What Ayn Rand Got Wrong!

Stefan Molyneux

Stefan Molyneux unpacks a compelling question from a subscriber about Ayn Rand's claim that epistemology is the highest branch of philosophy. He clarifies his argument that moral philosophy may actually take precedence, unpacking Rand’s view that reason equals virtue and serves humanity's flourishing. He challenges this correlation by discussing how individual actions, driven by self-interest, can yield success at odds with societal well-being. He explores discomforting truths about ethics and morality, highlighting contradictions in Rand's arguments and how unethical behavior can sometimes lead to personal success. Stefan also examines Rand's perspectives on societal obligations and the implications for individualism, questioning the effectiveness of a purely reason-based morality in our complex realities. Throughout, Stefan reflects on historical contexts and Rand's life experiences, advocating for a nuanced understanding of morality that transcends traditional ethical frameworks.  SUBSCRIBE TO ME ON X! https://x.com/StefanMolyneux  Follow me on Youtube! https://www.youtube.com/@freedomain1  GET MY NEW BOOK 'PEACEFUL PARENTING', THE INTERACTIVE PEACEFUL PARENTING AI, AND THE FULL AUDIOBOOK! https://peacefulparenting.com/  Join the PREMIUM philosophy community on the web for free!  Subscribers get 12 HOURS on the "Truth About the French Revolution," multiple interactive multi-lingual philosophy AIs trained on thousands of hours of my material - as well as AIs for Real-Time Relationships, Bitcoin, Peaceful Parenting, and Call-In Shows!  You also receive private livestreams, HUNDREDS of exclusive premium shows, early release podcasts, the 22 Part History of Philosophers series and much more!  See you soon! https://freedomain.locals.com/support/promo/UPB2025

Transcript

00:00All right, a question from a subscriber on freedomand.locals.com.

00:06While reading Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, I came across a passage where

00:10Rand says that epistemology is the highest goal of philosophy, since it's what integrates

00:15not only all of the knowledge in a man's individual mind, but also the sum of all human

00:20knowledge and all disciplines.

00:22In past shows, you said that moral philosophy is the primary goal of philosophy.

00:26Instead, could you clarify that point and also get into why you disagree with Rand's

00:30argument?

00:30I can't remember the exact quote, but I can attach it in reply to this message when I

00:33get home.

00:35Thank you for the effort you put into explaining philosophy in an easily understandable way.

00:39Edit, adding the quote.

00:40This is from Rand.

00:41Who, then, is to keep order in the organization of man's conceptual vocabulary, suggest the

00:48changes or expansions of definitions formulate the principles of cognition and the criteria

00:53of science, protect the objectivity of methods and the communications within and among the

00:58special sciences, and provide the guidelines for the integration of man's knowledge?

01:03The answer is philosophy.

01:04These precisely are the tasks of epistemology.

01:07The highest responsibility, our philosophers, is to serve as the guardians and integrators of

01:11human knowledge.

01:12Philosophy is the foundation of science.

01:14Epistemology is the foundation of philosophy.

01:16It is with a new approach to epistemology that the rebirth of philosophy has to begin.

01:23Ah, she's so good.

01:25Yeah, we love the rant.

01:26Okay, so, Ms. Rosenbaum.

01:29So, great, great question.

01:32I will lay out my case, and hopefully it will make good sense, and hopefully, well, hopefully

01:42I will be right.

01:44It's always a reasonable or decent goal.

01:47So, to understand what was going on with Ayn Rand, and why she would say that, is she

01:57believed that she had solved the problem of human ethics.

02:03Because, with the virtue of selfishness, she said, basically, the argument is, the moral

02:09argument, is that virtue is that which is best for the survival and flourishing of mankind.

02:16This is the sort of syllogism.

02:19So, virtue is that which is best for the survival and flourishing of mankind.

02:24Reason is best for the survival and flourishing of mankind.

02:28And, therefore, reason is virtue.

02:30But, the problem is, you can disagree with that and disbelieve in that while still remaining

02:36in the paradigm.

02:37So, rather than saying, it's funny, because she's an individualist, right?

02:41She's an individual.

02:41And, I would think it has something to do with her own personal corruption, in terms of sleeping

02:47with students and all other kinds of stuff.

02:49Well, not students, but sleeping with people who were followers and the affair that she had

02:54with Nathaniel Brandon.

02:55So, there was a certain amount of selfishness that she herself had, and that, you know, did not

03:00help, I think, these arguments.

03:04So, the problem with that formulation is, you can disagree with it.

03:10And, what are the results?

