Conversation with Tara Smith, Valuing Other People | Yaron Brook Show

Hey, it's Bubba Wallace from 2311 Racing.

You know what it feels like forever?

Sitting on a plane waiting for takeoff.

Good thing I've got Jamba Casino.

With daily boost in social casino games on tap, this is a kind of fun that makes time

fly.

Why not turbo charge a downtime?

Play now at JambaCasino.com.

Let's Jamba.

Sponsored by Jamba Casino, no purchase necessary, VGW GroupFord, where prohibited by law,

21 plots, Terms and Conditions apply.

No radical, fundamental principles of freedom, rational self-interest, and individual rights.

This is the Your Own Book Show.

Oh, hey, everybody.

Welcome to your own book show and this Monday.

February 23rd.

I am really excited to have Tara Smith with me today.

This is going to be fun.

We've also got a, I think, a fun topic to talk about.

So welcome, Tara.

Thanks for joining me.

Thanks for having me.

Excellent.

So a few weeks ago, I think it was a few weeks ago, we, I participated in a seminar in

Austin that Tara had put together on valuing others.

And of course, this is a question that comes up in objectivism because we're all supposed

to be selfish and how do you know why should a selfish person value other people?

What's in for me?

They have so much to give, I mean, yeah, so I mean, other people, great source of value

in most of our lives, tremendous source of value.

One of the people in principle, not obviously, not everybody, you know, they're idiots,

there are destructive people, there are, you know, there are all sorts of people.

But human beings add, I mean, typically, add tremendously to the kinds of lives that we

lead.

I mean, just being realistic, think about your day-to-day life.

Think about your friends, you know, certain friends, you know, I mean, they're all tears

of friends.

Think about your lover, your spouse, or, you know, your children, if you have children.

I mean, just think about those kinds of people.

Think about the people who've done all the thing, I mean, it's almost too obvious to talk

about the great value that we get, and I can talk to you now because some people figured

out how to have this internet thing, you know, like you were able to be here in Austin

a few weeks ago and then go on to God knows where in your case, you know, because of these

fabulous things that we take for granted that are all coming from other people.

And I mean, obviously, I mean, I'm ran-newness that ideally you live in a certain kind of

community with others where you're respecting each person's, you know, lead your own life,

make your own choices and all of that.

But we can do that so much more profitably and enjoyably when we tap into, oh, that guy,

he, you know, he wrote that really clever essay, or he told that great joke, you know, if

I just want to go to the comedy club or whatever it might be.

Yeah, even in the grocery store, right?

I mean, there's, oh, of course, I mean, the people who stack up all the stuff from

the grocery store.

The people who stack up the stuff, let alone the chefs who come up with the, oh, that

is the perfect pesto or whatever it might be.

And I mean, what was I just going to say?

I mean, there are, it's relatively, I think, unrelatively, under-explored area within

objectiveism.

I mean, obviously, we talk about the virtue of justice.

How do you deal with other people?

You know, how do you judge other people?

How should you treat other people?

We talk about justice.

We talk about individual rights.

There's been some writing among objective scholars about friendship over the years.

I've written some on that, Tristan Deligely is writing on that.

You know, there, there are pockets of, again, I think, you know, I'm grand, gives a lot

of attention to justice in particular and rights.

But then beyond that, there are these sporadic engagements.

And I just thought it was something that, because it's such an, like, a major dimension of

all of our lives, how we deal with other people, strangers, family, the, the regulars in

our lives at the office or at school or wherever it might be, that it would be worth looking

into a little bit more some of what should play out egoistically in these relationships.

So it was fun.

A few others from out of town, on-car any longer there, Greg and Gina and that.

Yeah, and it's always, it's always great to get different people's perspectives and we

have psychologists there, we have philosophers.

Yeah.

And there's always something new and different that comes out of it that you don't quite

really like.

And things you don't expect.

I always find like, oh, I think this session will go this, you know, this topic.

Yeah, yeah.

And then, you know, and I know now not to, you know, to expect the unexpected, but then

there's still some angle that somebody raises like, oh, I never would have thought of it

that way.

And sometimes, you know, even at the end of the discussion, you don't know why they're

coming out of that way, but sometimes, oh, okay, I see how you're thinking of this and

maybe there is something to that because we, no, there's certainly a, you know, fair amount

of disagreement, especially in the beginning, but not only at the beginning, it's some of

these aspects of it all that way.

Yeah, no, absolutely.

So, yes, the people, you know, the people that are obviously, it's obvious that they

provide us with the direct value, like, you know, like the people who are friends and lovers

and people who work in the stores that we go to and the chefs and all that.

But then, you know, what about things like charity and philanthropy?

We talked about that during one of the sessions.

Where it strangers.

Yeah, yeah.

So, so first, I guess we can talk a little bit about philanthropy and charity.

I mean, do you value humankind in a way like philanthropy, love of man, love of mankind?

Well, I'm random, love mankind, right?

You know, she didn't love every son of a gun, but, right, I mean, and she, it was precisely

if one loves that one can detest certain people and what they do, okay?

But it's, if you're a valueer and you're aware of the tremendous value that human beings

bring to one another's lives, then I think it's natural to be philanthropic, not and charitable,

not at all in a self-sacrificial way, obviously, you know, I mean, I think obvious to any semi-literate

objectiveist, right?

Yeah.

Like, not in a self-sacrificial way, not just to placate others, but if you really value

certain, you know, you have the resources, you have some discretionary income to share

with others who you value, and sometimes it is strangers.

It's those people who had the horrible misfortune of being in the throes of the hurricane's path

or something like that, right?

Now again, it's different if you know that somebody set him up, set himself up to be in

this bad, homeless shape or something like, but bad things happen to good people through

no fault of their own.

As a way of contributing to a kind of world in which you want to live, alleviating some

suffering way, it seems to me perfectly fine.

Again, you've got to be honest about where does this person or this money stack up in my

scheme of values right now?

But I mean, you actually led some of the discussion on that one.

I mean, I worry with a lot of philanthropy and charity today in kind of the world in

which we live.

There's so much altruism everywhere and it's so hard, even for objectivists to rid themselves

of the altruist tendency that could be rationalization, you know, you could be rationalizing what

you're doing rather than doing out of a real sense of valuing.

Yeah.

Oh no, definitely.

I mean, sadly, I think altruism has, you know, we're so soaked in a culture of altruism

and have been for centuries that it really distorts our outlook on other people in all sorts

of ways, including charity and so on.

And people are gilded into giving, you know, there's that collection at the office every

fall for United Way and are you going to be the person who says, no, yes, I am.

But I mean, you and yeah, a lot of people will give, but kind of rationalize how it's

really selfish when it isn't when it's really simply to placate other people or something

like that.

No, so I think also it's an area, not just charity, but more generally where we, we have

some unresolved conflicts often like, well, I kind of feel this obligation to my family

or I kind of feel this obligation to open my wallet even though, but wait, I have been

saving diligently because I want to start this business enterprise or whatever it is.

Well, no, in those cases, you shouldn't give to the charity if you, you know, if there

is something you value more, but I think you're right that things are skewed by altruistic

expectations.

And, you know, you've got to get back and all that kind of nonsense.

And guilt.

People, people carry guilt with them, even people who should know better.

Right.

No, and I mean, that's what I like, altruism, even after you own, you read Iron Rand and

you agree with Iron Rand.

The tentacles of altruism, I mean, this is what my last ethics book was about like egoism

without permission because there's a psychological hangover.

There's the emotional sort of clinging of those assumptions that you really have to uproot

so that you know why you're doing things and make sure you're being honest with yourself

about how much you do value something.

You also want to look generous to other people, I think, sometimes.

So it's not, I mean, it's related to the placating others, but you want to maintain a certain

image rather than explain yourself as to why you're not giving or something like that.

One thing we talked about in that session, you're on, was people talk about the helping

professions.

Yeah.

You know, like, well, is it okay to be a social worker or a therapist of some sort?

And you know, exactly what qualifies as a helping profession is sometimes murky, but people

often have the objectivist might have the question, is it okay to work in helping professions?

And as you recall, one of the things we talked about is if you're doing legitimate work,

like if you're creating a valuable good or service, you're helping people, right?

Like that is the...

All professions are helping professions, all productive professions, yeah.

You know, you're cleaning the streets, you're, you know, fixing my car, you're like, that's

a helping profession.

I mean, people trade because they're helping one another in various ways, right?

Because they're...

