0:07 - Introduction to Drug Discussions
10:32 - Exploring the Nature of Insights
39:50 - The Consequences of Drug Use
59:15 - Personal Experiences with Health and Drugs
1:07:47 - The Isolation of Mystical Experiences
1:17:25 - The Destructive Nature of Drug Dependency
1:19:38 - The Nature of Belief
1:19:44 - The Weight of Pain
1:23:42 - Exploring Relationships
1:24:15 - The Genetics Dilemma
1:30:39 - Understanding Love and Lust
1:34:28 - The Challenge of Parenting
1:42:51 - The Burden of Choice
2:09:22 - The Impact of Upbringing
2:25:32 - The Non-Aggression Principle Explained
In this episode, we dive deep into the complex relationship between personal trauma, substance use, and the moral implications involved. The conversation begins with an exploration of people's experiences with drugs, particularly how those who self-medicate with substances often come from backgrounds of trauma and pain. I discuss the psychological mechanisms that underlie drug use, emphasizing that many individuals turn to substances in an attempt to manage their emotional distress, often stemming from adverse childhood experiences. I express my sympathy for those who seek relief, highlighting the importance of understanding their struggles.
As we navigate the topic, I explain my perspective on the distinction between moral principles and practical applications of those principles concerning substance use. I express skepticism regarding the insights people claim to gain while under the influence of drugs, arguing that they often do not lead to profound self-awareness or moral clarity. Instead, I caution that drug use can mask deeper issues, preventing individuals from confronting and addressing the root causes of their suffering.
Throughout the discussion, I emphasize the importance of responsibility, particularly in terms of parenting and how individuals shape their children's understanding of morality and conflict resolution. We delve into the nuances of the non-aggression principle, emphasizing that while children are not morally responsible for actions they may take, adults must cultivate empathy and a sense of accountability to guide them. I express my views on the idea that violence and aggression are often mismanaged and misinterpreted, especially when stemming from a place of emotional pain.
The episode also touches upon personal anecdotes and philosophical reflections on the nature of happiness, personal fulfillment, and the possible paths one might take to achieve a more profound sense of satisfaction. I challenge listeners to contemplate their choices thoughtfully, urging them to seek deeper connections and authentic understanding of themselves and others as they navigate the complexities of their lives.
Ultimately, this conversation is an invitation to engage with the difficult questions surrounding drug use and morality, urging both introspection and dialogue as I call for a collective understanding of how to foster a society that adheres to ethical principles while also recognizing the human capacity for growth and redemption.
[0:00] Well, good morning, everybody. Hope you're doing well. It is the 11th of July, 2025.
[0:07] And apparently, it's just my low-res opinion, man. It's just like your opinion, dude.
[0:16] So, it's funny, you know, because these landmines that have occurred in the past, you know, some of them aren't here on X anymore, and some of them are. And one of the ones that I had forgotten about completely. There was a martial arts one. Of course, there was a free will determinism one. There's the dating ancestor one, which is a bit newer, and the one that I'd completely forgotten about, because I don't have any people who do drugs around me, and I haven't had anyone who does drugs around me since I probably, I don't know, late teens. And I never really knew any heavy drug users, just some people who used marijuana and things like that. So I just don't move in those circles, and I don't know those people. And so, yeah, the drug thing.
[1:13] Now, it's not, you know, there's this old meme about if somebody's a smoker or an alcoholic and somebody says, you should quit smoking and you should quit drinking. And they're like, yeah, yeah, I know, man, I'm on it, right? But if you say to a weed addict that he should quit weed, you get this, you know, hey, man, it's all natural. And, you know, like arsenic is not natural. And it's enlightenment. And it keeps me in touch with myself. And it's fun. It's social. It's, you know, whatever, right? Just endless justifications. And listen, I'll be straight up. I mean, I really sympathize with the trauma. I mean, people don't do drugs because...
[1:59] They are not traumatized. They don't do drugs because they're happy. They do drugs because they're unhappy. And the general gist of it seems to be something like this, that if you have a really bad childhood, then you're stressed, you're tense, you're unhappy, you're anxious, or whatever it is. Normal people, let's just use a, sort of silly numerical scale here. So normal people, let's say you've got a happiness in general of about a hundred. I said, it's your hundred, right? But people who are, no, you know what? Let's do a plus and minus scale. I'm going to revise that, right? So people who are, you know, they're raised relatively well and they're reasonably happy. They have a happiness level of, let's say, plus five and on average, right? And, you know, sometimes it goes way up, sometimes it goes down, but, you know, you just kind of settle around a sort of plus five. But people who've had, you know, really bad childhoods, a lot of stress, a lot of tension, maybe violence and assault and so on, bad adverse childhood experiences, scores, well, what happens is that they kind of cook it like minus one or minus two. They're unhappy. And look, I mean, I hugely sympathize with that. It's not their fault that they were treated so badly as children. I really, really sympathize with them.
[3:25] And then what happens is, let's say they get a hold of alcohol or nicotine or weed or mushrooms or something, you know, whatever it is. They get a hold of something. And then, having cooked around for most of their life at a minus two happiness, they then get to plus five. They don't feel happy. They don't feel high. They just feel normal. It's like a painkiller, right? I mean, if you have a bad headache and you take an aspirin or something like that, you're not taking an aspirin to get high. You're taking an aspirin.
[4:13] So, you're not in pain, right? You have a toothache. You don't take the Novocaine and get your tooth fixed so that you can feel high. You do it so you don't experience the toothache. So then what happens is they take the drugs, and this is all just, of course, my amateur, obviously generally foolish and non-informed viewpoint. So, for more on this, you should read Gabor Mate's book in the realm of hungry ghosts. But yeah, they feel normal. And then they crash down instead of minus two, they're minus three, minus four. So then they take the drugs, they get a plus four, and it just goes from there, right? We've sort of talked about this before, but so I have huge sympathy, huge sympathy for the suffering that drives people to want to use drugs.
[5:09] However, the problem, well, there's a couple of problems, right? One of the main problems from a moral standpoint is I've never, ever, ever, and I've talked to a lot of people about drugs over the years. I've done this call-in show for, you know, 20 years. I'm like, hey, I'm doing one now. We'll talk in a few minutes. So I've done this call-in show. I've talked to lots of people about drugs. And people get these, you know, insights. He gives insights on drugs, right? You know, one guy was posting this morning on X that, you know, he took some mushrooms and he had an insight that, hey man, the burgers on TV look better than the burgers in real life. And it's like, that's really not much of an insight. Or somebody said, you know, I realized I have a party self that's not truly authentic. And it's like, yeah, you have a false self, right? In your 20s, you should kind of know that by now, right? So... So, you don't get these insights. And what I've never heard of, and this is sort of my concern, what I've never heard of is people taking drugs and saying, oh my gosh, I realized my parent did some corrupt and evil things and really harmed me as a child, and the drugs helped me confront them with their immorality. Ooh.
[6:25] Not heard that one. I have not heard that one. So my concern is that tyrannies drug dissidents. I mean, in the old Soviet Union, well, according to the communist regime, communism was perfect. And so if you were unhappy under communism, if you criticized communism, clearly you were mentally ill and had to be institutionalized, where they would leave you sitting in a corner dribbling on yourself in a straitjacket, with horse tranquilizers galloping through your veins and disassembling your personality. I mean, dissidents get drugged. The system does not reform itself based upon criticism. It views the critics as a problem and drugs them.
[7:20] I mean, this happens with the increasingly girl-focused and goal-centric government schools, the boys who are bored and annoyed and frustrated and irritated and, you know, just don't, don't particularly enjoy sitting at their desk and doing group work quietly, when their genes are telling them to go and learn how to hunt buffalo, well, they're dissidents, right? And what happens to dissidents? In a corrupt system, they're drugged.
[7:58] The increasing unhappiness that people have with modernity, which again, I sympathize with and I understand, I think fairly well. Oh, well, then. Handfuls of drugs. Let's get them drugs. So, one of the concerns that I have is that people who take drugs are self-medicating stress, anxiety, unhappiness, which arises, I would say most often, from being abused as children. And by masking the symptoms, they do not confront the wrongdoers who harmed them as children. Instead, they drug the symptoms rather than get to the cause. Because, you know, people are posting on X that they took mushrooms or something like that. And, you know, they felt better. It's like, well, yeah, I get it. If you've got a toothache, you can take some kind of painkiller and you'll feel better. But it is actually kind of important to deal with the toothache. With the infection, is it not? Is it not?
[9:07] So, since I was a teenager, you know, people would say to me, oh, yeah, drugs give you all those insights. I'm like, oh, give me one.
[9:18] Right? Just give me an insight. I mean, it doesn't have to be E equals MC squared or the inverse square law or the second law of thermodynamics. So I get all of that. It doesn't have to be some massive blinding insight moving forward. But just tell me what you learned that is truly wise. And it's always the most banal stuff. Well, I realized that I had a different face in social situations than I did at home. It's like, yes. Yes. Do you think that I speak exactly the same way to myself or my wife as I do on the show? Of course not. FM voice in the bedroom, sexy as hell. Of course not, right? I mean, I try to be honest and authentic, and I'm not faking anything, but it's not the same. Of course it's not the same. We have, yeah, so we have different selves, so to speak, for different situations. Sure, you're different at work, you're different at home, you're different with your friends, but it's not fake.
[10:29] It's just that we have adaptations that work and are effective.
[10:33] And again, we always want to be honest and authentic, but.
[10:42] Anyway, so you never get these big insights. And it's all about comfort and feeling better, which I understand. Of course, we all want to be comfortable and feel better. But it's never moral. It's never moral. It's never moral. Now, if people, from a moral standpoint for me, and I'll take your questions in a sec. I appreciate your indulgence here. But if you want to take drugs, let's say you're just some young person, you're a young guy, you want to take some drugs, it's a bad idea. Because you're saying you're not enough as you are. And even if you do get some insights, if you need the drugs to get the insights, that's like needing steroids to build muscle. They're not your muscles. They're steroids' muscles. It's like having somebody whisper in your ear, Cyrano de Bergerac style, telling you what to say. It's not your words. It's not your girl.
[12:00] If you want to take drugs on your own, it's not a violation of the non-aggression principle to scramble your own brain. It is not against the non-aggression principle to harm yourself. You own yourself. You can't destroy something of mine because it's my property, but you can destroy your own property if you want to take a mug and you want to hurl it against the wall on your own because you're frustrated. You've broken your own cup. You'll sweep it up, but it's not, it's not evil. It's not immoral. You have, you can, you can harm your own property and your brain is your own property. I think it's a terrible thing to harm your brain. And when you take drugs to get insights, you're telling your brain, you can't do it on your own. You can't do it on your own. We can't do it on our own. You need outside and outside help. And of course, it just gives you a feeling of oneness. Like one guy this morning was telling me that, hey man, I took some drugs and I went out and communed with my garden and the creatures within. It's like, bro.
[13:10] Low rent mind melding with flowers and slugs and snails is not my idea of enlightenment. And so if you want to take drugs on your own, you have your own property, you are your own property, you're harming your own property. It's not a violation of the non-aggression principle. Now, of course, if you lie to people about it, well, that's not good. Lying is bad. And you start to get into moral areas.
[13:48] If you have people who depend upon you and you become disabled through addiction, that's bad. If your wife quit her job so that she could stay home and raise your kids and then you fry your brain or get fired or underperform at work and your career is in jeopardy or fails or something like that, well, or if you parent while high or drive while high or make important decisions or really any decisions at work while high because you're being paid for clarity of mind. So if you're high and there are other people in your life and you're interacting with them while high without telling them, that's a form of fraud because they want to be with you, not you plus drug. So the simple act of taking drugs is not a violation of the non-aggression principle. I think I could put it in the aesthetically negative category. So it's negative, but it's not immoral.
[14:52] But what I consider fairly foul is, and this is sort of what came up last night, is that there was somebody who was like, oh, here's the person that can give you microdoses at this. It's very productive. Like, don't, no, my God, no, no, no, no. It's the praising of it. It's the praising of it. As enlightenment, as a deep experience, as a connection with the universal, as the oceanic feeling that Freud described that is similar to being mind merged with your mother when you're a baby against her breast. It's not, if you say, look, I had a really bad childhood and the only thing that makes me feel better is taking some drugs. Okay, at least that's honest, right? I have a pain in my soul from the talons of early trauma and I have this chronic pain and the only thing that can make it better is the drugs. Okay. I mean, just like being on opiates, right? And if you have some chronic pain that the doctors can't fix and opiates help, okay, look, I sympathize. I understand that. I mean, I've taken an Advil or two over the course of my life. If you have a headache, sleep funny, something like that, yeah, I sympathize. I'm not going to say no, right?
[16:18] So if you've got a pain you can't fix, you take the drug. But if you take a drug based on spiritual pain, and I'm not talking about some low-dose whatever in a Johns Hopkins setting for PTSD. I'm not talking about that. Like if you're an opiate addict, that's a real tragedy, but opiates can have, I assume, some utility. Yeah, actually, I was given some fairly strong painkillers after a cancer surgery. And they were pretty nice i gotta tell you they were pretty nice pretty i got this this this feeling of floating i got this feeling of dissociation i got this feeling of of happy ball of joy in the belly and all of that and i took i took them once or twice and i was like okay, no i cannot i'm not getting used to this i'm gonna earn my happiness the old-fashioned way, through virtue and integrity. So, yeah, it was pretty, those painkillers were pretty nice. I don't even remember what they were, but they were pretty nice.
[17:23] And it's the spreading of it, though. It's the normalizing of it. It's the praising of it. That's my concern. Because when people talk about, oh, drugs are cool, they open up the doors of perception, they enlighten you, and you get all these insights, well, then you're kind of like a dealer, not obviously of the drugs themselves, but of the mindset. You're spreading it. You're spreading it. And I think that evil people should be held to account, and people who traumatize children should be confronted. People who harm and abuse children should be confronted. And if drugs mask the symptoms, ah, then you don't get any meaningful reforms within families. So, to put it another way, I think that people who are traumatized as children take drugs as a result of parental commandments. It's the parents, deep down, who are telling them, don't confront us, don't discover the evil of your childhood, just get drugged. In the same way that totalitarian leaders in the old Soviet system.
[18:34] Were saying to all the dissidents, well, we're perfect, so you've got to be crazy, so we're going to drug you. And I think there's a certain amount of just the avoidance of confrontation with immorality or corruption or downright evil in more extreme cases. I think people take drugs so that they don't confront those who did them wrong. And I sympathize with that too. I'm just not going to praise it. I'm just not going to praise it. It's like the people who are really scared of talking to girls or, you know, risks in life. I sympathize. I really do. Look, we all have things in life we're nervous about, and I get all of that. But I'm not going to praise it. I'm not going to say it is anything other. It's the old saying, the beginning of wisdom is to call things by their proper names. I'm not going to call it something it's not. I'm not going to call the avoidance of legitimate suffering and the cover-up of crimes, I'm not going to call that enlightenment. I'm going to call it what it is. And that doesn't mean I don't have sympathy. I have genuine sympathy for the suffering that causes people to be tempted by or to use drugs. Genuine sympathy for that.