03:13If you say, listen, I'm a guy without much conscience, I'm a guy, you could say, who is

03:21a good liar, I'm a guy who's a good manipulator.

03:24So, for me, not being rational gets me the most resources, right?

03:30And then, she would have to say, ah, yes, but that's negative for society as a whole, right?

03:36But then, of course, you can easily say, but you're not a collectivist.

03:40So, if anti-rationality is better for an individual, then he's selfish that way, and he lies and

03:53cheats, and is a con man, and it's way easier for him to get resources.

03:59Now, then, of course, the argument is, ah, yes, but you see, there's all this psychological

04:04damage that you incur, and you can't be loved, and this, and the other.

04:07And it's like, well, but the primary purpose of human evolution and human life is the acquisition

04:13of resources.

04:15So, just saying, well, you'll be unhappy if you're immoral, well, the problem is that people

04:24who are immoral spread their genes, right?

04:29A guy who sleeps his way through a bunch of women, evolutionarily speaking, like, he's

04:36really charming, he's really sexy, and he sleeps his way through a bunch of women, he

04:40leaves a whole bunch of his genes behind.

04:42And the purpose of genes is not to be happy, but to reproduce, right?

04:47She may just not, may not have understood much about evolutionary biology.

04:50She never really talked about it, to my knowledge.

04:53And maybe, she said she didn't understand human psychology, and she didn't understand,

04:57I mean, maybe this is one of the things, right?

04:58So, the purpose of genes is to reproduce.

05:02And a man who lies to women and sleeps around spreads his seed more than a man who is very,

05:11very honest.

05:12And, I mean, we've all seen this, right?

05:14That there's just the women who like the bad boys, and the bad boys are liars, but they're

05:18tall, dark, handsome, sexy, motorcycle, riding, whatever, right?

05:21Sort of take this as a cliche, right?

05:22So, women are drawn, a lot of women are drawn to that sort of stuff, and so, the fact that

05:31he lies allows him to acquire resources with less effort, right?

05:36The sort of music man, con man thing, right?

05:38It allows him to acquire resources with less effort, and it allows him to spread his seed

05:44more.

05:45Now, if you're going to say, that which is good for man's survival and flourishing, and

05:50you say, well, survival and flourishing has to do with genetics, and it's really important.

05:54Like, why do people lie?

05:56Because it works.

05:58Why are people violent?

05:59Because it works.

06:01The people who couldn't beat me in argument got me deplatformed.

06:04It fucking works.

06:07People aren't random.

06:08They're not irrational, right?

06:10If an irrational strategy is very effective, right, then it will be reproduced.

06:17We have the ability to lie, because lying works.

06:21So, let's say that I was such a prominent and powerful intellectual that the welfare state

06:28was going to be eliminated, right?

06:30Well, if that's the case, then people who are dependent upon the welfare state would lie

06:38about me, would try to kill me, would get me deplatformed, would do just about anything

06:44to shut me up and scare people into going back to giving them resources, right?

06:48And again, Ayn Rand can say, yes, but that's to the negative for society as a whole, and

06:53it's like, but you're not a collectivist.

06:55You are an individualist, which means that what matters is the survival of the individual,

07:00not the survival of the collective, right?

07:04Why is it that we have a whole bunch of people in the West, in particular, well, men and women,

07:10but let's look at the men.

07:11Why is it that we have a bunch of people who don't feel obligated to their society as a

07:17whole?

07:17They don't feel obligated to produce, to fight for freedoms.

07:20They don't feel obligated to have children.

07:22Like, why is it?

07:23Because the people who were the most obligated to society, which have some genetic element,

07:28got fucking slaughtered in the First and Second World War.

07:32You know, all of the people, oh, I'm going to fight for my country, I'm going to fight

07:35for the good, I'm going to fight for the West, and they went and they fought and they

07:39got killed.

07:40And the people who were, you know, skeptical and, you know, frankly, kind of weaselly in

07:45this way, and, you know, they survived.

07:48And the loyalists are gone, and the amoral survivalists are ruling in that, you know.

07:55So, so saying that the rational is what advances and causes human life to flourish, the moral

08:03is what causes human life to flourish, and the rational causes human life to flourish,

08:08and therefore the rational is the moral, well, what if you disagree?

08:11What if you say, no, no, no, listen, I'm a guy with a, you know, you can say, I'm a

08:16guy with a very strong ability, a strong language center and a weak body.

08:21So, I'm, I'm way better off, you know, lying and, and manipulating people, you know, maybe

08:28I don't have the charisma to be an actor, but I can lie and manipulate people and get

08:31resources that way, right?

