water, fuel, or electricity from entering Gaza-“
Benny Morris
Did Israel do that?
Did Israel do that?
Norman Finkelstein
No, I’m wondering-
No, I’m wondering-
Benny Morris
Well, he said-
Well, he said-
Norman Finkelstein
I’m asking-
I’m asking-
Benny Morris
… Isn’t Israeli government policy.
… Isn’t Israeli government policy.
Norman Finkelstein
But we’re talking about statements now, intent. How would you interpret that?
But we’re talking about statements now, intent. How would you interpret that?
Benny Morris
After 1,200 of your citizens are murdered the way they were, I would expect extreme statements by lots of politicians.
After 1,200 of your citizens are murdered the way they were, I would expect extreme statements by lots of politicians.
Mouin Rabbani
But you don’t accept extreme Palestinians-
But you don’t accept extreme Palestinians-
Benny Morris
But that’s not a crazy [inaudible 03:24:02]-
But that’s not a crazy [inaudible 03:24:02]-
Mouin Rabbani
Wait, but you don’t accept-
Wait, but you don’t accept-
Benny Morris
What he said isn’t Israeli policy.
What he said isn’t Israeli policy.
Mouin Rabbani
But you don’t-
But you don’t-
Benny Morris
… that’s not Israeli policy.
… that’s not Israeli policy.
Mouin Rabbani
But you don’t accept-
But you don’t accept-
Benny Morris
What he said isn’t Israeli policy. They let in water. They let in gas.
What he said isn’t Israeli policy. They let in water. They let in gas.
Norman Finkelstein
Untrue. Untrue. Untrue.
Untrue. Untrue. Untrue.
Mouin Rabbani
But you don’t accept extreme Palestinian statements after they lost their entire country, not just 1200 people.
But you don’t accept extreme Palestinian statements after they lost their entire country, not just 1200 people.
Benny Morris
That’s a good point. No, no, that’s a good point.
That’s a good point. No, no, that’s a good point.
Lex Fridman
And on that, on that brief moment of agreement, let’s just take a quick pause. We need a smoke break. We need a water break, a bathroom break.
And on that, on that brief moment of agreement, let’s just take a quick pause. We need a smoke break. We need a water break, a bathroom break.
Norman Finkelstein
Take down Gaza is not a genocide.
Take down Gaza is not a genocide.
Steven Bonnell
Defeat Russia is a genocide statement.
Defeat Russia is a genocide statement.
Benny Morris
What does take down Gaza?
What does take down Gaza?
Steven Bonnell
When we went to war with Iraq and we wanted to destroy Iraq, that was a genocidal statement.
When we went to war with Iraq and we wanted to destroy Iraq, that was a genocidal statement.
Benny Morris
Take down Gaza.
Take down Gaza.
Steven Bonnell
There’s a reason why genocide is such an importantly guarded concept, and it’s not to condemn every nation that goes to war.
There’s a reason why genocide is such an importantly guarded concept, and it’s not to condemn every nation that goes to war.
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Bonnell-
Mr. Bonnell-
Steven Bonnell
Wait, you do know how to pronounce my name. You’re mispronouncing it intentionally.
Wait, you do know how to pronounce my name. You’re mispronouncing it intentionally.
Benny Morris
He made you an Italian all the time.
He made you an Italian all the time.
Norman Finkelstein
I’m so [inaudible 03:24:46] by your solicitude for international laws.
I’m so [inaudible 03:24:46] by your solicitude for international laws.
Steven Bonnell
You should try learning it sometime. It would help you sort out a lot of the civilian deaths.
You should try learning it sometime. It would help you sort out a lot of the civilian deaths.
Norman Finkelstein
Unfortunately, 15 judges disagree.
Unfortunately, 15 judges disagree.
Steven Bonnell
You could keep citing the judges. You should actually try reading the actual statements.
You could keep citing the judges. You should actually try reading the actual statements.
Benny Morris
This is tiring. You’ve invited us to a tiring session.
This is tiring. You’ve invited us to a tiring session.
Lex Fridman
Yeah. There you go. How are you guys doing?
Yeah. There you go. How are you guys doing?
Benny Morris
Okay. Okay. There are major things to discuss here, not just what some court is doing and the judge in two years time.
Okay. Okay. There are major things to discuss here, not just what some court is doing and the judge in two years time.
Steven Bonnell
Yes. Okay. So what you just said is my whole… One of the reasons why I feel so strongly about this particular conflict is because there are really important things to discuss, but they will never be discussed.
Yes. Okay. So what you just said is my whole… One of the reasons why I feel so strongly about this particular conflict is because there are really important things to discuss, but they will never be discussed.
Benny Morris
They’re not being discussed here.
They’re not being discussed here.
Steven Bonnell
We’re not going to talk about like Area A, B, and C or what a transference of territory. So we’re going to talk about apartheid. We’re not going to talk about the differences in how do you conduct war in an urban environment where people, we’re just going to talk about genocide. We’re not going to talk about what’s a good solution for the Palestinians. We’re just going to say ethnic cleansing,
We’re not going to talk about like Area A, B, and C or what a transference of territory. So we’re going to talk about apartheid. We’re not going to talk about the differences in how do you conduct war in an urban environment where people, we’re just going to talk about genocide. We’re not going to talk about what’s a good solution for the Palestinians. We’re just going to say ethnic cleansing,
Lex Fridman
Is it possible to be productive over the next two hours and talk about solutions?
Is it possible to be productive over the next two hours and talk about solutions?
Benny Morris
About solutions. I have no idea what to say. I mean, I don’t see any solutions on if you wanted a positive end to this discussion, which is what you said at the beginning. I can’t contribute to this because I am pessimistic. I don’t see anywhere any way forward here,
About solutions. I have no idea what to say. I mean, I don’t see any solutions on if you wanted a positive end to this discussion, which is what you said at the beginning. I can’t contribute to this because I am pessimistic. I don’t see anywhere any way forward here,
Steven Bonnell
But the solution is easy. The reason why the solution is hard is because the histories and the myths are completely… There’s a different factual record.
But the solution is easy. The reason why the solution is hard is because the histories and the myths are completely… There’s a different factual record.
Lex Fridman
One of the things would be good to talk about solutions with the future is going back in all the times that it has failed. So every time-
One of the things would be good to talk about solutions with the future is going back in all the times that it has failed. So every time-
Steven Bonnell
But even at that, we’re probably not going to agree. He’s going to say… You could write that. I can predict the whole line. He’s going to say from ’93 to ’99, he’s going to say, Israel didn’t adhere to the Oslo courts ever, settlement expansion continued, raids happened into the West Bank, that there was never a legitimate… That Netanyahu came in and violated the Y Memorandum, the transference. He’s going to say all of this and he’s not going to bring up anything of the Palestinian side. And then for Camp David, he’s going to say that yeah, that Arafat was trying, that the maps and the territorial exchange wasn’t good enough, that they were asking Palestinians to make all the concessions, that Israel would’ve made-
But even at that, we’re probably not going to agree. He’s going to say… You could write that. I can predict the whole line. He’s going to say from ’93 to ’99, he’s going to say, Israel didn’t adhere to the Oslo courts ever, settlement expansion continued, raids happened into the West Bank, that there was never a legitimate… That Netanyahu came in and violated the Y Memorandum, the transference. He’s going to say all of this and he’s not going to bring up anything of the Palestinian side. And then for Camp David, he’s going to say that yeah, that Arafat was trying, that the maps and the territorial exchange wasn’t good enough, that they were asking Palestinians to make all the concessions, that Israel would’ve made-
Lex Fridman
Well, lay it all out. Lay it out.
Well, lay it all out. Lay it out.
Benny Morris
You do talk quickly.
You do talk quickly.
Steven Bonnell
Yeah, I know. Yeah.
Yeah, I know. Yeah.
Benny Morris
Yeah. My future book should interest you guys.
Yeah. My future book should interest you guys.
Mouin Rabbani
What are you working on?
What are you working on?
Benny Morris
No, it’s not working on, it’s actually going to come out. It deals with Israeli and Arab atrocities, war crimes I call them in the ’48 war.
No, it’s not working on, it’s actually going to come out. It deals with Israeli and Arab atrocities, war crimes I call them in the ’48 war.
Mouin Rabbani
Really?
Really?
Benny Morris
That’s the book, just deals with that subject.
That’s the book, just deals with that subject.
Mouin Rabbani
Because I know you’ve also talked about the closure of the archives and stuff.
Because I know you’ve also talked about the closure of the archives and stuff.
Benny Morris
Well, it’s marginal. It deals with that as well. But they have tried to seal off documents, which had already used and seen. Now they don’t let people see them. That’s happened. But it’s marginal in terms of its effect on-
Well, it’s marginal. It deals with that as well. But they have tried to seal off documents, which had already used and seen. Now they don’t let people see them. That’s happened. But it’s marginal in terms of its effect on-
Mouin Rabbani
Were the British archives useful for you, for this new book?
Were the British archives useful for you, for this new book?
Benny Morris
Yeah. Well, for this list it’s mostly Israeli archives. The British and the Americans and the UN did deal with these subjects, but not as well as Israeli documents.
Yeah. Well, for this list it’s mostly Israeli archives. The British and the Americans and the UN did deal with these subjects, but not as well as Israeli documents.
Mouin Rabbani
What’s your casualty count for Deir Yassin?
What’s your casualty count for Deir Yassin?
Benny Morris
It’s about a hundred. I think there’s agreement on that by Israelis and Arabs, 100-105.
It’s about a hundred. I think there’s agreement on that by Israelis and Arabs, 100-105.
Mouin Rabbani
Because before they were-
Because before they were-
Benny Morris
They used to say 245 or 254. Those were the figures. The British and the Arabs and the Haganah agreed on it at the beginning.
They used to say 245 or 254. Those were the figures. The British and the Arabs and the Haganah agreed on it at the beginning.
Mouin Rabbani
Because the Red Cross, I think was the one that first put out that number.
Because the Red Cross, I think was the one that first put out that number.
Benny Morris
I don’t remember. Maybe it was, what’s his name? Jacques de Rainier or maybe, yeah, maybe he came up with that number. But it was just they didn’t count. They didn’t count bodies. They just threw the number out and everybody was happy to blame the Irgun and the Lehi for killing more Arabs than actually-
I don’t remember. Maybe it was, what’s his name? Jacques de Rainier or maybe, yeah, maybe he came up with that number. But it was just they didn’t count. They didn’t count bodies. They just threw the number out and everybody was happy to blame the Irgun and the Lehi for killing more Arabs than actually-
Mouin Rabbani
Well, and they put it to good use as well.
Well, and they put it to good use as well.
Benny Morris
Well, they said that it helped to precipitate more evacuations. So they were happy.
Well, they said that it helped to precipitate more evacuations. So they were happy.
Mouin Rabbani
I think Begin in his memoir [inaudible 03:28:33].
I think Begin in his memoir [inaudible 03:28:33].
Benny Morris
Yeah. Yeah. They also use that number.
Yeah. Yeah. They also use that number.
Peace
Lex Fridman
So first of all, thank you for that heated discussion about the present. I would love to go back into history in a way that informs what we can look for as by way of hope for the future. So when has Israel and Palestine have we been closest to something like a peace settlement, to something that where both sides would be happy and enable the flourishing of both peoples?
So first of all, thank you for that heated discussion about the present. I would love to go back into history in a way that informs what we can look for as by way of hope for the future. So when has Israel and Palestine have we been closest to something like a peace settlement, to something that where both sides would be happy and enable the flourishing of both peoples?
Benny Morris
Well, from my knowledge of the 120 years or so of conflict, the closest I think the two sides have been to reaching some sort of settlement appears to have been in the year 2000 when Barak and then subsequently Clinton offered a two-state settlement to PLO, Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat and Arafat seemed to waver. He didn’t immediately reject what was being offered, but ultimately at the end of Camp David in July 2000, he came down against the proposals. And Clinton who said he wouldn’t blame him, later blamed Arafat for bringing down the summit and not reaching a solution there. But I think there on the table, certainly in the Clinton parameters of December 2000, which followed the proposals by Barak in July, the Palestinians were offered the best deal they’re ever going to get from Israel unless Israel is destroyed and then there’ll just be a Palestinian Arab state.
Well, from my knowledge of the 120 years or so of conflict, the closest I think the two sides have been to reaching some sort of settlement appears to have been in the year 2000 when Barak and then subsequently Clinton offered a two-state settlement to PLO, Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat and Arafat seemed to waver. He didn’t immediately reject what was being offered, but ultimately at the end of Camp David in July 2000, he came down against the proposals. And Clinton who said he wouldn’t blame him, later blamed Arafat for bringing down the summit and not reaching a solution there. But I think there on the table, certainly in the Clinton parameters of December 2000, which followed the proposals by Barak in July, the Palestinians were offered the best deal they’re ever going to get from Israel unless Israel is destroyed and then there’ll just be a Palestinian Arab state.
But the best deal that Israel could ever offer them, they were offered, which essentially was 95% of the West Bank, East Jerusalem, half of the old city of Jerusalem, some sort of joint control of the Temple Mount and the Gaza Strip of course in full. And the Palestinians said no to this deal and nobody really knows why Arafat said no. Some people think he was trying to hold out for slightly better terms, but my reading is that he was constitutionally, psychologically incapable of signing off on a two-state deal, meaning acceptance of the existence of a Jewish state. This was really the problem.
Mouin Rabbani
Of Israel or of a Jewish state?
Of Israel or of a Jewish state?
Benny Morris
Of a Jewish state, the Jewish state of Israel. He wasn’t willing to share Palestine with the Jews and put his name to that. I think he just couldn’t do it. That’s my reading. But some people say it was because the terms were insufficient and he was willing, but was waiting for slightly better terms. I don’t buy that. I don’t think so. But other people disagree with me on this.
Of a Jewish state, the Jewish state of Israel. He wasn’t willing to share Palestine with the Jews and put his name to that. I think he just couldn’t do it. That’s my reading. But some people say it was because the terms were insufficient and he was willing, but was waiting for slightly better terms. I don’t buy that. I don’t think so. But other people disagree with me on this.
Lex Fridman
What do you think?
What do you think?
Mouin Rabbani
Well, just briefly in response, Arafat formally recognized Israel in 1993. Yeah, earlier. I don’t think actually that in 2000-2001, a genuine resolution was on offer because I think the maximum Israel was prepared to offer, admittedly more than it had been prepared to offer in the past, fell short of the minimum that the Palestinians consider to be a reasonable two state settlement. Bearing in mind that as of 1949, Israel controlled 78% of the British mandate of Palestine. Palestinians were seeking a state on the remaining 22%, and this was apparently too much for Israel. My response to your question would be-
Well, just briefly in response, Arafat formally recognized Israel in 1993. Yeah, earlier. I don’t think actually that in 2000-2001, a genuine resolution was on offer because I think the maximum Israel was prepared to offer, admittedly more than it had been prepared to offer in the past, fell short of the minimum that the Palestinians consider to be a reasonable two state settlement. Bearing in mind that as of 1949, Israel controlled 78% of the British mandate of Palestine. Palestinians were seeking a state on the remaining 22%, and this was apparently too much for Israel. My response to your question would be-
Benny Morris
Wait, wait. They were being offered something like 22 or 21%.
Wait, wait. They were being offered something like 22 or 21%.
Mouin Rabbani
They were being offered, I think less than a withdrawal to the 1967 borders with mutual and minor and reciprocal land swaps and the just resolution of-
They were being offered, I think less than a withdrawal to the 1967 borders with mutual and minor and reciprocal land swaps and the just resolution of-
Benny Morris
The refugee problem was one of the problems.
The refugee problem was one of the problems.
Mouin Rabbani
Refugee question. Yes. I worked for a number of years with an international crisis group and my boss at the time was Rob Malley, who was one of the American officials, present at Camp David.
Refugee question. Yes. I worked for a number of years with an international crisis group and my boss at the time was Rob Malley, who was one of the American officials, present at Camp David.
Benny Morris
Who was be thrown out of the State Department or whatever.
Who was be thrown out of the State Department or whatever.
Mouin Rabbani
The point I want to make about Rob was he wrote, I think, a very perceptive article in 2001 in the New York Review of books. I know that you and Ehud Barak have had a debate with them, but I think he gives a very compelling reason of why and how Camp David failed. But rather than going into that, I’ll-
The point I want to make about Rob was he wrote, I think, a very perceptive article in 2001 in the New York Review of books. I know that you and Ehud Barak have had a debate with them, but I think he gives a very compelling reason of why and how Camp David failed. But rather than going into that, I’ll-
Benny Morris
He wrote that together with Hussein Araj.
He wrote that together with Hussein Araj.
Mouin Rabbani
Hussein Araj, yes, who was not at Camp David. But in response to your question, I think there could have been a real possibility of Israeli-Palestinian and Arab-Israeli peace in the mid 1970s in the wake of the 1973 October War. I’ll recall that in 1971, Moshe Dayan, Israel’s defense minister at the time, full of triumphalism about Israel’s victory in 1967 speaking to a group of Israeli military veterans, stated, “If I had to choose between Sharm El-Sheikh without peace or peace without Sharm El-Sheikh…” This is referring to the resort in Egyptian Sinai, which was an under Israeli occupation. Dayan said, “I will choose for Sharm El-Sheikh without peace.” Then the 1973 war came along and I think Israeli calculations began to change very significantly.
Hussein Araj, yes, who was not at Camp David. But in response to your question, I think there could have been a real possibility of Israeli-Palestinian and Arab-Israeli peace in the mid 1970s in the wake of the 1973 October War. I’ll recall that in 1971, Moshe Dayan, Israel’s defense minister at the time, full of triumphalism about Israel’s victory in 1967 speaking to a group of Israeli military veterans, stated, “If I had to choose between Sharm El-Sheikh without peace or peace without Sharm El-Sheikh…” This is referring to the resort in Egyptian Sinai, which was an under Israeli occupation. Dayan said, “I will choose for Sharm El-Sheikh without peace.” Then the 1973 war came along and I think Israeli calculations began to change very significantly.
And I think it was in that context that had there been a joint US-Soviet push for an Arab-Israeli and Israeli-Palestinian resolution that incorporated both an Israeli withdrawal to the 1967 lines and the establishment of a Palestinian state in the occupied territories, I think there was a very reasonable prospect for that being achieved. It ended up being aborted, I think for several reasons, and ultimately the Egyptian President Anwar Sadat decided for reasons we can discuss later to launch a separate unilateral initiative for Israeli Egyptian rather than Arab-Israeli peace. And I think once that set in motion, the prospects disappeared because Israel essentially saw its most powerful adversary removed from the equation and felt that this would give it a free hand in the occupied territories also in Lebanon to get rid of the PLO and so on.
You ask when were we closest, and I can’t give you an answer of when we were closest. I can only tell you when I think we could have been close and that was a lost opportunity. If we look at the situation today, there’s been a lot of discussion about a two-state settlement. My own view, and I’ve written about this, I don’t buy the arguments of the naysayers that we have passed the so-called point of no return with respect to a two-state settlement. Certainly if you look at the Israeli position in the occupied territories, I would argue it’s more tenuous than was the French position in Algeria in 1954, than was a British position in Ireland in 1916, than was a Ethiopian position in Eritrea in 1990. And so as a matter of practicality, as a matter of principle, I do think the establishment of a Palestinian state in the occupied territories remains realistic.
I think the question that we now need to ask ourselves, it’s one I’m certainly asking myself since October 7th and looking at Israel’s genocidal campaign, but also looking at larger questions, is it desirable? Can you have peace with what increasingly appears to be an irrational genocidal state that seeks to confront and resolve each and every political challenge with violence? And that reacts to its failure to achieve solutions to political challenges with violence by applying even more violence, that has an insatiable lust for Palestinian territory, that a genocidal apartheid state that seems increasingly incapable of even conceiving of peaceful coexistence with the other people on that land. So I’m very pessimistic that a solution is possible.
