[Music]

hello everyone and welcome to this very

special edition of through conversations

podcast I am joined for a third time and

they said show by Professor Noam Chomsky

he does not need any introduction and

he's uh previous guest in this show so

our listeners are very excited about

this conversation and so am I so

Professor thank you again for joining me

very pleased to be with you I'm very

excited and very grateful with you

because this conversation comes at a

time where there's a lot of moving Parts

in our society and your voice has always

been one that can steer us into a more

thoughtful conversation and more engaged

discussion into how to improve our

society

our listeners were very interested in

hearing your thoughts on the upcoming

2024 election presidential election

Professor Chomsky which may be may be

one of the most favorable moments in our

history not for our country but perhaps

through the entire globe what are your

thoughts in the upcoming presidential

election and what do you think are the

key issues that will shape this election

there are two key issues that shape

everything

including the election

one is

are we going to destroy organized human

life on Earth

there are two ways in which we are now

racing to do that

one is the increasing threat of nuclear

war both in Europe and in Asia the

second is by heating the globe to the

point where much of it will be unlivable

we just heard a couple of weeks ago from

the ipcc

the international scientific monitors uh

their most dire report

cutting few Corners about where we now

stand

overwhelming scientific consensus

if anything's solid that is they say we

have to radically cut the use of fossil

fuels beginning now

aiming for

termination a couple of decades from now

if not we pass

irreversible tipping points where

there'll be a steady decline to

centrally destruction of organized human

life on Earth

the other possibility is we do it

quickly with a nuclear war

well going back to the 2024 election

uh as in every other major decision in

our lives

these are the top issues of concern

there are other issues will American

democracy survive in any form

rather serious question

it's not a joke other democracies are in

deep trouble read the newspaper this

morning

in India the head of the opposition

party Raul Gandhi was just tossed into

jail

part of

prime minister modi's effort to

dismantle India's democracy and

installer racist Hindu ethnocracy in its

place

it's one case uh talk about others the

United States is

finally the most important because of

its extraordinary power and influences

in the world so that's at stake

and we can continue there are lots of

other things

so I think we could have said for each

of the recent elections that it's the

most important yet that was correct you

know we also drew the next one

hmm

yeah it's really interesting and you

touch on many crucial points that I want

to get into our conversation today and

in terms of

electing someone there's a lot of

names that are coming around more in the

in the angle of the Republican party

which are Nikki Haley Vivek reps one

wani and Donald Trump and some that are

potentially running which are the santis

and Mike Pompeo and

also in terms of the democratic party it

seems that there's speculation that

Biden may not run

or perhaps he's not leaning towards

running or maybe he will run but these

are all of the questions that I have for

you what are your thoughts in the

Republican candidates are is there

anyone that really would you would be

interested in in having as a next

president

and also what are your thoughts in a

potential re-election of President Joe

Biden

the Republic the Republican organization

is not a political party in the

traditional sense it that it is

been turning into something quite

different for several decades in fact

I agree with the

comments of

the political analysts of the American

Enterprise Institute

Thomas Mann Norman Ornstein

that the Republicans have become what

they call a radical Insurgency that has

abandoned the

procedures of normal parliamentary

politics

if you rank it internet look at

International rankings it's

attitudes and commitments it ranks

alongside the far-right parties in

Europe with

neo-fascist Origins the party is now

pretty the popular base of the party is

pretty much in the pocket of Donald

Trump

uh you look at polls

overwhelmingly popular

that's the end result of a

long period

can trace it back to Richard Nixon in

which the party recognized

back in at that time it was an authentic

political party

the Republicans and the Democrats

whatever he thought about them they

pretty pretty much overlapped in uh

modes of procedure and attitudes and so

on

the Republicans were the the more

pro-business of the two business parties

in the United States

the United States is basically a

one-party State the business party has

