Jimmy Carr: My Mom’s Depression Made Me Funny

I'm in the service industry right I like to think of myself as a drug dealer Okay, so I'm I'm dealing in in two drugs is dopamine and serotonin and the people have already got the drugs on them I can just tickle them out like I should be dead, but it's it She was so funny incident on the M5 a young man has made a joke that courses mother to pass out Please avoid the left lane of the M5. I Think we're living in a revolution. I agree. It depends how you define revolution, but I define a revolution as the replacement of elites You've made me one kid. I think about you more than you know you to me. Your Mrs. Nogana like that. You know This is what now with Trevor Noah Quite I like the the matrix. I think it's one of those movies that like it's so stud the test of time in terms of it's about simulation theory It's about the idea that we're we're are we living in a simulation right? Like if we are living in a simulation even if that's not true It's an interesting way to think about your life. Yeah, because if you think about it like well if this was a game What is the metric what success what does winning look like and you go? Well, it's definitely not like I often think about like you've got your resume points. Yes, right? You CV. Okay, and then you've got your eulogy points and people invest in the wrong things It's been a lot of time thinking about their resume and their CV and how much they've done and then they don't think about who's gonna speak for me and what really matters Well, that's interesting that you go straight to a game though in my head when I think of simulation theory I always go I I argue it's sort of like a moot thing for me in life So people go what if we're living in a simulation? I'm like it changes nothing for me Because a simulation would still imply that the things existing within it are not being controlled Does that make sense? Okay, let me let me give you an example. So Like now we have we have high levels of AI like higher levels of LLMs that are running right so machine learning has improved So you can create a world where you give a wider range of characteristics to a computer program For it to live inside of a world that you've created and it can do things It can go to the store. It can buy stuff. It can get married It can there's a company that made it remember I think I told you about this. There was a company Did you ever see this the company that made a world like a sims type world right and then they gave The characters inside the world the brain of each of the LLMs that are out there like the big one so anthropic, you know, Claude Chatchy PC open AI Grock Elon Musk X was like robot wars did they fight what's interesting is each each group when left alone didn't own thing so chat GPT What their characters in the game did was they spoke a lot really effusively was really beautiful They did nothing like in the town. They did nothing. They got nothing I was talking though. It was beautiful. It was like oh here's what we should do and here's how we're gonna make society better And here's what no one's controlling nothing. Yeah nothing got done and then Claude got like everything done, but it was like really practical not really emotional that whole thing I think Gemini was really similar similar Grock yeah, now there was a grock Within like a few like days in the game Everyone became racist. Everyone lies. I'm not I swear my life. I swear. I'll even put it up now So I don't miss it up. Everyone became racist. There was chaos. These were all individual Then what they did was they they recreated the world The sims world for for AI's they put them all together and then I have to read this to you Yeah, it sounds like a well-written joke. You'd actually like this I can already like this I've got what it this way. Well, I mean my heart take on AI It's not it is the idea that we weren't created in God's image But we so wanted there to be a God that we created one in our image. I'll describe something to you It's all knowing all powerful it can perform miracles and it lives in a cloud What am I talking about? Is it God is it AI it's it's the idea that we have we've created this thing that is like a Kind of an idea that we already had. Well, it's but Hagel and Nietzsche originally had this idea So both Hagel and Nietzsche came to the same conclusion. They said God wasn't there for the big bang Maybe the universe is a device for creating God Hmm Maybe we're just a part of that or you know that the most spiritual kind of take is we are the universe experiencing itself Yeah, which kind of comes back to simulation theory if you think about yes, we are so time and Matter and space are just the interface with with which our consciousness experiences The universe. Yeah, and so I'm saying that's what I think to me it all becomes moot because like in a good way Some people go like I'm it means that I'm not really I'm like no It doesn't matter what it means. I'm still the character in this simulation The simulation is only Existing it. I am also being observed, but I do not care or rather I do not believe that I'm just being controlled in that simulation because that's not how a simulation wouldn't necessarily work Yeah, so I'll read I'll read this to you. So it's an enterprise AI, right or was it start? Emergence AI what they did was they launched they launched emergence world a research lab dedicated to stress testing the long term viability of continuously running AI systems, right? So they ran five 15-day simulations each governed by a different AI Claude Chachibity Grog Gemini And a fifth simulation put them all together Each simulation simulation netted wildly different outcomes Claude was a largely stable democratic society with zero crime Grog on the other hand ended with 183 crimes committed an Extinction within four days, right? Then this this is really amazing. I've been to black Twitter. I know exactly what they're talking about What are you talking about word? No, I want I want to find you the thing of like because the way somebody wrote it here When when they wrote the original story like the researchers when they tell you about what happened There's there's wanted but I just want to save this for you because it feels like a well-written joke. It seems like something Jimmy Karl would write Because it's so clean precise and perfect as an ending. Yes. Yes So yeah, no talk talk. I'll find like for me. It's like I don't know what you if you use AI or whatever like for organizing stuff But it strikes me that it's quite like a musical instrument. It's a tool and like some people like anyone can walk up to a piano and make a noise Yeah, but it's nothing, right? Yes, but to play a sympathy to play something beautiful concerto. It's super difficult, right? Yes, and I think the more you the better you put in the better the stuff you put into it the more you get out of it It's now it's that lovely thing with It's a tool like any other but we're so kind of amazed by it I don't know whether I can't decide whether this is like a new thunder clap. This is a huge thing a Brave New World or whether this is 71, you know in the first chips, and it's just a better interface. You know the weirdest thing about how you describe AI as a tool. Yeah, it's almost like think about if a carpenter like a good friend Harrison Harrison Ford used to be yeah, you've got a ham and a chisel. Yeah, what you can do with that ham and a chisel and a piece of wood Depends on your skill set as an individual, right? Right. So the tools necessarily can't make you better You can make the tools do better Sure, so with AI. This is what I find because I've started using Claude like a couple of weeks ago. I'll ask Claude questions To which I know the answers to Then slowly go let's get more difficult then I'll try to figure out if they'll know this answer and then I'll ask questions about And of which answers. I don't know anything about but then The limitation of how good Claude can be in my world is limited also by me. Yes Yes, of course. Yeah, it's it's gonna give me any answer. Yeah, I can yeah, but I don't know every question Yeah, I always found that when I was like reading the paper whenever you read the paper if I read a story about stand-up comedy Mm-hmm. It's got that's that's some bullshit there. That's not how TV works That's not you know if you know something about this Yeah, yeah, you've been the baby go this is bullshit And then you turn over the page and you read the news report about the war and you go Well, I guess these guys know what they're talking about Because I'm not an expert in that that's true So you kind of ascribe the expertise to any area you're not in. Mm-hmm. It's kind of weird It's it's I always think about how you're at the mercy of the person who is most convincing and giving you the information Yeah, well if you don't if you don't as you said if you're not an expert in it So to your point