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Being a writer is an act of immense arrogance.
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Very few people write as a means of catharsis or self-expression.
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Most people who write want to be read.
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And in their act of writing, therefore, is a presumption that what they are writing brings
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value to somebody's life.
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Every time somebody reads an article written by you, they do so when they could be doing
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a million other things with their time.
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There's an opportunity cost to their time.
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And yet you simply assume that when you write something, that is worth that time.
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This is often arrogant and sometimes delusional.
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And it's also true of podcasting.
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You're listening to me speaking right now when you could be doing so many other things.
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Is this worth your time?
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Welcome to The Seen and the Unseen, our weekly podcast on economics, politics and behavioral
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Please welcome your host, Amit Varma.
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Welcome to The Seen and the Unseen.
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I'm an accidental podcaster.
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And when I started The Seen and the Unseen, I assumed that at worst I'll get laughed at,
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at best I'll get ignored.
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But hey, what the hell, new experience.
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Well, I've grown to enjoy podcasting, though I've sometimes felt that I'm doing this in
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Our numbers are decent for a podcast, but why do people listen to this?
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What do they think of the show?
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What could I be doing better?
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Also, is there any way that instead of me asking questions, once in a while I have to
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answer them and tough ones at that.
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I do the show in partnership with IVM Podcasts.
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We each own 50% of the show.
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And one of the people who works here, Kavita Rajvare, recently mentioned that she met some
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people at her music class who are regular listeners of The Seen and the Unseen.
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So why don't I do an episode where I interact with them?
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I thought this was a good idea.
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It gave me a chance to see if such people actually existed.
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I mean, who listens to the show and maybe get some feedback from them.
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And I could expand this into an AMA or an ask me anything.
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Now conducting an AMA for myself itself feels embarrassing because I'm not a celebrity or
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a man of great accomplishment.
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But I spent so much time pontificating on the world that I thought it would be nice
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to open myself up to questions, including difficult ones.
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I put out a call on Twitter and Facebook and my noble producer, the famous stand up comic
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Abbas Momin has compiled all those questions and will shoot them at me.
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But before that, a warm welcome to my guests on the show, Nakul Sampurkar and Rachit Jain.
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Nakul and Rachit, welcome to the show.
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Thanks Amit, glad to be here.
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Thanks Amit, glad to be here from a listener to now right here with you.
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So before you start asking, I'm just like curious how people listen to podcasts.
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You know, when, when I first started podcasting, the reason I call myself an accidental podcaster
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was I never considered podcasting because I never listened to podcasts.
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I was not one of those people who would listen to podcasts and so it was, it was completely
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And of course, since I've started podcasting, I listen a lot.
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But do you guys listen to podcasts a lot, Nakul?
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Yeah, actually this is, I was introduced to podcasts by my brother in the US when I went
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I would see him, you know, listening to podcasts on his commute a lot.
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And that's when I got hooked onto those podcasts.
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And next thing, you know, I've come back to India, I'm listening to those podcasts and
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looking for, you know, podcasts based in India on Indian issues, on Indian things.
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And so that's when I was introduced to IBM and Seen and the Unseen.
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And that's when I became a regular listener.
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So for me, it was more like I had been listening to podcasts on and off for the last two, three
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years, but largely centric to comedy, where, you know, comedians do a podcast, a lot of
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varied stuff, et cetera.
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But I guess with respect to IBM and Seen and the Unseen, Nakul is the one who introduced
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And yeah, but in terms of consumption, it's more or less on our way to work.
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I was fed up of listening to music, how much more music you can listen to all day, right?
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So podcasts is like a breath of fresh air coming in while you're on your way to work
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It's the best utilization of time I think you can do.
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So I'm just relaying the inevitable.
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You guys have some tough questions for me.
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So since I'm a regular listener here, I've always seen that, you know, we've most of
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the episodes are focused on the bad, quote unquote, policy making or decisions that governments
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have taken, you know, like demonetization or jobs or pakoda now makes, et cetera.
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So what do you think has been a good policy decision by any previous government?
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And what do you think have been the seen and the unseen benefits of those?
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That's a great question.
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I'll have to actually think a bit for that.
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We are going in cold, so I haven't seen these questions before.
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I think firstly, the reason I tend to focus on and everybody, in fact, tends to focus
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on policies which have a negative effect is those negative effects are unseen and therefore
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you feel a sort of a duty to point out that, no, hey, this looks good.
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This has great intentions, but these are the kind of effects it can have.
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As for having good effects, I would say that I can't think of something offhand and you've
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started public policy, so maybe you can help me, but anything that I think increases freedom,
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increases economic freedom or increases personal freedoms for that matter will inevitably have
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good effects, which are often hard to quantify.
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I mean, okay, here says an easy quantification, which people often give you look at the different
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fates of Eastern West Germany.
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When they chose a different baskets of public policy that they chose at the separation and
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they took North and South Korea, they chose consciously to go in different directions
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and follow different kinds of policies and you saw the impact of what economic freedom
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did in West Germany and South Korea and the ravages that were brought upon the people
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of East Germany and North Korea as a result of their taking the wrong direction.
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So I guess that's one example.
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While this episode goes on, if I think of something, I'll bring it up, but yeah, I mean,
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one tends to keep focusing on all the things government does wrong because it does so much
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So yeah, my question comes out of a recent Prakriti podcast, which was related to podcasts
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About how this entire issue of discoverability is there, podcasts are not so big in India
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And as a alternative content source, it's still very, very low, right?
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People listen to music, videos, et cetera.
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So what is your take on that in terms of, you know, we obviously far lagging behind
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in terms of the indicators in the U.S. for that, but what will it require in India to
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change that, you know, be able to shift for consuming podcasts as an alternative platform?
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I should tell those of my listeners who are wondering what Rachit is referring to.
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This is an episode of the Prakriti podcast, which is a great show hosted by Pawan Srinath
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and Hamsini Harihar and my colleagues at Prakriti.
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And they spoke to Amit Doshi of IVM podcast and it's a very enlightening conversation.
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So just check that out either on the IVM app or on thinkprakriti.com.
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But to answer your question, I think here's the thing.
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India doesn't have a culture of talk radio that much, which is why even I was very skeptical
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You know, I was an early blogger 15, 16 years ago, but I was not an early podcaster because
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I thought, who listens?
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And I assume that that's a cultural thing, that talk radio is big in the U.S. and whatever,
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but in India it simply isn't.
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Now Amit Doshi, when he was trying to convince me to do this show or to do a show with him,
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his spiel to me was that research is shown across the world, across cultures, 30% of
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the people who listen to audio content prefer talk to music, 30%.
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And because these are findings from across the world and across cultures, that means
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that there's something hardwired, that a certain number of us just prefer talk to music, which
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is, and 30% doesn't seem like much, but 30% of a lot of people is a lot.
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And so therefore then that raises the question, why hasn't talk taken off in India?
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And one reason for this is that there's just been a vicious cycle where no one's tried
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to supply it and therefore there haven't been listeners.
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And because there haven't been listeners, no one's tried to supply it.
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And what I think IVM Podcast is doing with Amit and so on is trying to break that and
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saying that, no, you know, screw what the numbers are right now.
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I'm going to try and give you great audio content with all these variety of different
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shows and let's build an audience and basically try to break that vicious circle and turn
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it into a virtuous circle.
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So people just, just to add on there.
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So for you personally, then, you know, let's say Amit Doshi is doing a fantastic job, obviously
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bringing content to all of us.
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But for you personally, you know, you spoke about opportunity costs, right?
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For you as well, you could be writing another, you know, column somewhere or, you know, you
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can be writing another book and devoting your time towards that.
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What made you, you know, say you said that, you know, one of the factors was this entire
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data which you had in front of you that, you know, people will listen.
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But to get into the industry at such a nascent stage, what made you do that?
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So like I said, I was an accidental podcaster.
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So what really happened was there's a very, very close friend of mine, a dear friend of
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mine called Naren Shanoi and Naren Shanoi hosts a show called Simplified with Deepak
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Right now they have a third co-host, but it was a two of them when they started.
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And they started on their own.
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And one day one of them put up something on Facebook saying that, hey, we've joined up
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with IVM and we are doing this and all that.
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And I just put a note of congratulations.
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At which point Amit replied to my comment, Amit Doshi, and said that, you know, a few
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months ago I approached you and said, would you be interested in a podcast?
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And you said, no, you think you'd be interested now?
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And I absolutely didn't remember anyone approaching me, but my attitude towards podcasts was very
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condescending, like who the hell is trying to listen, screw this.
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So I said, yeah, okay, let's talk.
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And we met up and all that.
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And I told him that one idea I had for a TV show at this time was the scene in The Unseen.
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The scene in The Unseen, by the way, is based on a famous essay by Frederick Bastia, that
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which is seen and that which is not seen, where he talks about a particular public policy
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and why everyone faces it, but you need to look at the unseen effects.
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So I thought that's a great sort of framework to look at the whole world by.
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Like Henry Hazlitt wrote a great book a few decades ago called Economics in One Lesson,
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which just looked at different aspects of the economy through this framework.
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So I said, look, here's an idea I had for TV and he said, why don't you do a podcast?
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And I said, okay, and here's the thing, when you speak of opportunity cost, for me to do
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a TV show out of this would actually take a lot of coordination and a lot of money because
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Where do you put together the thing?
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How do I look on camera?
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You know, I tell people I have a classic podcasters face.
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But on the other hand, after the first few episodes where you'll see that I'm a little
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self-conscious and I'm trying all kinds of things.
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After that one sort of settles down into a groove and you start having great conversations
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and sort of learning from it.
