https://youtubetranscript.com/?v=aGTvRwNFFzg
Okay, the New Zealand government has established slash funded a group called the disinformation project. Oh it’s well liked I can tell. To debunk internet myths. Internet myths, yeah. Does this threaten free speech in your view? Well that’s its purpose. So yes. It’s such a funny term. It’s such a funny term. Disinformation. It’s really got this Orwellian flavor. It’s like what do you mean disinformation? Do you mean lies? Like why don’t we just use the little Anglo-Saxon word instead of that long tedious and manipulative Orwellian word? That’s disinformation. It’s like who says there’s the rub? It’s like who’s the arbiter of disinformation? I know the answer to that. That’s easy. Exactly the person that you don’t want to be. So I mean it would be lovely. It would be lovely wouldn’t it if we could just set up a committee of like factual people. Just the facts ma’am. Here’s ten of us. We know the facts and here’s something that’s not the facts. Let’s put an X on that. Stamp. Disinformation. It’s like who thinks that? How daft do you have to be to believe that’s the case? You know if everybody knows it’s a fact then we don’t have to worry about disinformation because everybody knows it’s a fact. Imagine there’s some dispute about some facts. Well then not everybody knows the facts. Well then how do you know who it is that knows the facts? And the answer is you don’t. That’s why there isn’t. That’s why everyone doesn’t know the facts. And so the facts are revealed as a consequence of let’s say dialogue. And how about fractious and offensive dialogue often? Difficult dialogue. It’s like well I don’t like your difficulty. I don’t like the difficulty your… I don’t like… yeah I don’t like your difficulty. Disinformation. It’s no longer allowed. It’s like well that’s so… I just can’t even believe we’re having this discussion and that we have panels about disinformation. And it really means it really means something like how do we set up an organization to punish those who dare challenge our ideology and then mask our intent to do that? By pretending that we’re only motivated by love of the facts. So we could we could think about this technically for a minute and it’s worthwhile thinking about it. So you might think you have the right to free speech and it’s one of a bunch of rights, list of rights, and you could argue about what those rights are and the list is the list differs from country to country even in the West. There’s some core rights. There’s a core list of rights let’s say. And you might think well free speech that’s that’s just one of those rights. And then you might also debate whether that’s those rights are intrinsic whatever in the world that means or they’re granted to you by the government by the social contract. It’s a very dismal way to think by the way but you can make a decent case for both of those positions. Intrinsic rights and rights granted to you by the social contract. And then free speech is the right to say whatever comes to mind. And why do you have that right? Well for the same reason that maybe you have the right to pursue happiness is you you can it’s kind of a it’s kind of a right of hedonism. You can say because you’re free you can just say whatever pops into your mind and you have that right. But that’s not that’s not that’s so shallow that analysis so blind it’s so primitive it’s it’s so immature that it’s a miracle of confusion. And that’s for people who accept that there is a right to free speech. Some people don’t even like the idea that there’s a right to free speech and that’s a whole other kind of hell. But even among those who think there is a right to free speech they often think about it in that sort of casual way. And it’s not the case. So I don’t know if you noticed but you think in words. Now some of you also think in images and some of you do both and it and everyone thinks in images and words to some degree because we all dream. And and so then you might think well what does it mean that you think in words? And the answer is the answer is to be founded in an analysis of thought itself. So then you might ask yourself what are you doing when you’re thinking? Let’s say you have a problem and so you’re thinking well I have a problem should I should I find a new job? So now you’re thinking about that. And then you think well here’s here’s a bunch of reasons why I should have a new job, should find a new job, and a bunch of reasons why I shouldn’t. And then you might think here’s some jobs that I could find, job A, job B, and then you compare and contrast those different ideas. But then you might ask well what are you doing when you’re comparing and contrasting those ideas? And really what you’re doing technically is you’re you’re setting up motivated sub personalities in the theater of your imagination. And each of those sub personalities has a viewpoint and so it’s a it’s a personality has a viewpoint and it has an argument. And then you you listen to one of those sub personalities argue here’s why I should have a different job. And then you listen to another sub personality argue here’s why you should stay in the damn job you have. And you let those sub personalities have a discussion in the theater of your imagination and you draw your conclusion and then move forward. If you can do that, if you actually think that’s hard, you might just do it on impulse. You might get so angry at work one day that you just tell your boss to go to hell and you