two factions called Democrats and

Republicans

the Republicans were more the more

dedicated pro-business party

Richard Nixon

intelligence strategist understood that

the Republicans cannot win elections on

their actual programs the programs of

strong support for the business world

for the ownership class for investors

from Banks and so on can't get votes

that way

so he recognized that what the

Republicans ought to do is to shift

attention away from their social

economic policies to something else

what are now called cultural issues

with Nixon it was what was called the

southern strategy

let's draw Southern Democrats to the

Republican Party by barely concealed

racism by the mid-1970s

Republican strategists

record pulls over particular

recognize that if the Republicans

pretended I stress pretend

to be opposed to abortion

they could pull in the

huge Evangelical book then being

politicized for the first time and the

northern Catholic vote so they all

switched on a dime uh George H.W bush

Reagan had been strongly

what's now called pro-choice

suddenly became what's an uncle for life

almost instantly other leaders too so

that became a plank of the Republican

Party

later on

love of guns later on something else

anything to keep people's attention away

from the socioeconomic policies

which are very harmful for their own

constituency

so you have to shift it with Newt

Gingrich when he took over the house

this became

almost an open War we said we have to

declare a war on the Democrats uh and

since then it's been

steady decline in this direction

became Donald Trump who's in

a very good showman was able to mobilize

these ideas that these Tendencies very

successfully

so you look at his legislative program

one achievement

a major tax cut for the rich and the

corporate sector

stabbing everyone else in the back but

you don't talk about that what you talk

about is the great replacement

Democrats being sadistic pedophiles or

anything else just it's kind of don't

look behind the curtain you know it's uh

and that's been

you can understand the success there has

been a period of 45 years of

what amounts to Savage class war

against the general population it's

bipartisan led by Republicans started

Ronald Reagan followed by Bill Clinton

Obama and it's it's called neoliberalism

but which has a technical definition

then definition of neoliberalism you

look it up in the dictionary and says

something about free markets free

enterprise that's not what it is uh the

uh it's basically class one

so yes there is deregulation

that is free of Enterprise but there's a

footnote

deregulation leads to financial crashes

very quickly in fact started right away

in the Reagan Administration

Continental no my bill and

homing savings and home prices

the business World understands that the

way it works is get deregulation we move

towards monopolization quite naturally

we make risky Investments make a ton of

money we're not all crashes

the state comes in and the friendly

taxpayer business and we're seeing it

right now unfortunately but it happens

over and over so it's a market

bailout economy for the very rich and

many other things

the cooperate and So Reagan and also

Thatcher is

associated in this uh their first Acts

were to attack labor movement and

undermine it severely that made good

sense the labor movement is the main way

in which people can defend themselves in

a vicious class of War so you have to

eliminate the defenses they used illegal

means but it didn't matter this opened

the door to the corporate sector to move

in with massive efforts at strike

working undermining labor laws and much

of it illegal but when you control the

criminal state it doesn't matter if what

you're doing should lead and many other

things like this go through the details

like for example real wages

for male workers are basically in 1979

productivity is increased goes to very

few hands we even have measures of it

the Rand Corporation super respectable

did a study of what they call politely

the transfer of wealth

from the working class and the middle

class lower 90 percent of the population

transfer wealth from them to the top one

percent

their estimate over the 40 Years of

class war they don't call it that is

about 50 trillion dollars that's quite

impressive class reward to steal 50

trillion dollars from the working class

in the middle class and in order to get

away with it you have to shift attention

away from the policies and go to

cultural issues well one of the effects

of the class war has been to shatter the

social order

people live with precarious existence is

very little wealth if you're an

Afro-American versus no wealth uh

precarious jobs and maybe it'll be

called tomorrow maybe he won't

associations dissolved the people are

alone atomized angry

properly angry resentful rightly

resentful distrust institutions greatly

institutions don't work for them very

