While watching Grey's Rules for Rulers video, it did feel as though Grey was the mentor passing knowledge to the audience, almost to a level where I felt like I should be taking notes and I feel that's a good thing, it almost gives me an idea of how general education can really evolve through automation and platforms like UA-cam.
And it only took him 2+ months, scripts and an editor to produce less than half an hour of content for a public that wants his content and isnt distracted by puberty fluids while they watch (or if they are, it doesnt affect the quality of his presentation). He also only produces content he wants to talk about. These "half-dead automatons" teach whatever they are told to teach to a room full of more or less unwilling individuals ; they do this about 5 days a week, several hours a day and with - in many countries - bad recognition by the institutions that may not trust them (and often badly trains them), bad recognition by parents (that often delegate their roles to the teachers) and bad recognition by society at large.
Was it really that bad though? There wasn't much structural policy change between Trump and Obama, and now there's not much between Trump and Biden. I'm no fan of Trump's, but in terms of policy we got nothing worse than the typical republican tax stuff. I understand the way he conducted himself wasn't what we were used to seeing, but if anything at least he was honest about how horrible he was rather than hiding behind a veil of presidential behavior.
Why couldn't she have just explained the situation to them and said that she could let them graduate a semester early if they tutored the other students and brought the grades up?
@@Flowtail May be it's possible that she fears Grey and his friend will go talk to someone that eventually get to the dean's ear. It's possible to say them to not tell anyone, but well, how can you trust 2 students on something that can affect your carreer?
Check out The Machiavellians by James Burnham. As the Italian School of Elite Theory and the Iron Law of Oligarchy demonstrate, it's worse than you think.
@@Flowtail probably because asking them would require negotiation no matter what while sending a message to the dean might result in needing to negotiate but it can also result in just an "ok request done" without needing to do anything more
As I listen to your school example, I was reminded of something that happened to me in college. I had a good professor for differential equations and everyone was getting A+'s in the class. On the day after the penultimate test, the professor starts class reveiling that the test was switched with another professor's test. This other professor had accused our professor of falsifying our grades, citing some standard grading curve. Our professor then boasted that the other professor's students had worse grades and that our grades improved. Our professor was gone after the end of the semester. Oof!
very glad Grey slogged through the difficulty in finishing "The Rules for Rulers" also glad the podcast is crossposted to UA-cam, I may not have found this discussion otherwise
Check out James Burnham's The Machiavellians, and the Italian School of Elite Theory next. The Iron Law of Oligarchy and the Circulation of Elites will likewise blow your mind.
It's a good thing your video's topic changed from being about the US's election to the "Rules for Rulers", changed my perspective entirely on politics as a whole and got me thinking about the reason behind every "corrupt" leader's actions. Much more useful than just another video about the Goddamned US elections again. You're work is inspiring and changing people's thought processes. That's an accomplishment you should be proud of.
It essentially explains why voluntarism isn't currently workable on the large scale. It can work on the small scale, happens all the time. But when you try to apply it to hundreds of people that are pooling their resources you are combining the ingredients to the rules for rulers, which leads you to an organizational structure...
@@MoonChildMedia the video explains some of the random actions a politician in a democracy will do (like reducing x tax for y group randomly through their terms or trying to get something passed through congress/parliament that they never talked about when they were campaigning). It also explains why dictatorships or single party states will suddenly do brutal or really kind things without further notice or indication. Whether some of these actions are good or bad is a completely different moral topic
On the original video 7:30 is such a lie, they obviously don't understand the complexity of the situations, instead just keeps portraying things as if he is a genious, anyone who worked in economic fields would roll their eys at this But I guess people on this channel don't have vast economical/political knowledge and will bow to this guy as some genious as if everything he says is true and we live all in this dystopianism Edit 1: 8.00 yes because parents don't care if you improve quality of their children Edit 2: Good lord democracies have lower taxes??? Just look at South Europe/Scandinavia taxes as comparison to Middle East for example 11:30 The amount of people that think this guy is a genious is trouble
Hey CGP Grey. I watched your "Rules for Rulers" video when it first came out. I only watched this video today, and listened to what it took for you to make this video. I just wanted to say thank you. Because of this video, I read the Dictator's Handbook, and that your "Rules for Rulers" changed my life. This helped the world make more sense to me. I plan to show this video to my kiddos when they are old enough.
i just quit a corporate job not too long ago because of how i couldn't deal with the bizarre power games and incomprehensible social attacks, and i've been struggling with the fact that none of the noble-sounding things i've been told about how democracy works seem to really be applicable, so the video was kind of a timely appearance in my life. it was like, once the things that had been angering me had been explained, i just felt sort of free and like i understood the world well enough to maybe do something about it for the first time since probably 2012. also a lot of the stuff you guys say in this 'cast about the subject is really relatable, especially with your school and work gripes. and also i super immediately went to buy the dictator's handbook as soon as the rules for rulers video ended lmaoo
In large public companies, CEOs don't typically have a huge degree of control over who sits on the board. Formally, that'd be the nominations committee, which is independent. Of course, if the CEO is also Chairman or happens to be a major shareholder, then "formally" is really more like "notionally", and "independent" is more like "suckling at the teat of power".
Thank you so much for pushing through making that video. It has changed my and many peoples perspective on power structures from a logical and mathematical perspective. Please do not abandon good concepts like this.They can change the world in no small way.
really man!?!? I'm kinda freaking out right now as I just had a moment where I realized I might be a hella screwed up person because everything this video covers is like first grade elementary common sense to me to the point I'd be playing with my toys recreating the rules for rulers on the playground! yikes!!!
Shit man! You must be so much brighter than the rest of us! Yet, I have a sneaking suspicion that you're a nobody with influence over nothing. Funny thing that is, eh?
the dictators handbook was an amazing suggestion and an amazing first video. it really has change how I look at power, and makes sense of a lot of things. thank you for introducing this to me, especially during this election.
I watched this video in 2018. Depending on your stance, on various global, economic, and other partially political perspectives, the conversation at the end pulls different emotions from you.
The kick of hilarity that someone officially voted for these two podcasters to be president and vice president, and the mild disappointment that there seems to be no record of this write-in otherwise.
When Grey finally talks with his office neighbour: G: Hi! N: Uh... Please don’t torture me for taking your pen, I didn’t have one and I had to sign the document I’m so sorry.
"I got an email from the publisher of the book, who told me that they had sold all of the books. And that they were doing another printing of the book, because there were no more books." I just can't even with this quote... so awesome...
[Keep the records going] Grey 2016: "How much bad could happen in four years? I can't imagine very much" Ian B. Lucy August 2021: "Either gray had no idea or he had every idea" DI05 August 2022: "Minutes turned to seconds, hours turned to minutes, days to hours, months to days, and years to months." [insert yours here next year]
40:04 Instead of a hard cut-off, they should use an "S" curve near 10 minutes. It could be that the algorithm allows you to schedule an ad, but between 8 minutes and 18 minutes there is an "S" curve where depending on the user or other data, even at random, a small percentage are shown an extra ad at the end, then at the 18 minute mark everyone is shown an ad. In between there is x% chance an ad will show, according to the "S" curve. So the hard and fast 10 minutes +1second stops being a thing, and people just accept that getting near 10 minutes is better, and each bit past is better still, though with diminishing returns.
I feel the way you took and made the video was genius because not everyone has access to knowledge, but we all still have our own intuition. If you're somebody gifted with both the ability to read, and express those ideas intuitively, you gain a power that the authors of those books did not have and that's a way to create thoughts on not just the hearts, but the minds of people.
I like stating the obvious because it gives us more leeway to picture the less obvious tangents, contrary points, and alternate interpretations.For example, gold is not the only treasure, and people are social creatures, not mere calculators. Charisma is an asset.