[19:53] However, there's a tipping point when you start to praise it, when you start to sell it, when you start to promote it to others. No, no, no. You get that shit off my timeline. All right, so I hope that at least helps with some of my perspective. And of course, if you're someone who's out there and you want to talk about these things one-on-one, I do a call-in show, and so on. It doesn't have sort of the chaos and hurly-burly of the live spaces that we do on X, but you can go to freedomain.com slash call. We can jawbone. We can talk. Fairly good at this sort of stuff, I think. And we can have the call, and it's totally free. It's totally free. All right. And Caroline, sorry to jump in like you've just been sitting there waiting to unmute, but if you could unmute, that would be great. What's on your mind? Hello there. Hey, how's it going?
[21:05] Yeah, not so bad. I hope you're doing well. I'd kind of like to know, I've heard you talk about, and I think you make some good points, but I'd like to know what your experience is. Do you have any personal experience with any kind of psychedelic or hallucinogen?
[21:19] Oh, yeah, absolutely. I mean, I hallucinate every night. I have the wildest dreams that give me some very interesting and fascinating, you know, I've dreamt about novels. I've dreamt about scenarios. And so, yeah, as far as hallucinogenics go, I have nightly dreaming, which is an incredible experience. I absolutely love it. Well, for the most part, every now and then, it's a little alarming, but for the most part, it's great.
[21:43] Yeah interesting i think um they can be a shortcut not a i don't like the term shortcut because it's kind of a loaded term but sorry
[21:51] They what are you what are you talking about 90 dreams you're talking about drugs.
[21:54] Yeah sure psychedelic i suppose that i don't tend to see them as um separate issues i suppose they're kind of related but it's just that uh psychedelics seem to enhance what's already there um that's in my limited experience and from what i've read i don't know if you've seen the film limitless but bradley cooper's character takes this drug which essentially unlocks his innate or dormant potential and he becomes a genius and
[22:17] He has a.
[22:18] Four-digit iq and masters the piano okay
[22:20] But you're not you're not you're not quoting some hollywood fiction movie as data are you.
[22:25] Oh not at all i was simply the uh the point seems to be that um psychedelics from what i can determine enhance what's already there and so if you have a sort of a closed mind or maybe you aren't that bright or you're not trained to think in a deep manner then you might not find them very useful but if you're open-minded and you've studied some of the classics and no
[22:44] See this is this is this is the shit that bugs me man i gotta tell you, can you sell drugs without insults well if you're closed-minded and if you you're kind of dumb and right then then maybe drugs aren't helpful for you but if you have hypertension like that's just kind of demonic and i'm not calling you demonic but the whole argument of like no no no on the other side of taking drugs is this limitless self and there's you'll be like bradley cooper in a movie and you'll have a, you know, a fortitude IQ or whatever you were saying, right? Like, can you sell drugs without the bribery of flattery and the stick of insults? Because this is kind of what happens, right? Well, if you're kind of dumb, maybe drugs don't help you that much. But man, if you've got a lot of potential, like, that's not, I mean, that's not a very nice way, obviously, to do it, right? So, you say that the drugs make you more than you are. But what does that mean? I mean, in practical terms.
[23:46] That's not exactly how I worded it. I think it seems to be something like an enhancer for attainment of innate capabilities.
[23:54] I think it also depends on that. I mean, I'm just boiling it down. So it enhances your innate capabilities, right?
[24:02] Well, it might. It depends on the drug. I feel like using the term drugs is also a bit of a problem because ibogaine and cocaine are essentially not the same at all.
[24:11] I'm sorry, what was that first one?
[24:13] Ibogaine are you familiar with the ibogaine initiative in um texas uh
[24:18] No no no but enlighten me please.
[24:21] Well i i haven't done ibogaine myself i've done psilocybin but not ibogaine um but i've i don't know if you're familiar with the sean ryan uh
[24:30] Gentleman who's a.
[24:31] Former navy seal and now runs a podcast i've
[24:33] Heard of him yeah i don't know much about him but i've heard of him yeah.
[24:35] Well he he outlined that he's done ibogaine twice in a controlled clinical setting and he was an alcoholic after leaving the special forces he uh sort of took a rough turn in life and found himself in a bad way and part of that was becoming an alcoholic and he said that he did ibogaine once in a controlled clinical environment and he found it extremely useful and essentially put him into what he described as it was imagined like being in a room where you have say a hundred tvs and each tv monitor is playing a part of your life a certain scene a romantic scene a scene at work whatever it might be and he could sort of zoom into these analyze what happened and then zoom back out and helped him process certain things he did ibogaine again uh so he's had two control trips and ibogaine trips are very long i think it's 10 to 12 hours extremely intensive extremely uh introspective and he's
[25:27] Oh did we lose him uh i lost you i lost you okay so i'm not sure if you'll be able to come back, feel free to start talking if you can. So, okay, so this guy, Sean, was a special forces guy, a military guy. He quit special forces, and he became, an alcoholic, and then he took these drugs in a controlled setting, and I think you were going to say that he was no longer an alcoholic, neither did he want this drug. Okay. My question of course, is what suffering did he experience as a child that had him become an alcoholic? Right? And so that's my big question is, I don't know this Sean fellow, but I would assume, that some bad stuff went down to some degree or another in his childhood, that he ended up with sort of bad habits of mental health, such as turning to drink, rather than dealing with his problems or his issues.
[26:42] Yeah, can you hear me now?
[26:44] Yeah, go ahead.
[26:45] Yeah sorry my wi-fi was playing um i mean it could well be i don't know i can't speak with authority on that i suppose to some degree i feel like that's kind of sidestepping the point because his point was that and he made it rather implicitly and he's made it multiple times is that that helped him when he was out of a bad spot and i'm sure if he'd had a better childhood perhaps he wouldn't have ended up in the bad spot in the first place but uh he did end up in that place and he found that ibogaine was extremely useful there's a good deal of clinical evidence that ibogaine is quite useful in these settings. The problem with it is that it has to be administered in a very controlled setting. Mainly doing the drug on its own doesn't necessarily, it can, but doesn't necessarily lead to improved clinical results. It seems to be
[27:27] That you have to take the drug to be open to it.
[27:29] Hang on. So did Sean explain how he became an alcoholic? Because, you know, becoming an alcoholic is not just a bad decision, it's a whole series of bad decisions.
[27:47] Right? So did he explain how he ended up making this truly massive series of bad decisions? Because, you know, becoming an alcoholic, you don't just, like, the first time you take a drink, then you start drinking three bottles of wine at night or whatever. It's a whole series of bad decisions, which, again, I sympathize with. I'm sure he had a rough childhood. I don't think you end up being in special forces and an alcoholic because you were raised with love, peace, and reason. So, did he ever explain why he became an alcoholic? Why did he have an addictive streak that he pursued voluntarily? It wasn't like he was dumped in Thailand, shot up with heroin, and then, you know, had withdrawal. I mean, he made a whole series of decisions to drink more, to drink more, to drink more, and to keep drinking more. So did he end up understanding why he made those bad decisions, or did he just basically take drugs, mask whatever bad decisions were being made, or come up with some sort of disconnection or release from that? Did he gain any insight as to why he became an alcoholic?
[29:02] It looks like, I think we lost him again. But anyway, so that's my sort of question or concern. Is it possible that people can gain some kind of significant relief from drugs or, you know, so I guess not drugs and drugs, but can they gain some kind of significant relief from all of these things? Sure, yeah, they can. Yeah, they absolutely can. But do they understand at a deep level, right? Do they understand why, these things are occurring? Oh, sorry, Cogito, Cogito, you're back. I'm not sure what happened. We had a hiccup there. Can you still hear me? Yeah, I mean, let me ask you this. Has Sean ever talked about his childhood or anything negative? I mean, to your knowledge, I don't know, like some absolute maybe, but in public, to your knowledge, has he ever talked about anything negative that happened in his childhood?
[30:15] Uh i'm not a regular listener of posca i've listened to a few of them um but that woman in particular stood out to me where he mentioned it i couldn't really say i you know all his obviously all of his stuff is sort of available online he has quite a few interesting guests um that that i suppose my larger point is that it's not just him that's reporting positive effect
[30:33] Um no no listen i'm not gonna sorry to be clear i'm not saying he's lying i'm not saying there aren't these positive effects for some people, for sure. So I'm not going to say that the drugs have no positive effects at all. And I'm not going to say recreational drugs. Of course, they have positive effects. I mean, you know, the sort of traditional thing of lying in the beanbag with Cheetos on your chest, listening to Dark Side of the Moon and watching The Wizard of Oz backwards, apparently it is quite a trippy experience. And you get to see the music and I get all of that. So I'm not saying that drugs don't have any, I mean, nobody would do them if they didn't have any positive effects. So saying the drugs, and can they have a positive psychological effect? I mean, there's these studies about some drugs with PTSD and so on. Sure. But then they're being used medicinally. But that's not what I'm talking about. I mean, it's the opiate example, right? If somebody's taking opiates because they had a miserable childhood and they don't want to deal with it and they just want to mask the symptoms, that's bad. If somebody's recovering for back surgery and takes opiates so they can get out of bed, that's not bad, right? I mean, I had a friend I worked with once many years ago. He didn't take Novocaine if he had to have a tooth drilled.
[31:51] Because he just didn't like the after effects. And so just out of curiosity, I had to get a tooth, a cavity filled sort of, I don't know, decades ago. And I was like, yeah, I'll try it with that. And then after about a couple of minutes, I'm like, I think I'll try it with because, you know, I would jerk and that would be dangerous. So he had a high pain tolerance, so he could do it. I mean, I guess my pain tolerance is normal. So I took the Novocaine and that's fine. So I'm not trying to say drugs never have any positive benefits. I'm not trying to say they can't help people with psychological issues. But my concern is that by masking the symptoms, you don't get to the roots. What is wrong with your environment, your history, the people around you? Like, how do you become an alcoholic? Don't people notice? Don't they intervene? Don't they have a formal intervention even or something like that, right? There's something in his childhood. I mean, I would ask him this directly if I was in a show. So like, what was it in your childhood that was negative that gave you this much pain to manage? And is it productively managed by taking drugs? And now I know he's just saying he just did it twice and all of that. And again, we're talking about him. He's not here, but that would be my first question.
[33:07] Your friend sounds hardcore, by the way.
[33:11] Well, I don't know. I mean, he just has a high pain tolerance. So, yeah, very high. Yeah, it's very light.
[33:19] Being drilled without Novocaine, yeah.
[33:21] Yeah, it's very light.
[33:22] But, well, I think people can have personality issues because of their childhood. I think that's a given. I don't think they necessarily all result from childhood. I mean, it could well have been his experiences in the SEALs. There are all sorts of, you know, horrible things that the Spec Ops guys have seen that can scar them for life. And certain psychedelics, and not just psychedelics, but ketamine, as you alluded to earlier, can have quite significant therapeutic results.
[33:48] Well, but I would argue that the very fact that he went into special ops and was willing to be a, I don't know, a paid violent guy, knowing that he was going to see all kinds of trauma, to have the personality to do that in the first place usually results from some kind of trauma as well.
[34:11] I suspect that's propositional. I think some people are just wired up to be warriors, and that's the most meaningful thing that they can do.
[34:18] Well yeah i mean so i mean this comes down to there is a there are warrior genes in in the dna and all of that that give people more of a predisposition to be comfortable with violence and so on and of course evolutionarily speaking we would understand that but i i remember a study that i read about some years ago which was uh the boys with a particular gene for violence, if they were physically abused as children, all of them became criminals. And if they weren't, they didn't. So I think there is genetic potential for a predisposition for violence. And by violence, I don't necessarily mean being a criminal. I mean, it could be defensive violence. It could be someone who's, you know, keeping the street safe or whatever it is. So I think there are genetic potentials for these things, but they generally tend to get activated by child abuse. And we would expect that evolutionarily speaking. That if you are in a violent society, then you're going to be treated violently as a child, so you're going to grow up with a propensity for violence. If you're in a peaceful society and you have the potential for violence, but you're raised peacefully, you might be a little bit more assertive or aggressive, but you won't be out there tearing people's heads off because that's going to get you killed or thrown in jail, killed, hung, or whatever, right? So I think there's a predisposition to it, but usually it takes trauma to activate.
[35:38] Oh, absolutely. I'm fully in agreement that we're partly genetic, partly environmental, No dispute there.
[35:44] Okay, I appreciate that. And, you know, I'm not obviously going to give anybody any kind of medical advice. So when it comes to medical treatments, trust your doctor. Don't trust some yapper on the internet. So, yeah, trust your doctor. But I don't even dislike in particular people who take drugs. I just really dislike those who glorify it and those who say, It's, uh, it's cool. It's, you know, it's a natural, it's, it gives you insights. It's, uh, you know, and then, uh, as you kind of came with a little bit earlier, there's just the implied insults. This is a low resolution take. Well, you're just, your mind is limited, man. You just, you, you, you, you, you've got too much of an ego to like, you know, this kind of stuff, right? Or, or the people who say, well, you can't, you can't, you have a negative opinion, about something you've never experienced. It's like, that's bullshit. It's complete bullshit. I have a negative opinion of murder. That doesn't mean I, well, man, you haven't tried it. No, I'm pretty sure I can have a negative opinion of murder and rape and assault without trying it. I don't know. It's just all cope. It's just all cope. And if you can get insights.
[36:58] In a perpetual way, that's better than getting insights once or twice. Now, if he had Sean, like, sorry, I'm not trying to be informal with the guy, Baker was his name, Baker? So if Sean had some, Ryan, Sean, Ryan, sorry. So if Sean had some loop in his brain that these drugs undid and he was able to get out of his alcoholism, great, you know, I think that's fine. However, by not doing drugs, I've now had, you know, there's supposed to be a time of sort of creative inspiration for artists that last 10 to 15 years. And we can see this all the time, right? You can think of bands and so on that they usually what they do is they chug around in relative obscurity, they release a couple of albums, and then they release some monster album, right? Like the Brothers in Arms for Dire Straits or Born in the USA for Springsteen and so on, the monster album. And then, you know, it kind of just kind of trickles out after that. And they keep doing their thing, but they don't have the same level of inspiration. It's what Bob Dylan was saying. You know, he is not busy living, he's busy dying. And he's like, oh, if I could do that now, I would. I can't, right? I don't know how to do it again.
[38:08] And by not doing drugs, I mean, whether it's related or not, I'll probably never know until they dissect my brain, at which point I might not care too much. But I have been able to keep a high level of inspiration going in my life now, for close to half a century.
[38:30] And I know this is, I'm just telling you, this isn't proof of anything. I'm fully aware of that. This is sort of my experience. But, you know, I first started writing novels when I was 12. I wrote a novel by the light of an alien son. It's a science fiction thing. So I'm currently working on a novel now that I think is some of the best stuff I've ever written. So I, and I'm still coming up and with useful things in the realm of philosophy and having great insights and conversations I have with people. So I guess my issue is that when you take the drugs, you get a feeling of insight, you get a feeling of connection, you get a feeling of all of these good things. And then if you stop the drugs, it seems to dry up. I don't know. I mean, this is sort of the Beatles thing, right?
[39:15] They did some pretty, obviously some of the most stunning and amazing songwriting and highly imagined it if everyone thinks that the Beatles have liked the ditties and so on, but some of the stuff they did. Or, I mean, Paul McCartney did a whole classical music piece called Liverpool Oratorio, which is, you know, amazing, right? But it does seem to dry up. It does seem to dry up. And I guess my concern is that drugs steal from the future a little bit by giving you a lot of activity in the here and now, but it does seem to come at a significant cost later on.
