Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 Let's get started. Uh, this is our clubhouse asked me anything with professor Richard Saltzman. We are going to record this to post it to our podcast platform. And, um, I have a few questions that have been submitted from our Instagram audience. So I'm going to start in with those, but to everyone who is joining us and filtering, go ahead, raise your hand, bring any question you have to professor Salzman and he will take a crack at it. And if he knows the answer, so, uh, let's get started. I have a question from JZ Pitt, uh, what would happen if we did away with minimum wage?
Speaker 1 00:00:46 Oh, you say what a great question. The first thing would be that those with the leaf skills, those who would be paid normally less than the minimum wage where they, which I think at the federal level now is seven 50 or $8 would have, uh, many more opportunities to go get a job. So one of the things that minimum wage does is it prevents, uh, would be employers and would be employees from getting together at a level below the minimum wage. It's just illegal. It's just not permitted. And so a lot of these, uh, younger, less, usually younger, but also less experienced, less skilled, uh, would be laborers. Uh, don't get the first rung on the ladder. So, um, the idea typically is that, uh, well wage levels would collapse, you know, as if government mandating wage levels somehow elevates them. It doesn't of course, just because you mandate that a business pay more than it wants to, to some employee doesn't mean it will, it usually just doesn't hire them.
Speaker 1 00:01:48 Or if it's, uh, if the, if the minimum wage is raised and it's above the level, they're currently paying people, they might even lay them off at places like McDonald's, they'll install kiosks, uh, because they're, uh, less expensive really, and more reliable than some of these others. So it's, so business has the choice also of just substituting capital equipment. So not to go on too long here, but my overall impression is if you either reduced and, or got rid of the minimum wage, that'd be a huge dynamic, a boost to the dynamism of the lower level, call it the lower level, lower, skilled, lower productivity level of the, uh, of the labor market. And there would be no compression of wages that goes down, you know, due to what that is not what's what keeps wages, uh, up.
Speaker 0 00:02:39 All right. Very succinct as always. And I want to recommend everybody is joining us today to follow the Atlas society on Instagram. If you're on Instagram, if for no other reason than to, uh, take advantage of professor Salzmann's Instagram takeovers, we do takeovers a week and professor talisman has one a month. And, um, I he's been inspiring me to get more creative and get a little deeper with my answers because he is the gold standard. Um, all right, we've got another question from Igor Perpich. Uh, and, uh, this is more, maybe more of a philosophy question. So I'm also gonna invite professor Kelly up on the stage, your thoughts on John Stuart mill and his,
Speaker 1 00:03:31 Oh, that's a good one. Okay. So to be positive about John Stuart mill, now we're talking about the mid 18 hundreds or early 18 hundreds, late 18 hundreds, John Stuart mill, a son of the famous James mill, who was a fabulous actually classical economist, uh, influenced by Adam Smith and John baptize say, so he trained young John Stewart, very rigorously. There's a famous story about him raising his young son, John in, in, in, in quite a deliberate, almost, uh, overbearing manner, in fact, but as a result, Milby was really smart really early, but he actually suffered psychological pain over this. This has such an overbearing father. What he's most famously known for is a case for Liberty. He wrote a famous booklet or pamphlet really called on Liberty, uh, but what he was, uh, at, and he wrote a treatise on political economy. So principles of political economy, this is 1848 an interesting year because it's the same year as the communist manifesto by marks and angles, but he was fundamentally a utilitarian.
Speaker 1 00:04:42 So he and here influenced by Jeremy Bentham. Their view was not that people had rights, but that there should be. And utility to them meant, uh, you know, a cost benefit analysis that we do things in life based on the pleasure pain principle. And there's a certain truth to that. But the social theory consequences of that was what we today call utilitarianism and utilitarianism is not a very good basis for ethics. In fact, it's quite a bad basis for ethics because it says something like do whatever brings the greatest happiness to the greatest number that is the famous line or phrase the greatest happiness for the greatest number. Now happiness itself objectivism would not say is bad, but this idea of having a kind of societal calculus is, is not only impossible, it's wrong, but it's very dominant. I mean, I see it among my students today.
Speaker 1 00:05:36 Any paper that I read that includes things like will benefit society or for the sake of society or societal benefits of blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I always circle and say your measurable, you know, non quantifiable, not possible to do this. And it's a very collectivist standard. When you think about it, it's the happiness of individuals, uh, practicing their rights, rights, protected by government. The utilitarians are very dismissive of rights. Bentham himself said the whole concept of natural rights is nonsense on stilts famous lines. So you can see obviously dismissing it as there's no such thing as rights. Um, and so there's a bit of duty involved here, but think of this also the idea of greatest happiness for the greatest number. It does permit and allow for the sacrifice of certain individuals or groups, if it would elevate the overall happiness of society or of the collective.
Speaker 1 00:06:32 And so it gives sanctioned to, and historically has given sanctioned to the idea of, well, we can impose costs on certain subsets of the society. And so what if they suffer? Uh, so what if they bear these costs, as long as the gains elsewhere are higher, do it like a very common example would be, suppose we take a dollar from bill gates and give it to a poor person. The utilitarian would say, well, the dollar is nothing to bill gates because he's got billions of them, but the dollar means a lot to the poor person, right? So their calculus would be net happiness would go up, yes, bill gates, his unhappiness will occur. So he will suffer a deduction of happiness, but it will be minuscule. And the recipient will, you know, so, so think of it. This is utilitarianism justifying, uh, redistributors welfare state, a redistributive welfare state.