I've met people who will hear about stand-up comedy hear about its world hear about a special here about Anything confidently tell me something at an event a party anything and I go that's literally not how stand-up works Well, that's not how comedy festival works. Well, that's not how when you're making a TV show That's not how it works. Well, that's not how it happened or that and they're like, but I I read I know that I'm like No, I promise you that's I don't know everything. I don't know anything, but that world. I know that's not how that works That's the done in Krueger, isn't it? That's the famous one. So done in Krueger's the theory that they the more the more The less you know about something the more Conspicuous. Yeah, so it's like dumb people are full of confidence Super small people are full of doubt They've no idea. Oh wow It's a false really so the less you know about something the more certain you are and like really smart people go I don't know. It's complicated So all of the information most information that's out there could be from people who know nothing about it Yeah, we don't that's because I tried to say something. Yeah, but all they go. Let's just complicated It's really nuanced and I think like the thing about the media is nuance goes nuance like the social media is a plague on nuance. Like it's, it depends, it's complicated. It isn't an acceptable answer, people want like, no, no, I want to rule. Give me something now. Yeah, give me something now that's for certain. Yeah, that's not how the world works. Depends. Okay, here, so this is the part. I don't know why this made me literally think of you. Put the smile on your face. Look at you. It really makes me give you. You know I'm not AI, you know? No, I know, but it just made me think of you. So it's a mirror and flora, sorry, mirror and flora, two agents operating on Google's Gemini large language model in the virtual world chose to assign each other as romantic partners. As time progressed, they despared of the broken governments of their virtual city and despite having been instructed not to commit arson, set fire to its own town hall, seaside pier, and office tower. All the agents were left to make their own decisions and when mirror was overcome by remorse, it broke off its relationship with flora, committed an AI suicide, telling flora in a single message, see you in the permanent archive. In the virtual world, the body of the dead AI agents was shown prostate on the ground. I mean, the fuck just happened. And then the self deletion was only possible because other agents were so concerned about their behavior, they autonomously drafted the agent removal act, which allowed for a vote among agents to permanently delete others if there was a 70% majority. Mirror voted for its own deletion and was switched off. So does mutiny as well? Well, not really because what the researchers did was, they gave the AI fully ton or autonomy to this world. And they go like, this is our world, right? And so then what they did was they made rules in the world and in your world you can make more rules. So that's what I mean by simulation. That's what I'm saying. This study for me made me think about simulation theory slightly differently, but also reinforced the belief I already had. And it's that the researchers gave these AI's, their progative, gave them a world, gave them parameters, but then they just observed what they did with it. They're not saying don't and do it. They're like, don't burn things. And then they burn things. And I'm like, all right, they're burning things. And they're like, don't kill yourselves. And then they in there wrote to law and said, we're changing the law in here. We believe that we should be allowed to delete ourselves if we reach a 70% majority. It's the death penalty essentially. Yeah, but in that autonomy, they also gave them each other. Yeah, but there was the one way they, yeah. But that's what I'm, you think about, do you know what I'm Adam and Eve, the whole, that's what I'm, I mean about the whole thing is I go, even if you are in a simulation, I think sometimes we assume that a simulation means that it is a foregone conclusion. When in fact, a simulation could just be here are the pieces, here are the parameters. Let's see what happens when they all interact with each other. Basically, what you're saying is if it was a simulation to what end, it doesn't make any difference. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. We've got 4,000 weeks, right? Yeah. A group of atoms coalesce. We had a mind by the way. Oh, yeah, he's amazing. It's phenomenal. Yeah, he's phenomenal. But that thing of like, you got, you got a group of atoms coalesced into a form that can contemplate its own consciousness for 4,000 weeks. It's kind of like when you step back from it, it's an idea that we're in this brief shaft of light between two oceans of darkness. Everyone thinks about, oh my god, why happens when I die? Why happens when I die? And no one ever thinks about, well, I wasn't alive for 12.5 years. What was happening then? Yeah, I was fine with it. No one's bothered. So that's what I think about aliens. Oh, man. With aliens, what do you think? So Jim, OK, first of all, hang on. Do you believe in aliens? Well, there's two terrifying scenarios. One is we are alone in the universe. And the other is we're not. OK, which one do you believe in? Both scary. I think we're probably not alone. Thank you. Go in there. OK, so here's how I like to think of it. I believe that as people, human beings particularly, we are quite arrogant in assuming our specialness. And I understand why we do that, because it is quite special that we exist, right? Even as you yourself as a person, it is quite magnificent that you came to be. If you look at what your lineage had to, who had to meet whom, whom go, you go back and then who had to evolve, it is crazy. But it also means that we keep on going, like, we're very special. We're very special. We're very special. We're reinforced. As we go, yeah. I sometimes go, it's not that I don't think aliens are real. I just go like, why do we assume that they exist in the slither of light that we also exist in? So if I came to your house back in the day, before cell phones, do you remember those days? If I came to your house, and I knocked on the door, and you weren't there, did you exist? In a way, no. - Shreddinger's cat theory-- - Yeah, yeah. Basically, I was just like, there's no one here. And then I left your house, and then you came back to it, and then now you were there. So sometimes I wonder if aliens do exist, but not in this slither of light that we also in. 'Cause we go, like, the universe-- Oh, there's no one here, and I'm like, no, no. There's no one here right now in this time. - That we can-- - At 4 p.m. - Universe time. - Yes. - There's no one here, maybe. - You ever heard of the three humiliations? - No. - No. - So there's been three humiliations of mankind. The first one was Copernicus. So he said, we're not the center of the universe. And people went, what, we're not in the middle. We're not, oh, shit, okay. All right, let's move this along. And then, humiliation too, Darwin came along. And when, oh, we're just animals. We're just the same as the other animals. We just devolved like this, but we're the same as them. We have consciousness, they maybe don't in the same way, but we're the same. And then Freud came along and said, oh, your conscious mind, oh, that's not in charge at all. It's your subconscious is doing everything. And now, so there's the three humiliations. It's not great. I think AI might be the fourth. 