I found it kind of strange how when Rules for Rulers came out, CGP Grey cited the book, The Dictator's Handbook, then some time later, the citation disappeared from the description, and then later still, the citation was re-added. Not sure what that was all about.
I was wondering this too. The video was great, but literally NONE of the ideas in them were original and basically followed the beats of the book. To remove the citation almost bridges on plagiarism. But it didn’t really matter because most of the people who saw the video walked away believing Grey was a political genius when in reality, all it proved was that he read an extremely well researched and executed book. Written by others. I don’t know, seemed scummy to me. But maybe he had different motivations than what I’m thinking
@@mythos951 Nah, can't take all credit away from CGP Grey, his video got me interested enough to buy & read the book itself. And his presentation style is his own at laying out what he thought were the most important or compelling ideas of the book.
@@mythos951 He is describing a real situation that happens, just because the original author was first to put it down on paper doesn't mean he has ownership over the concepts. This would be like the first person to write down the mechanics behind running, refusing to allow anyone else to describe it even in their own words.
So great to see this, as an "self-employed" the words that you spoke @45:00 is comforting. Its the main reason I dropped the agencies I worked for, not believing in what I was doing.
It's about reverse-engineering the political system. In the book, The Dictator's Handbook, there are recommendations for breaking the control of the rulers. One of the most powerful innovations might be sortition, randomly selected representative (the way we select jurors), which was used to avoid corruption in Switzerland. The Sortition Foundation is a good source for additional information.
Joe Adams yes. but cultural and belief systems would take on effect. such in switzerland it would work because the level of educations and clear seperations between religion and faith from the government system (not saying that they dont have faith(s) or religions, but they were strict on the involvement to deciding every actions). it would be very difficult to apply to the many religious-centered societies
@@docadams1 The point being "how would you get people to say 'yeah, we'll elect the mayor the way we do juries despite the fact that most people spend far more time complaining about jury duty than actually ever serving on a jury'"
@@Flowtail The same way we put a gun in their hands and sent them to Vietnam. Only this time, they don't have to kill people or take orders from other people. We could allow them to decline if they pay a fee or something. The Confederacy and the Union did that in the Civil War. If you're going to live here, you should be responsible for maintaining the country. The Swiss had no problem doing it when they used it. From Wikipedia: "Modern-era citizen lawmaking began in the towns of Switzerland in the 13th century. In 1847, the Swiss added the "statute referendum" to their national constitution. They soon discovered that merely having the power to veto Parliament's laws was not enough. In 1891, they added the "constitutional amendment initiative". Swiss politics since 1891 have given the world a valuable experience base with the national-level constitutional amendment initiative.[10] In the past 120 years, more than 240 initiatives have been put to referendums. The populace has been conservative, approving only about 10% of these initiatives; in addition, they have often opted for a version of the initiative rewritten by government. "
Most states (including Illinois) require write-ins to file paperwork to be counted. And some States outright refuse to count write-ins for President. How disappointing.
But talking about books, I would love CGP Grey to do a video about The Idea Factory. I'm suprised that even though he majored in Physics, he doesn't have videos about that.
It’s really interesting to me how Grey is talking about how the video might appear cynical. For me it’s exactly the opposite. Whenever I get too frustrated with politics I go back to watch his video and it always makes me feel better about politics and the intentions of politicians.
Honestly it kinda makes me think of the existential dread of ever being in the highest position of power. You basically become reduced to a mechanism that either must act within the interests of your keys/find a way to basically dominate the board system to include members that are basically your pawns, or just get eaten up by a more competitive engine that does your job way better. You could argue it is very natural selection but its also very wild, stressful and psychologically taxxing, just look at how much politicians age and physically deteriorate from the stress of the system, is it worth shortening your lifespan and suffering so greatly for transient money, power and influence?. It just really shows that most of the power relations in the hierarchy disincentives being good, because you are punished by being replaced for doing so. And even if you play the game of self-interests, you could be imperfect, slow to act or lack knowledge or insight in some ways and then a competitor can come and oust you. The security of being in the highest seat of power is quite low unless you amass an empire to dominate the board (ironically the only way to secure your place is to become a pseudo-dictatorship). It just feels like way too much mental gymnastics that only some really ambitious megalomaniacs would want to gun for such things.
Enjoyed this immensely. Laughed a lot regarding the college Economics Dept. incident. I've often told people that I went to college to learn Architecture, but ended up learning Politics -- a quite similar situation. :D
20:34 So people care more about metrics of their job performance than the integrity of the duties, functions & purpose of the job. If a person focuses more on the metrics, then you can game the system to get more rewards.
You forgot to factor in the ruler`s skill at bargaining with his keys. The more brutal the competition he can keep them in, the less treasure he has to use to please them and the more he can use on the people. It`s not easy but it IS possible. Divide and conquer is something you can use for good as well. There are also plenty of cases where dictatorships, based on resource extraction or not, used their power to fantastically boost the average peasant`s standard of living as well as greatly diversify the economy. Saddam`s Iraq, Ghadaffi`s Lybia, the USSR, Yugoslavia etc. Yes, all of these had human rights abuses ranging from "meh" to "horrendous" but they were against rivals, disobedient cronies and remnants of the predecessor`s power-structure. They were not slaughters of poor resource-extracting peasants rebelling because of their being exploited.
Honestly this is perhaps the best explanation of how Putin seems to be retaining power in Russia right now. The invasion of Ukraine's various military disasters and the resulting cost in treasure, prestige and lost opportunity for international trade mean most of the oligarchs - Russia's most obvious keys to power - are losing money hand over fist. There is clearly something keeping them from conspiring against him. Publicly, he would claim it is loyalty, but behind the scenes I feel it is almost certainly that he is fostering an environment of confusion and fear of duplicity that keeps the keys looking at eachother for knives aimed at their backs rather than raising all those knives against Putin's back. My hope is that the delicate balance that such a system must inherently be will come toppling down on him sometime soon, but plenty of rulers stupider than him have maintained that kind of balance for years and years of loss - Hitler used that system even in the "good days" of Naziism - leading up to and in the early war when they were making money and territorial gains hand over fist, but even when the shares of power started contracting, he managed to keep things going....it's not until the last couple of weeks of the war that we really start to see the other Nazi bigwigs setting in motion their contingency plans (by which point it was pretty much universally too late.) And frankly, I think Putin is a far more competent ruler than Hitler ever was.
The CGP grey channel in general has massively influenced how I think, and the rules for rulers video in particular was one of the first things to get me to seriously think about politics and why people in power do what they do. Weirdly enough I had a loosely similar experience in college where I was kicked out of a class when I was trying to learn for its own sake simply because the professor didn't want to look bad.
if you let some random stranger on youtube influence you so deeply without a good enough reason, chances are you have neglected actually thinking for yourself for too long as a result of the prussian school model that grooms you into "trusting the experts".
@@thenightwatchman1598 Or I was 14 when I discovered the channel and around 16 when I first watched this particular video. It was an introduction to many novel concepts that when combined with independent reading helped me to form a better world model.
what's funny is how they talk about making the Rules for Rulers video differently to maximize ad revenue and how it makes business sense... that video is what made me a Grey fan to this day, all those years ago. it was the superb quality of the product. so, in a way that most companies would never be able to see, because their heads would have to be not only out of their asses, but far away from their asses as well... it made the most business sense.