Yeah, and people think about, you know, social workers, there's something not quite right

there, but then doctors, that's okay.

And why?

I mean, if somebody takes their social work properly, seriously, and they study, and they

think about it, and they really dedicate it to helping somebody in some...

Right.

And there's a, like, a problem-solving aspect that they...

Yeah.

Right.

I mean, in any profession, being a philosopher, being a, you know, public, in any profession,

you know, the motivations of a given individual could be healthy or not, right?

The given social worker, the given nurse or doctor, you know, might be motivated by bad

reasons or good.

But there's...

Yeah, it's an odd designation, again.

But altruism spawns these bogus concepts or misleading, it's like, well, I'm not helping

professions.

Really?

Then I guess you're, you know, bankrupt or something, because nobody's paying you to do what

you do to make what you make.

Drew McIntyre here from WWE, wielding the Claymore can be a life of chaos.

When I'm not dominating in the ring, Chumba Casino is how this warrior takes a wee break.

With hundreds of online social games and new weekly releases, there's always something

fresh to try.

And those daily busts, next level, even my free time feels like foul-hallum.

So when life feels like a battle, kick up your feet, have some fun, and let's Chumba.

No purchase necessary, VGW Group, Boyd, we're prohibited by law, CTs and Cs, 21 plus, sponsored

by Chumba Casino.

Yeah.

I mean, one of the things I found with new objectives and it is, they, they, it needs

to be emphasized to them how much thinking needs to be done in sorts of higher-key

values and really figuring out what is important to you and then, and being selfish means going

after that.

Really pursuing that.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And knowing it all and it's not, you know, it's not even sign numbers to the different,

I mean, like 3.2, 5.6.

But you do have to, and it, it can change over time, you have to be very self-aware of

what matters to you and why, and it does that make sense that it should matter to me that

this much, you know, this relationship or doing this kind of work or living in this country

or part of the country, it's like different things all together compose what your life

is, is like.

So you've got to be paying close attention to what you really value, and yet it's, it does

require a lot of thinking, yeah.

Yeah, particularly given the, the altruism in, in the background, you have to

really think it through.

It's easy to just slide into that as a default, you know, like it spares me the thinking,

well, everybody else is doing this, yeah, and it's not that you consciously think everybody

else is doing this, you know, as an objectivist, you know, not to think that, but subconsciously

that can still play a role and like, well, and that's why I said, I think we have to confront

some of these questions and, you know, think through, resolve the discrepancies in some

of our relationships with others.

Yeah.

And really, and, and, and I think when you do that, the opportunity to, the positive relationships

have become more positive because now you know where you have them, you know what the

values are, calling attention to the value, I mean, it's, it's the upside of justice

that I've always loved, celebrating the good and just appreciating.

This is a really great thing about this person, about this person has done, it just shines

a light on values, which sort of creates a greater positive atmosphere in your life

of how much there is to value, because there is so much that people do, and you know, one

of the things that got me interested in the whole subject really is, observing what

I think is people taking each other for granted, like the people who you know well who are

in your inner orbits, let's say, it's not just, you know, your closest friends, but some

of the other kind of regulars in your life, I see a lot, not obviously like I'm observing

and I could be wrong and I know people have different ways of expressing things and all,

but I see a lot of behavior that just seems to me like people aren't sufficiently appreciative

and it's not like I'm asking for a lot to show your appreciation or something, but of

how their actions affect others, how they're coming in and dominating the conversation

is inconsiderate of others, how they're missing those deadlines they promise to make is

inconveniencing up like, whoa, do you value this person really in your actions? Not, oh, of

course, he's my friend or I love him and I'm really, you know, we're nice when we're to get,

okay, but are you acting like that behind the scenes in doing some of these other things?

And that, you know, I think it's what do you do to, if you really value somebody, what do you

do to show it? And that's an aspect of justice, right? I mean, are there ways and I think it's

helpful too to think about times that you yourself have felt, oh, slighted or underappreciated

or over like think about those times when you've been on the receiving end or at least it's seen

to you like, so what was going on there? You know, maybe your feeling wasn't valid in a giving

like, but was that valid and why and what is it? Oh, so maybe I could learn from that about,

oh yeah, I should be sure to not do that to the people I care about or to, you know,

and you know, with the people who are most familiar, it's easiest, I think, to get lazy

or to just fall into the grooves and, you know, I don't know, you look like you're thinking,

that's good. No, I think that's right. I think, I think the closest somebody is,

the more unusual, the more rare it is to see somebody, the more you think about that particular

meeting and when, when somebody you're seeing on a regular basis, yeah, it's easy to take them

for granted. Yeah, yeah. And I think too, sometimes like with strangers or in a formal relationship,

a formal business meeting, you sort of know to be on your guard to like, okay, I've got to be,

got to be just, you know, got to be objective and everything. And that can just slide

from familiarity in a way that I think it can be helpful to call, you know,

call one's attention to it's like, okay, am I really being fair to her here? Yeah.

Well, one of the areas that we talked about and that we're, I think it's tricky,

again, also because of kind of the altruism, because of the cultural pressures,

is relationship with family, with parents, let's say, there's a certain view that you have to have

a particular commitment, but this, you know, but we also, if parents were good to you, there is

a sense of appreciation and love to them and it's tricky to navigate. Yeah, it is tricky,

because it's so, I mean, and here it's altruism coupled with, or maybe come, like the potentially,

well, the bad influence of altruism, that's always going to have a bad influence,

but then how that can distort one's attitudes, you know, as an adult toward one's

inherited family, siblings, parents, or like, the bit, it's like, you didn't choose,

like you choose to have a child, you didn't choose your parents or your siblings or cousins and so on,

but it's so emotionally, just like, you know, if you've been raised in a family,

it's just natural that it's also going to be so emotionally wrapped up that that I think

compounds the distorting effects that can make it hard to get the distance or the detachment

to really try to be objective of what are you getting out of this relationship now?

What do you owe your parents if anything of these people? And sometimes you do all them something

out of respect for what they have given you if they have given you a great deal and so on.

But, you know, we talked a little bit that weekend about, at some point you do, as an adult,

you do have to kind of take ownership of all of your relationships, including the uncomfortable

aspects of your relationships with your parents, but I don't mean by that just accept the

uncomfortable, but confront, like, well, no, maybe I really don't like this aspect of my parents

now or how they treat me these days or what they're expecting of me, and I need to set the

boundaries or make clear to them, no, I'm not just going to objectively, you know,

recede into my 12-year-old self every time you come around, you know, mommy and daddy and my

big, but I mean, but it's hard, I mean, it is hard, and it's, you know, I think in general,

we're not poised to alienate other people. We like to get along, everybody likes to get along,

but you're getting along when it's submerging what's really good for you. For instance, spending

holidays with family, when you would really rather not be, and it's like really your

consumer opinion is, I'd be better off just, you know, staying in Puerto Rico this year or staying,

you know, or whatever it is, you don't have to do that, like, but it's just being honest,

and it's like, not, this isn't worth it to me, there may be other things that are worth it to you to,

you know, maintain the relationship in certain ways, but prices you don't want to pay.

Yeah, that was one of the aspects we were thinking about.

Yeah, and there's such a sense of duty that the culture tries to impose on us when it comes to

faith. And blood is thicker than water and all of this. Like, blood is accidental, you know,

I mean, certain of our blood, it's like, that's an accident, and we can, you know, we can take it

forward in a positive way, depending on the individuals involved, or not.

So, what I found really interesting was when we talked about, kind of, in more intimate relationships,

I think, the value of the other, this idea that really, I think, Nathaniel Brandon

introduces explicitly, kind of, into objectivism, with the idea of visibility.

And there was some pushback about visibility, which I found interesting. I think that was,

I thought that was, that was new to me. Yeah. Well, I think it's, it's less clear,

like, what the whole concept of visibility means, or it's about, is a little fuzzier than I used

to think, you know. And there are a few different senses in which it can be used. And I think a few

of these are, are real phenomena. So, for instance, there's, you get to see in this other person,

the personification of a lot of your most important values, right? So, it, they're made visible to

you. And something like, something like the way that an artwork makes real perceptible, you know,

certain things that you really value. But obviously, this is in a person, the person isn't an

object of contemplation. It's a person to human being, leading a life, but you get to see that.

Then there's another sense in which we sometimes speak of visibility that you, you perceive that

you're visible to this person. Yeah. That this person who loves you, oh, she gets me.