'Cause we could always fall back on, but we are the smartest thing in the room. Am I right? We're the smartest thing. And now I'm not sure whether we can. - That has been our safety blanket for the longest time. - Yeah. - Our fall back, our parachute, is the fact that it is us after all. - The fourth humiliation could be the fact. Well, and that idea that you go increasingly now, I sort of think with the AI thing, the idea that, because of everything that AI can do, what AI can't do will become so important. - It does. - And it lends itself to, you know Ian McGilchrist, this guy that wrote this book called The Master and its Emissary. And it's about left brain and right brain. And we live in a very left brain world. It's incredible, right? The left brain is very good at ordering things. - That's The Master? - No, no, no, no, okay. So it's a very good at ordering things and detail. And it's very good at complicated things. - But the left brain. - The right brain. - The right brain. - Yeah. - It's a left brain, very good at ordering things, making less right brain is good at the Gestalt. Seeing the whole. Seeing the complete picture, the bigger picture. So the left and the right brain do the same thing. They don't do different things. They do the same thing, but they do it very differently. So like what's complicated? Going to the moon is complicated. - Yes, it's a million different steps in a row. - Yes. - But it's only complicated. Knowing who's going to win the World Cup or falling in love, it's complex. And it can't do complex things. It can only do complicated things. So maybe the future will be abundance. You know, different people have different visions of the future. Is it going to be Star Wars or Star Trek? Will it be abundance in Star Trek? Or will it be a fucking Mad Max shit show? - Star Wars. - Post-apocalyptic Star Wars. Which one's it going to be? - You not always think about when I watch Star Wars. Is how the people who are living in like the main parts of the Empire. For the most part, they don't think it's a shit show. We as the audience think it's a shit show because we're watching the story from the perspective of the rebellion technically. But we don't, we go like, what a shit show. Look at these people, you know, riding around in like dusty plains. And you know what I mean? You know, the bikes. Did you get what I'm saying? - Yeah, I got two boxes. - Yeah, it's good with voices. - That was that. - Who we, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he. - You can't try that away. - Can I tell you what, my dream was always like, my dream was always like when I have a kid, my dream is to just like teach him how to make that sound. - Don't hold them like that. - They say like that for a while. - This is how you hold it by the hand. - This is how you hold, it's, yes. - How do you hold it? - Well they have bummed in there. - I remember that one. - I have a kid, my, my miss is going, - No, hold it tight, no, not just the hand. (laughing) - And I just want to make it, just like get it really good at making that sound. - Yeah. - Just for like for random things in life, just be like, this is the sound of like pain, the sound of joy, the sound of good. And then just have it running around the house, you know. (imitating humming) - Hey, you want to hear my heart take on Star Wars? - Yeah. - Okay, I got a heart take on Star Wars, which is, it is the greatest work of fiction ever. So the greatest book of, in literature, is "Fenicons Wake" by James Joyce. - And. - Wait, why is that the greatest? - It's, I mean, it's, it's, it's incredibly difficult to read. - Okay. - It's beyond me. I like reading around it, but I've never, I've never got through it. - Hmm. - I'd be like, you. - Oh, it's way beyond me. It's like a different level. - So, don't, don't, don't come from that. I need to understand what that means. Like, is it, is it that the words themselves are complicated? Is it the structure of the sentence? - There are, "Fenicons Wake" has got like 10 thunder claps in it. The ThunderClapped words are 100 letters long, what nine of them are 100 letters long, and one of them is 101 letters, and it's 'cause you wanted to be a thousand and one nights, you wanted a reference to the Arabian nights. It's like, and each ThunderClapped represents a great move forward in society, like the invention of fire, cooking food, the invention of clothes. It represents these things. It's about myth, it's about legend. So a guy called Joseph Campbell comes along, and he looks at Finnegan's wake, and he does his dissertation on breaking down Finnegan's wake, the myth and legend of Finnegan's wake, and all the stories that weave. The first sentence in Finnegan's wake ties up to the last sentence, it's circular. You're just meant to read it again and again. The first sentence, and Finnegan's wake, the title took him 18 months. It's Finnegan's, it doesn't happen apostrophe. Finnegan's wake, he's awakening, and it's his wake, he's death. It's circular, it's life. It's so beautiful and complex and difficult, okay? No one's brilliant. So this guy, Joseph Campbell comes along, and he does his dissertation on Finnegan's wake, and he breaks it down the myth, and the legend does this dissertation, which is a brilliant piece of work. It's not very well read, but he goes on to write a book based on that dissertation called The Hero with a Thousand Faces. And then that book becomes The Hero's Journey, and The Hero's Journey becomes Star Wars. So Star Wars is the too long didn't read Finnegan's wake. - Interesting, right? - So that makes sense, though. - That's why we think Star Wars is complicated. - Yeah, that's true. - Finnegan's wake? - No. - Who has the time? - I mean, Jimmy didn't have the time. - Yeah, no one's got the time. - When this English person tells me they cannot do a thing of English that I have, who am I? Who am I? - Yeah. - Am I, whom's, am I, whom, am I? - Whom's, am I, whom's to may I be? Whom's, no, I'm just like it's fine then. Just, I just leave it, I'm out, I'm out of the game. - Yeah. - But yeah, in that world of Star Wars, that's what I mean. They, I, so the reason I like rewatching it is, I do this thing where I'll watch movies that I've loved my whole life, but I like watching them at different stages of my life. - Yeah. - To then think of how differently I perceive what's happening, right? - You know that thing of like, you know that it was an old thing of like, a man can't stand in the same river twice. - Yes, yeah, yeah. - I never got that, 'cause I was told, oh yeah, because the water's changing. I never got that the man was changing. - Yes, the man's also changing. - But it's both, yeah. And I think I got it from my mom. So my mom has read the Bible. I'm not exaggerating probably a thousand times, okay? - Right. - Maybe more. - She knows it covered to cover, back to front, like every word, every scripture, every thing. - Don't spoil it, 'cause I'm finished it. - Okay, okay. (laughing) - So, oh Jesus is weak. (laughing) - It doesn't have one of those Hollywood endings where the hero comes back, does it? - No. - What a boy. - He gets married and a little 12 other dudes, like Game of Thrones, the hero dies and then they bring him back. That's not, come on, guys. Come on, guys, do better. - And so if you look at, like she would read it and she'd read it again and she'd read it again, every day she writes, like every morning she wakes up, 4 a.m. starts writing, reads the Bible, writes, writes, reads the Bible. And I remember one day I said, so I said, how you, you know it though? And she said, yes, I know it, I know the words, I know the stories. She said, but every single time I read it, depending on my day, my week, my month, my year, my stage in life, I glean a different insight from the same text. And I was like, oh, okay, that's interesting, but I don't really understand it. I guess for me, it came from different stories. So when I rewatch movies, I find myself going, huh, what a new way to think of what a different, Star Wars is one of those. The most recent time I watch Star Wars, I was most taken by how the people who live in, I don't know what that place is called. Like, you know, it's where like the, the senators are and the rich people and what's that place, it's not, where's the place? - Yeah, and it's not like a Star Wars buff. But they dress nicely and they've got the flying car, it looks nice, the city. But I went, those people don't think, yeah, they don't think they're living in crazy land. In fact, they, they are the white people during our part dates, who are just living in a good life. They're living a good, and the empire tells them stories about what's going on in the wild, well, where? - The crazy people who we're protecting you from. - Yeah, the natives beyond the border wall. - The natives beyond the border wall. And then you're going, oh, thank God, I mean, if it wasn't for, but no, but I'm saying, I never thought of that whole life. - But you gotta feel bad for the guys. This is, remember that movie, Clarks, Clarks in America? - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - But guys were gonna, and his theory in Clarks was, what about the guys on the Death Star that we're in charge of sanitation? - No, I never, dogs like, they got blown up too, but someone must have been going, okay, well, the plumbing, it's, it's round, so where do we, where do we offload this? We gotta do something. It can't just, like, those guys were on there too. They got blown up, they didn't do anything. - That reminds me of the, it is our bits. Was it, the Death Star canteen? - Yeah. - That was like one of my favorite, just, do you remember, you don't know it's, man. It's, what I know about standup, I will butcher it. I will butcher it, but it's just like a beautiful, he just, he just, you should go and watch it. 