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So it was kind of accidental and like most things in life, you know, most things in life
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aren't things you decide to do, they just happen.
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The good things are, yes, absolutely.
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So Amit, so you've kept your podcast very India focused, no issues that plague the Indian
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I mean, I deeply appreciate it and I really want to listen to a podcast on those.
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But if you want to cover any political scenarios or any policy making issues on a global scale
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in different countries, you know, what topics would you have liked covered?
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Yeah, I'm actually, I've always intended not to keep it to India, but every few episodes
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do something with an international guest.
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And the thing is, I simply have been lazy about reaching out to them and doing it right.
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So Alex Tabarrok was here in Bombay for a while.
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So we met up and I got him here and I did a couple of episodes with him.
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So there are tons of people I want to reach out to and kind of beg them to be a guest
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on my podcast, but I haven't really gotten down to it.
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I'd love to, for example, if you ask me who are sort of dream guests and dream subjects,
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I'd love to talk to Sam Harris about free will.
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I don't believe in free will either, I think, but I have certain nuances in the way I look
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So that would be an interesting...
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That's the libertarian in you peeking out.
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Yeah, so, and a bunch of economists, I mean, just speak about, like every time I read a
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fascinating book, I think, hey, I should speak to this person.
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Like I keep thinking I should write to Philip Tetlock and, you know, ask him to be on the
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show because I loved his book, Super Forecasting.
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I thought that's one of the best books I read in recent times and a lot of the conclusions
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of that book also tied in very nicely with things that I learned in my years as a professional
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poker player, which I was, and that was very fascinating.
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But I've just been bloody lazy and, you know, so at some point I'll get over that.
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But I think, like you said, I think one of the reasons people listen to this is that
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if you're listening to international podcasts, there are like thousands of them, but Indian
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So, you know, keep the main focus Indian, but once in a while, if I do an international
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podcast, and I'd love to, if anyone agrees to come on the show.
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And I guess it's great that you played poker because we got to listen to the episode, which
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Coming from a financial services background.
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A lot of people I recommended the episode to also quite like that.
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I mean, all credit to my guest, Mohit Satyanand, who is a man of immense wisdom.
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As a listener, as someone who maybe started listening to this podcast for the first time
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and is now, you know, now his eyes are opened to new ideas that, hey, these are the unseen
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effects of so-and-so policy or so-and-so decisions.
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So as a listener to these things, so how can I, how can a layman contribute, you know,
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to the political system or to policymaking in any way as just as a single, other than
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of course, voting for the right people.
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What other things do you think any, any person who's interested in this can do to effect
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change other than maybe start his own podcast?
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I mean, I think the key thing here is that it's not just about specific policies like
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a policy, a policy, it's more about a framework of looking at the world.
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And about certain values that are within those framework like, you know, individual freedom
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We need to protect individual rights and so on and so forth.
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And my great lament is that those ideas are not in the culture, that a few English speaking
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elites like myself and because you're listening to the show like yourself may agree with them
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or engage with them, but they're absolutely not out in the culture.
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So in the culture, for example, there is widespread support for the notion that free speech should
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Uh, you know, there's widespread support for the notion that, um, uh, you should not offend
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anybody and, um, and, and, and various other things, which we would disagree with.
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So what, what I keep, you know, a lot of people who think about policy, look at it as a political
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battle that, okay, we are doing policy advocacy and we have to convince politicians and bureaucrats
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and so on to change their policies and whatever.
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And I've always, and I've come to the conclusion, I didn't always believe like this, but I keep
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I've sort of come to the conclusion that this is not about change is not going to happen
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Change first has to happen culturally, like for example, one big reason of the great success
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of the alt-right in the U S was a recognition of this, like Andrew Breitbart who founded
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Breitbart and who died a few years ago.
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He once said, and this is something I don't stop quoting that, um, politics is downstream
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And, and, and what that indicates is that if you want to change politics, you have to
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change culture and none of us can personally really do much about changing politics.
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All of us can contribute to changing culture in our own really little ways, but to be frank,
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we are just individuals and it seems futile and what do you do when your family WhatsApp
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group at 10 uncles telling you, Modiji is great.
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But, uh, yeah, so, I mean, um, yeah, that's, that's coming to coming, uh, you know, taking
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off from Modiji is great.
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You spoke about, uh, this entire mindset of the Indian water to not let us, uh, what go
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And, but your view was that, you know, you should rather work for the individual who's
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there in your constituency, correct me if I'm wrong there, uh, and not look at, you
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know, my word is going to waste because I should work for Modiji because the world is
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doing so or India is doing so.
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And hence I should work for the BJP, you know, MLA or MP from my area.
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So how do you really come into, you know, affecting that cultural change?
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So what do you change on ground to make that happen?
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Cause to make people vote more, to make people vote more, no, but to make people vote or
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think about, you know, not thinking about the larger picture first, but starting from
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bottom up and me voting for my guy first.
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So it's, it's, it's complicated and there are a number of questions within that question
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Uh, the first aspect that you look at is that local government in India is not very strong.
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Now ideally what should happen is that power should be devolved from the center to the
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state, to the city, to the ward and all that.
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So local government actually matters.
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If somebody isn't collecting garbage outside your thing, your vote can make a difference.
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Now actually your work can make a difference.
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And we had a, I had a very interesting episode of the scene in the unseen on this with Shruti
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Rajgopalan on urban governance.
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And the key point she made there, which is something a lot of people don't realize about
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the cities or they do, which is why they're apathetic is that there is a disconnect between
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power and accountability at the local government level.
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So what happens is that you have as a, you know, who is accountable to you, your corporators
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and all are accountable to you.
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They need your vote, but do they have the power?
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They don't really have any power to do anything.
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They don't really take any big decisions.
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The state legislature has a power because it's not devolved further.
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So the real power is with the state legislature and they are not accountable to you.
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They are not accountable to urban voters.
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If you think about it in practice, in the Maharashtra government, they're, all their
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vote banks are rural vote banks.
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Mumbai per se doesn't really make a difference to that.
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So they can afford to ignore the urban vote and just pander to whatever different rural
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vote banks they might want to pander to.
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And which is, you know, a government job is at the end of the day to all its people.
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So I'm not saying that you should give a special, special privileges to urban voters just because
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you've got more taxes coming out of Mumbai.
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That's not my point at all.
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My point is that government should be so localized that there are, that people who have power
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over you should be accountable to you.
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And in practice, that's not really the case.
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And I think that's the reason why people become so apathetic because they realize that, look,
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you know, fine, we're a democracy, but I can't really hold anybody accountable, right?
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Especially at a local government level.
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The other facet of this is the fact that every voter knows, you know, you might tell people
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it's your duty to vote and so on, but every voter knows that his one vote is not going
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You know, at a local election somewhere in the north, some guy actually said this, that
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ek vote se kya hota hai.
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He lost by one vote and his wife hadn't gone and voted.
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So I can't imagine that the family dinners were much fun after that.
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But yeah, so I think most people have the, have the attitude that what difference is
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And also one of the questions which comes up in the, in the ask me anything section,
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which Abbas will take us through at the end.
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And I'll repeat the question then and name the person to give you credit.
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But I think one of the questions was look at all my options.
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Look at all, you know, and there are two ways of looking at it.
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One way of looking at it is that you vote for the person who is the least bad.
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So a lot of people today will say that, okay, look what Modi ji is doing to the country,
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which is absolutely true.
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And therefore you vote for whatever you think is the most viable alternative.
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So that is one way of looking at it.
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And I'm leaning towards that, but my way of looking at it, which is slightly different
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And here's the reason why I won't vote.
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Because if you look at the political marketplace as a marketplace, now think of, I go to a
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They're all crappy shirts.
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I buy the least crappy shirt.
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I've got a crappy shirt, but if I don't buy a shirt, what does that do?
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Because those sales aren't happening that sends a signal to the marketplace that there
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is a market for shirts and somebody, some entrepreneur or the other will then make different
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shirts, which I might like.
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So similarly in the political marketplaces, some marketplace voting is, it's a privilege,
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If you don't like any of the products, by not voting, you send a message to political
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entrepreneurs that X percent of the people haven't voted and therefore there is a market
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And I actually know people who are thinking like this right now and are working on it.
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And I'm sure this was part of the reason why, for example, Kejriwal and gang, I'm not a
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big fan of the man, but talented political entrepreneur and he came up in one part because
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he obviously saw that apathy.
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Where does that apathy reflect itself in the percentage of people who are not voting?
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So even by not voting, you are sending a signal to the marketplace, which might be important.
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Now I'm very conflicted because many close friends of mine have been trying to convince
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me that, no, you're wrong, that you, you think you're sending a signal to the marketplace,
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but there may be no marketplace.
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We are going towards despotism and we need to do something now and it's an emergency
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and so on and so forth.
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So to be honest, I'm conflicted between these two points of view that should you vote for
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whatever is the least bad option or should you not vote at all?
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And just a simple counter to, I was just thinking out loud that you said, you know, you will,
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you will express your sort of dissatisfaction by not voting, but say how is any politician
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or anybody actually able to differentiate that?
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Suppose 30 percent people have not voted in the next election.
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So how can you say that this 30 people have not have chosen to not vote or have just sat
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in their homes and said, ki is deshka kuch nahi hone wala.
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So yes, those are two very different things, right?
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I'm busy and I'm not not voting, for example, and you're sitting in your home and saying,
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I am not going to vote like it's a choice.
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Yeah, but, but it, no, I, I, I think in terms of actions, I think it's actually the same
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It's, it's whether I vote from this conscious sort of rational process that I have, whether
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I refrain from voting for that reason, or whether I just don't give a shit about politics
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and I'm doing my thing.