fertile to Reign for demagogues you get

it accomplished megalomaniac narcissist

like Donald Trump who's a good German uh

he can mobilize people on this basis and

from their point of view it's

understandable the Republican

organization now relies pretty heavily

on a rural vote

take a walk through rural town

see what it looks like

where's the industry

is gone Clinton

developed insisted on

global

trade policies which were designed to

harm the American working class and to

benefit Rich entrepreneurs and investors

called NAFTA World Trade Organization

it's not free markets highly

protectionist it's one reason why drugs

are out of sight in the United States

because of the highly protectionist

elements of the

um investor rights agreement called free

trade agreements or in our propaganda

system

so the industry's gone uh stores are

shuttered homes are shuttered young

people are leaving there's nothing there

desperation in fact there's even an

increase in mortality on the white

working class increase in mortality

unheard of in societies outside of war

and pestilence What's Happening Here

economists call it deaths of despair

well you grab onto something

maybe it'll be the church maybe it'll be

the great replacement the Democrats are

bringing in immigrants to undermine the

white race

almost half of Republicans believe that

the Democratic party is run by sadistic

pedophiles who are trying to groom

children one after another crazy belief

and you can understand it when your life

is being taken away you grab onto

something

well it used to be things like say in

the 1930s when I was growing up

you grabbed onto the labor unions which

were then growing developing my own

family first generation working class

things were pretty harsh much worse than

today objectively but it was a hopeful

period I remembered very well

we're going to get together we're going

to get out of this together we'll work

together there was a moderately

sympathetic sympathetic Administration

and labor unions were not just wages

they were cultural institutions

classes adult education meetings

discussions concerts

even a week in the park in the Pocono

Mountains for my uh Catskill Mountains

for mine ants who were unemployed

seamsters it was a whole way of life

gone Reagan was a vicious brutal killer

and racist understood or at least as

advisors understood we ought to wipe

this out and that and it's been the same

pretty soon Clinton joined in in his own

way

well that's where we are now we have an

election coming up with one party

which is

for quite rational reasons dedicated to

undermining his democracy they can't

survive in a democratic system you can't

have a party who's Soul commitment in

policy is to enrich the very rich in the

corporate sector and stab everyone else

in the back can't run on those programs

so let's undermine democracy let's bring

up issues like Democratic

pedophiles and the great replacement

whatever crazy idea comes along next but

just turn people's attention to that

and again given the collapse the attack

on the social order this is not too hard

to do that's one party the other party

is split

the Democratic party which still

functions as a political party is pretty

much split between uh Clinton nine party

management

which is part of the general assault

with a slightly softer touch

and the sort of Sanders movement which

has a strong popular base not much of a

representation in Congress

and they are in the American system

doctrinal system they're called radical

in fact by International standards

they're mildly Centrist

in fact one of the editors of the London

Financial Times the major Business

Journal by no means the radical Journal

one of them equipped half jokingly only

half jokingly that of Bernie Sanders was

in Germany he could be running for the

Conservative Christian Democrat Party

if you look at it it's not false take a

look at his programs

Universal Health Care

free higher education

child care

have that everywhere

they have it in Germany Mexico

France to take up Brazil and look around

the world

so these are mildly Social Democratic

policies in the United States considered

very radical uh the United States has a

very class conscious business class this

goes way back that's why we have a very

violent labor history

extremely violent surprise conservative

Europeans but and now

even simple things like

maternal care care for a woman after

childbirth

the only country that doesn't have it is

the United States and a couple of

Pacific Islands a here is considered a

very radical idea

um right now in France people are out in

the streets

demonstrating that macron's version of

neoliberalism

raising pension age now here nobody

understands that of course everybody

wants to work like a maniac until the

last minute well friends still people

want to have decent lives you raise the

pension age who are you attacking