[39:50] Just as drugs give you comfort now at the expense of discomfort now i think drugs can give you some creativity now by relaxing self-criticism and ego boundaries but it does seem to come at the expense because when you stop doing the drugs what happens right so uh that would be sort of at a practical level that would be my concern all right listen i appreciate your your comments and uh, Brent, what's on your mind, my friend?
[40:20] Hey, Stef. First of all, just wanted to say, I've got to get my dogs out of here. Really happy to have you back on X, brother. I've been listening to you for a couple of decades now. Huge admirer. You got me into philosophy in the first place. I currently have a podcast now because of it. Huge thanks. That said, really also happy to hear you moderate a little bit throughout this discussion and back off a little bit because I think there are tons of benefits for some people. And I was certainly helped by psychedelics. But also, I...
[40:51] Sorry, hang on, hang on. What haveI moderated and backed off on? I'm not disagreeing with you. I just want to make sure we're talking about the same thing.
[40:57] Okay, fair enough. From the start, when you started tweeting today and also through this conversation, I feel like you have honed in more on the folks who are glorifying the psychedelics, right? The druggie mentality. I'm certainly against that, right? And said, like, okay, for example, that the Sean Ryan Ibogaine experience, like, you know, there are people that can be helped through it. And so I think having that differentiation is important. And so happy to see that little bit of moderation there and then some nuance.
[41:27] Well, I mean, but who would ever say that drugs never have a positive effect? Otherwise, people wouldn't do them. My question is, in general, is it better? Like, let's say, let's just sort of take an example, and I'm happy to hear your feedback on this. I'll keep this brief. So let's take an example, which is somebody who had insomnia, right? I had insomnia, oh, in my, I think it was about 30 or something like that, I had insomnia. And the reason I had insomnia, and I didn't take any sleeping pills or anything like that, I did go to therapy, and it turned out that the reason that I had insomnia was because I was not living my values. I was talking about them a lot, I was preaching about them a lot, which was fine, but I was not living my values in that I had people around me who were resolutely opposed to reason and virtue.
[42:15] And it was bad. So, if I had taken sleeping pills, I may have become addicted to sleeping pills, and in a sense, I would never have woken up to my own hypocrisy or at least lack of consistent integrity, which was of huge benefit to me. So, if I had masked the symptoms of insomnia by taking drugs, then I would not have achieved what I did achieve, which was escaping some fairly high levels of corruption in some areas of my life and making my way to the great marriage and great relationships that I have now. So again, this is just sort of a personal example, and that's not proof of anything. Obviously, I know it's just a personal example, but isn't it better to get to the root of issues rather than take drugs to mask the symptoms? So if somebody's unhappy to the point where they want to take drugs, shouldn't they get to the root of that unhappiness and doesn't taking drugs mask that journey.
[43:15] Yeah, 100%. And I completely agree. And by the way, just from my own personal story, I had a horrible childhood, a terribly abusive childhood, and had suffered tons of problems from it. But once you have,
[43:27] I just want to, I don't want to let that blow past. Like, I'm really, really sorry. You really have massive sympathy for me. The harshness that I have with people is just to shock them out of the loop to some degree, right? Because they're just on this loop of like, drugs are cool, drugs are cool. So I just wanted to obviously give you the massive sympathy, but please continue.
[43:44] Yes, thank you so much for that. I really appreciate that. And you've helped a ton, by the way. I've done psychotherapy, intensive therapy. I've gone through a bunch of stuff. And actually, this is my therapist who sort of low-key said, hey, you should potentially look at what Johns Hopkins is researching, right? And so I had already gone through that. I've resolved things. I've cut my mother out of my life, who is a horribly abusive person. You know, I've done all the things, right? And this was an adjunct. This was something, and I looked at the research on this, and what I think is interesting is two pieces I think you would be interested in. Number one, the way psilocybin acts on the brain. I think as you know, the more patterns you repeat, the more you burn in neural pathways that reinforce behaviors. And psilocybin appears to, especially at high doses, shake the extra sketch clean a little bit. That's a super important thing. So to your point, like you can shake the etch-a-sketch clean, but then you have to, you know, follow through with, you know, better patterns and there's work involved. It's not like a panacea. It's not a fix-all. It's a help.
[44:46] Well, just to reinforce your point very briefly, we are in sort of the modern world, we are subject to levels of stress that are somewhat unprecedented. I'm thinking in particular in wartime. So to think of the first world war where people were in fear of being blown up for four years straight. That is like wars in the past. Like you grab a stick and the other guy grabs a stick and one of you walks away and it's over in about 10 minutes, right? So we're subject to sustained levels of stress in the modern world that we're not really designed for and it certainly can wear out the neurons. But sorry, go ahead.
[45:23] Yeah, certainly. And I completely agree with that. The second component, I heard you mention the Johns Hopkins research around psilocybin, and you called out low dose for PTSD. And what's interesting here is that it's not low dose. So the Hopkins research, one of the key findings that Dr. Roland Griffiths found was that the mystical experience actually appears to be what caused the changes, right? So they found smoking cessation, they found end-of-life anxiety about death with terminal cancer patients, a whole bunch of research around this, PCSD, a bunch of mental health issues. It appears that the mystical experience at high dose is actually what causes most of the effect, not the actual drug itself, which I think is super interesting. I know Jordan Peterson has talked to quite a bit.
[46:09] Sorry, I didn't quite follow that. High dose is rather than the drug itself. I'm sorry if I missed something, but you can explain that.
[46:16] Yeah, apologies. So there's something in the literature called the mystical experience, right? Some people call it ego death. This is essentially the default mode network of the brain being tamped down, right? And sort of this experience that you have, and this is what people claim they encounter God. And I've had this type of experience, and I'm an atheist, but I do understand the ontological squishiness around that experience. And it's very profound, and it appears that that experience itself is what causes the long-term transformation. I don't know what that means. I'm not sure exactly why. The mystical experience, yeah. And the only way to get that experience is on a very high dose. We're talking five to seven grams, depending on body weight. But it's the Terrence McKenna heroic dose. That is the type of thing that occasions the transformation that follows, whether that's smoking cessation or ceasing alcohol or positive mental health effects. It appears to be directly linked.
[47:10] Sorry to interrupt, but I mean, so philosophically speaking, that's a challenge. Doesn't mean it's wrong. I'm just telling you philosophically speaking. So philosophically speaking, reason equals virtue equals happiness, right? If you're rational, then you can have integrity, you can be moral. And as a result of integrity, you get, I mean, happiness, not, you know, obviously that, so that's a general, general sequence. Now, The mystical experience is false. It's not true. It's not a real metaphysical experience. It is a feeling of oneness with the universe. It is a feeling of comfort in the nestled bosom arms of the motherly atoms and so on. But it is not a real thing. You're not contacting anything real. There's not a universal consciousness out there. You are not one with the universe. I mean, you're made of universal matter, of course, right? But you're not at one with the universe psychologically we are isolated from all other matter in the triumph and tragedy of consciousness because there's nothing else that does it so it's not true it feels true and of course as you know there have been particular um you you can induce religious visions in people by stimulating particular parts of the brain like down to cherubs and angels and right it's not true it's not you're like any more than i i had a dream about flying on the back of a giant condor last night that doesn't mean that I flew on the back of a giant condor. It means I had a dream about it. It feels true in the moment you wake up and you go, wow, that was wild, right?
[48:36] So, and to be clear,
[48:38] I'm not making an awful point. Sorry, let me just finish my thought. I pause, so that's not your issue. So, my question is, can good things come out of a lie? And drugs make a lie feel true? Oneness with the universe, mystical experiences, and so on? And can good things come out of, I mean, Plato would call it a noble lie, or like, well, just believe this false thing, and you get good effects. Philosophically, no, can't do it, won't do it, won't do it. I do not believe that sustained happiness comes out of lies. I believe that a lie can get you some temporary relief, right? I mean, if you're a criminal and you get caught and you plead innocence and they believe you and they let you go, then you've lied. I didn't commit this crime. You've lied and you get a temporary relief. But that doesn't mean that you end up with long-term happiness. So the problem is that the mystical experience is a lie. It's false. And you're drugging yourself to believe that what is false is true, and then that's the foundation of your future happiness. That's not philosophically acceptable. But sorry, go ahead.
[50:02] Fair point. I don't agree, though, right? Because I don't think it's a lie, right? So what you have is a mystical experience, which is completely subjective. It's in your own head. Whether somebody who's not philosophically trained, right, doesn't understand epistemology and doesn't have any sort of grounding could misinterpret that experience and believe something false about the experience they had is not necessarily a lie, right? So I don't like that kind of relation,
[50:26] But I don't follow what you're saying. My apologies. So it's in your head. It's not true. It's not real. It's not objective. And you believe that it is true, real, and objective. Well, that's a lie. I'm not saying that the person is lying because they genuinely feels that it's true, but it's not, right?
[50:41] Well, I get your point, but it's not necessarily a lie, right? Because it's actually happening, right? So this substance does occasion this type of experience subjectively in your experience, and it's very much like the color purple,
[50:53] Right? No, no, no, hang on, hang on, hang on. So I'm not saying nothing happens in your brain, but it doesn't happen, it's not real in the universe. It's not like, again, I dreamt of flying on the back of giant condor last night, but I wasn't actually doing it. So it was real in my brain it was real in my dream i didn't doubt it while i was having it but then i woke up and i'm like wow that was something right so of course they're having a subjective experience i'm not disagreeing with them obviously drugs have an effect or nobody would take them but it's not and the fact that they're having a subjective experience if somebody said oh i took this drug and i felt this oceanic oneness with the universe i would say sure i believe you you're not lying you're not lying that's fine but if they say i understood that i, objectively have oneness with the universe. That's different. That's the lie. And I'm not saying they're lying. I'm just saying it's not true. It's not true that I was flying on the back of a giant condor, although it felt real at the time. And it's not true that if you take a drug and feel this oneness with the universe, that you actually have a oneness with the universe in any objective sense. It's just a subjective experience. It's not the subjective experience that's a lie. It's the claim that it has some sort of metaphysical reality.
[52:04] Got it. Got it. Okay. No argument there then. I view this very similar. I know I've listened to you a long time. I know you understand dreams, right? And you do dream interpretation type of stuff. And I look at it that way, right? Like the dream didn't actually happen, but there's some value that can come from what comes from the dream, right? Like you can analyze it. You can try to figure out the root of it. I think psychedelics are the same way to induce a state similar to dreaming, I guess, that has some potential value. And I also definitely believe, I know it's for a fact for myself personally, that has helped me immensely. But like I said, I did the work, right? Like, I didn't start there. I was never a drug guy. I didn't do any, I don't smoke cannabis. I don't drink alcohol. Like, I avoided all of that stuff. This was not like an attempt to,
[52:44] Hey, drugs are cool. Okay, but would you, hang on, would you recommend that other people do drugs?
[52:50] I would not.
[52:51] Okay, so it worked for you, and it was helpful and healing for you. Then why would you withhold that helpful and healing aspect from other people?
[52:59] Out of feeling of responsibility, understanding the grave consequences that could come from taking this course of action, right? Like, I would never say this is for everybody, and I bristle.
[53:09] No, no, no, I didn't say for everybody. I didn't say for everybody. But when you talk about the positive experiences you had doing drugs, that is an endorsement.
[53:21] Oh, sure. And I will say my personal experience, and I think it was incredibly helpful for me, And I do know that it was helpful for a bunch of other people. The research is out there. The data is out there. I'm an empiricist. I've got about a reason and evidence. It's out there. But I would not personally say like, hey, Stef, I want you to take psychedelics tomorrow. Like, I think that is insane.
[53:38] No, but you're saying that. You're saying that psychedelics. Produce a good effect. That is not achievable in a natural way, because if you had the joy to receive that good effect, you would prefer it to be natural rather than drug-induced right correct yes so is it your contention and this doesn't i'm not trying to be confrontational i'm really trying to understand your mindset so is it your contention my friend that the drugs you took had positive effects on your life that were not achievable in any other way in any natural way you couldn't achieve it without the drugs.
[54:19] It's hard to say. I know it certainly fast-tracked a lot of things, for sure. And I'm not trying to say I'm trying to do shortcuts. The issue, Stef, is when I found you, I was deep into the mindset of, you know, you spank your kids or you don't love them. I had all that trauma very late into life. And I started in my 40s, essentially, healing, right? And, you know, things get burned in over time. And I did, like I said, all the foundational work. This was something that helped me tie up some things that were really difficult to get over. And so maybe it accelerated some stuff, but I'm not claiming that I could not have gotten to where I'm at today without them at all. I would never make that claim. I think you can.
[55:04] Okay. Okay. Yeah, of course, compared to what, right? We don't know. And the other thing, too, is if you can do it, let's take a sort of extreme steel man case. if you can do it in 10 minutes with drugs, or it's going to take you 10 years of psychotherapy. And especially if you're older and don't have all the time in the world, I can certainly understand the appeal. Let's put it, again, we don't know for sure. But listen, again, massive sympathies for your childhood. I'm certainly glad that you're in a much better place. I'm glad that philosophy helped. And I'm still going to hold on to, though. I think most people gain value from drugs by believing that it's a true experience. I think if they accept that it's just some chemically induced half psychosis of the brain, then they don't feel that sense of oneness with the universe. But I would say that most people believe that it's true, that they get some connection with something larger than themselves and so on. So, but I certainly listen, I massively appreciate the call and I'm thrilled that you're doing so much better. And again, massive sympathies for your childhood.
[56:04] Thank you so much and thank you for everything you've done for me man like i'm really happy that you're back here uh super pleased to talk to you for the first time it's a great honor
[56:11] A great pleasure for me as well thanks man, Count the something something. Hey, Stefan, how's it going? Good, how you doing? I'm good. Awesome.
[56:22] Appreciate this conversation you're having and just wanted to weigh in.
[56:25] Okay, you're sounding like a tinny beach radio in the far distance. Can you get it closer to your mic or something like that?
[56:31] Yeah, I have my... Hold on one second. I'm going to take my AirPods out. Okay, is this any better?
[56:37] Much better, thank you. Go ahead. Better, thank you. Okay.
[56:40] So just, yeah, just wanted to say I appreciate the conversation here. And kind of just wanted to weigh in as someone who has experience with specifically psychedelics on a broad range.
[56:54] I'm sorry, which psychedelics? Because that's a broad range of terminology there.
[56:57] Well, most of them, psilocybin, LSD, DMT, a couple of others that would be considered research chemicals. And this is all from a past period in my life. if I no longer have anything to do with substances or anything mind-altering.
[57:16] And sorry, for how long did you take the drugs? How many years, if it was years? And roughly how many doses would you say you took?
[57:23] Over the course of two years, probably, I don't know, 50? Probably 50.
[57:32] And what age were you?
[57:34] Late 20s.
[57:35] Okay. So, sorry, I just need some facts, but go ahead. Sure, sure. I'm happy to hear.
[57:39] Yeah, no. And yeah, I was part of a community, an online community that was into psychedelics specifically, recreationally, and it really had nothing to do with any kind of therapeutic benefits or trauma. It was all completely recreational and knew many, many people in that scene.
[58:09] And sorry, what was the purpose of the drugs? Why did you take them?
[58:13] Well, I initially got into them, I guess, as an escape mechanism, a more intense form of escapism than I had previously experienced.
[58:26] Sorry, escape from what?