Grey should write a mini series on the science channel titled "Knowledge that matters". A documentary on the specific knowledge that society relies on. How to keep electrical equipment working, how to repair large engines, etc. Other things like how to organize a large number of people so that no one is getting a free ride and wasting company resources, and at the same time not wasting everyone's time with constant reviews. A whole episode on healthcare and the core of medicine that we need in the world, like how to make pills and how to extract specific chemicals from specific plants, and then how to verify that the pills that are supposed to have a specific ingredient have actually been made to have that exact amount. How to mix concrete, how to tell the quantities of specific components of an enormous quantity of rock dust so that the concrete will undergo the necessary chemical reaction and bond correctly so that bridges, buildings, and entire city centers don't just crumble, killing untold millions of people all over the world. It is unlikely to ever get made, but it is knowledge that is extremely important to life, and as a whole we don't encourage kids to learn it in school. Rarely if ever do we mention that unless someone knows how to calibrate a carbon detector for measuring steel's carbon content, we wouldn't even be able to make the tools to do all the other jobs that we rely on for survival on this planet. Knowledge is important, and knowledge that actually matters is the most important.
I know this is very old video at this point. But honesty, in 1513 this is EXACTLY what Machiavelli wrote about. When he wrote The Prince, he was saying, "Look, I don't endorse what I'm saying, this isn't how it should be, but like it or not, this is how you rule." He speaks specifically about how a new Prince must clear the court of nobles and bring in his own people. Just like Grey talked about Jobs stacking the "court" (the boardroom) with his "nobles" (his Board friends). But it's done at all levels, when I became a VP, I immediately brought in my people under me. Because I know and trust them and I know they'll make me look good. In Grey parlance, I'm a Key for someone above me, so I need my people to make me look good to secure my Key position. I'm reading some of these comments about how people had to leave companies because of the politics and I just laugh. Guys, it's not hard. This isn't the Roman Senate. No one is getting stabbed on their way home form the market. Corporate politics are basically human interaction 101. There's nothing mysterious or difficult about it. What's more, because EVERYONE understands the rules, everyone knows what's going to happen. When a new CRO comes in, I know I'm in trouble. Either I get into his court quickly, or I start job hunting, because he'll clear me, a "noble" he doesn't know, and place his own people in. I understand that. That's why you team up with people in your career and move together.
Your video made me recognize some weaknesses in my own company and how I needed to incentivize certain key employees better to minimize risk of future betrayal. I found it valuable
This is very relevant to rules for radicals... I would love to see a video similar to this but how to break structures of power structures as outlined in rules for radicals
I thought he done very good job explaining that this is pretty much just inevitable order of things, just because it is in interest of everyone, nevertheless what it is: democracy, dictatorship, there is thinking about people or not. And as he said here, the goal is just to analyse structure and how to properly handle it
What am I supposed to do now, wait 2 weeks until you talk about the Apple conference?! Preposterous! It's only been 10 days since the last podcast -- how dare you release podcasts this often!
It’s interesting knowing that you have someone, a stranger in the next office because when you know that, you can really hear that your voice is just a bit quieter than you usually have it, and especially when you’re saying certain things, I can hear that you lower your voice just a little bit. Ha ha, but it’s probably not actually going on because if I had never been told about the “neighbour” I’d never have noticed the change.
I looked for the results of the county's election and there are some polling stations recorded with single write in votes, but hopefully they will follow up with a confirmation of that voter's particular polling place.
It’s interesting because I’ve always wanted to get into power to do good and leave the world better than how I left it. It’s very interesting to learn about this power structure and how to master it to do the good I want to do
Looking on the website of Illinois State Board of Elections where you can download the results as a pdf, it looks like that vote has not been counted in the official write-in results of 2016.
Mr Grey, you did include that your health suffered but you didn't say why. Why would this, rather than how to become the mayor of London or how the US election system works, both making being a dictator seem pretty easy by comparison , be such a stress? I am intrigued.
I think what makes a video viral is that people feel compelled to share it, so the video spreads far outside the subscriber base. If people generally feel compelled to share all CGP Grey videos, then that would make all of them viral. I think there is a baseline level of virality that is normal for CGP Grey videos, but it might be possible for a CGP Grey video to be even more viral than that if even more people than normal feel compelled to share it.
While listening to this, particularly the corporation reference, I realized that labor unions in corporations give the keys of power to the "lower level/regular" people kind of like how a true democracy gives its keys of power to the people
I view that as more of a case where someone discovered that they could insert a mid-tier power hierarchy. By claiming to represent the workers, the union bosses gain power over them. They give power (keys) to the corporation by keeping the workers in line and from the corporation gain legitimacy. And they get their reward directly from the members instead of the corporation redistributing it to them, but done with permission from the corporation.
then again labour unions get most of their money from their members. If they do not do what their members expect them to do then they will lose their members. So in this way the members own the keys for the labour union and the labour union owns keys from the companies due to it having loads of members.
@@TheRealInscrutable You're thinking HR, not unions. Unions are funded with membership dues and are not part of the work culture. Still when union bosses are far removed from their employees then things go wrong.
I wanted to buy it on audible, but I am from Germany and the publisher does not allow audible to sell it there. So I *HAD* to get it from amazon. I am still pissed about that.
What I would love to hear Grey talk about is how did it become like this? How did governments develop to have this kind of system? Why is it always greed that leads to power? Just imagine yourself with a group of friends and you are the leader and the biggest thing you might have to worry about is what to do with your buddies. How does that sort of leadership suddenly transition into needing to pay certain people to stay in charge. I feel like there was a tiny piece missing somewhere. How this comes to existence and is there possibly a better way?
It comes into existence naturally. Let's say you start with the group of friends. Well there exists a group of people who AREN'T your friends that exist. And *they* want power. The power that YOU have. If they are more ruthless, more cunning, more greedy - they'll win.
is called hierarchy, power can only be obtained by having someone with less power below you. You put friends and trusted people in positions of power, people who you know wont betray you.
Kevin Z There is a moral component, that deals with payment but isn't the same as *just* payment. I'm not disagreeing with Grey, and i know he cut a lot from his video. Just more accurate to talk about the psychology too, not just the game theory.
Grey, after having watched your video, I have developed an idea on how to change politics. And the thought process is kind of scummy, but I think that the effects would be good. *Objective:* We permanently shift focus back to local elections and increase voter turn-out also permanently. *Implementation:* All children of 13 years of age, whom are still under compulsory education laws, are also mandatory voters in local elections. How will this help? A mandatory vote of any kind will never go over well on a national level, but in the case of a local election, and for children whom already partake in a mandatory "civic duty", I could foresee this being implemented with less fuss. The effects that this would have is an upheaval in local elections, which in the US can be met with great apathy, to the point that many local officials win by default as the only candidate. And this works fine in some cases, because local electorates may have once in the past elected this local official for a reason and they have a reason to keep him in power, misplaced as that reason may be. However, by forcing all the children between 14 and 16 in a local election to make their votes count, you have greatly upset the balance in the elections. Suddenly, politicians have to placate a new key supporter; the education sector, which happens to have a lot of cross-over with other sectors. For example; infrastructure. Make traffic more comfortable for children and they will be happier going to school at all and even vote. But there are many other benefits. Children are already organized by schools. This makes them less prone to gerry-mandering, but this also makes it easier for politicians to visit specific schools and hold speeches to convince students on a personal level. It's also easier for politicians to know where their funds would be best spent if they wish to gain support; donate to a school. And because the minds of children are especially fleeting, giving them one big boulder of gold is nice, but giving all children free lunches every day for the rest of the schoolyear is more cost efficient and also more productive. What other effects this has, however, is that local politicians are reported on more. They are in the open more. They are debating more. Because they are garanteed an audience at schools. And anyone outside of that school will not neccesarily be able to attend those debates or speeches and because everyone is suspicious of what the children will vote, they all want some way to get that line of communication. Even if, before, they might not even have been interested. What do you think?