working people

not affluent professionals not people

like me not people who work in offices

we live longer

you're a construction worker police

officer

you're not going to live very alone it's

a hard life raise the pension age

you have less

of a retirement to enjoy yourself or do

whatever you want so in France that's

fighting issues

here it's almost even unimaginable

raise the pension aged 64. what's that

about

I'm in Europeans Americans work about a

month or six weeks longer than Europeans

because of the Savage character of the

uh sort of the Conservative Business run

system

it's not in the dreams you go back to

the 1930s my childhood the United States

led the way in social democracy

Europe was descending into fascism

the New Deal was offering hope for

social democracy it's later picked up in

Europe

so it's not

it's not a law of Nature and these are

basically questions of the character of

class war

that the essence of it you're not

allowed to talk about that in the United

States there's no such thing as class no

such thing just everybody's middle class

whatever that's supposed to mean well

it's not the case now there are people

who give orders or people of followers

that's class uh if and you look at the

way this is developed over the years yes

you know there's been

constant class war takes different forms

last 40 years it's been pretty Savage

not just in the United States

various forms elsewhere in France you

see the forms right like during that

cross period in office this prime

minister you look at the record

the rich have become richer the workers

have become

stagnated or become poor that's a mild

form of the class War called

neoliberalism and if I wanted indeed the

worst victims those have suffered worse

or the global selves they were subjected

to IMF structural adjustment programs

which had devastating effects in Latin

America

Africa elsewhere and the weaker are the

ones who suffer most naturally Professor

thank you for for that answer and

there's a lot there that

we can unpack and you mentioned right

now you mentioned Latin America and my

next question was regarding what we're

seeing with a fentanyl crisis and with

what we're seeing in Mexico with the

cartels and there's been a lot of

concern with how to solve this Challenge

and I kept asking myself what would

Professor Chomsky say how can we really

tackle this Challenge and if there has

to be a solution which one should it be

should it be a military Intervention

which I'm sure you you wouldn't you

wouldn't agree on

led by the U.S or would it justify the

killing of Americans would justify us

coming and helping the Mexican military

cope with the cartels or how do you

think we can solve the rising violence

that's happening south of our border

well let me give

an unserious answer and a serious answer

there's a saying in Mexico which I'm

sure you're familiar with that Mexico is

too far from God and too close to the

United States

okay since it's too close to the United

States adopt the U.S way of dealing with

these things

so in the United States there is a major

issue

the fossil fuel companies and the banks

are destroying the possibilities for

life on Earth so how do we deal with it

we try to bribe them to be nicer people

you look at the

recent so-called inflation act basically

a climate Act what it basically does is

say please fossil fuel companies be

nicer we'll pay you to be nicer we'll

give you incentives to be nicer uh we'll

offer you more fossil fuel fields to

exploit we'll give you subsidies all

right so how should Mexico deal with the

cartels bribe them say here we'll pay

you off if you stop killing people

if you listen to the United States

it's too close to the United States why

not try that

of course that's ludicrous is it more

ludicrous than what we're doing here

no now let's talk to a serious answer

what's the source of the drug problem

it's in the United States

where do the guns come from for the

Mexican cartels

from where I'm sitting right now in

Arizona

but I don't know which end of a gun to

hold but I could go into a gun store buy

a rifle and hand it over to the local

cartel representative now you can take

it to Mexico and start murdering people

problem is primarily in the United

States

that's where the drug problem is that's

where the majority of the guns are

coming from

so the problem has to be answered here

it's the criminalization of

drugs and the harsh drug policies

no this history to this

in fact it goes back to Richard Nixon

except that in his case

the Republican party still hadn't moved

off to Total savagery

so

Nixon did impose kind of drug laws but

they had a

rational

humane

element to them one part of the drug

laws was prevention and treatment

that's gone

there are studies again around

Corporation others have done studies on

what ways work for cutting down drugs

well

they studied just in terms of cost