She sees me. She sees me. She sees the important aspect. I mean, if, you know,

ideally you have that kind of relationship, but it's the value of being seen yourself. So,

those are two very different perspectives on it. But one of the things we talked about,

and I agree, I, I thought it was a really interesting session that we had on visibility and

value of being valued. And I think Anko was, you know, pointing this out, like an artwork is

there for contemplation. Your wife, your husband, you know, your lover, they're not there for

contemplation. You're, you know, if you've partnered up, you're going through life together,

you're living together. And you're seeing the way values, values that you really care about,

manifest themselves in this particular form of this person who's doing it and all.

And you're enjoying them together.

Tyler Reddick here from 2311 Racing. The rush of racing, nothing beats it, but Chamba Casino comes

close. Chamba's got fast spins, fun games, daily bonuses, and all the action you can handle.

Now that's a ride. Ready to hit the throttle, get in the driver's seat and head to

ChambaCino.com. Let's Chamba sponsored by Chamba Casino. No purchase necessary. VGW Group

Voidware prohibited by law, 21 plus turns and conditions apply. But yeah, in a related vein,

we just talked about the value of being valued. And obviously that's going to depend on

well, who's valuing you and what are their standards? And I mean, so even if you leave aside

love relationships or romance or anything like that, I think we all know from experience

that the value of a compliment depends on who it came from and how intelligent it is. I mean,

compliments are very nice, other things being equal, right? But there are some that you appreciate

much more than others because you respect the judgment of that person more than others.

Or because, ah, she's explaining what she means. And yes, that's a good reason to say that as

opposed to, you know, it might be just the, the polite or even if not merely polite, the simple.

So I mean, there's a value in being valued by people whom you value and whose judgment you respect.

And here again, like, think of the fiction. It was a very, very good thing that Francisco

valued Hank. And I think it meant something to Hank. And I don't think, oh, you see, he's just

the second hand or two. No, I mean, he didn't care about the phrase of any jerk, right?

But it's like, oh, this guy sees some of what's really good. Like, that's a wonderful,

it's an affirmation of your values and your, you know, we can all use that from time to time.

Yeah. And I think, I think the relationship between Hank and Francisco is really interesting,

because of, you know, Hank's opinion of Francisco is very negative to begin with.

And how it evolves over time. Yeah. How he comes to realize kind of the truth.

Right, right. And appreciate those compliments. Because in the beginning, the compliment,

he's pushing them away because he thinks it's just a playboy. I don't want to playboy.

This jerk, this place, Nair do well. Oh, it's everything I hate, right?

But he keeps seeing different evidence and he keeps thinking about, I mean,

early you're bringing up, it takes a lot of thought to really think about yourself as rise.

And it takes a lot of honesty about your experience. So this guy, he is not playing to my image

of him. Okay, but, but, right, Reardon continues to pay attention to the evidence and what he's

getting such that the view really changes than a Francisco, because he sees, he sees more who he is.

Yeah, but there's something else I was going to say now, but I lost it.

Yeah, I think that for too much, and I think this is a point I'll call me, there was too much

made of this idea of seeing, seeing somebody else reflect back you. And this seems to be in

Brandon, this seems to be a sort of neediness to be seen by others. And I think the emphasis

during that session was more about seeing the value of this person, the life living together

than this person, and kind of what that represents metaphysically in terms of valuing, evaluating the

world around us. I mean, I think there is value in having your value recognized by somebody else,

right? But it's going to be having your genuine value recognized by them, sort of for the right

reasons in an intelligent way. It's not that I think this is like a desperate need on a daily basis.

So you've got to give me my little ego compliment every day, honey, okay, do that till death to us part.

But there is a kind of affirmation of yeah, you're you're you're a good kind of person or you're

the kind of person a person should be in certain ways. It's very, it's like a wind at your back

or something like, I mean, it's a nice thing. And I did think again, just talking about kind of

rookie mistakes that some newer objective is sometimes make, think you should be indifferent to

others, like utterly indifferent to others attitudes toward you. Like praise, I shouldn't care

in the least about praise. I ran depreciated an intelligent compliment, right? I mean, and shouldn't

she? I mean, of course, if we think about justice and being just other people, it's a sign of justice

if somebody says you're on, you're a great speaker. Like, well, good for them for recognizing,

like, it's okay to enjoy. Absolutely.

So, I mean, that's a ability thing. So it's so, and this is where I'm, you know, over my head, but

it's very psychological. Yeah. Like that whole, I mean, Brandon was a psychologist. We had

Gina with us the other week, you know, to to bring her psychological thoughts about some of these

phenomena to the table. But it's so entwined with just things that you're not fully consciously

in your control. Yeah. And I think your responses to this are not going to be completely conscious,

right? So somebody says something to you. You feel first before you can, you can really think it

through and, you know, over time, over time, you align, hopefully, but, but a lot of new people,

you know, they try to repress, I think a lot of objectives when they're early. First,

introduced objectives and tend to try to repress those emotions because, uh-huh. Yeah.

You're not supposed to feel that way. That's right. You're supposed to think first, right?

You're not supposed to feel. Right. Right. And feels only get in the way. It's like, oh, it's

right now. I don't know. Feel it. Think it. Think it afterwards. Analyze it. Yeah.

So another aspect of relationship with others is this idea of the trade principle, which is

clear when we talk, I think, about economics. It's clear that when we buy something at the

Gosa store, what the trade is, but how do we define the trade when it comes to kind of spiritual

relationship values? Now, there's some, again, I mean, going back to some of what we were talking

about toward the very beginning of, there's just, you know, this world where all these people do

these great things, but it's not, oh, you're a great guy because you're a good supermarket,

stopper or something, or oh, you're great just because you have a great recipe at the at the

restaurant or something. There's that extra or bonus of seeing people go after their lives. I

mean, it's, I'm jumping ahead a little bit here, right? But, you know, when you ask about

spiritual value, there's seeing human lives thriving. Isn't it a wonder? I mean, think about

small children, you know, the smallest children and every little mile. Oh, and now he's starting

to make noise, you know, or now he's starting to, oh, it's a word, you know, where he's like,

each of those things, we celebrate as we should. It's like, yes, a life developing and

flourishing. And when you see people doing work that they love, like clearly, they're into it.

They, they really like, and this could be in any sphere, it doesn't have to be of some great

ambition or the, you know, the businessman entrepreneurs, we always write about the innovators.

But when you see people going after, when you see people going after the wine connoisseur who's

just, oh, no, he knows this region that has the cabinet that he or would like, it's people

valuing, which is what we're here to do. We're here to have a good time, you know, to make the most

of our lives. And the spiritual value that you can get out of so much that you appreciate that

other people are doing, then there's like another level of spiritual value. It's just, yes,

you go to Starbucks and you enjoy their brew, let's say, but you might also enjoy the camaraderie

of that barista who I see every Monday morning when I go in there or something, or maybe I still sit

in a Starbucks for an hour or so and I enjoy that. I mean, there's all that kind of spiritual

value too. But I thought the, I really enjoyed the session on the trader principle because it was

bringing together the, right, I think the first connotations are always economic with the trader,

it's like a trade. And you can think of a trade in a fairly bare-boned way of, you know,

we exchanged, you have this right now in your home and I have this, we're going to exchange it.

And there's, you know, there were these pre-existing goods and now we've just shuffled around

who has what. But in fact, when people trade, like, and again, like, oh, we know this, but we

forget this sometimes. That is, I think, objective is no. At least like, oh, when we trade, why do we do

that? Because we'll be better off, none of our'd rather have that than the money I'm exchanging for,

you know, or I'd, you know, it's, I'll be better off and you're doing the same thing. So that alone

brings us both to a better place than just this bare, reshuffling around of what already exists.

We're creating better conditions for both of us. We're building, I mean, we're contributing to

a relationship in which we can have further trades, whether it's you and me in the future or

me and other people, but this whole community of, oh, yeah, we can build, we can take advantage of

the good things that one another does, what another do, one another does, right? And,

and create richer lives for ourselves. So it's a, it's an environment that breeds benevolence.