This doesn't do anything other than change a few key-holders from adults to children. Hardly a wise move. The ultimate problem, which CCP Grey seems to assume as axiomatic, is that politicians are motivated to hold onto their office. In order to do that, they cause a bunch of havoc. If you could stop that (one-term only offices) then they would be beholden to the people who elect them. In this case, that'd still be corporations, not the people, but if you outlawed all forms of advertisement that would actually help. That, however, is precariously difficult to implement. I mean, it'd require every candidate to be under surveillance and if they said a word about running for election prior to the election they would be eliminated. You could allow them to write one single "advertisement" to be used in the ballet only. This way, the only influence corporations could have is helping them write a better essay.
mathig nihilcek _"This doesn't do anything other than change a few key-holders from adults to children. Hardly a wise move."_ That's sadly not very informative. Can you explain why you think this, in light of my stated objective?
The Pretender Well, right now, a majority don't even know how to do proper research, and those that do are almost always too lazy to do it for elections. So, essentially, if you get your message out there with enough coverage, people will believe it. (Basic research is distinguishing BS sources from valid sources. If it's a newspaper = trash. If it's a large university = better. That sort of thing.) What you are suggesting is adding a new group of voters, children. Now, if you really wanted decent decision making capabilities, I'd suggest mandating 500 hours minimum in economics, politics, and sociology (combined) before anyone could vote. That's about when you can call yourself a novice and actually understand what buttons you are pushing. You still don't know what the buttons will do, but you know what the label says. Free lunches? HAHAHA... never going to happen. Besides the fact that kids wouldn't care. It's their parents who pay, not them. They'd be more happy if the school tuition went up, and the teachers provided candy. You're also patently wrong on the boulder of gold. Why do you think they fix the roads and such right before election time? Offer a bunch of children a massive party right before election time to get reelected and they will choose that over free lunches. It's a no-brainer. Improve traffic? Many kids don't even want to be in school in the first place. Make traffic worse to win more votes. In the end, politicians can buy children's votes with a few costco bags of candy, some teacher benefits. You change who the key supporters are, by adding teachers/children, but nothing fundamental will change. If anything, you introduce a host of problems due to the children not understanding what is really important, and instead caving to more short-minded desires.
mathig nihilcek _"Now, if you really wanted decent decision making capabilities"_ See, but that's not my goal here. Like I said, my suggestion is scummy and it's scummy in the way that it's not actually about decent decision making. It's about people trying to influence the influencors around those children, with monetary support. But I guess you're right about the parties. However, what about multiple donors funding multiple parties, doesn't that just equalize matters?
Rules for rulers is my favorite video on the internet and has been for years. I post it to my Facebook page annually. To me it is the lord of the rings of internet content.
Watched both parts of this and listened to the discussion. Remarkably interesting, thanks. Wondering if this apply to a direct/pure democracy like what two cantons of the Swiss have? Will matters become messier i.e having more keys instead with a representative democracy or a dictatorship?
BigBadWolf 2nd that. albeit i have read the old version discussed this topic (ill principe and le discourse ~machiavelli. onze strijd~sutan tahdir alisyahbana etc) but it is lacking in modern day global effect applications). so how about it? or make it a book of your version, Grey?
When I listened to this I assumed you were doing an update of The Prince, by Machiavelli, but you never mention that and a search through the first page of the comments doesn't mention Machiavelli either.
Discovering Grey and Myke's podcast years later. I've got a question for any well-meaning persons that come across this comment: What did they mean by Guns, Germs, and Steel being misinterpreted? Is it being championed by people that completely missed the excellently dispelled/destroyed myth of European exceptionalism?
re Head of Economics Department - No evidence is being given that that acted soley in their own interests. By removing 2 students the grading curve is no longer skewed which benefits more students than it damages. The problem seems to lie in the grading on a curve method. The inclusion of 2 highly advanced members (on an optional basis) disadvantaged the group as a whole. Although it probs totes was bcz it made her look bad.
Dan Random it a sad...sad day for human strive for advancement the day the educator hinders the achievement and passion of learning from students just to make it in the dean good side. :(
Dan Random It's ironic that the economics department could not just recognize the two students as outliers in the grade curves to save the economics students. ANYONE in economics could tell you that you need to recognize outliers to accurately interpret and manipulate important data. I'd do that in a heartbeat and make myself look better with having high test scores in my reports.
I hear the great power line as "With Grey power comes Grey responsibility"
E
While watching Grey's Rules for Rulers video, it did feel as though Grey was the mentor passing knowledge to the audience, almost to a level where I felt like I should be taking notes and I feel that's a good thing, it almost gives me an idea of how general education can really evolve through automation and platforms like UA-cam.
He felt like an actual teacher and not those miserable half-dead automatons I had at my school..
And it only took him 2+ months, scripts and an editor to produce less than half an hour of content for a public that wants his content and isnt distracted by puberty fluids while they watch (or if they are, it doesnt affect the quality of his presentation). He also only produces content he wants to talk about.
These "half-dead automatons" teach whatever they are told to teach to a room full of more or less unwilling individuals ; they do this about 5 days a week, several hours a day and with - in many countries - bad recognition by the institutions that may not trust them (and often badly trains them), bad recognition by parents (that often delegate their roles to the teachers) and bad recognition by society at large.
narsil1984 Good that you agree! The schooling system is fucked and is in need of overhaul.
abschussrampe
In general, yes, sure. In some countries more than in others.
I don't know if you know. But Grey did used to teach Science (physics I think?) at a high school level.
"How much bad could happen in four years? I can't imagine very much" Either gray had no idea or he had every idea
Grey*
I instantly thought of the still ongoing COVID pandemic and how they would react to it as pres/vice pres.
Was it really that bad though? There wasn't much structural policy change between Trump and Obama, and now there's not much between Trump and Biden. I'm no fan of Trump's, but in terms of policy we got nothing worse than the typical republican tax stuff. I understand the way he conducted himself wasn't what we were used to seeing, but if anything at least he was honest about how horrible he was rather than hiding behind a veil of presidential behavior.
This aged.... poorly.
@@greymatter5492 Yeah, Autocorrect...
That Economics minor story is so gutturally frustrating.
Why couldn't she have just explained the situation to them and said that she could let them graduate a semester early if they tutored the other students and brought the grades up?
@@Flowtail May be it's possible that she fears Grey and his friend will go talk to someone that eventually get to the dean's ear. It's possible to say them to not tell anyone, but well, how can you trust 2 students on something that can affect your carreer?
I doubt the dean would have cared.
Check out The Machiavellians by James Burnham. As the Italian School of Elite Theory and the Iron Law of Oligarchy demonstrate, it's worse than you think.
@@Flowtail probably because asking them would require negotiation no matter what while sending a message to the dean might result in needing to negotiate but it can also result in just an "ok request done" without needing to do anything more
As I listen to your school example, I was reminded of something that happened to me in college. I had a good professor for differential equations and everyone was getting A+'s in the class. On the day after the penultimate test, the professor starts class reveiling that the test was switched with another professor's test. This other professor had accused our professor of falsifying our grades, citing some standard grading curve. Our professor then boasted that the other professor's students had worse grades and that our grades improved. Our professor was gone after the end of the semester. Oof!
Oof indeed
His mistake was boasting. Never give your rival ammunition.
Scorpio pursuit of power by itself. They don't understand competence as a power.
CGP Grey needs to narrate a civ/god game.
fucking yea
I would love that very much!
Holy shit.. that is a good idea
Shut monkeys I hate you black people
How is this my top comment? 5 years old with a few 5 year old replies and one from a few months ago.
very glad Grey slogged through the difficulty in finishing "The Rules for Rulers"
also glad the podcast is crossposted to UA-cam, I may not have found this discussion otherwise
The Errant One, same here. I don't know how it happened, but I'm glad it did.