08:33Okay.

08:34So, you lie and you, and you get resources that way, and you get more resources from

08:40lying and manipulating than you do from doing, you know, hard manual labor.

08:45You're better off.

08:47You win.

08:48Ayn Rand would say, but, but, but no.

08:50No, no, because bad for society as a whole.

08:53Well, that's not how human beings work.

08:56Or, to put it another way, the human beings who sacrificed themselves for the good of society

09:02as a whole, got again fucking slaughtered in the two world wars.

09:07And the people who lied and cried, right?

09:10Because Ayn Rand was writing, uh, really, I mean, she died in 1980, right?

09:14So, she was writing, obviously, in the 40s and 50s, uh, was Atlas Shrugged, 53 or something

09:19like that.

09:19That's the pride of the welfare state, really.

09:21And the welfare state has taken resources from the responsible and the hardworking and

09:27those willing to make sacrifices, and it's transferred those resources through the power

09:31of the state to people who are not responsible and who cry and who are aggressive and manipulate

09:37and play the victim and all of that, right?

09:38So, those genes, uh, those mindsets, and whether it's genetic or the mindset, it doesn't really

09:43matter, right?

09:43That, that, that mindset is spreading like wildfire.

09:47The responsible are getting punished, the irresponsible are being rewarded.

09:50And so, um, the irresponsibility is spreading and responsibility is diminishing.

09:55You say, ah, yes, but it's not good for society as a whole, but that's not how, that's not how

09:59the world works, right?

10:01Again, you go to, uh, go to somebody who's just won the lottery, a government, some government

10:06lottery, right?

10:07And you say, you shouldn't cash that check because it's bad for society as a whole.

10:12You just won $10 million, higher than 10 millions, hundreds of millions in the state

10:16sometimes.

10:17So, let's just say $10 million, you've just won $10 million to say, ah, you know, but it's

10:21government money, uh, it's going to increase taxes, uh, more money printing, more debt.

10:26And, and of course, by, by cashing the lottery ticket and by posing with it, uh, and so on,

10:34then, you know, what happens is you, um, you, you end up promoting, playing the lottery,

10:42which is bad for the poor.

10:43And so, you know, he's going to say, no, I'm going to get my $10 million.

10:47Thank you very much.

10:48Ah, but it's not rational.

10:50It's a coerced money.

10:51It's, you know, whatever, right?

10:53Well, what are you going to say?

10:54I mean, it's good for him to get the $10 million.

10:57Oh, but it's bad for society as a whole.

10:59He disagrees.

11:01He just, it's tax, $10 million, it's like tax-free in a lot of places, right?

11:05It's $10 million, right?

11:07It's like, uh, saying to people in the business world, well, you shouldn't do business with

11:12the government because the government is inefficient and it's just going to raise your taxes and

11:16so on.

11:16It's like, well, but I've got to make my payroll and the government's offering me a million

11:19dollars for this, this business, right?

11:22Okay.

11:23What are you going to do?

11:24So, Ayn Rand genuinely felt that she had solved the problem of ethics when she had

11:33not solved the problem of ethics, right?

11:36What do you do with people who disagree?

11:39Now, of course, she can say, well, society would pass laws and this and that and the other,

11:42but, you know, then, of course, if you're a good thief and society is passing laws, then

11:46you just become one of the lawmakers and then you're, you know, you're away to the races.

11:50You're fine, right?

11:50So, you say, ah, yes, but what about UPB?

11:55How does UPB solve this problem?

11:56Well, UPB is, uh, rape, theft, assault, and murder can never be universally preferable

12:02behavior and you can't disagree with it.

12:04You can't.

12:06And even people who hate the theory, even people who hate me, you know, they think I'm the

12:11worst guy and it's the most terrible theory.

12:13When I run through the theory with them, they cannot disprove it.

12:17They cannot overturn it.

12:19Now, again, I understand that doesn't turn it into a species of physics that people have

12:23to obey no matter what, but it means that they can't disagree with it.

12:28Now, you can disagree with Ayn Rand and say, listen, what's best for me is, uh, cashing

12:36the lottery ticket, right?

12:38That's what's best for me.

12:40Yeah, well, you know, it's not rational.

12:41It's government money and promoting gambling, blah, blah, blah.

12:44Yeah, you could better get $10 million.

12:45It's good for me, spreading my seed by lying to women and misleading women or promising

12:52that I'll be there forever.

12:53Will you still love me tomorrow, right?

12:55Promising I'll be with the women forever, blah, blah, blah.