I grew up in Western Europe in the long shadow of the Second World War. I think we can all agree that there could have been no peace in Europe had certain regimes on that continent not been removed from power. I look at Southeast Asia in the late 1970s, and I think we all agreed that there could not have been peace that region had the Khmer Rouge not been ousted. I look at Southern Africa during the 1990s and I think we can all be agreed that had the white minority regimes that ruled Zimbabwe and South Africa not been dismantled, there could not have been peace in that region. And although I think it’s worth having a discussion, I do think it’s now legitimate question to ask, can there be peace without dismantling the Zionist regime?
And I make a very clear distinction between the Israeli state and its institutions on the one hand and the Israeli people who I think regardless of our discussion about the history, I think you can now talk about an Israeli people and the people that have developed rights over time and a formula for peaceful coexistence with them will need to be found, which is a separate matter from dismantling the Israeli state and its institutions. And again, I haven’t reached clear conclusions about this except to say as a practical matter, I think a two state settlement remains feasible. But I think there are very legitimate questions about its desirability and about whether peace can be achieved in the Middle East with the persistence of an irrational genocidal apartheid regime. Particularly because Israeli society is beginning to develop many extremely, extremely distasteful supremacist, dehumanizing aspects that I think also stand in the way of coexistence that are being fed by this regime.
Lex Fridman
So if you look back into history when we’re closest to peace, and do you draw any hope from any of them?
So if you look back into history when we’re closest to peace, and do you draw any hope from any of them?
Steven Bonnell
I feel like in 2000, I feel like the deal that was present, at least at the end of the Taba Summit, I think in terms of what Israel, I think had the appetite to give and what the Palestinians would’ve gotten, would’ve definitely been the most agreeable between the two parties. I don’t know if in ’73. I’m not sure if the appetite would’ve ever been there for the Arab states to negotiate alongside the Palestinians. I know that in Jordan there was no love for the Palestinians after 1970, after Black September. I know that Sadat had no love for the Palestinians due to their association with the Muslim brotherhoods, attempted assassinations in Egypt.
I feel like in 2000, I feel like the deal that was present, at least at the end of the Taba Summit, I think in terms of what Israel, I think had the appetite to give and what the Palestinians would’ve gotten, would’ve definitely been the most agreeable between the two parties. I don’t know if in ’73. I’m not sure if the appetite would’ve ever been there for the Arab states to negotiate alongside the Palestinians. I know that in Jordan there was no love for the Palestinians after 1970, after Black September. I know that Sadat had no love for the Palestinians due to their association with the Muslim brotherhoods, attempted assassinations in Egypt.
Mouin Rabbani
Sorry, which? PLO and the Muslim brotherhood?
Sorry, which? PLO and the Muslim brotherhood?
Steven Bonnell
Sadat was upset because there were attempted assassinations by people in… Oh no, an assassination. It was a personal friend of his, Yusuf Al-Sabah. I can’t pronounce that. He was assassinated by a Palestinian-
Sadat was upset because there were attempted assassinations by people in… Oh no, an assassination. It was a personal friend of his, Yusuf Al-Sabah. I can’t pronounce that. He was assassinated by a Palestinian-
Mouin Rabbani
He was killed by the Abu Nidal organization, which was not part of the PLO and had nothing to do with the Muslim Brotherhood.
He was killed by the Abu Nidal organization, which was not part of the PLO and had nothing to do with the Muslim Brotherhood.
Steven Bonnell
Admittedly, he says as much, belongs to a [inaudible 03:42:05] group, not PLO directly. But I think that there was a history of the Palestinians sometimes fighting with their neighboring states that were hosting them if they weren’t getting the political concessions they wanted. The assassination of the Jordanian king in ’51 might be another example of that in Jordan. It feels like over a long period of time, it feels like the Palestinians have been told from the neighboring Arab states that if they just continue to enact violence, whether in Israel or abroad, that eventually a state will materialize somehow. I don’t think it’s gotten them any closer to a state. If anything, I think it’s taken them farther and farther and farther away from one, and I think as long as the hyperbolic language is continually employed internationally, the idea that Israel is committing a genocide, the idea that there is an apartheid, the idea that they live in a concentration camp, all of these words, I think further the narrative for the Palestinians that Israel is an evil state that needs to be dismantled.
Admittedly, he says as much, belongs to a [inaudible 03:42:05] group, not PLO directly. But I think that there was a history of the Palestinians sometimes fighting with their neighboring states that were hosting them if they weren’t getting the political concessions they wanted. The assassination of the Jordanian king in ’51 might be another example of that in Jordan. It feels like over a long period of time, it feels like the Palestinians have been told from the neighboring Arab states that if they just continue to enact violence, whether in Israel or abroad, that eventually a state will materialize somehow. I don’t think it’s gotten them any closer to a state. If anything, I think it’s taken them farther and farther and farther away from one, and I think as long as the hyperbolic language is continually employed internationally, the idea that Israel is committing a genocide, the idea that there is an apartheid, the idea that they live in a concentration camp, all of these words, I think further the narrative for the Palestinians that Israel is an evil state that needs to be dismantled.
I mean you said as much about the institution, at least to the Zionist government. Israel’s government is probably not going anywhere. All of the other surrounding Arab states have accepted that, or at least most of them down in the Gulf. Egypt and Jordan have accepted that the Palestinians need to accept it too. The Israeli state or the state apparatus is not going anywhere, and at some point they need to realize like, “Hey, we need a leader that’s going to come out and represent us, represent all of us, is willing to take political risks, is willing to negotiate some lasting piece for us, and it’s not going to be the international community or some invocation of international law or some invocation of morality or justice that’s going to extricate us from this conflict. It’s going to take some actual difficult political maneuvering on the ground-“
Mouin Rabbani
Of accepting Israel?
Of accepting Israel?
Steven Bonnell
Of accepting Israel.
Of accepting Israel.
Mouin Rabbani
Which they formally did in 1993.
Which they formally did in 1993.
Steven Bonnell
Which they formally did in 1993. But then no lasting piece came after that in 2000.
Which they formally did in 1993. But then no lasting piece came after that in 2000.
Mouin Rabbani
No. Because 1993 was not a peace agreement.
No. Because 1993 was not a peace agreement.
Steven Bonnell
Sure. The Oslo Accords didn’t have a final solution.
Sure. The Oslo Accords didn’t have a final solution.
Mouin Rabbani
… were an interim agreement. And Palestinians actually began clamoring for commencing the permanent status resolutions on schedule, and the Israelis kept delaying them. In fact, they only began, I believe in ’99 under American pressure on the Israelis.
… were an interim agreement. And Palestinians actually began clamoring for commencing the permanent status resolutions on schedule, and the Israelis kept delaying them. In fact, they only began, I believe in ’99 under American pressure on the Israelis.
Benny Morris
I think you’re being a bit one-sided. Both sides didn’t fulfill the promise of Oslo and the steps needed for Oslo. There was Palestinian terrorism which accompanied Israel’s expansion of settlements and other things. The two things fed each other and led to what happened in 2000, which was a breakdown of the talks altogether when the Palestinians said no. But I don’t agree incidentally with this definition of Israel or the Israeli state as apartheid. It’s not. There is some sort of apartheid going on in the West Bank. The Israeli regime itself is not an apartheid regime. That is nonsense, by any definition of apartheid, which-
I think you’re being a bit one-sided. Both sides didn’t fulfill the promise of Oslo and the steps needed for Oslo. There was Palestinian terrorism which accompanied Israel’s expansion of settlements and other things. The two things fed each other and led to what happened in 2000, which was a breakdown of the talks altogether when the Palestinians said no. But I don’t agree incidentally with this definition of Israel or the Israeli state as apartheid. It’s not. There is some sort of apartheid going on in the West Bank. The Israeli regime itself is not an apartheid regime. That is nonsense, by any definition of apartheid, which-
Mouin Rabbani
Well, by the formal definition, I think it qualifies.
Well, by the formal definition, I think it qualifies.
Benny Morris
No, it doesn’t qualify. Apartheid is a race-based distinction between different segments of the population and some of them don’t have any representation at all, like the Blacks in South Africa.
No, it doesn’t qualify. Apartheid is a race-based distinction between different segments of the population and some of them don’t have any representation at all, like the Blacks in South Africa.
Mouin Rabbani
That’s not a requirement.
That’s not a requirement.
Benny Morris
In Israel itself, the minority, the Arabs do have representation, do have rights, and so on. I don’t think Israel is also genocidal. I don’t think it’s being genocidal. It wasn’t so in ’48. It wasn’t so in ’67, and it hasn’t been recently in my view. And talk about dismantling Israel and that’s what you’re talking about is, and I think Steven said it correctly, is counterproductive. It just pushes Israelis further away from willing to give Palestinians anything.
In Israel itself, the minority, the Arabs do have representation, do have rights, and so on. I don’t think Israel is also genocidal. I don’t think it’s being genocidal. It wasn’t so in ’48. It wasn’t so in ’67, and it hasn’t been recently in my view. And talk about dismantling Israel and that’s what you’re talking about is, and I think Steven said it correctly, is counterproductive. It just pushes Israelis further away from willing to give Palestinians anything.
Lex Fridman
Please, Norm tell me you have-
Please, Norm tell me you have-
Benny Morris
Something optimistic to say.
Something optimistic to say.
Lex Fridman
… optimistic to say.
… optimistic to say.
Norman Finkelstein
Even though I agree, I’ve thought about it a lot and I agree with Marine’s analysis. I’m not really in the business of punditry. I’d rather look at the historical record where I feel more comfortable and I feel on terra firma. So I’d like to just go through that. I don’t quite, I agree and I disagree with Mouin on the ’73 issue. After the 1973 war, it was clear that Israel was surprised by what happened during the war, and it took a big hit. The estimates are… I don’t know what numbers you used, but I hear between two and 3000 Israeli soldiers were killed during the 19-
Even though I agree, I’ve thought about it a lot and I agree with Marine’s analysis. I’m not really in the business of punditry. I’d rather look at the historical record where I feel more comfortable and I feel on terra firma. So I’d like to just go through that. I don’t quite, I agree and I disagree with Mouin on the ’73 issue. After the 1973 war, it was clear that Israel was surprised by what happened during the war, and it took a big hit. The estimates are… I don’t know what numbers you used, but I hear between two and 3000 Israeli soldiers were killed during the 19-
Mouin Rabbani
It was 2,500.
It was 2,500.
Benny Morris
Yeah, 27. Yeah.
Yeah, 27. Yeah.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay, so I got it right. I read different numbers. That’s a very large number of Israelis who were killed. There were moments at the beginning of the war where there was a fear that this might be it.
Okay, so I got it right. I read different numbers. That’s a very large number of Israelis who were killed. There were moments at the beginning of the war where there was a fear that this might be it.
Benny Morris
There wasn’t.
There wasn’t.
Norman Finkelstein
No. The Israelis fear-
No. The Israelis fear-
Benny Morris
This is nonsense. Everybody forgets Israel’s atomic weaponry.
This is nonsense. Everybody forgets Israel’s atomic weaponry.
Norman Finkelstein
I know, but-
I know, but-
Benny Morris
So how could they have been defeated?
So how could they have been defeated?
Norman Finkelstein
Because Dayan expressed-
Because Dayan expressed-
Mouin Rabbani
Didn’t Dayan talk about the collapse of the third temple?
Didn’t Dayan talk about the collapse of the third temple?
Benny Morris
He did, but it was hysterical and silly because Israel had weapons. They wanted to stop the Syrians or the Egyptians.
He did, but it was hysterical and silly because Israel had weapons. They wanted to stop the Syrians or the Egyptians.
Mouin Rabbani
But we’re talking about perceptions.
But we’re talking about perceptions.
Norman Finkelstein
I can’t tell you if he was hysterical or not.
I can’t tell you if he was hysterical or not.
Benny Morris
No. He was. For a day, he was hysterical.
No. He was. For a day, he was hysterical.
Norman Finkelstein
I wasn’t in the same room with him.
I wasn’t in the same room with him.
Benny Morris
For a day, he was hysterical.
For a day, he was hysterical.
Norman Finkelstein
But I’m just saying, let’s not bog down on that. The war is over and when President Carter comes into power… Carter was an extremely smart guy. Jimmy Carter, extremely smart guy, and he was very fixed on details. He was probably the most impressive of modern American presidents, in my opinion, by a wide margin. And he was determined to resolve the conflict on a big scale, on the Arab-Israeli scale. On the Palestinian issue, he wouldn’t go past what he called a Palestinian homeland. He wouldn’t accept-
But I’m just saying, let’s not bog down on that. The war is over and when President Carter comes into power… Carter was an extremely smart guy. Jimmy Carter, extremely smart guy, and he was very fixed on details. He was probably the most impressive of modern American presidents, in my opinion, by a wide margin. And he was determined to resolve the conflict on a big scale, on the Arab-Israeli scale. On the Palestinian issue, he wouldn’t go past what he called a Palestinian homeland. He wouldn’t accept-
Mouin Rabbani
Palestinian national home.
Palestinian national home.
Norman Finkelstein
On the Palestinian national home. He wouldn’t go as far as a Palestinian state. I’m not going to go into the details of that. I don’t think realistically, given the political balance of forces that was going to happen, but that’s a separate issue. Let’s get to the issue at hand, namely, what is the obstacle or what has been the obstacle since the early 1970s? Since roughly 1974, the Palestinians have accepted the two states settlement and the June 1967 border. Now as more pressure was exerted on Israel because the Palestinians seemed reasonable, the Israelis, to quote the Israeli political scientist, Avner Yaniv, he since passed from the scene. He said… Yaniv in his book, Dilemmas of Security, he said that the big Israeli fear was what he called the Palestinian peace offensive.
On the Palestinian national home. He wouldn’t go as far as a Palestinian state. I’m not going to go into the details of that. I don’t think realistically, given the political balance of forces that was going to happen, but that’s a separate issue. Let’s get to the issue at hand, namely, what is the obstacle or what has been the obstacle since the early 1970s? Since roughly 1974, the Palestinians have accepted the two states settlement and the June 1967 border. Now as more pressure was exerted on Israel because the Palestinians seemed reasonable, the Israelis, to quote the Israeli political scientist, Avner Yaniv, he since passed from the scene. He said… Yaniv in his book, Dilemmas of Security, he said that the big Israeli fear was what he called the Palestinian peace offensive.
That was their worry that the Palestinians were becoming too moderate. And unless you understand that, you can’t understand the June 1982 Lebanon war. The purpose of the June 1982 Lebanon war was to liquidate the PLO in Southern Lebanon because they were too moderate the Palestinian peace offensive. I’m going to have to fast-forward. There are many events. There was the First Intifada, then there’s the Oslo Accord, and let’s now go to the heart of the issue, namely the 2000-2001 negotiations. Well, the negotiations are divided into three parts for the sake of listeners. There’s Camp David in July 2000, there are the Clinton parameters in December 2000, and then there are negotiations in Taba in Egypt in 2001. Those are the three phases. Now, I have studied the record probably to the point of insanity because there are so many details you have to master.
Benny Morris
I’ll vouch for that, the insanity part, yeah.
I’ll vouch for that, the insanity part, yeah.
Norman Finkelstein
Actually, I will vouch for it. I will personally vouch for it. There is one extensive record from that whole period, from 2000 to you could say 2007, and that is what came to be called the Palestine Papers, which were about 15,000 pages of all the records of the negotiations. I have read through all of them, every single page, and this is what I find. If you look at Shlomo Ben-Ami’s book, which I have with me, Prophets Without Honor, it’s his last book. He says, “Going into Camp David…” That means July, going into Camp David, July 2000, he said the Israelis were willing to return about… Not return. But will withdraw from-
Actually, I will vouch for it. I will personally vouch for it. There is one extensive record from that whole period, from 2000 to you could say 2007, and that is what came to be called the Palestine Papers, which were about 15,000 pages of all the records of the negotiations. I have read through all of them, every single page, and this is what I find. If you look at Shlomo Ben-Ami’s book, which I have with me, Prophets Without Honor, it’s his last book. He says, “Going into Camp David…” That means July, going into Camp David, July 2000, he said the Israelis were willing to return about… Not return. But will withdraw from-
Mouin Rabbani
Relinquish.
Relinquish.
Norman Finkelstein
Relinquish. 92% of the West Bank.
Relinquish. 92% of the West Bank.
Mouin Rabbani
Ben-Ami was at Camp David.
Ben-Ami was at Camp David.
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah. Then he was at Taba. Oh, yeah. He was also at Camp David. Israel wanted to keep all the major settlement blocks. It wanted to keep roughly 8% of the West Bank. They were allowing for… You put it at 84 to 90% in your books. They put it at roughly 92%. Israel was willing to give up.
Yeah. Then he was at Taba. Oh, yeah. He was also at Camp David. Israel wanted to keep all the major settlement blocks. It wanted to keep roughly 8% of the West Bank. They were allowing for… You put it at 84 to 90% in your books. They put it at roughly 92%. Israel was willing to give up.
Mouin Rabbani
It also depends how you calculate.
It also depends how you calculate.
Benny Morris
It depends what stage at Camp David because there were two weeks.
It depends what stage at Camp David because there were two weeks.
Norman Finkelstein
I’ll get to that.
I’ll get to that.
Benny Morris
The proposals changed during those two weeks.
The proposals changed during those two weeks.
Norman Finkelstein
So Israel wants to keep all the major settlement blocks.
So Israel wants to keep all the major settlement blocks.
Benny Morris
Means the border area of the West Bank.
Means the border area of the West Bank.
Norman Finkelstein
Well, not the border. We have Ari’el, we have Ma’ale Adumim. We have, as Condoleezza Rice called Ari’el, she said it was a dagger into the heart of the West Bank. So they want to keep 8% of the land. They want to keep the settlement blocks. They want to keep 80% of the settlers. They will not budge an inch on the question of refugees. To quote Ehud Barak in the article he co-authored with you in the New York review of books, “We will accept…” And I think the quote’s accurate. “No moral, legal or historical responsibility for what happened to the refugees.” So forget about even allowing refugees to return. We accept no moral, legal or historical responsibility for the refugees. And on Jerusalem, they wanted to keep large parts of Jerusalem. Now, how do we judge who is reasonable and who is not?
Well, not the border. We have Ari’el, we have Ma’ale Adumim. We have, as Condoleezza Rice called Ari’el, she said it was a dagger into the heart of the West Bank. So they want to keep 8% of the land. They want to keep the settlement blocks. They want to keep 80% of the settlers. They will not budge an inch on the question of refugees. To quote Ehud Barak in the article he co-authored with you in the New York review of books, “We will accept…” And I think the quote’s accurate. “No moral, legal or historical responsibility for what happened to the refugees.” So forget about even allowing refugees to return. We accept no moral, legal or historical responsibility for the refugees. And on Jerusalem, they wanted to keep large parts of Jerusalem. Now, how do we judge who is reasonable and who is not?
Ben-Ami says, “I think the Israeli offer was reasonable.” That’s how he sees it. But what is the standard of reasonable? My standard is what does international law say? International law says the settlements are illegal. Israel wants to keep all the settlement blocks. 15 judges, all 15 in the wall decision in July 2004, all 15 judges, including the American judge, Buergenthal ruled the settlements are illegal under international law. They want to keep 80% of the settlers under international law. All the settlers are illegal in the West Bank. They want to keep large parts of East Jerusalem. But under international law, East Jerusalem is occupied Palestinian territory. That’s what the international-
Benny Morris
Well, not Palestinian, because there was no Palestine.
Well, not Palestinian, because there was no Palestine.
Norman Finkelstein
Excuse me. Okay.
Excuse me. Okay.
Benny Morris
There’s never been a Palestinian state. How could it be Palestinian?
There’s never been a Palestinian state. How could it be Palestinian?
Norman Finkelstein
I listened patiently to you.
I listened patiently to you.