[58:28] I escaped from my failing body and just wanting to kind of get away from, not the consequences of my body, but just the reality of my body.
[58:43] I'm sorry, it's very abstract and I obviously don't talk about anything you're not comfortable talking about. Oh, sure. How was your body failing in your late 20s?
[58:51] Well, I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes at the age of 7 and have subsequently developed other autoimmune issues and my eyes are starting to fail, partly because of the diabetes, partly because of genetics. My dad's partly blind.
[59:11] Gosh, I'm so sorry. How old are you now?
[59:13] I'm 30, almost 32.
[59:16] I'm really sorry, man. Health issues, especially chronic and deteriorating health issues, are a bear and a half, and I just really want to extend massive sympathies. But sorry, go ahead.
[59:35] I see the value that they've brought to my life in terms of learning to deal with adversity and that kind of thing. So it's not without a silver lining.
[59:47] I'm not trying to compare my health to yours, right? But I certainly notice that I'm a slightly more gentle and nice person when I'm sick. But anyway, go on.
[59:54] Right. But no, so I got into it purely for the recreational side of things. And at least that's what I thought when I got into it. I know that I was just into it for the, you know, the trippiness and the fun experience.
[1:00:10] Well, no, no, I wouldn't say the fun. I'm sorry, I don't mean to tell you your own experience, of course. I wouldn't say it was just the fun experience. I mean, you were dealing with some seriously horrible stuff in life.
[1:00:18] Oh, but I didn't know that until, I didn't understand why I was chasing them until later.
[1:00:24] Okay, got it.
[1:00:25] I was more instinctively reaching for more intense experiences of escapism without really consciously embracing the fact that I was trying to escape from my body.
[1:00:36] Well, and this is what I was talking about earlier, which is, in a way, you didn't take drugs to feel great. You took drugs to not feel bad.
[1:00:45] Right. Exactly. Precisely. I mean, I was specifically seeking out an altered mind experience to sort of shut off the bad signals that I was receiving from within my own mind and from my body so that I could experience something different, some sort of uninterrupted bliss, for lack of a better term.
[1:01:07] And sorry, do you have siblings?
[1:01:10] Yes.
[1:01:11] And do they also suffer from similar ailments, or did they dodge that bullet?
[1:01:17] No, my oldest sister also has type 1 diabetes, and there are a number of other autoimmune issues in my family. A lot of it is genetic.
[1:01:25] Gosh, that's a rough deal, and that's a really rough deal, and I sympathize. But sorry, so go ahead with your story. You said these two years and 50 doses and so on, right?
[1:01:35] Yeah, so, you know, it was a really interesting experience because I interacted with a lot of people who got into it for other reasons, who clearly had some sort of either unrealized or realized trauma behind them, but they were seeking the drugs, whether or not they knew it, to deal with some of that trauma. And something that I witnessed was that people who were experienced with these substances or sought them out primarily for recreational purposes and had come to grips that the reason they were seeking them out were for recreational purposes, tended to handle the effects of the drugs long-term much better than the people who were seeking some sort of enlightenment, seeking some sort of connection with the universe or oneness. And almost to a person, of the people who I witnessed these drugs kind of ruin with or ruin or mess with their, their real, um, their real lives. Um, they were all people who, who believed what they, what they saw in the drugs or what their experiences were. Um, and it's just interesting.
[1:03:01] Yeah, go ahead.
[1:03:01] It, it, it is, it can be really destructive. I mean, imagine how chaotic your life would be if you acted on every impulse you had in a dream, if you objectively believed everything that happened in your dreams to be some sort of deep spiritual metaphysical reality or in some cases like some people some people go further and they and they believe that these things are like not just metaphysical but that but that they have some sort of they have some sort of concrete tangible manifestation in the world or will or can and you just have to get there kind of thing and it can be really it can be really dangerous for people with trauma and with underlying psychological issues. And so I think the interesting thing to me is that the proponents for using psychedelics, they talk about the therapeutic benefits, the John Hopkins studies, all of that stuff, basically target people with trauma, people with PTSD, people with issues. But the flip side is that those are the people, I think, who are the most vulnerable to
[1:04:25] The effects of the drugs being genuinely detrimental. And I don't deny that there are people out there who have and who could see positive benefits from those drugs. Just as you said, people wouldn't do them if they didn't have something to gain from it. But it's just, it's scary to me because like doctors prescribe opioids for pain and that's a legitimate use in many cases, but how many of those people end up being hooked on these things because the legitimate use turned into some form of escapism or dealing with trauma or just being chemically hooked to the drug after repeated use. And so that's where I have a concern is that the recommendation for people with trauma and with issues to try it, even in a controlled setting, but those people are going to be the ones most susceptible to abusing those and relying on them for any kind of improvement or long-term change. And that's just, I think that, I think the responsibility, the people don't understand how, you know, recommending those things is just, is, I think it can be very irresponsible. I just think it objectively is very, very irresponsible.
[1:05:49] Yeah. And I really appreciate your distinction between those who know that they're doing it for self-medication and those who believe that they're exploring the outer frontal lobes of the universe in some existential manner. Those are too, like if I, oh, I have a headache, I'll take an aspirin, oh, my headache's better.
[1:06:04] But then if I think,
[1:06:05] Oh man, aspirin opens up my creativity and allows me to contact the bone marrow of the planet, then I'm obviously going to be a lot more hooked on aspirin. Rather than, yeah. Yeah, for real. And so the other analogy for me is like if somebody, um, you know, they really twist their ankle in the woods and they've got some aspirin on them, then they take the aspirin and they do that so they can get back to.
[1:06:29] Civilization get to a doctor have their their ankle looked at as opposed to somebody shoots up heroin in the woods and they just lie there blissfully as their ankle gets worse and worse and then eventually they can't even walk and i think that's the concern and of course the number of people i mean every time you bring up drugs and i'm not saying this is on you it's just on on x or anywhere anytime you bring up drugs people are johns hopkins you know johns hopkins and it's like you're not in the johns hopkins program man yeah don't give me that you're in your basement yeah exactly yeah you're smoking a bowl in the morning and uh and playing fortnight all day you're not in the johns hopkins study and that's just that's just coke and again i have sympathy except for when people promote it as if it's the only way as if and and also and this was a little bit but the first guy you know well you're just you're just too narrow-minded and you you just you can't handle the ego death and like you know this this vague appeal to i'm superior because i've screwed it up my brain chemistry like that just to be as you know it's like well i mean it's like it's like somebody who cuts themselves somebody cuts themselves to get the high or the dissociation uh they they cut themselves and then they say well you know you just don't have the stamina and the strength to cut yourself i'm like i don't want that yeah i mean
[1:07:44] you don't want that and if there's a natural way to do it that's better
[1:07:46] yeah narrow-mindedness.
[1:07:47] Is is often used as some sort of some sort of insult or some sort of implication of superiority, but we have to be narrow-minded in that we can't just be, we can't allow ourselves to bombard our brain with things that we know to be false in a situation where we could begin to believe them to be objectively true. I mean, that's just perilous.
[1:08:17] That's just propaganda.
[1:08:17] Yeah, I mean,
[1:08:18] It's people who take drugs, get that feeling of oneness with the universe, while things that we, believed to be true that are false are either lies or propaganda. And sorry, as a philosopher, I cannot promote lies and propaganda. That's just not the deal. That's not the gig. That's not the job. And the job is to say, is it true or not? And so people are like, oh, I got this oneness with the universe. They might as well say, I had a vision that Joseph Stalin is the savior of the proletariat, and I'm going to go and join the Red Guard. And it's like, that's just propaganda. Sorry, go ahead.
[1:08:52] Yeah, and that, what you alluded to right there is the questioning, is this true or is this not, was the one, I think the one lifeline for me going through way too many doses of psychedelics over the course of two years. It was the one thing I think that kept me from losing it, like many people that I knew whose lives just dissolved because they bought into it, was even when I was super tripping to the point of mega ego death on LSD or one of these research chemicals to the point where I didn't have any understanding of my own body and mind, there was one thread that I would pull continually on as I was in these trips. And it was the knowledge. It wasn't the belief. It was the knowledge that none of this is real. None of it's true. I'm like living inside a sci-fi movie. I'm watching the most realistic, epic feeling, epic looking sci-fi movie from inside my brain. But I knew on a very, very fundamental level that I couldn't trust anything that I saw or felt during those trips.
[1:10:07] And I just wish that some of the people that I knew and befriended before they jumped off the deep end had been able to maintain that same level of certainty when using these for what they thought was recreational purposes and ended up turning into a complete inversion of their prior beliefs and lifestyles and a philosophy. so
[1:10:30] I appreciate that. And what is it that they mean? Because people use this term and I'm not really, I mean, I have an idea what it means to me. I don't know what it means to the people who use it. And I'm not saying, you know, all the people in the drug community, but what do people mean with ego death? What are they talking about?
[1:10:46] It's a very fascinating experience, and I'm sure it does mean different things to different people, but there is a point when, you know, if you take the drugs up to a certain threshold, you still maintain some sort of sense of identity, some sort of connectedness to your body, a degree of sobriety, I guess, for lack of a better term. But once you get past a certain threshold, some of those connections start to either fade or just disappear entirely. And for some people, it feels like death, like you can't feel your heart beating anymore. You can't feel your body breathing. You can't even really recognize like where your body starts and ends. And then for a lot of people, it also just involves sort of, it's really hard to explain, but like loss of this concept of self. I mean, it's impossible to explain because it takes large doses of mind-altering drugs to be able to experience.
[1:11:55] Yeah, because of course people use ego to mean sense of identity, sense of judgment, sense of self. But they also use it to mean like egoist, right? like your dominant vanity and your sense of self-importance that's not grounded in anything real and the sort of win-lose negotiations where you have to come out on top. So people use this ego in very different ways. And ego death, I mean, ego is identity. Ego death, ego is judgment. And I just, I would love to hear somebody coming out of a drug trip with an ability to reason better. And I've never seen that.
[1:12:32] Oh, no. I mean, it's intoxicating. It completely inhibits your ability to reason better until you're out of the trip. And I would say even, I mean, there's this for a lot of psychedelics, especially for like LSD, you feel the after effects of that. You may not be intoxicated after that 12 or 14 hour trip, but I would say about two weeks is, is when the effects actually start to kind of fully fade. Um, and, and you're kind of back to a baseline. Um, and no, I, I, I would talk with people who, who, um, you know, when I was coming out of one of my trips or when they were coming out of one of their trips and, and you go back into the conversation log and it's just like, man, I, I either don't remember saying that or like, i really thought that this was true and it wasn't or for some reason i said this and obviously i didn't mean it i never would have said that in my right mind oh yeah
[1:13:28] All the people who like i had this great insight under lsd and they wrote it down and they read it back like the umbrella's wetness comes from the sky god's fantasy i'm like okay yeah that's that's real real deep man.
[1:13:38] I mean i yeah i have i have created art and i i recorded like guitar solos while while tripping because, you know, I feel like this, this sense of, of grandeur and, and profound skill and, and meaningfulness to these creations while I'm in the experience. And then I go back to them a week later and I'm just like, like, it looks like a child drew this. And I listened to that. I listened to that music I made and I'm like, this felt so meaningful, so profound in the moment. And I listened back to it and objectively speaking, it's just trash, you know?
[1:14:12] Right, right. And the other thing, too, I have an issue with mysticism in many ways is kind of narcissistic in that it's all about, it is actually all about the self. So, for instance, there are some people who go through a religious conversion, they're born again and so on, and they come out with an incredible mission in the world to... Feed the feed the hungry to to provide sucker to the homeless to whatever it's going to be right they come out with a a mission that is not just about themselves and you know one of the concerns i have this sort of stuff is i've never heard of anyone and this doesn't mean that it's obviously scientific but i've talked to a lot of people about this stuff who said you know i realized, that I was kind of selfish. And after taking drugs, I decided to go out and battle evil in the world and promote virtue and so on. But it's all just about the self and what feels good in the moment for the self and a sense of oneness with the universe. It's for the self. At least people who become religious have rules that they have to follow, right? Like, okay, I can't bear false witness. I have to forgive people who earn it. They come out with rules and responsibilities, But the mysticism of the druggies has no external responsibilities or rules. It is really self-indulgent and kind of selfish, I think.
[1:15:37] Absolutely. And it's not something that can ever be, you can't draw a connection back to anything concrete. And so it's impossible to argue with somebody who has this position. And I'm talking more, the farther you go into the fringe and the extreme people who buy into the mysticism and all this, but there's no way to work on their level because they're basing their entire reality and their entire philosophy around something that only they've experienced. There's no objective way for anybody else but them to have experience because everybody's trips are
[1:16:20] Different it isolates i love the way i love the freudian slip of like because you know the idea that the druggies are snacky and they're like you go to the back of the fridge it's like but and this is the thing too so it's a basic principle that if you think your subjective experience is objective it alienates you from people because you're now part of reality that no one else can share. You have this giant moat of delusion around you. Other people cannot join you. You know, we can only meet in reality. We can only connect with others, with social animals, right? We can only connect with each other in reality, which is why the meaning of words matter and sense data matters because we meet in sense data reality. You and I are having a conversation based on sound, right? So, we have to trust sound. We have to trust the medium that is allowing us to communicate and so on. So when you have a subjective experience, that you think is objective, that nobody else can share, you're now in a universe of one that no one can join you in. Like if I thought that I genuinely was flying on the back of a condor last night
[1:17:22] in my dreams that was real, nobody else can join me in that dream.
[1:17:26] It's fundamentally terrifyingly isolating, and that's why I think it tends to escalate for people who are already isolated.
[1:17:32] And it's completely destructive. I mean, a person I became good friends with before he got into psychedelics, He only really used cannabis before these, but he had a phenomenal career, made a lot of money, had a loving wife and multiple children. He had everything going for him, and he started getting into psychedelics. And it did exactly what you described. It isolated him from his family because he started to have these thoughts. And anytime his wife did something that annoyed him or disagreed with him, it started to turn into, well, she's not, she doesn't understand. She's not enlightened and she can't possibly understand. And she's got all of these blocks to what's true. And so he doesn't have his family. He doesn't have his job. I don't know that he's homeless, but he doesn't have any of the social connections that he had before. And he relies on government welfare to pay his bills. And it has completely destroyed the wonderful life that he had before, and he's completely at peace with that because he thinks that he's working off of some sort of objective reality that he sees in these drugs, and it's just tragic.
[1:18:45] Well, at least, so in the realm of religion, even if we were to say, oh, religion is not true, so I'm like being an atheist or whatever, but at least the religious people have things that are not true that are relatively objective. Like they have beliefs in Jesus, or Muhammad, and they have shared rules, excuse me, the Ten Commandments, they have shared rules and so on. They have shared obligations. They have shared morals. And so at least, but with the subjective being the objective, being isolating, they don't even have anything that they share with everyone else, and it's really tragic. All right. We've got a bunch of people listening. Great conversation and massive sympathies for your health issues. Obviously, you know, fingers crossed for the universe that something positive happens. And I just, you know, I sort of hate to give you the consolation prize, but you have a fine, fine mind and a great set of communication skills.
[1:19:36] So I hope that you're doing something great in the world with all of those.
[1:19:39] That's a great gift to have. And I really appreciate the conversation. All right.
[1:19:43] Thank you, Stefan.
[1:19:43] You're welcome.
[1:19:45] Alice. Alice.
