Michael Shermer w/ Helen Pluckrose-Activist Scholarship Made Everything About Race, Gender, Identity 

Helen is a wonderful example of “the examined life”. I admire her so much.

It's concerning when people think that 'sconce' claims to find 'the truth';. I don't think it ever claims that. All science offers is a method to test hypotheses and the creation of provisional truths which are the best explanation we can currently make given the data we have. Of course, so things have been so thoroughly tested that we can treat them as 'true', but it's not generally the case with science.

I dont see how anyone can call themselves both skeptical and a socialist.

Her voice reminds me of Caroline Quentin's

I don't know who that literary critic was -- but I think she's wrong. I think the reason Twain used that word is because he was an American Naturalist who was committed to using the actual speech that people used -- and people actually used it during that time period. It was an issue of literary realism. That's not to say that he didn't realize it had to do with injustice -- he certainly did know that. But the word simply did not have the same power at that time than it does today.

First

Helen, so noble, lovely and wise, you are such an admirable person. Thanks to you and Michael.

I’m reading her book now. Helen: this book for us for the layman Me after reading the same page 4 times just to understand it: I’m dumber than a laymen

Just finished watching this. This is one of the all-time best interviews I've ever seen on RU-vid. Heading to Amazon now to order her book.

Thomas Sowell has written about this for decades.

Helen is a treasure! I do still need to get a copy of the recent book!

And i’ve thought that Sam Harris is the most balanced intellectual that represents my view and my politics! This is another level! Helen Pluchrose virtually is reading from my notes lol Respect!

This interview is so good

When I saw this interview was posted, I couldn't listen fast enough. In fact, I listened to it almost instantly...I think there were something like 300 views when I pressed play. Now I wanted to respond and comment quickly after hearing the discussion, but instead, took a few days to formulate a thoughtful response. I apologize for its length. Firstly, let me say, I consider 'Cynical Theories' to be one of the most seminal books written and released in 2020 for American audiences. It's right up there with 'The Plot To Change America' by Mike Gonzales (the two books complement each other well). Now...having said that, I think an opportunity was lost here. Michael is one of the more luminous liberal minds in our country. I've been following him for decades. I was actually ecstatic when he chose to engage the book because I really wanted to know his thoughts on the matters discussed. However, Michael essentially lives in an ivory tower, insulated and apart from the pressing matters of the day. He has the well-earned luxury and privilege to consider these issues without being embroiled in them. So upon reading the book, of course he thought the Woke ideas contained within were nonsensical and abhorrent because the platform of the Woke is largely precisely that... absurd to the limit. And this is where the opportunity was lost...Helen failed to make him truly consider the practical ramifications of the content of her book. 'Woke theory' isn't simply a strange aberration doomed to play out and die in obscurity because it's absurd and nonsensical. The nonsense of woke theory is real in every way, and spreading, poisoning American public institutions from grammar schools to universities. It has even infiltrated State (particularly California) and Michael's beloved Biden Administration's Federal government. This is a serious matter for anyone with children, with a business, who still defend liberty and even the slightest sense of human rights in the Constitutional sense; things that probably aren't so pressing to Michael now that he is somewhat insulated from such matters, but are important just the same, for which he needs to be reminded. In this regard, a better recent conversation on this matter can be found between Jordan Peterson and Bret Weinstein.

Just bought the Cynical Theories on Audible ☺️

I'm on page 43 of CYNICAL THEORIES and it's a landmark work. I am going to buy copies as gifts for my friends.

Thank you, wonderful interview❤️

Great conversation Helen is fantastic and I look forward to reading the book

Please do another episode with her! But let’s make that one four hours!! 😃😃😃 I enjoyed this so much!

I believe Tony Robbins is a con man, I know several people who attended all his courses, but achieved nothing after the ‘high’ they experienced by the group mass hysteria dissipates. Jordan Peterson is a genuine man and genuinely helps young men..

Great talk. You've been on a roll!

I retired as a tenured faculty member in 2012; so glad I left my university in time. Education today is a main culprit in this lunacy. Dont get me started!