Benny Morris
Sorry.
Sorry.
Norman Finkelstein
Under international law, if you read the decision, all territory, the 2004 wall decision, all territory beyond the green line, which includes East Jerusalem is occupied Palestinian territory.
Under international law, if you read the decision, all territory, the 2004 wall decision, all territory beyond the green line, which includes East Jerusalem is occupied Palestinian territory.
Mouin Rabbani
With the exception of the Golan Heights.
With the exception of the Golan Heights.
Norman Finkelstein
According to the International Court of Justice, the designated unit for Palestinian self-determination, and they deny any right whatsoever on the right of return. I don’t want to go into the details now. The maximum formal offer was by Ehud Omar in 2008. He offered 5,000 refugees could return under what was called family reunification, 5,000, in the course of five years, and no recognition of any Israeli responsibility.
According to the International Court of Justice, the designated unit for Palestinian self-determination, and they deny any right whatsoever on the right of return. I don’t want to go into the details now. The maximum formal offer was by Ehud Omar in 2008. He offered 5,000 refugees could return under what was called family reunification, 5,000, in the course of five years, and no recognition of any Israeli responsibility.
So if you use as the baseline what the UN General Assembly has said and what the International Court of Justice has said, if you use that baseline, international law, by that baseline, all the concessions came from the Palestinian side. Every single concession came from the Palestinian side. None came from the Israeli side. They may have accepted less than what they wanted, but it was still beyond what international law allocated to them. Now you say-
Mouin Rabbani
Allocated to the Palestinians.
Allocated to the Palestinians.
Norman Finkelstein
Allocated to Palestinians, yes. Thank you for the clarification. Now about Arafat, like the Mufti, never liked the guy. I think that was one of the only disagreements Mouin and I had. When Arafat passed, you were a little sentimental. I was not. I never liked the guy. But politics, you don’t have to like the guy. There was no question. Nobody argues it that whenever the negotiation started up, the Palestinians just kept saying the same things.
Allocated to Palestinians, yes. Thank you for the clarification. Now about Arafat, like the Mufti, never liked the guy. I think that was one of the only disagreements Mouin and I had. When Arafat passed, you were a little sentimental. I was not. I never liked the guy. But politics, you don’t have to like the guy. There was no question. Nobody argues it that whenever the negotiation started up, the Palestinians just kept saying the same things.
Benny Morris
No.
No.
Norman Finkelstein
No.
No.
Benny Morris
They kept saying no.
They kept saying no.
Norman Finkelstein
No. Professor Morris, with due respect, incorrect. They kept saying, “International legitimacy, international law, UN resolutions.” They said, “We already gave you what the law required. We gave that in 1988, November 1988, and then ratified again at Oslo in 1993.” And they said, “Now we want what was promised us under international law.” And that was the one point where everybody on the other side agreed. Clinton, don’t talk to me about international law. Livni during the Olmert administration. She said, “I studied international law. I don’t believe in international law.” Every single member on the other side, they didn’t want to hear from international law. And to my thinking that that is the only reasonable baseline for trying to resolve the conflict. And Israel has, along with the US-
No. Professor Morris, with due respect, incorrect. They kept saying, “International legitimacy, international law, UN resolutions.” They said, “We already gave you what the law required. We gave that in 1988, November 1988, and then ratified again at Oslo in 1993.” And they said, “Now we want what was promised us under international law.” And that was the one point where everybody on the other side agreed. Clinton, don’t talk to me about international law. Livni during the Olmert administration. She said, “I studied international law. I don’t believe in international law.” Every single member on the other side, they didn’t want to hear from international law. And to my thinking that that is the only reasonable baseline for trying to resolve the conflict. And Israel has, along with the US-
Benny Morris
When has international law been relevant to any conflict basically in the world?
When has international law been relevant to any conflict basically in the world?
Norman Finkelstein
That’s why-
That’s why-
Benny Morris
Over the last 150 years.
Over the last 150 years.
Norman Finkelstein
That’s why the Palestinians have to recognize Israel because that’s international law.
That’s why the Palestinians have to recognize Israel because that’s international law.
Benny Morris
But international law is-
But international law is-
Norman Finkelstein
[inaudible 03:58:00] have to recognize Israel because that’s international law.
[inaudible 03:58:00] have to recognize Israel because that’s international law.
Benny Morris
No, but international law is meaningless.
No, but international law is meaningless.
Norman Finkelstein
That was UN Resolution 242.
That was UN Resolution 242.
Benny Morris
Conflicts are not solved by international law or in accordance with international law.
Conflicts are not solved by international law or in accordance with international law.
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah. But then, Professor Morris, for argument’s sake, let’s agree on that, strictly for argument’s sake. What’s the alternative? Dennis Ross said, “We’re going to decide who gets what on the basis of needs.” So he says, “Israel needs this. Israel needs that. Israel needs that.”
Yeah. But then, Professor Morris, for argument’s sake, let’s agree on that, strictly for argument’s sake. What’s the alternative? Dennis Ross said, “We’re going to decide who gets what on the basis of needs.” So he says, “Israel needs this. Israel needs that. Israel needs that.”
Dennis Ross decided to be the philosopher king. He’s going to decide on the basis of needs. Well, if you asked me, since Gaza is one of the densest places on Earth, it needs [inaudible 03:58:50]-
Mouin Rabbani
Tel Aviv.
Tel Aviv.
Norman Finkelstein
Yes. It needs-
Yes. It needs-
Benny Morris
It needs part of Sinai. That’s what Gaza-
It needs part of Sinai. That’s what Gaza-
Norman Finkelstein
It needs a nice big chunk-
It needs a nice big chunk-
Benny Morris
Of Sinai.
Of Sinai.
Norman Finkelstein
Not Sinai.
Not Sinai.
Benny Morris
That’s what it actually needs.
That’s what it actually needs.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay. I don’t even want to go there. It needs a nice big chunk, but I have to accept international law says no. Okay.
Okay. I don’t even want to go there. It needs a nice big chunk, but I have to accept international law says no. Okay.
Benny Morris
International law is irrelevant.
International law is irrelevant.
Norman Finkelstein
Now, Benjamin says, “I think the Israeli offer was reasonable.” Okay.
Now, Benjamin says, “I think the Israeli offer was reasonable.” Okay.
Benny Morris
And he’s a reasonable guy. You know that.
And he’s a reasonable guy. You know that.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay, I don’t want to go there. I’ve debated him and partly agree with you. But who decides what’s reasonable? I think the international community in its political incarnation, the General Assembly, the Security Council, all those UN Security Council resolutions saying the settlements are illegal, annexation of East Jerusalem is null and void, and the International Court of Justice, that, to me, is a reasonable standard. And by that standard, the Palestinians were asked to make concessions, which I consider unreasonable or the international community considers unreasonable.
Okay, I don’t want to go there. I’ve debated him and partly agree with you. But who decides what’s reasonable? I think the international community in its political incarnation, the General Assembly, the Security Council, all those UN Security Council resolutions saying the settlements are illegal, annexation of East Jerusalem is null and void, and the International Court of Justice, that, to me, is a reasonable standard. And by that standard, the Palestinians were asked to make concessions, which I consider unreasonable or the international community considers unreasonable.
Steven Bonnell
I think that the issue is when you apply international law or international standards, I wouldn’t say what Benny Morris says, that they’re irrelevant, but I think that these have to be seen as informing the conversation. I don’t think these are the final shape of the conversation. I don’t think, historically, Israel has ever negotiated within the strict bounds of whether we’re talking Resolution 242, whether we’re talking about any General Assembly resolutions. That’s just not how these negotiations tend to go.
I think that the issue is when you apply international law or international standards, I wouldn’t say what Benny Morris says, that they’re irrelevant, but I think that these have to be seen as informing the conversation. I don’t think these are the final shape of the conversation. I don’t think, historically, Israel has ever negotiated within the strict bounds of whether we’re talking Resolution 242, whether we’re talking about any General Assembly resolutions. That’s just not how these negotiations tend to go.
You might consider international opinion on things, but at the end of the day, it’s the bilateral negotiations, oftentimes historically started in secret, independent of the international community, that end up shaping what the final agreements look like. I think the issue with this broad appeal to international law is, again, going back to my earlier point about all of the euphemistic words, all it simply does is drive Palestinian expectations up to a level that is never going to be satisfied. For instance, you can throw that ICJ opinion all you want, it was an advisory opinion, that came in 2004, how Palestinians gained more or less land since that 2004 advisory opinion was issued.
Mouin Rabbani
So what would your standard be then?
So what would your standard be then?
Steven Bonnell
Both sides have to have a delegation that confronts each other and they assess the realistic conditions on the ground, and they try to figure out, within the confines of international law-
Both sides have to have a delegation that confronts each other and they assess the realistic conditions on the ground, and they try to figure out, within the confines of international law-
Mouin Rabbani
See, the problem with that-
See, the problem with that-
Steven Bonnell
… [inaudible 04:01:13] both sides are reasonable for. But for instance, this statement of retreat from the West Bank. What is it? 400,000 settlers? How many settlers live in the West Bank now?
… [inaudible 04:01:13] both sides are reasonable for. But for instance, this statement of retreat from the West Bank. What is it? 400,000 settlers? How many settlers live in the West Bank now?
Benny Morris
Probably half a million.
Probably half a million.
Steven Bonnell
Yeah.
Yeah.
Benny Morris
Depends if you include the Jerusalem suburbs or not.
Depends if you include the Jerusalem suburbs or not.
Steven Bonnell
Yeah. 4 or 500,000 people.
Yeah. 4 or 500,000 people.
Norman Finkelstein
I think it’s 700,000.
I think it’s 700,000.
Benny Morris
With the Jerusalem suburbs, perhaps.
With the Jerusalem suburbs, perhaps.
Steven Bonnell
Yeah. Half a million people are-
Yeah. Half a million people are-
Benny Morris
But Israel calls that Jerusalem, not settlements.
But Israel calls that Jerusalem, not settlements.
Norman Finkelstein
I know that, but that’s not what the law… The law calls it null and void.
I know that, but that’s not what the law… The law calls it null and void.
Benny Morris
[inaudible 04:01:34]. The law is irrelevant.
[inaudible 04:01:34]. The law is irrelevant.
Steven Bonnell
We can say whatever we want until we’re blue in the face, but half a million Israeli people are not being expelled from [inaudible 04:01:41]. It’s not going to happen.
We can say whatever we want until we’re blue in the face, but half a million Israeli people are not being expelled from [inaudible 04:01:41]. It’s not going to happen.
Mouin Rabbani
My response… You’re basically saying, if I understand correctly, there’s only one way to resolve this, and that is through direct bilateral negotiation?
My response… You’re basically saying, if I understand correctly, there’s only one way to resolve this, and that is through direct bilateral negotiation?
Steven Bonnell
Probably, yeah.
Probably, yeah.
Mouin Rabbani
Okay.
Okay.
Steven Bonnell
Or ideally.
Or ideally.
Mouin Rabbani
So I’ve taken over your house. Okay. You’re not going to go to the police because the law is only of limited value. So you come over and sit in what is now my living room that used to be your living room and we negotiate. The problem there is that you’re not going to get anything unless I agree to it. And standards and norms and law and all the rest of it be damned.
So I’ve taken over your house. Okay. You’re not going to go to the police because the law is only of limited value. So you come over and sit in what is now my living room that used to be your living room and we negotiate. The problem there is that you’re not going to get anything unless I agree to it. And standards and norms and law and all the rest of it be damned.
So you need to take into account that when you’re advocating bilateral negotiations that, effectively, that gives each of the parties veto power. And in the current circumstances, the Palestinians have already recognized Israel.
Steven Bonnell
You keep bringing that up like it’s a significant concession.
You keep bringing that up like it’s a significant concession.
Benny Morris
It’s not true. It’s not true.
It’s not true. It’s not true.
Norman Finkelstein
It’s called the law.
It’s called the law.
Benny Morris
It’s not even true.
It’s not even true.
Norman Finkelstein
It’s called the law.
It’s called the law.
Benny Morris
Even though they signed a piece of paper-
Even though they signed a piece of paper-
Steven Bonnell
The recognition from Palestine isn’t doing anything for-
The recognition from Palestine isn’t doing anything for-
Benny Morris
Hamas totally rejects-
Hamas totally rejects-
Mouin Rabbani
I’m not talking about Hamas.
I’m not talking about Hamas.
Benny Morris
Hamas is the majority among the Palestinian people. They won the elections in 2006.
Hamas is the majority among the Palestinian people. They won the elections in 2006.
Mouin Rabbani
Actually, they won a majority of the seats.
Actually, they won a majority of the seats.
Benny Morris
Yes, exactly.
Yes, exactly.
Mouin Rabbani
They didn’t win a majority of the votes.
They didn’t win a majority of the votes.
Benny Morris
Every opinion poll today says the majority of Palestinians-
Every opinion poll today says the majority of Palestinians-
Mouin Rabbani
That sounds right.
That sounds right.
Benny Morris
… support Hamas.
… support Hamas.
Mouin Rabbani
That sounds right.
That sounds right.
Benny Morris
And Hamas absolutely rejects Israel. So if Arafat, in 2003, 1993 or whatever, issued a sort of recognition of Israel-
And Hamas absolutely rejects Israel. So if Arafat, in 2003, 1993 or whatever, issued a sort of recognition of Israel-
Mouin Rabbani
It wasn’t a sort of recognition.
It wasn’t a sort of recognition.
Benny Morris
Okay, a recognition of Israel. It’s meaningless. It’s meaningless.
Okay, a recognition of Israel. It’s meaningless. It’s meaningless.
Mouin Rabbani
It’s meaningless?
It’s meaningless?
Benny Morris
Anyhow, I don’t believe that Arafat was sincere about it.
Anyhow, I don’t believe that Arafat was sincere about it.
Mouin Rabbani
Does it matter what you or I think about what he felt?
Does it matter what you or I think about what he felt?
Benny Morris
Well, most Israelis do, and that does matter.
Well, most Israelis do, and that does matter.
Mouin Rabbani
Okay.
Okay.
Benny Morris
That does matter. But Hamas says no and Hamas is the majority today.
That does matter. But Hamas says no and Hamas is the majority today.
Mouin Rabbani
So for years, the Israeli and US demand was that the Palestinians recognize 242 and 338. They did. But you’re saying, “Okay, we demanded that they do this, but it was meaningless when they did it.” Then the demand was that-
So for years, the Israeli and US demand was that the Palestinians recognize 242 and 338. They did. But you’re saying, “Okay, we demanded that they do this, but it was meaningless when they did it.” Then the demand was that-
Benny Morris
It was a tactical thing. Yes.
It was a tactical thing. Yes.
Mouin Rabbani
Then the demand was that the PLO recognize Israel.
Then the demand was that the PLO recognize Israel.
Benny Morris
Tactical.
Tactical.
Mouin Rabbani
Okay, we demanded that they did this, and they did it, but it’s meaningless.
Okay, we demanded that they did this, and they did it, but it’s meaningless.
Benny Morris
And they never changed their charter, the PLO. You may remember that.
And they never changed their charter, the PLO. You may remember that.
Mouin Rabbani
In fact, in 19-
In fact, in 19-
Benny Morris
They supposedly abrogated the old charter but never came up with a new one.
They supposedly abrogated the old charter but never came up with a new one.
Mouin Rabbani
No.
No.
Benny Morris
So there’s no new [inaudible 04:04:05].
So there’s no new [inaudible 04:04:05].
Mouin Rabbani
But in 1996-
But in 1996-
Benny Morris
And Farouk Kaddoumi said, “Of course, the old charter is still enforced.”
And Farouk Kaddoumi said, “Of course, the old charter is still enforced.”
Mouin Rabbani
Yes, yes. But the point is, the Palestinians, demands are constantly made of them.
Yes, yes. But the point is, the Palestinians, demands are constantly made of them.
Benny Morris
And of Israel.
And of Israel.
Mouin Rabbani
And when they accede to those demands, they’re then told, “Actually, what you did is meaningless, so here’s a new set of demands.” I mean, it’s like a hamster-
And when they accede to those demands, they’re then told, “Actually, what you did is meaningless, so here’s a new set of demands.” I mean, it’s like a hamster-
Benny Morris
There’s no new set of demands.
There’s no new set of demands.
Mouin Rabbani
It’s like a hamster stuck in a wheel-
It’s like a hamster stuck in a wheel-
Benny Morris
No, no, let me tell you what the bottom line is.
No, no, let me tell you what the bottom line is.
Mouin Rabbani
… that will be told, “If you run fast enough, you’ll get out of the cage.”
… that will be told, “If you run fast enough, you’ll get out of the cage.”
Benny Morris
No, no. The bottom line is that Israel would like a Palestinian Sadat. It wants the Palestinians… Listen. Listen. Just let me finish.
No, no. The bottom line is that Israel would like a Palestinian Sadat. It wants the Palestinians… Listen. Listen. Just let me finish.
Mouin Rabbani
This is really a worst-case scenario that you’re talking about now.
This is really a worst-case scenario that you’re talking about now.
Benny Morris
Okay, let me just… Because they shot Sadat, but anyhow.
Okay, let me just… Because they shot Sadat, but anyhow.
Mouin Rabbani
For good reason.
For good reason.
Benny Morris
The Israelis-
The Israelis-
Steven Bonnell
For good reason?
For good reason?
Benny Morris
… want the Palestinians… Israelis want the Palestinians to actually accept the legitimacy of the state of Israel and the Zionist project and then live side by side with them in two states. That’s what the Israelis… I don’t even know if it’s true-
… want the Palestinians… Israelis want the Palestinians to actually accept the legitimacy of the state of Israel and the Zionist project and then live side by side with them in two states. That’s what the Israelis… I don’t even know if it’s true-
Mouin Rabbani
And what is the formal position-
And what is the formal position-
Benny Morris
I don’t even know if that’s true today because there may be-
I don’t even know if that’s true today because there may be-
Mouin Rabbani
And what is the formal position of this Israeli government?
And what is the formal position of this Israeli government?
Benny Morris
No, no. I’m saying I don’t know if it exists today.
No, no. I’m saying I don’t know if it exists today.
Mouin Rabbani
Okay, its predecessor and its predecessor and its predecessor.
Okay, its predecessor and its predecessor and its predecessor.
Benny Morris
I’m talking about [inaudible 04:05:13].
I’m talking about [inaudible 04:05:13].
Norman Finkelstein
Professor Morris. Professor Morris.
Professor Morris. Professor Morris.
Mouin Rabbani
Come on.
Come on.
Benny Morris
That’s what Israelis want.
That’s what Israelis want.
Norman Finkelstein
Professor Morris.
Professor Morris.
Benny Morris
They want a change of psyche among the Palestinians.
They want a change of psyche among the Palestinians.
Norman Finkelstein
Mouin has an interesting-
Mouin has an interesting-
Benny Morris
If that doesn’t happen, there won’t be a Palestinian state. There just won’t be.
If that doesn’t happen, there won’t be a Palestinian state. There just won’t be.
Norman Finkelstein
Mouin has an interesting point.
Mouin has an interesting point.
Benny Morris
Forget international law and all the UN resolutions.
Forget international law and all the UN resolutions.
Norman Finkelstein
I know you want to forget it just like you want to forget the genocide charge. I know you want to forget that.
I know you want to forget it just like you want to forget the genocide charge. I know you want to forget that.
Steven Bonnell
Well, the Palestinians want to forget it too when it doesn’t suit them as well, right?
Well, the Palestinians want to forget it too when it doesn’t suit them as well, right?
Norman Finkelstein
But here’s the problem, and it’s exactly the problem that Mouin just brought up. Now, I read carefully your book, One State, Two States. With all due respect, absolutely a disgrace. Coming from you, coming from you-
But here’s the problem, and it’s exactly the problem that Mouin just brought up. Now, I read carefully your book, One State, Two States. With all due respect, absolutely a disgrace. Coming from you, coming from you-
Benny Morris
Most reviewers didn’t agree with you, though.