effectiveness

the least cost the most effect

turns out the most effective by far is

prevention and treatment

worse than that is criminalization

put them in jail worse than that is

border controls

the worst of all is

chemical warfare what we call fumigation

so destroy the crops in Colombia

including drugs but all other crops as

well so you create insurgencies and

terrorism and so on that's the worst of

all that's the ranking now take a look

at the funding it's the opposite

most funding goes to the worst least

funding in fact practically none goes to

the best

well it's another form of class war in

fact the drug war has been an effective

way of

removing what are some of them is called

the dangerous classes

in fact if you look back over the

history of drugs it's the way it's

always been take prohibition

you know back in the I mean you know the

women's Temperance league and so on but

what was the powerful force behind to

get rid of the dangerous people

the guy the immigrants who hang around

in bars like those people

if you were a rich Banker living in

Westchester County you could get any

kind of wine or liquor you wanted

if you were a poor immigrant and or in

New York you get arrested and thrown

into jail

well what happened when prohibition

ended the

Arianne Slinger the head of the Federal

Bureau of Alcohol had nothing to do

so they launched a huge propaganda

campaign

trying to show that marijuana was a

killer you know Senate hearings with

lured presentations

so-called doctors coming in talking

about the Hideous things that would

happen to you if you smoked a joint and

so on just happened that marijuana was

being used by the dangerous classes

Harlem blacks

Working Class People so let's go after

marijuana let's make that the enemy then

it's one after another but

I think Nixon was probably the last

president to have had a any

semi-reasonable element in this drug

program so you want to solve the Mexican

cartel problem

overcome the drug crisis in the United

States which is where it's coming to uh

and stop the crazed gun culture

I mean there's hundreds of millions of

millions of guns in the United States

southlandish

uh the

far-right Supreme Court has turned the

Second Amendment into holy writ you know

you ask people what's in the

Constitution

first thing they'll say is the Second

Amendment

in the modern form the form that was

created by

Justice Antonin Scalia in 2008

before that the Second Amendment meant

what it said

in order to have a well-regulated

militia you know don't restrict arms now

it's changed

Clarence Thomas's View

Thomas's picture of the United States is

a hateful murderous Society his view is

look you can't walk in the streets

without having an Armory you need it

because this is such a horrible society

that was the latest decision on the New

York law to try to restrict guns on the

street no everybody has to have lots of

guns uh six-year-old kid has to walk

down the street with a

an assault rifle because who knows

what'll happen next well when you create

that kind of culture oh you're going to

be overflowing with guns schools are

going to become the most most dangerous

places in the country and it'll flow

into Mexico where the drug cartels are

delighted to have a cheap source of guns

the actual figures we don't really know

but most studies show that at least the

majority of the guns in Mexico

come from the United States Mexico

itself has pretty tight gun laws you

can't just walk into a store and buy a

gun

as you can where I live in Arizona

but with the United States right next

door

not much in the way of Border controls

to the South you can uh import guns you

can export drugs and then well we know

the answer

but it's here in the United States

Mexico itself can't do very much

wow thank you professor and

it seems that

it's an interesting take that we have to

tackle it from our end of the equation

rather than trying to solve it for

Mexico and moving on last year we also

had a conversation which was in-depth

regarding the Ukraine Russia crisis

we've been seeing the conflict escalate

and escalate and escalate and continue

to escalate up until today and we've

seen also President Biden going to

Ukraine uh in the past month to meet

with president zelensky and with ongoing

threats of escalation nuclear escalation

with the treaty being removed the

nuclear tree being removed so our

listeners wanted me to ask you on your

updates your current update perspective

on the conflict and where do you think

it's going from this point on

um side comment before I get into it how

many

presidents or high officials visited

Baghdad when the United States was

demolishing

zero in fact the peace activists in Iraq

were ordered to leave because life was

so impossible under the U.S attack

does that tell you something

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it does something you're not allowed to