Check out James Burnham's The Machiavellians, and the Italian School of Elite Theory next. The Iron Law of Oligarchy and the Circulation of Elites will likewise blow your mind.
It's a good thing your video's topic changed from being about the US's election to the "Rules for Rulers", changed my perspective entirely on politics as a whole and got me thinking about the reason behind every "corrupt" leader's actions. Much more useful than just another video about the Goddamned US elections again. You're work is inspiring and changing people's thought processes. That's an accomplishment you should be proud of.
may I ask how your perspective changed? I'm just curious, as a voluntaryist, I'm a little confused on how to take the rules for rulers video.
It essentially explains why voluntarism isn't currently workable on the large scale. It can work on the small scale, happens all the time. But when you try to apply it to hundreds of people that are pooling their resources you are combining the ingredients to the rules for rulers, which leads you to an organizational structure...
@@MoonChildMedia the video explains some of the random actions a politician in a democracy will do (like reducing x tax for y group randomly through their terms or trying to get something passed through congress/parliament that they never talked about when they were campaigning). It also explains why dictatorships or single party states will suddenly do brutal or really kind things without further notice or indication. Whether some of these actions are good or bad is a completely different moral topic
On the original video
7:30 is such a lie, they obviously don't understand the complexity of the situations, instead just keeps portraying things as if he is a genious, anyone who worked in economic fields would roll their eys at this
But I guess people on this channel don't have vast economical/political knowledge and will bow to this guy as some genious as if everything he says is true and we live all in this dystopianism
Edit 1: 8.00 yes because parents don't care if you improve quality of their children
Edit 2: Good lord democracies have lower taxes??? Just look at South Europe/Scandinavia taxes as comparison to Middle East for example 11:30
The amount of people that think this guy is a genious is trouble
@@Random17Game You're not helping anyone understand the complexity of the situation. You're just calling the viewers stupid.
Hey CGP Grey. I watched your "Rules for Rulers" video when it first came out. I only watched this video today, and listened to what it took for you to make this video. I just wanted to say thank you. Because of this video, I read the Dictator's Handbook, and that your "Rules for Rulers" changed my life. This helped the world make more sense to me. I plan to show this video to my kiddos when they are old enough.
The video:
40% The Rules for Rulers
60% Understanding UA-cam
i just quit a corporate job not too long ago because of how i couldn't deal with the bizarre power games and incomprehensible social attacks, and i've been struggling with the fact that none of the noble-sounding things i've been told about how democracy works seem to really be applicable, so the video was kind of a timely appearance in my life. it was like, once the things that had been angering me had been explained, i just felt sort of free and like i understood the world well enough to maybe do something about it for the first time since probably 2012.
also a lot of the stuff you guys say in this 'cast about the subject is really relatable, especially with your school and work gripes. and also i super immediately went to buy the dictator's handbook as soon as the rules for rulers video ended lmaoo
Because pure democracies are just 2 wolves and a sheep voting on what to eat
Should read democracy the god that failed
im voting grey
In large public companies, CEOs don't typically have a huge degree of control over who sits on the board. Formally, that'd be the nominations committee, which is independent. Of course, if the CEO is also Chairman or happens to be a major shareholder, then "formally" is really more like "notionally", and "independent" is more like "suckling at the teat of power".
Thank you so much for pushing through making that video. It has changed my and many peoples perspective on power structures from a logical and mathematical perspective. Please do not abandon good concepts like this.They can change the world in no small way.
really man!?!? I'm kinda freaking out right now as I just had a moment where I realized I might be a hella screwed up person because everything this video covers is like first grade elementary common sense to me to the point I'd be playing with my toys recreating the rules for rulers on the playground! yikes!!!
Shit man! You must be so much brighter than the rest of us! Yet, I have a sneaking suspicion that you're a nobody with influence over nothing. Funny thing that is, eh?
+
I can’t tell you how much I want to see the hour long version of rules for rulers.
the dictators handbook was an amazing suggestion and an amazing first video. it really has change how I look at power, and makes sense of a lot of things. thank you for introducing this to me, especially during this election.
I watched this video in 2018. Depending on your stance, on various global, economic, and other partially political perspectives, the conversation at the end pulls different emotions from you.
The kick of hilarity that someone officially voted for these two podcasters to be president and vice president, and the mild disappointment that there seems to be no record of this write-in otherwise.
When Grey finally talks with his office neighbour:
G: Hi!
N: Uh... Please don’t torture me for taking your pen, I didn’t have one and I had to sign the document I’m so sorry.
"I got an email from the publisher of the book, who told me that they had sold all of the books. And that they were doing another printing of the book, because there were no more books."
I just can't even with this quote... so awesome...
timestamp?
@@peachierose3356 1:06:00
I remember watching this video years ago and it really changed my view of the world. I'm really thankful that Grey decided to stick with it!
I love his voice.
We all do
your mom
[Keep the records going]
Grey 2016: "How much bad could happen in four years? I can't imagine very much"
Ian B. Lucy August 2021: "Either gray had no idea or he had every idea"
DI05 August 2022: "Minutes turned to seconds, hours turned to minutes, days to hours, months to days, and years to months."
[insert yours here next year]
The Steve Jobs part is right, he actually even took out the guy who convinced him to come back.
Source and aftermath?
Hmmmm
@@bensoncheung2801 ever heard of Steve Wozniak?
@@ng.tr.s.p.1254 Aye, I need to re-watch this video now for this comment to make sense.
Why would he do that?…
Isnt the guy who convinced him to come back supposed to be his ally?
Myke missed a great (grey) opportunity. "With Grey power comes Grey responsibility."
:) *internal screaming *
40:04 Instead of a hard cut-off, they should use an "S" curve near 10 minutes. It could be that the algorithm allows you to schedule an ad, but between 8 minutes and 18 minutes there is an "S" curve where depending on the user or other data, even at random, a small percentage are shown an extra ad at the end, then at the 18 minute mark everyone is shown an ad. In between there is x% chance an ad will show, according to the "S" curve. So the hard and fast 10 minutes +1second stops being a thing, and people just accept that getting near 10 minutes is better, and each bit past is better still, though with diminishing returns.
"It's just one term, how much bad can happen in 4 years? I can't imagine very much"
- CGP grey 2016
the rules for rulers video is probably one of the most impactful videos you could have done
I feel the way you took and made the video was genius because not everyone has access to knowledge, but we all still have our own intuition.
If you're somebody gifted with both the ability to read, and express those ideas intuitively, you gain a power that the authors of those books did not have and that's a way to create thoughts on not just the hearts, but the minds of people.
"How much bad can happen in 4 years? I can't imagine very much."
Oh no.
I like stating the obvious because it gives us more leeway to picture the less obvious tangents, contrary points, and alternate interpretations.For example, gold is not the only treasure, and people are social creatures, not mere calculators. Charisma is an asset.
I found it kind of strange how when Rules for Rulers came out, CGP Grey cited the book, The Dictator's Handbook, then some time later, the citation disappeared from the description, and then later still, the citation was re-added. Not sure what that was all about.
I was wondering this too. The video was great, but literally NONE of the ideas in them were original and basically followed the beats of the book. To remove the citation almost bridges on plagiarism.
But it didn’t really matter because most of the people who saw the video walked away believing Grey was a political genius when in reality, all it proved was that he read an extremely well researched and executed book. Written by others. I don’t know, seemed scummy to me. But maybe he had different motivations than what I’m thinking
@@mythos951 Nah, can't take all credit away from CGP Grey, his video got me interested enough to buy & read the book itself. And his presentation style is his own at laying out what he thought were the most important or compelling ideas of the book.
@@mythos951 He is describing a real situation that happens, just because the original author was first to put it down on paper doesn't mean he has ownership over the concepts. This would be like the first person to write down the mechanics behind running, refusing to allow anyone else to describe it even in their own words.