Most reviewers didn’t agree with you, though.
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah. Coming from you, it was like you wrote it in your sleep. It’s nothing compared to what you wrote before. I don’t know why you did it. In my opinion, you ruined your reputation, not totally, but you undermined it with that book.
Yeah. Coming from you, it was like you wrote it in your sleep. It’s nothing compared to what you wrote before. I don’t know why you did it. In my opinion, you ruined your reputation, not totally, but you undermined it with that book.
But let’s get to the issue that Mouin wrote. Here’s what you said. You said, formally… You said, “Yes, it’s true, the Palestinians recognize Israel.” But then you said, “Viscerally, in their hearts-“
Benny Morris
They don’t.
They don’t.
Norman Finkelstein
“… they didn’t really recognize Israel.” So I thought to myself, “How does Professor Morris know-“
“… they didn’t really recognize Israel.” So I thought to myself, “How does Professor Morris know-“
Mouin Rabbani
Cut open your chest.
Cut open your chest.
Norman Finkelstein
“… what’s in the hearts of Palestinians? I don’t know.”
“… what’s in the hearts of Palestinians? I don’t know.”
Benny Morris
[inaudible 04:06:34].
[inaudible 04:06:34].
Norman Finkelstein
I was surprised, as a historian, you would be talking about what’s lurking in the hearts of Palestinians. But then you said something which was really interesting. You said, “Even if, in their hearts, they accepted Israel,” you said, quote, “Rationally, they could never accept Israel because they got nothing. They had this beautiful Palestine and now they’re reduced to just a few parcels of land. The two-state settlement-“
I was surprised, as a historian, you would be talking about what’s lurking in the hearts of Palestinians. But then you said something which was really interesting. You said, “Even if, in their hearts, they accepted Israel,” you said, quote, “Rationally, they could never accept Israel because they got nothing. They had this beautiful Palestine and now they’re reduced to just a few parcels of land. The two-state settlement-“
Benny Morris
So they will never accept it.
So they will never accept it.
Norman Finkelstein
Yes.
Yes.
Benny Morris
Which is true.
Which is true.
Norman Finkelstein
So you said there’s no way they can accept it.
So you said there’s no way they can accept it.
Benny Morris
No, I would say that as well.
No, I would say that as well.
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah.
Yeah.
Benny Morris
The two-state solution, as proposed, doesn’t make any sense.
The two-state solution, as proposed, doesn’t make any sense.
Norman Finkelstein
Exactly as Mouin said, you keep moving the goalposts until we reach the point where we realize, according to Benny Morris, there can’t be a solution. So why don’t you just say that outright? Why don’t you say it outright? According to you, the Palestinians can never be reasonable because according to you-
Exactly as Mouin said, you keep moving the goalposts until we reach the point where we realize, according to Benny Morris, there can’t be a solution. So why don’t you just say that outright? Why don’t you say it outright? According to you, the Palestinians can never be reasonable because according to you-
Benny Morris
They want all of Palestine. That’s why.
They want all of Palestine. That’s why.
Norman Finkelstein
According to you, they couldn’t possibly agree to a two-state settlement because it’s such a lousy settlement. That’s what you say.
According to you, they couldn’t possibly agree to a two-state settlement because it’s such a lousy settlement. That’s what you say.
Benny Morris
Because they want all of Palestine.
Because they want all of Palestine.
Norman Finkelstein
But you said, rationally, they couldn’t accept it, not their feelings.
But you said, rationally, they couldn’t accept it, not their feelings.
Benny Morris
It’s both.
It’s both.
Norman Finkelstein
You said rational. You went from formally, viscerally, rationally. So now we’re reaching the point where, according to Benny Morris, the Palestinians can’t be reasonable because, reasonably, they have to reject two states.
You said rational. You went from formally, viscerally, rationally. So now we’re reaching the point where, according to Benny Morris, the Palestinians can’t be reasonable because, reasonably, they have to reject two states.
Benny Morris
They want all of Palestine.
They want all of Palestine.
Norman Finkelstein
So, Mouin is absolutely correct. There’s no way to resolve the problem, according to your logic.
So, Mouin is absolutely correct. There’s no way to resolve the problem, according to your logic.
Benny Morris
They want all of Palestine. He said that himself. He said they should dismantle Israel.
They want all of Palestine. He said that himself. He said they should dismantle Israel.
Norman Finkelstein
I’m talking about-
I’m talking about-
Benny Morris
That’s what he’s saying.
That’s what he’s saying.
Mouin Rabbani
What I said-
What I said-
Norman Finkelstein
He didn’t say that.
He didn’t say that.
Benny Morris
Dismantle Israel.
Dismantle Israel.
Mouin Rabbani
What I said, and I’ve written-
What I said, and I’ve written-
Norman Finkelstein
I’m glad you didn’t deny it. Go ahead.
I’m glad you didn’t deny it. Go ahead.
Mouin Rabbani
I’ve written extensively on this issue, on why a two-state settlement is still feasible, and I came out in support of that proposition. Perhaps in my heart, you can see that I was just bullshitting, but that’s what I actually wrote. That was a number of years ago.
I’ve written extensively on this issue, on why a two-state settlement is still feasible, and I came out in support of that proposition. Perhaps in my heart, you can see that I was just bullshitting, but that’s what I actually wrote. That was a number of years ago.
And just as a matter of historical record, beginning in the early 1970s, there was fierce debate within the Palestinian national movement about whether to accept or reject. And there were three schools of thought. There was one that would accept nothing less than the total liberation of Palestine. There was a second that accepted what was called the establishment of a fighting national authority on Palestinian soil, which they saw-
Benny Morris
As a springboard.
As a springboard.
Mouin Rabbani
… as a springboard for the total liberation of Palestine. And there was a third school that believed that, under current dynamics and so on, that they should go for a two-state settlement. And our friend and correspondent [inaudible 04:09:41] has written a very perceptive article on when the PLO, already in 1976, came out in open support of a two-state resolution at the Security Council. PLO accepted it. Israel, of course, rejected it. But the resolution didn’t pass because the US and the UK vetoed it. It was both of them.
… as a springboard for the total liberation of Palestine. And there was a third school that believed that, under current dynamics and so on, that they should go for a two-state settlement. And our friend and correspondent [inaudible 04:09:41] has written a very perceptive article on when the PLO, already in 1976, came out in open support of a two-state resolution at the Security Council. PLO accepted it. Israel, of course, rejected it. But the resolution didn’t pass because the US and the UK vetoed it. It was both of them.
Norman Finkelstein
I think it was nine to five [inaudible 04:10:06].
I think it was nine to five [inaudible 04:10:06].
Mouin Rabbani
Ah, okay. Yeah. But fact of the matter is that the PLO came to accept a two-state settlement. Why they did it I think is irrelevant. And subsequently, the PLO acted on the basis of seeking to achieve a two-state settlement. The reason, I think, and I think Norm, you’ve written about this, the reason that Arafat was so insistent on getting minimally acceptable terms for a two-state settlement at Camp David and afterwards was precisely because he knew that once he signed, that was all the Palestinians were going to get. If his intention had been, “I’m not accepting Israel. I simply want to springboard,” he would’ve accepted a Palestinian state in Jericho, but he didn’t. He insisted-
Ah, okay. Yeah. But fact of the matter is that the PLO came to accept a two-state settlement. Why they did it I think is irrelevant. And subsequently, the PLO acted on the basis of seeking to achieve a two-state settlement. The reason, I think, and I think Norm, you’ve written about this, the reason that Arafat was so insistent on getting minimally acceptable terms for a two-state settlement at Camp David and afterwards was precisely because he knew that once he signed, that was all the Palestinians were going to get. If his intention had been, “I’m not accepting Israel. I simply want to springboard,” he would’ve accepted a Palestinian state in Jericho, but he didn’t. He insisted-
Benny Morris
That’s something I’ve never understood. He should have logically accepted the springboard, and then from there, launched his next stage.
That’s something I’ve never understood. He should have logically accepted the springboard, and then from there, launched his next stage.
Norman Finkelstein
No, he understood what you don’t understand.
No, he understood what you don’t understand.
Benny Morris
He should’ve done that.
He should’ve done that.
Norman Finkelstein
He understood international law would put a real constraint on him once he accepted it was over.
He understood international law would put a real constraint on him once he accepted it was over.
Benny Morris
No, but also, I think, constitutionally, he was incapable of signing.
No, but also, I think, constitutionally, he was incapable of signing.
Norman Finkelstein
I don’t know that.
I don’t know that.
Benny Morris
You’re right that he should have-
You’re right that he should have-
Norman Finkelstein
I’m not his [inaudible 04:11:21].
I’m not his [inaudible 04:11:21].
Benny Morris
… accepted it.
… accepted it.
Mouin Rabbani
But if you’re correct, okay, that he was really out to-
But if you’re correct, okay, that he was really out to-
Benny Morris
[inaudible 04:11:26].
[inaudible 04:11:26].
Mouin Rabbani
… eliminate Israel, then he wouldn’t have cared about the borders. He wouldn’t have cared about what the thing said about refugees. He would’ve gotten a sovereign state and used that to achieve that purpose.
… eliminate Israel, then he wouldn’t have cared about the borders. He wouldn’t have cared about what the thing said about refugees. He would’ve gotten a sovereign state and used that to achieve that purpose.
Norman Finkelstein
The springboard.
The springboard.
Mouin Rabbani
But I think it was precisely because he recognized that he was not negotiating for a springboard, he was negotiating permanent status, that he was such a stickler about the details.
But I think it was precisely because he recognized that he was not negotiating for a springboard, he was negotiating permanent status, that he was such a stickler about the details.
Norman Finkelstein
Just as a factual matter, he wasn’t such a stickler. When they asked him how many refugees, the numbers at the-
Just as a factual matter, he wasn’t such a stickler. When they asked him how many refugees, the numbers at the-
Mouin Rabbani
It was the principle rather than the numbers.
It was the principle rather than the numbers.
Norman Finkelstein
It was the principle.
It was the principle.
Benny Morris
He said they would be pragmatic about it. [inaudible 04:12:00].
He said they would be pragmatic about it. [inaudible 04:12:00].
Norman Finkelstein
Yes. And the numbers that were used at Annapolis were between 100 and 250,000 refugees over 10 years. That was the number. Arafat, when he was asked at Camp David, he kept saying, “I care about the Lebanese… the Palestinian refugees in Lebanon,” which came to about 300,000.
Yes. And the numbers that were used at Annapolis were between 100 and 250,000 refugees over 10 years. That was the number. Arafat, when he was asked at Camp David, he kept saying, “I care about the Lebanese… the Palestinian refugees in Lebanon,” which came to about 300,000.
Mouin Rabbani
Those were his priority.
Those were his priority.
Norman Finkelstein
Which was a large concession from… whether you accept the number or not, that he wasn’t talking about 6 million. He was talking about between 100 and 250,000 over 10 years. Now, the best offer that came from the Palestinians… Excuse me, the best offer that came from Israel was the Olmert offer.
Which was a large concession from… whether you accept the number or not, that he wasn’t talking about 6 million. He was talking about between 100 and 250,000 over 10 years. Now, the best offer that came from the Palestinians… Excuse me, the best offer that came from Israel was the Olmert offer.
Lex Fridman
Can we just pretend like we didn’t all lay out the exceptionally pessimistic view of a two-state… Hold on a second. Two-state solution? Let’s pretend that in five years, in 10 years, a two-state peace settlement is reached. And as historians, you’ll still be here writing about it 20 years from now. How would it have happened?
Can we just pretend like we didn’t all lay out the exceptionally pessimistic view of a two-state… Hold on a second. Two-state solution? Let’s pretend that in five years, in 10 years, a two-state peace settlement is reached. And as historians, you’ll still be here writing about it 20 years from now. How would it have happened?
Steven Bonnell
I think that, historically, I think that the big issue is I think that both sides have had their own internal motivations to fight because they feel like they have something to gain from it. But I think as time has gone on, unfortunately, the record proves that the Palestinian side is delusional. The longer that the conflict endures, the worse position they’ll be in.
I think that, historically, I think that the big issue is I think that both sides have had their own internal motivations to fight because they feel like they have something to gain from it. But I think as time has gone on, unfortunately, the record proves that the Palestinian side is delusional. The longer that the conflict endures, the worse position they’ll be in.
But for some reason, they’ve never had a leader that convinced them of that as much, that Arafat thought that if he held on, there was always a better deal around the corner, that Abbas is more concerned with trying to maintain any legitimacy amongst Palestinians than actually trying to negotiate anything realistic with Israel, that Palestinians are always incentivized to feel like as long as they keep fighting, either the international community is going to save them with the 5 millionth UN resolution condemning whatever, that another ICJ advisory opinion is finally going to lead to the expulsion of half a million Jews from the West Bank, or that some other international body, the ICJ and the genocide charge, is going to come and save the Palestinians.
As long as they, in their mind, feel like somebody is coming to save them, then they feel like they’re going to have the ability to get something better in the future. But the reality is all of the good partners for peace that the Palestinians had have completely and utterly abandoned them; Egypt, Jordan, the Gulf states. Whether you’re talking bilateral peace or the Abraham Accords, most of the Arab leaders, in negotiating peace with Israel, have just not had as much of an interest in maintaining the rights and the representations of what the Palestinian people want.
And the only people they have today to draw legitimacy from or to have on their side to argue with them are people that, I guess, write books or tweet or people in the international community that do resolutions or Amnesty International reports. And the reality is, we can scream until we’re blue in the face on these things, none of it has gotten any closer to helping the Palestinians in any sense of the word.
The condition has only gotten worse. The settlements only continue to expand. The military operations are only to get more brutal. The blockade is going to continue to have worse effects. As long as we use international law as the basis and there isn’t a strong Sadat-like Palestinian leader that’s willing to come up and confront Israel with the brave, peaceful negotiations to force them to acquiesce, nothing is going to happen.
And I think that the issue you come up with is, whether it’s people like Norm that talk about how brave the October 7th attacks were or how much respect they have for those fighters, Israel, in a way… And I think people have said as much about Netanyahu. The right wants violence from the Palestinians because it always gives them a perpetual excuse to further the conflict.
“Well, we have to go in on October 7th and we’ve got to remove Hamas. Well, we can’t trust these people in the West. We have to do the night raids because the Second Intifada made us feel like the Palestinian people didn’t want trust with us.”
I feel like the biggest thing that would force Israel to change its path would be an actual, a real… not for two weeks, but an actual peaceful Palestinian leader, somebody committed to peace, that is able to apply those standards and hold the entire region of Palestine to those standards. Because I think, over time, the mounting pressure from without the international community and the mounting pressure from within because Israel hosts a lot of its own criticism, if we talk about B’Tselem, we talk about Haaretz, Israel will host a lot of its own criticism.
I think that that pressure would force Israel towards an actual peace agreement, but it’s never going to come through violence. Historically, it hasn’t. And in the modern day, violence has just hurt the Palestinians more and more.
Lex Fridman
If you paint a picture of the future, now is a good moment for both Palestine and Israel to get new leadership. Netanyahu’s on the way out, Hamas possibly is on the way out. Who should rise to the top such that a peaceful settlement can be reached? And I’d love to [inaudible 04:16:33].
If you paint a picture of the future, now is a good moment for both Palestine and Israel to get new leadership. Netanyahu’s on the way out, Hamas possibly is on the way out. Who should rise to the top such that a peaceful settlement can be reached? And I’d love to [inaudible 04:16:33].
Steven Bonnell
The problem is, as Benny said, yeah, it’s difficult because Hamas enjoys so much widespread support amongst the Palestinian people. I think that… Well, I don’t know. There’s opinions on whether democracy or pushing them towards elections was the right or wrong idea. But with an Islamic fundamentalist government for Hamas, I don’t know if a negotiation with Israel ever happens there.
The problem is, as Benny said, yeah, it’s difficult because Hamas enjoys so much widespread support amongst the Palestinian people. I think that… Well, I don’t know. There’s opinions on whether democracy or pushing them towards elections was the right or wrong idea. But with an Islamic fundamentalist government for Hamas, I don’t know if a negotiation with Israel ever happens there.
And then when the international pressure is always ’67 borders, infinite right of return for refugees, and a total withdrawal of Israel from all these lands to even start negotiations, I just don’t see, realistically, on the Palestinian side, no negotiations are ever going to start in a place that Israel’s willing to accept.
Mouin Rabbani
If you want to dismiss international law, that’s fine, but then you have to do it consistently. You can’t set standards for the Palestinians but reject applying those standards to Israel. If we’re going to have the law of the jungle, then we can all be beasts and not only some of us. So it’s either that or you have certain agreed standards that are intended to regulate our conduct, all of our conduct, not just some of us. So that’s a fundamental-
If you want to dismiss international law, that’s fine, but then you have to do it consistently. You can’t set standards for the Palestinians but reject applying those standards to Israel. If we’re going to have the law of the jungle, then we can all be beasts and not only some of us. So it’s either that or you have certain agreed standards that are intended to regulate our conduct, all of our conduct, not just some of us. So that’s a fundamental-
Steven Bonnell
[inaudible 04:17:46] I’m saying to abandon?
[inaudible 04:17:46] I’m saying to abandon?
Mouin Rabbani
Well, you’re saying international law and the millionth UN resolution, you’re being very dismissive about all these things.
Well, you’re saying international law and the millionth UN resolution, you’re being very dismissive about all these things.
Steven Bonnell
Well, I’m saying [inaudible 04:17:54]-
Well, I’m saying [inaudible 04:17:54]-
Mouin Rabbani
And that’s fine.
And that’s fine.
Steven Bonnell
I’m not being dismissive.
I’m not being dismissive.
Mouin Rabbani
But then you have to be dismissive across the board.
But then you have to be dismissive across the board.
Steven Bonnell
I’m just saying, for instance, 242, that was a Chapter VI resolution. That’s non-binding. But 242 [inaudible 04:18:01]-
I’m just saying, for instance, 242, that was a Chapter VI resolution. That’s non-binding. But 242 [inaudible 04:18:01]-
Mouin Rabbani
It’s binding.
It’s binding.
Steven Bonnell
It’s absolutely not binding.
It’s absolutely not binding.
Mouin Rabbani
It’s binding.
It’s binding.
Norman Finkelstein
What is binding? Do you know anything about how the UN system works?
What is binding? Do you know anything about how the UN system works?
Steven Bonnell
If you read the language of the resolution, binding is typically if it commits you to upholding a particular international law or if it establishes [inaudible 04:18:13].
If you read the language of the resolution, binding is typically if it commits you to upholding a particular international law or if it establishes [inaudible 04:18:13].
Norman Finkelstein
What is Chapter VI? You just throw out words. You hear binding, not binding.
What is Chapter VI? You just throw out words. You hear binding, not binding.
Steven Bonnell
Does 424 mention a Palestinian state?
Does 424 mention a Palestinian state?
Mouin Rabbani
Norm-
Norm-
Norman Finkelstein
Of course not.
Of course not.
Mouin Rabbani
That’s part of the problem.
That’s part of the problem.
Steven Bonnell
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, exactly.
Norman Finkelstein
That was the reason why the Palestinians didn’t want to recognize 242 because they only referred, at the very end, the refugee problem.
That was the reason why the Palestinians didn’t want to recognize 242 because they only referred, at the very end, the refugee problem.
Steven Bonnell
Sure, but the PLO recognized 181 and 242 [inaudible 04:18:31].
Sure, but the PLO recognized 181 and 242 [inaudible 04:18:31].
Mouin Rabbani
Yeah, but hold on. Hold on. Every United Nations Security Council resolution, irrespective of under which chapter it was adopted, is, by definition, binding. Binding not only on the members of the Security Council but on every member state of the UN. Read the UN Charter. It’s black and white.