I mean, when you have free trade, when you're getting to decide how you're spending your time,

your money, right, your labor, when you're, when you're free to choose, and then you see all the

options out there, right? And you get like, wow, this is, it's going to reinforce that sort of

benevolent outlook on people that'll make you want to be charitable when you have, you know,

the resources to be charitable again. And here again, think about the corrosive influence of

altruism on the other side. Yep. I mean, one of the things we read was that horrific

because it's graphic and it's so true from Atlas, the description of what went on at the 20th

century motor company, right? And the, okay, you know, you, you systematically just pick people's

pockets, treating them as they've got to, you know, got to give to you. And the resentment and the

hostility, anti-life, right? Anonymous that that breeds is all too true to life. I mean,

in terms of the depiction there. Yeah, no, I think one, once you understand even in the economics

level what the win-win kind of value added benefit of trade is, I mean, so you buy an iPhone

for $1,000 and you're grateful to Apple maybe. But then there's all the different stuff that goes

inside this, the people who made the microprocessors and the people who designed it and the,

you know, just, and just a miracle of, of, of, of, it's incredible. Right, right. And what you

want to get is it's not a miracle. Yes, Joe Shmo and Mary Shmo is like, and this individual did,

like, they made this happen. People, human beings. I mean, this is why it's like, people, the value

mass index. It's like, you know, one thing I think is, look, if reason is man's means of survival,

right? Where are the ones with reason? Like, it's human beings. It's not Fido. Sorry, nothing

against our beloved animals and all. But it's where the ones with reason. So look to the value of

these people. It's like the potential value, the value upside, the, again, the value mass indexes,

you know, pounds for pounds is a lot of potential there. So, and, and, and, yeah, and in these

economic transactions, most of the people who've added value to your life, you, you don't know,

you'll never meet. They're anonymous. Right. The complete strangers. And this is why benevolence

towards strangers makes so much sense. Once you understand the value, you get to those strangers.

Yeah. Yeah. And, I mean, so many people who, you know, they just looked at that well-dressed

when they get on the plane with you or on the buzz or whatever. It's like, that guy could be the guy,

like, who knows what he's doing? And again, it's not like, oh, he could be some great chemist or

something. He's just doing something really well. Or it's like, no, there's a lot of good people out

there. I mean, it's, it's one of the things that offends me so much about the whole attitude to

immigrants and immigration right now is, is just a hostility to human beings.

Hey, it's Bubba Wallace from 2311 Racing. You know what it feels like forever?

Sitting on a plane waiting for takeoff. Good thing I've got Jumbo Casino with daily boost

in social casino games on tap. This is a kind of fun that makes time fly. Why not turbocharger

downtime? Play now at JumboCasino.com. Let's jump up.

Sponsored by Jumbo Casino, no purchase necessary. VGW GroupFord, we're prohibited by law,

21 plus terms and conditions apply. The callousness. Yeah. And I mean, yes, I don't know, yes.

The callousness toward other human beings, I find just, I find it hard to believe. I really find

the hard to believe. I'm like, what? And I do think what self-hatred and what evasion of humanity

has got to be going on for the people who could treat other human beings and rejoice in some of

the pain that people have suffered with some of these ice raids and shootings. Yeah, now I find

that just, I mean, the coarsening and that this is where altruism has brought us. It's like

got all the money. Yeah. No. Yes, absolutely. And they call it. And they think we're the malevolent ones

because we're self-hatred. Oh my God. Yeah. The attitude to selfishness in the culture is so

horrific. Right. Right. It's so. And it is such a lie. It's such a, you know. So one of the

things that people throw back at me often when we talk about self-ishness is this idea of the

trade principle. So what do you trade with your wife? You know, how does this trade work?

You know, and I'll show you what your friends and talk a little bit about how that does work and

what it's this minimizing. Again, that seems to come from a very thinned out understanding of trade.

Or it's like, yeah, you value the person for their values. Like with things that you genuinely

value like, I love your sense of life or I love for vivaciousness or I love whatever, you know,

but but there's there's an answer like the whatever. There's specifics. Yep. And yes, those are

values and you get to enjoy those in this relationship and you're bringing something to it. So there

is a trade. Definitely. Again, it's a lot of it is spiritual trade. It's not, you know, yeah.

But I guess I don't there's this reductivist view. And I think to it's a caricature of what

goes on in many of our relationships. And if some of these people, I think we're honest about just

looking at their own relationships, it's their friendships even. They know there are things they

get out of different friends. He's really talked to about my problems or my love life or he's

really good when I just want to forget about work and have a good time and have you know, we know

there are different things we get out of different friends. And that's why we go back to them.

And we realize some of what we bring to them. So they're yes, there's trading going on. But it's

as if, oh, well, trading is bad. Trading is just mercantile. Or that comes from, you know,

there's this mind-body split, too. That just comes from the base materialist part of us.

It comes from part of us, yeah. Well, and it has to be a trade. I mean, if it wasn't a trade,

the relationship wouldn't work ultimately. If there is a friendship way. It wouldn't work. And

yeah, you're listening, but I never listening. And it's it's not going to. Absolutely. Right. No,

and it's not working now. You're just kidding yourself if you think it is. Yeah.

Yeah. Good. Anything, what do we, anything coming out of this seminar we haven't covered? I mean,

this has been a lot. This is good. Yeah. I don't know. They come up more. But, uh, yeah, there's some

good questions. I think we'll get to those in a minute. Good issues. Okay. Let's um, I know you're

teaching. We talked about this before the show. You're teaching a course on, of course, on

philosophy of law. And there's been this, you know, major, major decision of Supreme Court on,

on tariffs. This may be a, um, another decision coming down to pipe on, uh,

both right citizenship, I think that's going to be a big one. Um, any any kind of thoughts of

the court as we have it today, what you thought about the justices? Man, um,

such mixed thoughts. I mean, in the Supreme Court is our bowl, you know, the judiciary in general,

it's our bowl work. And I was greatly relieved the other day at this decision, just relieved

that there's a breath of hope for liberty, I think, um, in jet. So I guess a few different,

different thoughts about the Supreme. I have great respect for them. I do think that all of them

act in good faith in their own, you know, minds. I think they're trying to go by the law and their

understanding of what doing that means. Um, so yes, I was glad of this decision from what I've read

about it. And particularly about Gorsuch's opinion, I think there's, you know, real things to cheer

that are signs of encouragement for the future in terms of the major questions doctrine in terms

of understanding that you don't have as much power as you claim, like the Constitution still means

something. And in the course I'm teaching, so we're at a teaching of philosophy of law class,

and the way I'm doing it this semester, because I do it usually a different way, but the first few

weeks, first three or four weeks, maybe we just spent on the rule of law, like what that ideal is

and why that ideal is important. And then a constitution, you know, not everybody has or has always

had a constitution. And once the difference between the American notion of a constitution and the

the British one that was very familiar to us before we broke away and how they really had different

ideas of a constitution and constitutionalism. And you have to realize for a lot of these students,

these things, politics, the law, it's all kind of merged together. So continually I'll bring up

things from the news, and it's been interesting because there've just been so many challenges to

government actions. There've been so many lawsuits against different things that Trump has done,

and then there'll be a court ruling, and usually a lower court ruling more often than a supreme

court ruling. But I'll call their attention to you see now this is how it's supposed to work in

that, no, the president can't just write his own ticket. He's limited by the limited government

laid out there. So we're taught like we're not going to spend a day on the terrorist decision

or anything like that. We've got we're getting to freedom of religion tomorrow. We have we have

bigger fish fry, but I'll bring it up again as an example of so you see the judiciary or you know

exerting it's authority and doing its job, trying to police that the constitution is what's

really governing us rather than just the individuals, even if you know if one can imagine the

individuals in the Congress someday actually exerting some will. Yeah. Now you've got a strong

interest in issues of privacy and and for the amendment and again particularly for the

amendment right now is in the news because of ICE and because of what they're doing. So

any any particular work that you're doing right now. Yeah that's a relatively recent you know

and I could deem you on intellectual matters. We moved so slowly relative to the reason I

could three or four years now. I really got interested in the privacy thing. But yes as it happens

and like right now I'm writing a paper on profiling which is related to some of what's going on

with ICE and it wasn't instigated by I mean the interest in this issue of profiling predates

the ICE raids of recent months but it's definitely related because I think it's so

there was a sort of cluster of issues that are related but part of for me I had to just clarify

and distinguish there's profiling you know if you've heard of I'm sure you have racial profiling

police profiling people. Then there's predictive policing and we refer to drag nets sometimes and

we've got these geofence warrants now you know where will geofence an area. So for instance

a cell service provider has data because they're constantly tracking your movements so that you can

use ways or you know the directional things and so on on your iPhone. You're following what I'm

talking about all this. So anyway geoite so that you know that the government will now sometimes

subpoena google is the geofence thing. Give us all the data within this geographic region on

you know between Friday midnight and Saturday midnight or something because we're looking for

the culprits of the arson or the the robbery or whatever it might be. So you've got these different

kinds of government investigations again sometimes it stops searches going into somebody's home

sometimes it's a more extended kind of part of an investigation but I so I wanted to clap

what's the relationship between some of these things. I'm ending up in this paper zeroing in on

profiling and what's wrong with food to crude profiling because there's a kind of profiling that