Speaker 1 00:07:29 So interestingly, he began as a free-market classical economist. And I don't know if you know this or his biography, but he pretty much ended up as a socialist. And so that would be, that would be a mill mill. So the question was about John's story began as a liberal, in the good sense for Liberty and ended with, um, uh, you know, being a socialist. So, uh, so it's a good question. He's an interesting story. His main thing is utilitarianism and the main reason to care is he still, that that whole doctrine is still quite influential, very influential, but it's a bad, it's a bad influence. It's a, it's a collectivist doctrine for maximizing societal happiness and permitting and sanctioning the sacrifice of some, you know, whether it's the dastardly 1% she'll be sacrificed or whether it's the Jews she'll be sacrificed. You see how they could come to this calculus that says certain individuals and or groups may be sacrificed. If we can find the benefit offsetting elsewhere in society.
Speaker 0 00:08:33 David, did you have anything to add on Jon Stewart? No. Otherwise I've got plenty of other questions and I want to encourage the audience to bring their,
Speaker 2 00:08:43 Yeah. Uh, just briefly Richard, that was a great summary. Um, I could not do better on the analysis of mills, um, utilitarian, uh, Elmer . I just want to add that, um, Mill's book on Liberty. Um, although it has a utilitarian framework framework, it has some of the most eloquent, uh, uh, defenses of open-minded engagement with people you disagree with. Uh, and as an argument for free speech, the benefit that all of us and wheels not at that point in the book is not talking specifically about society, something by the individuals. And, uh, I've quoted it many times. It's really beautiful. So, uh, despite his deficits, um, I think on the breeze while we're reading,
Speaker 1 00:09:40 I agree with that, David and actually his quotes about I'm paraphrasing here from memory. Something like if you only know your side of the argument, you know, you don't know the half of it, not, not meaning you should embrace error, but you need to engage with those who critique you and understand what their side of it is. So I agree with you, there is an element of him in, on Liberty, which pushes against the, today, the kind of self censorship and a brow beating that goes on with people hearing views that they're not comfortable with. He's got a lot of great lines, you know, this as well as that about, uh, you know, being open-minded and effectively being objective. So I, I agree with that entirely.
Speaker 0 00:10:24 Okay. Next question. Uh, Gabrielle, and yet 23 asks, how can school shootings be stopped in a free moral society with free access to guns?
Speaker 1 00:10:39 Well, Gabriel, that's a good question. I think the first thing that has to be done, this will sound weird on, on first hearing, we need to, uh, uh, stop gun-free zones. So John, the famous John Lott, L O T T is written the Mo he is the absolute expert in the world on crime and guns and causation and all this kind of stuff. He collects it. So make sure you read John lots books, but, uh, he noticed, uh, he's done a study of mass shootings, not just school shootings, but also mass shootings, you know, at post offices and fast food restaurants and things like that. 98% of them banned the use of guns in the area. So this is what's meant by gun-free zones. So there are laws and they mandate gun-free zones. And the problem with this, of course, is it, it, it does not make the zones gun-free it makes the zones prone to a gunman coming in, knowing he'll have no opposition.
Speaker 1 00:11:35 So talk about, uh, you know, just ducks in a shooting gallery. It's the tragedy of thinking if we just mandate no guns in this area, they won't exist. So these mass shootings, uh, yes, part of it is psychological dementia. These people doing this, but, but a large part of it is carving out these areas where the, this would be gunman knows he will face no opposition. And that, and it's not only a gun-free zones, they have signs outside literally saying gun-free zone. So, um, this is a problem, uh, but, but it's hard to get, uh, lawmakers and others to assess it this way and think of it this way. But here's another way I, I say you would think of, it would be, we have a second amendment Americans have a right to bear arms and use them in a sense, the second amendment is, is suspended in these areas. Uh, so it would be like saying that, you know, a free speech, free zone, no free speech allowed here, censorship allowed here. I mean, people would recoil at that, the idea of the first amendment, not applying, uh, you know, in a ubiquitous fashion throughout America, but that's what the gun-free zone laws are doing. So I, I pushed back against those who would say it's due to guns themselves, or the use of guns or things like that. I think a lot of it has to do with the gun-free zone idea.
Speaker 0 00:12:55 And, you know, this is sort of outside of the box as well, but I haven't seen a lot of reports of, uh, school shootings that occur within parochial schools, private schools, charter schools. And, you know, there may be something about the government school, ethos, um, where it is one size fits all. And, uh, it, it doesn't necessarily place the students first. I mean, we've certainly seen with, um, the pandemic that it plays, uh, you know, teacher's unions first and, um, that just maybe might not be conducive to, uh, a hopeful psychological orientation where, um, you know, these kinds of manias and mental diseases, um, can take root.