Yeah, but hold on. Hold on. Every United Nations Security Council resolution, irrespective of under which chapter it was adopted, is, by definition, binding. Binding not only on the members of the Security Council but on every member state of the UN. Read the UN Charter. It’s black and white.
Steven Bonnell
Sure. People can look that up [inaudible 04:18:53]-
Sure. People can look that up [inaudible 04:18:53]-
Mouin Rabbani
Yes.
Yes.
Steven Bonnell
… but the language even of 242 is kept intentionally vague such that it doesn’t actually provide, again, the final [inaudible 04:18:59]-
… but the language even of 242 is kept intentionally vague such that it doesn’t actually provide, again, the final [inaudible 04:18:59]-
Mouin Rabbani
It’s actually not that vague-
It’s actually not that vague-
Steven Bonnell
It’s incredibly vague.
It’s incredibly vague.
Mouin Rabbani
… because the term “land for peace” originates in 242. The idea is-
… because the term “land for peace” originates in 242. The idea is-
Steven Bonnell
Sure, but the part about territorial acquisition and Israel’s need to give it up was kept vague. That’s why, in ’79, Israel thought that they fulfilled their obligations under 242 [inaudible 04:19:13]-
Sure, but the part about territorial acquisition and Israel’s need to give it up was kept vague. That’s why, in ’79, Israel thought that they fulfilled their obligations under 242 [inaudible 04:19:13]-
Mouin Rabbani
You asked a separate question.
You asked a separate question.
Norman Finkelstein
Allow me points of information. The first principle in UN Resolution 242 is that the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by force-
Allow me points of information. The first principle in UN Resolution 242 is that the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by force-
Steven Bonnell
Which is meaningless.
Which is meaningless.
Norman Finkelstein
It may be meaningless to you, Mr. Bonnell.
It may be meaningless to you, Mr. Bonnell.
Steven Bonnell
It was meaningless to everyone in the region.
It was meaningless to everyone in the region.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay. Mr. Bonnell, that principle was adopted by the Friendly Nations Resolution, the UN General Assembly in 1970. That resolution was then reiterated in the International Court of Justice ruling, advisory opinion in 2004. That was the basis of the coalition against Iraq when it acquired Kuwait and then declared it a province of Kuwait.
Okay. Mr. Bonnell, that principle was adopted by the Friendly Nations Resolution, the UN General Assembly in 1970. That resolution was then reiterated in the International Court of Justice ruling, advisory opinion in 2004. That was the basis of the coalition against Iraq when it acquired Kuwait and then declared it a province of Kuwait.
Steven Bonnell
Which Arafat supported.
Which Arafat supported.
Norman Finkelstein
That’s what’s called-
That’s what’s called-
Benny Morris
That’s true. Arafat did-
That’s true. Arafat did-
Steven Bonnell
Arafat did support it.
Arafat did support it.
Benny Morris
Arafat did support it.
Arafat did support it.
Steven Bonnell
[inaudible 04:20:11].
[inaudible 04:20:11].
Norman Finkelstein
It’s not accurate. I’m not going to go there. I’m not going to go there.
It’s not accurate. I’m not going to go there. I’m not going to go there.
Steven Bonnell
It’s not accurate that Arafat endorsed-
It’s not accurate that Arafat endorsed-
Norman Finkelstein
Okay, I’m not going to go there.
Okay, I’m not going to go there.
Steven Bonnell
Okay. [inaudible 04:20:18].
Okay. [inaudible 04:20:18].
Norman Finkelstein
It’s called, under international law, jus cogens or peremptory norms of international law, the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war. That is not controversial. It’s not vague. You couldn’t put it more succinctly. You cannot acquire territory by force under international law.
It’s called, under international law, jus cogens or peremptory norms of international law, the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war. That is not controversial. It’s not vague. You couldn’t put it more succinctly. You cannot acquire territory by force under international law.
Steven Bonnell
On the West Bank before ’67, who owned the Gaza Strip before ’67?
On the West Bank before ’67, who owned the Gaza Strip before ’67?
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Bonnell, don’t change the subject. If you don’t know what you’re talking about-
Mr. Bonnell, don’t change the subject. If you don’t know what you’re talking about-
Steven Bonnell
It’s not about [inaudible 04:20:50]-
It’s not about [inaudible 04:20:50]-
Norman Finkelstein
… at least have the humility-
… at least have the humility-
Steven Bonnell
How close has 242-
How close has 242-
Norman Finkelstein
You talk about Chapter VI-
You talk about Chapter VI-
Steven Bonnell
How close has 242 gotten-
How close has 242 gotten-
Norman Finkelstein
You don’t know Chapter VI-
You don’t know Chapter VI-
Steven Bonnell
How close has 242 gotten the Palestinians to peace?
How close has 242 gotten the Palestinians to peace?
Norman Finkelstein
You don’t know Chapter VI from tweet five. You have no idea what you’re talking about. It’s just so embarrassing. At least have some humility. Between us who have read maybe 10,000 books on the topic and you’ve read two Wikipedia entries and you start talking about Chapter VI. Do you know what Chapter VII is?
You don’t know Chapter VI from tweet five. You have no idea what you’re talking about. It’s just so embarrassing. At least have some humility. Between us who have read maybe 10,000 books on the topic and you’ve read two Wikipedia entries and you start talking about Chapter VI. Do you know what Chapter VII is?
Steven Bonnell
Answer me. Answer the question.
Answer me. Answer the question.
Norman Finkelstein
Do you know what Chapter VII is?
Do you know what Chapter VII is?
Steven Bonnell
Norm, answer the question. How close has 242 gotten the Palestinians to a state?
Norm, answer the question. How close has 242 gotten the Palestinians to a state?
Mouin Rabbani
Let me ask you this.
Let me ask you this.
Steven Bonnell
How close has the 2004 advisory opinion gotten the West Bank settlement [inaudible 04:21:26]?
How close has the 2004 advisory opinion gotten the West Bank settlement [inaudible 04:21:26]?
Mouin Rabbani
What’s your alternative?
What’s your alternative?
Steven Bonnell
The alternative is not this, whatever this making money off the conflict is. The actual alternative-
The alternative is not this, whatever this making money off the conflict is. The actual alternative-
Norman Finkelstein
[inaudible 04:21:33] making money-
[inaudible 04:21:33] making money-
Steven Bonnell
The actual alternative-
The actual alternative-
Norman Finkelstein
Destiny should talk about making money off of idiocy.
Destiny should talk about making money off of idiocy.
Steven Bonnell
Yes. Yeah, you’re a media [inaudible 04:21:37] when you go and talk to 50 million different people about your awesome [inaudible 04:21:40].
Yes. Yeah, you’re a media [inaudible 04:21:37] when you go and talk to 50 million different people about your awesome [inaudible 04:21:40].
Benny Morris
But he has a point, though.
But he has a point, though.
Norman Finkelstein
What point?
What point?
Steven Bonnell
But the issue is you have to negotiate-
But the issue is you have to negotiate-
Benny Morris
All these resolutions have gotten the Palestinians no closer to a state.
All these resolutions have gotten the Palestinians no closer to a state.
Steven Bonnell
Nothing.
Nothing.
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah, but hold on. Because they haven’t been enforced because of the US veto.
Yeah, but hold on. Because they haven’t been enforced because of the US veto.
Benny Morris
They’re not going to be enforced.
They’re not going to be enforced.
Norman Finkelstein
Wait, wait, wait, wait.
Wait, wait, wait, wait.
Benny Morris
They’ve gotten nowhere-
They’ve gotten nowhere-
Mouin Rabbani
If I may, if I may-
If I may, if I may-
Steven Bonnell
[inaudible 04:21:52].
[inaudible 04:21:52].
Norman Finkelstein
You know what? You know what? Professor Morris-
You know what? You know what? Professor Morris-
Steven Bonnell
[inaudible 04:21:58] about the case for genocide.
[inaudible 04:21:58] about the case for genocide.
Norman Finkelstein
Professor Morris, because of your logic, and I’m not disputing it, that’s why October 7th happened.
Professor Morris, because of your logic, and I’m not disputing it, that’s why October 7th happened.
Benny Morris
Oh my God.
Oh my God.
Norman Finkelstein
Because there was no options left for those people. Exactly what Mouin said.
Because there was no options left for those people. Exactly what Mouin said.
Benny Morris
And now what options are left? After October 7th-
And now what options are left? After October 7th-
Steven Bonnell
This has been the Palestinian mentality for 60 years.
This has been the Palestinian mentality for 60 years.
Benny Morris
… what’s the options left?
… what’s the options left?
Steven Bonnell
The only option is conflict.
The only option is conflict.
Norman Finkelstein
Listen to this.
Listen to this.
Steven Bonnell
The only option is combat.
The only option is combat.
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Bonnell is now an expert on Palestinian mentality.
Mr. Bonnell is now an expert on Palestinian mentality.
Mouin Rabbani
Hold on. You’re contradicting yourself.
Hold on. You’re contradicting yourself.
Norman Finkelstein
You know as much about Palestinian politics as you know about Chapter V.
You know as much about Palestinian politics as you know about Chapter V.
Steven Bonnell
I only deal with facts. I only deal with facts. Egypt didn’t find it necessary to-
I only deal with facts. I only deal with facts. Egypt didn’t find it necessary to-
Norman Finkelstein
Tell me about Chapter V.
Tell me about Chapter V.
Steven Bonnell
Egypt didn’t find it necessary-
Egypt didn’t find it necessary-
Norman Finkelstein
Tell me about Chapter V.
Tell me about Chapter V.
Steven Bonnell
… to negotiate peace [inaudible 04:22:34] the Palestinians. Jordan didn’t find it necessary to negotiate peace [inaudible 04:22:36] the Palestinians.
… to negotiate peace [inaudible 04:22:34] the Palestinians. Jordan didn’t find it necessary to negotiate peace [inaudible 04:22:36] the Palestinians.
Mouin Rabbani
Hey, if I may-
Hey, if I may-
Steven Bonnell
The Abraham Accords [inaudible 04:22:37] the Palestinians-
The Abraham Accords [inaudible 04:22:37] the Palestinians-
Norman Finkelstein
Talk faster, faster, faster, faster.
Talk faster, faster, faster, faster.
Steven Bonnell
… despite all of the international law-
… despite all of the international law-
Lex Fridman
Everybody, Mouin.
Everybody, Mouin.
Norman Finkelstein
Faster.
Faster.
Mouin Rabbani
You’re contradicting yourself. On the one hand, you’re saying all the Palestinians do is fight and violence and terrorism and all the rest of it, but on the other hand, you’re saying they’re expecting salvation from UN resolutions and international court. Those aren’t violent.
You’re contradicting yourself. On the one hand, you’re saying all the Palestinians do is fight and violence and terrorism and all the rest of it, but on the other hand, you’re saying they’re expecting salvation from UN resolutions and international court. Those aren’t violent.
Norman Finkelstein
It’s the law.
It’s the law.
Steven Bonnell
No, but it’s part of maintaining-
No, but it’s part of maintaining-
Norman Finkelstein
It’s the law.
It’s the law.
Steven Bonnell
It’s the continual putting off of negotiating any solution.
It’s the continual putting off of negotiating any solution.
Norman Finkelstein
[inaudible 04:23:06].
[inaudible 04:23:06].
Mouin Rabbani
They’ve negotiated.
They’ve negotiated.
Steven Bonnell
As in when Arafat takes 10 days to respond-
As in when Arafat takes 10 days to respond-
Norman Finkelstein
I think he said-
I think he said-
Steven Bonnell
When Arafat takes 10 days to respond and hops on a jet all over the world to go and visit his friends, yes.
When Arafat takes 10 days to respond and hops on a jet all over the world to go and visit his friends, yes.
Norman Finkelstein
I think Mouin said-
I think Mouin said-
Steven Bonnell
But it’s for putting the conflict off indefinitely.
But it’s for putting the conflict off indefinitely.
Norman Finkelstein
… they accepted two states in 1975. Brace yourself.
… they accepted two states in 1975. Brace yourself.
Benny Morris
They didn’t.
They didn’t.
Steven Bonnell
Why didn’t they accept the Taba Summit then?
Why didn’t they accept the Taba Summit then?
Norman Finkelstein
Brace yourself. That’s 50 years ago.
Brace yourself. That’s 50 years ago.
Steven Bonnell
Why didn’t they accept the Camp David [inaudible 04:23:19]?
Why didn’t they accept the Camp David [inaudible 04:23:19]?
Benny Morris
This is a legend.
This is a legend.
Norman Finkelstein
That’s a half-century ago.
That’s a half-century ago.
Benny Morris
No, no, they didn’t accept a two-state solution [inaudible 04:23:26].
No, no, they didn’t accept a two-state solution [inaudible 04:23:26].
Norman Finkelstein
He quoted a very good article [inaudible 04:23:28].
He quoted a very good article [inaudible 04:23:28].
Steven Bonnell
You can quote Arafat talking about how he’s lying and he’s just going to use… In ’94 and ’95 when he’s making trips around the world, how he just wanted [inaudible 04:23:35] starting ground.
You can quote Arafat talking about how he’s lying and he’s just going to use… In ’94 and ’95 when he’s making trips around the world, how he just wanted [inaudible 04:23:35] starting ground.
Norman Finkelstein
Talk faster. Talk faster.
Talk faster. Talk faster.
Steven Bonnell
I’m sorry. I can’t talk slow. You can watch [inaudible 04:23:38] and slow it down to 0.5 speed if you don’t understand what I’m saying.
I’m sorry. I can’t talk slow. You can watch [inaudible 04:23:38] and slow it down to 0.5 speed if you don’t understand what I’m saying.
Norman Finkelstein
Faster. Faster.
Faster. Faster.
Mouin Rabbani
There’s a very lengthy history-
There’s a very lengthy history-
Norman Finkelstein
Motor mouth.
Motor mouth.
Mouin Rabbani
… of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. You want to deny that those negotiations took place.
… of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. You want to deny that those negotiations took place.
Steven Bonnell
Where it feels like there was a good-faith effort-
Where it feels like there was a good-faith effort-
Norman Finkelstein
What it feels like.
What it feels like.
Steven Bonnell
Where there was a good-faith effort-
Where there was a good-faith effort-
Norman Finkelstein
Feels like.
Feels like.
Steven Bonnell
Where there was a good-faith effort-
Where there was a good-faith effort-
Norman Finkelstein
We have a written record.
We have a written record.
Steven Bonnell
With all due respect-
With all due respect-
Norman Finkelstein
We have a written record, Mr. Bonnell.
We have a written record, Mr. Bonnell.
Steven Bonnell
Mr. Pop History, you can’t even read the written records. I don’t know why you’re referring to them. Okay.
Mr. Pop History, you can’t even read the written records. I don’t know why you’re referring to them. Okay.
Norman Finkelstein
Excuse me? I just said there are 15,000 pages on Annapolis.
Excuse me? I just said there are 15,000 pages on Annapolis.
Steven Bonnell
And I’m sure you cherry-picked your favorite quotes from all of them. Okay.
And I’m sure you cherry-picked your favorite quotes from all of them. Okay.
Norman Finkelstein
I don’t cherry-pick.
I don’t cherry-pick.
Steven Bonnell
That’s great. That’s great.
That’s great. That’s great.
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Bonnell, at least I had a quote to cherry-pick.
Mr. Bonnell, at least I had a quote to cherry-pick.
Steven Bonnell
That’s great. [inaudible 04:24:12].
That’s great. [inaudible 04:24:12].
Norman Finkelstein
All you have is Wikipedia.
All you have is Wikipedia.
Steven Bonnell
I gave you quotes.
I gave you quotes.
Norman Finkelstein
All you have is Wikipedia.
All you have is Wikipedia.
Steven Bonnell
Do you want quotes? Find me the information that shows the Palestinian cause has been furthered by any international law. You can’t do it.
Do you want quotes? Find me the information that shows the Palestinian cause has been furthered by any international law. You can’t do it.
Mouin Rabbani
I think the problem is different. Okay. You want to say the Palestinians were only fighting. And then when I point out they’ve also gone to the court and the UN, you say, “Well, all they do then is these things and they should be negotiating.” And I demonstrate that there was a lengthy record of negotiations. You said, “Yeah, but they didn’t go in good faith.” Again, you’re placing the hamster in the wheel and telling him if he runs fast enough, maybe one day he’ll get out of the cage.
I think the problem is different. Okay. You want to say the Palestinians were only fighting. And then when I point out they’ve also gone to the court and the UN, you say, “Well, all they do then is these things and they should be negotiating.” And I demonstrate that there was a lengthy record of negotiations. You said, “Yeah, but they didn’t go in good faith.” Again, you’re placing the hamster in the wheel and telling him if he runs fast enough, maybe one day he’ll get out of the cage.
Steven Bonnell
What was the best good-faith negotiation on the side of the-
What was the best good-faith negotiation on the side of the-
Mouin Rabbani
Okay. Please, if I could just finish. I think the fundamental problem here is not what the Palestinians have and haven’t done, and it’s perfectly legitimate to have a discussion about whether they could have been more effective. Of course, they could have been more effective. Everyone could have always been more effective. The fundamental issue here is that Israel has never been prepared to concede the legitimacy of Palestinian national rights in the land of the former British mandate of Palestine.
Okay. Please, if I could just finish. I think the fundamental problem here is not what the Palestinians have and haven’t done, and it’s perfectly legitimate to have a discussion about whether they could have been more effective. Of course, they could have been more effective. Everyone could have always been more effective. The fundamental issue here is that Israel has never been prepared to concede the legitimacy of Palestinian national rights in the land of the former British mandate of Palestine.
Steven Bonnell
Then how do you explain Taba Summit? How do you explain Camp David?
Then how do you explain Taba Summit? How do you explain Camp David?
Benny Morris
No, Barack and Olmert did accept the legitimacy-
No, Barack and Olmert did accept the legitimacy-
Steven Bonnell
How do you explain Olmert’s offer to Abbas? Yeah.
How do you explain Olmert’s offer to Abbas? Yeah.
Benny Morris
… of Palestinian demands. But they didn’t want to give the Palestinians all of Palestine, that’s all.
… of Palestinian demands. But they didn’t want to give the Palestinians all of Palestine, that’s all.
Norman Finkelstein
No, all of Palestine? No, no.
No, all of Palestine? No, no.
Mouin Rabbani
You mean all of the occupied territories?
You mean all of the occupied territories?
Benny Morris
You’re talking about all of Palestine being occupied territory?
You’re talking about all of Palestine being occupied territory?
Steven Bonnell
Wait. What is the occupied territories?
Wait. What is the occupied territories?
Norman Finkelstein
Professor Morris.
Professor Morris.
Mouin Rabbani
The occupied territories-
The occupied territories-
Steven Bonnell
Is that all of Israel?
Is that all of Israel?
Norman Finkelstein
Professor Morris, could you show me-
Professor Morris, could you show me-
Mouin Rabbani
The occupied territories are those territories that Israel occupied in June of 1967.
The occupied territories are those territories that Israel occupied in June of 1967.
Norman Finkelstein
Could you show me-
Could you show me-
Benny Morris
Palestinians often use that term to define the whole of Palestine, not just the West Bank.
Palestinians often use that term to define the whole of Palestine, not just the West Bank.
Norman Finkelstein
Could you show me, Professor Morris, in all the negotiations, all the negotiations and all the accounts that have been written, can you show me one where the Palestinians in the negotiations, because that’s what we were talking about, wanted all of Israel? The maximum-
Could you show me, Professor Morris, in all the negotiations, all the negotiations and all the accounts that have been written, can you show me one where the Palestinians in the negotiations, because that’s what we were talking about, wanted all of Israel? The maximum-
Benny Morris
They can’t say that because the international community won’t accept it.
They can’t say that because the international community won’t accept it.
Norman Finkelstein
Oh, so you know it because you know what-
Oh, so you know it because you know what-
Mouin Rabbani
So they didn’t say it. They didn’t ask for it.