12:57Well, that gets me laid and that's good for me.

12:59I like it, whatever, right?

13:01All the stuff you talk about.

13:03So Ayn Rand thought she had solved the problem of ethics when she had not solved the problem

13:09of ethics.

13:10And when you haven't solved the problem of ethics, you have to get progressively more aggressive.

13:14I personally think that Ayn Rand knew that she hadn't solved the problem of ethics.

13:22And because she knew she hadn't solved the problem of ethics, she became increasingly

13:27bitter, resentful, and hedonistic.

13:30Because, you know, the last couple of decades of Ayn Rand's life were not, were not an ennobling

13:37spectacle, to put it mildly.

13:39And I think it's because she knew that she hadn't.

13:42And of course, if she had solved the problem of ethics and had truly universalized the

13:48non-aggression principle, then she would not have written the ending of Atlas Shrugged that

13:53she'd written, which is, well, we just need to fix the Constitution and we'll be fine.

13:58And it's like, no, no, no, no, no, no.

14:01Because people just find ways around it, right?

14:02So in America, there's a freedom of speech, the government can't compel you to, can't

14:07throw you in jail for your freedom of speech, and there's no such thing as hate speech.

14:11Okay, I'll get all of that.

14:12But government agencies can just, you know, pressure social media companies who aren't

14:17covered in that way by the First Amendment to simply de-platform you, right?

14:21Eh, easy peasy.

14:22Easy peasy.

14:24No, but it's in the Constitution.

14:25Like, yeah, well, people just find a way around it, right?

14:27People just find a way around it.

14:29DASA, what they do.

14:30So, she was frustrated, and I understand it, right?

14:38She was frustrated at the fact that, she never put it this way to my knowledge, this is sort

14:44of an original idea of mine, that if you base your morals on God, then you can just disbelieve

14:49in God and you're no longer covered by morals.

14:52And so she said this, you know, flourishing of mankind stuff, which is a kind of an odd sort

15:00of collectivism, right?

15:02That human beings make moral decisions based upon their individual standards.

15:07Good for me, right?

15:09She says, selfishness is good, but morality should serve that which is best for mankind

15:14as a whole.

15:15And it's like, that's a huge contradiction.

15:17But if you've put out, and you're kind of wed to what you've put out, it's really tough

15:21for some people to change their minds, right?

15:22And so if Ayn Rand were to say, you know, I haven't solved the problem of morality, and

15:27I've got to really get back to work on it, I've got to deal with it, I've got to fix

15:29it, then she comes to the universality of the non-aggression principle, absolute property

15:34rights, then she has to withdraw the ending or rewrite the ending of Atlas Shrugged and

15:40say, you know, it was close, but it misses as good as a mile, and I've got a better answer.

15:46I mean, that's what I had to wait for me.

15:48I mean, to be honest, right?

15:50And it's not easy.

15:51And I've been studying philosophy for 20 years, and I largely accepted, with some unease,

15:58the argument for morality that comes out of objectivism, right?

16:03And what do you do with people who disagree?

16:05Well, you can't disagree with UPB without saying, it's logically contradictory to say

16:11that rape, theft, assault, and murder can be universally preferable behavior.

16:14That is completely, it is impossible for, say, theft to be universally preferable behavior.

16:20Right?

16:21So once you've got people on that, then now they can say, no, it's possible for theft to

16:27be universally preferable behavior, and you say, yes, but it's self-contradictory.

16:30And they can't resolve that contradiction.

16:32It is self-contradictory to say theft can be universally preferable behavior.

16:36So they have to admit that.

16:37Now, they admit that, and like, was it John Balfour, who called in, they admit that, and

16:43then they say, well, so what?

16:44Right?

16:45It's like, and I said to him, it's kind of a big deal.

16:48We've just done a very big thing.

16:49Rape, theft, assault, and murder can never be universally preferable behavior.

16:52So Ayn Rand would have had to withdraw the ending of Atlas Shrugged, her magnum opus,

17:00and that's a pretty big thing.

17:02That's a pretty big deal.

17:03Right?

17:04And she would have been castigated for, oh, so you were certain of Atlas Shrugged.

17:08Now you're not.

17:09Are you certain of this too?

17:10Right?

17:10I mean, it's tough to withdraw, because a lot of petty people will use it against you.

17:13It's tough to withdraw a public inclusion.

17:16I was fortunate that I really haven't had to withdraw too many public pronouncements.

17:22I was too harsh on Christianity, for sure.

17:24And that, but I'm still not a Christian, and the harshness was really, Christians acted

17:31in many ways more nobly over my deplatforming than atheists did, and so I got to see some

17:38of the positive benefits.

