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Rubin on Rogan on Rand

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Dave Rubin was recently featured on Rogan's podcast, which Yaron has expressed that he wants to go on. Rogan, if you don't know, has one of the highest rated podcasts out there. 

Rogan has also stated that (1) he doesn't like it when people suggest to him about having someone on, if people keep asking it annoys him and he doesn't want to have that person on, and (2) he doesn't like anyone who is too doctrinaire about anything. When I suggested this to Yaron (in chat) his response was "well I'm not doctrinaire." I'm positive Joe will not see it that way. Joe is really averse to principles, I have a feeling he equates "nuance" with concrete-boundness. But apparently Joe enjoys Peter Schiff and has had him on multiple times. (If you watch those you'll see what I'm talking about.) Anyways:

Relevant part is at about 2:05:00 ish. The background is Rogan saying that we have to have government regulation because people won't build houses correctly. Rubin suggests that he doesn't think that implies government regulation, but Rogan is having none of it. People aren't inherently benevolent and so will try to bilk as much as possible out of the next guy, so there will be much more hazardous construction without regulation. Rubin suggests this isn't the only way to organize things, but admits he doesn't really have a good argument.

[My transcript guaranteed to not be 100% accurate]

Rubin: You know who should have on to talk about this, and I know people have looped you in before, is Yaron Brook from Ayn Rand Institute cause he's really good on this.

Rogan: No one's looped me in with him. Maybe they have, but I haven't paid attention to that.

Rubin: I'll hook you up, I'll be happy to do that, he's a really interesting guy that has moved my thinking a little bit on this.

Rogan: Those Ayn Rand people, they're really fucking harsh.

Rubin: They like ideas, man.

Rogan: Those are... They're.... Pssssss.....[shakes head] yeah.

Rubin: They're not the most fun people on the planet, but I generally like them, cause they just want, they're kind of live and let live. That's really it, that's really the crux of it. Pretty much.

Rogan: Is that really the crux of it though?

Rubin: Yeah.

Rogan: People think that there's like a cruelty aspect to it, though, the Ayn Rand philosophy.

Rubin: Well, they believe in rational self-interest. Which, if you say "self," people think you're evil. But we all basically operate in rational self-interest all the time.

Rogan: Right, but espousing it, that's the thing. It's like proclaiming it, that's what makes people go "ohhhh," you're essentially setting up the Gordon Gekko idea, that "greed is good."

Rubin: Yeah, I kinda buy into that idea.

Rogan: Do you buy into "greed is good"?

Rubin: Yeah, basically. Not greed to destroy the word, but if you, Joe, do what is good for you, by extension...

Rogan: Right but is that greed? Or is that ambition?

Rubin: Right, exactly, that's my point.

Rogan: That's where it gets conflated, isn't it?

Rubin: Right, so without whittling it to the definition of greed versus ambition, it's like you do what is good for you, but it doesn't mean you're just running this rampaging program to destroy the world in the name of Joe Rogan, you're doing what's good for you because you actually like your audience and you want them to learn, you want to have money so that your family can live in a house that you can afford, so that you can send your kids to good schools and all of those things. That's all rational self-interest. If, at the same time, you're running a nuclear power plant, and you're Mr Burns, and you're dumping in the river, well no, that's actually no longer rational self-interest because you're polluting the very environment you live in.

Rogan: Who takes care of that, who regulates that? Is that where government comes in? Who gets you in trouble, in your opinion, if you're this deregulation guy, who goes after you when you dump shit into the river?

Rubin: I'm not saying there should be no regulation, I'm just saying I generally like this line of thinking.

[...they discuss how there's ways to may money through green entrepreneurship]

Rogan: What's the solution if someone pollutes? If you're not gonna have regulation, what is the solution when someone does something that's illegal?

Rubin replies basically that it's not as if you get rid of regulations and then every businessmen everywhere just goes, "ah finally, let's dump into the rivers!" and that if someone did, it's easy to catch, and that there are more market-friendly ways of doing things. Rogan remains unconvinced and just thinks not having laws wouldn't stop people (which he equates to Rubin's position.)

 

Anyways, comments, deconstructions, analysis?

Edited by 2046
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 Most people hear an "opposition to regulation" to mean "ignoring fraud". One fundamental problem with arguing successfully against regulation is not coming across like you are advocating the absence of "the rule of law".  The advocate of Capitalism has to quickly assure that objection to regulation is not against fraud or the police or judicial system.
 
 Pollution is an infringement of someone's rights. Joe did bring up that fact that it was illegal to pollute. The idea that an insurance company would not insure/certify is not commonly accepted as a solution due to the diseased intertwining of government and insurance system, there is no example of complete of private regulation, only partial private regulation. They think a regulatory bureaucracy (which is familiar) does a better job than a competing set of insurance companies (chaos).
  
 Most people would be against, prior restraint of voluntary contracts that don't harm. It's the determination of harm that is the disagreement. It is hard for them to envision, but I submit that it is hard for us to envision and explain privatized "regulating".

And that is the crux of the problem. We don't demonstrate the way that the system should work through art or even computer simulation.
 
 

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On 6/15/2018 at 6:48 PM, 2046 said:

Anyways, comments, deconstructions, analysis?

Just that Dave Rubin has accumulated quite a history of excellent interviews over the past couple years.  Yaron Brook did an outstanding job particularly on his first appearance.

Larry Elder, Thomas Sowell (naturally), and Alex Epstein's appearances are particularly worth checking out. 

https://www.youtube.com/user/RubinReport/videos

Rogan is a new name to me. 

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