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Eric Weinstein is a mathematician with a bold and piercing intelligence, unafraid to explore the biggest questions in the universe and shine a light on the darkest corners of our society. He is the host of The Portal podcast, a part of which, he recently released his 2013 Oxford lecture on his theory of Geometric Unity that is at the center of his lifelong efforts in arriving at a theory of everything that unifies the fundamental laws of physics.

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Do you see a connection between World War II and the crisis we're living through right now?

The need for collective action, reminding ourselves of the fact that all of these abstractions, like everyone should just do exactly what he or she wants to do for himself and leave everyone else alone.

None of these abstractions work in a global crisis.

And this is just a reminder that we didn't somehow put all that behind us.

When I hear stories about my grandfather who was in the army, and so the Soviet Union where most people die when you're in the army, there's a brotherhood that happens, there's a love that happens.

Do you think that's something we're gonna see here?

I mean, what the Soviet Union went through.

I mean, the enormity of the war on the Russian doorstep, this is different.

we can't talk about Stalingrad and COVID in the same breath yet.

And the, the sort of, you know, just the sense of like the great patriotic war and the way in which I was very moved by the Soviet custom of newlyweds going and visiting war memorials on their wedding day.

It's like the happiest day of your life, you have to say thank you to the people who made it possible.

You know, I've called this, on the Rogan program I called it the great nap.

The 75 years with very little by historical standards in terms of really profound disruptions.

When you call it the great nap, meaning lack of deep global tragedy.

So I think that the development, for example, of the hydrogen bomb, you know, was something that happened during the great nap.

And that doesn't mean that people who lived during that time didn't feel fear, didn't know anxiety, but it was to say that most of the violent potential of the human species was not realized.

And this is the thing that I've sort of taken issue with with the description of Steven Pinker's optimism, is that if you look at the realized kinetic variables, things have been getting much better for a long time, which is the great nap.

But it's not as if, our fragility has not grown.

Our dependence on electronic systems, our vulnerability to disruption.

And so all sorts of things have gotten much better.

Other things have gotten much worse and the destructive potential has skyrocketed.

It's tragedy the only way we wake up from the big nap?

Well, no, you could also have jubilation about positive things, but it's harder to get people's attention.

Can you give an example of a big global positive thing that could happen?

I think that when, for example, just historically speaking, HIV went from being a death sentence to something that people could live with for a very long period of time.

It would be great if that had happened on a Wednesday, right, like all at once, like you knew that things had changed.

And so the bleed in somewhat kills the, sort of the Wednesday effect where it all happens on a particular day at a particular moment.

I think if you look at the stock market here, you know, there's a very clear moment where you can see that the market absorbs the idea of the coronavirus.

I think that with respect to positives, the moon landing was the best example of a positive that happened at a particular time or recapitulating the Soviet American link up in terms of Skylab and Soyuz, right?

Like that was a huge moment when you actually had these 2 nations connecting in orbit.

And so, yeah, there are great moments where something beautiful and wonderful and amazing happens.

You know, but it's just, there are fewer of them.

That's why as much as I can't imagine proposing to somebody at a sporting event, when you have like 30,000 people waiting and you know, Like she says yes, it's pretty exciting.

So I think that we shouldn't discount that.

you think it's going to get in terms of the global suffering that we're going to experience with this crisis?

They're almost like 2 separate storylines.

We're in 1 storyline, we aren't taking things nearly seriously enough.

We see people using food packaging lids as masks who are doctors or nurses.

We hear horrible stories about people dying needlessly due to triage.

On the other hand, there's this other story which says there are tons of ventilators someplace, we've got lots of masks, but they haven't been released.

We've got hospital ships where none of the beds are being used.

And it's very confusing to me that somehow these 2 stories give me the feeling that they both must be true simultaneously and they can't both be true in any kind of standard way.

don't know whether it's just that I'm dumb, but I can't get 1 or the other story to quiet down.