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Mera dhanda theek chal raha, f**k all that and don't vote.
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It's actually the same thing.
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It indicates that you don't care for the options out there and therefore there is an opening
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that you might, you know, care for, that somebody might want to provide an option.
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And you know, if you eventually have those kinds of figures, and I've actually sat with
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a political entrepreneur who is thinking or was thinking of launching his own party and
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he went through constituency wise figures of how many people haven't voted in each
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district and broke it down and spoke about where he thinks his niche might be and whatever.
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And that's just one person I have access to.
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I'm sure across the country there are, and this is a common lament all of us have, ki
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vote karo to kiske liye vote karo.
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Surely some entrepreneurs going to come out of somewhere and try to capitalize on that,
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Rukesh Iwaldit for example.
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I think, I think this topic deserves a podcast episode of its own.
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Do you have any guests you'd recommend?
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And yeah, this also partly answers another, I was just going through the AMA post on Twitter
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and someone just asked about, you know, what are the advantages, disadvantages, et cetera
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I think that the nota is like, if you really have, like your time has no opportunity cost,
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you've got fucking nothing to do, then you go and vote nota.
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Because to me, a non-vote and a vote for nota is the same thing to me by the logic I just
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So what's the point of voting nota?
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Why go all the way there and, you know, just, just vote nota?
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It's either you vote for someone or you don't vote at all, which is sending the same message
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for less effort, you know.
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Rukesh But isn't, isn't that a stronger signal then?
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That, okay, fine, people are coming out and saying nota rather than just as Nakul was
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And I have a, that, you know, you might just be laid back, relaxed and not give too many
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fucks about, you know, going there.
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Because I'm happy, I don't care who's there at the, at the center right now.
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Rukesh I think that would be true if the nota percentage
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Like one of my friends campaigned for nota in the recent Mumbai municipal elections.
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And I think he spent a lot of money doing it.
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Though I used to keep telling him that, you know, you should have a freaking product for
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Why are you campaigning for freaking nota?
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I think he got the percent of from one to two.
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And your non-voters would be, you know, in the tens.
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So you know, unless you, unless you get, if 30% of the people vote nota, I agree with
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Everybody would stand up and say, okay, my God, you know, but one or two percent, no
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A broader question which I have is that right now we're, as a country and in fact across
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the globe, we're more divided than ever in the sense that there's either, I mean, you
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are, you're right, you're on the, you're far right or I'm far left.
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And I mean, you have your magazines, your, your political thinkers and your ideas, and
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I have my own, if I'm a left guy, I have my own New York Times and my Trevor Noah's of
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And so how do, is there any way that we can bridge that gap today?
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Like that, is that possible for people to meet somewhere halfway down?
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Because earlier, I mean, things were not so divided that people didn't have their own,
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I mean, you're, you don't live in your own bubble at least some time back.
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But now we've become very divided and I'm sure in the future, it's just going to increase
#
The contrast is going to be even sharper.
#
So is there any way that this can be sort of healed?
#
I mean, and the reason this has happened interestingly is technology.
#
We used to think technology will bring the world together, but technology actually makes
#
it easier to form echo chambers and live in the comfort of your own worldview.
#
And you might be the most bigoted racist person out there, but technology enables you to discover
#
millions of other bigoted racist people like you and then you take comfort in numbers and
#
you're no longer the odd one out in your family.
#
The overall, I think technology is a huge net positive, but yes, this has happened.
#
I mean, one glib answer, so glib, I feel embarrassed to give it is maybe culture, you know, we
#
can still like the same movies and the same music or whatever.
#
I mean, it's very hard and the question that I had written an op-ed in the Hindu about
#
this, I think late last year, December, and the question that I'm asking, which I can't
#
find an answer for is people keep talking about fake news.
#
How do you break through it?
#
Because earlier what would happen is that even if a rumor spreads, you have these authoritative
#
sources of information.
#
You have your New York Times or your Times of India or whoever.
#
But now that is all diffused.
#
Now everybody has their sources of, you know, WhatsApp Baba ki Jai and people have adopted
#
They will, it's confirmation bias.
#
They will only take whatever fits into their worldview and reject everything else.
#
How do you break through this?
#
I don't have an answer.
#
That comes back to the latest episode where the debate is all about, you know, should
#
you regulate the likes of Facebook, Google, etc.
#
Which I think is the wrong answer.
#
You give government the power, you're going to get screwed because whenever you give any
#
power to government, you must assume, you must imagine the worst possible person being
#
You know, so if you're a left liberal, you should imagine Adityanath in that government.
#
If you are a hardcore Hindutva person, you should imagine Sonia Gandhi or whoever, whoever
#
is your nightmare, Sitaram Yachuri in the government, you know, using that too.
#
Because ultimately any power that you give to government, government never lets go of
#
And the more power you give government, the more oppression becomes inevitable.
#
And I think that's an easy answer that people are searching for because in India, there
#
is also this tendency for everything to say that the government should do something about
#
And I think the unseen effects of that are just something no one thinks about and concentrating
#
too much power in the hand of government is…
#
In the 70s, I mean, the government used to make watches, right, in the 70s.
#
And now when I think back, I mean, why is the government making watches?
#
Why was the government making watches like…
#
The government makes sex toys.
#
There's a public sector company which makes sex toys.
#
Yeah, yeah, I'm serious.
#
We'll talk about unseen.
#
We'll have a piece, we'll have a piece about it today.
#
I think it's actually, I forget the name of the company, I think it's one of these
#
condom manufacturing companies or whatever, but they also do sex toys.
#
So the government, that's, you know, and then, yeah, what can you even say about that?
#
So on a different note, I mean, you've been a, you're an accidental podcaster, you're
#
a policy sort of voice and you're a professional poker player.
#
But I also remember reading somewhere that you were at MTV.
#
So how have you, how have you been in so many different places?
#
And this is not something you've seen, it was accidental.
#
So this was in the 90s when I was in my early 20s, I spent five years shuttling between
#
Channel E and MTV, I was in both those places.
#
So I wrote for guys like Cyrus Brocha, Javed Jafri, all the funny guys back then, and whatever.
#
And television was just very shallow and dissatisfying and I mean, all due respect to my former colleagues
#
And currently also Cyrus, right?
#
Oh, well, I mean, yeah, in the sense, yeah, okay, he has an IBM podcast as well, so fellow
#
host, all Mr. Colleagues is a great guy and I was on a show a couple of times talking
#
But all those things were accidental.
#
So for example, wherever I have to send a short one pair of bio of myself to someone
#
I didn't even mention those because they weren't shaping influences.
#
The time that I spent in journalism, I mean, journalism has shaped me, blogging has shaped
#
But none of that was really shaping.
#
It's an incidental thing that kind of happened.
#
I feel like you've used the word accidental to describe so many aspects of your life.
#
Yeah, which is one of the actual, which is one of the revolutions of which one of the
#
things that poker taught me in the years that I played it that more in life is due to sheer
#
luck than you realize that we often tend to be hard on ourselves when things go bad and
#
blame ourselves for it, or we often tend to become arrogant and self-confident when good
#
But much more of both the good and the bad things are due to sheer dumb luck than we
#
So a lot of things are indeed accidental and if I'm to take it all the way, of course,
#
and maybe, you know, and I'm sure Sam Harris would agree with me, there is no failure,
#
but yeah, I think we all underestimate the role of luck in our lives.
#
And it's very tempting to sort of look back and, you know, in a million alternate universes
#
there are a million Amit's now doing completely different things.
#
It's nice to hear a professional poker player say that luck is important because that gives
#
No, I used to be a professional poker player.
#
See, luck is something that runs through life.
#
Poker is actually a game of skill, but that skill comes in the management of luck.
#
Management of luck and probability.
#
So that's, that's kind of what it comes down to.
#
And then then that is a skill which then gives you life lessons about life itself, which
#
I discussed in my poker episode with Mohit.
#
Just about to ask another question related to poker itself.
#
You keep saying you were a professional poker player, then one is what, how did you get
#
And A, you know, how did you end up quitting it?
#
Or if you've already done that, what is a, was it a bad turn or a river which led to
#
that or a conscious choice?
#
So what happened was how I got into it was sort of like beginner's luck in the sense
#
I went to Goa, I think must be 2009 or 2008 and we were just in Goa for a holiday and
#
I went to a casino, played a little bit and yeah, actually that one time I lost a little
#
I was playing poker on my phone.
#
So I like bought in for 10,000 and lost that after a couple of hours and then I went off.
#
Then there was a poker weekend, which happened there where they had, I think the India Indian
#
And I went there for the weekend and I did quite well.
#
I did well enough to say that, you know, you know, what the hell am I doing that writing
#
And the irony is I wasn't good at all.
#
I wasn't good enough to know how bad I was, but those were early days and everyone was
#
So the games were very soft and then gradually I kept playing and got, you know, I got better,
#
the field got better and so on and so forth.
#
And I, you know, the kind of games I used to play were illegal then and I illegal now.
#
So I don't want to talk about that in too much detail, but what basically happened was
#
while I did well enough for myself, it destroys your lifestyle because poker is all consuming.
#
You end up playing long 20 hour sessions.
#
You go home, you sleep, you go, you play another 20 hour session.
#
It's extremely unhealthy or eating all kinds of crap.
#
I used to drink Red Bull after Red Bull, which is, you know, Red Bull is perfectly safe except
#
So I, I basically, I put on like 15 kgs in, in that time, all of which I have now lost.
#
So I'm like this year, since Jan, I've lost 14 kgs and you know, today I was wearing these
#
jeans after three months and it was like they don't fit because they like pajamas, you know,
#
when I stand up, you speak about keto a lot.