Speaker 1 00:13:51 Yeah. And, and I agree with that entirely. So, so another element would be well to the extent. And the extent is large. To the extent the public schools are left to deal with the most ignorant, the most disadvantaged, the most violent students, uh, because they're not accepted say, or can't afford the private schools, they are already dealing with a higher potential violence level than the private schools where, so if the private schools can at least not have gun-free zones, they have a security office at the place that's going to prevent gunman from coming in. But then also they have better behaved more peaceful, uh, students. So yes, but, but no, you know, there's a problem because when the mass shootings occur, you almost hear no one say what I just said, no one ever says, oh my gosh, another gun-free zone catastrophe. They always say more gun-free zones or more gun control or more this or more that, um, now the other thing is sometimes you'll get the false answer of, well, what do you expect to arm all the teachers? No, you don't arm all the teachers. You have a security system, you have security guards and, and maybe you have signs that don't say, gun-free zone. You say, we have security guards here. We will fight back. Don't dare come in here thinking you can shoot up the place.
Speaker 0 00:15:14 That sounds like a good idea to me. I know I rely heavily on, uh, my, my own armed security, uh, for protection here at the house. And, um, makes me feel a lot that and my own firearms. Uh, okay. Here are a few questions from the same person, the underscore w uh, and so I will read them and I will let you take your pick. Uh, this is clearly somebody who knows a bit about objectivism is asking about, uh, the relationship between the Atlas society and Ari, but also further asking if strict objectivism leads one to be pro-gun or anti-gun district objectivism lead one to be pro-choice or pro-life. And finally, uh, whether we worry or I worry, you worry, um, that a cult of personality over Rand in peeds, the spread of objectivism.
Speaker 1 00:16:18 Well, let me take the last one first, but I've written down the others. I won't forget. Yes. Colts are bad. If a cult is a set of ideas taken on faith, and then certain personalities who seem to, uh, expound that faith are to be bowed down to and not questioned. Yes, that's terrible. Now, the question now is, is that what objectivism is or must be, or was that what Rand was, or, or followers were, I think objectivism being a rational philosophy is its own, uh, cleanser, if you will, it's its own, uh, how would I put it bodyguard, intellectual bodyguard that if followed consistently it would his shoe, those who take ideas on faith, because it's reason based it's, fact-based it's logic, but, and so it would, uh, not, uh, truck with those who come in and try to treat it like a religion or a called now the same thing with the personalities.
Speaker 1 00:17:22 Um, one of the, I think, interesting things about, uh, objectivism, but really about any movement, including say Marxism, there is a certain, um, uh, personality dynamism typically shown by the leaders. I mean, you could go back to Christ and say this, uh, Mark's certainly others. Um, so even on the bad side, you know, that, that there is about the personality of people who come up with great systems, great ideas, even someone like Napoleon with the Napoleonic code. I mean, not necessarily a philosopher, but just these dynamic personalities. There's always going to be a risk that their dynamism is interpreted as, you know, something that the personal matters more than the theoretical. Uh, so I, I'm not saying there aren't people who over the years became associated with objectivism, who tried to turn it into a religion or interpreted it that way. I do think certain people were like that or who, uh, made her personality something like, you know, if you don't follow her personality or her personal preferences in some cases, then you're not a true objectivist.
Speaker 1 00:18:33 So, uh, I am not one of those who thinks that objectivism necessarily must become a cultish. I do think, however, almost no one is born into families that are Objectivists well, that was true, especially 50 years ago because it didn't exist as a predominant thing. And so most people are born into religious settings, Catholic Jewish doesn't matter if you know Islam. And so now think of this, they're born into a religious setting and then they see objectivism and their first blush and reaction might be, oh, this is a better religion. That's a mistake. Uh, uh, it takes time to overcome it and distinguish, but sometimes that will happen. And of course, then objectivism gets blamed when really the blame lies with the original religious, uh, training as the way I would put it. Um, one of the things I love by the way about, uh, professor Kelly and all the great folks, Jennifer and others at TAs is they're very committed to making sure that is not how they treat objectivism.
Speaker 1 00:19:34 And they treat it as a very rational, uh, open-ended um, benevolent thing as something to be learned every day and applied every day. And, and we don't take authority figures as necessarily authority. It's that, it's the ideas that matter in their application that, that matters. Now, when you say are, do strict Objectivists, are they pro gun pro choice? If by strict you mean consistent? I think on the pro gun thing, there are debates even within objectivism as to how much this right to, uh, own operate a gun or versions of guns, you know, they can be very, uh, more high powered weapons. I mean, I know of no objective, as you said, you can walk around downtown with an Uzi, you know, aiming at people. So, so there are, if, you know, there have been debates among Objectivists about whether there should be gun control or not, but there really certainly has not been any debate about whether you have a right to self-defense.
Speaker 1 00:20:34 That is certainly part of objectivism. And if the guns are the, are one of the means by which we defend ourselves, then it's just an extension of that principle. Um, now I, I think my own view would be, and this is not new to me. Other Objectivists have said the same thing. If someone demonstrates a criminal past, past, or record that makes them, uh, unfit to own a weapon. I think there's a reason to restrict access to that person. Maybe even mental health, or that's a harder one, because the terms can be somewhat subjective and you don't want government running around saying you can't own a gun, cause you're not mentally stable, but the cases where kids there have been cases recently where kids, I mean, minors, I mean those younger than 18, get their parents' weapons and do bad things with them. There's a case recently where they wanted to hold the parents responsible for that.