I truly respect Pluckrose & Lindsay and this is not a criticism of them. I think the whole PoMo/Marxism thing is not so much the driving force but an a-posteriori recuperation of social forces that have always evolved, in cycles through the millennia, exactly in the way we're seeing today.

When people throw the appropriation argument, I tell them : "ok no issue there, take off your jeans... Well it's Jewish appropriation... Also let me take your human rights away, that's white people's appropriation.".

I loved this conversation sooo much, could have listened for another 2 hours!!!

Lindsey and Pluckrose's book is an excellent introduction to the intellectual trainwreck of critical theory. It may very well be the book that makes that dangerous house of cards collapse. Highly recommended.

Yes we do need to come to terms with Empire. It was bally marvelous. I am not one to be proud of such things but if I was, I would be proud of the British Empire. The largest the world has ever seen. Take the Monty Python, What Have the Romans Ever Done For Us? Do that & just keep going, not least of which ending slavery wherever the British Empire set up shop. Without the British Empire there would have been no India, Singapore or Hong Kong. Stop apologising for the British Empire. It was the best thing that ever happened to the countries involved. French colonialism only lightly brushed the coastal regions of Mauritania. They managed to get around to ending slavery in 2007. These countries would not have been awesome if we had not arrived.

Helen like Matt tiabbi, tim dillon, and many other people, she's an international treasure. Thank Jesus, Zeus and baby Oden for Helen. She is such a sincere British woman who brings her British culture and sensibilities in a positive manner to CRT discussions

I had to laugh when Michael mentioned his book "what it means to believe in conspiracy theories" then repeated a conspiracy theory about a conspiracy theory lol. I think he already knows what it means to believe a conspiracy theory. 46:20

What the heck does "postmodern" mean? After modern? Sounds like a "writery" word that doesn't really mean anything specific.

Michael, Amazon has done exactly that with opening bookstores.

Beckner is absolutely right -- there is definitely a postmodern element to Jordan Peterson, 100%. I'm actually reading Derrida's _Of Grammatology_ right now, and I simply don't see anything that in any way essentially contradicts Peterson. I see that Derrida treats patriarchy and logosophia with some derision -- but I actually think that's more of a difference of emphasis rather than substance.

Isn't the biggest problem with postmodernism, that most of the postmodernists never came to the point of modernism.

Hayek's point about limited government knowledge is specifically that the vast majority of economic knowledge is distributed through all the different people in society. A top-down approach run by experts therefore excludes the vast majority of knowledge on how to control a problem compared to a bottom-up approach and hence is guaranteed to fail. In a free market, this knowledge is efficiently communicated through the pricing mechanism.

Although I absolutely agree with the position expressed here about Q-Anon etc, I think this blanket dismissal of conspiracy theory is unwarranted. The skeptical intellectual position should be to judge individual conspiracies on their own merit. Just as an example, what about Jeffrey Epstein and how outrageously he was enabled at the highest levels of our society?

Oh those Brits. So decent and polite. Maybe Americans should try it...again. Hold a door, say excuse me and thank you. You, yourself will experience the goodness that comes from just such a small gesture.

Great conversation but the delay is crippling.

The arguments used by both Michael and Helen against free markets are sadly very out of date. They have been beaten to death by economists a long time ago and isn't used by anyone who have bothered to read up on the subject. The Amazon/Bagel scenario simply isn't valid. Once all the bagel sellers go out of business their shops and equipment will be on sale, very cheap as all bagels just went out of business. This creates a even lower than usual barrier entry for anyone who would like enter the market. Which a lot of people would likely do once Amazon raises their prices. Although Amazon have got very big economic muscles, it would be totally irrational for both them or anyone else to invest more money to enter a market than they are likely to earn back in reasonable amount of time. Ceteris paribus, of course ... There simply aren't any historic examples of such price gouging strategy working on a free market where the government hasn't granted any kind of monopoly status to an actor such was the case with AT&T. Standard oil is often used as an example of when this worked. Sadly the story is often told from a very skewed point of view. Standard oil continuously lowered their prices for almost a decade due to a more efficient refining process which hurt their competitors a lot but did a the same amount of good for the consumers. Once they no longer could continue their business process improvements and prices stagnated they also started to lose their 90+% market share. At the time the antitrust trial broke up standard oil their market share had already been lowered to about 60%.