I think is absolutely fine for certain purposes but what we seem to be seeing with the ice

too is a lot of very crude profiling or prediction of where we can find the bad guys or the illegal

immigrants. So I'm harping on the idea of the individuality of suspicion on how you need to have

specific grounds for stopping this guy that are not just well he's you know he has a foreign

last name where he speaks Spanish you know some of the things that Kavanaugh was saying are okay

in the Vasquez decision back in the fall. So I'm anyway I'm trying to insist on the individuality

of grounds for suspicion as a basis for stopping somebody detaining somebody. So would you still

call that profiling? I'm sorry. So which part you're asking? So this most specific would you

still call it profiling? In a way not in a way it's not profiling. I've really got evidence that you

either have some information that I need or have done something you're not supposed to do then it's

no longer profiling. But what I'm saying is when we allow these sorts of crude profiles. So when would

profiling be legit? It seems like you're suggesting there's some profiling that you think is legit

when it's not cool. So after the fact right okay so something like this and I'm still working on

this but I think that's interesting. After the fact there's been a crime. So it's not that we're

anticipating a crime is like oh you know they mugged that old lady in the park or they disrupted the

speaker on the public grounds or something and we're looking for who did it and we have some

descriptions from many eyewitnesses they're all consistent with you know so we're looking for a

middle-aged white man you know it was only about five foot two or whatever it might be you know

so you're profiling to narrow down suspects like that kind of profiling I think is okay and even for

I think deployment of resources but not like okay police departments they have to decide where

they're going to put more guys on the on the beat I sure control and so all right we're

going to spend more money and certain neighborhoods have more crime than others there's a sense in

which so there may be some profiling of I mean maybe that's not exactly profiling but certain kinds

of profiling I think could legitimately come into how you allocate some resources which is not

yet we're going to stop you we're going to go in your home with that right that's what you need

a warrant more so I'm trying to work out some of how this should work good with the need for a warrant

and the right kind of warrant as opposed to some of these administrative warrants that ice has been

using lately rather than traditional ones um trying to work that out but again insisting on the

individuality of suspicion and I want to argue that when you deny that you're in it's as if you're

reversing the presumption of innocence because I think that's what some of what we're seeing going

on is there's this presumption while they're all guilty therefore we can just go in and treat

them as we like which is so antithetical to you know it's like no you've got to have something on

me before you can interfere with with my life and what I'm doing so anyway that's the current

paper very much still in the early stages good I'm working on it so but yeah the fourth amendment

stuff is I've gotten very interested in that and I'm also interested in a more personal end

of privacy as well apart from the law but yeah that's been fun. Tyler Reddick here from 2311

racing victory lane yeah it's even better with chamba by my side race to chamba casino.com let's

chamba don't purchase necessary VTW group void work prohibited by law ctnc's 21 plus sponsored by

chamba casino um you're teaching and are you close they know or you're going to be teaching one

I'm going to very soon good thank you for the chance to plug starting in April I think April

first maybe um teaching an ethics course on the virtues so I did a course a couple of years ago

for ARU which was an introduction to the objectivist ethics this one is on the moral virtues so how

to live the selfish life you know ran's discussion of honesty and justice and productiveness and

pride integrity independent so we'll basically spend a week on each I think in justice this case

maybe a couple of weeks yeah but we're you know really talk about what does this mean in practice

how is this egoistic yeah how is this good for me or a lot of people like honesty what does

I have to do with egoism and we'll talk about conventional idea with each of these virtues what's

the conventional take on pride or honesty and what's the conventional reason for why you should be

and then sort of correct some of that with the objectivist understanding of why you really need

to be just and uh have integrity and all of that so it should be a lot of fun yeah I look forward

to that because again the virtues are where we live the egoism yes all right it's how you deal with

your roommate how you deal with your mother data the life everything how you introspect and deal with

yourself and your own conflicting sometimes desires and emotions so yeah so that starts in April

I think I think registration is already open yeah so it's air i live I think the it's called now

okay good air i live air i live and you guys can go to aynvand.org slash start here

and go to the air i live tab and and you can find the course there and yeah we're just in everything

for the next semester yeah that's exciting that'll be fun good good thanks for remembering

of course of course all right let's so we've got a bunch of questions so let's maybe start on those

and see uh see how far we go so thank you guys for submitting questions I do want to thank let me see

Troy as usual Troy from australia 500 australian dollars thank you Troy it's very generous thank you

yeah Troy's great Robert thank you Cobb thank you so these are just stickers without questions

so now we'll go to questions Dave Dave says really appreciate the intellectual

candor that applies to individuals and how they operate in a social setting not a question but thank

you Dave appreciate that alone the center I sense that aynvand's supreme and ruling values are

underappreciated as compared to her identification of life as the standard and her virtues can tell

comments on their importance a structural features of aynvand's ethical theory her her her

profound values supreme and ruling values so I guess I guess he means reason purpose self-esteem I

think so yeah no that's a very interesting question I mean they're there throughout in my own work

I haven't brought a great deal of attention to like at times I have I've written on self-esteem but

but they are you know for and and she makes clear they are the ruling values that the virtues

that you know we were just saying I'm going to teach a course on the virtues and that's how you

live but that's how you value reason by for instance being honest not faking it not faking it with

others not faking what you think or you know what you know with yourself that is one of the ways

that we value reason by being honest by being productive you've got to make your way in the world

right you can only think what you think you've got it you know you've got to be independent and so

so reason purpose is so crucial to doing anything constructive that's also going to be building toward

this composite life of values and valuing and it's interesting self-esteem I think going back

to the issue of valuing other people often what gets in the way of healthy valuing of other people

is not sufficiently valuing oneself or having some real self-esteem deficits can really screw up how

you see others they're a threat to you in some way so yeah self-esteem I see and I again I have

a chapter on that in my the recent book eagle wisdom without permission there's a whole discussion

of self-esteem there and I gave a lecture on self-esteem a few years ago at Okan but I think

they're all really crucial and enmeshed with the virtues yeah virtues are the actions you need to

take to attain these values and the values are necessary for a successful life yeah yeah absolutely yeah

um let's see Shazbad um he has a quote Tyler Reddick here from 2311 Racing victory lane yeah it's

even better with Chamba by my side race to chamba casino dot com let's chamba no purchase necessary

VTW group void work prohibited by law ctnc's 21 plus sponsored by chamba casino

what can you do when you have to deal with people that's a quote from Dr. Stadler

um any comments on how the villains and rans novels view other people

it's hard to make a wall I mean you know that they're different the villains but they're all

the same in some ways uh they're all such frightened children and that insults children you know

um no they're all like such small shriveled no talk about no self-esteem and no yeah um and so much

of the two actually with other people seems to be focused on manipulating them yeah yeah because

they're the fundamental reality for them as opposed to like problems let's solve like the problems

of life or how to build a better railroad or how to build a better anything we do something real

but it's others are threatened them so I've got to manipulate others to alleviate the threat or

alleviate my fear of these other people um let me just try to think a minute more though