17:39And where there are positive benefits, you have to acknowledge that.

17:42It doesn't mean that I'm withdrawing my metaphysics or epistemology or criticisms of

17:46religion as a whole, right?

17:48It's just that atheists turned out to be kind of douche-nozzles, to put it mildly.

17:53And so, if Ayn Rand says, as she did, reason is man's primary tool of survival, that which

18:02serves man's survival is the good, therefore reason is the good, well, if she accepts that

18:07that's the answer, then her primary job is not a theory of ethics, but a validation of

18:15reason.

18:16Because she's saying, look, if people accept reason, then they will promote reason.

18:23But people need to accept reason.

18:26Now, for her, once you accept reason, then all the other dominoes of her morals fall into

18:33place, right?

18:35So, what that means is that her primary job was to validate reason, right?

18:41Because once you validate reason, reason is man's tool of cognition, reason is superior

18:47to the instincts and to the emotions, reason is objective, universal, syllogistical, non-contradictory,

18:54the non-contradictory art of identification, was the way she put it, right?

18:57So, given that her morals flow directly from the validation of reason, right?

19:03If reason is man's tool of knowledge, then clearly reason then serves man's flourishing

19:10and survival, and therefore reason is the good and the moral problem is solved.

19:14So, why did she say the primary job of philosophy or the central cause of philosophy is epistemology?

19:23Because Ayn Rand believed that if you get your epistemology right, reason as virtue follows

19:31automatically.

19:32So, once you validate reason, morals follow automatically.

19:38So, there's no point trying to prove that reason is virtue if people don't accept reason.

19:44Once they do accept reason, then reason becomes virtue.

19:47So, her primary job in terms of proving her moral system was to validate reason.

19:53Now, the validation of reason is the job of epistemology, right?

19:57The study of true and false, the study of knowledge, right?

20:00So, that's why, that's why Ayn Rand had that perspective, that approach.

20:07So, the validation of reason does not prove that reason is man's highest virtue and value

20:16and that reason serves man's well-being and therefore reason is man's highest standard

20:24of value and the ultimate good.

20:26It does not follow.

20:27It does not.

20:28You can accept reason and then you can say, reason is what serves my survival.

20:38There is no collective survival in mankind, right?

20:40No, you can't share.

20:41I mean, you can share a plate of food with people, but you can't share swallowed food with people.

20:49You can't digest for other people.

20:51You can't think for other people.

20:52You can simulate thought, but you can't think for them.

20:54So, if you validate reason, so reason is man's tool of cognition, okay?

21:00Yeah, reason is man's tool of cognition.

21:02And if you say reason serves egoism, reason serves self-interest, okay?

21:08Then there's good reason to lie if lying gets you more resources than telling the truth.

21:13There's good reason to do it.

21:14If you are a skinny weakling with great language skills, then there's good reason for you to lie.

21:23You get more resources.

21:24I mean, if you look at Obama or Bush, you know, they're just liars.

21:30They're just liars.

21:30And they got lots of power, and they got tens of millions of dollars, and they got, you know,

21:38huge amounts of respect and resources from the various parties or factions for their family.

21:44Their kids are famous.

21:45Their kids will want for nothing, never have to work a day in their life.

21:48And they lied to get all of that.

21:49And are you going to say that lying has not served the Obamas or the Bushes or the Bidens?

21:59Has lying not served them?

22:02Say, ah, well, but they got material resources, but they're cursed by unhappiness.

22:06It's like, what if they don't experience that?

22:09What if they don't experience that?

22:12Putting a curse of unhappiness on people is not an argument.

22:16Saying, well, I'm unhappy when I lie, therefore lying makes all people unhappy is a fundamental

22:25misunderstanding of human motivations and consciousness.

22:29And this is the debate I had on Axis with the first big debate that I had after I got back.

22:34I don't like to lie.

22:35I feel bad about it.

22:37But that's not a universal human experience at all.

22:41At all.

22:42There's tons of people who lie and take delight in lying.

22:45There's tons of people who lie and are really good at it.

22:48You say, ah, yes, well, but they suffer in their relationships.

22:51They're never going to be.

22:51People aren't close to them.

22:52It's like, but in terms of survival and flourishing, gathering massive amounts of resources to yourself

22:59and also reproducing, right?

23:03So some guy tells the truth and he gets fired everywhere he goes and he can't afford a family.

23:08And he dies without passing on his genes.

23:11Another guy lies.

23:12And this is academia, right?

23:13This is academia.