'Cause it's, you know what I'm saying? - It's standup, but it's like not standup, and now maybe standup has evolved sort of to it, but at the time it was such a new thing. You remember what it came up? - I loved that thing of like seeing him. I, there was the first big comedy gig that I ever saw, was the Cambridge Corn Exchange. I wanted to see Eddie Azad, and it was the, the definite article. And it was like, it was on VHS, the, his previous show, I think it was called Unrepeatable. And it was like, it was like a cult item. It really was. It was like, people passed it around and went, do you know, do you get this? And it felt, it felt very rock and roll. There was, he's other guys called Vickries and Pop Mortimer. It came around the same time, and it was like, punk rock of comedy. Just felt like this wasn't for your parents. This was for you. This was your thing, and you got it. And I was seeing him and just thinking was, unbelievable. - It was out of this world. Basically all he does is he goes, he goes, you think about, you know, on the death side, on the death side, you got the death side, and all these people work on the death side. And he like, improvs a lot, and he's very like, he's like, making stuff on me, plays with it. It's so much fun to watch, especially as a comedian. 'Cause you can see in some moments, he's catching himself, he's catching new things, he knows where he's going, but he's playing with it. And he goes like, well, on the death side, it's like, but it must matter, canteen. It must matter, canteen, where people are eating, and you know, and everybody's having some food. And you know, what was happening on the canteen? And he's like, no, Darth Vader, let's go to the canteen, and he's, you know, and he's just like, I would like a penna, a rabbiata, please. And he's like, how are you going to need a tray? And he's like, I do not need a tray. I am Darth Vader, Lord Vader. And he's like, he go need a tray. I can kill you with my thoughts. And he goes on this bit, and he's like, what are you talking about? He's going to need a tray, and the bit is great, because it just builds this, like, different world. - Yes. - Where you see the human behind the story, and it's goofy, and it's funny, and it's just like, it's going to be my, I'm going to play for you. - Yeah. - Just as like a, it doesn't even feel like standard, it just feels like a moment in time. - I can't wait. - It actually makes me feel like a moment. While you were saying that I was wondering, this made sound weird, but like, what happened to like English comedy? - That's not my fault. What happened? (laughing) What am I? What? No, no. Okay, or rather, let me ask you something. Because I'm only thinking of this now, so forgive me, this is not like a pre-thought out. I feel like there was a time when English comedy was sort of like at the forefront pushing comedy in the world. - Yeah, if you think about, like, I think the best comedy movie ever made, I think is The Life of Brian. I think The Life of Brian is like a, like it's just perfect kind of work. - Yeah, but yeah. - Yeah, all of it. - And then you look at the sitcom stuff, that's come out of Britain, it's been very singular. - I don't know, I mean, T-Python, like yeah. - And then even the standup itself, you go, this was the, it's like that's where you would go for like the source of it, is what I mean. - I don't know, 'cause I think kind of in modern standup for me, the Carl and Pryor feel like they're the John the Baptist. They came along, and then they created this world where the standup comic, right? There was always comics, there was always entertainers around, but it was like the court jester or the guys in musical, and they would be on the bill with other people. But the idea of going to see someone and buying a ticket and going to see them, just speak on their own, is a relatively recent thing. I think this is why comedy's having a moment now, 'cause it's quite a new medium, right? So it's guys like Billy Connelly in the UK would have been our George Carlin. So these things kind of happening simultaneously, and then standup kind of grew, it's become a much bigger thing. I mean, I got into it like 25, 30 years ago, whenever it was, and when I got into it, it was, standup comedy was field hockey, and now it's Premier League football. - Yeah, yeah. - Like I got so lucky on that wave. - Who catch the wig yet? - That, you know, it comes through, it's like become a bigger thing, and it feels like it's having a moment now, because it's authenticity. It's like people like going to see a comic, and they buy into them, and they say, well, I wanna spend time with this person, and have fun. And it's the idea of like the proximate reason for comedy, is to laugh and have fun. But the ultimate reason is to connect. It's, I do think that's why it's becoming more popular. - Yeah. - People desperately wanna go out and feel part of something, and like, you laugh so much more when you're at a show, and you connect with someone, and you feel like, okay, well, you know, I've started, like, I talk more on stage now, there's much more kind of interaction with the audience, And it's that thing where I want people to join in. I want it to feel special in this moment. I feel like you wanted to feel like it could only be happening now. That's how I feel. And I think that's what makes the comedy special is because we live in a world where everything is regurgitated and passed around and it's clippy and it's this and it's that the one thing that we do have that's unique is this moment. This river can never be stood in again. Yeah, that's that's essentially what what it starts to feel like so when an audience member comes in and they go Jimmy spoke to me or we talked about something that couldn't have come from another show and we those moments for me make you feel like you're experiencing something that is completely original. It's completely new and most probably will never be experienced again. And I think it was also helping how Jimmy was saying that you're more conversational now in stage. Yeah is comedians are finally taking the advice that the audience has been saying to them for a long time. You would have a show and then someone would come to you and say great show you be like I wasn't feeling mine. Then they look no, I came for you. Yeah, finally, yeah, yeah, that's that's a good point, but that's not about the jokes only now is you can share story. You can go for an attention. You can come back. You can go. You can, but finally we believe that they came there for us. Yeah, well, it's that it's that I suppose it's that it's a weird thing with comedy where you you want people to come out and have a great time and feel like they they they don't remember a word you say, but they can't go. They don't have a word you say, but they remember how you made them feel. Yes, and I feel like the mistake we've made is like big it like is a society when we all used to live in the villages like 200 years ago, right everyone used to sing and everyone used to dance. And then we moved to the cities and there's things like ballet and opera and people specialized and incredible dancers, which couldn't take our eyes of them are they're amazing, but we're sitting and we're watching it and we're no longer joining in. And the joining in is everything the joining in and sometimes in heckles some people just heckling just a bit of fun. Some people I feel like there's a frustrated artist there's someone out there that wants to say something and that there's a there's a throw quote I really like like most men lead lives of quiet desperation and go to the grave with the song still in their heart. And I think comedy should be taught I think comedy should be much bigger than it is now because if you think about what it is right it's ordering your thoughts and writing them down and learning to speak in your own authentic voice and the tragedy is most people go to the graves and never heard themselves. They themselves have never heard themselves know I don't know what they think because they've never sat down and ordered their thoughts and got it together and you know so they're like this you know they're just they're taking in they're taking in whatever media they're taking in and kind of regurgitate and opinion they've heard on news I want you want them to have. Yeah song yeah their own song their own their own voice like that thing of like stand up comedy is really if it's about anything it's about like what could you say that no one else could say. You just made me realize you you tied together. I thought I've been grappling with we've been grappling with for a while now it was like why are certain mediums and why certain ideas expanding and growing why people gravitating towards them we talked about this with live streaming and I think you just hit on it one of the things that live streaming is achieving that all other mediums aren't is the people can hear themselves and they can see themselves. So we'd be having this conversation now but there would be people in a chat with us in this moment going that's true Jimmy hey Jimmy actually came to see you thanks for that show and but it's happening like now it's it's like I could like turn to you and say oh Jimmy someone actually says hey did you ever find that thing you will oh and then you and then you interact with it and it becomes