#
So keto is one of my sort of one of the things that's helped me sort of cut a long story
#
I thought the lifestyle was messed up.
#
Also, it's a zero sum game.
#
You're not bringing anything new to the world.
#
Like if you, you know, the world, essentially all our interactions are positive sum.
#
So we all having this conversation, if it's a voluntary conversation, we'll all enjoy
#
and have a good time and therefore we all benefited from it.
#
But poker, you only when have the other guy loses.
#
And I saw tons of people who were addicted to the game.
#
I've seen people, friends of mine just destroyed by the game.
#
So at one point I decided that, look, the lifestyle sucks.
#
Philosophically, I just, I, I sometimes I feel like I'm a drug dealer exploiting someone
#
And I had made enough to not have to work for a while though those savings are now gone.
#
So Mr. government, if you're listening, please don't come and ask for taxes.
#
Not that you know how much I want.
#
So I, I, and I just wanted to get back to writing.
#
I mean, that was my main thing anyway.
#
My thing with poker was just get in for a while and get out.
#
But one question which I was just musing about is that we've, over the last hundred years
#
or so, I think in terms of political discourse or theories and ideas on politics, we've sort
#
of, I mean, the ideas have now trickled down or maybe I'm just not aware, but the spectrum
#
that we've built in terms of left, right, or liberal, libertarian, secularism, all of
#
So I think we've now, the ideas have slowed down to trickle and things are where they
#
So do you think there's room for any more new political ideologies or new ideas of thinking
#
on politics or do you think we've reached the zenith of, you know, this is what it is
#
now and you have to, I mean, a government has to work in this framework only.
#
No, I mean, I think there are certain frameworks along which you think, for example, one framework
#
along which I certainly think is a framework of freedom.
#
How much freedom do, you know, how much freedom do different systems have and how much you
#
respect individual rights.
#
Another framework which might ignore my framework and consider itself valid is equality, which,
#
you know, people on the left will go for, though I would argue that freedom is, gives
#
you the best shot at equality, but equality of opportunity, but that could be another
#
A third framework could be the, you know, the whole conservative framework where you
#
say that things have worked a certain way given human nature for a while and we should
#
not mess with it too much and so on and so forth.
#
I think one of the things that any, whichever way you look at the world has to take into
#
account is human nature itself and the thing is that there is a duality to humans.
#
There is one part of us which is basically animals, that our brains are hardwired in
#
certain ways in the sense that our tribalism is hardwired into us, our bigotry is hardwired
#
into us, our misogyny is hardwired into us and all of those hardwirings find a reflection
#
in culture and the way, for example, the way the patriarchy is set up, the way the power
#
systems work and the instinctive distrust of the other throughout the world.
#
And so that is really a reflection of the dark side of human nature, but what humans
#
also have, the other side, is that we have also been, I won't say blessed because it
#
makes it seem like I believe in God, but we are also lucky enough, a much better word
#
for me, we are also lucky enough to possess brains which can actually self-reflect and
#
which can think about all this and which can understand that this is our programming and
#
we need to go beyond that.
#
And to me, what we have seen culturally in the last three centuries since the Enlightenment
#
is essentially that, is earlier culture was something that reinforced human nature and
#
in the last three, four hundred years, culture has begun to mitigate human nature and to
#
fight against it and to fight against those instincts where, whether it's a simple thing
#
like me deciding not to have a child, where I'm fighting my hardwiring, or whether it's
#
a various ways, equality for women, for example, comes out of culture, I mean as time goes
#
we've become, like there is the philosopher W. E. H. Leckie, 19th century philosopher,
#
he had come up with this phrase called the expanding circle.
#
So what he postulated was that all of us, that since prehistoric times there has been
#
an expanding circle around humanity.
#
That means that if you go back to our prehistoric ancestor, there are a circle of people that
#
is his family or his tribe who he deems worthy of moral consideration.
#
Nobody outside that tribe is worthy of that moral consideration.
#
So if he's at war with them, he will kill them, he will rape them, he will do whatever,
#
they're not human beings at all.
#
Now Leckie's postulation was that this circle has expanded through human history.
#
It's expanded from the family to the tribe, to maybe alliances of tribes, to a nation,
#
to an ethnicity, and it's kept expanding till all of humanity is in it for some people.
#
Different people have different circles of people they consider worthy of the moral consideration.
#
And the utilitarian philosopher Peter Singer in fact wrote a book about this called the
#
expanding circle where he argued that it should expand to include animals.
#
Now that's a different argument in itself and let's not go there, but it's worth thinking
#
It's possible that the way we today look down on Thomas Jefferson for having slaves, future
#
generations may look down on us for killing animals, and of course by that time you won't
#
have to kill animals to eat meat, you'll grow it in labs, that's almost around the corner.
#
So there's that thing of the expanding circle, now the thing is that overall yeah people's
#
circles have vastly expanded and you see this more in the big cities than in small areas
#
because cities tend to be cosmopolitan and it's also in your economic interest to have
#
the largest networks, to be part of the largest networks you can be and so on, but they haven't
#
And you see that even in India, like one of the really disturbing questions that came
#
up in the last few weeks was during the Asifa case, that how could someone do this to an
#
18 year old, how could you to another human being, where is your humanity, but the answer
#
to this is that the people who did this did not consider her worthy of their moral consideration.
#
She was from the Bakarwal tribe, Muslim tribe and those people weren't part of the circle
#
of these people who you know, their circle had an expanded far enough to include them
#
and you see this in the treatment of the other across India where there will be many Hindus
#
who will not consider Muslims around them and certainly lower class Muslims around them
#
worthy of their moral consideration.
#
So that answers this question, how could you?
#
You could because you don't see this person as human and that's a very disturbing thing
#
and I think what happens is like the earlier point that you made and that you went back
#
to is that technology reinforces, you know technology helps us form these echo chambers
#
where we find like-minded people and where we can stay in our comfort zones with tribes
#
we feel comfortable with.
#
So you know will this make us one world or will this actually further divide, you know
#
And I have just completely rambled, what was the question, I'm so sorry, please forgive
#
I don't even know what I set out to answer.
#
No, that's okay, so my question was that is there room for more political thought?
#
It's an unknown unknown right, it's an unknown unknown so I wouldn't know it.
#
I can engage with all of these frameworks of thinking like Arnold Kling wrote a great
#
book called The Three Languages of Politics where he says that left liberals, libertarians
#
and conservatives frequently talk past each other because their first principles are different
#
because libertarians value freedom, left liberals value equality, conservatives value
#
tradition and they talk past each other all the time, they can never talk to each other
#
and once you're cognizant of these different first principles maybe you can begin a dialogue.
#
Are there other first principles that will suddenly emerge?
#
I don't know and I can't imagine what they are but that could easily be a lack of imagination
#
on my part, like I said it's an unknown unknown but I see these as three ways of three broad
#
frameworks of looking at the world and I know which my framework is and I can talk about
#
that and I think I can also I can also you know have conversations with left liberals
#
and conservatives where I'm not talking past them where I can engage with them on the basis
#
of what I understand or where they are coming from but if you're asking will there be some
#
other way of thinking that is beyond this who knows.
#
So just wanted to ask one more thing in terms of you know the guests on your show and so
#
have you ever thought of actually getting politicians since there's so much discussion
#
about policy and you know get the decision makers essentially or who've been you know
#
made decisions in the past getting on to the show and discussing that to actually understand
#
you know what the constraints they work with etc and if they're honest about it yeah obviously
#
you're very learned on this space etc and I'm more more like a novice but still you
#
know to get to know about their side of the view.
#
I don't think I'm learned I think I know enough to ask good questions if those guys come but
#
firstly who would come on the show like if Modi ji would come on the show or even Rahul
#
ji would come on the show.
#
I think he has his own podcast.
#
So I don't think I did get JP Narayan on the show by the way.
#
State of politics which I was very thrilled about that because someone I respect enormously
#
is just a huge intellect and a powerful force and in many ways is given up on politics which
#
is sad and says a lot I think or maybe I shouldn't say it out or put words in his mouth but that's
#
a sense I got but yeah if they if they if they would come I would get them.
#
So now Nakul and Rachit are going to take a break not that I was doing all the talking
#
but they'll take a break and but they're still here and the conversation will continue
#
and now over to my producer the famous random comic Abbas who will and we'll go through
#
the IMA questions that a lot of you have asked on Twitter and Facebook and I'll try my best
#
to actually cover everything everybody said including flippin stuff but I'll let Abbas
#
first go through the shortlist that he made.
#
I like how every time you mention me you say famous stand up comic it's like it's a moniker
#
like the spectacular Spider-Man the fantastic the famous stand up comedian.
#
Alright so first of all we got a lot of questions so thank you everyone for sending in the questions.
#
One thing I noticed is that scene unseen listeners don't just ask a question they give their
#
opinion then ask a question or they ask a question.
#
Also the two questions that did get covered in the conversation which was the nota question
#
But let's just name the people.
#
Dodwani and Kelvin Inc at Kelvin Inc on Twitter.
#
So those were the those were the two people who send in I've got a question here from
#
Krishna Kumar on Twitter who asked why do you think at later cut the handle also I think
#
he used to be a cricket writer.
#
So his question is why do you think urban Indians are so disconnected from reality.
#
Just a random sample of urban Indians in any decent sized city.
#
Only a minority would know what they're drinking only a minority would know what they're drinking
#
water sources are where their food comes from.
#
It's the biggest reason they vote wrong come election time.
#
I'll give the positive side first.
#
The positive side is there's this famous essay called Eye Pencil by Leonard Reed and famous
#
essay just Google it Eye Pencil by Leonard Reed R E A D and what that essay is about
#
is it's the autobiography of a pencil which talks about how it's made and what you realize
#
through that is that it can't be made by any one person.