talk about

it's called what aboutism

okay it's a way of deflecting attention

from what is highly important and

recognized throughout certainly

throughout the global South but even in

Europe

the hypocrisy is just

Beyond shocking and it's having an

effect

well what's happening in Ukraine

uh

the wars and escalating the Ukraine is

suffering bitterly

huge number of casualties the Ukrainian

Army has been

apparently virtually destroyed no

young recruits I'm not very well trained

and huge casualties on the Russian side

civilian casualties we don't know the

details the United Nations estimates

7 000 which is surely a serious

underestimate maybe twice three times

that many

pretty serious I mean it's not a wreck

it's not the American kind of War but

it's bad enough

then it can increase uh now it's tanks

beginning to be jet planes of the

American Military has the actually

Washington posted an article a couple

weeks ago pointing out that the U.S

American forces basically are directing

the

fire of the advanced weapons by Mars and

others that are being used

the world most of the world sees this as

a proxy war

between Russia and

the United States fought over Ukrainian

bodies

and it's being become harder and harder

to avoid that conclusion if the work

continues to escalate Ukraine will be

some of the economies very severely

harmed I mean not like Iraq or Libya or

targets of American attack but bad

enough seriousness it's going to get

worse

pretty soon increase the tax jet plans

and so on

Russia will probably retaliate by a

harsher attack against Western Ukraine

against supply lines

run to conflicts with NATO

at that point you're moving up the

escalation ladder to terminal War

Putin has made statements

inflammatory statements about

nuclear weapons in reserve

suspended participation in the new

starts reading all of this is very

dangerous uh

I should say it's equally dangerous the

way it's escalating in China we don't

talk about it much but should

but all of this is quite serious U.S

policy in Ukraine remains stable

the war must continue in order to

severely weaken Russia

that's policy

written in the united Britain which is a

virtual satellite in the United States

now Britain and the United States

actually intervened directly list March

and April to
urge Ukraine not to move towards

negotiations in

negotiations were going on with Russia

under Turkish auspices

they broke down we don't know exactly

why but

Britain and the US were very clear that

we're not ready for negotiation to them

still not the official stand remains

fight the war to severely weaken Russia

if you think about it just from a

practical point of view it's kind of

sadistic but people are in fact talking

about it to bargain for the United

States

that a small fraction of the huge

military budget the United States is

severely degrading the military forces

of its main military enemy that's being

openly discussed now in the United

States and Britain pointing this out

it's pretty obvious

whether that's a factor or not you can

debate but it's certainly a fact uh the

United States in fact you look around

the almost the entire world of suffering

from this Ukraine most but

Africa Asia and

curtailment of food and fertilizer

shipments having a big effect Europe is

declining

even moving towards the

industrialization

because of its the breaking of its

natural

trade commercial relations with Russia

the whole german-based very successful

European industrial system was based on

interactions with the East and Russia

doesn't have much of an economy it's

about the size of Mexico but it's very

rich in resources minerals oil all

Essentials for West European industry

it's collapsing

all over the world decline one exception

the US is doing brilliantly it's

degrading the forces of its enemy at

very low cost fossil fuel companies are

just euphoric with the huge profits that

come

Germany's importing

the quad national grass from the United

States and far higher costs and it could

get cheaply from Russia and arms

manufacturers they're doing great

food monopolies there's foods that

Global Food system is half a dozen

companies raising prices uh profits

going through this roof it's uh

you know it's very successful in many

ways

no how long will Europe agree to accept

this

um I don't know we do know what's

happening in the global Zone

the they're just refusing to participate

became very dramatic in the

International Conference in Munich a

couple weeks ago was an International

Conference a strategic conference the

United States Vice President Harris was

there other Representatives desperately

trying to get the countries of the South

to join the United States in the world

one after another said mothers your

world we don't pay any attention to your

hypocritical proclamations we know

exactly what they mean we've suffered

from your uh from your savagery for

centuries stop lecturing to us uh just

laugh at him

we're not going to take part in this

we're going to make our own regulation

on our commercial and other religion

arrangements with Russia and

particularly with China you don't like

it too bad but even you as a long time

U.S allies like Colombia simply flatly

refused uh Brazil no that's not our

woman I don't know what Mexico said but

probably something similar uh Asia India

Indonesia I'm sorry we continue in our

own way the United States is quite

isolated

the Anglers the English-speaking

countries and for the time being

Continental Europe

centrally isolated probably in 90 of the

countries in the world don't even

observe the sanctions uh meanwhile China

is moving ahead with its loan

development investment projects also

moving ahead diplomatically it just

threw a major wrench in long-term U.S

policy in the Middle East

by arranging the Saudi Iranian

negotiations it's a very severe blow to

the United States

control of the Middle East has been a

crime crime concern of U.S foreign

policy it's not the southern real

government

now China comes in the United States was

working very hard to put together a

an alliance of the most reactionary

states in the region

in a conflict with Iran it's called the

Abraham Accords the United States we're

supposed to applaud it was wonderful

it's actually a reactionary Alliance

subordinated to the United States aimed