Speaker 1 00:21:30 I'm not actually against that. I liked the idea that parents should not be in the home permitting access to weapons, to minors who otherwise couldn't get the weapons, especially if they know the minor is mentally unstable, especially if it's their kid, they should know that. So, um, that would be my answer on that. I think self-defense is very important. It's, it's part of the virtue of selfishness that we should be able to defend ourselves. And it's not always possible for the police of course, to arrive in time to do that pro choice. I mean, if you're referring to a woman's right to control her own body, yes. If you know, Iran's views much, much more writing from her on that, uh, than there is on guns. And she was definitely of the view of the woman had the right to choose there. Isn't. And so she was for Roe V Wade, which was a 1973 decision.
Speaker 1 00:22:23 So she was still alive at the time. I don't think she was entirely happy with the way it was defended, but you certainly thought it was properly, uh, adjudicated in the sense of resulting in a woman's right to choose. Now, they still did restricted in some way to certain trimesters. So it wasn't all the way to full birth abortion. But, um, I have much more to say on this, which I think is interesting, but I don't want to take up too much time, but I think the conservative opposition to abortion is very wrong and very, very philosophically confused. For example, when they say, when they, even, when they use phrases like child in the womb or baby in the womb, I mean the, the break point, the clear bright line is obviously birth and everything prior to birth as a potential. And so zygotes and embryos and fetuses are in the womb.
Speaker 1 00:23:17 There were no babies or children in the womb. The baby and child is all post birth. So the terminology itself is confused. But I think if, if by strict objectivism, medium and consistent defender of individual rights, Iran, one said, there are only individual rights. There are no extra rights you get by joining a group. You know, there are no group rights, like women's rights or black rights. There are individual rights, but interestingly, she also said that and going the other way, there's no rights of pieces of individuals. There's very fascinating answer. There's only individual rights and you don't get more when you group individuals, but you also don't have sub-parts of individuals assigned rights. They don't know. They're just part of the individual. And the individual decides what they do with their bodies. This is not just an issue of women's right. To choose on reproductive issues. Notice it's very relevant to vaccines. I do. You have a right to, to what's injected in your body. So what comes out of your body? What goes into your body? Bodily integrity is very crucial to objectivism. So I would leave it to David. If David, there was a question here about TAs and Ari, but I, I'm not sure I want to handle that one, but
Speaker 0 00:24:36 I think we can just probably leave that. But David, did you have any, either, did you wanna address that or did you want to address any of the other questions on abortion or a cult of personality or
Speaker 2 00:24:52 No, let's leave the internal, um, conflicts within objectivism, the side for now. Um, I would add one thing to, uh, what Richard was saying, which I, um, I agree with pretty much down the line, but it's important. I think to draw a line between objectivism as a philosophy and the application of objectivism to specific issues like gun guns or abortion, what the philosophy says for example, is that we have a right to self-defense how that's embodied, you know, legal code in terms of guns or whatever other, um, uh, means or self-defense we have that that's not a philosophical issue. I don't believe it is. It has, it involves legal, economic, other considerations, and similarly with abortion. Um, uh, the philosophy says that there's no, uh, no divine intervention that creates a person at the, at the stage of conception, um, because there's no divine person, but how you apply that to the continuous process of the gestation and birth of a child. Um, is there question medical as well as, um, um, sociological questions about what the best policy is and what the law should be. So I just want to make that distinction, um, if, if you have the right philosophy, you're going to approach the issues, um, on a good standing, um, philosophy should, should, should serve us as a, kind of a and a way of navigating these complicated issues that are often involved with other than philosophical.
Speaker 1 00:26:51 Uh, David, I just want to, I agree with that entirely. I would just want to add to that the, I, the idea that this is all the more reason to have something that we might call open objectivism because in application, of course, things change the world, changes science and technology changes, birthing that birthing methods and things like that. So if you had a closed objectivism approach, you would only go back and cite what I read said prior to 1982. And if she only said, if she only said X and such on guns, you know, circa 1982, or set only something about abortion circuit, we would be lost. So I like your, I like your distinction. And I'm thinking not only does the philosophy itself, should it be growing and living and consistently, so, but the applications themselves particularly faces this issue of how do we do new applications and claim that there are legitimate applications unless we had a more open objectivist approach. That's just an add on really
Speaker 2 00:27:57 Great. Thank you. Thank you, Richard. Totally, certainly. Uh, agree.
Speaker 0 00:28:03 Here is one tailor-made for you, Richard, from my role thoughts on the way inflation during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Speaker 1 00:28:14 Well, the idea of runaway just getting higher than normal inflation in the last two decades until this year was running in a one to 2% range. And now it's in the six to 7% range. And for context, the higher, the highest it got in the Carter years, which is the 1970s, is something like 15 or 16%. So we're now at the level at the rate, which is about half of what was seen, uh, under Carter. So now you mentioned COVID, um, and actually I actually heard the fed chairman the other day attribute the inflation to COVID. Okay. That is not the cause of the inflation, except in the following sense. It's not really COVID if there are two major things that have happened in the last, uh, 13 years, which are way off the charts in America, the first thing was the 2000 8 0 9 financial crisis.