They asked him to I would guess, maybe they ran out of books printed and were trying to curb demand.
@@placeholdernameisplacehold7671a majority of his videos is him reading a book then making a video about parts of it
So great to see this, as an "self-employed" the words that you spoke @45:00 is comforting. Its the main reason I dropped the agencies I worked for, not believing in what I was doing.
It’s weird listening to one of the most concise and to the point UA-camrs speak with someone so verbose about things as trivial as going to vidcon 😂
2 Grey podcasts in the same day, yes. Very yes.
24:15 - Reality is not always a happy place to shop, but it is the only place to get what you need.
11:10:00 They sold all the books-the definition of the word Brilliant
It's about reverse-engineering the political system. In the book, The Dictator's Handbook, there are recommendations for breaking the control of the rulers. One of the most powerful innovations might be sortition, randomly selected representative (the way we select jurors), which was used to avoid corruption in Switzerland. The Sortition Foundation is a good source for additional information.
Joe Adams yes. but cultural and belief systems would take on effect. such in switzerland it would work because the level of educations and clear seperations between religion and faith from the government system (not saying that they dont have faith(s) or religions, but they were strict on the involvement to deciding every actions). it would be very difficult to apply to the many religious-centered societies
We already use it for jury selection.
@@docadams1 The point being "how would you get people to say 'yeah, we'll elect the mayor the way we do juries despite the fact that most people spend far more time complaining about jury duty than actually ever serving on a jury'"
@@Flowtail The same way we put a gun in their hands and sent them to Vietnam. Only this time, they don't have to kill people or take orders from other people. We could allow them to decline if they pay a fee or something. The Confederacy and the Union did that in the Civil War. If you're going to live here, you should be responsible for maintaining the country. The Swiss had no problem doing it when they used it. From Wikipedia:
"Modern-era citizen lawmaking began in the towns of Switzerland in the 13th century. In 1847, the Swiss added the "statute referendum" to their national constitution. They soon discovered that merely having the power to veto Parliament's laws was not enough. In 1891, they added the "constitutional amendment initiative". Swiss politics since 1891 have given the world a valuable experience base with the national-level constitutional amendment initiative.[10] In the past 120 years, more than 240 initiatives have been put to referendums. The populace has been conservative, approving only about 10% of these initiatives; in addition, they have often opted for a version of the initiative rewritten by government. "
@@docadams1 Ah, so by ignoring anybody who doesn't want to do that--sounds easy enough
Grey: Catapults Book from thousands of places back into #24
Grey: "we do a little trolling"
I've read the book and watched the rules for rulers video, their discussion makes way more sense if you're familiar with both.
Most states (including Illinois) require write-ins to file paperwork to be counted. And some States outright refuse to count write-ins for President. How disappointing.
Grey, I am glad to hear you didn't put this one to rest. This is a fantastic, eye opening kind of script.
But talking about books, I would love CGP Grey to do a video about The Idea Factory. I'm suprised that even though he majored in Physics, he doesn't have videos about that.
It’s really interesting to me how Grey is talking about how the video might appear cynical. For me it’s exactly the opposite. Whenever I get too frustrated with politics I go back to watch his video and it always makes me feel better about politics and the intentions of politicians.
Honestly it kinda makes me think of the existential dread of ever being in the highest position of power. You basically become reduced to a mechanism that either must act within the interests of your keys/find a way to basically dominate the board system to include members that are basically your pawns, or just get eaten up by a more competitive engine that does your job way better. You could argue it is very natural selection but its also very wild, stressful and psychologically taxxing, just look at how much politicians age and physically deteriorate from the stress of the system, is it worth shortening your lifespan and suffering so greatly for transient money, power and influence?. It just really shows that most of the power relations in the hierarchy disincentives being good, because you are punished by being replaced for doing so. And even if you play the game of self-interests, you could be imperfect, slow to act or lack knowledge or insight in some ways and then a competitor can come and oust you. The security of being in the highest seat of power is quite low unless you amass an empire to dominate the board (ironically the only way to secure your place is to become a pseudo-dictatorship). It just feels like way too much mental gymnastics that only some really ambitious megalomaniacs would want to gun for such things.
rules for rules is one of the best videos on this platform
Enjoyed this immensely. Laughed a lot regarding the college Economics Dept. incident. I've often told people that I went to college to learn Architecture, but ended up learning Politics -- a quite similar situation. :D
I hope no failed artists learn politics...
So how do I get one of these puppet-CEO jobs?
networking, networking, networking. connections, connections, connections. politics, politics, politics...
Power
principal
You usually have to have a powerful, rich Dad.
1st marriage with the girl/guy with a right father- Limitless, movie
20:34 So people care more about metrics of their job performance than the integrity of the duties, functions & purpose of the job. If a person focuses more on the metrics, then you can game the system to get more rewards.
You forgot to factor in the ruler`s skill at bargaining with his keys.
The more brutal the competition he can keep them in, the less treasure he has to use to please them and the more he can use on the people. It`s not easy but it IS possible. Divide and conquer is something you can use for good as well.
There are also plenty of cases where dictatorships, based on resource extraction or not, used their power to fantastically boost the average peasant`s standard of living as well as greatly diversify the economy.
Saddam`s Iraq, Ghadaffi`s Lybia, the USSR, Yugoslavia etc.
Yes, all of these had human rights abuses ranging from "meh" to "horrendous" but they were against rivals, disobedient cronies and remnants of the predecessor`s power-structure. They were not slaughters of poor resource-extracting peasants rebelling because of their being exploited.
Honestly this is perhaps the best explanation of how Putin seems to be retaining power in Russia right now. The invasion of Ukraine's various military disasters and the resulting cost in treasure, prestige and lost opportunity for international trade mean most of the oligarchs - Russia's most obvious keys to power - are losing money hand over fist.
There is clearly something keeping them from conspiring against him. Publicly, he would claim it is loyalty, but behind the scenes I feel it is almost certainly that he is fostering an environment of confusion and fear of duplicity that keeps the keys looking at eachother for knives aimed at their backs rather than raising all those knives against Putin's back.
My hope is that the delicate balance that such a system must inherently be will come toppling down on him sometime soon, but plenty of rulers stupider than him have maintained that kind of balance for years and years of loss - Hitler used that system even in the "good days" of Naziism - leading up to and in the early war when they were making money and territorial gains hand over fist, but even when the shares of power started contracting, he managed to keep things going....it's not until the last couple of weeks of the war that we really start to see the other Nazi bigwigs setting in motion their contingency plans (by which point it was pretty much universally too late.) And frankly, I think Putin is a far more competent ruler than Hitler ever was.
The CGP grey channel in general has massively influenced how I think, and the rules for rulers video in particular was one of the first things to get me to seriously think about politics and why people in power do what they do. Weirdly enough I had a loosely similar experience in college where I was kicked out of a class when I was trying to learn for its own sake simply because the professor didn't want to look bad.
if you let some random stranger on youtube influence you so deeply without a good enough reason, chances are you have neglected actually thinking for yourself for too long as a result of the prussian school model that grooms you into "trusting the experts".
@@thenightwatchman1598 Or I was 14 when I discovered the channel and around 16 when I first watched this particular video. It was an introduction to many novel concepts that when combined with independent reading helped me to form a better world model.
@@garethbaus5471 if you say so geeves... hope you arent falling for any misinfo. its hard to spot in todays age.
for people wondering, youtube red is youtube premium now.
what's funny is how they talk about making the Rules for Rulers video differently to maximize ad revenue and how it makes business sense...
that video is what made me a Grey fan to this day, all those years ago. it was the superb quality of the product.
so, in a way that most companies would never be able to see, because their heads would have to be not only out of their asses, but far away from their asses as well... it made the most business sense.
listen to this 6 years later during midnight homework crunch, highly recommend lol
It’s giving Robert Greene 48 Laws of Power. Like he says, it’s not moral/immoral, it’s amoral. It just is.