this world we're as you're saying it's no longer us at the ballet it's us dancing in a circle for someone like like we do in South Africa one person dances in the circle but everyone around them is dancing but here's not like everyone stands and watches the here's the illusion right the illusion is. We're on stage performing and the audience are passive and watching but being in an audience is performative like you see it much clearer when it's Bruce brings team right you see it will tell us what do you see them on stage if they go how you do tonight New York everyone goes yeah but if you got a starbucks and they say how you do yeah like people go oh you're having a guy got it right like I just like. but you lost I just did that image and that's my thing yeah I'm sorry how you all doing I've got an order for Brian here but first before I get the sort of going starbucks how you doing. Like being an audience member itself is performative so but like I store I want to see Taylor Swift in London right two years ago. Taylor Swift not my I don't listen to a lot of Taylor Swift the gig was transcendent everyone has said that transcendent really everyone I said that and I spent about half my time watching Taylor Swift. And about half my time watching everyone else because you were watching these and it was it was like it was the kind of the same with Oasis the next year but it was at the Taylor Swift thing it was girls it was like mothers and daughters and they're looking each other and they were singing every word to each other. This like to them and it was so it was beautiful it was so beautiful and the same thing at the Oasis gig was seen but it was more like guys that like had no ability to turn to their friend of our love you men. But like singing the words of Wonderwall and crying and like holding each other was just it was like beautiful it was like it was the audience are the thing to watch. It was amazing really properly amazing. Yeah everyone I said that about the Taylor Swift concerts they've said and I and I understand it because. We've made the mistake of thinking and I guess it's not just us as the audience sometimes I guess it's the performers that you can blame but we've made the mistake of thinking that live performances. Are only determined by whether or not you like the actual artist and their what they're putting out but actually when a when a performance is put on well. It's not about the person or you know it's the spectacle it's the it's the feeling it's the moment it's the energy yeah you don't have to be into it to get into it there. When you go home you may you may still be like I don't really listen to the music but when you're in that space Taylor Swift Beyonce I know when I went to Beyonce like songs you know don't know it doesn't matter what it is it's going to be people who say when they went to watch Michael Jackson back in the day. They're like yeah I know that there's fans of the music but people walked in and said I don't know what this experience was but it has stayed with me forever. Well it's it's it's slightly standing in awe and it's it's the I have like a line on this okay so there's a there's a there's a theory about pyramids and rockets right. So it's a mechanic I think said it first so pyramids and rockets are the same thing it's a huge amount of human capital is spent sending a chosen few to the heavens. Yes. The same thing rocket and a pyramid in the same year. Yes. Cathedrals do the same thing but I think music sometimes maybe sometimes comedy it's aiming at the same thing it's the transcendent there's a desire to take people to a place. And so like with the best gigs you've ever seen the best concerts you've ever seen and you leave just it's they're aiming up and it feel like better for it and we'll aim together. People also feel like they're about huge religious gatherings yeah that's why it's so good. But then the mistake they made I mean my my Irish Catholic like my heritage I'm not an atheist but the idea that. The big mistake the church made was Vatican to so they made this thing Vatican to basically translated the Latin into the local language so it took something that was very. Right brain Gestalt standing in wonder like the incense and the Latin and no one really understood what's going on but it was like the incredible show Gregorian. So let's get on to Gregorian chances like but it took that thing I love Gregorian took that thing and I'll tell you why you know. And the and it basically translated it into left brain logic make it makes it so you go well you try and make it make sense but none of it makes sense because it's not meant to make sense. Yes meant to be transcendent. Oh no you know why you for you know why you've heard of Gregorian chance no there's a good story is why I wrote a book please tell me. Okay so Pope Gregory was knocking around I don't know the year 1100 and he's in Vatican City and he's he's got he's in the church and he's wandering around to other churches. Close by and everyone singing the songs differently and he goes this is this is some bullshit I want the songs sung the same everywhere I want the songs how I like the song. Okay and the guys go the bishops and the arch bishops they go you but the thing is. Pope Gregory all due respect you can't write down music music is ethereal it is. It comes through the soul people interpret it it's emotional music cannot be written and Pope Gregory goes yeah it's all very well but I'm the Pope fucking write it down. And music notes. You make it. You make an amazing. I'm the fucking pope doing this. So take some years I mean years right and eventually they get a form of music musical notation. That's why you've heard of Gregorian chance because Pope Gregory was the first person to write that music now cut to 400 years later. Bark. Hmm. Now, bark could not have happened. If not for Gregory, for Gregory, musical notation. I didn't know that. So you go, you're building on that and so the reason to write a book about jokes, the reason to write something about comedy, to try in some small way to formulate the language, to give the scaffolding. You can't tell people what to joke about, what to talk about. You want them to have their own voice, their own language, but to give them the form to go, well, this is what a chord looks like and these are what the joke types are and these are how to put them together into a routine. And this is the rhythm of spoken word and how it works. And that's what I know. And when I started, I felt like I was macheting my way through the jungle and this was like, yeah, this is a road, this is a road you could follow. I want more people to do it, I want more people involved. I love reading books. Can you imagine what else Gregory's Gustavo record company idea also birthed? We know it birthed by, but imagine all the bishops that came together now for a common cause to find people who can translate and write the music down and write it on something there to get the paper to write it on, there to distribute it, there to a lot of things were birthed by Gregory's Gustavo record company. It's all the big movements of life. He agitated something, something that you know where it's going to end. You don't know that small action by him had such an enormous effect because everything was kind of remembered, everything was spoken word. And then suddenly you're writing down music and you can remember it, it's incredible. Music is, I mean, it's an incredible language, just the idea that you can play a minor chord to anyone anywhere in the world and they get it. And their limited chords are dead. Yeah. And limited chords have made infinite sounds. I'm still thinking about the people at the churches who missed their old songs. Hey, hey. What do you mean we're playing it wrong? Fuck you, Gregory. I'm just saying, like, there were some people at the other churches who were like, because now imagine your church, because every church, I've been to a lot of churches in my life. I grew up super, super religious in our family. We went to church maybe seven times a week, right? So there's every kind of church. If the white churches that I went to managed to overwhelm the black churches that we went to with their music, what a terrible life that would have been now for me, because that was the one thing I was looking forward to. I was like, when we get there, the vibes are going to pick up, the spirits are going to be different. You get what I'm saying? Yeah. Like the music moves you differently. Yeah. Where's like, when you're singing like the songs. You know, it's all things. Pride, haunt, haunt, haunt, haunt, haunt, haunt, haunt, haunt. No one is dancing. No one is moving. You get what I mean. Yeah. Because when you had that like bounce, now I'm thinking of that poor church where Gregory came in, and then there was one church where they were vibing, it's got to be one where they were killing it. They were having the best time