So I think weirdly, this is much more serious than we had understood it.

And it's not nearly as serious as some people are making it out to be at the same time, and that we're not being given the tools to actually understand, oh, here's how to interpret the data, or here, the issue with the personal protective equipment is actually a jurisdictional battle or a question of who pays for it, rather than a question of whether it's present or absent.

I don't understand the details of it, but something is wildly off in our ability

What about, do you think about the quiet suffering of millions of people that have lost their job?

I mean, what I'm, my ear's not to the suffering of those people who have lost their job or the 50% possibly of small businesses that are gonna go bankrupt.

This could go from recession to depression and depression could go to armed conflict and then to war.

So it's not a very abstract causal chain that gets us to the point where we can begin with quiet suffering and anxiety and all of these sorts of things and people losing their jobs and people dying from stress and all sorts of things.

But look, anything powerful enough to put us all indoors in a, I mean, think about this as an incredible experiment.

Imagine that you proposed, hey, I wanna do a bunch of research.

Let's figure out what changes in our emissions profiles for our carbon footprints when we're all indoors or what happens to traffic patterns or what happens to the vulnerability of retail sales as Amazon gets stronger, you know, et cetera, et cetera.

I believe that in many of those situations, we're running an incredible experiment.

Yes, there are some bright spots, 1 of which is that when you're ordered to stay indoors, people are gonna feel entitled.

And the usual thing that people are going to hit when they hear that they've lost your job, there's this kind of tough love attitude that you see, particularly in the United States.

I think there's gonna be a lot less appetite for that because we've been asked to sacrifice, to risk, to act collectively.

Maybe the idea that we actually are nations and that your fellow countrymen may start to mean something to more people.

It certainly means something to people in the military, but I wonder how many people who aren't in the military start to think about this as like, oh yeah, we are kind of running separate experiments and we are not China.

So you think this is kind of a period that might be studied for years to come.

From my perspective, we are a part of the experiment, but I don't feel like we have access to the full data, the full data of the experiment.

We're just like little mice in a large...

I'm romanticizing it and I keep connecting it to World War II, so I keep connecting it to historical events and making sense of them through that way, or reading The Plague by Camus.

Like, almost kinda telling narratives and stories, but I'm not hearing the suffering that people are going through because I think that's quiet.

They're not realizing what it means to have lost your job and to have lost your business.

There's kind of a, I don't, I'm afraid how that fear will materialize itself once the numbness wears out.

And especially if this lasts for many months, and if it's connected to the incompetence of the CDC and the WHO and our government, and perhaps the election process.

You know, my biggest fear is that the elections get delayed or something like that.

So the basic mechanisms of our democracy get slowed or damaged in some way that then mixes with the fear that people have that turns to panic, that turns to anger, that anger.

Can I just play with that for a little bit?

What if, in fact, all of that structure that you grew up thinking about.

And again, you grew up in 2 places, right?

So when you were inside the US, we tend to look at all of these things as museum pieces.

Like how often do we amend the constitution anymore?

And in some sense, if you think about the Jewish tradition of simcha Torah, you've got this beautiful scroll that has been lovingly hand drawn in calligraphy that's very valuable and it's very important that you not treat it as a relic to be revered.

And so we, 1 day a year, we dance with the Torah and we hold this incredibly vulnerable document up and we treat it as if, you know, it was Ginger Rogers being led by Fred Astaire.

Well, that is how you become part of your country.

In fact, maybe the election will be delayed.

Maybe any 1 of a number of things will indicate that you're actually living through history.


Speaker 0: Do you see a connection between World War II and the crisis we're living through right now?

Speaker 1: Sure. The need for collective action, reminding ourselves of the fact that all of these abstractions, like everyone should just do exactly what he or she wants to do for himself and leave everyone else alone. None of these abstractions work in a global crisis. And this is just a reminder that we didn't somehow put all that behind us.