Grey should write a mini series on the science channel titled "Knowledge that matters". A documentary on the specific knowledge that society relies on. How to keep electrical equipment working, how to repair large engines, etc. Other things like how to organize a large number of people so that no one is getting a free ride and wasting company resources, and at the same time not wasting everyone's time with constant reviews. A whole episode on healthcare and the core of medicine that we need in the world, like how to make pills and how to extract specific chemicals from specific plants, and then how to verify that the pills that are supposed to have a specific ingredient have actually been made to have that exact amount. How to mix concrete, how to tell the quantities of specific components of an enormous quantity of rock dust so that the concrete will undergo the necessary chemical reaction and bond correctly so that bridges, buildings, and entire city centers don't just crumble, killing untold millions of people all over the world.
It is unlikely to ever get made, but it is knowledge that is extremely important to life, and as a whole we don't encourage kids to learn it in school. Rarely if ever do we mention that unless someone knows how to calibrate a carbon detector for measuring steel's carbon content, we wouldn't even be able to make the tools to do all the other jobs that we rely on for survival on this planet. Knowledge is important, and knowledge that actually matters is the most important.
Weirdly enough I have been trying to learn as many of those things as possible as a sort of hobby.
Listening to this one day before 2021 inauguration and realized this is an evergreen.
The rules never change.
Oh you poor, hopeful pre-Trump, pre-Covid, pre-shortage, pre-brexit, pre-Russo-Ukraine war children
just finished watching last podcast and see this one posted. Looks like im going to have a good day at work after all lol!
Well having the example and that experience helped to open your eyes to it, therefore it had an impact upon you.
I know this is very old video at this point. But honesty, in 1513 this is EXACTLY what Machiavelli wrote about.
When he wrote The Prince, he was saying, "Look, I don't endorse what I'm saying, this isn't how it should be, but like it or not, this is how you rule."
He speaks specifically about how a new Prince must clear the court of nobles and bring in his own people. Just like Grey talked about Jobs stacking the "court" (the boardroom) with his "nobles" (his Board friends).
But it's done at all levels, when I became a VP, I immediately brought in my people under me. Because I know and trust them and I know they'll make me look good. In Grey parlance, I'm a Key for someone above me, so I need my people to make me look good to secure my Key position.
I'm reading some of these comments about how people had to leave companies because of the politics and I just laugh.
Guys, it's not hard. This isn't the Roman Senate. No one is getting stabbed on their way home form the market. Corporate politics are basically human interaction 101. There's nothing mysterious or difficult about it.
What's more, because EVERYONE understands the rules, everyone knows what's going to happen.
When a new CRO comes in, I know I'm in trouble. Either I get into his court quickly, or I start job hunting, because he'll clear me, a "noble" he doesn't know, and place his own people in. I understand that. That's why you team up with people in your career and move together.
Your video made me recognize some weaknesses in my own company and how I needed to incentivize certain key employees better to minimize risk of future betrayal. I found it valuable
1:20:50 2016 Grey: "How much bad can happen in 4 years"
Me looking back on this from 2021: Oh boy... Where do I even start.
At least the wall wasn’t built 😪
Oh it got worse... It got so much worse
This is very relevant to rules for radicals... I would love to see a video similar to this but how to break structures of power structures as outlined in rules for radicals
I would really pay good money to see this as well.
@@mshara1 grey is a corporate suck-up, he'd never make something like that
I thought he done very good job explaining that this is pretty much just inevitable order of things, just because it is in interest of everyone, nevertheless what it is: democracy, dictatorship, there is thinking about people or not. And as he said here, the goal is just to analyse structure and how to properly handle it
@@volodyadykun6490 okay corporate suck up.
WTF 2 Grey's podcasts in the same day?
What am I supposed to do now, wait 2 weeks until you talk about the Apple conference?! Preposterous!
It's only been 10 days since the last podcast -- how dare you release podcasts this often!
"How much damage can happen in 4 years?"
Parts of this podcast did not age well...
i think they aged like fine wine
18:27 I also get freak out when the professor piss me about the grades. So they just keep pushing me to work harder for that so called average score.
It’s interesting knowing that you have someone, a stranger in the next office because when you know that, you can really hear that your voice is just a bit quieter than you usually have it, and especially when you’re saying certain things, I can hear that you lower your voice just a little bit. Ha ha, but it’s probably not actually going on because if I had never been told about the “neighbour” I’d never have noticed the change.
This is my favorite episode.
I looked for the results of the county's election and there are some polling stations recorded with single write in votes, but hopefully they will follow up with a confirmation of that voter's particular polling place.
Cgp podcasts are like xmas morning
It’s interesting because I’ve always wanted to get into power to do good and leave the world better than how I left it. It’s very interesting to learn about this power structure and how to master it to do the good I want to do
really loving the discussion of office politics around 28:00
1:18:00 So did anyone know how this ended up? I was searching through results but none seem to mention minor candidates... I am curious.
Looking on the website of Illinois State Board of Elections where you can download the results as a pdf, it looks like that vote has not been counted in the official write-in results of 2016.
Mr Grey, you did include that your health suffered but you didn't say why.
Why would this, rather than how to become the mayor of London or how the US election system works, both making being a dictator seem pretty easy by comparison , be such a stress?
I am intrigued.
I think what makes a video viral is that people feel compelled to share it, so the video spreads far outside the subscriber base. If people generally feel compelled to share all CGP Grey videos, then that would make all of them viral. I think there is a baseline level of virality that is normal for CGP Grey videos, but it might be possible for a CGP Grey video to be even more viral than that if even more people than normal feel compelled to share it.
Yeah completely true about pushing book sales. I went out and bought the Rules for Rulers book after watching the CPG Grey video.
imagine grey becomes a president and just fixes every problem with the voting system, with pennies and etc.
and just say "that was just for the lolz"
While listening to this, particularly the corporation reference, I realized that labor unions in corporations give the keys of power to the "lower level/regular" people kind of like how a true democracy gives its keys of power to the people
I view that as more of a case where someone discovered that they could insert a mid-tier power hierarchy. By claiming to represent the workers, the union bosses gain power over them. They give power (keys) to the corporation by keeping the workers in line and from the corporation gain legitimacy. And they get their reward directly from the members instead of the corporation redistributing it to them, but done with permission from the corporation.
then again labour unions get most of their money from their members. If they do not do what their members expect them to do then they will lose their members. So in this way the members own the keys for the labour union and the labour union owns keys from the companies due to it having loads of members.
Union strong! ✊️
@@TheRealInscrutable You're thinking HR, not unions. Unions are funded with membership dues and are not part of the work culture. Still when union bosses are far removed from their employees then things go wrong.
I could still tell that the high reelection rate/low approval rate was about the USA.
I wanted to buy it on audible, but I am from Germany and the publisher does not allow audible to sell it there. So I *HAD* to get it from amazon. I am still pissed about that.
Same problem here in the UK, I ended up buying a digital copy from Amazon
What I would love to hear Grey talk about is how did it become like this? How did governments develop to have this kind of system? Why is it always greed that leads to power?
Just imagine yourself with a group of friends and you are the leader and the biggest thing you might have to worry about is what to do with your buddies. How does that sort of leadership suddenly transition into needing to pay certain people to stay in charge.
I feel like there was a tiny piece missing somewhere. How this comes to existence and is there possibly a better way?
It comes into existence naturally.