#
It takes literally it has raw material from across the world made by thousands of people
#
requiring you know the cooperation and coordination of millions to actually produce that one pencil
#
and yet none of these people know of any of the others.
#
I think a recent version of this was done as a homage to this which was about the iPod
#
about how the iPod is made with inputs from 70 countries or whatever and all these people
#
don't know all the other people.
#
So this lack of knowledge is not necessarily a bug.
#
It's actually a feature.
#
It means that you can go about your daily life and without your knowing it or planning
#
for it there are millions of people across the world who are working at this moment to
#
That's the wonder of a market.
#
But that's obviously not Krishnakumar Hakka at later cut is referring to what he's referring
#
to is why are we so apathetic and again that is something we discussed earlier Rajit had
#
asked a question about that and the thing is our apathy is rational because it is indeed
#
true that we can do nothing about it not just because rationally one vote makes no difference
#
but also because there is a disconnect between power and accountability at the level of local
#
government and the forces that are around us sometimes seem too overwhelming to do anything
#
about and if I've interpreted his lament correctly it's a lament I share.
#
I don't have any solutions.
#
You just go on doing what you're doing.
#
He's tried to connect the apathy to voting wrongly in the elections.
#
Yeah I mean voting wrongly it's what is wrongly it's not like there's a right option.
#
Everybody is entitled to their view of looking at the world and also everybody is wrong and
#
there's nothing more to say life is sad.
#
So Mr. Dodwani asked another question which I found pretty interesting where he asks most
#
of India's problems lie in yesteryear's law that don't work for modern society.
#
Is there a way to rewrite the constitution of India understanding the needs of the present
#
time and dealing with them more aptly?
#
Yeah but who's going to do it?
#
You know if the constitution is rewritten it won't be by Mr. Dodwani or me.
#
It'll be by the people in charge.
#
They will make it worse.
#
So it's an easy thing to sort of say that you know you see it's first of all it's true
#
that the constitution doesn't go far enough to protect our freedoms.
#
For example free speech is not protected article 19 2 lays out all those restrictions to it
#
such as public order decency and so on.
#
And because of that various laws in the IPC which were framed by the British to oppress
#
us like 295A 153A which make it a crime to give offence though you breach those laws
#
often a bus in your standup comedy cannot be challenged constitutionally because hey
#
the constitution allows for laws like that.
#
So our constitution people call it a liberal constitution in the good sense of the word
#
I don't think it is really it doesn't protect our freedoms enough and also my good friend
#
Shruti Rajgopalan who's been on the show a few times she had done an awesome presentation
#
or somewhere on YouTube if you search for her name you'll find it about how the constitution
#
has been consistently over the last 70 something years been amended time and time again for
#
political purposes still is practically meaningless.
#
So Ambedkar in 53 in fact said that you know the constitution of India should be burnt
#
because it is meaningless.
#
I don't remember his exact words.
#
Shruti's presentation which would be on YouTube Shruti Rajgopalan.
#
And there was a cartoon at one point about how the constitution of India is not a book
#
but a periodical it's changed so much.
#
So politicians have been changing it throughout to their.
#
So our constitution is a pretty messed up beast it's got some very good elements of
#
it still it does offer us some protections it could be far worse and the worry is that
#
if you wanted to be amended it could actually become far worse depending on the dispensation.
#
Now at some point I remember I got into this controversy on Twitter because you can't make
#
everything idiot proof where right wingers were talking about changing the constitution.
#
And somebody pointed out that oh it can't be done.
#
And I merely pointed out that hey it can be done it's been done repeatedly by Nehru and
#
Indira it's fucked us over the right to property is no longer a fundamental right.
#
And so without saying glibly it can't be done realized that it can be done and we should
#
be aware and we should fight it.
#
And that was because I wasn't idiot proof enough that was misinterpreted as my supporting
#
a change to the constitution but I would just say that look if someone's going to change
#
it it's not Mr. Dodwani or me it's Mr. Adityanath and Mr. Vinay Katiyar.
#
So do you really want that.
#
Yeah that's the one question that comes into my head if we change laws to protect free
#
speech there are also someone will stand up and say chat try and change a lot to bring
#
in Hindutva or Sharia law.
#
So like there will always be that second point of view.
#
All right Arvind Iyer on Twitter asks I would love to hear your views on US gun control
#
with your consent and free trade principle I think you would oppose any restrictions.
#
Can you share more details?
#
Yeah we should go to Twitter ID I think if I'm not mistaken it's at Iyer Archie A R C
#
Yeah yeah Arvind Iyer I don't know this person but I just remembered the ID because I was
#
writing all these down.
#
That's a great question and I'm afraid I must disagree with my libertarian friends I am
#
for gun control I don't believe gun should be freely sold in India.
#
Now to explain why let me first say that in the US context I imagine in the US context
#
I completely understand looking at how the country originated and how it has since come
#
by gun rights for a big deal because you actually needed to protect yourself from the state
#
and so on and so forth and that's how it originated I understand that.
#
I am however glad that guns are not sold freely in India and I hope they never are.
#
And I wrote a post a long time back called the bombzooka question that's the name of
#
the post if you just go on my blog India uncut India uncut dot com search for bombzooka
#
you'll come across a post where I pose a hypothetical question let me pose this to you guys as well
#
it's a difficult question.
#
The question is this imagine three kinds of weapons that are sold okay one is a knife
#
you need a knife for cutting vegetables and so on and so forth you can also use it to
#
kill people should a knife be allowed question one question two gun you can use a gun for
#
self defense you can also kill people with it and it's got deterrence value should a
#
Weapon three bombzooka okay bombzooka is my invention that is my notional invention I
#
haven't actually invented something like that it's an invention the bombzooka is something
#
which you which people are demanding be sold at groceries everyone is allowed to buy and
#
what it basically does is you can press a button or remotely you can set it off and
#
a whole neighborhood blows up let's say a few square hundred meters just blow up and
#
there are people saying that hey you know it's you can't condemn me till I've done
#
it and men kill you know guns don't bombzookas don't kill people people kill people and yeah
#
should a bombzooka be allowed now I think so first knives should it be allowed I say
#
yes yeah so knives should be allowed to be sold right because it has daily utility as
#
well right three bombzookas should it be allowed any random guy can buy a bombzooka and blow
#
up a neighborhood no right okay so clear answers now my only my follow-up question
#
then is forget the second one about guns my follow-up question then is that somewhere
#
between the knife and a bombzooka you are drawing a line where is that line and why
#
is that line there you know I think you'd both agree with me because you said nice should
#
be sold and bombzooka should not be sold that there should be a line where should that line
#
be and why there the line is in I think two parts one is the magnitude of damage it can
#
do maybe that's one and secondly a knife also has a lot of other utilities yeah right so
#
to the benevolent less less harmful utilities exactly and a bombzooka doesn't yeah right
#
so which is a great answer which is which are two of the parameters I'd look at but
#
I'd say that it is now very clear and I think even the most ardent libertarian would agree
#
that you can't have bombzooka selling over the counter where you can just press a button
#
and blow up a neighborhood because hey we're right end of civilization so you are drawing
#
a line you're drawing a line what are the reasons you're drawing a line and then you
#
can debate about whether gun should be part of it or not I personally feel gun should
#
be part of it and it how I justify that with my libertarian principles is that part of
#
what a libertarian recognizes as a valid role of state the one valid role of state is to
#
protect all our rights and this is sort of one preemptive way of doing that of avoiding
#
violence this justification can be misused so I'm even hesitant of giving it out and
#
many of my libertarian friends are very angry at me right now and perhaps you know tearing
#
the headphones apart I hope they're not expensive ones but but yeah and look in India man come
#
on look around you yeah if you had guns selling freely they would be freaking mayhem I agree
#
yeah true Abbas do you agree with him I do agree with you imagine I mean would you feel
#
comfortable as a stand-up comic I would have nightmares of a person standing up and gaming
#
at the stage all right we move on to the next question so at Manish T on Twitter asks if
#
ever a private bank goes bankrupt government will have to bail it out like the US in 2008
#
then why not let government participate in profits of the banks by owning them good question
#
and where I will take issue with the question is not the second sentence but the first one
#
that private bank should not be bailed out by the government that what happened in the
#
financial crisis of 2007 where the government bailed out all these private banks was wrong
#
it creates something called moral hazard it sets the wrong incentives because all these
#
companies then realize that they can do whatever in the end the government will bail them out
#
what does that do that privatizes profits it socializes losses if the company makes
#
money they get the profits if the company loses money we the taxpayers pay so I don't
#
care what you say about the economy going down I think that was a rationalization that
#
was alarmism I think no private company should ever under any circumstances be propped up