23:14Another guy lies and gets a promotion and gets a great job and gets money and has the kids and so on.

23:20It's like, okay, well, who's human flourishing?

23:25Survival, that which is good for man's survival, most times involves lying your ass off.

23:31I mean, we can't.

23:33I'm not even willing to debate this post-COVID.

23:35You know, people who lied to the population made absolute fortunes.

23:41They made tens of billions of dollars, lying their asses off to the safe and effective.

23:45They didn't know, right?

23:46Lying their asses off to the public.

23:49Now, you can say, oh, but they're unhappy.

23:54Okay.

23:55I'm just saying, hey, I'm an empiricist.

23:57I'm open to the theory.

23:58What do unhappy people do?

24:01Well, unhappy people get depressed.

24:05Unhappy people look miserable.

24:08Unhappy people, really unhappy people, can be suicidal.

24:13Okay.

24:14Do you see that?

24:15Do you see the various news anchors who peddled a bunch of lies?

24:20I mean, and if you find COVID too controversial, that's fine.

24:25Okay.

24:26We can go back to the Iraq war.

24:29The lead up to the Iraq war, right?

24:31Weapons of mass destruction.

24:33We don't want the smoking gun to be in the form of the mushroom cloud.

24:36We know exactly where his weapons of mass destruction are and so on.

24:39And it was all fucking lies that got hundreds of thousands of people slaughtered.

24:45It was all fucking lies, right?

24:50Okay.

24:50So you say, oh, well, you know, they lied.

24:53And what happened as a result of their lies?

24:55Well, the military industrial complex made hundreds of billions of dollars.

24:59The media made tens of billions of dollars.

25:01People glued to their assets.

25:02They sold advertising at a higher rate and so on, right?

25:05Okay.

25:07So did any news anchors quit in disgust?

25:10Did any news anchors get so depressed that they had pushed a war

25:14that turned out to be false?

25:16Did any news anchors get so depressed that they couldn't get out of bed?

25:20I mean, caused the deaths of half a million plus people,

25:24not counting all the birth defects, not counting all the injuries.

25:27It's like direct deaths, half a million people.

25:30I mean, Raskolnikov is kind of tortured in crime and punishment

25:33by killing the old porn broker and Luziveta, her sister.

25:37He's tormented.

25:38Okay.

25:39Was Napoleon tormented?

25:41Whiff of grapeshot?

25:43People protesting?

25:44He blasted them with cannon?

25:46Shrapnel?

25:47Was Napoleon miserable?

25:49Was he...

25:50I mean, honestly, saying, well, the flourishing of people...

25:54I mean, you see Bill Clinton joking with Elizabeth Holmes

25:57back before she went to prison.

25:58Ha, ha, ha.

25:59Tell them how old you are.

26:00Ha, ha, ha.

26:01Right?

26:02Is Bill Clinton depressed?

26:03Is Bill Clinton unable to get out of bed in the morning?

26:06Is Bill Clinton miserable?

26:07Oh, but deep down, it's like...

26:10But that's just a ghost.

26:11You're just...

26:11You're creating a ghost of unhappiness in people.

26:14He seems...

26:15Fine.

26:16Oh, but deep down, I know.

26:18It's like...

26:18Okay, but that's...

26:20Where's the evidence, right?

26:22Don't give me this deep down stuff.

26:24Honestly.

26:25Don't give me this deep...

26:26Deep down, he's really secretly unhappy.

26:29I mean, look who he's married to and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

26:31It's like, well...

26:32You show me where the crisis of conscience has shown up.

26:35You show me where massive apologies and restitutions and hand-wringing and can't get out of bed and super depressed and the conscience, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

26:47You tell me where all that's happening among the elites.

26:50I mean, the BBC promoted and paid Jimmy Savile a...

26:55Who raped hundreds, worked at a hospital, raped corpses, just a complete fucking monster of a human being.

27:02Where do people...

27:03Oh, my God.

27:03I promoted that.

27:04I gave this guy access.

27:05I made him famous.

27:06I, you know, promoted him and...

27:08Right?

27:09Where are the people at the BBC who are like, oh, my God, I'm so depressed.

27:12What the hell's wrong with me?

27:13I got involved in this.

27:14It's so corrupt.

27:15They don't...

27:15They're fine.

27:17They're fine.

27:17How many people who got me deplatformed, right?

27:22These sort of liars.

27:24How many people who got me deplatformed have had attacks of conscience since?

27:29I mean, hey, I'm just asking for the facts.

27:33Right?

27:34Not some, well, according...