I mean stadler is an interesting character because he's got that superiority comp or whatever like

other people like what is he looking for from others it's just so sad like the kinds of

confirmation that people want or acceptance it's such an amazing of reality and thinking

contrast of somebody like work yep him in the world he's a piece I mean from the very opening scene

like he likes being here he likes being alive on this earth you know with the rock diving into the um

people don't get in the way for him so one of the great vert I mean I love the virtue of independence

you know that's one of the great ones but it's just it's about you what I mean it's

electoral independence thinking your own thoughts you know using your own judgment it I mean

rely relying on others in the sense of you you don't depend on them but you gather from

them sure you're trying to learn there's so much to learn from other people and all but

you're doing the processing you're doing the thinking making the logical connections asking the

questions not accepting something before you really see why it makes sense for yourself

yeah and that is so what the the different kinds of I mean even the statler villains lack the

independence of judgment yeah it's amazing given how brilliant he is right so it just shows that

it's not an issue of intelligence it's an issue of values and virtues I mean

so Liam says hi to could you give us could you give us your assessment of Donald Trump and how

narcissistic how no how narcissists can't see any value in others okay um I'm not gonna say much

about Trump other than this I disdain him I think he's a despicable human being

maybe I'll leave it at that it's his being president is well yeah let's leave it at that yeah um

then what was the other question about you know the relationship between

hung narcissists can't see any value in other people um I guess

I've not fun about narcissism in that way exactly I mean they clearly don't see much value in

themselves and that's why they're trying to pump themselves up and act as if they do because

they want to try to you know convince themselves that they value themselves um

um

there's a narcissist not seeing any value in others I mean they're just so wrapped up it seems

in trying to show their value that it's as if others register only and so far as they might

help them prop up their self image um I mean it's all skewed for the narcissist I think just

you know the value the value that they themselves might have and the value of others it's

yeah it's all seen through this defensive lens that's got to

proper I don't know it's very difficult to have a

trade-off kind of mentality with regards to other people when you don't value yourself

because there's nothing to trade there's not yeah all right and part of you knows that

yeah knows that anything is gonna yeah um

yeah

it's interesting to just not even not just in trading with other people but in valuing other people

you know um Rand has the line about to say I love you one must first know how to say the

hi and that applies not just to you know a love yeah you know the love of your life to any value

applies to people right but it's like it's gonna be really hard to value people if you don't value

yourself so that comes back to the self-esteem thing they're like like you don't know what it is

to value truly if you don't value your like valuing yourself is the the I don't know the foundation

for valuing oh these things in my life these things in my oh I can have that too I can enjoy that

I can enjoy him um being a value or all stems from valuing yourself absolutely and if you don't

love yourself if you don't value yourself yeah you can value other people you can't value anything

it's it's gonna be bad hey Jonathan owning says terror is a brilliant author thank you Jonathan

you're brilliant reader Jonathan thank you Romans says what is thank you what is empathy and why

is it valuable this is not a very um it's not at all a refined sense of it but I mean I just

think of empathy as you know the traditional I mean that they'll say it's feeling with another

person I just think of it as and I mean I might be corrected you okay but um empathy a kind of

natural feeling for the feelings of others in particular usually for the um suffering that they

might be going through but in so far as you know you don't have to lionize suffering to realize it's

real it's a genuine phenomenon that everybody to differing extends for different reasons is

got like we suffer that's the flip side of valuing we lose values we have things that hurt our values

and so on and empathy is I think you know I can feel for your own if he is going through a really

hard time because of some loss in his life for some you know deep uncertainty about something

that he really got I mean I can feel for him it's a natural I think reaction and it's some of

what you know a few few minutes ago we were both commenting on the coarseness and the callousness

of some of the attitudes that we're seeing evidenced these days in again talking about the ice

raids or attitudes for immigrants um and empathy is it's like oh you can feel for people

now that doesn't mean go out there and turn your life into serving these other people some but natural

fellow feeling seems appropriate right fellows are you value yeah given that you value others

tolerated care from 2311 racing victory lane yeah it's even better with chamba by my side

race to chamba casino dot com let's chamba no purchase necessary vtw group void work prohibited by law

ctnc's 21 plus sponsored by chamba casino yeah there's nothing a natural yeah

Andrew says let's see some objectives get touchy if you ever hint at judging personal tastes

um um ran thought Beethoven reflected malevolent universe and I hear what does that even mean

is it okay to disagree but she was okay to disagree yeah I'm not trying to understand the

question is it too defensive any any comments yeah I also don't fully understand the question

is it okay to disagree with what I mean yeah it's okay to just have different taste

yeah I think I like Mozart and I like um Beethoven maybe more than I'm rendered that's okay there's

nothing wrong with that um I mean not just because I happened to like no I know there's anything

there's nothing wrong with liking or not liking certain things now certain things there might be

something wrong like okay but just the other day I was having you know the objectives I was shocked

that he liked that movie that I mean really oh my god but um but it wasn't a moral matter it

wasn't it did no bad character on his part like no the difference um people do get touch I know what

you mean uh a questioner in that yes sometimes I think a lot of people are uncomfortable with this

whole area I'm kind of supposed to think this but I'm not supposed to think this or feel this

and certainly when it comes to the arts um and certain other regions in life taste is look you

know like taste is variable with with uncertain boundaries I mean if you enjoy torturing cats or

something we have things to talk about but um oh there's a there's a great range of legitimate

different enjoyments that would be different tastes now you know if you read into certain things

if you you know or the reaction to certain music might be related to the fact that

that kind of music exudes this to this idea to me then there would be good reason for you're

having a particular emotional reactions that you have or affinities that you have but yeah then

it would be based in the reasons for you to think you know so we're feeling yeah I I mean I think

any time I mentioned something like Beethoven reflected in 11 in universe it's worth thinking

about why she said it because she I mean she was smart and and she knew her stuff uh oh yeah

and I I love Beethoven he's probably my favorite composer and I love his music but I know what she

means and and and she's oh yeah yeah and she and she she's probably white right no I think you

you make a good point that's always it's never worth like oh well that was just her taste then

it was just some frivolous like if she's making that kind of statement it's worth looking at is there

anything to that and there and it also may be that you know there is to some pieces and not others

or you think he's just such a dark guy but yeah and we respond differently we respond differently

because we're being different contexts to to our aesthetic responses so you be shocking if we

all like the same stuff and if we all agree with him and in terms of lakes but usually when she says

something like that in in a manning manifesto there's at least something we're thinking about in

terms of why she said it yeah that's a very good reminder yeah there you there usually is he wasn't

he wasn't given to the frivolous observation she would put an imprint to you uh and you can

still disagree with her that's fine I mean there's something you have to agree but but I understand

what she made yeah uh Cobb asks what is your assessment of the current composition of Supreme

Court justices so we talked a little bit about this earlier yeah again so many of them I have like

even individual that have mixed views of some of them um you're one and I were chatting a little

bit I think before we got on Gorsuch is sometimes really good and sometimes not so much um

there's a way in which I really like Kagan just because she's really smart and she's a really good

writer and she'll get to the nub of an issue though I'm not you know I don't agree like but again

she's in the middle a lot of times Gorsuch should be at six threes and so on um

oh boy I don't want to there's some I really don't have five opinions up but I'll tell you this

it's been interesting to me like I'll go a long time oh yeah it's another one of these stupid

opinions from him another another stupid you know whether it's a majority or concurring or descent

another stupid and then it all it's like oh but he was really good on this out of the blue

like that will happen to me with some of the justices of whom I like there are a couple of two

justices which I have pretty negative opinions and have for a while they both been on the

court a while so they're not the most recent of our uh of our people but then they'll do some

things that they're really good on issue x and I think that's in part because they're they're

compartmentalized thinkers who you know they're not really philosophically consistent

even judicially philosophically consistent so that on a given issue they might be able to be

very clear headed like some of them I think are really good on some surveillance issues

I think Sotomayor has written some really good stuff basically in defense of the fourth amendment

and she's not someone who in general yeah okay but if you look at some like she's written some

really good stuff on you know the fourth amendment related search issues um there's somebody yeah

so but I have very mixed views of a lot of them and more than I mean

I wish I like Robert's item what the heck he's all about you know um

I think I know I'm not a particular fan of

Thomas is like sometimes good sometimes it's like Thomas used to be pretty good

and since Trump has been elected has become kind of a

Trumpist he's abandoned his wife is getting to him yeah I don't know

it's as if he's abandoned his is judicia philosophy and become just a Trump guy

wish I don't know I know but again I think a lot of these guys it's peace meal

it's you know on a given issue they can be really clear headed because it's something they

they're kind of you know hate to say that pre-committed to in a certain way but I think

unfortunately yeah I'll be really interested to see more of Barrett's jurisprudence

because again you're not chatting a little bit before we got on she's been better than I expected

she's been much more careful and smart a thinker in elaborating on her version of originalism

than I had anticipated and she's smart like she's a force to be reckoned with even when I disagree

with her she's a worthy adversary you know what I'm like so that's I like the ones who are okay

they're making the best possible argument for this position which I still think might be wrong

but she's a good you know and again I respect Kagan a lot on that front but

but of course such is a very interesting one these days because they'll stand up like he's good

in a lot of ways and some of these separation of powers issues oh yeah the separation of the

administrative state is very good yeah yeah yeah he was good on yeah no he was good on equal protection