#
by the government it creates a moral hazard which makes a second part of the question
#
and talking about just adding to that incentivizing them to perform better it doesn't help when
#
the RBI itself classifies two of the largest banks in the country as too big to fail exactly
#
it's like a statement that you know I'm here it's an invitation to misuse the system and
#
those two banks are public sector banks and therefore you have your Nirav Modi's and all
#
that yeah right so all right the next question again comes from twitter it's the twitter
#
handle is at adi triple one two we should name both by the way so the earlier one was
#
at Manish T which is we call them sir Euclid yeah so adi triple one two's name was a sentence
#
so I'm assuming that's not his name respect the user no I'll have it somewhere here I've
#
taken printouts of the whole thing yeah it's I told you so exclamation mark yeah which
#
is clearly a scene unseen listener adi triple one two yeah I envy his certainty that's actually
#
his his name sort of personifies a hindsight bias I told you so I knew about it many crisis
#
dekha tha maine tab bola nahi tha dekha tha I'll just read out his question he asks your
#
thoughts on the best libertarian thinkers out there and any books that you recommend
#
that that distills the principles of libertarianism in a simple to understand format right so
#
I picked up sort of my understanding of liberty through the years in various diffused ways
#
and I'm trying to write a book on this which does exactly this okay and hopefully when
#
I do that I'll be the definitive but why are you laughing I'm serious when can we expect
#
that book yeah yeah I'm half Bengali so I procrastinate a lot but someday but to answer
#
the question and to try and be useful there's a gentleman called David Boas he's written
#
a book called the libertarian mind which is a marvelous book in which we'll give you all
#
the basics of the libertarian way of thinking David Boas works at the Cato Institute in
#
the US he's also edited a compilation called the libertarian reader which is great essays
#
on libertarianism by various people and which contextualizes them as well in these easy
#
to read sections so that's again a great place to find out about them and those two books
#
I think will be your gateway to a lot of other reading on the subject any Indian authors
#
or books that come to mind no yeah libertarian India it is up to me a heavy burden my friend
#
Sancho had some good libertarian ideas I don't even remember it was a shit book if any of
#
you read it I apologize I'll go on quickly to the next question is asked by at Shan say
#
at Twitter his name is Shantanu he asks will Indians create a liberal party like Swatantra
#
in the future to defeat socialist parties like BJP and Congress who do you think would
#
be new Rajaji's and Masani's emerging from great question that's a question we've been
#
asking ourselves for you know almost decades virtually I make myself sound older than I
#
am though but you know a lot of people very foolishly put their faith in the BJP and thought
#
that when Modi said things like minimum government maximum governance that he was of that persuasion
#
by the way that line was on a cover of Prakriti many many years ago I mean I was not part
#
of Prakriti then so I have but I mean I wasn't part of Prakriti then this is what I've been
#
told but but like Shantanu correctly said in his question Modi is as socialist as all
#
the as his favorite Nehru or Indira if not more in some ways the point is I'll go back
#
to what I said earlier when when I think of the political marketplace the party is part
#
of the supply right the party is on the supply side I'm saying don't think of the supply
#
side think of the demand side till there is demand for it the supply won't be there when
#
people demand a liberal slash you know free thinking party or party that stands for individual
#
liberty like Rajaji and Meenu Masani did then they will be that party but do people demand
#
it no those ideas are not in the culture they're not part of the discourse then why should
#
that party be there and many of the people who said that they believed in that and they
#
subsequently supported Modi even when it was obvious that Modi is socialist in economics
#
and authoritarian in his approach to governance in general and both of which should completely
#
be the opposite of what you should stand for they continued supporting him they rationalized
#
it which makes me like I wrote this piece for Prakriti and editorial last year which
#
I think is our most read piece ever in terms of views or whatever it's called beware of
#
the useful idiots so do a search for that beware of the useful idiots which talks about
#
exactly this that all of these people gave him legitimacy by sort of pretending that
#
BJP was a great liberal party which is of course a joke.
#
At Anand Hegde on Twitter asks if you were to create a utopian country what would be
#
the role of the state in it?
#
Ideally the role of the state should be restricted to protecting rights but the thing is and
#
if you are actually interested in this in a theoretical sense then Robert Nozick wrote
#
a great book called Anarchy, State and Utopia and David Friedman wrote a book called The
#
Machinery of Freedom, Milton's son David Friedman and both of them sort of say that
#
you don't need a government at all and they tease out that idea to his logical conclusions
#
and they show how it's possible to live without a state at all which I don't agree with because
#
my mind can't wrap itself around it is probably a flaw on my part that I think there does
#
need to be some government which protects our rights and so on but I should not do much
#
more than that but the question is sort of not something I give great I mean not something
#
that the point is we live in the real world that we live in and all our battles are for
#
more freedom and we know that more freedom helps and why think of utopia I mean utopian
#
thinkers are the most dangerous.
#
Okay got a question on Facebook from Darshana Mahatre where she asked you express your displeasure
#
on demonetization when it was announced today more than a year has passed obviously the
#
cash crunch still remains and it will only increase with the elections coming in but
#
otherwise do you still believe it is too bad a move for the economy?
#
It's a disastrous move I said it at the time I said it repeatedly again and again I stand
#
by it and I am going to raise my finger and say I told you so right I think I was completely
#
right I won't give myself much credit for being completely right because anybody with
#
half a brain could have seen that it was going to be a disaster for the economy and its consequences
#
go far beyond the cash crunch current cash crunch it's you know it destroyed lives it
#
was a humanitarian disaster and the fact that there are some people who call themselves
#
economists who can say hey in the long run it will help us we will talk about costs and
#
benefits though the presumed benefits may happen to one group of people and the costs
#
are on another group of people and it's overwhelmingly hurt the poor I find that repulsive and disgusting.
#
Demonetization was a disaster it was a unilateral move by a mad despotic leader who doesn't
#
have a clue about economics and I condemned it then and I condemn it now and my condemning
#
it is really meaningless because it's damaged this country.
#
Alright another question from Twitter from at Tilak365 whose name is Tilak Kamath also
#
a very regular Cyrus listener he sent in a question that says just read the WHO's report
#
on air pollution how do you think our country should lay out a concrete plan on tackling
#
the issue regulations penalties rewards for states private entities who tackle it public
#
Okay so I'm not an expert on the environment or WHO so I can't go into specifics but I
#
would just say that to identify a problem and say we should do this is a little too
#
simple what often happens is if you remember I had an episode with Vivek Kaul on the pollution
#
in Delhi and what Vivek pointed out and this is like really an interesting way of thinking
#
about this problem in the political economy of it.
#
What Vivek pointed out was that look the pollution in Delhi is happening because farmers in Punjab
#
are burning rice and it's a death cover of that the rice husk or whatever which they
#
are burning that after you know because they have no other way of getting rid of it and
#
the fumes because of the way the wind blows is going to Delhi.
#
Now the thing is if you one of the reasons that is happening is that rice first of all
#
should not be grown in Punjab at all is a point he made because it's a water intensive
#
crop in Punjab is relatively arid why is it grown there because of government subsidies
#
and electricity and these people can just drill out from their bore wells as much water
#
as they need to so that is an unseen effect of a government subsidy which you see right
#
there the Delhi pollution and if you are going to solve this how would you solve this you
#
can't just say that let us make it a crime to burn that because you don't have the state
#
capacity to actually enforce anything all that will happen is that the few cops that you
#
have will just get more bribes and it's a political problem because government of Punjab
#
is not going to do anything about it you know so Kejriwal will go to the Punjab CM and say
#
that do something about it but the Punjab CM needs those votes any party which pisses
#
off the farmers of Punjab is not going to come to power in Punjab so no party is going
#
to do that how do you solve the problem poor Kejriwal in Delhi is you know putting his
#
muffler and having asthma because of that but there's nothing he can practically do
#
this is such a huge problem that I can't even think of a possible solution for it even if
#
there's a dictator at the center and he really won't be you know how and a lot of governance
#
problems are of this nature so if you're on the outside and you say that oh okay this
#
is happening because farmers are and all of the Delhi pollution isn't because of this
#
this is sort of that takes it beyond the tipping point but say okay ban the farmers from doing
#
that or whatever but those are very easy answers those don't work no answer so these are huge
#
problems so for me having literally no understanding of the environment and what the WHO might
#
have done but when I say no understanding the environment I mean the sort of the specific
#
politics as in this case I really can't say anything.
#
Devon Roy who's Twitter handle is at f82lingman asks why is there no faith in free markets
#
in India in spite of its many successes?
