I’ve now spoken with Daniel Krawisz (aka The Bitcoin Emperor) for several episodes of my podcasts relating to bitcoin. Daniel takes a broad philosophical approach to things in bitcoin and makes fun videos about his views on bitcoin.
In my latest podcast episode with Daniel, he shares with me his latest thoughts about what Fredrick Nietzsche and Ernest Becker had to say about taking risks in life. Daniel implores us to consider taking some calculated risks in life. Thanks, The Bitcoin Cash Podcast for the chapter marks!
Here are a few clips from the episode.
Listen to the full interview below.
Listen to all my podcast episodes with Daniel here:
Chapters:
00:00:00 Intro
00:00:42 Discussing economics
00:03:10 Presentation start
00:06:34 Nietzsche and Becker
00:11:21 Random walks
00:14:51 Fear of death
00:16:32 Economics and Becker’s psychology
00:23:05 Darwinian influence
00:24:14 Theory summary
00:26:00 Rationality of instinct
00:30:47 Fauci
00:33:57 Summary of attitudes
00:40:35 Application of theory
00:45:00 Optimal strategy
00:48:35 Modern cultural groups
00:57:58 Men and danger, philosophical approaches
01:03:00 Practical implementation and Warren Buffet
01:07:00 Scams/games
01:10:00 Value of money and Bitcoin
Automated Transcript
Today, I’m talking with Daniel Krawisz and I love him having Daniel on the show because he takes a very broad philosophical perspective to things. He also reads very widely. Um for example, a while back, we were chatting online and he was reading the Malius Malaficharum, I believe it’s called and so he’s just, he reads a lot of different books, a lot of different things and he has a lot of interesting ideas and so Dan I appreciate you taking the time out of your day to come on the call and share some of your thoughts about Bitcoin with me okay well thanks well yeah it’s a lot easier if I get help so so thank you for inviting me so today what we did some some previous some previous sessions on Austrian economics but today I want to talk about some things that I would have talked about first if I had known about them but I learned some new things since last talked and what what I’ve learned about is why it’s so hard to talk to people about economics.
00:01:09
So so I mean I think economics is very very beneficial and it’s something that everybody can understand. It’s not really that difficult of a subject but when when you’re trying to talk about it with people, they they have psychological problems. So I don’t think that there’s a problem with being able to understand the material. I think that there’s there’s some kind of there’s some some kind of psychological problem with it.
00:01:50
So what I’ve learned is why why people struggle to engage with economics or at least I’ve learned a good theory on it. So I’ve got a little presentation here that I’m going to start with let’s see Well, now it’s not letting me share the screen.
00:02:21
Doesn’t it no okay there’s the problem it just doesn’t really even let me do full screen so it’s just being secure so that’s fine I’ll just have to share a different screen when I get to some of the the diagrams but that’ll be fine so this presentation is called the Psychology of Risk people are so unhappy about not having the impossible that they lie to themselves or live in fear regardless of how good things are following Nietzsche and Ernest Becker So problem. Economics drives people insane.
00:02:56
Um so as as I said there’s a big problem with with talking to people about economics and people don’t want to learn it even though it’s extremely beneficial. And I mean I I guess we should talk about why economics is so so beneficial. Um well economic centers into everything and you you know it’s good to it gives you insight into how the world works. Um I mean you need you need more than just economics to understand you know what’s going on with the with the economy but if you don’t have economics then I don’t think you can understand it at all.
00:03:48
It also enters into all of your your interactions I think because every every person you know is is interacting with the whole economy and so I mean economics is really just about finding the optimal strategy it’s it’s like the the theoretical part of that so that’s why you need more in order to actually find the optimal strategy but you can’t really I mean you without without the theory it’s hard to get get anywhere on it so it’s just it’s just really good to me it feels like it’s it’s like you know it’s like it’s like Daniel and you know I think what we were chatting at one point and and I I feel like what you were trying to tell me is that it’s people want to have their cake and eat it too is is that part of the problem that you’re trying to describe that people don’t like talking about trade out sort of I mean well what they want is something impossible so I haven’t talked about what it is yet but what what happens with people is they get they get emotional or they project bad motives onto you or attribute very silly ideas instead of what you’re really saying like they don’t try to genuinely understand what you’re saying and they also believe craziness like Marxism or or MMT and MMT is modern monetary theory so both of those things are are just crazy and they are I mean they have some economics in them but I think that if you if you understand the Austrian school it’s pretty it’s pretty easy to see what’s what’s wrong with with any of the other schools.
00:06:07
And they’re all they all kind of fit into this this this theory that I’m going to explain. But Well, anyway, so here is here’s what I learned that that you know that open open my mind to something. So this is a theory that follows Nietzsche and Ernest Becker. So Nietzsche had a theory about self deception. And he said that people are afraid of chaos. And they invent imaginary eternal worlds to tell themselves that not all good things must come to an end.
00:06:57
And that’s kind of the problem with chaos is that it means that everything is unstable. So if there’s if there’s chaos then eventually if eventually anything is is going to fall apart. And people don’t like that idea and they they want to tell themselves they they want to eliminate chaos.