Speaker 0: When I hear stories about my grandfather who was in the army, and so the Soviet Union where most people die when you're in the army, there's a brotherhood that happens, there's a love that happens. Do you think that's something we're gonna see here? A sense of community?

Speaker 1: Well, we're not there. I mean, what the Soviet Union went through. I mean, the enormity of the war on the Russian doorstep, this is different.

Speaker 0: What we're going through now is not,

Speaker 1: we can't talk about Stalingrad and COVID in the same breath yet. We're not ready. And the, the sort of, you know, just the sense of like the great patriotic war and the way in which I was very moved by the Soviet custom of newlyweds going and visiting war memorials on their wedding day. It's like the happiest day of your life, you have to say thank you to the people who made it possible. We're not there.

We're just restarting history. You know, I've called this, on the Rogan program I called it the great nap. The 75 years with very little by historical standards in terms of really profound disruptions. And so-

Speaker 0: When you call it the great nap, meaning lack of deep global tragedy. Well,

Speaker 1: lack of realized global tragedy. So I think that the development, for example, of the hydrogen bomb, you know, was something that happened during the great nap. And that doesn't mean that people who lived during that time didn't feel fear, didn't know anxiety, but it was to say that most of the violent potential of the human species was not realized. It was in the form of potential energy. And this is the thing that I've sort of taken issue with with the description of Steven Pinker's optimism, is that if you look at the realized kinetic variables, things have been getting much better for a long time, which is the great nap.

But it's not as if, our fragility has not grown. Our dependence on electronic systems, our vulnerability to disruption. And so all sorts of things have gotten much better. Other things have gotten much worse and the destructive potential has skyrocketed. It's tragedy the only way we wake up from the big nap?

Well, no, you could also have jubilation about positive things, but it's harder to get people's attention.

Speaker 0: Can you give an example of a big global positive thing that could happen?

Speaker 1: I think that when, for example, just historically speaking, HIV went from being a death sentence to something that people could live with for a very long period of time. It would be great if that had happened on a Wednesday, right, like all at once, like you knew that things had changed. And so the bleed in somewhat kills the, sort of the Wednesday effect where it all happens on a particular day at a particular moment. I think if you look at the stock market here, you know, there's a very clear moment where you can see that the market absorbs the idea of the coronavirus. I think that with respect to positives, the moon landing was the best example of a positive that happened at a particular time or recapitulating the Soviet American link up in terms of Skylab and Soyuz, right?

Like that was a huge moment when you actually had these 2 nations connecting in orbit. And so, yeah, there are great moments where something beautiful and wonderful and amazing happens. You know, but it's just, there are fewer of them. That's why as much as I can't imagine proposing to somebody at a sporting event, when you have like 30,000 people waiting and you know, Like she says yes, it's pretty exciting. So I think that we shouldn't discount that.

So how bad do

Speaker 0: you think it's going to get in terms of the global suffering that we're going to experience with this crisis?

Speaker 1: I can't figure this 1 out. I'm just not smart enough. Something is going weirdly wrong. They're almost like 2 separate storylines. We're in 1 storyline, we aren't taking things nearly seriously enough.

We see people using food packaging lids as masks who are doctors or nurses. We hear horrible stories about people dying needlessly due to triage. And that's a very terrifying story. On the other hand, there's this other story which says there are tons of ventilators someplace, we've got lots of masks, but they haven't been released. We've got hospital ships where none of the beds are being used.

And it's very confusing to me that somehow these 2 stories give me the feeling that they both must be true simultaneously and they can't both be true in any kind of standard way.