#
Because it's counterintuitive and this is something like many of the basic precepts
#
of free markets are counterintuitive this goes back to what I was saying about human
#
nature earlier that we've evolved we evolved in prehistoric times our instincts have evolved
#
in prehistoric times so number one we thought of the world in zero-sum ways that if I get
#
something because those were times of scarcity so you know there's a dead deer if I get the
#
deer the other tribe won't if the other tribe gets it we won't you think of the world in
#
zero-sum ways so if somebody wins somebody else loses that's how you think of the economy
#
so you assume that the solution to poverty must be redistribution you assume that if
#
the rich are getting rich it can only be if the poor are getting poorer and so on the
#
positive someness of things which is one of the great insights of insights about the world
#
is very counterintuitive and very hard to get across number one spontaneous order that's
#
large systems can run by themselves that languages can evolve and form up with sets of rules
#
and all that on their own without a central committee planning it and saying this is how
#
you should use a comma people don't get that how can you know spontaneous order is because
#
back in prehistoric times when we evolved everything was on a scale where you could
#
plan it and control it but large societies are not like that we run through spontaneous
#
order markets are spontaneous order languages are spontaneous order to go back to I pencil
#
by Leonard Reed that is a case of spontaneous order where millions of people combine to
#
produce a pencil for you yet you don't know anything about them and they don't know anything
#
about you deeply counterintuitive right so all the ideas of about free markets are extremely
#
counterintuitive whereas all these sort of command and control socialist ideas that government
#
will plan everything and all of that despite all evidence to the contrary over the last
#
few decades of how that works out they still remain strong in the popular imagination all
#
right okay let's take some last few questions Damanbir Singh whose Twitter handle is Damanbir
#
Singh nine asks for spreading ideas of liberalism which is better a podcast championing liberalism
#
criticizing reactionary forces with like-minded experts or a podcast run by a liberal who
#
gets people from the other end of the political spectrum on the show and engage them using
#
logic and data not political correctness right and this is a common I mean this is a question
#
as others have also asked why don't you get people you disagree here and my answer to
#
that is I have did you listen to my future of the internet episode with Nikhil Pawar
#
it was very lively we were arguing all the time Vivek Kaul is a frequent guest on the
#
show and we disagree over a lot of things I mean he's not a libertarian certainly like
#
me very close friend very fine mind so I try to engage with people who don't think the
#
way I do at the same time I must say that this quest for balance in the personal domain
#
like this is a personal podcast is my podcast after all is not always necessary for example
#
there are ideologies that I find repulsive right I will never bring in say a Hindu to
#
a bigger tear who will argue that Muslims don't belong in India I find that kind of
#
thinking so repulsive I will never have him here equally I will never bring in somebody
#
here who for example doesn't care about individual rights or who believes in mass scale coercion
#
or social engineering again I find that equally repulsive why should I engage with those people
#
those ideas are dangerous do you not subscribe to the idea that if you get someone like that
#
you and him or her will find a common ground somewhere and they each of you go back with
#
something sure no I'd love to find common ground with conservatives and left liberals
#
but I'm saying there are some categories of people on the far right and the far left right
#
there is no common ground possible with so why even try if someone is going to sit across
#
me and tell me that Muslims don't belong in India and it's a Hindu nation I don't even
#
want to have that conversation and maybe it's wrong on my part to react so strongly against
#
that but I don't want to have that conversation okay Vimal Roy on Facebook asked what's closer
#
to you cricket or poker okay I haven't actually I've been a poker player and a pretty good
#
practitioner I am not a cricket player though I bowled three balls to Rahul Dravid and he
#
was clean bowled but this was not proper cricket what happened on the third ball I used to
#
work in cricket force so he had come over and he used to play office cricket with this sort
#
of plasticky kind of ball which you could squeeze and I figured out a way of squeezing
#
it and imparting phenomenal forward spin and the first ball was a wide the next two he
#
was bowled and then he called me Shoaib and he refused to play although I had to point
#
out that I wasn't chucking it was fingers that were generating the pace because of the
#
nature of the ball or was it just being good to the managing editor there no no no he wouldn't
#
give a shit about that though he's a delightful man but I don't think he'll get deliberately
#
clean bowled by anyone so no but in real cricket I'd be a complete joke but I love both of
#
them you know sports are sports Vimal's second question was do you think Dan Bilzerian made
#
all his money playing poker no of course not he's just like a celebrity he's like the Kim
#
Kardashian of that kind of I mean to interject I think you've done a podcast on cricket right
#
like or a series of yeah yeah I've done yeah yeah so me and Prem Panicker the legendary
#
reading somewhere yeah yeah so we've done for the company story tell we did ten turning
#
points in Indian cricket so it's a ten episode series which starts with CK Naidu and ends
#
with Virat Kohli so yeah check that out story tell.in I think his third question was what
#
is the path to legalize traditional vices and he puts vices in quotes like sports betting
#
or poker in India yeah I mean first of all of course I agree with him with the presumption
#
that they should not be illegal they should absolutely be legal and people conflate match
#
fixing and betting and I'm like no they are completely different things that legalizing
#
betting will actually stop match fixing like the moment you make something illegal the
#
underworld gets in and that increases the chance of nefarious activities like this so what
#
are the chances I honestly think that you are not going to do it through reason and
#
logic it will only happen if some powerful interest group decides that there is something
#
in it for them like for example Mukesh Ambani says I want to do a casino in Bombay and he
#
realizes that's going to be very profitable and then he tells the government to change
#
it so if something like that happens so if that changes sometimes laws changing for the
#
better can be because of the wrong reasons like this all right last three questions this
#
one is from Rajesh Bhateja it would handle his Bhateja Rajesh props to him for sending
#
a screenshot and not typing out the entire question it's a longish question with a comment
#
he says hi Amit where and how do you see hope for India corruption has gotten into our DNA
#
education perhaps the only hope is broken political scene seems degenerative perhaps
#
only thing that worries politicians is winning next election valueless lives lost by dozens
#
and hundreds every day in road accidents medical apathy violent clashes etc filth all round
#
missing civic sense you may say we are a country still in the making and the tolerance to accept
#
this messiness is in some way part of our struggle towards the hope that wo subha kabhi
#
to aayegi okay where's the question the question was first sentence where and how do you see
#
hope for India I think somebody else also asked a question they asked one one good thing
#
and one thing that depresses you and one thing that gives you hope yeah so let's let's just
#
name the person in the middle so that question is asked by Rohit Ajit Kumar one thing that
#
gives you disband one thing about Indian politics that gives you hope things spoken about despair
#
a lot what gives you hope what gives me hope and I think I've said this in another context
#
I think I might have said this in my podcast with libertarianism Vipavan spoke to me what
#
gives me hope is that many of the much of what we could not achieve with political struggle
#
maybe technology will do for us maybe technology will empower the individual in ways that political
#
battles could not and so that gives me hope but it's like really an unknown unknown and
#
it can work both ways technology can actually help governments oppress us more and take
#
more of our powers away in which we for example see with the all-pervasive surveillance system
#
of Aadhaar coming in and so on and so forth so it can work both ways but I just think
#
that you know technology can empower individuals more than all of this you know ivory talk
#
can has at mad man web Madhu Menon asked who is your favorite photographer and why is it
#
me so Madhu Menon is my very old friend and all my dps you see of me everywhere on Twitter
#
Facebook whatever are basically shot by Madhu Menon brilliant photographer not all he does
#
he ran a great restaurant called Shiok which unfortunately no longer exists and I've done
#
an episode with Madhu Menon on restaurant regulation listen yeah I've heard that so
#
you should check that out delightful guy and he also on the side good at tech and makes
#
website so the website of Prakati thinkprakati.com is again made by Madhu Menon so my favorite
#
photographer is Madhu Menon and why because I say so it's a circular reasoning I'm allowed
#
that all right the last question asked by at Veena Venugopal Veena Venugopal asks which
#
lit Twitter on fire how are you so handsome Veena Venugopal is messing with me she's
#
my good friend she's messing with me I have a Facebook podcast I know this has gone on
#
quite long but I just want to quickly mention try to sort of go through every question since
#
I've printed out a list I don't want to leave anyone out they took the trouble to ask Satya
#
Piyani from Punni Talks asks typical policy making pitfalls that government makes but
#
private enterprises generally avoid and pitfalls that both are equally likely to fall into
#
a okay because Abbas is on my head I don't want to spend too much time but I would say
#
that more than policy making pitfalls policy making pitfalls that government makes come
#
if you ignore incentives if you just look at intentions a private enterprise has to
#
go beyond intentions and think about outcomes because the bottom line depends on it the
#
survival depends on it government enterprises can often do ignore outcomes and do things
#
for good intentions because the optics are good that we are doing this because we care
#
about you regardless of the optics this is especially true for moves which play out over
#
a long period of time because politicians tend to be focused on the next elections
#
so I mean I would have a lot more to say about this but I'll move on.