00:07:27
People are motivated to deceive themselves so that they can believe that chaos has been put at bay and Becker basically took Nietzsche’s theory and he kind of applied it to people in general because he was a a therapist so he talked about he talked about his his patience whereas Nietzsche was talk about some special cases like philosophers. Becker was kind of talking about everybody. So that’s that’s how he improved on Nietzsche but I think he also he he also lost some some important things from from Nietzsche.
00:08:21
So I think I think overall Nietzsche’s theory is is better but Becker did did some stuff better. So what what Becker said is people are afraid of death and they believe in illusions in order to attribute cosmic significance to their actions so so what I think is is good about Becker is that he tried to make a theory that’s more general for that’s for more more people but I think it’s not necessary to make everything about death and I think Nietzsche’s formulation to say that it’s about about chaos is better and so I Becker was influenced by Freud and Freud likes to say everything complex in people is really about some kind of like fundamental drive in childhood so so Becker’s like all fears are about death really but I think if you look at Becker’s descriptions of death he’s not talking about old age he’s talking about chaos he’s talking about like random events that could kill you tomorrow and he says that’s what people are most afraid of and that kind of make sense because if if you could know that you were going to die of old age then then you could plan ahead you could plan for it you know and then then death wouldn’t really interfere very much with you having a meaningful life because you could make sure to complete everything before then but the problem with death that happens randomly is that it it interrupts whatever you’re doing and it it prevents your actions from being meaningful.
00:10:12
Cuz you didn’t finish them. Right. Right. So so what so I think that this this makes a lot of sense and it explains a lot about why why people don’t like economics because usually in in economics we have to talk about randomness and what we’re we’re talking about like big groups of people who who just do do all kinds of different things and if you’re well let’s let’s let’s continue with this because I think the one dimensional random walk kind of it’s kind of is a good example to clarify what I’ve what I’ve just been talking about.
00:11:11
So a random walk is a mathematical idea that involves probability and the way it works is you start at zero and then you go up or down one with probability P. So there’s different different kinds of random walks depending on what the probability is. So but there is a proof which says that regardless of probability P, the random walk will cross zero an infinite number of times.
00:11:46
Um and so if you’re you can think of you can think of the random walk as being a model for life. Uh and the randomness is like chaos. And so what this theorem is saying is that so let’s say let’s say that going below zero is when you die.
00:12:08
Um what what this is is as long as there’s any randomness whatsoever eventually you die because eventually the random walk goes below 0 and that’s even if like the probability you could say the probability is 1, 000 to 1 that you will go up instead of down but you still eventually will go down and cross zero and it’s kind of easy to see why that is if you think about it and the reason is that there’s just always some probability that you will get enough bad rows bad roles in a row to get down to zero no matter how how far away you are and there’s always some probability of that so you know eventually it happens and that’s not really a proof because you could say like maybe the Uh maybe the probability of failure goes down you know approaches zero faster than you you go go up for for some probability but it doesn’t really it turns out it doesn’t work that way.
00:13:30
So I think that what what what this means is that people are people are afraid of small risks or I should say like this clarifies the idea. So one thing that’s kind of weird about these these theories about people’s fear of chaos is we could be talking about very unlikely things. Like Becker talks about you know getting struck by lightning or or something like that. Like things that that probably aren’t aren’t going to happen.
00:14:11
At least not anytime they’re they’re probably not going to happen tomorrow. But What what seems to make people afraid according to him is is the fact that it it could happen. So I think I think this kind of makes sense because what what the if you if you take tiny risks for a long enough time eventually they kill you. So a fear of a a tiny tiny risk is really a fear about inevitability.
00:15:00
And so that’s kind of what what what both Nietzsche and Becker are are saying. They say that Nietzsche is that suffering and misfortune is inevitable and Becker says that that death is inevitable and these are the things that that make people afraid but the way that they the way that Becker talks about death is he talks about it as if it’s like chaos and so because small risks taken over time make make suffering and misfortune inevitable people are afraid of them and they want to eliminate tiny risks and make them zero.
00:15:51
So people are people are people are afraid of the idea that they cannot eliminate tiny risks to make them zero. And I think that’s the the purport of of the theory. And so another another thing that seems to affect people. So well let’s let’s go back to economics. So in in economics we usually say that the free market is better and we like we like capitalism and the reason it works is because of randomness because everybody everybody benefits from the the the creativity of of everybody else and people can try all kinds of you know crazy things that that probably won’t work but what happens is the ideas that that don’t don’t fit in with everybody else die out.
00:17:14
So then what we’re left with is whatever’s whatever’s better. And that process works a lot better than designing everything centrally.
00:17:27
So according to this this theory of psychology people people have have trouble engaging with the idea that randomness is good and so when when you talk about so because if things are random that means something bad could happen right and if if you wait long enough eventually something really bad will happen or eventually something bad will definitely happen. That’s kind of why people don’t like it and so when when we’re saying that randomness is good people’s people struggle with that idea emotionally. That’s that’s the theory. Um and I would say that this this seems to explain my experience talking to people about economics.