Speaker 0: And I

Speaker 1: don't know whether it's just that I'm dumb, but I can't get 1 or the other story to quiet down. So I think weirdly, this is much more serious than we had understood it. And it's not nearly as serious as some people are making it out to be at the same time, and that we're not being given the tools to actually understand, oh, here's how to interpret the data, or here, the issue with the personal protective equipment is actually a jurisdictional battle or a question of who pays for it, rather than a question of whether it's present or absent. I don't understand the details of it, but something is wildly off in our ability

Speaker 0: to understand where we are. So that's policy, that's institutions. What about, do you think about the quiet suffering of millions of people that have lost their job? Is this a temporary thing? I mean, what I'm, my ear's not to the suffering of those people who have lost their job or the 50% possibly of small businesses that are gonna go bankrupt.

Do you think about that? Quiet suffering? Well, and how that might arise itself? Could be not

Speaker 1: quiet too. I mean, could be a depression. This could go from recession to depression and depression could go to armed conflict and then to war. So it's not a very abstract causal chain that gets us to the point where we can begin with quiet suffering and anxiety and all of these sorts of things and people losing their jobs and people dying from stress and all sorts of things. But look, anything powerful enough to put us all indoors in a, I mean, think about this as an incredible experiment.

Imagine that you proposed, hey, I wanna do a bunch of research. Let's figure out what changes in our emissions profiles for our carbon footprints when we're all indoors or what happens to traffic patterns or what happens to the vulnerability of retail sales as Amazon gets stronger, you know, et cetera, et cetera. I believe that in many of those situations, we're running an incredible experiment. And am I worried for us all? Yes, there are some bright spots, 1 of which is that when you're ordered to stay indoors, people are gonna feel entitled.

And the usual thing that people are going to hit when they hear that they've lost your job, there's this kind of tough love attitude that you see, particularly in the United States. Oh, you lost your job, poor baby. Well, go retrain, get another 1. I think there's gonna be a lot less appetite for that because we've been asked to sacrifice, to risk, to act collectively. And that's the interesting thing.

What does that reawaken in us? Maybe the idea that we actually are nations and that your fellow countrymen may start to mean something to more people. It certainly means something to people in the military, but I wonder how many people who aren't in the military start to think about this as like, oh yeah, we are kind of running separate experiments and we are not China.

Speaker 0: So you think this is kind of a period that might be studied for years to come. From my perspective, we are a part of the experiment, but I don't feel like we have access to the full data, the full data of the experiment. We're just like little mice in a large...

Speaker 1: Does this 1 make sense to you, Lex?

Speaker 0: I'm romanticizing it and I keep connecting it to World War II, so I keep connecting it to historical events and making sense of them through that way, or reading The Plague by Camus. Like, almost kinda telling narratives and stories, but I'm not hearing the suffering that people are going through because I think that's quiet. Everybody's numb currently. They're not realizing what it means to have lost your job and to have lost your business. There's kind of a, I don't, I'm afraid how that fear will materialize itself once the numbness wears out.

And especially if this lasts for many months, and if it's connected to the incompetence of the CDC and the WHO and our government, and perhaps the election process. You know, my biggest fear is that the elections get delayed or something like that. So the basic mechanisms of our democracy get slowed or damaged in some way that then mixes with the fear that people have that turns to panic, that turns to anger, that anger.

Speaker 1: Can I just play with that for a little bit? Sure. What if, in fact, all of that structure that you grew up thinking about. And again, you grew up in 2 places, right? So when you were inside the US, we tend to look at all of these things as museum pieces.

Like how often do we amend the constitution anymore? And in some sense, if you think about the Jewish tradition of simcha Torah, you've got this beautiful scroll that has been lovingly hand drawn in calligraphy that's very valuable and it's very important that you not treat it as a relic to be revered. And so we, 1 day a year, we dance with the Torah and we hold this incredibly vulnerable document up and we treat it as if, you know, it was Ginger Rogers being led by Fred Astaire. Well, that is how you become part of your country. In fact, maybe the election will be delayed.

Maybe extraordinary powers will be used. Maybe any 1 of a number of things will indicate that you're actually living through history. This isn't a museum piece that

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The Big Nap: Coronavirus and World War II - Eric Weinstein and Lex Fridman | AI Podcast Clips