[1:19:50] Hi, thanks.
[1:19:52] You're welcome.
[1:19:53] Um, uh, uh,
[1:19:55] What you were saying was, it just made me think of, um, uh, the, the writer, um, the French writer Montesquieu. He wrote that he theorized that warmer climates gendered religions that tended toward that because in warmer climates, the muscles relax, that then the religion and enlightenment is kind of trying to recreate that experience of just relaxing. And that's their idea of enlightenment. And whereas I dislike drugs, I think that it's much more preferable to exercise the brain and that when you gain wisdom and you gain understanding that it's a bulwark against the terrors of the world and the uncertainty of being alive, so that creates relaxation through strength, which is the preferable mode of achieving enlightenment.
[1:20:54] But anyways, that was it. No, I think that's a very interesting thought. I mean, I've got, there's a whole RK selection theory that I talked about in my presentation. You can find this at fdrpodcast.com called Gene Wars as a four-part presentation. And about sort of warm versus cold climates, R versus K selection. And this is why we have liberals and conservatives. This is why I have the left and the right wing. So you should go and check that out. But I will say that, you know, relaxation is both a positive and a negative in life. I mean, you wouldn't want to take a hyper-relaxing drug when being chased by a bear in the woods, right? So sometimes you are in danger. And turning off your body's danger signals is comfortable in the moment, like turning off pain, turning off anxiety or fear or things like that. It's good in the moment.
[1:21:46] Excuse me, I'm so sorry, a little bit of a frog in my throat. So I remember when I was a kid complaining about pain, right? And I can't remember somebody was telling me, oh, but, you know, pain is your body's way of changing something. You should do something different, right? So I think the example was like if you're climbing a tree and you disturb a wasp's nest and the wasps are all stinging you in your back and you don't feel that, then eventually your body will just become overwhelmed by poison and you'll fall and die. So pain is your body's way of saying you need to change something, right? I remember when I was a kid, we had this gas burner stove and the burner was on. I needed a knife to butter some toast. I grabbed the knife. The knife happened to have been by the burner and was superheated. So I grabbed it. I didn't even feel the pain before I dropped it. Because the body works that way. Like you get the pain receptors, they go to your spine, they tell you to drop it before you even register the pain. And that really hurt. That really hurt. And so that's my body's way of saying, hey, you might want to check if stuff's on the stove, whether it's hot or not. And you do that, you touch it really quick, a little slower, a little slower, and then, you know, maybe it's okay, you pick it up, right?
[1:23:05] And so your body pain is stress anxiety fear it's your body's way of telling you to change something like my insomnia was my body's way of saying change something and i guess my concern is that if people sort of drag the symptoms they don't figure out what needs to change in their life absolutely yeah i appreciate that is there more that you wanted to uh to add to no.
[1:23:29] No i just wanted,
[1:23:30] Just enjoying hearing your insights. That's all.
[1:23:34] I appreciate that. Thank you so much for calling in. All right.
[1:23:43] Every man, no man. No time at all. No time this time. What's on your mind, my friend? Don't forget to unmute.
[1:23:52] Oh, is it me? Oh, there we go. I have a philosophical question that I've been thinking about for a few years and I think I'm too biased to answer it myself because you know for obvious reasons once you hear it so I have some very specific this question is not about drugs yeah it's
[1:24:14] Totally fine I.
[1:24:16] Have some very specific and rare phenotypes I have brown hair and a red beard and freckles and blue eyes and I'm really tall and my dad had these phenotypes and his dad had these phenotypes and I tend to have I tend to experience a dramatic difference in enthusiasm from partners who don't share these phenotypes. And just in the last few years, I've realized that I want kids really bad.
[1:24:46] Sorry, sorry. You got to, I don't know your life. So just bear with me while I try to unpack what you're saying. So when you say you have a massive enthusiasm from partners, I assume you don't mean tennis partners. You mean that women want to have sex with you. Okay just want to want to make sure that we're not talking about business partners or squash partners and and so women you're tall you've got great phenotypes it's unusual you've got a striking look and so women want to bang you like a gong right yes.
[1:25:14] Every woman i meet wants to have my
[1:25:16] Kids
[1:25:16] okay got it got it so you are a chick magnet and how old are you
[1:25:20] 34
[1:25:21] okay uh go ahead.
[1:25:23] Uh but the the square that i'm trying to circle is that women who also share these phenotypes show me what i would consider average enthusiasm whereas women who don't have these phenotypes show me extraordinary enthusiasm and as a rule of thumb i've always just dated the women who treat me the best. But now that I'm going into this phase of my life where I want to have kids, if I follow that logic, it basically guarantees that my sons will not have red beards. They won't have blue eyes. They won't be six foot four.
[1:26:06] Okay. So you've got a genetic subsidy that you didn't earn in the dating market, and you want to exploit that subsidy by having sex with women whose admiration you don't have to earn because they're just admiring the genetics.
[1:26:21] Yeah well that's what's currently happening
[1:26:23] No no it's not what's happening it's what you've chosen, It doesn't happen like the weather, like you're making choices. And I'm not bagging on those choices, but I don't like it when people speak about their lives as if stuff just happens. These are all choices, right? So you have women who are as attractive as you are, who aren't that impressed by your attractiveness, whose respect you might have to earn through other means, quality of character, integrity, or something like that, hopefully. And then you have women who are just like, wow, he's hot, and he's tall, and he's got, you know, whatever, these striking features. So you'd rather have sex with the women who admire you for things you didn't earn rather than try to earn the love of a woman through something other than your genetics yeah.
[1:27:07] I mean i don't disagree with that part but that's not my question
[1:27:10] No no i'm i know we haven't gotten to your question i know but but i just want to sort of understand the lay of the land get it lay of the okay go ahead.
[1:27:21] I'm what i'm trying to get to and this is what i mean when i'm saying like i'm too biased to come to this answer myself, I think. Yes. I mean, I feel like I'm objectively, I don't know, right is probably not the right word because I feel like that sounds like it's moral or something like that.
[1:27:47] Okay, if you could do me a favor, all of the hedging is making my head spin. Right? So just give me your bold statement and don't worry about the judgment.
[1:27:58] Yeah, well, I mean, I'm not sure how to communicate what I'm trying to say. Sorry, I'm not a great communicator. I want my sons to have red beards and blue eyes and whatnot.
[1:28:08] Okay, so then you need to choose a woman who's not impressed by your genetics.
[1:28:20] Okay, so...
[1:28:20] You need to win the love of a woman not through things you didn't earn but things you do earn, like maybe income, quality of character, morals, that kind of stuff. I'm not saying you're immoral, obviously, but if a woman is, yeah, you've been, you've been doing life on easy mode, right? You've been having the God cheat.
[1:28:39] Yes, by, by virtue of genetics.
[1:28:42] No, not by virtue of genetics, by virtue of genetics and your choices. You've chosen to go for the easy sex rather than a more challenging woman.
[1:28:56] I wouldn't put
[1:28:57] It that way
[1:28:57] i think you did i think you did put it exactly that way because you said that the women the women who share your phenotypes aren't that impressed with you so you instead you've had sex with women who are impressed by your genetics no.
[1:29:10] They both want to have sex with me but one treats me like the the way i like to describe it is one group looks at me and they go oh i kind to like that guy. The other group looks at me and they go, I love that guy.
[1:29:25] But it's not love, it's just lust, right?
[1:29:29] Uh, I mean, I have incredible relationships with good women who do truly love me.
[1:29:34] Okay. Then why are you 34 and single?
[1:29:38] Uh, cause I was deluded to think that I didn't want a family until my late twenties.
[1:29:46] Okay. So you married, sorry, you, you dated, what's the longest, how many relationships and what's the longest one you've had?
[1:29:52] Uh, the longest one was two and a half years and I've had a couple of one to two year relationships, like maybe three or four at this point.
[1:30:02] And these are women who don't want to have kids. Is that right?
[1:30:06] No, they all, they all wanted kids.
[1:30:09] Um, and sorry, but you didn't.
[1:30:12] Well, I was very honest with them about that.
[1:30:15] Okay. So they wanted kids. You didn't want kids. Therefore they dated you for reasons of lust.
[1:30:25] I, I would argue that they thought they could change my mind.
[1:30:28] Right. But why did they pick a guy whose mind they have to change rather than a guy who already wants kids? Because lust.
[1:30:35] Oh, yes, of course, because they were very attracted to it. Right. Okay.
[1:30:40] Now, did you know that the women wanted to change you?
[1:30:46] I mean, I suspected. That's been the pattern my whole life. Okay.
[1:30:50] So the women wanted to change you because the women wanted to have children. Right.
[1:30:57] Yes.
[1:30:59] And certainly at the time in your 20s, you weren't going to change, right?
[1:31:06] No.
[1:31:07] So did you tell them explicitly, I will never change, you're never getting kids out of me?
[1:31:12] Yes.
[1:31:13] And why did they continue to date you?
[1:31:18] Because they were in love.
[1:31:20] No, no, no. because love is pair bonding so that we can raise children well. And if they want to have kids and you don't want to have kids, there's a huge mismatch in values, right?
[1:31:35] Yes.
[1:31:36] And if they thought they could change you, it means that they were dissatisfied with you as you were, right?
[1:31:44] Yes, or dissatisfied with the outcome.
[1:31:47] Well, can you imagine that you have a woman, right? Imagine a woman she's got the perfect kitchen. She shops around, looks at different houses, and she finally, oh, this is the perfect kitchen. And then she gets in and she says, man, I got to renovate this. No, she only renovates a kitchen she's dissatisfied with. So if you want someone to change, it's because you're dissatisfied or unhappy with who they are.
[1:32:14] I mean, yeah, to a degree.
[1:32:16] Well, everything's to a degree. Everything's to a degree. Come on, you got to up your game in this conversation. Everything is to a degree, right? It's hot outside.
[1:32:23] I'm not compared to Venus.
[1:32:25] It's like, yeah, yeah,
[1:32:25] I get it, right? So, of course, everything's to a degree, but you do understand that if you want somebody to fundamentally change, right? This isn't like, oh, I really wish you'd stop picking your nose or whatever, right? This is fundamental. I want you to reverse your entire stance on having children. That's a huge change and a huge dissatisfaction with who you are, right?
[1:32:45] Agreed, yeah.
[1:32:45] So you can't love somebody and fundamentally want them to change something essential about themselves.
[1:32:57] I don't know about that.
[1:32:59] Well, it's okay. You can take your time.
[1:33:03] No, I mean, yeah, I don't know. I mean, I'm calling you because it's hard for me to think through these things myself.
[1:33:08] Okay, so, but you understand. Look, I'm not saying that you were a bad guy, but what I'm saying is that you can't love your SUV if you really want it to become a sports car or something, right? Or a boat, right?
[1:33:26] Okay. I like that analogy. So let me ask you, what if in this era of your life, you're not driving on roads, you're exclusively off road. So you're in the SUV and you're like, this SUV is great. Although in the future, I would like it to be a sports car when I am eventually driving on a road.
[1:33:45] Well, so now you want to change, right?
[1:33:49] Yeah, exactly. So in that analogy, I was the SUV and now I've become a sports car. I was dating women who were happy with the SUV, but they wanted me to become a sports car in the future.
[1:34:02] Right, which to both of your knowledge wasn't going to happen.
[1:34:07] Yes.
[1:34:08] I'm not saying that they didn't have affection for you, and I'm not saying there weren't aspects of love, but you cannot love someone and want them to fundamentally change.
[1:34:16] Okay, that's fair.
[1:34:17] Okay, so what caused the end of the two and a half year relationship?
[1:34:23] Just me not wanting kids. This was always like a day one conversation.
[1:34:28] And then the pattern that I've noticed is that no matter how convincingly I told the women, they would say, okay, no problem. And then they would eventually come to the realization that I wasn't, that I was not going to change. And then we would separate.
[1:34:48] Okay. So why didn't you date women who didn't want kids? Because it's kind of cruel to date women who do want kids if you know you don't. Now, I know you told them, but you have such an advantage when it comes to your look that you can't expect those in the throes of lust to behave rationally. Lust is a kind of madness, right? So why wouldn't you just date women who didn't want kids?
[1:35:15] Well, some of them didn't. The girl I'm dating right now was absolutely against kids until we met, and then women fall in love with me, and it completely changes the way that they look at...
[1:35:26] Okay, they fall in love. You keep saying love. It's lust, primarily.
[1:35:30] Okay. Yeah, an infatuation, I suppose.
[1:35:32] No, it's lust. I mean, you tell me you're tall with amazing phenotypes, very good-looking guy, so it's lust. And listen, I have no problem with lust. Lust is fine. lust is a beautiful, wonderful pair bonding thing. I lust for my wife. It's great. Right?
[1:35:48] I always assume that infatuation, the majority of that was lust.
[1:35:51] Okay. So I don't know why you have trouble with the word lust. We can use infatuation as long as we know that it's somewhat of a synonym. Okay. So why did you date women who wanted kids?
[1:36:04] I mean, it just wasn't a conscious choice. I didn't filter for wanting versus not wanting kids. Nope.
[1:36:15] No, no, brother. Brother. Don't contradict yourself within three minutes. You said it was a first date conversation.
[1:36:26] Oh, I get, no, what I was trying to say is that it wasn't a filter of mine.
[1:36:31] It was a first date conversation, you said, right? I don't want to have kids. Yes. And what did the women say?
[1:36:41] They either agreed or disagreed. Okay, so that's a filter.
[1:36:45] So on a first date, when knowing how sexy you are, right, knowing how attractive you are and that you're catnip to women, on the first date, if a woman says, oh, I do want to have kids, why wouldn't you say, okay, well, we shouldn't date then because you're not going to get what you want.
[1:37:03] I suppose it is just toxic? Is that the...
[1:37:07] I don't know. I mean, I'm asking you, don't guess at your own motivations. Only you know them. I don't.
[1:37:13] Well, that's the thing. On a first date, you never know that you're going to actually long-term date the person.
[1:37:18] No, but why wouldn't you just say, no, we can't date because you want to have kids and I don't want to have kids. It's unfair.
[1:37:27] Well... I don't have a good answer for that.
[1:37:32] Sure you do. It's just not a nice answer. The good answer is they were sexy and you wanted to have sex and you enjoyed being in a relationship.
[1:37:41] Oh, well, yeah, I didn't consider that a good answer. Like, that's obvious.
[1:37:44] Yeah. No, I get it. So you had two people making bad decisions based on lust.
[1:37:51] Yes, exactly.
[1:37:52] Okay. So I assume that these women themselves were attractive, but not with your unusual phenotypes, right?
[1:37:59] Yes. Okay. Yes.
[1:38:00] Now, do you think that, let's say, what was your age when you were dating the woman for two and a half years?
[1:38:09] Mid-20s, early 20s.
[1:38:11] Mid-20s, okay. So women have like a 20-year window, right? It takes about half the time to get over a relationship as being in the relationship. So we're talking, you know, maybe four years. You took her out of the dating market, which is 20% of her entire reproductive window. You have a much longer reproductive window. So you at 34 can say, I think I'm going to have kids, and you can start to plan for that because you've still got another 40 years to have kids. But a woman doesn't, right? So do you think that the women you dated who wanted kids and broke up with you eventually because you just wouldn't have kids, do you think that they benefited as a whole or had something negative as a whole from dating you?