Let's say you start with the group of friends. Well there exists a group of people who AREN'T your friends that exist. And *they* want power. The power that YOU have.
If they are more ruthless, more cunning, more greedy - they'll win.
is called hierarchy, power can only be obtained by having someone with less power below you. You put friends and trusted people in positions of power, people who you know wont betray you.
I agree, he is missing the group evolution component, the tit for tat fairness of being in the same boat.
Tit for tat "fairness" is just a method of payment. To pay anything you need treasure.
Kevin Z There is a moral component, that deals with payment but isn't the same as *just* payment. I'm not disagreeing with Grey, and i know he cut a lot from his video. Just more accurate to talk about the psychology too, not just the game theory.
I don't know how I ended up in this podcast. But it's amazing.
This video was 7 years ago?! Damn. 😢
Grey, after having watched your video, I have developed an idea on how to change politics. And the thought process is kind of scummy, but I think that the effects would be good.
*Objective:* We permanently shift focus back to local elections and increase voter turn-out also permanently.
*Implementation:* All children of 13 years of age, whom are still under compulsory education laws, are also mandatory voters in local elections.
How will this help? A mandatory vote of any kind will never go over well on a national level, but in the case of a local election, and for children whom already partake in a mandatory "civic duty", I could foresee this being implemented with less fuss.
The effects that this would have is an upheaval in local elections, which in the US can be met with great apathy, to the point that many local officials win by default as the only candidate. And this works fine in some cases, because local electorates may have once in the past elected this local official for a reason and they have a reason to keep him in power, misplaced as that reason may be.
However, by forcing all the children between 14 and 16 in a local election to make their votes count, you have greatly upset the balance in the elections. Suddenly, politicians have to placate a new key supporter; the education sector, which happens to have a lot of cross-over with other sectors. For example; infrastructure. Make traffic more comfortable for children and they will be happier going to school at all and even vote.
But there are many other benefits. Children are already organized by schools. This makes them less prone to gerry-mandering, but this also makes it easier for politicians to visit specific schools and hold speeches to convince students on a personal level. It's also easier for politicians to know where their funds would be best spent if they wish to gain support; donate to a school. And because the minds of children are especially fleeting, giving them one big boulder of gold is nice, but giving all children free lunches every day for the rest of the schoolyear is more cost efficient and also more productive.
What other effects this has, however, is that local politicians are reported on more. They are in the open more. They are debating more. Because they are garanteed an audience at schools. And anyone outside of that school will not neccesarily be able to attend those debates or speeches and because everyone is suspicious of what the children will vote, they all want some way to get that line of communication. Even if, before, they might not even have been interested.
What do you think?
This doesn't do anything other than change a few key-holders from adults to children. Hardly a wise move.
The ultimate problem, which CCP Grey seems to assume as axiomatic, is that politicians are motivated to hold onto their office. In order to do that, they cause a bunch of havoc. If you could stop that (one-term only offices) then they would be beholden to the people who elect them.
In this case, that'd still be corporations, not the people, but if you outlawed all forms of advertisement that would actually help. That, however, is precariously difficult to implement. I mean, it'd require every candidate to be under surveillance and if they said a word about running for election prior to the election they would be eliminated. You could allow them to write one single "advertisement" to be used in the ballet only. This way, the only influence corporations could have is helping them write a better essay.
mathig nihilcek _"This doesn't do anything other than change a few key-holders from adults to children. Hardly a wise move."_
That's sadly not very informative. Can you explain why you think this, in light of my stated objective?
The Pretender Well, right now, a majority don't even know how to do proper research, and those that do are almost always too lazy to do it for elections. So, essentially, if you get your message out there with enough coverage, people will believe it.
(Basic research is distinguishing BS sources from valid sources. If it's a newspaper = trash. If it's a large university = better. That sort of thing.)
What you are suggesting is adding a new group of voters, children.
Now, if you really wanted decent decision making capabilities, I'd suggest mandating 500 hours minimum in economics, politics, and sociology (combined) before anyone could vote. That's about when you can call yourself a novice and actually understand what buttons you are pushing. You still don't know what the buttons will do, but you know what the label says.
Free lunches? HAHAHA... never going to happen. Besides the fact that kids wouldn't care. It's their parents who pay, not them. They'd be more happy if the school tuition went up, and the teachers provided candy.
You're also patently wrong on the boulder of gold. Why do you think they fix the roads and such right before election time? Offer a bunch of children a massive party right before election time to get reelected and they will choose that over free lunches. It's a no-brainer.
Improve traffic? Many kids don't even want to be in school in the first place. Make traffic worse to win more votes.
In the end, politicians can buy children's votes with a few costco bags of candy, some teacher benefits. You change who the key supporters are, by adding teachers/children, but nothing fundamental will change. If anything, you introduce a host of problems due to the children not understanding what is really important, and instead caving to more short-minded desires.
mathig nihilcek _"Now, if you really wanted decent decision making capabilities"_
See, but that's not my goal here. Like I said, my suggestion is scummy and it's scummy in the way that it's not actually about decent decision making.
It's about people trying to influence the influencors around those children, with monetary support.
But I guess you're right about the parties. However, what about multiple donors funding multiple parties, doesn't that just equalize matters?
Depends on the donors.
👍👍
Is there more of this kind of conversation?
Rules for rulers is my favorite video on the internet and has been for years. I post it to my Facebook page annually. To me it is the lord of the rings of internet content.
26:05 I also don't want to frick around with the ruler... I just want to rest.
Watched both parts of this and listened to the discussion. Remarkably interesting, thanks. Wondering if this apply to a direct/pure democracy like what two cantons of the Swiss have? Will matters become messier i.e having more keys instead with a representative democracy or a dictatorship?
Is that video of mkbhd reviewing a VHS player still out there?
Grey, can I find the 1h20min version somewhere?
Or can I pay you somehow to view it?
BigBadWolf 2nd that. albeit i have read the old version discussed this topic (ill principe and le discourse ~machiavelli. onze strijd~sutan tahdir alisyahbana etc) but it is lacking in modern day global effect applications). so how about it? or make it a book of your version, Grey?
Nurlinda F Sihotang albeit is such a word weird, even when it is in perfect context it sounds completely wrong
When I listened to this I assumed you were doing an update of The Prince, by Machiavelli, but you never mention that and a search through the first page of the comments doesn't mention Machiavelli either.
Discovering Grey and Myke's podcast years later. I've got a question for any well-meaning persons that come across this comment:
What did they mean by Guns, Germs, and Steel being misinterpreted? Is it being championed by people that completely missed the excellently dispelled/destroyed myth of European exceptionalism?
1:08:25
lol, I am so curious to hear what Grey has to say about that geography kerfuflle.
Grey, do you still plan to make more Videos like Rules for Rulers?
The publisher: "stop selling our books!!! we don't have any more!!!"
re Head of Economics Department - No evidence is being given that that acted soley in their own interests. By removing 2 students the grading curve is no longer skewed which benefits more students than it damages. The problem seems to lie in the grading on a curve method.
The inclusion of 2 highly advanced members (on an optional basis) disadvantaged the group as a whole.
Although it probs totes was bcz it made her look bad.
Dan Random it a sad...sad day for human strive for advancement the day the educator hinders the achievement and passion of learning from students just to make it in the dean good side. :(
Dan Random It's ironic that the economics department could not just recognize the two students as outliers in the grade curves to save the economics students. ANYONE in economics could tell you that you need to recognize outliers to accurately interpret and manipulate important data. I'd do that in a heartbeat and make myself look better with having high test scores in my reports.
its great to not splitt your videos, because that stuff belongs together. as user you might end up watching the second first.
instead of a cutoff on the number of ads per video make it like be a 50% chance at some points and fade it
I bought the kindle edition 1 or 2 years after seing the video