Robert Wright's Nonzero

Bob and Mickey hatch a plan to profit from the University of Austin ... Bob: The question of inflation is tied to the status of the pandemic ... Mickey’s soft infrastructure proposal ... Whither high-speed rail? ... Who will claim ideological leadership of the Republican Party? ... If Kyle Rittenhouse is acquitted, will civil unrest follow? ... Parrot Room preview: Substack, under-news about a member of Congress and a would-be member of Congress, Mickey’s beef with Jonathan Chait, Fiona Hill, Bob chastises the Washington Post for inaccurate Brian Williams coverage, evidence that Mickey is suffering from CTCDS (child tax credit derangement syndrome), some damning Tony Blinken audio, Mickey’s so-crazy-it-just-might-work solution to the Trump dilemma, Bob attempts to stump Mickey with a Beatles trivia question, Sam Harris, car talk, and more on the University of Austin ...

Who pays Eli to "follow the money"? ... Dispelling illusions about US foreign policy ... Which think tanks serve foreign interests? ... Bob tells an anecdote about a naive prominent journalist ... The hidden influence of the weapons industry ... Did money from Saudi Arabia and UAE help get America involved in Yemen? ... How foreign actors buy influence in Washington ... Eli's Twitter thread thriller ...

Bob enters the pantheon of world historical philosophers ... Was the Virginia election a referendum on wokeness or social spending? ... The Democrats’ strategy for passing (or at least voting on) infrastructure ... Have the Virginia results emboldened challengers to Trump? ... Investigating the Russia investigation ... Will Kyle Rittenhouse be acquitted? ... Is Pfizer’s Covid pill a game changer? ... China’s efforts to address inequality and climate change ... Have we reached peak newsletter? ... Clubhouse: So exclusive no one wants to use it anymore ... Parrot Room preview: Jeffrey Epstein news, the lab leak hypothesis, can Joe Manchin get away with driving a Maserati, the future of custom cars, Bob reads a book about Allen Dulles, the unkind things Sam Harris recently said about Bob, the Foundation trilogy TV adaptation, and Walter Kirn’s Blood Will Out ... A very special Walter Kirn mash-up ...

Paul’s new book, The Sweet Spot: The Pleasures of Suffering and the Search for Meaning ... Why do we get pleasure from some kinds of suffering? ... The many forms of self-flagellation ... Paul: I don’t think we pursue the good only because it gives us pleasure ... How do we derive meaning from suffering? ... Paul: You cannot have a meaningful life without suffering ... Does Buddhist meditation risk severing us from important relationships with others? ... Is parenting pleasurable? ... Making progress on the hedonic treadmill ...

Could a McAuliffe loss bring about a Dem meltdown? ... Mickey: Most Americans don’t care about Build Back Better social spending ... Bob: There’s a breakdown of trust within the Democratic Party ... More possible evidence in favor of the lab leak hypothesis ... Should Biden withdraw from Syria and Iraq? ... Bob: Most people in the Blob are sincere in their beliefs ... Could Tucker run for president to the right of Trump? ... Mark Zuckerberg, mayor of the metaverse ... Bob: God bless Louis Dekmar ... Parrot Room preview: The special guest’s identity revealed, Huma Abedin’s claim that a senator made a pass at her, RIP Mort Sahl, Mickey’s friend gives up their electric car, and how Bob got mauled by Frazier ...

How Tom and Bob wound up talking about the Blob ... Why Tom wants to retire the term "the Blob" ... Is the "Restrainers vs. the Blob" framing useful? ... Chomsky's misunderstood view on how money corrupts discourse ... Tom questions the value of understanding Vladimir Putin's perspective ... Does the Blob undermine America's national interest? ... Engaging a diverse, evolving Blob ...

Mickey: Sinema’s tax plan is screwing up the infrastructure bill ... Bob: It’s a political mistake to cut free community college ... Did Biden accidentally commit to defending Taiwan against attack? ... Why you shouldn’t worry about China’s new missile ... JD Vance’s weird tweet about Alec Baldwin ... Can Trump be convinced not to run in 2024? ... Bob: Steve Bannon is still an extremely dangerous person ... US Covid numbers remain inscrutable ... Parrot Room preview: What Dave Chappelle said about Mike Pence, Merrick Garland’s conflict of interest, how to bribe Trump into staying out of the race, death threats in politics, more car advice, Bob takes another crack at besting Mickey’s joke, meditation retreats, Bob defends “the pounce move,” Alec Baldwin, King Juan Carlos’s sex drive, and the French election ...

Steve’s new book, Rationality: What It Is, Why It Seems Scarce, Why It Matters ... Are humans inherently logical? ... What is “motivated reasoning”? ... How attribution error distorts our public discourse ... How Steve deals with criticism of his work ... Bob’s defense of whataboutism ... Did evolution make us moral—or at least moralistic? ...

Trump finally crosses the line for Mickey (again) ... Why is Trump threatening to undermine Republicans in the midterms? ... Mickey: It’s smart politics to dump the child tax credit ... Are some of Dave Chappelle’s jokes antisemitic? ... Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s less-than-flattering appraisal of Colin Kaepernick ... Is Steve Bannon going to jail? ... Bob: “The jury is out” on the possibility of democracy in China ... Parrot Room preview: Supply chains, Michael Wolff’s account of Jeffrey Epstein’s theory of Trump, Walgreens closes stores over crime, Nick Kristof's possible gubernatorial run, more evidence of Ben Rhodes’s blobishness, David Shor, Terry McAuliffe’s chances in Virginia, a roadblock to Mickey’s coup theory, the new Velvet Underground doc, Steven Pinker and the left, a genitalia joke face-off, Facebook’s thought policing, and help for boomers ...

Aryeh's new YouTube channel ... The early technological innovations of Bloggingheads ... Bloggingheads's curatorial principles ... How the #Resistance media further alienated Trump supporters ... Is journalistic neutrality an obsolete concept? ... Why did the "cool kids" in the US media get the Iraq invasion so wrong? ... The powers and limitations of the UN Security Council ... Bob: "The pandemic is actually a much more complex problem than climate change" ... Why Aryeh's show is getting its own YouTube channel ...