quit. Which which is not a very good all that’s not a very good strategy. It might be necessary but it’s not a very good strategy. It’s probably better to think about it first and then to think you divide yourself into opposing avatars and you let those avatars have a discussion. And so what you’re doing when you’re thinking is mimicking the process of dialogue and maybe it’s not just dialogue maybe you got four different avatars of your imagination running at the same time and you’re having a pretty good internal debate between all four. And you’re mimicking internally exactly what you would be doing if you sat down and talked to let’s say a friend or your wife or your husband about the problem. And then you might say well what are you doing when you’re talking to your wife or your husband or your friend about your problem? And the answer is you’re trying to think. And then you might say well why bother thinking? Alfred North Whitehead said we think so our thoughts can die instead of us. And then you think what is that? And this is technically true. This is biologically true. This is what human beings do is we produce fictional variants of ourselves and then we assess their viability and then if they’re not viable we kill them. And if they are viable then we act them out. And if they’re viable and we act them out then we don’t die. And so the reason you think is so that you don’t fall into a pit. And your thought is dependent on dialogue. Dialogue. Logos. Dialogue. Dia means two let’s say two. Logos. That’s the divine word. It’s the divine word manifesting itself in the interaction between two or more people even internally. Thoughts just the internalization of that. And so thought is what allows you to generate new variants of yourself that that aren’t destined for catastrophic failure. And so then what happens if you interfere with free speech? Well then people can’t think. Well then what happens? Well then they die instead of their thoughts. And so that’s just not just another right. That’s the process by which adaptation itself makes itself manifest. And so then you have people who say well we can’t have any disinformation which means I don’t want anybody telling me anything I’m ever uncomfortable with. It’s like while so much for thinking is like think about when you think. So when do you think? Well when you have a problem. Well what does it mean to have a problem? It means something is in front of you that’s an obstacle that you better deal with before it runs you over let’s say. And so you’re gonna think when you’re desperate and you’re desperate when the stakes are high. And then thinking is really difficult. It’s really challenging. It’s gonna result in the death of some of your presuppositions. We already explained what that means. Your tyrannical presuppositions are gonna be killed by thought. You’re gonna be in the desert. And so if someone opposes your thought maybe they’re right. They oppose your thought and they’re right. It’s like your thought dies. Maybe you don’t. Your thought dies into the desert with you. That’s not very pleasant. Well it’s no wonder people want to interfere with that. But if you don’t allow people to speak freely it isn’t allow because the government doesn’t allow that. Governments that don’t allow that precipitously collapse. Or they transform themselves into tyrannies and then they precipitously collapse. This isn’t optional. And so if you don’t allow for free speech, if you don’t promote free speech, if you don’t understand the transcendent value of free speech then you deny people the opportunity to think and then they die. And so I don’t care why people justify their interference with that. I don’t care what the rationale is. It’s like the people who don’t want you to think, they are not only your enemy they are the enemies of themselves. There are people who think that you can tell the difference between truth and reality without thinking. Well that’s disinformation. It’s like it’s obvious. It’s like no it’s not. That’s why we’re talking. It’s not obvious. It’s not obvious at all. You know and one of the things I learned as a scientist, this is a horrible thing to learn, if I have if I stumbled across something in one of my research programs and I didn’t want it to be true, it was probably true. And so it’s even worse in some sense right? So maybe you’re the enemy of disinformation. You might think well are you so sure that what you regard as disinformation isn’t just a truth that would send you to the desert? Because everyone has that problem. It’s like there are unpleasant truths. Like yeah those are the ones that teach you. That’s when an unpleasant truth makes itself manifest, you really have something to learn. And it’s almost impossible to disentangle those. You know that perfectly well in your own life. I’m sure all of you have swallowed some pretty damn bitter pills. You know you thought well my god really I have to learn that? Man I sure learned that the hard way. It’s like are you really so wise that you’ve ever learned anything other than the hard way? Now you know I’m not that cynical and you can play and you can explore and you can listen and you can learn and it doesn’t always have to be the hard way. Man but sometimes it’s sure the hard way. And if you had just describing the hard way as disinformation you don’t think you’d take that? It’s like you you bloody well be sure you take that. That’s for sure. So yeah it’s pretty it’s quite something to see disinformation. God.