Guru Right to Respond with Robert Wright *UNEDITED*

It was not a bad conversation, but I am always left with the feeling that people talking about NATO expansion always seem to forget that the Russians never really gave up on their claims to their empire or accepted the crimes of the Soviets. The president of Estonia, Lennart Meri, laid this out quite clearly during a speech in Hamburg in 1994. Furthermore depending on your view in 2008, Putin had already brutally subjugated Chechnya. In a way NATO caused the War in Ukraine works mostly because Americans don't really pay attention or know much about Eastern Europe and if they do it is mostly a Russianized perspective like giving credence to Crimea not really being Ukrainian. Also waffling on the clear cultural and linguistic genocide in progress in the occupied areas feels rather weak. Anti-imperialist Americans seem generally underinformed when looking at Russia so they pivot to what they know 'West does bad things.' and fit the situation in that mold. Good on Chris for voicing the obvious when stating that regardless of neighbors, the right of the Ukrainians to choose is paramount and as long as they want to fight on the west should provide them with the means.

Wouter Vermeyen

When I was a kid I decided that every night while we’re sleeping, we transpose into another persons consciousness. We never know it because lived experience is also transposed, so you would never have the memory of being anyone else. I entertained this idea for a while, somewhat amused that I was building it for others to witness as “they” rotated into “my” consciousness. I came to understand that this concept was not falsifiable (perhaps obviously). I also came to realize that entertaining the possibility was a good recipe for severe anxiety.

Jesse Hodges

That's very fair, and I'm much more inclined to agree having read more since watching the episode. He seems to sit in a part of the left American discourse where we look at world events through the failures and malicious subterfuge of our past, often to the detriment of addressing the present. The consistent reframing of the issue back to a US perspective, when many questions were about an EU or NATO perspective, makes it easy to see (and stop at) whataboutism in his responses if the listener isn't willing to do some work to dig beneath the surface and both his and our kneejerk reactions.

Geoff Whiting

Whatever you think of his political takes, Bob's perspective is interesting and I think he does represent a common perspective on the left.

Christopher Kavanagh

He came up enough times that we will probably edit a few out!

Christopher Kavanagh

Understandable given how long he endured talking to us!

Christopher Kavanagh

Thanks Sue! We are the true IDW ;)

Christopher Kavanagh

Because he is right!

Christopher Kavanagh

Cheers!

Christopher Kavanagh

Yep. I worked with these gents at Slate, and then Bob hired me to work at Bloggingheads. I love Mickey and Bob, but their views on some things make me bananas.

Sian Gibby

Noticed you being discussed on the Parrot Room a few times too Sian!

Christopher Kavanagh

Came here to watch this because Bob said in the Parrot Room that y'all (and esp Chris) gave him the business on Ukraine.

Sian Gibby

Martin Unland Elorrieta

Great episode. Will have to support Chris in his view of consciousness.

Giovanni

Thank you so much for the push back on his views on Putin and NATO. His political naivete reaches Neville Chamberlain levels.

Mike Nelson

I really enjoyed this one. The subject matter, but also simply the relatively rare phenomenon of watching people who like each other navigating strong disagreement. Too often we see people either in total accord (which can be fine), or yelling over each other without pausing to think beyond their talking point.

Sue Sutton

I think Bob came across very well, aside from being a little testy at the end.

Kat

I really enjoyed the discussion. I've been reading/listening to Bob on and off since the early '90s so no big surprises for me. Regarding US foreign policy, I tend to share Bob's jaded view. He referenced Dulles Brothers in the '50s, but having studied US diplomacy from the Spanish-American War (1898) forward, I've counted well over 70 US foreign interventions, by which I mean either overt or covert interference with a nation's sovereignty and attempts at regime change. It's a spectacularly unsuccessful record, with even short run successes tending towards eventual blowback. Only sorry you didn't get the time to jointly make fun of Sam Harris more.

TheRick

best pushback on Bob's position i've heard and appreciate it very much as i've found all things you brought up so frustrating having liked him and his stuff for so long. bizarrely similar at times to Sam - ' i'm not that familiar with their work' when cherry picking and thank god someone brought up hid gliding over atrocities and equivalence. i think problem is he can't bring himself to explicitly state where his realpolitik ends up and eventually he began to go quiet as you pointed it out and even stopped defending / cog empathising with Putin.Think you both not being American meant he also had to deal with non-us consequences of his view and where it leads. It's fine if he holds these views but hopefully but his glossing over, cherry picking and taking agency away from everyone was at least called out. i did feel a bit sorry for him at end whether caffeine or his difficulty defending against reasonable people. He remains very likeable and i'll still listen to him though- especially on non- Ukraine stuff. Again like Sam and Chris what are the odds he'll modify at least his presentation on Ukraine though...😶

Brainbiter

This was a wild ride. Not being familiar with him before this, it was pretty surprising to hear him call himself left-of-center. Also very easy to see how he has hung the albatross of whataboutism around his neck.

Geoff Whiting

Think this is a glitch on your side, we haven’t heard this anywhere else.

Christopher Kavanagh

Poor Bob. It was evident Bob was running out of steam. I appreciated the clarification because the framing in the Nonzero newsletter obscures Bob’s fulsome position.

Tim Tripp

Wright* to respond

James Lohner

Not to be too crass, but if I were to set up mad scientist experiments in the future, I'd have a few ideas how to make (cognitive processes associated with subjective) 'consciousness' visible; for example by trying to multiplex identical inputs with brain-machine interfaces onto brains to see if identical subjective experiences can be prompted...

Protagonist Science

Also, Robert is wrong when he says: 'Consciousness is not publicly observabale' as if it will or could never be. It might be unobservable yet but does not mean it will be so in the future. There were plenty of scientific phenomena 'unobservable' for most of human history until we build the tools to observe them. Germ theory comes to mind, or LIGO... I see now evidence why cognitive processes that feed our internal U.I ('consciousness') should be unobservable, for me this is like saying: 'Ah, software programs/video game worlds/virtual realities are actually publicly unobservable' when in fact we build the interface technologies that let us observe these.

Protagonist Science

On the issue of consciousness, Chris is right. There is no magic sauce of subjective experience, there is no unknowability inherent to it that science cannot fathom because it is outside its purview, and there is no doubt that science will eventually have the right descriptions to deal with all the processes we now collectively assign to consciousness, probably leading to the break-up up of the concept of consciousness into more apt descriptions of what is going on 'under the hood'.

Protagonist Science