00:18:28
And so so I really think it makes it makes a lot of sense.
00:18:38
Um so Nietzsche said that people go through phases and they start out in dogmatism which means that they they they think they have some definite answers from somewhere and this is usually like a received received wisdom from from people in power but dogmatism really just means that you you think you have absolute certainty so then when they realize that they can’t have absolute certainty then they go into nihilism and nihilism is saying that that nothing is good or that there is there is no meaning so once once people engage with the idea that they can’t have absolute certainty they don’t they don’t know how to replace that with with something that is not not certain.
00:19:49
They don’t know how to replace that with with uncertain things. So they become nihilists because they think they don’t have anything. Um and that’s Not well that’s not the original meaning of nihilism but that’s how Nietzsche used it. So so then Nietzsche says you overcome nihilism when when and and you can start to find meaning in life again when when you you learn to you learn to embrace suffering.
00:20:28
So that doesn’t mean that you suffer forever but it just means that there’s there’s going to be good times as well as bad.
00:20:38
And if you can can accept that then you can start thinking about like what you know what’s my best option you know what I mean so Becker said that a real heroes well so Becker said that people try to tell themselves that they’re heroes that has to do with giving their actions cosmic significance but he said the real heroes accept the truth that human life is insignificant to the universe with with resignation so I think that well I mean I think that Becker didn’t really have a very clear idea of of overcoming nihilism to me it seems like he had dogmatism and and nihilism and his real hero was someone who was resigned so hm live live with your disappoint and like a Chaupenhauer type like a Chaupenhauer exactly yeah he’s yeah I’ve had Schopenhauer later yeah so I think Becker was more like more like a Shopenhauer guy yeah so some people never get out of nihilism.
00:21:52
I mean to me like there’s it sounds like Becker’s patience did get better. So it’s not like they all just confronted death and then became really depressed for the rest of their lives. But to to me a Becker’s Becker’s hero is kind of like like someone who who denies the will. Like like Chaupenhauer. And he doesn’t to me doesn’t seem like he has a very good idea about someone really really embraces life.
00:22:27
So someone someone who’s really driven to be successful at something according to to Becker or I think Becker would say that he’s he’s in some kind of illusion. And I don’t think that he has an idea of someone who who who understands the truth but who’s on on some kind of quest anyway.
00:22:56
So I think a problem with both Nietzsche and Becker is that they are not Darwinian. They’re not Darwinists. Although Nietzsche could be seen as sort of like a proto Darwinist or someone who kind of kind of thought like Darwin but didn’t didn’t quite get the idea right. But I think that if I think that if we’re Darwinist we can say that we we are on a quest. And it’s not because of some some metaphysical world. It’s not because of some some alternate reality. Right? It’s because that’s a a natural process. And it’s like it’s it’s based on what what are what is given to us in our our instincts.
00:23:53
And but well any anyway so here is summary of the the theory what are people want they want small risks to be zero and they want to avoid facing the inevitability of suffering and they want to say that anybody who likes randomness is malicious or ignore them yeah I was going to add that and that’s that basically explains my experience when I talk to people about about economics so thirdly part I’ve I’ve seen a lot. Now well not just me but like other people who I think are are good economists. They either get ignored or people say that they’re they’re evil.
00:24:46
And if if if we if we hypothesize that people get emotional around the idea of risk no matter how small it is. You know, in other words, they don’t they don’t have much nuance about how they think about risk and they don’t they don’t want to accept the idea that you can’t entirely avoid risk.
00:25:23
Even though and they can’t argue with it they can’t you can’t find an argument against that idea so what what they want to do is deceive themselves and the only way they’re going to do that if they’re confronted with somebody who’s disagreeing with them is they have to say that that that person is malicious or say they’re not there or or something so Nietzsche had another idea that I think we can make some more more sense of with this this theory.
00:26:01
So if you look up Dyonesian and Opalonian online what what they say is that the Dyonesian is like the the the irrational and the Opalonian is the rational. But I think it makes more sense to say that the the Dionesians are they’re they’re instinctive and maybe they don’t they don’t use rational thought but I don’t know if I would agree that that means they’re they’re irrational because I mean as long as an animal is in its natural environment then it’s usually going to make pretty good decisions I think but not because it thought about all of the consequences it’s because all of the in the past the the related animals that made bad decisions got caught or didn’t get enough food and died out so his his ancestors were the ones who had the right had the right the right instinct and they were passed on to him because his ancestors survived and the alternatives didn’t.
00:27:29
So is is an instinctive creature really irrational I mean I would say that I mean if you put the animal outside of its natural environment then it’s going to make it’s going to make bad decisions. But I I don’t think that saying it’s irrational really makes much sense. Um because it does it does make good decisions too and a a good decision is rational even if you didn’t even if you didn’t think it through all the way like if you had some some other some way of making the decision that isn’t you know that isn’t a rational way of thinking if it if it still works it’s still I I I don’t know I just don’t I don’t think that’s a really good way of describing it.