Speaker 1 00:29:08 And then COVID so call COVID 2021. In both cases, the federal reserve responded massively increasing the money supply massively flooding the system with cash. Uh, you can tell where I'm going here. That inflation. The problem with inflation is too much money inflation me inflation means not just rising prices. Broadly, the rising prices reflect the diminishing value of the dollar. The reason we pay more dollars for stuff is each dollar's worth less. Why is each dollar worth less? Because they're printing too much of them. They're creating too much of them. And the federal reserve is largely responsible for that. I mean, it is the reason they call them central banks, as they have monopolies over, uh, the issuance of money. Now it's a wholly separate question. Why the fed felt the need to answer the night, the 2008 financial crisis with a flood of money creation.
Speaker 1 00:30:05 But in that case, it was largely to bail out the banks who had bad loans. That was a bad idea. That's not something that's not what the fed should have done. Now, in the case of COVID here's the government, uh here's. If you're at the fed, here's the government telling people to stop working, go home a hole up in your basement, and don't talk to anybody and put a mask on your face. And, uh, so people didn't have incomes. And the here to the federal reserves response was, well, I guess we have to print money and give them money. As they sit on the couch and, and what would happen. They wouldn't be making anything. They wouldn't be producing wealth, but they would be getting gobs of cash, which is exactly what happened to go spend on things. Well, most economists who understand inflation, no, they'll, they'll say something like inflation is caused by too much money, chasing too few goods.
Speaker 1 00:31:02 If you've ever heard that phrase before, it's a kind of crude way of putting it, but it's, it's close to the truth. It's the idea that if you produce too much money relative to goods, the money's value is gonna go down. So that's what the fed has done. They've done it twice now. And the, and that to me is the main reason prices are going up. Now, I have to say, however, the amount of money they created, if you looked at historical relationships is the inflation rate. Wouldn't be 7%. It would be 70. I mean, it would be crazily high and it's not that high yet, but it's going higher. So, uh, the, the connection between how much money is created and how much prices actually go up is always a loose one or a lot of the money that they created this last round.
Speaker 1 00:31:46 People hoard it. And if you know what hoarding means, hoarding means they just hold the money in their bank accounts. Or you can check banks are doing this in their vaults, or if you ask corporations in their bank accounts. So, so if you get a case where the feds creates a lot of money, but people don't spend it, you won't necessarily see the inflation of prices going up. So that's my quick, and there's way more to say on this, but I just want to stress. It is not due to supply chain issues. It's not due to COVID. It's not, it's not technically even due to lock downs when money loses value like this, it's always due to the federal reserve, creating too many, too much money.
Speaker 0 00:32:26 Any predictions on where we go from here? Do you think,
Speaker 1 00:32:32 Uh, I don't think it'll get as bad as the Carter years. So I don't think it'll get double digit. And the fed in more recent weeks and months has said, we realize this is a problem. And we are going to try to restrain ourselves. The problem is they've already created this money and they're in no position to take it back. So to speak. So the money is sitting there like gas in a bucket. And, you know, you just wonder whether the match is going to be lit and it goes higher. So, no, my, my, my forecast would be, uh, it's gonna remain bad for awhile. Meaning inflation is going to stay high for a while, but I doubt it will go into the double digit range, but it's still very bad and the most dangerous thing that could happen. So look for this. I hope it doesn't happen, but is if you hear anybody talking about price controls and you know, you know, that price controls, if they say now they're trying to control the effect, not the cause or not telling the fed to behave, they're blaming it basically on price setters. So if they, if they start imposing price controls, which Carter did do, and Nixon did as well, then the whole economy gets deranged. So I'm, I'm hoping we can get through this without price controls, but I do worry about price controls.
Speaker 0 00:33:43 David, I don't know if you have anything to add to that. I was trying to remember whether or not installation, uh, showed up or was that a feature in Atlas, shrugged? I mean, there, there were,
Speaker 1 00:33:55 Um, it wasn't Atlas
Speaker 0 00:33:58 Where,
Speaker 1 00:33:59 Well, she does talk about the money losing its value and there are price freezes and then widespread shortages. So she's, she's very good on the economics of inflation and, and price controls and then shortages,
Speaker 2 00:34:16 And those who know Atlas a directive 10 to 89 at the end of part two froze prices, froze wages for people who do their jobs. Yeah. So it was, it was, uh, you know, uh, you know, nightmare scenario, but yes, uh, the, there were price controls and, uh, because
Speaker 1 00:34:36 Prices were going up so much.
Speaker 2 00:34:38 Yeah, yeah. But Brian also wrote about, um, inflation in one of her several aggressive literary essays that, uh, I can't put my finger on, but words looking at
Speaker 1 00:34:50 Yeah. One of them is titled, I think it's title egalitarianism and inflation, and it's in, uh, early seventies and it's in the compilation called full-on it's in the compilation called philosophy who needs it. She was also thankfully around the time Nixon went off the gold standards and that would be 1971. And then immediately that day also imposed price controls. She, I believe was writing the Iran letter at that time. So there's some, and I think some of that stuff is unpublished other than the newsletters themselves. Um, so yeah, she, she has some great essays on inflation and the cause of it.
