Eureka

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How did Georgia, with its unique language, survive sandwiched among empires?

Georgian histography and the origins of the Georgian language

How has the perception of Napoleon change over time

Is history fake?

Did Napoleon only eat one meal at the academy so that he could afford to buy himself books?

Napoleon, Jørgen Jørgensen, Mehmet Ali (Albanian founder of modern Egypt): the charisma and power of the outsider

Mamluks and the prominent roles of Georgians, their continued involvement with Georgia and how their nepotistic preference for Georgian slaves generated demand for Georgian captives

Georgian cuisine

What is most striking thing about living in Louisiana?

The role of Great Men in history

Lewis Grafton left private equity to cofound and raise US$55m for a pre-launch crypto-native game (SolChicks)

I have profound admiration for anyone who takes the leap to start something new, and I was excited to talk to Lewis to see how he did it. Cherry on top: he’s expecting his second baby with his wife shortly.

We speak about:

What is SolChicks

What’s special about gaming on the blockchain

How do you back yourself as finance guys to build a winning game experience

Working remotely from Australia and the global team

Day-to-day work in the early days

What SolChicks is doing differently, including innovations in fundraising

Going from zero to one

Taking the leap to a new career

Why gaming is a such a powerful sector and systemically underrated

Is Play-to-Earn dystopian?

0 to 1 to 2 to 3 kids

We cover a lot:

the immigrant impulse

rascality as a temperament

fatherhood

Judaism

unchosen obligations as the nexus to a meaningful life

the intellectual life as respite to depression

+ more

Noah as a Lithuanian yeshiva student

American growth and decline

Critical Race Theory

How the left dominates academia and has cut off the right’s head

2020 riots and how we know anything

Noah's conversion out of Judaism and into 90s gamer culture

Cultural preservation, including Judaism

Christian revivalism

The misguided fixations of the right and the left

The fertility crisis

Noah’s cultural composition: Jewish, Texan and Japanese

What Noah invests in

+ Much more

On life as an angel, failure and success, humility, portfolio construction, what we can know

East Coast vs West Coast 

Differentiation in a world of cheap capital

What a restructuring background can teach you and why he didn’t pursue private equity

This moment in technological and political history

What he’s reading

Whether you should become a VC today

Why he teaches

“The biggest mistake most new angels make is they invest in things where they know it’s going to succeed”

A special episode for the Sydney Cremorne Jewish community, everyone welcome to listen in

This conversation picks up on a strand that I’ve been thinking a lot about. Diana Fleischman in my conversation with her said: Institutions are increasingly reflecting the values of middle aged women. Tyler Cowen often writes about the feminization of society at Marginal Revolution. In addition to feminisation we discuss:

Growing up with another language

Richard’s folkways

American culture as a dissolvent

Impact of immigrant background

Money, fame or power?

What is the source of GOP derangement?

Diana's writing a book called “How to Train Your Boyfriend” – so, there’s a lot of that. We also discuss:

The mating market and the downstream effects of untangling sex from marriage

Big lies in the open today

Things that don’t work if you name them

Feminisation of society and how, in her words, institutions are increasingly reflecting he values of single middle aged women

Sorcery and witchcraft

The problems of knowledge in evolutionary psychology

And a lot more. Including tangents. Lots of tangents.

 This was a really fun conversation. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

Razib and I discuss “Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World” by Jack Weatherford, which Razib had recommended. We deep dive on the book, read extracts and discuss the Mongols and related history.

We discuss:

The profound achievements and impact of the Mongols

Potential relationship between the founding story of the Mongols and the story of Genesis

Cultural and political aspects

Military tactics and brutality

How they seem somewhat liberal and globalist in a surprisingly modern way

How they seemed in many ways less brutal than their contemporaries

The decadence of second and third generation Khans

Other downstream effects of their rule