00:28:22
So Opalonians they’re they’re people who claim to be rational. So like they say Opalonians are rational but really they’re irrational. And they claim to like rationality but really they’re they’re driven by fears that they don’t want to acknowledge. So they they’re not they’re not rational. They just say they they just say they’re rational. And they say that people who are people who like risk or people who embrace risk are irrational.
00:28:53
When really those people could be making really good decisions. Uh but they’re they’re driven by a They’re driven by an irrational fear.
00:29:09
And so there are people who say that all all risk is bad and Nietzsche said that the the Superman was able to balance the Dynasian and Opalonian and so that you know the you might some interpretations say that the the Superman is able to be both rational and irrational but I would say that it makes more sense to say that his rationality is in tune with the instinct and he understands that some risks are good and some risks are bad and it’s not like he’s a combination of of two contradictory things.
00:29:58
I would say that his I I would say that the the Nietzsche has has real rationality because he’s like someone he’s to me he would be like someone like me who would say like why would we want some kind of intelligent solution when we could have a really stupid one that works a lot better you know what I mean like to me that’s that’s rational and you’re you’re irrational if you don’t like that I mean assuming I’m right assuming the stupid solution is better but Oh sorry.
00:30:40
What were you saying? It it makes me think about the the solutions that we’ve seen lately past couple years with the COVID measures. I I mean there’s people at the top like Tony Fauci who can’t stand stand any chaos and think that they can have a totally rational and no risk approach but there really needs to be some sort of in-between method that embraces a sort of a a a market based or a knowledge on the ground approach.
00:31:09
Yeah, right. Well, okay. You should you should read this one next so Fauci is a oh great okay well yeah so he he claims he claim he pretends to be a rational person but really he’s playing a a part and so what well maybe he’s rational but his goals are not not the not what he not what he projects on on people so Yeah and just for people who might only be listening listening to the audio.
00:31:48
Daniel just held up a book called what’s the title of it again Daniel? The book that you held up. Bill Gates Big Pharma and The Global War on Democracy and Public Health by Robert F Kennedy Junior. Uh it’s really good. So it’s it’s a pretty interesting book but go ahead. I’m only about halfway through but it’s good so far.
00:32:11
So but yeah Fauci is appealing to the Opalonians in the audience and he’s he’s appealing to people who want to listen to the experts instead of instead of wanting to evaluate information themselves. So like I would say that things are much better when people figure out they’ve come to their own conclusions about what good decisions are and people do do different things. Whatever they think is is better.
00:32:49
And that that minimizes risk because there’s a really there’s it’s really bad if we have a centralized solution that where there’s a a mistake because then everybody gets hurt. If if people just do different things then at least at least one group of people or well it’s more likely that at least some people are not going to get hurt badly. So so maybe if you’re a an Apalonian you would say that that’s that’s irrational but that’s really that rational and it depends on recognizing that nobody has absolute truth.
00:33:37
So, there’s no way, there’s no way that you can get everybody to do the same thing and and and know that they’re doing what’s correct, you know? Um oh and let me talk about, well, let me bring up this this this diagrams that I have now. Wait a minute, let me see.
00:33:58
Okay. Um here we go so here’s a here’s a diagram that I made to explain explain Nietzsche’s theory so according to Nietzsche what happens is we start off where we’re like we’re like animals and we’re just following instincts and then then we embrace risk because our our instincts tell us to do to do risky things and that’s not always good because in the past you know if if if mother nature was like a person she would be like well we’ll just we’ll just make everybody try to kill themselves and then whoever whoever gets through it they make the next generation.
00:35:01
So it’s fine. So your instincts aren’t necessarily telling you what what what most likely to to keep you alive. They’re they’re telling you they’re telling you drives that that that you’re supposed to do but they’re not necessarily telling you about all the potential dangers right so then we have consciousness and that brings about awareness of of risk so the realization that that you are not not immortal so now then the the Opalonians are the ones who believe that all risk is bad Because if there’s risk then you could die tomorrow and that’s that’s like I know that that sounds like a silly thing to say and that’s not that’s not what people will say they think if you’re if you’re talking to them like if you’re if you ask them to actually explain explain their idea they won’t say something like that but it seems like people act that way where they say they think they think all risks is bad.
00:36:20
Um regardless of how how bad it is and there’s there’s no there’s no nuance and you know not everybody is like that because there are different choices people make but it to me there’s it seems like there’s a there’s a lot of people out there who who are thinking this way and so then if you believe that you have a way of eliminating risk completely then you’re a dogmatist dogmatist and then once you realize that you can’t really do that then you become annihilist and then you say nothing nothing is good because all all all risk is bad and everything has risks so then nothing is good and so there there see I have shown how there and Buddhism and Becker and I think they kind of are are like this and there so then but Nietzsche says if you you take another step back and you start saying that some some risks are good then then there can be good things and you just have to understand that risk the fact the fact that you could fail or you could something could kill you is just not not the only the only it’s not the only quality of decisions that that matters and sometimes increasing your odds of getting killed is the optimal strategy because at the same time the you know there’s a big potential benefit and So, I think I think the best things in life only come through the the Nietzsche category.