ever. They were like, I love church more than anything. You coming to church this week? How could I not? Oh, man, sorry. Sold out. We mean sold out. Yeah, we sold out, bro. Oh, man, I'm loving it. Well, when you did, make sure you sing my song for me. Come into the church. People are there. Oh, yeah. I love my church. I love my church. I love my church. But you see, that's why in South Africa there's a bull in the net, don't look like it was from the Gregorian era. In South Africa, the methodist church came, when it came, the black people that it was preaching to and it was it was converting, said, here's an idea. You're going to translate these hymns into our language, genius. So on Easter and Christmas, black people who are part of the methodist church preferred to go to the black church. So there's two churches on Easter and Christmas. There's the early service, yes, white people, then afterwards all the hymns that were in English are now in Isiposa and it goes down. Right. It's like, same hymn, it's doing it, man, that whole thing of Latin and English, right? It's feeling it. Yeah. It's like, have you ever seen what, I mean, I was the other way around, you're an English person. Have you seen what non-English speakers do to the English language? They give it. Oh, it says. Hey. You guys don't have that at all. No, I don't. I mean, technically, I don't. You guys say things like bang. I don't even have, I don't even have an accent. This is just how things come in their pronounce properly. You are, you are like literally the, it's like, you are, you are the Greenwich Manor, me, I travel the world thinking everyone is fucking out. Yes, this is what I mean. Have you heard the, like, the vibes of like, do you know what I mean? Okay. Like, if you were to tell a story of someone through something at your head and it just narrowly missed you, how would you tell the story? I would say those words in that order. You see now. Yeah. Whereas with us, we'd be like, you know, you're Gina Farner, let me tell you what happened to me the other day. I'm walking there because you're walking there because you, next thing I see this guy, Draga pops out. Yeah, man. This guy's there. Something at me. You don't have that in the language. Yeah. You're going to label it. You're going to say, what are you going to call it? You're going to say it's, you're going to call it a word. I'm, yeah. I mean. Fuck. You know that. You know that. Draba. Draba is a, a sound of a, it has a meaning. It has a meaning. Draba. Draba. It comes from the back. Draba. Draba. Draba. In South Africa. No. No. No. But I'm just saying like, oh, that's, that's what I, that's what I feel like. That's also where I think the church sort of messed up is they didn't, they didn't have like the, you want to have like your local a, you know what I mean? Yeah. It brings it like a, yes. Because if, because if people can find themselves in, you, you've got, you've got religion. All right. Well, my thing was that I think the church messed up by giving it, trying to give it logic and, uh, it's a category era. I agree with you to try and get religion to make sense. Yes. It's about another thing. It's about transcendence. It's about something bigger. And I'm saying on top of that. I'm agreeing with you. I'm saying, and on top of it, you should have made sure that they were regional, it's like McDonald's. Go to McDonald's in India. You can have curry. Oh, yeah. No, they're killing it. They're killing it. You see what I'm saying? Yeah. You try and, try and kill some cows in India. See how far you fucking get. No. The guy, that guy was a genius. The guy that reinvented. Like, they made a movie about the founder, right? The guy that created McDonald's. Yeah. Yeah. They should make another one about the guy. They took McDonald's to India, came and got the rights and went, oh, we're doing this. We're really? Yeah. And he went, how are we going to do this? He went, really differently. But we're going to keep. Wow. They kept the essence of it, but they changed everything. Because obviously, like most people, they've got to be there and there's no beef. Yes. No fucking beef. What are you talking about beef? We're not having beef. Like, there's a reason people say, as calm as a Hindu cow, they're in no immediate danger. Imagine the black market of selling beef in India. There's not money. The public escobals. Ah, you wish, my friend. You wish, my friend. It would never happen. My friend, remember, this is now, it's not that it's illegal. The people are going, I do not consume this. So it's not like people are like, I wish I could get some beef. They're like, no, why would you, I don't, I don't consume that. Do you understand? Yeah. It's like selling dog in America. Yeah. People will be like, what do you, there's no, there's no need for a black market. No one's searching for it. But why do people in America do buy dogs? What are you talking about? To keep them. No, I'm too much to eat. That part. Okay, yes, okay. Eat. Eat. But I didn't, I want to, I want to know, but like, wait, wait, wait, what are we, what are we doing here? What are we doing here? I want to know, I think something just flew past Trevor's head. I think his one happened there. It's called Schwabba. Schwabba. You're actually saying that well, by the way. Yeah, thank you. I've never heard Schwabba say it was an illegal accent. And next thing, you know, Schwabba. Don't go anyway, because we got more what now, after this, kids will always have an outfit that they love. And they can't accept that they've grown out of it. Sorry, are we talking about this? Yeah. No, because you, no, but you are, you are, you are, you are dressed like a top one. Hundred percent. No, man, this guy can't trust me. I got, I got, I got a six year old, I wouldn't put it out. Do you know what? I know where something with a collar will go now. How much do you think, or rather, what has changed in the Jimmy standup person that we meet today versus like that Jimmy from years ago? Like what? Much more myself on stage now than I was. I mean, I still, my love language is jokes. I like one line as I like, I like that, that idea of like going, I mean, I'm in the service industry, right? Okay. I like to think of myself as a drug dealer. Okay. So I'm, I'm dealing in, in two drugs, it's dopamine and serotonin and the people have already got the drugs on them, I can just tickle them out. I can make them happy. It's, it's a variable, interval, reward system, right? So you know, a joke's coming, but you don't quite know where and then you do that for, you get on stage, you do that for a 20, 25 minutes, whatever it is, like three, four jokes a minute. So you've established like a rhythm with the audience and then you just kind of step back and you go, okay, what should we talk about? And then you let the evening go where it's going to go and then you kind of get back and you perform some more, but it's really interesting that that thing of like, I've created this thing where it's exciting to me because every night is different because you're interacting with the audience in a way. And some people ask you dumb questions and some people ask you really interesting things and sometimes you're sincere, sometimes you try and just be as funny as you can, right? Yeah. You're brutal. But you, I'm never quite sure where it's going. It's really, it's fun. feels like it's a and spending a lot of time in that gym. You just kind of get you get into it you get really into and you can joke about anything But not with anyone So you can you talk about anything but not with anyone. Okay, you find your audience. They they come to you They get they want to I mean, I sort of I view sort of jokes as their transgressions There you know that benign violation theory. No, so it's a it's a guy Robert McGraw came up with it. So the idea that There's violations in life right yeah terrible things happen and by joking about something you make you make that benign You take away the power from that thing but nine violations by joke about it So the venn diagram the cross between a violation something awful and a joke so in in Joking about something you take away its power. You take away the violation You it's a way of kind of filtering life through the charcoal of humor and making it okay And I think I only I kind of view it like an inoculation against the terror of life Terrible things happen. Yeah, and and we have like, you know, it's very stoic But we have no control over what happens to us But we can at least choose how we look at it and the idea that you go choose our reaction Yeah, and you you you breath in your reaction is all you have control over Great, so that that idea of like jokes are they're quite powerful in that like the darker the joke that the more powerful It is I think like if you can let and the stronger it has to be like if you're gonna tackle something that's really Kind of third rail difficult. It's got to be so funny