So they didn’t say it. They didn’t ask for it.
Norman Finkelstein
… but you know what’s in their hearts.
… but you know what’s in their hearts.
Benny Morris
No, Hamas did. Hamas always said all of it.
No, Hamas did. Hamas always said all of it.
Mouin Rabbani
Hamas only negotiated with Israel about prisoner exchanges [inaudible 04:26:36].
Hamas only negotiated with Israel about prisoner exchanges [inaudible 04:26:36].
Benny Morris
No, I know. But they represent-
No, I know. But they represent-
Norman Finkelstein
So we were talking about the negotiations.
So we were talking about the negotiations.
Benny Morris
… a lot of the Palestinian people, you will agree.
… a lot of the Palestinian people, you will agree.
Norman Finkelstein
The only place I saw pieces of Israel were the land swaps, and the land swaps accounted for about 2-5% of Israel. Nobody asked for all of Israel. Why do you say things like that?
The only place I saw pieces of Israel were the land swaps, and the land swaps accounted for about 2-5% of Israel. Nobody asked for all of Israel. Why do you say things like that?
Steven Bonnell
What do you mean? They asked for all of Israel in ’48. They asked for all of Israel in ’67. What do you think those reports were about?
What do you mean? They asked for all of Israel in ’48. They asked for all of Israel in ’67. What do you think those reports were about?
Norman Finkelstein
Okay. Mr. Bonnell, you talk so-
Okay. Mr. Bonnell, you talk so-
Steven Bonnell
You’re not going to respond to anything I’m saying because you have no answer.
You’re not going to respond to anything I’m saying because you have no answer.
Norman Finkelstein
I’ll respond to you. Okay. Mr. Bonnell, we were talking about the diplomatic negotiations beginning with 2001.
I’ll respond to you. Okay. Mr. Bonnell, we were talking about the diplomatic negotiations beginning with 2001.
Steven Bonnell
Yes, I understand, but you can’t pretend that the first ask for Israel was in diplomacy. It was through war.
Yes, I understand, but you can’t pretend that the first ask for Israel was in diplomacy. It was through war.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay. You don’t know what you’re talking about.
Okay. You don’t know what you’re talking about.
Steven Bonnell
Is the international law argument ever going to get the Palestinians closer to state? Is the Israeli state ever going to be dismantled? Do you think that’s realistic coming up, ever, in the next 20 years?
Is the international law argument ever going to get the Palestinians closer to state? Is the Israeli state ever going to be dismantled? Do you think that’s realistic coming up, ever, in the next 20 years?
Mouin Rabbani
Again, I’m posing a question, and the question is, regardless of what’s feasible or realistic today, the question I’m posing is, can you have peace in the Middle East with this militant, irrational, genocidal, apartheid state and power?
Again, I’m posing a question, and the question is, regardless of what’s feasible or realistic today, the question I’m posing is, can you have peace in the Middle East with this militant, irrational, genocidal, apartheid state and power?
Steven Bonnell
[inaudible 04:27:49] I don’t think so, no.
[inaudible 04:27:49] I don’t think so, no.
Mouin Rabbani
Okay. And the question I’m asking is, can you have peace with this regime or does this regime and its institutions need to be dismantled, similar to the examples I gave of Europe and Southern Africa?
Okay. And the question I’m asking is, can you have peace with this regime or does this regime and its institutions need to be dismantled, similar to the examples I gave of Europe and Southern Africa?
Steven Bonnell
How do you contend with the fact that most of the surrounding Arab states seem to agree that you can?
How do you contend with the fact that most of the surrounding Arab states seem to agree that you can?
Mouin Rabbani
Yeah, you’re correct. Several of them, most importantly, Egypt, Jordan, have made their peace with Israel. I should add that Israel’s conduct since then has placed these relations under strain. I had very little… I didn’t take the reports of a Saudi-Israeli rapprochement particularly seriously before October 7th, the reason being that it was really a Saudi-Israeli-US deal, which committed the US to make certain commitments to Saudi Arabia that would probably never get through Congress.
Yeah, you’re correct. Several of them, most importantly, Egypt, Jordan, have made their peace with Israel. I should add that Israel’s conduct since then has placed these relations under strain. I had very little… I didn’t take the reports of a Saudi-Israeli rapprochement particularly seriously before October 7th, the reason being that it was really a Saudi-Israeli-US deal, which committed the US to make certain commitments to Saudi Arabia that would probably never get through Congress.
Steven Bonnell
Do you not consider the Egypt-Israeli peace deal legitimate then since the United States made a great financial contribution to Egypt?
Do you not consider the Egypt-Israeli peace deal legitimate then since the United States made a great financial contribution to Egypt?
Mouin Rabbani
I don’t think the question is whether that deal is legitimate or not. I think that deal exists. But the point is, the core of this conflict is not between Israel and Egypt. The core of this conflict is between Israel and the Palestinian people.
I don’t think the question is whether that deal is legitimate or not. I think that deal exists. But the point is, the core of this conflict is not between Israel and Egypt. The core of this conflict is between Israel and the Palestinian people.
And the reason that Israel agreed to relinquish the occupied Egyptian Sinai and the reason that Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty was signed in 1979 is because Israel, in 1973, recognized that its military superiority was ultimately no match for Egypt’s determination to recover its occupied territories and that there would come a point when Egypt would find a way to extract an unbearable price.
Benny Morris
Maybe just Israelis wanted peace.
Maybe just Israelis wanted peace.
Mouin Rabbani
Well, the Israelis wanted-
Well, the Israelis wanted-
Benny Morris
Not just because they were afraid of what Egypt might do at some point.
Not just because they were afraid of what Egypt might do at some point.
Mouin Rabbani
If you’re talking about the average Israeli citizen, I think that’s a fair characterization. If you’re talking about the Israeli leadership, I think they looked at it in more strategic terms of how do you remove-
If you’re talking about the average Israeli citizen, I think that’s a fair characterization. If you’re talking about the Israeli leadership, I think they looked at it in more strategic terms of how do you remove-
Benny Morris
I think it’s both.
I think it’s both.
Mouin Rabbani
… the most powerful Arab military states from the equation?
… the most powerful Arab military states from the equation?
Norman Finkelstein
Two points. Simple points. What was the terms of that Egypt-Israel peace treaty? International law, Egypt demanded every-
Two points. Simple points. What was the terms of that Egypt-Israel peace treaty? International law, Egypt demanded every-
Benny Morris
Nobody cared about international law.
Nobody cared about international law.
Norman Finkelstein
Allow me to finish. Every single inch of Egyptian-
Allow me to finish. Every single inch of Egyptian-
Benny Morris
Nobody [inaudible 04:30:30] about international law.
Nobody [inaudible 04:30:30] about international law.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay.
Okay.
Benny Morris
Begin and Carter and Sadat talk about the realities-
Begin and Carter and Sadat talk about the realities-
Norman Finkelstein
No, Professor-
No, Professor-
Benny Morris
… of Israel occupying territory and wanting peace.
… of Israel occupying territory and wanting peace.
Norman Finkelstein
Professor Morris, I know the record. They demanded, as you know because you’ve written about it, they demanded every square inch, as you know. They demanded the oil fields be dismantled, the airfields be dismantled.
Professor Morris, I know the record. They demanded, as you know because you’ve written about it, they demanded every square inch, as you know. They demanded the oil fields be dismantled, the airfields be dismantled.
Benny Morris
No, not dismantle. They wanted the oil fields.
No, not dismantle. They wanted the oil fields.
Norman Finkelstein
And they wanted the settlements dismantled.
And they wanted the settlements dismantled.
Benny Morris
They wanted the settlements dismantled.
They wanted the settlements dismantled.
Norman Finkelstein
The settlements, the oil fields, and the airfield, they demanded all three back. You can’t have-
The settlements, the oil fields, and the airfield, they demanded all three back. You can’t have-
Benny Morris
What do you mean “back”? The airfields weren’t there when the Egyptians were there.
What do you mean “back”? The airfields weren’t there when the Egyptians were there.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay. That’s incorrect.
Okay. That’s incorrect.
Benny Morris
What’s incorrect?
What’s incorrect?
Norman Finkelstein
You’re incorrect.
You’re incorrect.
Benny Morris
The airfields were built after-
The airfields were built after-
Norman Finkelstein
They built an airfield. The Israelis built an airfield in the occupied Sinai.
They built an airfield. The Israelis built an airfield in the occupied Sinai.
Benny Morris
Yes.
Yes.
Norman Finkelstein
And they wanted it back.
And they wanted it back.
Benny Morris
They didn’t want it back. It wasn’t theirs.
They didn’t want it back. It wasn’t theirs.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay.
Okay.
Benny Morris
They wanted the territory in which the airfields were built back.
They wanted the territory in which the airfields were built back.
Norman Finkelstein
The oil fields, the airfields, the settlements had to be dismantled.
The oil fields, the airfields, the settlements had to be dismantled.
Benny Morris
Yes.
Yes.
Norman Finkelstein
Begin said, “I don’t want to be the first prime minister to dismantle a settlement.”
Begin said, “I don’t want to be the first prime minister to dismantle a settlement.”
Benny Morris
But he did.
But he did.
Norman Finkelstein
But he did. Why? Because of the law.
But he did. Why? Because of the law.
Benny Morris
No.
No.
Steven Bonnell
No. It was because of peace… It was normalization-
No. It was because of peace… It was normalization-
Benny Morris
Nobody cared about the law. The law had nothing to do with anything. It was a negotiation between two states-
Nobody cared about the law. The law had nothing to do with anything. It was a negotiation between two states-
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Morris. Mr. Morris.
Mr. Morris. Mr. Morris.
Benny Morris
… each of which wanted certain things.
… each of which wanted certain things.
Norman Finkelstein
Palestinians [inaudible 04:31:42]-
Palestinians [inaudible 04:31:42]-
Benny Morris
The law had nothing to do with anything.
The law had nothing to do with anything.
Norman Finkelstein
… as they said repeatedly in the negotiations-
… as they said repeatedly in the negotiations-
Benny Morris
You’re not listening. You’re not listening.
You’re not listening. You’re not listening.
Norman Finkelstein
I know-
I know-
Benny Morris
You’re missing the whole point.
You’re missing the whole point.
Norman Finkelstein
I’ve read the negotiations.
I’ve read the negotiations.
Benny Morris
The law has nothing to do with anything.
The law has nothing to do with anything.
Norman Finkelstein
There were two foreign relations of US volumes on it.
There were two foreign relations of US volumes on it.
Benny Morris
Nobody cared about the law.
Nobody cared about the law.
Norman Finkelstein
The Palestinians kept saying, “We want exactly-“
The Palestinians kept saying, “We want exactly-“
Benny Morris
Forget the Palestinians. They weren’t there.
Forget the Palestinians. They weren’t there.
Norman Finkelstein
Allow me to finish. The Palestinians kept saying, “We want what Egypt got.”
Allow me to finish. The Palestinians kept saying, “We want what Egypt got.”
Norman Finkelstein
The Palestinians kept saying, “We want what Egypt got. We want what Egypt got.” Egypt got everything back.
The Palestinians kept saying, “We want what Egypt got. We want what Egypt got.” Egypt got everything back.
Benny Morris
But nothing to do with the law.
But nothing to do with the law.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay.
Okay.
Benny Morris
Nothing to do with the law.
Nothing to do with the law.
Norman Finkelstein
And number two, I’m not saying it’s the whole picture, but as Foreign Minister Moshe Dayan said at the time, he said, “If a car has four wheels and you remove one wheel, the car can’t move.” And for them, removing Egypt from the Arab front would then remove any Arab military threat to Israel.
And number two, I’m not saying it’s the whole picture, but as Foreign Minister Moshe Dayan said at the time, he said, “If a car has four wheels and you remove one wheel, the car can’t move.” And for them, removing Egypt from the Arab front would then remove any Arab military threat to Israel.
Benny Morris
Yeah, but it’s got nothing to do with the international law.
Yeah, but it’s got nothing to do with the international law.
Norman Finkelstein
No, the first part did, and that’s what the Palestinians kept saying-
No, the first part did, and that’s what the Palestinians kept saying-
Benny Morris
I don’t know what the first part is.
I don’t know what the first part is.
Norman Finkelstein
… “We want what each Egypt got from the settlement.”
… “We want what each Egypt got from the settlement.”
Benny Morris
Yeah, that’s true, but forget the international law.
Yeah, that’s true, but forget the international law.
Norman Finkelstein
By the way-
By the way-
Benny Morris
It had nothing to do with negotiations.
It had nothing to do with negotiations.
Norman Finkelstein
… one last thing on a personal note. The quote about Sharm El Sheikh without peace, that’s the only thing you ever cited from a book of mine.
… one last thing on a personal note. The quote about Sharm El Sheikh without peace, that’s the only thing you ever cited from a book of mine.
Benny Morris
I’ve cited from your book?
I’ve cited from your book?
Norman Finkelstein
Yes. I was absolutely shocked at your betrayal of your people. That was pure treason.I
Yes. I was absolutely shocked at your betrayal of your people. That was pure treason.I
Benny Morris
I apologize for that. I apologize.
I apologize for that. I apologize.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay, I accept.
Okay, I accept.
Hope for the future
Lex Fridman
All right. Well, let me try once again, for the region and for the entirety of humanity, what gives you hope? We just heard a lot of pessimistic, cynical takes. What gives you hope?
All right. Well, let me try once again, for the region and for the entirety of humanity, what gives you hope? We just heard a lot of pessimistic, cynical takes. What gives you hope?
Benny Morris
People don’t like war. That’s a good reason, that’s hope. In other words, the fear of war, the disaster of war, should give people an impetus to try and seek peace.
People don’t like war. That’s a good reason, that’s hope. In other words, the fear of war, the disaster of war, should give people an impetus to try and seek peace.
Lex Fridman
When you look at people in Gaza and people on the West Bank, people in Israel, fundamentally they hate war?
When you look at people in Gaza and people on the West Bank, people in Israel, fundamentally they hate war?
Benny Morris
Yes, I think so.
Yes, I think so.
Lex Fridman
What gives you hope?
What gives you hope?
Norman Finkelstein
There is no hope, no. It’s an extreme… Hey, I’m not happy to say that.
There is no hope, no. It’s an extreme… Hey, I’m not happy to say that.
Steven Bonnell
Of course you are.
Of course you are.
Norman Finkelstein
It’s a very bleak moment right now.
It’s a very bleak moment right now.
Benny Morris
That I agree with. I agree with that.
That I agree with. I agree with that.
Norman Finkelstein
Because Israel believes it has to restore what it calls its deterrence capability. I think you’ve written about it actually, I just realized. Israel has to restore its deterrence capability, and after the catastrophe of October 7th, restoring its deterrence capacity means… this part you didn’t write about… the annihilation of Gaza and then moving on to the Hezbollah.
Because Israel believes it has to restore what it calls its deterrence capability. I think you’ve written about it actually, I just realized. Israel has to restore its deterrence capability, and after the catastrophe of October 7th, restoring its deterrence capacity means… this part you didn’t write about… the annihilation of Gaza and then moving on to the Hezbollah.
So the Israelis are dead set on restoring that deterrence capability. On the Arab side, and I know Mouin and I have disagreed on it, and we’re allowed to disagree, I think the Arab side, the lesson they learned from October 7th is Israelis aren’t as strong as we thought they were.
Benny Morris
That would be an unfortunate message if that’s really what the Arabs come to believe.
That would be an unfortunate message if that’s really what the Arabs come to believe.
Norman Finkelstein
And they think that there is a military option now. I think that it’s a zero-sum game at this point, and it’s very, very bleak, and I’m not going to lie about that. Now, I will admit my predictive capacities are not perfect-
And they think that there is a military option now. I think that it’s a zero-sum game at this point, and it’s very, very bleak, and I’m not going to lie about that. Now, I will admit my predictive capacities are not perfect-
Benny Morris
Are limited.
Are limited.
Norman Finkelstein
… are limited, but for the moment it’s a very bleak situation-
… are limited, but for the moment it’s a very bleak situation-
Benny Morris
That I agree with.
That I agree with.
Norman Finkelstein
… and I don’t see right now a way out. However, at the very minimum, permanent ceasefire ended in human and illegal blockade of Gaza, and free the hostages.
… and I don’t see right now a way out. However, at the very minimum, permanent ceasefire ended in human and illegal blockade of Gaza, and free the hostages.
Benny Morris
Why is it illegal? They were shooting rockets at Israel for 20 years. Why is that illegal to blockade Gaza?
Why is it illegal? They were shooting rockets at Israel for 20 years. Why is that illegal to blockade Gaza?
Steven Bonnell
He thinks they’re bottle rockets, that’s what he calls them [inaudible 04:35:47].
He thinks they’re bottle rockets, that’s what he calls them [inaudible 04:35:47].
Norman Finkelstein
Why is it illegal? I’ll tell you why.
Why is it illegal? I’ll tell you why.
Benny Morris
You don’t rocket your neighbor. You rocket your neighbor, expect consequences.
You don’t rocket your neighbor. You rocket your neighbor, expect consequences.
Norman Finkelstein
I’ll tell you why.
I’ll tell you why.
Benny Morris
Expect consequences.
Expect consequences.
Mouin Rabbani
But that works both ways.
But that works both ways.
Norman Finkelstein
Yes.
Yes.
Benny Morris
I know, and I accept that, it works both ways.
I know, and I accept that, it works both ways.
Norman Finkelstein
Professor Morris. I’ll tell you why. Because every human rights, humanitarian and UN organization in the world-
Professor Morris. I’ll tell you why. Because every human rights, humanitarian and UN organization in the world-
Benny Morris
They’re all irrelevant.
They’re all irrelevant.
Norman Finkelstein
… has said that the blockade-
… has said that the blockade-
Benny Morris
You keep quoting them. Nobody cares about Amnesty.
You keep quoting them. Nobody cares about Amnesty.
Norman Finkelstein
… is a form of collective punishment-
… is a form of collective punishment-
Benny Morris
Nobody cares about Amnesty.
Nobody cares about Amnesty.
Norman Finkelstein
… which is illegal under international law.
… which is illegal under international law.
Benny Morris
Forget illegal. The word illegal is…
Forget illegal. The word illegal is…
Norman Finkelstein
You think a blockade which-
You think a blockade which-
Benny Morris
You don’t understand the way the world works. These things are irrelevant.
You don’t understand the way the world works. These things are irrelevant.
Norman Finkelstein
And you think confining, because that’s the blockade-
And you think confining, because that’s the blockade-
Benny Morris
Yes, you don’t shoot rockets at your neighbor.
Yes, you don’t shoot rockets at your neighbor.
Norman Finkelstein
… confining a million children-
… confining a million children-
Benny Morris
That’s the choice of Hamas.
That’s the choice of Hamas.
Steven Bonnell
Children?
Children?
Benny Morris
That’s Hamas’ choice.
That’s Hamas’ choice.
Norman Finkelstein
Confining a million children in what The Economist calls a human rubbish heap-
Confining a million children in what The Economist calls a human rubbish heap-
Benny Morris
The Economist supported Israel in this war, and continues to support Israel.
The Economist supported Israel in this war, and continues to support Israel.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay. What International Committee of The Red Cross called a sinking ship, what the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights called a toxic slum, you think-
Okay. What International Committee of The Red Cross called a sinking ship, what the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights called a toxic slum, you think-
Benny Morris
It is a slum, of course it’s a slum, but it’s caused by the Hamas.
It is a slum, of course it’s a slum, but it’s caused by the Hamas.
Norman Finkelstein
… under international law, you think it’s legitimate-
… under international law, you think it’s legitimate-
Benny Morris
Forget the law.
Forget the law.
Norman Finkelstein
Hey, I know you want to forget the law.
Hey, I know you want to forget the law.
Benny Morris
What about morality? Forget the law, what about morality?
What about morality? Forget the law, what about morality?