00:38:24
So, I think I mean, I I don’t think people are all in one category but it’s it’s more like you know, some people have really really engaged with this this kind of thinking and have allowed it to really affect how make decisions and other people are more more intuitive about it but I think that I think that if if you think about this like good the the best things in life only come if you if you make the decisions in the way and you’re willing to to take on extra risks sometimes when when the prospects are good and in order to do that you you need to look at risks Uh in a a nuanced way and so I put Warren Buffett down there he’s one of my favorite guys and you know he what he and and people like him do is they they read they read up on tons of different companies and they go through they go through a lot before they find one that they want to buy and they try to figure them out really carefully because they are worried about risk but they know that there’s there’s also reward and so while Nietzsche was also influenced by hair colitis of course I put him on there so I I was I’ve been really interested in this this diagram because I think it’s a really good way to think about people and I I really think that there there are really big problems with with the way that that some people make their decisions.
00:40:28
I mean many many people that I’ve interacted with I would say. And I I think that if I can if I imagine that this kind of thing is what’s going on in their minds then it it just makes a lot more more sense.
00:40:41
So like one of the thing one one thing that was really surprising to me was when I would try to talk to people about why why Bitcoin is a good idea.
00:40:56
So what I found out is that almost nobody will say that will will will understand at the same time that that Bitcoin has good prospects and at the same time there’s significant risks and that kind of make sense of this like it seems like some people are they’re so convinced that Bitcoin will be successful that they it doesn’t even matter if they completely ruin it so that’s like everybody in in BTC they’re like the the dogmatists and then People who than other people won’t won’t really even try to understand it because they think it’s it’s risky and that’s all that matters to them they’re and they’re like people who don’t don’t want to get into crypto but yeah it’s been been very hard to Well so I mean think about this like if like people play the lottery all the time right lots of people buy lottery tickets and you know you know based on how those things work that on average you’re going to lose and so to me Bitcoin is like like a lottery except that that on average you would win so like maybe you would say Bitcoin has a 1% chance of being successful but I if if it if it is successful then you would more than 100X.
00:42:36
the money you put into it so I mean really people should should like that like the people should like a lottery that’s that’s positive even if you lose most of the time at it that just means don’t put all of your money into it you should put not I mean if that’s what you thought if you thought that it’s it’s one 1% chance of being successful then you wouldn’t want to put more than 1% of your money into it what you want to do is find find lots of different things that have a a small chance of being really successful and then it would it would average out to being something something that will will probably probably increase what you have but of course not necessarily because there’s always a chance that everything you get will fail you just reduce that chance if you get different things Um so you see what I mean like it’s very hard to it’s it’s just been hard for me to talk to people about about this kind of thing and according to Nietzsche most of the people are are stuck in the dogmatist category and then a small fraction of them escape into the Nihilist category but then the Nietz category is the rarest of all and well I think it’s it’s really kind of kind of sad because Well, as they said, I think I think good things in life comes from from from thinking in in this nuance way about risk and people who can’t do it are well they they miss they miss out on benefit so if you’re the the nihilist you’re you’re avoiding benefit because you’re afraid of risk and then if you’re the dogmatist what you do is you do risky things and then pretend that they’re not risky So, in both cases, you do you’re you’re losing out.
00:44:46
So, Right. Well, let’s let’s go back to this statement I I had up in my presentation earlier. This is the optimal strategy involves risk. So, what’s what’s going through the mind of somebody if they’re who you’re talking to if they’re trapped in this diagram? Um So if they’re if they’re a a dogmatist then what they’re thinking is like first of all they’re you’re you’re messing with them because you’re saying that the the optimal strategy isn’t isn’t perfect.
00:45:27
So they’re they’re screwed up because the best possible thing is not not as good as eternal bliss in heaven. Right? So that’s like the first thing they’re thinking. And then the next thing they would be thinking is like every suboptimal strategy involves more risk and they don’t if they don’t like any risk then it’s like you’re telling them that not that they they need to be like the perfect the perfect profit maximizer or else or else they have they have or else they have more more risk than they need and all risk is bad so so Uh you’re you’re putting a lot of you’re giving them a lot of stress by saying something like that.
00:46:20
Whereas to me like nobody really knows exactly what what is optimal. We have some theoretical economic idea of what is optimal. We can we can try to try to guess at where that is in the real world but we never know we never know Exactly how the real world corresponds to the economic theory because we never have enough enough information and so to me this is like it’s like you just just try your best at at at the game you know it’s not like you don’t have to do perfect at but yeah it’s like it’s like one of those old arcade games where it’s you’re supposed to get they’re they they rank people’s scores in the game and that’s kind of that’s you can get on the scoreboard if you do really well and so if you’re if you’re an Opalonian it’s like saying like if you don’t if you’re not at the top of the scoreboard that’s that’s not good enough because in their minds everything that’s not perfect is is too scary but I’m just saying let’s just let’s just play the game and try to do do the best we can and yeah I like that then the Nihilist is like somebody who’s saying we’ll just run out of Orders eventually.