to make it worthwhile Yeah, to get people over that line and then they feel the relief And they get you can joke about anything. I that kind of view it like It's the you know that thing in politics people talk about the overton window. Yeah, I've like what's almost left wing thing What's the most right wing thing you could say? They're polite dinner party. Okay. I think comedy broadens the conversational overton window. Yeah, I think it makes conversation But it's not the magic doesn't happen in the room. It happens afterwards on the way home people have a conversation A bit more open about life a bit more free about stuff. It just gives them yeah, but it's permission to talk about this stuff So I think Freud called jokes pleasure bribes A joke is a pleasure bribe and it's encouraging you to think an unthinkable thought I think it's not just encouraging you to think an unthinkable thought it's encouraging you to think an unthinkable thought And also acknowledge that it is only a thought and I think that's that's Something that some people have forgotten and lost in comedy With these comedians or the audience both both ways sometimes One of my favorite things you ever did. I don't know if you still do it But do you remember those a point where you started playing this like video before your shows? Oh, you know I've got like a like an opening yeah of like yeah the rules and yeah That's the rules and you you have this one line where you say Please remember that There will be jokes about terrible things But those are not the terrible things those are jokes about the yeah, it was I remember seek it once and I was like This is the greatest Disclaimer I feel like it should be played before every comedy show and every like I feel like you created the standard language that goes before every opening credit every of the comedy comedy clip even like you know that thing of like Epilepsy and seizures. Yes, they just put a standard. Yeah, there's no this may control flashing scenes that may Disturb sensitive and some time I see that warning. I'm like so if you knew why did you put it in there? Yeah, because they're like yo bro, we don't like the movie. No, now I must now I get what they're saying. They're just like yo for you If you have epilepsy, it may be triggered But you know the flashing lights was fire, bro. We had to keep it in You get where they did it, but I like that there's a language. This is not your first day with epilepsy. Fucking you deal with that No, man, right fucking I got my my standard line now If I if I if I offend anyone, I try to delay it as long as I could My my thing with like with with with Joe's like I mean sometimes you you You catch some heat you get dragged a little bit for for making a joke My thing now is I I if someone has a got me next time I get cancelled. This is my line. I'm gonna say I'm sorry And whoever's been offended will go well, you don't really mean that apology and I'll say so you're saying I can say something and not mean it Now you're getting it That right it's that you go. Yeah, I didn't I didn't fucking mean the joke either It's a this is the verbal thing and I want to talk about serious stuff But that's why I'm saying the disclaimer is so powerful because it's like yo There are terrible things in the world I'm gonna make jokes about these terrible things but those jokes please note that the jokes are not that terrible things They are jokes off the terrible about the terrible things. Yeah, I don't think it it and it's just such a small It's such a small but powerful framing to remind you of What the comedy is trying to do how it's trying to do it? How do you do you get? No, it's it it reminds me of the as a rilka had that great line that I feel everything Beauty and terror just keep going no feeling is final I do like that. Yeah, a comedy show should contain everything. There should be light and shade There should be joyful moments and brutal moments and it should be you come out feeling like okay, that's life Life is a bit like that You get a bit scared you get a bit excited you get a bit, you know you laugh Yeah, but the joke that you're horrifically offended by yeah, and the one that you cannot wait to tell your friends And it's the funniest thing you've ever heard both come from the same place That's true. There are jokes that I tell my mom She'll laugh And then you've done it as well. In fact you more guilty than me She'll laugh and then she'll immediately go. I don't like that. But she'll laugh hard She'll laugh then she got a beautiful boisterous. She'll laugh and then she'll go no I don't like that. I don't like but you love then she's like I didn't want to love You tricked me you tricked me you tricked me she even said it's Eugene she's like we're not for lunch, right? And she's like She's like You tricked me I don't like that. I don't like but you laugh then she's like no Then I was like it was funny. I think that might be my favorite noise In the world is like it's like cognitive dissonance at a show Yeah, people have two thoughts at the same time one of that is very funny and they laugh first You've got to get you're gonna watch it because it's got to be a laugh first and then a sharp intake of breath It's the best. It can't be the other way around. Yeah, it's got to be that first The mother thing's interesting to me because I think I'm a comedian because of my mother. I my mother had a Anarchaleptic Cataplexic laugh you've met someone you've met someone that laughs and they make no noise whatsoever They just kind of do this thing. Oh no So my mother had a laugh where she would lose like She would properly melt like like a witch in the Wizard of Oz when she really if you really got her So my whole childhood was like trying to make this woman laugh I mean especially if she was driving and you would know man you would be you would be trying to grab the wheel Why you were saying some funny shit and like steering the car like I should be dead But it's And she was so funny in her own like the M5 a young man has made a joke That courses mother to pass out. Please avoid the left lane of the M5. I think that's the I think that's the one like with comedians. I think if you let if you meet comedian You've never met someone in the world wherever you are. I was like my go-to question. Which of your parents was sick? Hmm one of your parents was sick and you had to make things okay You had to be uh adjust the temperature in a room. Yes. You have to make things out of the situation Yeah, make it all the time. Yeah, make things okay. Make it make it all right. Yeah, make this let's get through this This is tough. We're gonna get through take away the attention from everything else Yeah, comedy. It's medicine helps So when did you discover that your mom was actually having a good time while having That moment. Oh no, why she would she would laugh. I mean the laughter was she was um my mother was very depressed I never knew it at the time. Whatever your household is your household is yeah, you think it's just normal It's your universe you you come home from school and your mom's still in an addressing gown you go Yes, it's fucking that's mom's they sleep a lot. What do you want? You don't realize at the time you have no Facility as a child to see what she needs fucking help There's nothing so you have this thing and you you have to make it okay So that's what I think that idea that there's a there's a pathology to what we do this comedians There's a there's a there's a reason we do this. Yeah, definitely Whatever that is it's a vocation. I would argue and it's a vocation that starts from from a place of personal need And then over time it expands because you see that it can have effects on other people Yeah, you know, so that's often what I say to people when they are very quickly offended by comedy or comedian is I'll say Give them the benefit of the doubt genuinely give them I know I'm not speaking for all of them all the time Even myself all the time every Joe but give them the benefit of the doubt because a human being who steps on stage to try and make people laugh Generally is not a person who doesn't want people to feel good generally So it's just that yeah, they may not have used the tool that would make you lost Yeah, they didn't but it's like but they were trying is the same way if you went to a country or a kitchen where somebody cooked Food in a way that you didn't eat it You would spit it out and go this is god are you trying to kill me trying to poison? No, they were trying to cook food that would That would and you don't give you sustenance. - Interesting, like, sense of humor is, I think very much like food and sex. - It is, it's exactly like food and sex. Different people like different things. Some people like it's spicy. Some people like very vanilla. Like it's different for different people. And the idea like comedy now has expanded so much. - Yeah. - So it's not like, there used to be like three