Speaker 0 00:35:32 Excellent. I sent an invite to Scott because it wouldn't be a clubhouse about Scott Schiff weighing. Uh, but, uh, he, he may be questioned out, um, here is okay. There's this comes up every single week. I don't know if either of you maybe David in particular thoughts or maybe this would have been a better, uh, Steven Hicks question. Thoughts on Mehta modernism. Yeah,
Speaker 1 00:36:05 I, I, uh, I actually think Steven answered this in a prior session. Uh, but I forget what session it was. I have nothing to say on that. That's one of the Jennifer, that's one of the reasons that I've never taken it up in an Instagram. I get it every month.
Speaker 0 00:36:24 Maybe we can get you on that question to do, do a little research. Cause I, this guy is extremely persistent.
Speaker 2 00:36:33 Uh, Jack, I did look that up and sent you a, a brief description. I finally figured out what it referred to. It's a combination of anarchism and socialism. It's kind of left-wing anarchism of a community new left. Community-based no, no government. We all agree on the living Tommy's standard. So, um, that's my take on it. I, we can elaborate that then Jack, I'd be happy to do more research on it. Stephen would know the most.
Speaker 0 00:37:03 All right. Well, we will. I'm going to tee that up for his next session. Uh, okay. Armin douchy asks, what do you think of a solid Omar Rova and her ideas? I'm sure I'm butchering her name.
Speaker 1 00:37:23 I've heard the name, but remind me of the ideas. I have heard that I have heard that name. I can't connect the, what the ideas were.
Speaker 0 00:37:34 She was, um, she was nominee for, uh, more of the currency withdrawn. He studied, I think that Moscow state university,
Speaker 1 00:37:55 I have a very definitive view of that. Yes. I know the connection. Now this was one of the craziest nominations ever of now the control of the currency sounds like some deep bureaucratic thing. It's, it's, it's part of treasury. It's not really a fed federal reserve position, but it is part of treasury that deals with the treasury department dealing with banks and financial institutions. Okay. So just briefly, this woman believes that there should be no private banking. She thinks she thinks everyone should have an account with the treasury or the fed so that the government should be in total control of the banking system. Now what's and, and the fact that she was nominated by a Biden is amazing. Me. Whoever is giving him lists of people to nominate. They are the most left-wing wacko people in the country. And maybe it's Obama's people. I don't know.
Speaker 1 00:38:46 I think she was not, uh, approved, but, um, she's a total socialist. And I think to the point where she would not even give up her dissertation, which is on this, it was at the university of Moscow years ago, train before the Soviet union fell in 1991. So now just for context very quickly, I'll just say this. When the us government monopolized the money, supply the currency in 1913, by creating the federal reserve, they very interestingly kept the banking system private. So they nationalize the currency, but not the banking system. In other words, not the banks that took in deposits and made loan decisions, but they were, but they were very good capitalist critics at the time who said, this is a cancer. And once they nationalized currency in time, they will take over the banks because this is the root resource that banks deal with.
Speaker 1 00:39:44 And of course that is exactly what she reflects. And that is exactly where the us banking system is going. By the way, in, in 10, 15 years, if we keep going in the direction we're going, there won't be any private banks. They'll, there'll be a system we'll be exact in a way. She is, uh, a leading indicator of what the banking system will become. She's just a bit early. She's about 10 years early, but 10 years from now, she'll be the ideal person to help, uh, nationalize the banking system or someone or someone like her.
Speaker 0 00:40:18 Okay. Um, let's see. Why has objectivism generally not taken root in academic philosophy? Another question from Aviv underscore w
Speaker 1 00:40:32 Well, that's a really good question. I think, uh, I would give two reasons, but then I really would like, like to hear from professor Kelly, from my understanding of it. And, and my understanding really is based on, do I know of objectivist students and philosophers and PhDs, who've tried to get jobs yes. And their success or not. Yes. And being an academia myself, even though I'm not in philosophy departments, I'm in political science and political economy, the state of, of philosophy. Um, I think actually the state of philosophy in the universities has either improved a bit over the last two decades, or at least not deteriorated as badly now here, um, I'm accepting excluding postmodernism, but post-modernism is, which is really terribly anti enlightenment is mostly actually in the literature and English departments, not the philosophy departments. Now their view of vine ranch. She's not rigorous enough.
Speaker 1 00:41:36 That's what they'll say in the philosophy department. They'll say she's not rigorous enough. She's an, she's a novelist, she's a dramatist. And we, and we do reason and logic and science here. So that's not Iran. And even though she was an advocate of that, they'll say she's too radical or too sloppy. Or, or she hasn't written enough, you know, shelves and shelves and shelves of books. Now the good side is they know she's an Aristotelian edgy. She says over and over again, I'm an Aristotelian I'm against Play-Doh, I'm against Augustine I'm against. And there has been a revival of Aristotelian, uh, scholarship in the universities. And so to that extent, uh, the, to the extent people with her to Aristotle, that's a good thing. And so if she, if she is, which I think she is the modern day, Aristotle new and improved, then that is where she has purchased within academic philosophy.
Speaker 1 00:42:30 That is where a young, bright up and coming philosophy. PhD can invoke GYN, Rand, and Aristotle, and maybe even Aquinas that they had to in the same breath in the same dissertation and get away with it, uh, so to speak. But the main thing is they really hate capitalism and they, they know that she has delivered the philosophy that delivers capitalism. And I think that's really the bias. It's not that they don't think her arguments are logical and cogent it's that they know it leads to a case for capitalism. I can say way, way more than that, but I, I suppose I'm more optimistic than most Objectivists about this, but Dave, David, I would love to hear your thoughts on that.