00:47:57
So why why bother? But that’s like it’s the only game there is. So why not? That’s that’s my attitude.
00:48:05
So yeah I like that. Have you have you found other ways that this has been useful for you? Oh you’ve got another diagram. Okay. Yeah. Great. So I was just thinking about the the manosphere because I think we see this pattern of nihilism, dogmatism, and nihilism and Nietzsche in there so and this is something that’s more modern that I think people might be more familiar with might might matter more to to people today but so in the dogmentist category I put feminist MRA which stands for men’s rights advocate and and blue pill and so so and for Babylonian I put I put instinct is evil because that’s that’s what they think because instinct might tell you to do something irrational you know and so so a while back we we started with feminism and that’s that’s sort of like a a version of of communism or a variant of of communism that says that well I mean I would I would say all egalitarianism is a way to put people off their guard as a way to Secretly try to invade and and control everything and then you say like oh everything is everybody is equal when like somebody’s really you know pulling pulling the strings from behind.
00:49:54
So that’s what the communists want to do with with government and that’s kind of what what the feminists want to do with society and and culture.
00:50:03
And and so there’s they there’s this illusion and we don’t know we don’t know who who really believes the illusion and who is who understands that it’s good good for manipulation and who’s just saying it you know and doesn’t really believe it but but the reason the illusion works is because of it it tells people that they can believe something comforting and it tells them that something that would be would be would be unhappy as something they they don’t have to believe and so and for for for men it’s the idea that that women are are risky and they can can screw you up in in ways that you can’t do to them and that’s kind of like well that’s part of part of what the the red pill is I guess but Well, I mean Didn’t Nietzsche say that woman is the most dangerous play thing involved or was that Schopenhauer? Um I don’t know.
00:51:34
Um.
00:51:34
I have to look that one up. So, in the dogmatist category, I I also put the men’s rights advocates because they’re like the inverse of of feminism. So, they’re they’ve they have understood some things that Um that are. They’ve they’ve seen through the some some kind of illusion I think but they have they’ve created a new illusion.
00:52:07
Because and they’re kind of like the the inverse of of feminists I think and they are using the same kinds of strategies as the feminists to get what they want but it’s not it’s not going to work because women are always going to be better at whining than than men are or more more successful So then the the blue pill that also means believing believing the illusion and that’s from the the matrix of course but actually I I kind of think that’s a very strange I I think it’s really weird that they use that metaphor because to me the red pill is more likely to be the illusion in the Matrix movie because the matrix is like like scientology.
00:53:05
The matrix is like like a cult and well, first of all, usually there isn’t somebody who’s going to give you the absolute truth. There isn’t like a person who’s the source of truth as there is in in the movie. So, I think you would naturally distrust the idea that someone is is offering you the truth and offering you offering you a way out of illusion because that’s what they do in cults all the time.
00:53:33
That’s what all cults say is that you’re living in an illusion and we’re leading you out. So, really Really they’re taking you in the opposite direction. Um so that’s scientology that’s that’s all of them. So I I think the red pill blue pill thing is pretty funny because to me the blue pill is really more. I mean it’s more like more likely to be accepting reality.
00:53:58
And someone who’s telling you that you can have superpowers and you’re living on a prison planet and stuff like that. They’re more likely to be the cult leader who’s leading you into a Although today we do live on a prison planet so it’s not always like that. So then in Nilas I put the the Mig Tao group because they’re the ones who are like all all relationships with with women are bad because you can’t eliminate risk and So they don’t think they just don’t think it’s it’s worthwhile to to try to find a girlfriend at all.
00:54:39
And so then I put the red pill under Nietzsche and I just don’t really know what what category to put there because you know Mig Tao would say their their red pill and MRA would say that their their red pill and really red red pill just means facing facing the truth. Um so really you could say that Nihilism and Nietzsche are both responses to facing the truth and Niilism is just the one where you just think that the truth is so bad that you don’t you don’t want to do anything anymore but when I say red pill I’m I’m I’m talking about the guys who who started using the the term red pill so that would be like like Rolo Tamasi and and and those kind of guy But they’re the ones who are who are just trying to say like this is what the reality is like and this is how you you optimize your your success in it.
00:55:53
And yeah. So you know nobody Getting getting a girlfriend has never been been risk free at any time in history in any any culture ever. So to me we’re that’s we’re not we’re not going to solve that problem. Um so to me like the the Nietzsche approach is is the appropriate one. Well I mean do you want to be the next stage of human evolution or not? You know what I mean? That’s there’s always there always has to be some kind of kind of obstacle to overcome Cuz if if there isn’t why why would you be the next stage of human evolution? You know what I mean? That’s what it’s all about.
00:56:48
Right. Yeah. I think since we’re we’re in the manosphere slide category, I I gotta read the and we’re talking about Nietzsche. I’ve gotta read a quote. Uh Nietzsche said, the true man wants two things, danger and play. For that reason, he wants woman as the most dangerous play thing of all.