in that case a few years ago yeah all right Richard asks how does one practice the virtue of

independence in a relationship with a person who fulfills their need for love

so independence in our loving close relationship well so one just at least think to

asterisk is who fulfills their need for love a lot may depend on what you mean by that need for love

like what kind of need it is in this like is it a need to be propped up I mean that sounds like a

a person who is not independent in the first place if he really needs to be loved in a certain way

by this other like depending on what what need you have in mind that it's being served by this but

independence in a rational loving you know mutually loving relationship is the basis the sort of

necessary foundation for the two people to genuinely be individuals who are worthy of love who are

worthy of valued you know the the second hander the dependent of any sort is not a person to love

to admire that's not anything you would want to encourage in another person so it's two individuals

who in effect can stand on their own two feet you know can stand on their own judgment and minds

who will be the kinds of values who are bringing anything you know we're bringing any value to the

world such that another person might respond oh you know she's this she's that she's got these

wonderful qualities but it's hard they're all coming from the independence of the person

um I mean the person who isn't independent doesn't truly have values yeah and can't have value

for others for another unless it's just a kind of codependent unhealthy sort of use you help me

fake it I'll help you fake it kind of relationship yeah of which there are many it seems sadly

hmm uh Roman says how is how is it selfish to support a liberation war in Iran

what do Iranians need to hear to choose liberal democracy over constitution of monarchy

what do they need to hear they just need to well I mean the poor people need the freedom

to be able to exert their choice right but it's um the history of the world will show them the

um I forget exactly the way she here she put it um but liberal democracy I mean you know

liberal liberty I mean the thing you would want with democracy but

democracy of a constitutional monarchy I mean it's still excuse me that oh over kind yeah yeah

what matters really is the details right what's what kind of constitution or you know what kind of

liberal democracy well right I mean you you want a constitution of individual right

constitution of respects individual liberty right but um these poor people in Iran they need

the freedom to be exposed you know to have full free internet and access to everything and for

God's sake these people take the you know get the boot off their necks from these theocrats and the

strangling absurdity of the mysticism that has these people

living in the conditions that they've lived in yeah but in so far as the more free people in the

world the better I mean we're all better the more valuable people there are around us we all right

that's why what goes on around the world matters like we are we all stand to gain from humanities

gains um and not just because oh my standard of living will go up by x dollars you know if

another country is free again there's not and there's more kinds of value and spiritual value

that's real value as well I mean I think sometimes people they're oh and you talk about

spiritual value it's just like smoking mirrors and you're trying to say yeah it's like

think about the value of inspiration think about the value of admiration

think about the value these are spiritual values think about the value of a good friend

yeah I mean like there's so many different like think about the value of learnings of education

of learning something in worthwhile like there's so many spiritual values that are real and enrich

our lives and the more you free up human beings to bring whatever value they can bring to life

you know like to realize values for themselves but in doing so like there's all this

wonderful stuff that other people get to enjoy as well it's a richer world the more people

are free and able to be selfish and live fresh

Tyler Reddick here from 2311 Racing victory lane yeah it's even better with chamba by my side

race to chamba casino dot com let's chamba no purchase necessary vtw group void work

prohibited by law ctnc's 21 plus sponsored by chamba casino

carbass is it rational to enjoy women's sports more than men's for example i enjoy women's

tennis more than men's tennis even though male tennis players objectively much better is that

egalitarianism well i don't think so the the question of which you enjoy more that's i would

think that's just a matter of personal taste like i don't think you're objectively you're making

a comment i enjoy this more right i enjoy this sport more than this sport are watching i

i enjoy men's tennis more than women's tennis for what it's worth but i just happen to enjoy it more

but i'm not making a statement on the metaphysical superiority of men or the

objective superiority of the male athlete or something it just that hooks me more

you know i enjoy the pace of the that's a lot of it with with men's tennis i enjoy the pace more

but i don't think there's a correct answer to what you should enjoy more there i mean it's

comparable to what we were talking about earlier a little bit in the arts and so on yeah

hoppa gambelast will trump turn texas blue

texas is where it's yeah uh i don't know i don't know and i'm not in the prediction business i'm

i'm a yeah hoppa gambelast do you see objectivism growing in austin texas

yeah you'd have to be blind not to it's it's nice it's great no there i mean just a lot more

objectivism moved here in the last five years in particular um which is wonderful and it's nice

because it's uh it's become then a magnet for more and more and it's it's terrific so you want to

get down here too i'm going to have the iron ran center in a few years would you be further draw

no it's it's great it's terrific yeah it's he won't ask but it's nice to have a hog where a lot of

people want to live it's a great place to have a hub and and it really is

california's emptied out in terms of objectivist they've all moved to to to austin

yeah which is fantastic the taxes and real estate it's yeah yeah i lived there before it was cool um

this is true uh romance says what do you think of shed executive power at the top like switchland

uh or during the roman republic two tributes sorry i really don't have any like i've not thought about

that uh i've not thought about that i don't know i don't know i need to hear like what are the

alleged advantages of this but no idea offhand i'm a little skeptical but i really don't know

it's not something i've given thought sorry roman asked should supreme court judges be elected like

in mexico oh no i don't probably not probably not um i'm wary of popularizing the decision-making

for such an important role of again put it policing the constitution um yeah and i mean as it is

like in the current system the president appoints subject to the approval of the senate which is

itself elected and so on so there's a sense in which the people have a say through their

representatives in the approval process but um no i don't think the popularizing so to put it

or the democratizing of the judiciary i don't think that's a good direction i think that's a

dangerous kind of direction to go and frankly yeah roman asks uh what do you think about

palantir the company and privacy oh i don't know because i do you have in mind some specific

privacy invasions that they're i mean supposedly they're helping us identify people um yeah

it's hard to tell because it's also secretive but yeah they're using AI and

and they're a surveillance company they're good at that yeah um and i mean you know surveillance

under some kind like surveillance can be okay for very limited purposes and used in

limited ways but i am very concerned about open-ended surveillance or i mean there are different

kinds of surveillance we have these days financial surveillance of laws that make you disclose

so i mean that's not i think the kind of thing the palantir does but i mean surveillance we should

be worried about in general but that doesn't mean there's never a time and place for surveillance

absurd you know but i just don't know enough about particularly the things that um

palantir might be facilitating and again you can make a perfectly fine product and how it's used

or misused or abused or put to illicit purposes is another you know another matter it's yeah

the CEO of palantir wrote a book um came over this book it's it's it's scary because it's got this

it's got this tinge of it's definitely collector it's super collectivist and yeah i've read about

i haven't read the book but i've read a lot about it no he sounds um like something of a nationalist

definitely definitely so it is scary when when people with those kind of philosophies have that

kind of technological power behind it's yeah yeah let's see woman else asks how do we make the

justice system more profitable yeah i don't know what that means profitable that sounds like

policing for profit which is a bad thing when they like take your property and yeah more profitable

i'm not yeah i'm not exactly sure what you mean um yeah why would we why would we want to make

it more profitable yeah i don't know woman maybe you can ask a platform exactly i mean it's

it's it's not to be a you know that's not the government's job to make a profit it's uh

be protective of our right i mean official seems to do yeah it's Stephen can you give a short

encapsulation of your legal methodology uh he says i think originalism's

originalists would say we strive to identify the original public reasonable meaning of the text

at the time it was written so do you have uh encapsulated well i don't know how well i can encapsulate

it but so i have a book on this uh judicial review and objective legal system and i do distinguish

my view from the originalist view because and i have too long well i have a chapter on

textualism and i have chapter on public understanding originalism which sounds very much like what you

just describe um they're written now there are ways of taking the words you just read in the question

that are perfectly fine like there are ways of taking that that i would be okay with

but the ways that is off is usually taken by originalists is the original understanding

be it right or wrong be it an objective or non-objective is what we must go by and that i think

is a mistake because you write laws and you have to try to then understand i mean obviously

you must try to understand what they were trying to convey but the person today reading a law

i'm just an average citizen i want to obey the law right the law has to tell me what i can do i'm

not trying to read minds i'm trying to read the law so we've got to be truthful to the objective

meaning of the law and we've got to realize that original meaners could have been wrong like the

original meaners don't get to set the way the world is such that it will conform to their understanding

in 1787 or 1849 or whatever it might have been of what a given concept means i mean over time

our understanding of certain concepts changes we have the same basic idea of what a mammal is

but what's classified as a mammal and what's a you know is a whale a fish or a mammal or so that