[1:38:56] When we're just looking at the time horizon, definitely negative. Like I've never beat around the bush there it's uh and I say that to the women I'm like if you want kids and I don't want kids you're I'm wasting your time to them
[1:39:08] Okay so then why would you date women if you say you want kids and I don't want kids you're wasting your time why again I'm sort of back to like if they're not smart enough to make good decisions shouldn't you make good decisions for them?
[1:39:26] I mean, I suppose hypothetically in a perfect world, but that's...
[1:39:29] No, no, it's not hypothetically in a perfect world. You're a very intelligent... I put all my listeners... Hang on, I put all my listeners top 1% of intelligence, right? Just where I categorize them, right? So if you have a friend who's drunk and wants to drive, do you take away his keys?
[1:39:50] Yes, of course.
[1:39:51] Right. So if somebody is not making good decisions, you have to make good decisions for them, right?
[1:39:59] Yes, to a degree, yeah.
[1:40:01] Again, everything is to a degree. That doesn't add anything to the conversation. Everything is to a degree. Okay.
[1:40:07] Well, I mean, it's not applicable when you talk about a friend versus a stranger. When you're talking about somebody who might drive drunk and kill themselves versus two horny 23-year-olds who just want to fuck.
[1:40:22] So if somebody is in the grip of lust, and okay, for how long have you known that you're unusually attractive?
[1:40:31] Um, I would say my whole life. Okay.
[1:40:37] So for your whole life, you've known that you're unusually attractive and that you provoke lust in women. And that lust is kind of like being drunk. It has you make bad decisions, right? Sure. And so, listen, I'm not trying to back on you and make you feel bad. It's just that I think if you want to have a good relationship going forward, or you say you're dating someone now, which is great, so you have a good relationship going forward, you did use your looks a little bit to exploit women in the past. And, you know, maybe they were exploiting you too just to have you, you know, look at this big tall Viking guy on my arm, doesn't that make me look good? And, you know, women in particular with regards to boyfriend status, especially with social media, right? They post a picture of you on their arm and, oh, what a great piece of man candy and what a himbo. And, you know, I'm not saying you're dumb, right? But, you know, they get great status out of your big manly Viking presence. And so you got benefits out of something you didn't earn, which just happens to be your looks, right?
[1:41:48] Yeah, yeah.
[1:41:49] And, you know, I mean, I know it's a little shocking to people, but I was scouted for modeling when I was younger. I was a very good-looking guy. And I was not the best boyfriend in my teens and 20s. Women dated me, and it was mostly lust. I was on the swim team. I was on the cross-country water polo team, tennis team. I was a lean and blue-eyed, square-jawed guy. And I didn't earn my looks. And I, you know, it wasn't good in general. And, To benefit from the unearned and to exploit people's lust. And again, you maybe were being exploited by them too. But if you want something different going forward, you have to, with a clear-eyed view, look at where you were coming from. And it was not honorable, in my view, it was not honorable to waste women's fertility years because they were in lust with you.
[1:42:49] Sure, I mean, I wouldn't claim that it was.
[1:42:51] Okay, good. so um the relationship you have now how long has it been for.
[1:42:57] About two months okay
[1:43:00] And how old is she.
[1:43:01] 27 27
[1:43:04] Okay and what is your goal with this relationship.
[1:43:09] Well like you know that's that was the whole the the core reason i called i'm trying to communicate this the best way i can if it please let me know if this doesn't make sense but part of me feels like it's petty to want my sons to have red beards and blue eyes and freckles and these things and part of me thinks well it's awesome having these things so I want my son to have them and so I don't know and the alternative where like what do I dump this girl and then go hunting for some ginger, that also seems absurd.
[1:43:52] What does the 27-year-old look like?
[1:43:57] She's Caribbean.
[1:43:59] Caribbean. Is she like black Caribbean?
[1:44:02] Yeah.
[1:44:03] Okay. Got it. Got it. All right. So it would be a biracial relationship, obviously, right? Yeah. Ginger and Caribbean. Look at me being a geneticist and all that. Okay. All right. So you would then be choosing biracialism for your children, right?
[1:44:19] Yeah, exactly.
[1:44:20] Okay. Have you looked up how biracial children experience the world?
[1:44:26] Yeah, that's rough.
[1:44:28] Right. So, I mean, I would just, you know, fundamentally, when we choose the mother of our children, we are choosing, obviously, the genetics of our children and so on. And so, just keep that in mind that it can be pretty rough. Socially, identity, medically, and so on, identity issues and so on, right?
[1:44:55] I had tons of mixed friends growing up. It was rough for all of them, regardless of what the mix was.
[1:45:01] So if you want to keep your red hair going obviously the Caribbean young lady is not the way to go, and I mean if she's a moral virtuous woman and all of that then obviously that matters more than genes but I would say that, it might be better for you to find something in between what you've been with and where you are so that you can have kids who are going to maybe struggle a little bit less with some of the identity issues. And again, it's not like you guys are like deeply in love. It's like been two months, right?
[1:45:46] Exactly.
[1:45:47] I would say date with your future children in mind. Oh, and by the way, what was it that changed your mind in your late 20s about having kids?
[1:45:57] Um, I was sort of, that's why I use the word deluded, because I, thinking back now, I sort of had like a comically anti-Natalist perspective. And then I was living in China, and I managed to escape just before COVID hit. And...
[1:46:16] Oh, so was the woman you were dating in your 20s, was she Asian?
[1:46:21] Some of them were.
[1:46:22] Some of them were. Okay, about China, I assume that most of them were, right? It's a pretty mono-ethnic culture.
[1:46:27] Yes yeah okay um yeah so during that period yeah most of them were but
[1:46:33] I got it.
[1:46:33] I got back and a combination of sort of the there was like a shattering of the anti-natalist agenda that had been pushed on me and china with the one child policy and how dystopian it is just made me realize like nothing matters other than having a family right okay okay and uh and a big family, especially the one-child policy over there. All my students were single kids. They didn't have any siblings, and it was incredibly depressing.
[1:47:05] Right. Well, I mean, and the funny thing is, of course, as you know, China has eliminated the one-child policy, but they just can't get the birthright back up.
[1:47:11] Of course. Oh, the Chinese women fucking loathe the Chinese men. One of the jokes was always that the Chinese would say, oh, well, the Chinese women fetishize foreigners, and all us foreigners are like, they fucking hate you. They would sleep with anybody who's not a Chinese man.
[1:47:30] Well, but you fetishize foreigners a little bit too, given your dating history, right?
[1:47:34] Well, that's the irony that my friends always say. It's chicken and egg. Because at this point, I certainly do, but was it the case that I gave them a certain energy and then they responded with it, or they gave me a certain energy and then responded with it.
[1:47:52] And that's what I don't know what any of that means, but I don't know this energy exchange thing. I don't know the gravitational wells or something like that. I mean, you just, you just want to choose, you want to choose your dating partners, especially if you want kids. And it's kind of funny, right? That, that women want children and you weren't just like, I don't want children, but you are a raging antinatalist as you sort of put it right. comically antinatal has showed. So that's a real, that definitely is some sort of fetish or lust thing then, right? I guess in China, you would be very much, I mean, about as exotic as you could possibly be, right? So I think you kind of strip mind your genetics for the sake of relatively easy sex, I think. But yeah, when it comes to choosing your partner, you want to choose what's best for your children, not what's best for your dick, right? Don't get dick-napped, right? Don't fall prey to lust. Or if you're going to fall prey to lust, at least have lust for a virtuous woman. And of course, maybe this Caribbean woman is virtuous and so on, but I would say choose what is best for your future children and not what is best for your loins in the moment. And if you just sort of draw that out and say, okay, what's the very best that I can choose for my future children? I think the answer will become pretty clear. All right. Well, thanks. I appreciate the conversation. Thanks to everyone for the reflections. We can go a little longer?
[1:49:14] Sorry, I don't know if I'm still on.
[1:49:17] No, but I'm going to move on to someone else.
[1:49:19] Oh, okay. Thank you.
[1:49:22] Owl. We talked before, I think. What's on your mind? Owl. Yes, hello.
[1:49:31] Hey, I didn't hear you for a sec because I tripped on this thing out here, dang it. Yeah, I think, just to piggyback off the idea that Chinese women loathe the China men, you know, some of it could very well be the fact that they didn't have a lot of offspring for a while and just genetically speaking, like a draw to different genetic partners. Because we, like, we have a draw to certain genetic partners.
[1:50:06] Well, yeah, that even, it's the realm of scent. They've actually shown that people who have complementarily healthy genetics smell better to each other. Like, it's at that level. It's just wild. And, of course, with the women, who were the primary enforcers of the one-child policy? Well, often it was men. And who were the primary enforcers of communism? To a large degree, it's men. They don't have the same sort of let's get women into all of the policing and so on quite as much as the West, to some degree. So I think because the enforcers of policies relatively negative to women were often men, I think that kind of translates into negativity.
[1:50:47] It's like a generational trauma. You know, those offspring, the mothers carry that resentment or that frustration down to their offspring as well. Like, you know, they have this oppression that they carried down into future generations.
[1:51:04] Yeah, I mean, they were, I mean, the one China policy was brutal. It wasn't about prevention. I mean, they would literally chase women down, sobbing and inject them with drugs to cause abortions, to cause stillbirths. I mean, it was absolutely horrific what happened in China. The one China policy, you know, people think it was somewhat gentle, like, oh, well, people just beyond birth control. It's like, no, you got pregnant, man. They would enforce that in brutal, brutal ways. And that's really tough for women that those stories get told. And, you know, this is what men are capable of. And again, it wasn't only men, but largely men. And yeah, I mean, it's something I think about from time to time, like North Korea, right? Like, how long is it going to take for people in North Korea to overcome the trauma of the communist dictatorship that they've been living under? 100 years, 200 years. I mean, it's easy to break things. It's very hard to fix them.
[1:52:02] I think that just genetically and stuff, like, three to five generations seems to be the pattern that we see. And so, you know, if we think about three to five generations, that's a couple hundred years.
[1:52:19] Yeah, it's very sad. It's very sad. And, you know, who knows when it turns around. And, yeah, it's, I mean, North Korean parents, even if they were liberated tomorrow, I mean, maybe grandparents even more so they wouldn't be able to undo the damage it is just just brutal all right is there anything else that you wanted to mention it's a great topic.
[1:52:40] Yeah no i'm i'm just saying good morning and popping in and saying hi to everyone i didn't know i'd be called right away and just be like how's it going i don't know if there's anyone else that's trying to to speak
[1:52:53] Yeah we got a bunch of requests so i'll uh i'll drop you like a Delightful Hot Potato and, Swaymi that's actually a very good I'm sorry Swaymi you have a good name for a philosophy show what's on your mind, Maybe everyone fell asleep with the intense, overwhelming intense philosophy. Yes, sir, go ahead.
[1:53:20] All right, great. I want to ask you a few questions on the non-aggression principle. One is the use of force justified?
[1:53:27] Sorry, when is the use of force justified?
[1:53:30] Yes.
[1:53:31] Well, I mean, that's common law, grievous self-defense. So if you have reasonable anticipation of grievous injury or death, then you can use force to neutralize by whatever means necessary the threat all.
[1:53:45] Right like let's suppose like like uh someone like if someone doesn't pay back a debt does that count as like fraud
[1:53:52] Uh well no it depends it depends if it is formally contracted for or just would be kind of nice if right like you you lend your oh your friend forgot his wallet and you pay for his lunch and he says, oh, man, I'll give you the 20 bucks back or whatever, right? And then he doesn't. That's not a formal contract.
[1:54:11] I don't mean like that. Like, let's suppose, like, all right, I asked my brother to hodl 59 Solana.
[1:54:16] Sorry, to what? Hodl what?
[1:54:19] 59 Solana in exchange for some cash some time ago.
[1:54:23] Okay.
[1:54:24] All right? He doesn't hodl it. And rather than doing that, he sells.
[1:54:32] Okay, do you have a contract?
[1:54:35] A verbal one over
[1:54:37] Text oh so you okay so you so he so that's a contract right verbal contracts if they're recorded it's just it has to be objective because otherwise he never like.
[1:54:45] Pays me back you know am i justified in
[1:54:47] Just just everyone knows right so the it has to be recorded in some manner otherwise it just becomes he said she said kind of thing right so uh so okay you have a formal contract he says i'll hold your solana uh and um i'll give it back to you on such and such a date. He agrees to that. It's in tax, which is fine. Okay, so you have a formal agreement, and then what?
[1:55:08] Well, the thing is, it's like, so my agreement was, all right, he would hodl Solana for me. All right? In exchange for cash now, if he doesn't sell until the day I tell him to sell, but when he does, he can keep the cash worth of the Solana that I gave him to hodl.
[1:55:28] Okay.
[1:55:29] And for every $10 it goes up, hand me an additional $200, and he can keep the remainder.
[1:55:38] Okay.
[1:55:38] And rather than doing that, he sells. And I try to negotiate, all right, can you pay off some debt for me? Can you buy some other things and just borrow it over time? So rather than doing that, he defaults. And then I'm like, and eventually I'm like, bitch, where's my money?
[1:55:57] Right.
[1:55:57] And I end up with like legal issues. Am I in the wrong there or no? Like, I mean, for my own common sense, I would say, but I don't think morally I'm in the wrong.
[1:56:07] Well, if he broke the contract, then he defrauded you. I mean, that's what happened, right? Yeah. In other words, if he had said ahead of time, I'm not going to respect this contract, you wouldn't have entered into the contract, right? So he pretended that he was going to respect the contract, which he didn't end up respecting. So that's fraud, right? It's the obtaining of a value through deception, right? Yeah. Okay. So you're in the right. Now, is your question under the current system or under a just justice system?
[1:56:51] Like just the non-aggression principle.
[1:56:53] Okay. So in the non-aggression principle, so in a free society, you have a contract. Now, we don't want people waving guns and enforcing their own contracts because that's, you know, a pretty volatile situation. So the way that it would work is you would have something, I call it a DRO, a dispute resolution organization. So this would be an organization that negotiates on your behalf. And so you'd say, okay, you'd launch this contract with your dispute resolution organization. And for more on this, you can check out my book called The Future at freedemand.com slash book. So I'll just touch on it briefly here. So give me a ballpark how much money you lost when your brother didn't keep his contract with you.
[1:57:35] Um, how much? So he only paid like,
[1:57:37] No, no, I don't, I don't need the details. Just give me 500 bucks, a thousand bucks, 2000 bucks. Like how much did you, do you think you lost based on your brother not keeping his contract?
[1:57:47] Over 1,500.
[1:57:49] Okay. So I'm just, hang on. I don't, again, I know it's detailed for you, but I just want to keep it relatively simple for the audience. So, so 1500 bucks, right? So you, you would lodge a contract with the dispute resolution organization and he'd have one too, or maybe you share the same one, but it's like cell phone companies and email companies, they all transfer data to each other and so on, right? So if you have a contract, you lodge it with your DRO, he lodges it with his DRO or the same one if you share one, and you say, okay, my brother's not keeping his contract. So then they would go and they would review the situation. They would talk to your brother. And assuming that your brother now owes you $1,500, or $2,000, whatever it is, right, $1,500, then they would say, you have to pay your brother $1,500. Now, either he would pay the money or he wouldn't. Now, if he wouldn't, they would say, okay, you're now in breach of your contract, which means we are going to, well, a couple of levels and layers. First of all, they would have the right to go into his bank and take the money out, because that's how you would sign that, saying, look, if I'm found to be in default, you can go into my bank account and take the money out. Because if there was no enforcement mechanism, nobody would sign up with that DRO, right? It would just be like, well, we'd really like to release some butterflies and have you do the right thing.