Speaker 2 00:43:13 Um, yeah, Richard, we say, is it very much to the point? I would say there are two reasons, um, that, uh, academic, that objectivism is not a hard sell in academic philosophy. One is the content most, most philosophers are, um, liberal to left as, as are most people in these days, especially in the humanity, across the humanities philosophers. They're not the worst because they're trained to, with your arguments. So they, you know, the monsters are the least vulnerable, most modern crap. And there are many, um, philosophers who have, you know, just announced that, um, uh, especially the subjective as a mother, but, um, they are left and they don't like egoism. They don't like capitalism. So that's the Southern two reason. The other reason is what you said, you, that philosophers don't consider who are rigorous. There's a, it's, it's a con it's a wider issue than that.
Speaker 2 00:44:19 About methodology. I ran was a, um, system builder and integrator across systemology metaphysics, ethics and political philosophy. Philosophers are still imbued with what, um, the approach of analytic philosophy, which is really reducing everything to very narrow concrete issues, um, not concrete specific issues and, um, you know, raising, you know, arguments that are, or, and using arguments to establish their views that take very little account in any wider context. And so Ren did not do that. She always went, you know, what, what are the first principles here? What are the assumptions? And, uh, philosophers are not trained to do that. That may be changing a bit. I think you're, you're right there. Vincent Good, um, movements, um, away from that kind of attitude in the last really three to four decades, um, that I've been, uh, but it's still a big issue. However, there are lots of reasons for optives and I'll just give you one example. I, I, my coauthor on my logic textbook, um, recently, uh, teaches at south Texas college, and she's a friend of a well-known philosopher, Jim sterbai, James Thurber, who, um, is a liberal, but he wants to debate me if, because he thinks if that goes, he thinks his colleagues have been really narrow-minded engine rent. Um, there are, that's the only 1, 1, 1 strong the wind, so to speak, but there are many others like that. So I'm kind of optimistic, but it's an uphill battle.
Speaker 1 00:46:19 Yeah, I totally agree with that day. There's another pattern I've noticed is precisely because she's systematic and they know that they actually interpret that as simple, they'll say she's simplifying thing, she's missing the nuances, the subtleties, the blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And to them, as you say, the, the, the narrowly analytical, narrow that to them is that's nuanced and that's very profound and that's very important and hold dissertations can be written on this. So they literally distrust what actually is very rare, which is an intelligence of the kind, literally Plato con, even the bad ones were systematic. It's enormously difficult to put together an entire system. So if anything, these people should be heralded as system builders, and now let's examine the system. But the, the you're absolutely right. The, the, uh, attention paid to these little gnats who are professors is crazy, but that's how they do. I was in a seminar once and I was trying to literally simplify the arguments of someone. And the professor said to me, uh, Salzman, you need to complexify more. So his, his, his brain, the word was complex. It was a verb. Apparently that the point of this seminar is to take simple things and complexify them, not the other way around. So there there's the mentality, right? So I think Leonard up one said a Sonic boom is not within the sense perception of a nap.
Speaker 1 00:48:01 And that does not hear a Sonic, but yeah, something big and large, they don't even get it, right. No,
Speaker 0 00:48:08 Here's a question that, um, is very intriguing, but I have no idea how to answer it. A nurse to Val asks can black market or shadow economies be beneficial for creating in libertarians feature?
Speaker 1 00:48:30 Well, my answer to that would be yes. Um, black markets and shadow markets occur when the activities illegal and has to be done under, under, you know, obviously so prostitution or gambling or drugs, or, you know, we know in prohibition, the U S 19, 19 to 1933, now the relationship to a Liberty system or libertarianism, I think of them as pockets of, uh, they're, they're like refugees still trying to carry on what should be, what should be a legal thing. And so I do think they play a role in terms of reminding people that this activity has not disappeared. Uh, people still want to gamble. People still want it.
Speaker 1 00:49:23 And so it's, it's funny because when they're made illegal, these black markets are, people are aware of them. They know of them. And I, and actually when you think of the very odd phenomenon, and especially in America of people loving gangster movies, why like the godfather godfather 1, 2, 3, 4, I've never personally liked, uh, mafia movies or whatever you call them Goodfellow. But, but I'm always intrigued as to why Americans do. I think they like the idea of these things should be illegal. And isn't it an interesting sub world that exists when people try to manage it in a black market setting. Cause there's still enforcement that goes on, there's still a kind of rough justice that goes on that, you know, the, the activity goes on, but it still needs to be managed in some way, but under the radar of government, um, if there's to be a future, you know, free society, we need examples of how this can go on, even when it's unfree pockets of it.
Speaker 1 00:50:19 And the fact that we've seen legalization of drugs or prostitution or whatever, even same-sex marriage shows it that if there can be a future where we regain these liberties, having once lost them, we regain them good. So all the good reasons, all the more reason why black markets are nice when they can survive. The, as you know, prohibition was repealed in 1933, that was a lot of violence and Capone and Chicago and stuff during that. But still people said, oh, we think maybe this violence is due to the fact that you prohibited it. Let's stop doing that. And then of course the crime went away when they dropped prohibition in 1933.