Re: *HUCKLEBERRY FINN* - Do you think that Mel Brooks intentionally echoed Twain’s strategy in his classic yet rarely seen film of 1974, *BLAZING SADDLES?* Can you imagine a bowdlerized version of that film? Isn’t that what’s being done to Twain’s book? I suggest you see *THANK YOU FOR SMOKING* (2005), specifically the scenes where a liberal Vermont senator tries to bowdlerize classic films by replacing images of cigarettes with, e.g., lollipops. Bowdlerization not only never works, but it draws attention to the word or object being censored (or trying to be).

Re: Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech (8/28/63) - Dr. King said : “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.” In 2023, 60 years since he said that, not only his children but - if the New Racists have their way with us - all the peoples of the world will be judged by their outward appearance rather than by the content of their inward character. We will all be figuratively circumcised, the better to classify us.

The book is excellent, perfectly comprehensible and politically sane. Read the book! Don't just watch the videos online if you are a student or scholar! The book is so good that reading all of it is very insightful and highly recommended.

Such a cogent and refreshing breath of air to be able to absorb tangibly reasoned intercourse. ( As apposed to spitting bones and feathers language.A Well worthy listen and think.👍

I'm extremely annoyed that I was first notified about this today. Helen is wonderful! Let's see a transgressive bridge.

Love Helen!

Mark Normand and Michael Shermer have to be related. I'm convinced.

Research Adrenochrome. Difficult to believe .

She was referring to Alan Watts - ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-UAocLUHJUKg.html

Awesome episode

Stop this talk of metaphorical truth. It was Bret Weinstein's (admirable, but) clumsy first try at understanding what Peterson was on about. What it actually is, is procedural truth, behavioral truth, practical truth, and the scientific method is an example of it. It is behavioral patterns that accomplish our goals, and since they do so, they appear true, so we keep acting them out. However, the more goals you add, the more constrained what appears true is. Some of those goals are ethical, and people can accept them as hypothetical imperatives (following Kant). Some goals are so distant from our immediate lives that we can't tell if we compromise them in acting out our procedural, propositionally "true" modes of being. The final arbiter is still reality, but importantly, in this conception, the quest for truths about the objective world rests on procedural truth claims, since it's more important to act in an iterable manner than it is to understand what you're acting with from an evolutionary perspective. It may help to think about truth as what you can rely on (a true friend, a true shot, a true statement), with the reason for why you can rely on it being, among other things, that it corresponds with reality, but also that it invites sustainable modes of existence that can continue to recognize things as true.

But WHO is actually trans??

Michael, you distilled race to a trait that was given to you upon birth. However I like to distil things even further and found the following sentence: It is wrong to create value or take away value from yourself or from someone else about a trait that you've had no control over in getting. Now you can apply this to a lot of things.

To those saying "why not have a debate?" or "why not balance it with the other side?"..... you need to Google up an essay titled "No, the Woke Won’t Debate You. Here’s Why" on NewDiscourses. You _cannot_ question the ideology, because it resembles a fundamentalist religion. You can problematize other people's work within the ideology using the tools of the ideology, but you can't criticize it from outside or using any more legitimate means.

Yes, Michelle Alexander does make great points, but then she makes some assumptions as though they could be taken for granted when they can't be. A bit like JBP: it checks out, it checks out, it checks out, some unfounded assumption is made and run with and I go 🤦‍♀️ Both their (unrelated) contributions are important, though, even if they are both, 😱, people and thus imperfect ❤️

I find it hilarious that Brits discriminate against gingers. Here in the U.S. my sense is that we see them as being very attractive and desirable. A red head woman is considered very beautiful and a red head man, especially if he has a red beard, is considered very attractive. Redheads will even have more friends because people like to choose good-looking friends. I've asked a lot of people here if they think the same thing just to check my own perspective and they response, "Oh yes, gingers are hot." So, yeah, I think this anti-ginger sentiment is some sort of particular British thing. I would love to hear an analysis of how the British came to consider the most attractive people as second rate people. What a difference in cultural perspectives, WOW.