Norman Finkelstein
It’s what every Israeli fears the most.
It’s what every Israeli fears the most.
Benny Morris
What?
What?
Norman Finkelstein
The law.
The law.
Benny Morris
No, no, no.
No, no, no.
Norman Finkelstein
As Tzipi Livni said, “I studied international law. I oppose international law.” Of course you don’t want to hear about the law.
As Tzipi Livni said, “I studied international law. I oppose international law.” Of course you don’t want to hear about the law.
Benny Morris
That has got nothing to do with anything.
That has got nothing to do with anything.
Norman Finkelstein
Okay, so here’s the thing. Then don’t complain about October 7th.
Okay, so here’s the thing. Then don’t complain about October 7th.
Benny Morris
Do you hear me complaining? I didn’t complain.
Do you hear me complaining? I didn’t complain.
Norman Finkelstein
If you want to say forget about the law-
If you want to say forget about the law-
Benny Morris
All I said was they acted like barbarians.
All I said was they acted like barbarians.
Norman Finkelstein
… when there is no international humanitarian law, there’s no distinction between civilians and combatants-
… when there is no international humanitarian law, there’s no distinction between civilians and combatants-
Benny Morris
There should be, but it’s got nothing to do with the law.
There should be, but it’s got nothing to do with the law.
Norman Finkelstein
Now you’re doing what Mouin said, you’re becoming very selective about the law. If you want to forget about the law-
Now you’re doing what Mouin said, you’re becoming very selective about the law. If you want to forget about the law-
Benny Morris
People should be [inaudible 04:37:51].
People should be [inaudible 04:37:51].
Mouin Rabbani
Across the board.
Across the board.
Norman Finkelstein
… Hamas had every right to do what it did. It had every right to do what it did according to you, not to me, because you want to forget the law.
… Hamas had every right to do what it did. It had every right to do what it did according to you, not to me, because you want to forget the law.
Steven Bonnell
Do you still support the Houthis shooting random ships?
Do you still support the Houthis shooting random ships?
Norman Finkelstein
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
Steven Bonnell
Okay, that’s a violation of international law, so you play the same game.
Okay, that’s a violation of international law, so you play the same game.
Norman Finkelstein
Absolutely. And were there are power during World War II who had the courage of the Houthis, were there are power that had that kind of courage-
Absolutely. And were there are power during World War II who had the courage of the Houthis, were there are power that had that kind of courage-
Steven Bonnell
So courageous to be bombing merchant ships while tens of thousands of people die of actual starvation, not the starvation that exists in the Gaza Strip where people before October 7th don’t die of starvation. Not the concentration camp, as they say of the Gaza Strip. The Houthis.
So courageous to be bombing merchant ships while tens of thousands of people die of actual starvation, not the starvation that exists in the Gaza Strip where people before October 7th don’t die of starvation. Not the concentration camp, as they say of the Gaza Strip. The Houthis.
Benny Morris
What about starvation in Yemen? Don’t that have something better to do?
What about starvation in Yemen? Don’t that have something better to do?
Norman Finkelstein
That was the Houthis.
That was the Houthis.
Benny Morris
Yes, I know. Don’t they have anything better to do?
Yes, I know. Don’t they have anything better to do?
Norman Finkelstein
That was the Houthis, and you know in three years they blew up 180,000 people.
That was the Houthis, and you know in three years they blew up 180,000 people.
Benny Morris
Shouldn’t they be feeding the Yemenis?
Shouldn’t they be feeding the Yemenis?
Norman Finkelstein
You know, 60,000 Yemenis died in starvation?
You know, 60,000 Yemenis died in starvation?
Benny Morris
Why fight the western powers in Israel when you should be taking care of your problems at home, the Houthis.
Why fight the western powers in Israel when you should be taking care of your problems at home, the Houthis.
Mouin Rabbani
Often the only allies of the dispossessed are those who experience similar circumstances.
Often the only allies of the dispossessed are those who experience similar circumstances.
Benny Morris
Don’t you think that they should take care of the Yemeni problems?
Don’t you think that they should take care of the Yemeni problems?
Mouin Rabbani
As I said-
As I said-
Norman Finkelstein
I’m very happy they’re helping out the Palestinians.
I’m very happy they’re helping out the Palestinians.
Benny Morris
It’s at the expense of the Yemenis. They’ll pay for it.
It’s at the expense of the Yemenis. They’ll pay for it.
Norman Finkelstein
Anybody who comes to the aid of those suffering the genocide-
Anybody who comes to the aid of those suffering the genocide-
Benny Morris
There’s no genocide.
There’s no genocide.
Norman Finkelstein
… half of whom are children… Yeah, according to the most current UN reports, as of today-
… half of whom are children… Yeah, according to the most current UN reports, as of today-
Benny Morris
There’s no genocide.
There’s no genocide.
Norman Finkelstein
… one quarter of the population of Gaza-
… one quarter of the population of Gaza-
Benny Morris
Is starving.
Is starving.
Norman Finkelstein
That means 500,000 children-
That means 500,000 children-
Benny Morris
Are starving,
Are starving,
Norman Finkelstein
… are on the verge of famine.
… are on the verge of famine.
Benny Morris
They keep saying on the verge of.
They keep saying on the verge of.
Steven Bonnell
On the verge of. Didn’t you quote that they said it was unlivable?
On the verge of. Didn’t you quote that they said it was unlivable?
Benny Morris
I have not seen one Palestinian die of starvation in these last four months. Not one.
I have not seen one Palestinian die of starvation in these last four months. Not one.
Mouin Rabbani
There have been documented cases.
There have been documented cases.
Benny Morris
They are always on the verge. They’re on the verge.
They are always on the verge. They’re on the verge.
Mouin Rabbani
There have been documented cases.
There have been documented cases.
Benny Morris
I haven’t seen any.
I haven’t seen any.
Steven Bonnell
Yesterday Al Jazeera said six, and the day before that they said two, so those are the two.
Yesterday Al Jazeera said six, and the day before that they said two, so those are the two.
Benny Morris
That number probably dies in Israel of starvation also.
That number probably dies in Israel of starvation also.
Mouin Rabbani
I don’t think there’s famine in Israel.
I don’t think there’s famine in Israel.
Norman Finkelstein
You’re so laid back, so blasé.
You’re so laid back, so blasé.
Benny Morris
There isn’t. There isn’t in the Gaza Strip either. It’s something which is produced for the Western-
There isn’t. There isn’t in the Gaza Strip either. It’s something which is produced for the Western-
Norman Finkelstein
“I haven’t seen any starving children yet.”
“I haven’t seen any starving children yet.”
Mouin Rabbani
There are infants dying due to a engineered lack of access to food and nutrition.
There are infants dying due to a engineered lack of access to food and nutrition.
Benny Morris
I don’t think it’s engineered, I think that if the Hamas stopped shooting perhaps, or-
I don’t think it’s engineered, I think that if the Hamas stopped shooting perhaps, or-
Norman Finkelstein
Unfortunately, most-
Unfortunately, most-
Mouin Rabbani
As I said, engineered.
As I said, engineered.
Norman Finkelstein
I think Human Rights Watch called it using starvation as a weapon. That’s called engineering.
I think Human Rights Watch called it using starvation as a weapon. That’s called engineering.
Steven Bonnell
That’s what they did, but you were pushed on this by Coleman Hughes to bring up an example of why is the Gaza Strip, by what metric are they starving? By what metric is it so behind the rest of the world?
That’s what they did, but you were pushed on this by Coleman Hughes to bring up an example of why is the Gaza Strip, by what metric are they starving? By what metric is it so behind the rest of the world?
Mouin Rabbani
If we’re going to bring up-
If we’re going to bring up-
Steven Bonnell
I want to hear an answer to that, because he didn’t answer it before.
I want to hear an answer to that, because he didn’t answer it before.
Norman Finkelstein
I’m happy to answer it. I just quoted you from the humanitarian organizations. They said one quarter of the population of Gaza is now verging on famine.
I’m happy to answer it. I just quoted you from the humanitarian organizations. They said one quarter of the population of Gaza is now verging on famine.
Steven Bonnell
Before October 7th.
Before October 7th.
Norman Finkelstein
I’m not going before October 7th.
I’m not going before October 7th.
Steven Bonnell
But you used that as justification for Hamas fighting. You said the conditions were unlivable, they had to fight.
But you used that as justification for Hamas fighting. You said the conditions were unlivable, they had to fight.
Norman Finkelstein
I said to him-
I said to him-
Steven Bonnell
So my question is what made it unlivable prior to October 7th? What are the metrics that you’re using?
So my question is what made it unlivable prior to October 7th? What are the metrics that you’re using?
Norman Finkelstein
There were about five, six or seven reports issued by UNCTAD, issued by the World Bank, issued by the International Monetary Fund, and they all said that’s why.
There were about five, six or seven reports issued by UNCTAD, issued by the World Bank, issued by the International Monetary Fund, and they all said that’s why.
Steven Bonnell
Why? Why did they say that?
Why? Why did they say that?
Norman Finkelstein
That’s why The Economist, not a radical periodical, described Gaza as a human rubbish heap.
That’s why The Economist, not a radical periodical, described Gaza as a human rubbish heap.
Steven Bonnell
So tell me by what metrics? If you’re a historian, if you do all this work to get to things, tell me what they said. Don’t just tell me a sentence, tell me by what metric.
So tell me by what metrics? If you’re a historian, if you do all this work to get to things, tell me what they said. Don’t just tell me a sentence, tell me by what metric.
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Bonnell.
Mr. Bonnell.
Steven Bonnell
He’s not going to answer again.
He’s not going to answer again.
Norman Finkelstein
I don’t think I’ve avoided any of your questions-
I don’t think I’ve avoided any of your questions-
Steven Bonnell
Of course you have, you’ve avoided every question.
Of course you have, you’ve avoided every question.
Norman Finkelstein
… except when they breached the threshold of complete imbecility.
… except when they breached the threshold of complete imbecility.
Steven Bonnell
So you were about to tell me by what metric the Gaza Strip is a humanitarian crisis.
So you were about to tell me by what metric the Gaza Strip is a humanitarian crisis.
Norman Finkelstein
I’m going to answer you. You remember what I said a moment ago, I said to Professor Morris, I defer to expertise? I look at what the organizations say. I look at what the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights said.
I’m going to answer you. You remember what I said a moment ago, I said to Professor Morris, I defer to expertise? I look at what the organizations say. I look at what the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights said.
Steven Bonnell
You’re saying in more words that you don’t know. You don’t know or you don’t care.
You’re saying in more words that you don’t know. You don’t know or you don’t care.
Norman Finkelstein
And I don’t know.
And I don’t know.
Steven Bonnell
Okay, that’s fine. That’s what I said.
Okay, that’s fine. That’s what I said.
Norman Finkelstein
Have you ever investigated how complicated is the metric for hunger, starvation, and famine? It is such a complicated metric they figured out, if you asked me to repeat it now, I couldn’t do it.
Have you ever investigated how complicated is the metric for hunger, starvation, and famine? It is such a complicated metric they figured out, if you asked me to repeat it now, I couldn’t do it.
Steven Bonnell
And yet we have a Human Development Index where we rank countries, yet we can still measure infant mortality-
And yet we have a Human Development Index where we rank countries, yet we can still measure infant mortality-
Norman Finkelstein
Okay, you go and call the news programs.
Okay, you go and call the news programs.
Steven Bonnell
… life expectancy, we can measure all of these things.
… life expectancy, we can measure all of these things.
Lex Fridman
Mouin, I’m holding out for you here. You still didn’t answer the hope question. What gives you a source of hope about the region?
Mouin, I’m holding out for you here. You still didn’t answer the hope question. What gives you a source of hope about the region?
Mouin Rabbani
Well, first of all, I would agree with Benny Morris and Norman Finkelstein that the current situation is bleak, and I think it would be unreasonable to expect it to not get even bleaker in the coming weeks and months. And we now, this conflict, really, it originated in the late 19th century, it’s been a more or less active conflict since the 1920s, 1930s, and it has produced a tremendous amount of suffering, and regional conflict, and geopolitical complications, and all of that. But what gives me hope is that throughout their entire ordeal, the Palestinian people have never surrendered, and I believe they never will surrender to overwhelming force and violence. They have taken everything that Israel has thrown at them, they have taken everything that the West has thrown at them, they have taken everything that those who are supposed to be their natural allies have on occasion thrown at them.
Well, first of all, I would agree with Benny Morris and Norman Finkelstein that the current situation is bleak, and I think it would be unreasonable to expect it to not get even bleaker in the coming weeks and months. And we now, this conflict, really, it originated in the late 19th century, it’s been a more or less active conflict since the 1920s, 1930s, and it has produced a tremendous amount of suffering, and regional conflict, and geopolitical complications, and all of that. But what gives me hope is that throughout their entire ordeal, the Palestinian people have never surrendered, and I believe they never will surrender to overwhelming force and violence. They have taken everything that Israel has thrown at them, they have taken everything that the West has thrown at them, they have taken everything that those who are supposed to be their natural allies have on occasion thrown at them.
But this is a people that never has and, I believe, never will surrender. At a certain point, I think Israel and its leaders will have to come to the realization that by hook or by crook, these people are going to achieve their inalienable and legitimate national rights, and that is going to be a reality.
Benny Morris
Well, what do you mean by that? You mean all of Palestine? Is that what you mean?
Well, what do you mean by that? You mean all of Palestine? Is that what you mean?
Mouin Rabbani
No.
No.
Benny Morris
From the river to the sea?
From the river to the sea?
Mouin Rabbani
Well, ideally, of course, yes. And what I was….
Well, ideally, of course, yes. And what I was….
Benny Morris
Are those the inalienable rights?
Are those the inalienable rights?
Mouin Rabbani
No. What I was saying earlier, and then the discussion got sidetracked, is that I did believe that a two-state settlement, a partition of Palestine along the 1967 boundaries would have been a reasonable solution, because I think it also would have opened pathways to further-
No. What I was saying earlier, and then the discussion got sidetracked, is that I did believe that a two-state settlement, a partition of Palestine along the 1967 boundaries would have been a reasonable solution, because I think it also would have opened pathways to further-
Benny Morris
But now you believe what?
But now you believe what?
Mouin Rabbani
… further nonviolent engagement between Israel and the Palestinians that could create other forms of coexistence in a federal, or binational, or other-
… further nonviolent engagement between Israel and the Palestinians that could create other forms of coexistence in a federal, or binational, or other-
Steven Bonnell
What do you think about refugees in regards to that? Do you think there has to be a resettlement of the five or six million, whoever wants to lay claim to be [inaudible 04:45:12]?
What do you think about refugees in regards to that? Do you think there has to be a resettlement of the five or six million, whoever wants to lay claim to be [inaudible 04:45:12]?
Benny Morris
A return?
A return?
Mouin Rabbani
I think there has to be an explicit acknowledgement of…
I think there has to be an explicit acknowledgement of…
Benny Morris
Responsibility?
Responsibility?
Mouin Rabbani
… of the responsibility-
… of the responsibility-
Benny Morris
And the return?
And the return?
Mouin Rabbani
… and of their rights. I think that in the framework of a two-state settlement, I think a formula would need to be found that does not undermine the foundations of a two-state settlement. And I don’t think it would be that difficult, because I suspect that there are probably large numbers of Palestinian refugees who, once their rights are acknowledged, will find it exceptionally distasteful-
… and of their rights. I think that in the framework of a two-state settlement, I think a formula would need to be found that does not undermine the foundations of a two-state settlement. And I don’t think it would be that difficult, because I suspect that there are probably large numbers of Palestinian refugees who, once their rights are acknowledged, will find it exceptionally distasteful-
Benny Morris
To return from [inaudible 04:46:00].
To return from [inaudible 04:46:00].
Mouin Rabbani
… to have to live among the kind of sentiments that we’ve heard around this table today, to be quite frank. I mean, I was previously unfamiliar with you, and I watched one of your preparation videos. Very disconcerting stuff, I have to say. You were explaining two days ago, in the discussion about apartheid and how absurd it was, that in your view Jim Crow was not apartheid, but Arab states not giving citizenship to Palestinian refugees is apartheid. That’s what I meant with my earlier comments about white supremacy.
… to have to live among the kind of sentiments that we’ve heard around this table today, to be quite frank. I mean, I was previously unfamiliar with you, and I watched one of your preparation videos. Very disconcerting stuff, I have to say. You were explaining two days ago, in the discussion about apartheid and how absurd it was, that in your view Jim Crow was not apartheid, but Arab states not giving citizenship to Palestinian refugees is apartheid. That’s what I meant with my earlier comments about white supremacy.
Steven Bonnell
That’s great, the white supremacy comment. Well, hold on, let me respond. My issue is that I feel like we have jumped on this euphemistic treadmill, and I think that’s part of the reason why this conflict will never get solved, is because on one end you’ve got a people who are now convinced internationally that they’re victims of apartheid, genocide, concentration camp conditions, ethnic cleansing, they’re forced to live in an open air prison, with all of these things that are stacked against them, all of these terms that are highly specific, that refer to very precise things. And then when people like you say that they should-
That’s great, the white supremacy comment. Well, hold on, let me respond. My issue is that I feel like we have jumped on this euphemistic treadmill, and I think that’s part of the reason why this conflict will never get solved, is because on one end you’ve got a people who are now convinced internationally that they’re victims of apartheid, genocide, concentration camp conditions, ethnic cleansing, they’re forced to live in an open air prison, with all of these things that are stacked against them, all of these terms that are highly specific, that refer to very precise things. And then when people like you say that they should-
Mouin Rabbani
Well, I would expect nothing less from someone who doesn’t think Jim Crow is apartheid, but who does think that Arab states not giving Palestinians-
Well, I would expect nothing less from someone who doesn’t think Jim Crow is apartheid, but who does think that Arab states not giving Palestinians-
Steven Bonnell
The problem is you’re morally loading. For you apartheid is when racists do bad things.
The problem is you’re morally loading. For you apartheid is when racists do bad things.
Mouin Rabbani
No. There’s a definition of apartheid.
No. There’s a definition of apartheid.
Steven Bonnell
That’s great.
That’s great.
Mouin Rabbani
There is a very clear definition of apartheid.
There is a very clear definition of apartheid.
Steven Bonnell
A specific top-down racial domination, enacted through top-down, like federal legislative policies or whatever, means that I don’t know if Jim Crow would have qualified for apartheid. That doesn’t make it any less…
A specific top-down racial domination, enacted through top-down, like federal legislative policies or whatever, means that I don’t know if Jim Crow would have qualified for apartheid. That doesn’t make it any less…
Norman Finkelstein
Have you ever heard of Plessy versus Ferguson?
Have you ever heard of Plessy versus Ferguson?
Steven Bonnell
Excuse me. Finkelstein, I’m talking right now. Excuse me, excuse me Twinklestein, I’m talking to your friend over here. I don’t know if it would have qualified as the crime of apartheid, just like if Israel were to literally nuke the Gaza Strip and kill two million people, I don’t know if that would qualify for the crime of genocide.
Excuse me. Finkelstein, I’m talking right now. Excuse me, excuse me Twinklestein, I’m talking to your friend over here. I don’t know if it would have qualified as the crime of apartheid, just like if Israel were to literally nuke the Gaza Strip and kill two million people, I don’t know if that would qualify for the crime of genocide.
Mouin Rabbani
In your eyes probably not.
In your eyes probably not.
Steven Bonnell
Well, yeah, but because genocide requires a special intent. I think the issue is, instead of… And I think this conversation actually is emblematic of the entire conversation.
Well, yeah, but because genocide requires a special intent. I think the issue is, instead of… And I think this conversation actually is emblematic of the entire conversation.
Mouin Rabbani
Then let me finish answering Benny Morris’s question.
Then let me finish answering Benny Morris’s question.
Steven Bonnell
Well sure, but you accused me of supporting racism.