27:35I'd be unhappy if I lied.

27:36Therefore, people are unhappy when they lie.

27:39I'd feel bad if I misrepresented things.

27:42Right?

27:43How many people now that defooing, separating from relentlessly abusive parents, how many

27:50people who called me an evil cult leader for years and years and years, how many people

27:57on seeing these articles have said, oh, you know what?

28:01We really did completely torture the reputation and attacked the first guy who really talked

28:06about this publicly, and now everyone's talking about it, and it's accepted.

28:09We should circle back and apologize.

28:11Like, no.

28:13Nothing.

28:14And honestly, if I live for another 30, 40 years, I will go to my grave without a single

28:19apology from people who've done me wrong.

28:22They sail on.

28:22They do their next thing.

28:23They do their new thing.

28:24Right?

28:26Jeffrey Epstein, did he wake up?

28:28And he's like, oh, my God, I'm just preying upon these poor girls, and I'm, you know,

28:33doing all this terrible stuff, and so on.

28:37And did he have a crisis of conscience?

28:40Did he, like, no?

28:41I mean, he seemed to enjoy the billionaire playboy lifestyle.

28:45He seemed to enjoy tormenting and torturing and having all of this horrible, ghastly,

28:53illegal sexual activity with these underage girls and, like, whatever, I don't know, whatever

28:58he was doing, right?

28:59Uh, was he like, oh, my God, I'm so unhappy, like, my conscience is really hitting me, blah,

29:05blah, blah.

29:05It doesn't.

29:07The brains are different.

29:08The brains are different.

29:10So, what if people disagree with you?

29:14Well, reason is the way you get resources.

29:17And Jeffrey Epstein is like, well, no, I mean, crime is how I get billions of dollars.

29:21I mean, nobody really knows how this math teacher made all these billions of dollars,

29:24right?

29:24Uh, oh, you know, Nancy Pelosi with her, you know, somewhat sketchy trades, right?

29:30Yeah, well, um, but it's, you know, it's insider information.

29:34It's bad.

29:35It's illegal, maybe.

29:35I don't know, right?

29:36I mean, but, I mean, she's, she's, oh, my God, the crisis of conscience.

29:39I feel so bad.

29:40I'm using information not available to the public, right?

29:43So, human flourishing.

29:46Human beings flourish from violence and lies.

29:49They do.

29:50They really, really do.

29:52Look at professors versus private podcasters.

29:55They've got job security.

29:57And they are respected and fated and interviewed and, and so on, right?

30:01Whereas I am, you know, I have to wear stab-proof vests to give speeches.

30:07They're not de-platformed.

30:09People aren't de-platformed who lie an entire nation into war.

30:13People aren't de-platformed who promote pedophiles.

30:17People aren't de-platformed for covering up mass child rape across England.

30:23They're not?

30:23No?

30:24They're fine.

30:24They're good.

30:25They're, they're, honestly.

30:26And, and, and this is, you know, I get it.

30:28You know, the Christians are like, well, they're going to go to hell and so on.

30:30It's like, okay, that's, they don't believe that.

30:33So, for, Ayn Rand did not puzzle out these.

30:38I, honestly, I would say, like, you have to be deeply realistic slash cynical about human

30:45beings in order to understand how difficult it is to prove morality.

30:52Human flourishing, that which is best for man's survival.

30:54It's like, I don't know, man, Jeffrey Epstein seemed to have a pretty good time of it.

31:00I didn't see any attacks of conscience.

31:02Of course, he regretted being arrested and all of that.

31:05Okay, yeah, but there's tons of people who aren't arrested.

31:08Do you think George Bush ever woke up or Condoleezza Rice or Donald Rumsfeld or Dick Cheney?

31:15Did they ever wake up in the middle of the night with the horror of what they had done?

31:21Do you think Barack Obama is looking at the premiums that people are having to pay to get

31:28healthcare, right?

31:29People who went from a couple of hundred bucks to a couple of thousand dollars a month with

31:33massive deductibles, right?

31:35Do you think that Barack Obama wakes up and is like, oh, my God, like, the things that I

31:39did and blah, blah, blah, I'm so bad and so sad that this is not what I wanted.

31:43Poor people and poor people are going bankrupt for healthcare and I was in jail.

31:46He doesn't.

31:47I guarantee you.

31:49He does not.

31:51He does not.

31:52It's a basic thing.

31:53Did Barack Obama flourish from getting into politics?

31:58Of course he did.

31:59Of course he did.

32:01He has no regrets.

32:02He's happy he did it.

32:04And he's fated and praised everywhere he goes.

