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Jay W. Richards

Jay W. Richards

American philosopher

Sep 23, 2026

14:43
But I mean, it was pretty dangerous.
14:45
Yeah.
14:45
Oh, totally.
14:46
You know, as you know, I wrote a book in 2020 called The Price of Panic about how stupid the lockdowns were.
14:51
You're highly suspicious that it was an engineered virus.
14:54
So at the time, we didn't know for sure.
14:55
So that similarity is the same.
18:16
Should Americans be worried about their career and how AI is going to impact it.
14:43
But I mean, it was pretty dangerous.
14:45
Yeah.
14:45
Oh, totally.
14:46
You know, as you know, I wrote a book in 2020 called The Price of Panic about how stupid the lockdowns were.
14:51
You're highly suspicious that it was an engineered virus.
14:54
So at the time, we didn't know for sure.
14:55
So that similarity is the same.
18:16
Should Americans be worried about their career and how AI is going to impact it.
9:00
Why?
9:01
Because we're not machines.
9:03
That's the simple answer.
9:04
And so for something to entirely replace us, they would have to be everything that we are.
9:09
Now, you might say, "Well, okay, but the, the things we do that are machine-like, that has everything to do with our work, and so therefore, the meaningful work that we do will ultimately be replaced by machines." And so part of this is a metaphysical claim, right? But a part of it is a kind of empirical claim.
9:26
And so when I wrote the book, it came out in 2018, I wanted to give the other side as much credit as possible.
9:33
And s- so in other words, I basically said, "Okay, let's assume that anything that can be automated using a combination of AI and robotics will be automated.

7 MINS LATER

RandyNARRATOR
16:47
Yeah, so what about the panpsychism, the idea that somehow or other there's a materialistic way in which you can explain consciousness?
4:34
And you know, one of the things that you point out in your book, and I mean maybe this is as basic, not in the sense of unimportant, but basic and important, is that our universe is fine-tuned for not only discovery, but for the existence of life itself.
4:55
That's right.
4:56
And so everything we've talked about so far is, like think of it as the fine-tuning of the stuff you need to get right at the local level.
5:03
But then you have the question, okay, well, what about the universal properties of the universe, the stuff that's true everywhere, uh, that govern the structure of molecules and the elements and planets? And so there's sort of basically three of these kinda universal properties.
5:17
So there's the, um, the initial conditions.
5:20
So what that would be is, okay, how did things have to be set up right at the beginning in order to have a universe like we have now? Uh, then there are the laws, so like the law of gravity that people learn in physics, and then within the laws, there are th- these sort of variables, um, and that might be M or C or something, and they're constants.
5:41
And so these are just, they're constant.

13 MINS LATER

18:14
And you go through in your book why this myth is perpetuated and how we can actually defend the truth in light of this mythology.
RandyNARRATOR
0:44
Let's now join Hank Hanegraaff and Jay Richards in their conversation.
0:49
Our atmosphere, which is another kind of feature of the same life, is going to need a nitrogen and oxygen-rich atmosphere.
0:56
There's lots of choices.
0:57
They're not all like that.
0:58
That's, of course, what we have.
1:00
Nitrogen-rich and oxygen-rich atmosphere is what's needed chemically for this, these life forms.
1:06
It also happens to be transparent to the visible part of the electromagnetic spectrum, so that that, that part of the spectrum that's needed for life gets through the atmosphere to the surface.

18 MINS LATER

19:36
What happens to your temperature when you hear that? [laughs]
5:08
But the privileged planet hypothesis actually helps inform us here.
5:13
It does.
5:14
And so, uh, just for people that only follow this superficially, the cli- the sort of climate change catastrophist claim is that our contributions of CO2 in particular into the atmosphere, CO2 is this three-atom molecule, and so it's a greenhouse gas, is causing the surface of the planet to heat up more, far more than it would naturally, and that's gonna lead to catastrophic types of climate that's, as you said, gonna be catastrophic to humans and to life.
5:41
First thing to note is that there's no justification for those extreme claims, and so if you even read the, the overheated, uh, intergo- governmental panel on climate change reports from the UN, none of... those never justify this.
5:55
They'll say, "Okay, yeah, we think based upon our computer models that we'll get between one and five degrees centigrade warming in the next 100 years." There's really no, not even a justification for that.
6:06
But notice that in either of those cases, it's not catastrophic.
6:09
I mean, anyone living at, at upper latitudes, uh, experiences a heck of a lot more than five degrees change in temperature every day.

9 MINS LATER

15:44
You taught us really how to ask the right questions and then how to ask the right questions in the right sequence so when you're confronted with something like climate change, you actually know what to do.
3:19
The news of our cosmic unimportance triggers impressive defense mechanisms in the human psyche." So he's basically talking about the Copernican principle, the principle of mediocrity.
3:34
That's right.
3:35
Yeah, a- a- and so Neil deGrasse Tyson is the kinda cur- our, our generation's current incarnation of Carl Sagan, whom we of course also quote in the book.
3:44
Uh, and Carl Sagan, who's since deceased, was the science popularizer that, that said this.
3:50
In fact, he wrote a book called Pale Blue Dot in which he said we don't hold a privileged position in the universe.
3:55
deGrasse Tyson says the same thing.
3:57
Of course, notice the kind of evaluative judgments here.

15 MINS LATER

18:38
On the other hand, as you point out, they've played a very significant role in scientific discovery.
8:28
Why?
8:28
Because we're not machines.
8:30
That's the simple answer.
8:31
And so for something to entirely replace us, they would have to be everything that we are.
8:37
Now you might say, "Well, okay, but the, the things we do that are machine-like, that has everything to do with our work, and so therefore, the meaningful work that we do will ultimately be replaced by machines." And so part of this is a metaphysical claim, right? But a part of it is a kind of empirical claim.
8:53
And so when I wrote the book, it came out in 2018, I wanted to give the other side as much credit as possible.
9:00
And s- so in other words, I basically said, "Okay, let's assume that anything that can be automated using a combination of AI and robotics will be automated.

7 MINS LATER

16:14
Yeah, so what about the panpsychism, the idea that somehow or other there's a materialistic way in which you can explain consciousness?

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