[1:59:07] So now let's say he shut down his bank account, he withdrew all of his money, and he just fought like crazy over this 1,500 bucks. Then at some point they say, okay, if you're going to break contracts and you're going to resist any reasonable enforcement, in other words, you're not just breaking contract with your brother, you're now breaking contract with the DRO, then they start to inflict.
[1:59:27] Economic ostracism, which means, oh, no, now you can't have a bank account. Oh, now you can't pay your bills. Oh, now you can't be part of the economy until you pay this money back. And economic ostracism is a very powerful thing. Trust me. It's how I was enforced upon after advocating for it for 15 years. I then was hit with significant levels of economic ostracism when I was deplatformed. So I know it works because I've actually, I've been the advocate of theory and the recipient in practice.
[1:59:57] So there would be various levels of escalation. Now, you'd want to do all of this stuff peacefully, right? You don't want people showing up with weapons to your brother's house. Now, if people came to, like, let's say, if he showed up violently, right? Somebody took the money out of his bank account and gave it to you because that's what he agreed to ahead of time, that if I'm found to be in violation of contract, then I owe the money that is agreed upon.
[2:00:25] But if he, I don't know, he showed up violently to protest this or something, then yeah, if he pulled a gun on them, they'd be able to shoot him. Of course, it wouldn't come to that, right? Because there's six million different things you can do to resolve conflicts, particularly financial ones that have nothing to do with pulling guns. But yeah, you would want a situation where things would be resolved through getting the money. Well, either he pays it voluntarily or they take it from his bank account. And if he continues to resist in some manner, then they just start cutting him off economically until the pain point is so high that it's just more efficient for him to pay off the money and rejoin society's, the economy in society. So all of these things would be handled that way. But yeah, I mean, if he didn't fulfill his contract. Now, what can you do now? I don't know, maybe take him to small claims court or something like that, which is usually a cap, like $2,500 or something like that. So maybe you can do it that way and you can get a judgment that way. But yeah, if he broke contract and it costs you money, you don't have the right to go and use force with him because there's so many other options to do it peacefully.
[2:01:27] Does that make sense?
[2:01:29] Yes. Also, I have a second question about the non-aggression principle.
[2:01:34] Yeah, go ahead.
[2:01:35] All right. About like the whole peaceful parenting thing. Yeah, let's suppose if a five-year-old violates the NAP, can you abort them?
[2:01:47] I mean, do you realize that's kind of a shocking question? You're just tossing this off like it's no thing? I mean, that's a shocking question, right? Are you talking about killing a five-year-old?
[2:01:59] No, I'm just like, when it comes to...
[2:02:02] No, no, hang on, hang on. Slow your roll, bro. You do realize you're talking about murdering a child, right? Do you get that? I'm just curious. I mean, do you get that?
[2:02:20] I don't have any kids, but I'm just saying like...
[2:02:23] Do you get that you're talking about murdering a child, yes or no? Just answer the question.
[2:02:28] Kind of.
[2:02:29] What do you mean kind of? You're talking about aborting a five-year-old that's killing a child.
[2:02:34] I suppose the kid violates the nap first.
[2:02:37] No, hang on. Do you? Hang on, bro. whoa, I just need to understand your level of empathy and compassion, not just for the child who's theoretical, but for me in the audience. You're suddenly dropping a bomb in a philosophy show about killing a child. Now, listen, we can entertain all kinds of theoreticals here, but the way you said it is like with no preparation, just dropping this bomb about, I mean, you understand that's kind of upsetting. I'm just like at an emotional level, right? Yes do you understand that it's upsetting so did you say okay look i got this really weird theoretical and i know it's a little sensitive subject and you know especially because you care so much about children because you already referenced the peaceful parenting stuff so i am talking about you know killing a child and like so i mean where's where's the prep you just dropped this oh can you abort like i'm just trying to like if you don't have any sensitivity to the people around you i'm not sure where the moral arguments really would be coming from.
[2:03:39] In terms of property rights, let's suppose a five-year-old were to...
[2:03:43] Okay, you're just repeating. Are you listening to anything that I'm saying? You're just going on like I didn't say anything.
[2:03:55] So, yes, I do have empathy and would say, like, personally, I do forgive people for small trespasses and things like that.
[2:04:05] Okay, so if you have empathy, then why do you coldly ask a question about killing a child?
[2:04:12] Why? It's just a funny thought experiment.
[2:04:15] Okay, how is it funny to even have a thought experiment about killing a child? How is that funny?
[2:04:24] I don't have any kids
[2:04:25] What does that have to do with anything it's.
[2:04:30] Like all right fine here's a
[2:04:33] Different
[2:04:33] no no no no i'm i want to stay on this and listen i'll answer the question i will absolutely answer the question but i want to help you in your communication with people because it's cold as hell man and you don't listen very well and i sympathize with that right you sound like a young man, and I'm sure you had a difficult upbringing, so I'm not trying to nag you or make you feel bad or anything like that. But holy shitballs, man, this is some cold, cold stuff. And listen, I don't mind tough, challenging questions. I don't mind even cold questions, but I just, I find it strange that you would just kind of drop this, bomb on the conversation like you were reading off a laundry list. I mean, what was your childhood like as a whole?
[2:05:31] What was it like as a whole?
[2:05:32] No, what was your childhood like as a whole?
[2:05:39] How to say it? I don't know. I'd rather not speak about that entirely.
[2:05:46] Well, there's no such thing as entirely, but just roughly. Okay, let me ask you this. How were you disciplined, if you were, by your parents if you did things they didn't like?
[2:05:58] Honestly, at most, they'd like yell, had DYFSinvolved in them. So, like, that was pretty shitty.
[2:06:04] I'm sorry, you said they would yell, and then I didn't quite catch the second part.
[2:06:09] Honestly, I'd say that they probably weren't involved in them.
[2:06:10] No, no, hang on, hang on. You said they would yell, and then I thought you said they had DYFS in them. But I'm sure that's incorrect.
[2:06:16] No, so it's like, I mean, honestly, my parents didn't really parent much.
[2:06:23] Okay, so they would yell, and what else would they do?
[2:06:27] That's about it i mean at most like my dad would yell okay
[2:06:31] And what would the what would the yelling be about and how loud would it be would you like would they call your names.
[2:06:37] No honestly it's like this like if i dropped a bowl of noodles like my or if there was like a mess or something like my dad would be like furious but it's like um let's suppose if i did something very bad like yeah i'm not going to say the worst stuff I did as a kid, but it's like, he probably wouldn't care.
[2:06:59] Sorry, so he'd be furious if you dropped a bowl, but if you did something really bad, he wouldn't care?
[2:07:05] Yes.
[2:07:06] Can you give me the category of things that you did that you would call really bad as a kid? Violence, theft, assaults?
[2:07:14] Stuff like around that. I mean, yeah, stuff that's pretty bad. Like throwing stuff out, that's like Yeah.
[2:07:25] Well, sorry, throwing stuff out? I don't know what that means.
[2:07:28] Yeah, stuff that's like that.
[2:07:31] I don't know. What do you mean by throwing stuff out?
[2:07:34] Never mind. Some of my mom's stuff, like if I got mad about something.
[2:07:40] Oh, you'd throw some of her stuff out, right? Okay, when you had issues with your parents about the way they were treating you or the fact that it sounds like they were ignoring you a lot because you said they didn't really parent, were you able to talk to your parents about the problems you had with them?
[2:07:57] No.
[2:07:58] And what would happen? I mean, usually we have the impulse, right? So what would happen if you had the impulse or what do you think would happen if you did try to talk to your parents and say, listen, there's some stuff that you're doing that is not great for me and can we talk about it?
[2:08:12] Honestly, some of the parenting, it's more like, I don't know, like your other siblings just jump you.
[2:08:20] So, your siblings were violent with you? Yeah. And I'm so sorry about that. That's terrible. And, you know, even by current standards, 50% of sibling relationships are abusive. And I've written about this in my book, almost, which again, freedoman.com slash books. So, what level of violence are we talking about when your siblings would jump in?
[2:08:43] Oh, shit. I don't want to get too much into detail.
[2:08:49] Okay are we talking bruises are we talking cuts are we talking hospitalization are we talking concussions just roughly what level of violence you don't have to give me details.
[2:08:59] I mean like besides like petty fights I'm not going to say the worst
[2:09:05] Stuff but.
[2:09:07] What am I going to say never
[2:09:15] Mind
[2:09:15] okay that's totally again don't ever talk about things you're not comfortable with. I get it to public forum. So let me ask you this.
[2:09:22] What level of compassion and empathy would you say you experienced from your family growing up?
[2:09:38] There's a degree of empathy from like, I'd say, like if I got into like, let's suppose, I don't know, your siblings get into fights with bastards in, like, the park. It's like, sure, you have their back, but it's like, you don't always have, like, you know, it's kind of interesting, because it's like, as I got older, there's less empathy, I would say, for, like, my oldest sibling, like, from, like, everyone. Whereas it's like, whereas, like, for my other siblings, there's still a degree of empathy.
[2:10:13] Okay, so from your parents in particular, did they care about how you felt and work reasonably hard to help you feel good?
[2:10:31] That sounds like a pretty broad statement.
[2:10:36] Okay, did they recognize your feelings? So if you came home, let's say you had a bad day at school for whatever reason, you come home, you're kind of down. Did they say, oh, you seem kind of down. What's going on?
[2:10:48] Honestly, I would say in school, I was more of the problem rather than I was more of a bully than I would say I got bullied.
[2:10:56] Okay, so that's fine. So did your parents, were they aware that you were bullying other children?
[2:11:03] I mean, I think they knew I got kicked out of like a few elementary schools.
[2:11:07] So they knew that you were bullying other children. And did they ever sit you down and say, oh, you know, help us understand why you're so angry. Help us understand why you have these urges, like we really want to figure this out.
[2:11:21] Uh, no.
[2:11:23] Okay. Can you think of a time when they recognized your emotional state and asked you about it or talked to you calmly and reasonably about your emotional state, whether you were happy or sad or angry?
[2:11:36] No, that doesn't happen.
[2:11:37] I'm sorry?
[2:11:38] No, that doesn't happen.
[2:11:39] Right. So that's why you dropped the child death bomb without understanding its effects on others. And this is not a criticism at all, right? but it doesn't sound like you grew up with people empathizing with you very much.
[2:11:57] You're correct. Right.
[2:11:59] And that's not your fault, obviously. I completely sympathize with that. So it wasn't totally theoretical because you feel bad, I assume. You feel, and I'm not saying whether you should or shouldn't, but it sounds like you do feel bad about some of the things you did as a child that were maybe bullying or predatory on other kids or other things.
[2:12:21] I'll agree with that, yes.
[2:12:23] For how long in your childhood, weeks, months, years, for how long did you spend bullying other kids?
[2:12:33] I'd say it's complicated. I was like, a six-year-old I know is a piece of shit.
[2:12:39] Hang on, no, no, I don't want that language. I don't care about the word shit, but no six-year-old is a piece of shit. They're victims of circumstances. You're not making fundamental moral decisions at the age of six, right? So I just want to be clear about that. So, but you were bullying other kids when you were six, is that right?
[2:12:59] I don't exactly remember, but like I wasn't a good kid.
[2:13:04] Well, but if you have a negative judgment of yourself at the age of six, it must be that you remember something.
[2:13:11] Yes.
[2:13:12] And what were you doing at the age of six that you have this negative judgment?
[2:13:25] I mean, I don't want to get too much into detail.
[2:13:37] Again, broad categories is fine. Again, don't talk about anything you're not comfortable with, at least relatively, but I think this might be a once-in-a-lifetime conversation for you, so it might be worth milking it for everything you can.
[2:13:49] All right.
[2:13:57] I'm not sure if you're considering what to say or not saying.
[2:14:03] Honestly i i kind of just don't want to talk about it that's all
[2:14:08] Well i agree with you that you don't want to talk about it but you did hang on hang on hang on but you did bring up a theoretical of a child violating the non-aggression principle at the age of five when you called yourself a piece of shit at the age of six like so when you say i don't want to talk about it i'm not sure that's entirely true. Again, I'm not trying to mind read you or anything, but have you listened to my show much at all?
[2:14:32] A decent amount.
[2:14:34] Okay. So you know that if you're going to drop something like that, I'm going to talk about your childhood. So I do think that you do want to talk about it. I think you're ambivalent about it. But I think that when you drop something like killing children to a moral philosopher who's really focused on protecting children, that I'm going to ask you better childhood. So I think that you kind of do in a way. Again, you don't have to get into specifics and all of that. So I understand that. So at least tell me, were you a bully for a week, so months or years?
[2:15:10] Years?
[2:15:11] And how many years would you guess?
[2:15:15] I'd say it really depends what counts. it's like well
[2:15:19] That's your definition I don't you know we have a general definition I'm sure we'd agree on right which is unprovoked aggression towards other children controlling you know violence or threats.
[2:15:30] I don't know if it
[2:15:31] Was like ever unprovoked
[2:15:33] well if it's if it's self-defense it's not bullying is it.
[2:15:41] I would say it stopped being unprovoked unprovoked at around nine I mean, in terms of like just towards my peers as a kid.
[2:15:55] And why do you think you bullied? What's your theory?
[2:16:00] I mean, before then, like, I'd say it's like just anger issues.
[2:16:06] And did the bullying, so you would go to school angry and the bullying would make you feel better? Is that right?
[2:16:13] No.
[2:16:14] Well, it had to be something positive or you wouldn't have done it, right? Or maybe the diminishing of a negative. Like, why do we do things? Either there's a benefit or at least it diminishes a negative, right?
[2:16:30] Um...
[2:16:41] Honestly, how I acted in school wasn't as bad as I would say.
[2:16:45] No, no, no, no, no. You don't have to answer the question, but I won't be ignored, if that makes sense. So you can tell me, Seth, and you've said this a bunch of times, I don't want to talk about it, I'm totally fine with that. But to just pretend I didn't say anything, that's not good, right?
[2:17:03] In general, I try not to get into ad hominins when I'm talking about philosophies.
[2:17:08] I don't know what that means, but what I am asking, hang on, I am asking, why do you think you bullied? So you were angry. And I said, well, did the anger, did it feel better after you bullied? And you said no. So then I need, I'm just trying to understand your mindset.
[2:17:23] I was probably taught as a habit from my older siblings.
[2:17:28] So your older siblings bullied you, and then you bullied other kids at school, right?
[2:17:33] No, it's more like, all right, they get into fights at the park, and that's why. So it's like, all right, you kind of like have to like, I mean, I'd say like they kind of encourage you to get into fights and stuff.
[2:17:49] So getting into fights because your brothers are picking fights or having fights picked upon them, that's not, I don't think that's what I would classify as bullying. Does that make sense?
[2:18:00] Yes.
[2:18:00] I mean, bullying is when you pick on usually smaller and weaker kids to feel dominant or feel like you're in control or feel strong because they're frightened or something like that. Was, do you have a different, so is the definition of bullying, my brothers would get into fights and I'd help them?
[2:18:24] No, that's not what I would call bullying, but it's like.