@2:12 Mark Twain and Joseph Conrad too. Conrad goes neck deep into into race and empire. The N-Word of Narcissus ?

It is tragic to me that some of the thinkers whom I have found most valuable, Foucault, Fromm, etc have become embroiled in postmodern fascism.

I am sure if you told X person "I believe I have objectively paid you for this lecture you just gave" even when you hadn't, they would quickly revert to subjective truth

Strawman Strawman strawman

This is an excellent discussion. Helen is profoundly insightful.

I support Helen on Twitter!!!!

She made several great points that may be very useful. For example, that people are either inclined to believe in myths and narratives or in facts and analysis. Without religion those willing to believe in narratives will believe in social justice, conspiracies, New Age and other BS. I thought they were just stupid/ignorant, but they are not, they just have such type of personality, and you can’t persuade them. Also, she correctly points that on individual level self reliance is the best way to proceed in life if you’re black, woman, LGBT, or other minority. But on policy-making level it’s better not to expect individuals to fix their problems, but actually do something to help people overcome inequality of opportunities.

I agree with Michael at around the 25:00 mark and his aunt. If you normalize a person with a disability then they'll feel normal and not out of place. Give them a purpose and make them feel apart of a team and have responsibility and they'll more then be able to do it. I've worked with people with special need and I can say that with working with dozens of people with DD for close to a decade is that, they get the most frustrated and angry when they're seen as furniture. They're more then willing to help you and being apart of doing activities whether its taking out the trash, helping prepare dinner, help stock shelves etc. If you hold them to account and have expectations for them and give them tasks that are worthwhile and stimulating, thats what I've seen as wjat they like the most. JUST LIKE ALL OF THE REST OF US!!!!!. We're all looking for purpose in life. The amount and what kind of purpose depends on many variables with mental and physical capacity being a few of them. Sadly we isolate people with DD and baby them. They're just money bags to the pharmaceutical industry who throws every and any med at them to make a dollar and coming from a middle eastern background which, is not always conducive to problems. A person with disabilities is treated no different. The expectation is the same and they thrive. Just treat people with dignity and respect and you'll see them thrive. A DD doesn't change that

Love her ... great listen

Saved Video 

According to Wikipedia 12.4% of the population identifies as Muslim in 2011 not 5%. Check your facts Helen.

Bravo

Helen is great!

I really appreciate Ms. Pluckrose. But this guy always comes across to me as someone carrying water for establishment narratives with a religious fervor. It makes him so hard to listen to--even in this context.

what book did Mike mention about patterns?

The examples around 50:00 and the conversation about Shrier, conspiracy theories, et al. all come down to one thing: Skull-stuff issues. We have a flood of cognitive decline at a rapid clip.

The Truth is always somewhere in the middle.

I like Helen but I don't think she is more rational than Jordan Peterson.

Why not invite someone from the other side, Michael? If you really want to be a skeptic, then you have to take both positions into account. Especially when it comes to gender and sexuality, you interviewed journalists (not scientists) like Abigail Shrier and Debra Soh who are especially known for rejecting the current positions held by mainstream academics. Why not invite someone who actually works in academia, is an expert on gender and sexuality, and agrees with the current narrative? And by that, I mean exactly NOT one of the usual suspects like Debra Soh, Geoffrey Miller, Diana Fleischman, Michael Bailey, and Ray Blanchard. Wouldn't that be a more balanced approach to discuss these issues?

"Everything About Race, Gender, Identity"

Ok, so I had to stop the video at about 05:30, as Mister Shermer introduces Miss Pluckrose and her book in one breath- before he takes off with a rambling overloaded spiel. An embarassing (!) opening IMHO, but I will continue watching- because I came for Helen. From Norway.

She ommited the real root of CRT being Marxism. Then she admits she is an ex socialist 😂