00:57:08
I don’t know if that’s if that fits in.
00:57:12
But he seems to be saying that woman is a pretty let me go back to that. Um The True Man, yeah. Uh what book is that in? Do you know the source? Uh I’ll I’ll follow it up. Uh let me let me follow that little rabbit hole. Let’s see.
00:57:33
No, it doesn’t have the source but I’m going to have to I’ll I’ll find it and we’ll put it in the show notes.
00:57:38
Yeah. Well, I mean I remember reading that at one point.
00:57:44
Yeah. Well, that’s interesting and that’s kind of ambiguous so it’d be nice to know a little more about the context but I mean, yeah. So, I think I think men do like like danger because instinctively they know that there has to be some obstacle to overcome in order to get a girlfriend but the problem with that is that can be manipulated because it’s it’s instinct.
00:58:10
So you need reason to figure out which which problems are worth worth overcoming. And so right now like the the The the the blue pillman are like like people who they’re like well it’s like like if you’re if you’re if you’re in nature and you’re an animal and you just like risk that’s not necessarily going to going to kill you because you’ve your instincts tell you like what the correct amount is but then if you get if you get to society and technology people can invent casinos and just present you with whatever you know they they can present you with something that that draws in in your instincts but is just designed to take all of your money away.
00:59:03
So, that’s kind of like. Yeah. Um that’s kind of like like being being the the blue pill man because you’re denying denying instincts and at at the same time you can be controlled by them because you’re not you’re not thinking about them and I guess that would be like if you were the feminist the feminist man because they’re the feminists are the ones who don’t think instincts are real or they say they’re not.
00:59:31
Um I don’t know what the a blue pill man who’s not a feminist would would say instincts but I I don’t know. I still think he basically fits in that that category. So I think we can also do can’t. So I’ve got a continuan version of this. So the Dynasian that’s like somebody who just believes things whatever without thinking about why why they believe it.
01:00:00
So they may accept they accept the faith of their fathers or they have religious experiences or something inspiration. So then then we have epistomology where we realize that our beliefs are not necessarily true so then now the Opalonian category are ones who think that knowledge equals certainty and so Khan said that before before him epistomology was in a vicious cycle between dogmatism and skepticism so now skepticist skeptics mean knowledge is impossible because there is no absolute certainty and then the dogmatists are the rationalists and the impurities because they’re both claiming to have some some solid foundation for knowledge and they just disagree on where it comes from.
01:01:01
So then the the content answer is is transcendental idealism. Excuse me but I don’t want to go into too much detail about what that means but because it’s pretty complicated but it is it is a way for us to have knowledge without absolute certainty. That’s one thing it’s good for and it points to modern science I think. Um so I think it’s I think that’s the right direction.
01:01:31
So I guess I should mention that of course you could also have a Hagelian version of this because Hagel always talked about synthesis or nothesis, antithesis, and synthesis but I think Hagel is a con artist and his theory is just so broad that it just works for anything. So it’s actually meaningless and it’s really just a trick to make you you think that he knows something and he he’ll just keep Saying thesis, antithesis, synthesis as long as you still believe he’s a genius.
01:02:10
But it’s it’s mean and that’s what what I’m talking about here is little more specific than that and a little more useful because it has to do with a a self deception and how people how people face that self deception or or choose not to and and also like why why do people want to deceive themselves? So that’s I don’t think that’s that’s in Hagel.
01:02:40
Okay. So those are my my Oh I I I love it. Um you know I I love it. Are there ways that you think about this in your daily life? I I know this is you know this is very philosophical. I I I this is why I like to talk to you but what about in your daily life? Are there ways that you try to embrace the the the middle I don’t know if it’s the middle ground but the trans the Nietzsche.
01:03:09
Yeah. Um well I mean I think I mean I think Uh oh here we go. Uh go back to the Niche Niche diagram. Yeah so I have I have Warren Buffet in there and I think I think I think good investors are the best practical philosophers. So I think that investment strategy is something that’s that’s really about all life or it’s not just about what what you buy and sell.
01:03:52
It’s not just about about your portfolio but the the ideas in it can be applied more more broadly to to everything you do. Oh and they’re they’re good even if you don’t have enough money to invest in anything even if if you’re like you know, someone someone without extra money. I think you can still apply them to your life because you have time and you have to think about how To how to use that time and you have to you you have to assess risk in order to figure out what what’s likely to grow and and You know Warren Buffett said that his best investments were his house and his wedding ring.
01:04:42
So those are not things that you know that he sold for for billions of dollars. Those are not things that that made him billionaire. Billion or they made him a billionaire. But they’re they’re things that that gave him a good life. And so that shows you that that’s what what he’s really thinking about. And yeah. So So I don’t know. I don’t have anything more more specific than that but I I would say that I mean I think I think I think finding the truth is is really important I mean it’s really one of the most you know you you save you save the the greatest costs the greatest cost the earlier you figure out your mistakes and yeah so if you can if you can figure out how to how to discern truth efficiently then all of the ways that you a portion your your time and and resources are going to be a lot more effective.