[2:18:28] Okay, so what were you doing that was bullying? If it wasn't getting into fights with your brother's enemies at a park?
[2:18:43] I don't know. It's like, in school, I honestly just don't remember.
[2:18:48] Well, then if you don't remember, how can you have a negative judgment?
[2:18:53] I mean, before nine and seven, when I did, I don't exactly remember.
[2:18:59] Okay, what does exactly remember? You said you were a piece of shit at six. That must be because you have some negative judgment about what you did, right?
[2:19:06] Yeah, sure. One of the things I remember I did do was I kicked my younger brother off of a table just because like I felt annoyed when I was like six and he was like, he's like four, I think. Yeah.
[2:19:20] And I assume he was hurt and cried.
[2:19:23] Yeah.
[2:19:23] And how did you feel when he fell and got hurt and cried?
[2:19:28] Like shit.
[2:19:29] And what did you do then?
[2:19:33] Said nothing.
[2:19:34] Did you give him a hug or comfort him or say sorry?
[2:19:38] I don't know.
[2:19:39] Well, you said nothing. So you didn't do that, right?
[2:19:46] And tried to act like nothing happened, I think.
[2:19:51] Right.
[2:19:54] And do you remember any acts of kindness? I'm not saying there weren't any, of course, right? But let me ask you in a different way. What acts of kindness do you remember performing towards others as a child?
[2:20:25] I'm not sure if we're still connected or if you're still thinking.
[2:20:28] I'm just trying to, like, remember you.
[2:20:30] Okay, no problem. Take your time.
[2:20:41] Okay, I mean, I can't have too much dead air in the show. So, it sounds to me like you were treated very coldly as a child, for which it's not your fault, obviously, and I'm incredibly sorry for that. I mean, we should all grow up with parents who care about what we feel and help us to understand our feelings and to manage our feelings and to act in some productive way regarding our feelings and to use our words, not our fists and all of that kind of stuff. And it sounds like your parents, I don't want to over-characterize this, but it sounds almost like your parents presided over a semi-criminal gang of thugs, you know, who were like roaming through the neighborhood and getting in fights and a fair amount of violence within the household and so on.
[2:21:23] And that's not good. And I say that with all due sympathy to you and your siblings. I think it sounds brothers. It doesn't sound like they were sisters. And that's really tragic. That's really sad. And I think it is important to recognize the deficiencies that we had in how we were raised. Because if we don't recognize those deficiencies, we tend to copy paste them. We tend to replicate them in our lives as a whole. And that's why I was startled. And I will answer the question, the theoretical, about children and the non-aggression principle. But because you weren't treated, I think, with sensitivity and compassion, which is really, really important, and it takes a very strong person to have sensitivity and compassion sometimes in the world. I know it can be pathological altruism. That's not what I'm talking about. That's kind of narcissistic and selfish in my view. But, It sounds like you weren't treated with any particular sensitivity and compassion.
[2:22:21] And this could be why you have trouble. Sensitivity and compassion is kind of like a language, right? If somebody airdropped me in Japan, I don't know anything other than a couple of words to a stick song. So I really don't speak that language, but you can learn. You can learn the language. So I think that it's important to recognize the deficiencies in how you were raised so that you can learn those skills. You know, some people are raised in super musical families, right? Everybody plays piano or cello or ukulele or they sing or whatever it is, right? And so you just learn a whole bunch of instruments growing up, right? Now, that wasn't my family. And so if I want to play an instrument, I have to learn it as an adult. And so I grew up speaking English, so I don't need to learn English. I didn't grow up speaking German. Actually, no, I spoke German when I was a little kid, but I don't really remember it very much. But I didn't grow up speaking Swahili, so if I want to speak Swahili, I have to go and learn it. And if you didn't grow up with a language of sort of compassion and sensitivity and, you know, basic love and caring and connection and so on.
[2:23:28] Then, you know, when my daughter was very little, if something upset her or whatever, she literally had to say, she'd go and go to her sad corner. And I'd say, oh, what's upsetting? Or she'd talk to me and, you know, we'd work to try and resolve it. In some way. So she always knows that I care about how she feels, and I'll take reasonable efforts to have her feel better. I mean, if she's really upset because she can't eat candy all day, that's a different matter, but she never really had that anyway. In fact, she kept her Halloween candy until we basically had to throw it out, because she's a Northern European-based life form, which means keep food in the cupboard, because you never know when winter's coming. So, but yeah, so if you grew up without people looking out for your inner state and trying to connect with you and understand how you feel and talk with you about what was going on for you, then that may be, it may be a language that you're not super fluent in, and it may be worth exploring how to become more fluent in that. I'm a big fan of talk therapy, but a great therapist can be wonderful that way. So, sorry, before I get to a long roundabout way to answer your question, but before I get to answering your question, because you've had some time to listen, is there anything that you wanted to add before I do that part of the convo?
[2:24:45] Not really.
[2:24:49] Okay, I'm going to take, I'm not sure if not really is yes or no.
[2:24:58] It's more of a no.
[2:25:00] Okay. Yeah. I mean, just be aware that, I mean, it may be years if ever that you come across someone who's going to want to talk to you about these kinds of things, especially for free. So just, I'm glad that you availed yourself of some opportunities in the conversation. I just don't want to leave you with regret, like later on, when this was sort of this portal opened, this window opened to somebody who'd be willing to talk to you in a positive and friendly manner about these kinds of things. I just don't want to kick yourself later, but if it's a no now. I just want to confirm that, and then I'll go answer the question.
[2:25:31] Uh, no.
[2:25:33] Okay. So, the answer to the question is, children cannot violate the non-aggression principle. The non-aggression principle must be understood before it can be violated. And a five-year-old is not capable of fully understanding and processing the non-aggression principle. So this is why a five-year-old cannot sign a contract, cannot get a credit card, right? Because they'll just go buy a bunch of candy and not think about the consequences, because they're five, right? They're still 15 to 20 years away from brain maturity, which is why they still have parents. So children cannot violate the non-aggression principle. So if a child, let's say, just walks up and punches another child, then we would not put the five-year-old child, like a five-year-old punches another child, We wouldn't put the five-year-old in jail. In a free society, well.
[2:26:28] The DROs that I mentioned earlier would have a word with the parents. They'd probably put the kid in for a brain scan and see what was going on with brain development, if there was some sort of tumor or lesion problem or dark spots where the empathy should be. And this would be done from very early on. I've talked about how in a free society, there would be brain scans of babies and children to make sure that they were developing empathy and they would show up pretty quickly and say, oh, the radiation. It's like, yeah, yeah, okay, I get that. But, you know, they'd find safer ways to do it and so on. And that way, you would prevent problems, or at least you'd be able to minimize or divert problems before they really manifested into violent or abusive or later on, of course, criminal behavior. So the five-year-old would not be put in jail. It would be the parents who would have to get some parental training and would have to have significant interventions in what they were doing, that they were raising a child who was going around belting other kids. But we would not hold the child morally responsible because he's not old enough or she's not old enough.
[2:27:32] To process a social contract and understand universal morals and ethics. So, no, you would not be able to. Now, it could be the case, of course, that if there was some kid who was really aggressive with my daughter, well, I, I'd keep my daughter away from that kid, right? Obviously, right? I mean, in the same way that if somebody had a dog who kept biting you, you wouldn't go to that person's house and play with their dog, right? It just wouldn't happen, right? So, there could be ostracism as a result of people keeping their children safe from a violent child, but the child himself would not be immoral because he's too young to process abstract ethics and social contracts. So no, you would not have any right to use violin. Now, in terms of would a child, let's say we've got Bob and we've got Sally, right? Now, they're both five and Bob is about to hit Sally. Can Sally push him away? Sure.
[2:28:41] Sure she can. Because she has the right of self-defense. You don't just sit there and get pummeled as a kid, right? So she has the right to use violence if Bob is about to use violence on her and so on, right? Or take a silly example, Bob's standing on a carpet and he's about to hit her. Can she pull the carpet causing Bob to fall down? Sure. She can do all of that. She could run away, she could fight back, and all of that, because we have that right of self-defense. I mean, even animals have that quote right. But no, so we might put sanctions in terms of ostracism against Bob. We wouldn't want our kids to play with him, and he wouldn't be welcome at her house, and the school might expel him and so on. But there would not be any right, nobody would have any right to lock him in jail or put him on trial or anything like that. The moral fault would lie in the parents and how they were raising him, if that makes sense. Is there anything else that you wanted to mention at the end of the cover?
[2:29:42] Besides that, in terms of the use of force, let's suppose like so when people talk about the non-aggression principle, they also talk about the use of force. How much force is generally justified? Let's say I'll give you an example. Let's suppose someone walks through your lawn. Are you allowed to shoot them? Or do they have to try to break into your house first?
[2:30:15] See, now, I mean, this is an interesting question, and this is the difference between morality and law. And it's a very fascinating question. So, in general, we would, of course, say that you would not be justified in shooting someone for walking across your lawn because walking across your lawn does not harm you directly. And therefore, a disproportionate response would be to shoot someone who's not. That's why in common law, it's imminent threat of grievous bodily harm or death.
[2:30:49] Right? So if somebody flicks your earlobe, you don't get to shoot them because that's not grievous bodily harm or death. You might push them back. You might, you know, remove yourself from the situation. So there's a moral principle, which is the non-aggression principle, the right of self-defense and so on, and the general sense of proportionality. Now, what people do, and I'm not saying this is the case with you, but what a lot of people will do is they will try to invent edge cases, right? Well, what if somebody's pulling something out, it turns out it's a toy gun? Or what if somebody is walking across your lawn, but you think you see them put a landmine in your lawn? Like, you know, they'll come up with stuff like that and say, well, where does the principle apply? Now, the difference between morality and law is a trial. So the principle is grievous bodily harm or death. That's a common law principle, and that would be the standard, I'm sure. Now, say, well, what is the objective definition of grievous bodily harm? Could you not be mistaken? You know, what if they are doing this but not that? So that is adjudicated in a court of law. So the principle is self-defense has to be proportional to the threat. Now, we can all come up with endless scenarios wherein it's an edge case. Now, the moral principle doesn't deal with the edge case. The edge case is dealt with in a court of law.
[2:32:12] So there are times where you think someone is going to harm you it turns out they weren't going to harm you, is that okay to harm them if you think they're going to harm you well we can't just say i thought he was going to harm me because then you could shoot someone who looks at you funny right or or you know raises a hand to scratch their head oh i thought it was going to hit so the principle is you're allowed to use self-defense proportional levels of self-defense, when you're facing grievous bottle injury or death. And that's the principle. Now, how that principle plays out in every specific situation is a matter for a court of law, not for moral philosophy. Does that make sense?
[2:32:57] I hear what you're saying. But in terms of philosophy, shouldn't we not rely on the system in that sense? Because we don't even believe in a state.
[2:33:11] No, no, but when I'm talking about a court of law, I'm not talking about the current system. I'm talking about a free market system, a free market system of law, which is common law evolved out of the free market of human relationships. In fact, there was quite a bit of common law That was in Ireland and other places where you had no government, a truly stateless society. So it's sort of like if you have a principle of physics, that is different from an implementation of engineering. A principle of physics is universal, but engineering has cost-benefit analyses. You don't want to over-engineer a bridge to the point where it can take a thousand elephants because there's never going to be a thousand elephants on that bridge, right? So, there's principles of efficiency, there's principles of compromise, there's principles of good enough. But, so, physics has sort of absolute universal principles. Engineering is the practical implementation of those in the same way that morality will provide you universal rules. Each practical implementation of those, I mean, there's stuff which clearly is not good, there's stuff that clearly is good, and then there's the stuff in the middle, but the principles don't. Handle that, that's going to be handled by a court of law, because a principal can't deal with every specific incident, if that makes sense.
[2:34:36] Yes.
[2:34:39] All right. Sorry, go ahead.
[2:34:41] Because it's like, all right, well, we don't really have a sort of ANCAP law, but even if we did, it's like, I'm still pretty sure a lot of moral cases wouldn't just be taken up or like to like a court of law or like some sort of like a system itself to like the Brehon or
[2:35:00] Sorry to like what.
[2:35:03] Brehon's law that's what you meant well
[2:35:06] I mean yes some general system of common law that's evolved to, To deal with edge cases, right? Because there are times, I mean, I remember, I won't say who it was, but I remember somebody being involved in a riot and somebody was about to hit them and they, you know, punched them in the gut and the cop looked at them and just nodded. Yeah, that's fine. Right? So you don't need to go to court, right? So if there's a video of a guy walking down a hotel hallway and some guy jumps out with a gun drawn, and then he gets killed by the guy he's throwing the gun on, nobody's going to sit there and say, well, that's an edge case, right? I mean, he jumped out of a hallway and pulled a gun on you, and if you happen to shoot first, everyone's going to be like, no, that's fine, right?
[2:35:55] If somebody breaks into your house, I mean, I think this is a Florida thing. I'm obviously no legal expert, so don't take anything I'm saying as any kind of legal advice or accuracy. But, you know, in terms of the duty to retreat versus stand your ground, right? So in some places, if somebody breaks into your house and you can run out through the back door, you're not justified in using force. In other places, you are justified in using force if somebody breaks into your house because you have to reasonably assume the worst, right? You don't abandon your property and let them do what they want with your house, right? So, so let's say that you are in a, you're in a place where you can use force against somebody who breaks into your house. Well, if somebody breaks into your house, then that's not an edge case. That probably wouldn't even go to, like, nobody would bring charges. That's not, like, somebody breaks into your house and you shoot them and they die or whatever, then that wouldn't be an edge case if that was the law.
[2:36:53] So the edge cases are for when it's hard to prove. And the principle is self-defense. Each individual instance of self-defense could be an edge case, and that's natural. And the principle can't decide the edge case because it's hard to prove, right? So rape is obviously a heinous moral crime. If both parties, like if a woman says later on, I was raped, and the guy says, no, it was consensual, and she has no injuries, and she texts him later and says, I had a wonderful night, let's do it again, and so on. Well, so the fact that that is tough to adjudicate, doesn't mean that whether rape is good or bad is under question or review. It's just hard to prove, it's hard to know beyond, you know, whereas if somebody is jumped by some guy, like some woman is jumped by a guy in an alley, he beats the crap out of her, you know, she's injured, and like, Well, then clearly that's rape, right? That's not an edge case, right? So the fact that there are fuzzy edges and edge cases and so on in no way changes the principle because what you're trying to do is you're trying to establish whether the incident conforms to the principle or not.
[2:38:13] So it is, is it rape or not? Not is rape good or bad? And the fact that there are edge cases doesn't change the general rules, if that makes sense. Yeah. All right. Well, thank you, everyone, for a wonderful morning's conversation. A real pleasure to chat with you. And I hope that these conversations are of value to you. And I appreciate everyone's feedback on X. And don't forget, freedomain.com slash donate to help out the show. And if you subscribe, man, the amount of goodies you get a whole bunch of AIs. You get my 12-hour presentation on the French Revolution. You get the History of Philosopher's series, a 22-part series on the History of Philosopher's. Really, really great stuff hundreds of podcasts and private live streams all kinds of great stuff just for a couple of bucks a month you can go to fdrurl.com locals fdrurl.com locals to sign up there you can also go to subscribestar.com free domain and thank you guys so much have yourself a wonderful day i will be talking to you tonight at 7 p.m for a live stream and uh thanks again everyone so much for a wonderful chat today. Lots of love.
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