at Iran

China

just dismantled it took the main element

Saudi Arabia

was not technically a member of the

Accords but basically part of it now

that means the main source of oil

pulled it into the Chinese system that

had already happened with the internet

at Arab Emirates the other major State

uh China's

has two major development programs for

Eurasia there's What's called the new

Silk Road which goes through the

Eurasian countries and the but there's

also a maritime silk route runs along

the South through these Seas one of the

hubs is the United Arab Emirates

the main along with Saudi Arabia the

main USA in the region The Hub of the

maritime Silk Road of China

these things are all taking place

the U.S can't stop them with guns

that's the U.S comparative advantage

military force

but it doesn't stop these things

they continue
and the world is

moving towards

complicated

reconstruction uh Ukraine war has

as part of it

the Korean War has driven I mean apart

from the criminality of the aggression

major crime it's also criminally stupid

from Putin's point of view

he gave the United States its fondest

wish Europe on a silver platter instead

of an accommodation between Russia

Germany

to the benefit of both

could drive Europe into the hands of

Washington and Russia moves to the east

we don't have the details of the latest

meeting of China and Russia a couple of

days ago but what's leaking out

indicates probably that the part of it

is economic policies developing Chinese

development of industrial projects in

eastern Siberia

and access to the rich mineral resources

of Eastern Siberia that's very likely as

Russia's most of the East

Europe sits in the pocket of the United

States and declines

um well uh India Indonesia South Africa

Brazil they're just going in their own

Direction maybe in their own

Arrangements that seem

that seems the way the world is moving

and the US has one

overwhelmingly powerful weapon violence

but it doesn't work very well in this

situation

in fact the U.S moving to China

the U.S which of course controls NATO

has now expanded NATO to the

indo-pacific region there is very

significant the last NATO Summit meeting

declared that the Pacific Ocean and the

Indian Ocean are part of the North

Atlantic

now

indo-pacific organization Europe is

drawn into the conflict of the U.S is

escalating with China

it's both military and

the commercial and the Biden

administrations quite openly openly no

secret declared a economic war or

against China trying to prevent China's

Economic Development by withholding from

them advanced technology and trying to

force Europe Netherlands particularly

like South Korea and Japan to break off

their relations with China and which is

their main market for advanced

technology

will they accept this

don't actually know it's very I'm going

to take Netherlands

as the main

industry in the world for crucial parts

of the development of semiconductors

are they going to agree to lose their

Major Market because the U.S told them

to

maybe if so they go into decline

if not

the world changes

I think all of these things are

right on the border and

the

one top US general and forgotten his

name just a couple of weeks ago

predicted that there would be a U.S

China war within two years

there can't be a U.S China award

both countries get destroyed there's no

such thing

but the people generals Congress talk

about it as if it's possibility

uh

it's very casual to talk about nuclear

Wars utterly shocking

you can read today in the New York Times

and

a long interview with Dan Ellsberg who's

no suffering terminal cancer but trying

still trying to alert the world to the

incredible

unbelievable stupidity of even thinking

about nuclear wounds totally impossible

but it's being abandoned about as if

it's some kind of possibility and

Putin's throwing his own

oil on the fire and but

that's what we're hurtling towards

including environmental catastrophe it's

a very the most dangerous fear in human

history

well yeah it's a very like you say it's

very

concerning that we are just casually

talking about a nuclear war and casually

talking about

the world transitioning from a unipolar

order to a multipolar order and like you

say my next question was going to be

your thoughts on the China Russian

development diplomatic developments

which you answered very thoroughly and I

appreciate that and it's it's impressive

like you say that we're moving on to a

world where nuclear war is being

discussed just casually like even among

friends

which is a strange time to live in and a

concerning one indeed Professor moving

on to an article you wrote on artificial

intelligence you wrote it last the last

couple of weeks

and

it got me thinking on your thoughts on

of course you you write them thoroughly

in that article but in the future and

which is moving very rapidly for many of

us including my generation who has to

transition and adapt to a world where AI

can come to get all of our jobs so what

are your thoughts for our listeners who

haven't read your article on chat GPT on

Artificial Intelligence on its dangers

in terms of not only

taking jobs but also building a more

dangerous world for all of us and its

potential threats

well we should first

recognize that

a huge amount of discussion about Chad

Pat and other devices is a totally

groundless

these have nothing to do they tell us

these systems are designed in such a way

that in principle

they can tell us nothing about language

about learning about intelligence about

thought

nothing they do some very sophistic

there's a lot of sophisticated

programming but basically what it comes

down to is

sophisticated high-tech plagiarism

that's uh in a certain way I mean you

have a computer when you're typing a

letter you get hints about what the next

word will be in autofilm well this is

glorified autofilm it's ways of making

up

good guess about what your next word

ought to be in a sequence of words if

you do this with an astronomical

database extraordinary database

supercomputers and a couple of billion

parameters string it together you get

something that looks pretty much like a

normal language use

the program is quite sophisticated so

you know you don't choose the most

probable next word because if you did