Speaker 0 00:51:02 Excellent. Okay. Um, there were a couple of, kind of related questions. Indian nationalist capitalist asks. Why is China on more serious threat compared to the USSR? I mean, I don't know if I agree with the premise, maybe it is compared to the Soviet threat back in the day,
Speaker 1 00:51:33 My own, okay. This is objectivism applied. So I agree with professor Kelly about this. You're not going to get an answer. Here's a perfect example of, you're not going to get an answer in this by closed objectivism. You'd have to go look up China, smile, the Soviet, you could, you couldn't possibly, we knew were views of the USSR. I would put it this way. I do not consider China anything like the threat that the U S faced under the USSR for a couple of reasons. One main one is the USSR was basically on record saying it wanted the U S vanquished. So it was somewhat in a similar position today of Iran. And, uh, Israel, Iran is on record saying we want to vanquish Israel. And that was basically the USSR position versus the United States until the war, the cold war ended in 91. That is not China's stance.
Speaker 1 00:52:28 It's never said that it doesn't mean China's capitalist, but that's a huge distinction. The USSR was clearly an enemy. It was also armed to the teeth with nuclear energy. They basically stole a nuclear power. They basically weapons. They stole it from the U S I believe China has nuclear weapons, but nothing of the arsenal that the Soviets had now point to the Soviets were imperialistic. They had satellites, they invaded countries. I don't really see China doing that. I mean, they're building bases in the south side, China sea, but it is the China sea. I mean, it's near China. I don't think what they did in Hong Kong was an invasion of Hong Kong. I think they resisted Hong Kong having, uh, democracy mob rule, but it doesn't mean they've taken away economic liberties in Hong Kong. Uh, the conservatives keep saying China will invade Taiwan. They never do. They never have China, Taiwan, Taiwan, uh, China also liberalized starting in 1978.
Speaker 1 00:53:27 They, they, on their own started liberalizing their economy. Now they've taken steps back. That's undeniable since 2008, especially, but the Soviets never did that. I mean, at the end, Gorbachov had, uh, Glasnost and Perestroika, but, uh, you know, attempts to liberalize a little bit, but they didn't, their hearts were not really in it. So China has since 1978, a long track record of liberating its economy and enormous bringing at least 850 million people out of dire poverty into some kind of prosperity could not have been done with a communist system. So China talks communism, but doesn't act that way. Uh, there's much more to say on this, but that's the major distinctions I would make between, um, China today. Vis-a-vis the United States and the old USSR versus the United States.
Speaker 0 00:54:23 Okay. See what else we have here? Thoughts on the Julian Assange extradition?
Speaker 1 00:54:35 Well, Julian Assange is an interesting case because he exposed, um, really bad behavior on the part of the NSA and elsewhere, and the U S uh, namely spying on American citizens after, especially after nine 11, but more recently. So, uh, is, this has been a bipartisan view if you know, both the Democrats and the Republicans who have been in charge of that. So trying to get him back and prosecute him, I don't know where he is now. He used to be in London. I'm not sure where he is now, but, uh, he, uh, I consider as somewhat of a hero, an amazing story of someone who, um, you know, exposed government wrongdoing. And of course I would be against his extradition, but there were extradition treaties between allies that are hard to decipher, but, uh, I'm not in the camp of demonizing us ONJ or Snowden, by the way, in a similar case, Edward Snowden and Assange are both cases of people trying to, uh, uh, and by the way, I would say the same thing about Daniel Ellsberg.
Speaker 1 00:55:42 If you're old enough to remember, you have to remember Daniel Ellsberg who worked at the Pentagon, released the Pentagon papers, showing that internally the United States was lying through its teeth on Vietnam. And now he was demonized by the right and by the Nixon people for daring to expose the Pentagon's, uh, lies about, uh, the Vietnam war and how it was going. So those of you who want to study these kinds of things, um, there is an issue of revealing state secrets, and it can be, um, pretty bad if you do that to undermine the national security of the United States, but in all these cases, Snowden, and Assan, I find them all heroic in a way, because they're looking at real bad misbehavior on the part of the government things they should, the government should not be doing if it were constitutionally limited.
Speaker 0 00:56:39 Okay, well, we are coming up on the end of the session. I don't know Richard or David, if you had any final thoughts or questions you might have liked to have answered, if not, then, um, I want to thank both of you, um, professor Salzman and, uh, professor Kelly, and thanks everyone who joined us, uh, for this special episode of clubhouse, ask me anything. And I want to encourage you to visit the events section of our website as mentioned, uh, professor Salzman is heading off to Phoenix. Who's going to be speaking at, uh, turning points, biggest event of the year. And then we also have coming up next week. We have a clubhouse, uh, a book club on, um, James Lindsey's book, cynical theories. And then, uh, on 21st, we have a clubhouse with Robert Sinskey on capitalism and Christmas. And then for those of you who are donors to the Atlas society later that day, we are getting together a private donors club happy hour. And if you are not yet, a donor send us some love, go to the outlet society website, send a $5, $10 donation and become an investor in the organization. That's providing the biggest returns in terms of impact and, um, creativity with the kinds of content that we produce and distribute. So thanks everybody. And I look forward to seeing you next week.
Speaker 1 00:58:34 Thank you, Jennifer. Thank you, David. And thank you for all the great questions. Those are fabulous questions. Thank you everyone.