Well sure, but you accused me of supporting racism.
Mouin Rabbani
Well, you did.
Well, you did.
Steven Bonnell
I didn’t.
I didn’t.
Mouin Rabbani
And you are.
And you are.
Steven Bonnell
Do you think I support Jim Crow laws?
Do you think I support Jim Crow laws?
Mouin Rabbani
Look, when-
Look, when-
Steven Bonnell
The fact that you can’t even answer that honestly, right?
The fact that you can’t even answer that honestly, right?
Mouin Rabbani
It doesn’t matter what-
It doesn’t matter what-
Steven Bonnell
You couldn’t say that 800 civilians were killed by Hamas, you said, “Well, maybe 400 were killed by Israel. I don’t know the number, maybe-
You couldn’t say that 800 civilians were killed by Hamas, you said, “Well, maybe 400 were killed by Israel. I don’t know the number, maybe-
Mouin Rabbani
No, I didn’t say that.
No, I didn’t say that.
Steven Bonnell
You said 400.
You said 400.
Mouin Rabbani
No, I didn’t say that.
No, I didn’t say that.
Steven Bonnell
You co-signed the opinion.
You co-signed the opinion.
Mouin Rabbani
No, I didn’t.
No, I didn’t.
Norman Finkelstein
No, he didn’t. He said the majority [inaudible 04:48:20].
No, he didn’t. He said the majority [inaudible 04:48:20].
Steven Bonnell
Well, wait, how many? I think the word was some, that’s what I heard.
Well, wait, how many? I think the word was some, that’s what I heard.
Norman Finkelstein
No, I think your memory-
No, I think your memory-
Mouin Rabbani
Well, you weren’t listening.
Well, you weren’t listening.
Norman Finkelstein
… you memory’s retarded.
… you memory’s retarded.
Steven Bonnell
How many people do you think approximately, if you had to ballpark it, how many do you think were killed by Hamas on October 7th?
How many people do you think approximately, if you had to ballpark it, how many do you think were killed by Hamas on October 7th?
Mouin Rabbani
I think it’s pretty clear that the majority of civilians that were killed on-
I think it’s pretty clear that the majority of civilians that were killed on-
Norman Finkelstein
That’s what he said.
That’s what he said.
Steven Bonnell
51%? Or 90%?
51%? Or 90%?
Mouin Rabbani
Don’t ask me to put a number on something I don’t know.
Don’t ask me to put a number on something I don’t know.
Steven Bonnell
I just want a ballpark. Those are two very different intuition.
I just want a ballpark. Those are two very different intuition.
Mouin Rabbani
First of all, when you say Hamas, do you mean Palestinians, or do you mean Hamas specifically?
First of all, when you say Hamas, do you mean Palestinians, or do you mean Hamas specifically?
Steven Bonnell
I mean the invading Palestinian force? I don’t like to say Palestinians, because I don’t think all Palestinian civilians were involved, so I’ll say Hamas, Islamic Jihad, whatever, Al Quds, whatever other-
I mean the invading Palestinian force? I don’t like to say Palestinians, because I don’t think all Palestinian civilians were involved, so I’ll say Hamas, Islamic Jihad, whatever, Al Quds, whatever other-
Mouin Rabbani
But that’s how this discussion started. You said Hamas and I began to answer that, and then Benny Morris said, actually he means Hamas in addition to Jihad and the others.
But that’s how this discussion started. You said Hamas and I began to answer that, and then Benny Morris said, actually he means Hamas in addition to Jihad and the others.
Steven Bonnell
So of the invading Palestinian force, how many do you think killed civilians versus the IDF? What do you think the ballpark, the percentage?
So of the invading Palestinian force, how many do you think killed civilians versus the IDF? What do you think the ballpark, the percentage?
Mouin Rabbani
Well, the figures we have are that about a third of the casualties on October 7th were military, and about two-thirds were-
Well, the figures we have are that about a third of the casualties on October 7th were military, and about two-thirds were-
Steven Bonnell
That’s not what I asked at all.
That’s not what I asked at all.
Mouin Rabbani
What’s your question?
What’s your question?
Benny Morris
He’s asking about the two-thirds.
He’s asking about the two-thirds.
Steven Bonnell
What percentage of civilians do you think were killed by the invading force, a ballpark?
What percentage of civilians do you think were killed by the invading force, a ballpark?
Mouin Rabbani
I think a clear majority, but I can’t give you a specific figure.
I think a clear majority, but I can’t give you a specific figure.
Steven Bonnell
If you thought it was closer to 51% or 99% were killed by-
If you thought it was closer to 51% or 99% were killed by-
Norman Finkelstein
Why would he know that? How would he know that?
Why would he know that? How would he know that?
Steven Bonnell
Because it’s interesting to actually stake out a position.
Because it’s interesting to actually stake out a position.
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah, it’s interesting-
Yeah, it’s interesting-
Steven Bonnell
If you want to be completely, totally agnostic on it, that’s fine.
If you want to be completely, totally agnostic on it, that’s fine.
Norman Finkelstein
Based on complete ignorance, because we don’t know. Professor Morris doesn’t know, Mouin Rabbani doesn’t know.
Based on complete ignorance, because we don’t know. Professor Morris doesn’t know, Mouin Rabbani doesn’t know.
Steven Bonnell
And yet you can speak with absolute certainty that the IDF is targeting and murdering Palestinian children intentionally.
And yet you can speak with absolute certainty that the IDF is targeting and murdering Palestinian children intentionally.
Norman Finkelstein
Well, actually-
Well, actually-
Steven Bonnell
Do you see the double standard?
Do you see the double standard?
Norman Finkelstein
No, I don’t. You see-
No, I don’t. You see-
Steven Bonnell
I know you don’t. It was a rhetorical question, obviously you don’t.
I know you don’t. It was a rhetorical question, obviously you don’t.
Norman Finkelstein
You know why?
You know why?
Steven Bonnell
Because you’re uneducated on the matter.
Because you’re uneducated on the matter.
Norman Finkelstein
I looked at the UN report.
I looked at the UN report.
Steven Bonnell
Uh-huh. The Goldstone Report?
Uh-huh. The Goldstone Report?
Norman Finkelstein
No. The UN report on the great march of return in 2018, and they said that the snipers were targeting children, medics, journalists, and disabled people.
No. The UN report on the great march of return in 2018, and they said that the snipers were targeting children, medics, journalists, and disabled people.
Mouin Rabbani
Just as they are now in this conflict.
Just as they are now in this conflict.
Norman Finkelstein
Exactly.
Exactly.
Mouin Rabbani
More journalists have been killed in the last several months in Gaza, than in any other conflict.
More journalists have been killed in the last several months in Gaza, than in any other conflict.
Norman Finkelstein
And in all of World War II.
And in all of World War II.
Steven Bonnell
Do you acknowledge that Hamas… That’s great, the comparison is fun.
Do you acknowledge that Hamas… That’s great, the comparison is fun.
Mouin Rabbani
Hamas is not killing journalists in the Gaza strip.
Hamas is not killing journalists in the Gaza strip.
Steven Bonnell
Do you agree that they operate in civilian uniforms, that their goal is to induce that confusion, that that’s the way that they conduct themselves militarily?
Do you agree that they operate in civilian uniforms, that their goal is to induce that confusion, that that’s the way that they conduct themselves militarily?
Mouin Rabbani
Let me finish my point. More journalists have been, more UN-
Let me finish my point. More journalists have been, more UN-
Steven Bonnell
I understand, and more children, and the-
I understand, and more children, and the-
Norman Finkelstein
He doesn’t want to hear it, it’s so boring.
He doesn’t want to hear it, it’s so boring.
Steven Bonnell
No, because it’s virtue signaling.
No, because it’s virtue signaling.
Norman Finkelstein
Virtue signaling!
Virtue signaling!
Steven Bonnell
You don’t have a material, a substantial… It is virtue signaling. Yes, like when you say children, over and over again, that’s virtue signaling.
You don’t have a material, a substantial… It is virtue signaling. Yes, like when you say children, over and over again, that’s virtue signaling.
Mouin Rabbani
You know you have this habit of mocking the dead.
You know you have this habit of mocking the dead.
Norman Finkelstein
But talking about how many Israelis were killed, that’s not virtue signaling, because that’s human life.
But talking about how many Israelis were killed, that’s not virtue signaling, because that’s human life.
Steven Bonnell
I don’t care if a hundred are killed or a thousand, I’m curious who you’re assigning blame to.
I don’t care if a hundred are killed or a thousand, I’m curious who you’re assigning blame to.
Norman Finkelstein
You just interrogated him, 51%, 90%.
You just interrogated him, 51%, 90%.
Steven Bonnell
The question, yes, that’s not the number, that’s the responsibility, Norman.
The question, yes, that’s not the number, that’s the responsibility, Norman.
Norman Finkelstein
And then Mouin mentions that more journalists were killed in Gaza than in all of World War II.
And then Mouin mentions that more journalists were killed in Gaza than in all of World War II.
Steven Bonnell
That doesn’t further any part of the conversation.
That doesn’t further any part of the conversation.
Norman Finkelstein
And more medics were killed in Gaza.
And more medics were killed in Gaza.
Benny Morris
No, that’s silly.
No, that’s silly.
Norman Finkelstein
And then he says, it’s virtue signaling.
And then he says, it’s virtue signaling.
Benny Morris
Journalists weren’t in the area.
Journalists weren’t in the area.
Norman Finkelstein
But when Israelis get killed, that’s serious.
But when Israelis get killed, that’s serious.
Steven Bonnell
I never said that. It’s serious on both sides. I didn’t say, respectfully-
I never said that. It’s serious on both sides. I didn’t say, respectfully-
Mouin Rabbani
It’s called [inaudible 04:51:29].
It’s called [inaudible 04:51:29].
Norman Finkelstein
No, you called it virtue signaling.
No, you called it virtue signaling.
Steven Bonnell
No, I’m not virtue signaling, I’m asking a substantive question of who do you assign blame to, or do you play into Norm Finkelstein’s conspiracies that the ambulances should have known immediately who was dead, that the numbers were changed because they were fake.
No, I’m not virtue signaling, I’m asking a substantive question of who do you assign blame to, or do you play into Norm Finkelstein’s conspiracies that the ambulances should have known immediately who was dead, that the numbers were changed because they were fake.
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Borrell, Mr. Borrell-
Mr. Borrell, Mr. Borrell-
Steven Bonnell
Or that maybe 51% of the people were killed by Hamas and Islamic Jihad, but 29% were killed by IDF helicopters.
Or that maybe 51% of the people were killed by Hamas and Islamic Jihad, but 29% were killed by IDF helicopters.
Mouin Rabbani
You asked me a direct question, and you got a direct answer.
You asked me a direct question, and you got a direct answer.
Steven Bonnell
I didn’t, I got majority, which could be anything from 51 to 99.
I didn’t, I got majority, which could be anything from 51 to 99.
Mouin Rabbani
I said a clear majority.
I said a clear majority.
Benny Morris
What percent is a clear majority as opposed to a majority?
What percent is a clear majority as opposed to a majority?
Steven Bonnell
They live in ambiguity.
They live in ambiguity.
Mouin Rabbani
A clear majority, in my view, is well over 50%. Please don’t ask me to be more precise, because I can’t.
A clear majority, in my view, is well over 50%. Please don’t ask me to be more precise, because I can’t.
Benny Morris
You could say 80, 90, 95%.
You could say 80, 90, 95%.
Mouin Rabbani
If I knew that, I would say it.
If I knew that, I would say it.
Benny Morris
I think it’s reasonable. It’s a reasonable supposition.
I think it’s reasonable. It’s a reasonable supposition.
Mouin Rabbani
Perhaps it is, but I…
Perhaps it is, but I…
Norman Finkelstein
Mr. Morris, you are not the best person to be asking that question. I read when you described Operation Defensive Shield, and you said a few dozen homes were destroyed.
Mr. Morris, you are not the best person to be asking that question. I read when you described Operation Defensive Shield, and you said a few dozen homes were destroyed.
Benny Morris
You’re talking about what happened in a Judean refugee camp.
You’re talking about what happened in a Judean refugee camp.
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah. And you said-
Yeah. And you said-
Benny Morris
No, the Arabs said 500.
No, the Arabs said 500.
Norman Finkelstein
You said a few died-
You said a few died-
Benny Morris
You guys said 500 Palestinians were killed in a Judean-
You guys said 500 Palestinians were killed in a Judean-
Mouin Rabbani
I never said that.
I never said that.
Benny Morris
No, but that was the statement from the PLO, the Palestinian Authority.
No, but that was the statement from the PLO, the Palestinian Authority.
Norman Finkelstein
You said a few dozen homes-
You said a few dozen homes-
Benny Morris
And that there were massacres there. Yes, a few dozen homes.
And that there were massacres there. Yes, a few dozen homes.
Norman Finkelstein
Yeah.
Yeah.
Benny Morris
That’s right.
That’s right.
Norman Finkelstein
Well, it turned 140 buildings were destroyed-
Well, it turned 140 buildings were destroyed-
Benny Morris
That’s a few dozen.
That’s a few dozen.
Norman Finkelstein
… 5,000 people were left homeless.
… 5,000 people were left homeless.
Benny Morris
How many people were killed?
How many people were killed?
Norman Finkelstein
5,000.
5,000.
Benny Morris
How many were killed?
How many were killed?
Norman Finkelstein
You described it… No, I’m talking about homes destroyed. So you are not the best person to be criticizing what Mouin says when he says clear majority, but he can’t say more. You know why he can’t say more?
You described it… No, I’m talking about homes destroyed. So you are not the best person to be criticizing what Mouin says when he says clear majority, but he can’t say more. You know why he can’t say more?
Benny Morris
He doesn’t know.
He doesn’t know.
Norman Finkelstein
He doesn’t know.
He doesn’t know.
Benny Morris
Yeah, I understand that. I understood that point.
Yeah, I understand that. I understood that point.
Norman Finkelstein
I hope as a historian you understand that.
I hope as a historian you understand that.
Mouin Rabbani
If I was trying to belittle, I would give you a very different answer. I would just say I don’t know. I do know that some were shot, but-
If I was trying to belittle, I would give you a very different answer. I would just say I don’t know. I do know that some were shot, but-
Benny Morris
You know what the right phrase there would be? The overwhelming majority were killed by Arab gunmen, and a very small number were killed by Israelis by accident or whatever.
You know what the right phrase there would be? The overwhelming majority were killed by Arab gunmen, and a very small number were killed by Israelis by accident or whatever.
Norman Finkelstein
You’re not speaking as a historian now.
You’re not speaking as a historian now.
Benny Morris
That’s probably true.
That’s probably true.
Mouin Rabbani
I can state with confidence, a clear majority. Overwhelming majority? You may be correct, but I can’t state that with certainty. I think there’s a very easy way to find out is to have an independent-
I can state with confidence, a clear majority. Overwhelming majority? You may be correct, but I can’t state that with certainty. I think there’s a very easy way to find out is to have an independent-
Benny Morris
Forget independent.
Forget independent.
Mouin Rabbani
Well, of course you forget independent.
Well, of course you forget independent.
Norman Finkelstein
I know you want to forget the law-
I know you want to forget the law-
Benny Morris
Well forget, that doesn’t mean anything.
Well forget, that doesn’t mean anything.
Norman Finkelstein
Forget the law-
Forget the law-
Benny Morris
Independent is the UN High Commission for-
Independent is the UN High Commission for-
Norman Finkelstein
– forget the independent commissioner. No!
– forget the independent commissioner. No!
Benny Morris
… Human Rights, whatever it’s called.
… Human Rights, whatever it’s called.
Mouin Rabbani
Not necessarily.
Not necessarily.
Norman Finkelstein
Just repeat the numbers.
Just repeat the numbers.
Benny Morris
They’re all from barbaric countries. You know, a Syrian was the head of the UN Commission for Human Rights.
They’re all from barbaric countries. You know, a Syrian was the head of the UN Commission for Human Rights.
Mouin Rabbani
But if it was an Israeli, it would have been okay?
But if it was an Israeli, it would have been okay?
Benny Morris
He certainly would have been more honest than a Syrian.
He certainly would have been more honest than a Syrian.
Norman Finkelstein
Oh yeah, sure, of course.
Oh yeah, sure, of course.
Mouin Rabbani
Of course. Oh yeah, from your perspective.
Of course. Oh yeah, from your perspective.
Lex Fridman
Well, to disagree with Steven, I thought this was extremely valuable, and at times really the view of history, the passion. I’m really grateful that you would spend your really valuable time.
Well, to disagree with Steven, I thought this was extremely valuable, and at times really the view of history, the passion. I’m really grateful that you would spend your really valuable time.
One more question, since we have two historians here. Briefly, from a history perspective, what do you hope your legacy is as historians, Benny and Norm, will be of the work that you’ve put out there? Maybe Norm, you can go first, and try to say briefly.
Norman Finkelstein
I think there’s a value to preserving the record. I’m not optimistic about where things are going to end up. There was a very nice book written by a woman named Helen Hunt Jackson at the end of the 19th century, describing what was done to the Native Americans. She called it a century of dishonor, and she described in vivid, poignant detail what was done to the Native Americans. Did it save them? No. Did it help them? Probably not. Did it preserve their memory? Yes, and I think there’s a value to that. There was a famous film by Sergei Eisenstein, it was either Battleship Potemkin or Mother, I can’t remember which one. The last scene was the Tsar’s troops mowing down all the Russian people. He pans the scene.
I think there’s a value to preserving the record. I’m not optimistic about where things are going to end up. There was a very nice book written by a woman named Helen Hunt Jackson at the end of the 19th century, describing what was done to the Native Americans. She called it a century of dishonor, and she described in vivid, poignant detail what was done to the Native Americans. Did it save them? No. Did it help them? Probably not. Did it preserve their memory? Yes, and I think there’s a value to that. There was a famous film by Sergei Eisenstein, it was either Battleship Potemkin or Mother, I can’t remember which one. The last scene was the Tsar’s troops mowing down all the Russian people. He pans the scene.
Benny Morris
Not all the Russian people, just a few of them.
Not all the Russian people, just a few of them.
Norman Finkelstein
Well, he pan the massacre.
Well, he pan the massacre.
Mouin Rabbani
But he could have killed a lot more.
But he could have killed a lot more.
Norman Finkelstein
And the last words of the movie were, “Proletarians,” exclamation point, “Remember,” exclamation point. And I’ve seen it as my life’s work to preserve the memory and to remember. I didn’t expect that anyone would read my book on Gaza. It’s very dense, it gives me even a bit of a headache to read at least one of the chapters.
And the last words of the movie were, “Proletarians,” exclamation point, “Remember,” exclamation point. And I’ve seen it as my life’s work to preserve the memory and to remember. I didn’t expect that anyone would read my book on Gaza. It’s very dense, it gives me even a bit of a headache to read at least one of the chapters.
Mouin Rabbani
You wrote a book on Gaza?
You wrote a book on Gaza?
Norman Finkelstein
But I thought that the memory deserves to be preserved.
But I thought that the memory deserves to be preserved.
Mouin Rabbani
Amen.
Amen.
Benny Morris
Well, I would say very briefly, unlike my colleague, I think writing the truth about what happened in history, in various periods of history, if I’ve done a little bit of that, I’m happy.
Well, I would say very briefly, unlike my colleague, I think writing the truth about what happened in history, in various periods of history, if I’ve done a little bit of that, I’m happy.
Lex Fridman
Thank you Norm, thank you Benny, thank you Steven, thank you Mouin.
Thank you Norm, thank you Benny, thank you Steven, thank you Mouin.
Thanks for listening to this conversation with Norman Finkelstein, Benny Morris, Mouin Rabbani, and Steven Bonnell. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now let me leave you with some words from Lyndon B. Johnson. “Peace is a journey of a thousand miles, and it must be taken one step at a time.” Thank you for listening, and hope to see you next time.