32:08Do you think about Joe Biden?

32:10Who knows what's going on in that broken hamster wheel of a brain?

32:13And, but do any of the, and we say always as people in, okay, do any of the, any of

32:19the Democrats or how many of the Democrats look back and say, oh, that's really, really

32:23bad.

32:24Boy, I really shouldn't have supported that.

32:25That's terrible.

32:26And so on, right?

32:27Nope.

32:28They just move on to the next thing, move on to the next thing, move on to the next

32:31thing.

32:31They don't, they don't process it at all.

32:34And honestly, look in your own life.

32:37And, you know, if I'm wrong about this, obviously I'd love to be corrected.

32:39But look in your own life, how many people do you know who've had a crisis of conscience,

32:46woke up screaming with horror at everything they had done and became catastrophically depressed

32:55or maybe even suicidal?

32:56I'm not wishing it on people.

32:57I'm just, I'm just asking how many people have you known personally who've had a crisis

33:06of conscience that lasts, not, you know, oh, I'm such a bad guy.

33:11You know, the drunk, right?

33:11Who gets drunk.

33:12Oh, I didn't tell you, I didn't take care of you kids.

33:14And the next day he's just totally back to normal.

33:16It doesn't last, right?

33:17I mean, something that lasts, something that lasts.

33:21All the people with a sense of responsibility and a conscience in the West got wiped out in

33:26the two world wars.

33:28What's left?

33:29And the women who loved them, the women who loved and supported these men, right, say,

33:35oh, well, why, why did the sort of white, the awful, right, affluent white liberal female,

33:39why did the awful, why did these women, why did they, why did they prefer, like the sort

33:45of heat map goes outside.

33:46Why did they prefer foreigners and outsiders to their own men?

33:49Well, because the women who preferred their own men married men who got wiped out in the

33:53world wars.

33:54You know, they're, they're gone.

33:56And those, those, whether it's genetic or it's a combination of genetics, genetics and

34:01environment, right?

34:02It's all gone.

34:03It's all gone.

34:04And it ain't coming back anytime soon.

34:07So you have to wrestle with the fact that very few people at the moment have much of

34:13a conscience.

34:14Very few people.

34:14I mean, I've known a number of Christians who do not forgive.

34:19Well, they either forgive the most awful people or they fail to forgive well-meaning people

34:24who make mistakes.

34:25I've known them.

34:27I've known them.

34:28People who get things wrong, don't admit it.

34:30They just move on to the next thing and never admit fault, right?

34:34That's just the reality.

34:36I mean, that is the reality.

34:37And again, maybe it was different in Ayn Rand's day and so on.

34:40But I assume that because she grew up under communism, but then she moved to America, you

34:45know, and she was intellectually formed prior to World War Two.

34:49And of course, the effects of World War Two took a long time to manifest.

34:51And in America, of course, World War One was not nearly as destructive.

34:55And of course, neither was it in America for World War Two.

34:58The Europeans, of course, suffered much more losses than the Americans.

35:03But she was around a lot of people with a good deal of integrity and a fair amount of conscience

35:07and all this kind of stuff.

35:09And but I don't know.

35:12Did Ayn Rand ever have a crisis of conscience and say, you know, I haven't really solved

35:15the problem of morality.

35:16And also, maybe I shouldn't have slept around on my husband.

35:20And maybe I shouldn't have slept with a student who was much younger than me, who had a lot

35:23of power over and and so on.

35:26Right.

35:26Maybe just maybe.

35:27Right.

35:28But I she didn't even either.

35:31She didn't even either.

35:32So, yeah, human flourishing.

35:34No, human beings flourish very well in the absence of reason to are, but in the long run,

35:39blah, blah, blah.

35:40But that's a collectivist argument.

35:41It doesn't work from an individualistic situation.

35:44You can't say the virtue of selfishness.

35:46And then when people gain a lot more virtues, sorry, they gain a lot more value and resources

35:51and material and respect and so on, they get a lot more of that by not being rational.

35:56Well, that's just a fact.

35:58It's a fact of life.

35:59It's a fact of nature.

36:00And so, yeah, Ayn Rand focused on epistemology because she felt if she proved reason, then

36:06like dominoes cascading down against their will, if she proved reason, her entire moral

36:09system is validated.

36:11But it wasn't.

36:12And that's why the world had to wait for you, baby.

36:14All right.

36:14Thanks, everyone.

36:15Hope you're doing well.

36:16I really appreciate your support.

36:18Freedomain.com slash donate.

36:19I'll talk to you soon.

36:20Bye.

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