may change with advances in knowledge this is a little bit different but think two of examples

like what's toxic we understand what it is to be toxic but the chemicals that might be listed as

toxic chemicals might change as we learn more about the properties of different toxins over time

or different chemicals that aren't actually toxic over time so what i'm saying is to be objective

is not the same thing as to go by what the original understanding was because the original understanding

of a concept that was written into law might be a misunderstanding and to give people a fair

chance to comply with the law they have to know what the rules are and they can only know that if

they're going by the objective meaning of the term not what was in the minds of those guys back then

but i go into this in much more detail and i think can make a better case for it if you read

the later chapters of my book on judicial review and a lot of people who read Iron Man get the

wrong idea about independence and minimize the importance of things like working with others

community and the value of others in general any thoughts no i think you make a good point they

think that she's anti social or you know you've got to make it a point to be different and that's

ridiculous again as we started out talking about there's such great value in other people and to

gain from other people and in collaboration with other people as you say sometimes in community

with other people and working with others you can build i mean i have these workshops that i have

because other people have such good ideas and it helps me to think further and you know

deepen my understanding and go farther and things so there's so much to gain there's nothing

wrong with other people there's something wrong with um letting them do your thinking for you

right or listening to your own work so i know what to think or what to say it's like no no no no no

now he might give me some good ideas that i can think about further or not but that's on me

but for me to really get value from whomever it might be i've got to be independent and do my own

thinking so that then if i'm working with others i'm bringing something to the working with others

right and he's bringing something to if he's an independent person but yeah no i take very

i take very well and warmly your point that yeah i mean she's not anti-social

at all no part of a rational egoistic life would say oh i'm better off without other people

or just put me on the island no thanks yeah right

i mean

baker says great to hear about your course on the virtues uh i've just been listening to

Don Watkins commentaries on the virtues chapter in opa uh they're great i didn't know he did that

that's good yeah i think i remember that from a few years ago yeah

how to have fun anytime anywhere step one go to chambakasino.com

chambakasino.com got it step two collect your welcome bonus

come to pop a welcome bonus step three play hundreds of casino style games for free

that's a lot of games all for free step four unleash your excitement

chambakasino has been delivering thrills for over a decade so claim your free welcome bonus now

and live the chambalife visit chambakasino.com

all right steven asks how would you conceptualize the battle of the sexes

she wants opera you want a movie doesn't mean one of you can't be fully selfish or what

so i don't think that's a battle of the sexes no i'm sorry the both are gonna have you know

differences like i want to do this this week and you want to do that how is that what how is

it a selfish yeah how can you be selfish if you have to compromise on stuff like that

well if you'd be bitter off with anger because you know if if it's more important to you i want

another one of the damn baseball game or whatever i forget it was opera in some of the movies or

something if it's more important to you to go into your movie you know then to have her then go

to you know if if that's really what's more important but if no like this relationship and this

woman or this person like oh this is of great value to me guess what we're not always going to be

in the mood to do the same thing you know to go to the same kind of restaurant same entertainment on

a weekend or something like oh so maybe we can't like if i'd rather i mean one option is to go your

own ways right but no i want to spend Saturday night with her i haven't seen her much this week

like i want to be it something like then it's not a loss it's not a compromise that's a net negative

like oh you're just subordinating yourself right obviously if week after week you know or

anytime there's a disagreement you know you'll let one person have their way 90% of the time you

know that then there's something wrong but i mean you understand in context that people's preferences

will vary sometimes and you'll have to you know if it's more valuable to you to be doing things

together and then there are there may be some weekends it's like you know i really this game is

important you know for this opera is a really special and i really want to go and if it's going to

be that painful for you then we should just do our own thing this weekend that's a bit too yep

Steven says how long can a bad person keep a girlfriend what's this how long can a bad person

keep a girlfriend usually does the fact that a person is far from perfect morally mean he'll have

to full-go romance well if you're trying to be moral it should if they're bad morally i mean

what are you doing with this person if you really have moral serious moral problems with them

what are you getting out of the person um that is of real value i mean why are you in this

relationship you know sorry and if somebody's far from perfect morally then they should improve

i mean what what what yeah they said they are we feeling sorry for

morally imperfect people i mean what not particularly no other thing there sorry no your

morality is in your control that's one of the things that are really in your control oh yeah i mean

maybe you just need no to be reminded of that right yeah uh Steven says tell what do you think of

the argument of elan woman that the words subject to the jurisdiction they're off in the fourth

amendment mean political jurisdiction you know i'm sorry i don't know because i haven't

followed this closely enough this is the birthright citizenship issue i think which they're still

going to argue in a few weeks i think um i'm sorry i really don't have an opinion because i haven't

paid close enough attention to that yet i expect that we'll be paying a little more attention to it

as it sort of comes to the fore more and i'll focus there but sorry yeah okay now he's

and i don't know some of the surrounding history of like how that language versus similar language

was used in terms of these jurisdictions yeah right uh yes uh Steven do you what do you think

of book versus Troy opinion i think the justices chosen easy to administer rule over a just

rule oh i don't even know that case by name so i'm sorry

book versus Troy right so Steven let's see nachya

with a lawyer i just play one in class uh so nachya with you i'll go with them says do you think

that because we have naughty germany as an example uh Gestapo Gestapo like formations like ice

can only get so far before they fall they fall to bits

i don't think it has to do with the exam i don't know yeah i'm not yet i don't see

how the example the history there helps particularly um

um i mean i think you have to like

what's going on these days like what are the ideas and the attitudes

underneath it that are generating it and generating a lot of support for it right um

and the underlying ideas again go back to the tribalism the

hatred of certain people the resentments that again have been bred by altruism and by a collective

estate over the years such that people feel you know many people seem to feel that immigrants are

taking their jobs and that sort of thing um but i i guess i'm it's not clear to me what lessons

there would be just from the Gestapo or the Nazis as to the limits of this um i think

the limits are going to be more whether there are limits and and i do think

ultimately it will fail but but it's going to be a while in the ultimately because it's a matter of

people seeing better ideas for just understanding the rights of individuals yeah

yeah and it goes against so much of what america used to be that some people

about some people wake up some people are waking up to the evil of it some more yeah i mean i

see like this is what we've become with this is who we are now and it's like no i'm yeah yeah

all right we got one last question from pygopta have the good folks said ij and pacific legal foundation

read your judicial review book i don't think many of them have but i know a few have um but thank you

thank you for the question but thank you also for bringing us to a bright light and i think both

plf and ij and some of you may know i recently about a year ago joined the board of the institute for

justice and i'm so proud to be associated with them and i'm so i both organizations do such great

actual legal work making progress for all of our rights for the rights of their clients

and you know plf was in on the tariffs case the other day they had brought one too that was consolidated

but both organizations i've met several people at both and more so ij but i know some of the people

at they do such great work absolutely and they really do give you like they win cases they win

liberties back they win constitutionalism back for real breathing human beings and that is good

for all of us warned parties even to those cases um and you know i think i know larry saltman and

steves and i think i've read my book so i know a few people read my book a few people that just

want you to be an originalist and be done with it and it's like no i'm sorry close but so far

so i'll try to get more of them to read it but thank you for the question

so Andrew has one more he says uh when asked if she'd ever revised the constitution

ran said that's a hard job for great philosopher of law uh which she wouldn't imagine doing

sort of at home between other jobs he says terror deserves a say if it ever is revised

well thanks uh thank you i appreciate that uh yeah that i got to figure out profiling first you

know i start small i got it i have these little pieces to put together but um but it's

it's it's very impressive that constitution you know like it's not perfect but it's very impressive

and yeah god we've got and and you know here's the thing too it comes back to

but people can't like you can't make people true to the constitution like you can't

legalize in some way or institutionalize good faith and honesty and if people don't care about

liberty then there's no constitution that can save them right i mean we have this constitution

and look where we've you know what we've descended to for a long time and this is not just a couple

of administrators like for a long time i mean it's amazing how well it's held up

in spite of all the rotten philosophy of the last 200 years oh it hasn't had defenders it's not

like the constitutions that big defenders over the last 200 years i mean it taught no i mean

back in the 19th century it still had some good ones you know yeah but yeah yeah that's been hard

good well this has been fun okay thank you all very much for the quiet i really appreciate all

those questions thanks thanks a lot your own thank you and thank you guys i will see you all tomorrow

for another episode have a great night good night thank you all bye too all right come to Texas come to

Austin

eat