#
Even Anand Hegde again discussion on whether taxation is theft or property is theft I find
#
the notion of property being theft is completely bizarre and the reason for it is this and
#
we had I had there was an episode of the scene in the unseen which Shruti Rajgopalan joined
#
and spoke about the right to property and for a little bit of that she also spoke about
#
the fundamental philosophical basis of why you need property which is because there is
#
scarcity in the world everybody can't have everything things are scarce and if you don't
#
have a system of property rights you will essentially have chaos and violence all the
#
time you know then what stops me from picking up this mic from IVM podcast and just taking
#
it with me and saying this is now mine and then Amit Doshi will have to sit here all
#
the time to defend his equipment the world can't function like that you have property
#
rights for a reason and again I wanted to elaborate on this but we're running out of
#
time what's the value advantage of voting nota kelvin ink we've been through this we've
#
been through Krishna Kumar okay someone called all wenger at pop underscore Mac which is
#
all wenger so it's like I don't know whether he's punning on the Avengers or arson wenger
#
or both he has a snarky question what's not wrong with our country which I think is taking
#
a dig at me that maybe I'm too negative or something I guess yeah what's not wrong with
#
our country I'll give you a serious answer and it's counterintuitive what's not wrong
#
with our country is population from our childhood no I'm serious from our childhood we've been
#
indoctrinated with the notion that population is a great problem and that is a mistake I've
#
written columns about this you can search for them on India uncut dot com that population
#
is our greatest strength because it's a positive some world human beings are in the words of
#
the economist Julian Simon the ultimate resources so I think what is not wrong with our country
#
our people are not wrong with our country and and it's interesting every time someone
#
says India ka problem population and they basically mean everybody else but themselves
#
okay major data at major 1441 on what grounds do you support net neutrality it seems contrary
#
to your belief system someone else also asked about net neutrality I don't support net neutrality
#
I don't oppose it either let me explain what is my belief system if I'm coming from a position
#
of property rights and this is something I mentioned in my episode on the future of the
#
internet with Nikhil where we were arguing is that I always when you contest the use
#
of a resource I look at who owns it now it so happens that spectrum in this country is
#
owned by the government it's a different argument whether the government should own
#
spectrum and if not what do you do with it but given that the government owns a spectrum
#
they have the right to set the conditions on it on how people may use it and so on and
#
what the net neutrality advocates like my friend Nikhil were fighting for is that these
#
are the XYZ are the conditions you should set others were saying ABC they have the right
#
to ask for those conditions as an interest group now personally I would just say that
#
every ISP should normally have the right to offer whatever it wants to the customers and
#
then you let them compete Nikhil's point was that there isn't real competition it's a cartel
#
in which case what the government should do is make sure that there isn't a cartel that
#
it's a competitive market and generally if there is a cartel and if there isn't competition
#
it's because the government is doing something wrong it's getting in the way so this is a
#
broad argument so but I on the whole I think the debate is mooted doesn't make a difference
#
I mean but I don't either support or oppose it you know more power to Nikhil as one interest
#
group to ask for what he wants to Mohit Dodwani asked a number of questions I'll kind of skip
#
them because we covered two of them we covered a couple of them Shaswat asked a question
#
about is consent an unseen factor of well-being not captured in the world happiness index
#
could the lack of it be a reason for India's plummeting rank I didn't understand the question
#
Shaswat I'm really sorry I'm not trying to you know if you can clarify exactly what you
#
meant by that maybe in a future episode and Euclid asked the same question about why don't
#
I invite someone who has views contrary to mine I do bro I did and yeah and and if you
#
disagree with me well come on the show yeah is there a way besides funding or joining
#
mainstream politics that NRIs can bring about meaningful sustainable and positive change
#
in the country Anad Gill at Anad underscore Gill again the same answer I think just try
#
to get your ideas in the culture talk to more people about it don't let your uncles dominate
#
your Facebook groups for family Facebook groups and okay episode on public sector banks oh
#
we did this the Euclid question okay question by Pratik Gupta at Pratik Gupta you talked
#
about free market and healthcare what do you think is the role of information asymmetry
#
in terms of healthcare where the consumer doesn't have enough know how to make a choice
#
of the price or value of a service remains the same example doctor gives me a choice
#
between two vaccinations for my child one is 8k the other is 4k 8k ones protects against
#
15 strains 4k one protects against 12 strains I can't make a rational choice because information
#
asymmetry perfectly very good question again I would have liked to spend more time on this
#
but netnet I'll say two things netnet I'll say that that if you don't have a free market
#
here and if you have the government deciding that the government choices will not come
#
from a position of from a benevolent all-knowing position the government will be captured by
#
special interest groups who will then dictate what vaccinations they provide and what they
#
don't the classic example of that is that fundamentally the obesity epidemic in America
#
was caused by the sugar lobby funding researchers on health on the one hand and government bodies
#
on the other hand which is why the government gave those guidelines which we now know to
#
be untrue with saturated fat and cholesterol are bad for you and sugar is perfectly okay
#
and that's really the one single reason for the obesity epidemic at some point I'll do
#
an episode on this but governments are always captured by special interest and therefore
#
I'd rather have a competitive marketplace and if you have a need as a consumer that
#
there is information asymmetry how can you make out the difference I'm sure there'll
#
be players who will then emerge in a marketplace if they're allowed to who will be able to
#
help you mitigate that and on the RTE episode Euclid again asked any particular reason the
#
panelists skipped discussing the sectarian nature of the act why is it applicable only
#
to non-minority institutions well no particular reason we skipped that what what we wanted
#
to focus on is all the unreasonable regulations that the RTE puts on private schools which
#
is actually harming education in this country that's kind of what we wanted to focus on
#
so we didn't discuss the sectarian nature and perhaps if I do a future episode I think
#
this episode was with Vivek Kaul I'll keep it in mind that this is something that we
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should take up and in fact by mentioning it I've already taken it up there it's done over
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don't bring it up again episode from free trade would help if panelists share example
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from real life how many countries in the last 50 years are becoming economic powerhouses
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by following the prescription contrast with experience of China South Korea and Japan
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again by Euclid again various examples but wherever markets are freer countries have
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done well and even though you know people talk about the socialism and the welfare states
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of the Scandinavian countries but if you look at how they became prosperous in the first
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place it was because of free markets and then they put those welfare systems in place later
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some of which actually hurt them for more on this just search for Johan Norberg on YouTube
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just go to YouTube and search for Johan Norberg in Scandinavia and you'll find talks by him
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on this Deepak Devate wanted to know about net neutrality I've covered this Devinder
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Beju asked why you stopped dreaming okay what he means is I used to start my episodes where
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I had a strange dream last night and I used to think okay it's kind of funny and I'm
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going to discuss some serious policy issue I'm doing a little bit of comic humor before
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that but I got tons of feedback from people saying that it's absolutely horrible and so
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I just stopped it I listened to feedback from my readers because you know you got to do
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that sometimes and and and so recently Krish Ashok you might know of him on Twitter said
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that hey he named two foreign podcasts and said one of them is a Sachin Tendulkaro podcast
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and one of them is the Rahul Dravidov podcast and so I said what is the Atul Beda day of
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podcasts and he said that my dream intros were the Atul Beda day otherwise my podcast
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is a Virat Kohli but the dream intros were Atul Beda day so so fine if people feel so
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strongly about it might as well not have it you know I mean maybe I can do a separate
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dream podcast okay Bharat Sriram is make in India hurting us more than helping us also
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can you talk about the increasing petrol prices is from at Bharat Sriram name is Bharat Sriram
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make in India in the sense that it replicates import substitution is helping us you know
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it's ironic that despite all the things that Modi says about Nehru that he's imitating
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Nehru in many ways for example Nehru harmed this country enormously I mean I'm a big fan
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of Nehru great statesman but economically he harmed us enormously and one of the ways
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he did that was through import substitution where his idea was that things should be made
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in India we shouldn't allow foreign companies to make for us which harmed us for various
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reasons some of which you know if you listen to my episode with Anupam Malur on protectionism
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you'll kind of understand us that's self-defeating and that's exactly what it did to us we defeated
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ourselves and make in India indicates the same mindset you know frankly it doesn't
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matter where something is made it just matters that consumers that is citizens like you and
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me get the best value for money they can and that creates value that they then go on to
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spend in the economy anyway listen to my episode in protectionism and you'll get a sense of
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that as for the increasing petrol prices I don't know I'm not an expert in this but it
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does strike me that Prime Minister Modi was incredibly lucky that oil prices worldwide
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have been so low since 2014 and that's one of the things that's kept the government performing
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much better than it would otherwise have although he's tried his best to shoot himself in the
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foot with things like demonetization and the terrible implementation of GST okay whose
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report okay Mojo at MKPin asks can you address how Modi's political philosophy is hurting
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India I am a lone voice in a family of NRI BJP supporters who think if you don't worship
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Modi it makes you a Congress supporter you know very good point I mean I mean I can't
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actually address how it's hurting India because already this episode has gone on too long
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and it will go on for two more days if I do that but you are right that people are thinking
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in binaries you know all my life as a writer I've railed against the Congress I've railed
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against the Gandhis and today I keep getting attacked because everybody thinks I'm a Congress
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supporter because I attacked Modi the thing is no they both suck and right now one of
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them is in power so he sucks a little bit more because he has power you have to keep
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opposing right so you know and and no doubt you know right now the bhakts hate me I think
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they'll probably whenever the next government change happens they'll start loving me because
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they'll see me as one of them I'm attacking the other guy okay Surekha Pillay on Twitter
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and we'll end with this Surekha Pillay on Twitter said that she has questions but she
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didn't want to ask them she said my questions revolve around policy discussions being exclusive
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prakriti not talking to the young and ideologies serving individuals more than societies so
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she didn't really ask them but by mentioning what she's not asking she kind of asked them
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so I'll so I'll actually try to answer them policy discussions being exclusive I think
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she'd actually have to elaborate on that I'm not really sure what she means but if she
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means that all of us are you know English speaking elites talking in our own little
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echo chambers and we don't affect the world outside she's absolutely right I mean I don't
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have a disagreement with that prakriti not talking to the young I relaunched prakriti
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last year but it's been running for it ran for 10 years before that I don't you know
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prakriti is a serious policy magazine but the thing is that it does talk to the young
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I believe in fact since we relaunched as a website under my heritageship since last year
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we've tried to make it more accessible and the thing is while a lot of its core writers
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are policy experts and so on retired bureaucrats and whatever we also have a lot of young policy
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experts writing for us like my friends Praveen Srinath, Pranay Kotasane, Hamsini Hariharan,
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Nidhi Gupta, Manasa Venkatraman outstanding writers really knowledgeable people really
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young like young millennials or even the generation after that I don't know how you define these
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things and and what Takshashila which is a think tank which runs prakriti keeps doing
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these courses and Nakul I think you did one of those courses three years ago and and they
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keep producing younger and younger policy wonks many of whom speak the Indian languages
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go out in the field try to make a difference we've even got a Hindi podcast which Pranay
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Kotasane and Saurabh Chandra run so I think that we do our best to have young voices in
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the mix diverse voices in the mix not just the same old same old we do our best as much
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as we can and finally ideology is serving individuals more than societies you know the
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thing here is that societies are composed of individuals and you have to protect them
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all and you know it's like that famous saying goes about an individual being the smallest
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minority you must protect all your minorities including individuals and people who talk
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about societies over individuals who talk about the greater common good and so on and
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so forth look where the leaders the communists did that the fascists did that the Maoists
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do that anyone who talks about the greater common good and about society is not talking
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about society as a whole they're talking about these specific interest group or class
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of people that they represent who's good they want the thing is I automatically believe
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that if you protect everybody's individual rights then you know society will flourish
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it's a positive some game just protect everybody let voluntary interactions take place between
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individuals in a society and we'll all do really well but whenever in the name of a
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group you try to clamp down on an individual you are hurting all of society all of humanity
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and on that grandiose note I will thank Surekha for not asking this question that she found
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a cunning way to ask and Nakul and Raja thanks a lot for coming on the show thanks for having
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us thank you thanks Amit and Abbas Abbas thanks a lot thank you so much
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If you're still here one and a half hours later thank you so much for listening to this
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full show you can follow me on Twitter at Amit Verma A-M-I-T-V-A-R-M-A and you can
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browse past episodes of The Scene in the Unseen on www.sceneunseen.in thank you so much
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