01:06:01
So I think philosophy and epistomology are really important. They’re not they’re not just you know they’re not they’re not just entertaining ideas. They’re they’re things that are they’re things that matter a lot. And you know usually these these famous philosophers talk about epistomology in terms of science.
01:06:29
But there’s all sorts of important hidden truths around you know that are not that are not about abstract science. Just like what’s what’s really going on in the world right now. That’s a pretty difficult the question and it’s really important to to your life because if you know if something happens that you weren’t expecting then you can get really screwed up and well and I talked about about cults earlier but just more generally thinking about scams big big and small right there’s scams everywhere and if you don’t if you’re not good at discerning truth then you can get scammed more easily.
01:07:22
So, I think all of this stuff is is really is really important you know it’s not just it it isn’t just just playing a game oh speaking of games there was something I was going to mention earlier because I think one of the things that makes me think that this this theory is good is that people I know often are are the kinds of people who like to play games because that’s something I like and they don’t have trouble assessing risk when we’re Talking about something with no stakes like if we’re playing settlers of Katan or something because they they can analyze they can analyze the game and it doesn’t drive them crazy but the moment the moment we bring real life into it and we start thinking of life as a game then that’s when that’s when problems seem to to arise with with people who seem like they they can be rational when we’re not talking about about real life and so but I think that I mean I think I think you can I mean you really you need to strategize about everything you do and about about your life as a whole or else you know or else things or else your your random walk isn’t as good right I mean you can’t plan everything out yeah you know you can’t plan everything out but I I think you can you can think about decisions in general and then think about what you know about about any particular decision that that you you come across Um so Well, Well, oh, yeah.
01:09:30
Daniel, you know, I I I love what what you shared with us so far. I mean, you’ve given a lot of food for thought and I’ve gotta go though. I’ve gotta put my my kids to bed but maybe we I mean we can explore more topics in the future episode at some point. Oh, okay. Well, bring us home to me. I mean, add a closing thought then because oh you asked for some questions and we didn’t even get to answer any of them.
01:09:54
There was one that was really important. So, I think I’m going to try to answer really quick but somebody asked what well Uh what’s what is well now I don’t even remember the question but he he asked about the value of money and about about Bitcoin so I’ve always said that the value of money is the other people and the reason the reason that’s true is that the reason the the reason you would want to hold cash is that new opportunities can arise that you didn’t know about so when you buy stocks you’re too committed and if some new opportunity comes along not necessarily a good idea to sell that stock in order to take advantage of the new opportunity.
01:10:45
So, holding cash is sort of something that puts you in line, puts you first in line for for new opportunities and some some business can can suddenly go on sale there can be a sell off and it’s only if you have cash then that you can get into it so money is about new opportunities and who creates those new opportunities is the entrepreneurs it’s the other people who use that money so if you want to make money more valuable what you need to do is make the other people into better entrepreneurs so I’m glad somebody asked that because I’ve been trying to tell people what the value of money is ever since I got into Bitcoin and it’s just like nobody ever wants to talk about it and it feels like I just kind of say this kind of thing over and over again and I don’t I don’t really see that that people are well I think I think everybody wants Bitcoin to go up but why don’t why don’t we figure out what what we can do to make that happen so to me that’s what I just said is really the best way of doing it so like what I’m doing now is the the optimal way of making Bitcoin go up and Bitcoin Bitcoin BSV for anybody who’s not not familiar with what’s what’s going on right now that’s that’s the the real Bitcoin that’s that’s the only one that’s that’s any good so what I’m doing now is I’m I’m improving the other people.
01:12:34
I mean hopefully. I mean I think this will be useful information.
01:12:38
And well you know so far I just haven’t really seen people really get the idea that doing doing this kind of thing is is for improving the investment in Bitcoin you you see what I mean like it’s it’s like I do I do this and I talk about it and it it seems like people haven’t haven’t really connected that idea yet even though that’s like the only thing I’ve been talking about this whole time Yeah. Yeah. It’s all about number go up but it’s but it from your perspective it’s more about cooperation and the other people.
01:13:25
Yes. It it’s would you say that that I got that right? So anyway yeah well it’s about value. I mean price is a conjecture about about value. But if we know what value is then we can we can improve we can make Bitcoin a better buy. We can’t it’s a silly idea to try to just make it go up because that’s that’s like Um that’s that’s manipulating sentiment and that’s that’s that’s too risky. We that’s a risk we can avoid easily, you know? Um. Yeah. But we can we can improve value and then you just wait until other people figure out that value has improved.
01:14:11
Yeah. Yeah.
01:14:13
Well, Daniel, thanks again for taking out the time out of your day. Oh, sorry. Go ahead. Well, you’re going to finish it up. I’m just going to say the same thing. Thank you for inviting me and great to talk to you again and yeah, I hope we can continue with with economics and we’ll continue where we left off with our our last discussion.
01:14:33
Awesome. Thanks, Daniel. It’s great talking with you tonight.
01:14:37
Okay, you too. Bye.
Aaron Olson 