that it would look kind of bland and not

very interesting

so you pick a lower probability word so

it's a little bit surprising that makes

it gives the false impression that

something's happening but and there

there's as far I mean conceivably

somebody will come up with a

constructive purpose so far there's none

but it's very dangerous in many ways not

so much taking jobs and maybe in the

long term but I don't think that's a

major thing it's dangerous in other ways

for one thing people take it seriously

there are cases people think they're

talking they ask it's like asking

questions of

these devices that the

what do they call them Alexa Alexa you

ask Alexa

should I you know should I leave my wife

or something Alexis is something or

other well that's Alexa you don't pay

that much attention if it's a chat but

you do pay attention and there are

already documented cases of people

getting deluded into believing these

things are real

um Thomas Friedman had an article in the

New York Times about it in which he

wasn't criticizing it he was accepting

it he was saying oh my God it's

Promethean the greatest Advance ever uh

well people fall forward cause them a

lot of problems

um the uh it's a terrific technique of

defamation and disinformation and that's

already being used

especially when you combine it with the

artificial image creation which is not

very hard

you get things you can put somebody's

name under it definitely fantastic

defamation massive ways of the

disinformation

as soon as it gets with Bots and

organized societies behind it it'll be a

flood all of this can be extremely

dangerous uh

no scientific interest no intellectual

interest but it does have

could have major effects it's

conceivable that it might replace some

work like maybe routine coding or

something like that but

it's it's a very threatening dangerous

development

Professor yeah it's a it's a counter

idea counter argument to all of the hype

that we're seeing in terms of charge GPT

and artificial intelligence it's also a

stumbling thought that without checks

and balances these Technologies can pose

threads that we can't even imagine

with hiding this information and the

effects of fake images constructed in

many more many more dangers and it's

important to have these conversations to

have them in mind

I'm beginning to be aware of of the time

Professor I know we have to wrap up soon

so my last question goes back to

your re when you were remembering the

1930s and how you said uh

the times there were in your childhood

where of optimism and how to how to

build the future that we can all strive

towards and it seems that in today's

conversations in today's political

climates and in today's society

the conversations are how can we become

more device

divide divided and how can we really not

be optimistic into the future be more of

a having more of a dystopian Vision so

Professor my last question for you is

how do you think we can reconcile our

differences in the American society in

this bipartisan environment that we are

on and how can we get back to that

Optimist perspective optimistic Vision

vision of the future

I think we know exactly how to do it

you go back to the Obama Obama years not

very far

the message was

hope and change

we can do it

brought it in a lot of people

a lot of the working class that's now

voting for Trump was voting for Obama

took the word seriously

the words seriously the actions didn't

coincide with the words

the actions were betray people

film this is just rhetoric you voted for

me and I'll go home I'll continue

working for the rich and Powerful well

what's the answer

take it seriously and do it can be done

I mean

a lot of things can be done let's take

the financial crisis 2008 let's be

concrete

one of the things that happened was that

the government virtually nationalized

the Auto industry which was collapsing

the government took it over

what did they do

build up

the owners

put them back in their positions maybe

new faces but the same class and set

them to redoing what they had been doing

producing more automobiles more SUVs

there was an alternative

handed over to the workforce

handed over to the communities

let it be run by the people and workers

in Detroit not rich Bankers in New York

have them produce things that the

country needs like mass transportation

not more SUVs

there was a possibility

wasn't thought about because we were not

organized active militant enough to make

that an issue

okay let's do it let's make it an issue

let's say yes these things are possible

that's one example there's a thousand

more examples

another example is

take over the fossil fuel Industries in

fact you can even buy them at market

prices the government could wouldn't be

more than the bailouts for the financial

industry turn them to sustainable energy

can be done to the workforce isn't even

been interested in West Virginia coal

State United mind workers has accepted a

transition program my friend and

colleague Robert Pollan in his group

very group have been working on this in

the ground Working Class People who said

okay we can imagine moving to it

transition program away from coal

towards capping the minds developing

sustainable energy better jobs better

communities better life the cold Baron

representative Joe manchin you just want

to hear about it of course the cold

fossil fuel Industries don't want to

hear about it but these things are on

the verge of possibility

and there's many more like them you can

think case after case well those the

Pope the reason to be optimistic is

there are these opportunities

can it be achieved

who knows

can't tell until you try

it's like negotiations in Ukraine you

don't try nothing will happen

you do trade maybe it'll fail maybe

it'll succeed same with everything else

Professor thank you thank you for that

answer and for these enlightening

conversation I'm sure our listeners will

find it very insightful as the previous

ones

and I'm looking forward to having this

conversation more in the future and

getting to get your insights into our

world ourselves and how to become more

optimistic and also active in building

our society to the better so Professor

again thank you so much for joining me

very glad to be with you

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