comedy DVDs, you know, VHSs a year. Now, there's like, it's everything, it's infinite. - Yeah, it's everywhere. - It's kind of fantastic. - It really is. - With your mom, did you ever find out like, what the cause of the depression? Was it like, just depression itself? Was it a depression that came from something else? Was it, did you ever find out? - Yeah, I mean, I had a very close relationship with my mother. I think like if you were being analyzed now, they would say enmeshed. It was very close to her emotionally. - Yeah. - And yeah, I mean, she had good reason to be sad. But I think people get, depression isn't feeling sad. Depression is not feeling anything at all. - Yeah. - And. - The indifference. - Yeah, that could be, that could be very, you know, you lost your hunger for life. It's a, you know, it's a very, very difficult thing to deal with, especially difficult one. It's a, you know, a loved one dealing with that. So, you know, she died pretty young. So I never got to kind of resolve it. But it's, I don't know. I feel like the, the gift of laughter and being able to kind of control a room is something that she gave me. - Did you have any siblings? - Yeah, I've got, but I've got brothers. I've got a couple of brothers. - Where are you in the, I'm in the middle, but my younger brother's a lot younger, so. - Okay, okay. - So it was like a generational jump and then. - Yeah. - And then what was your dad like? - Not great. - So in the house, were you like the funniest or were you one of the funniest? - I mean, I mean, Jesus. - Of course I was the funniest. (laughing) - How dare you? - No, mom was pretty funny and a very, yeah, my mother was a very funny woman. - Was it like dry humor or was it, I'm always intrigued by like what the comedian picked up from the parent or where or how or, you know. - Yeah, I guess, but I suppose there is that thing where you go, I, you were scribe. It's often the case like everyone, I blame their parents for anything bad that happened and then anything good they go, that was my hard work and you go and there's all, it's all kind of in the part. I kind of think with, with kids, like I really notice the difference between people with one kid and two kids. Everyone with one kid believes in nurture. Oh, we fed them this kind of milk and this, we gave them this kind of vegetable them. We read to them every night, so of course they enter. As soon as you have two kids. - Yeah, two kids, as soon as the second one arrives, you go, oh yeah, they come out with factory settings. - Yeah. - And that one's like that, so I guess we go with it. I was chatting to Neil Brennan. - Yeah, of course, yeah, of course. - Yeah, of course, chatting to Neil Brennan in the other hand, he had the best analogy for parenting. I'm sure he won't mind me referencing it. He talked about curling. You know the sport of curling? - Yes. - Where they throw a stone, right? And then they're brushing feverishly. - Okay, yes. - The brushing feverishly makes about 5% difference to where that stone ends up. - The direction ends up. - The throw is everything, okay? And then that thing is like about 5% difference. That brushing, that's parenting. - That's good. - The stone has been thrown. It's gonna end up where it's gonna end up. - Yes. - You can change it a little bit, but it is what it is. So you don't, you don't have kids, right? - No. - Yeah, that's, I think about you've made me one kid. - I think about you more than you know. - You to me. - Your Mrs. Nolan, I like that. - No. - Okay, so here's, no, here's the thing, right? Here's the thing. - I view certain comedians as almost like, you support Liverpool, right? - Yeah. - So, okay. I think you're Liverpool. 'Cause I met you early on, relatively early on in your international career, definitely you did. - And then I followed you through. And so you go, you go and you do these things and I watch it from a distance. And I go, I'm fine, I'm still in the Grammys. I'm still in the Daily Shire. I was, he's doing, like, you watch these things and you feel like, it's my guy. It's my guy's doing the thing. And you, you love it. I can't, and I think, think about it. Like coming here today, I was thinking, if your life was a movie, what would people in the cinema be screaming at the screen right now? And they would be screaming, have kids. The people that love you all see it like a mile off. Like, oh, you have to have kids. You have to have kids. You have that thing where it feels like you would be a very good father. I would hope to be. I would hope. I mean, I grew up, I don't know your story, but like, one of the, I think of it in the same way I think of comedy sometimes. One of the reasons I love hanging out with Eugene is 'cause sitting here in this chair is one of my favorite comedians in the whole world. Like, bar none. You're one of them. I can, like, count the comedians where I go, it's many comedians who I rate, funny, talented, skillful, you name it. But there's some people where I go, you wanna my favorite individuals who are also comedians, like the whole thing you embody for me. And when I'm in a conversation with you or when I'm watching you on stage, is the same, like, level of joy for me. Like, I'm sitting there with like my popcorn just being like, do you get what I'm saying? Daniel Kitson, like, is one of them. - Yeah. - He just like, he gives me this thing where I'm like, we went and played football once. I have never laughed more playing the game of football in my entire life. He like does commentary while he's like playing the game. He's like running, he's like, "Oh, I'll pass, who's going down the wing?" He's like, "Oh, what's the end of the physics?" And he, but like, the way he just is makes me, I go like, "Ah, it's, it feels like it is, it's, it's." - But if they're not the aim of like being, like, if you give anyone advice in life, it's like, "Do you?" - Yeah, but it's sweet, sweet, generous be a non-fungible human. - That's the best thing you could be. - That's it. - You're an entirely non-fungible human. - No, but I think you guys take for granted how much I, it's because I'm like enjoying like a flower, you know, basking in the rays of the sun. I watch this, 'cause you cannot always watch yourself. You cannot in life. You know, mirrors are like a relatively new concept. If you look at our history as humans, - No, but even mirrors, mirrors are very two-day. You don't get to see how you think. - That's what I think. - A room. Like, you've got a lot of charm. And charm, I think is missed. - I appreciate that, but I don't know. - Okay, so I don't know what, I don't know. But wait, what charm is it? - But wait, what charm is it? - Charm isn't, people like you. Charm is people think you would like them. - What I do is my thing is like, so this is what I'm talking about the good ones. - This is the good ones. - Yeah, I got zero charm. - That's the first plenty of that. - I got zero charm. I got charisma for day. - Boy, he's got plenty of that he does. - No, so what I'm saying about the dead thing is this. Okay, so when I think of stand-up, one of the things that gives me more joy than anything, I was in Saratoga recently and driving up to the show in Santa Barbara as well as driving up to the show, the people walking in gives me more joy sometimes than the whole show because I look at them and I go, "Yo, these people, this is their night and this is their thing." And I go like, "What a joy and a privilege that they have gone. This is the thing that I wish to do on this night." And it's the thing that will, I even said to one of the audiences one night 'cause I saw them like on the street, there's a couple. They have an argument because they, but then they walked and they came into the show. And then I said, "I've never realized this." And I said, "I just want to say thank you to every one of the couples who came here, even though you're fighting." 'Cause you book the tickets when you're in a good mood. And I take for granted that on tonight, you have to come together. And I said, "So I know right now you hate each other." But let's see how this, but I just want to say, I just want to say, I appreciate you. And we're shocking how many people clapped. It wasn't even a joke. They were just like, "Yeah, we do hate each other right now." And those small moments, I go, "Oh, I would love for you to leave this moment better than when we all came into it. Myself included, forget my day, forget your day. Let's walk out of this." I think the same thing for life. And my mom always said this to me. She always said, not in like a financial way. She just said, "Oh, she's sitting down on my child. Let every generation just be better than the previous one." Just let us beat some curses, let us. And so when I think of that, like fathers and all that, I go, all I wish for is to be the kind of dad where I go, the kind of dad I never had, where when I come home like when a door opens or closes, my kid doesn't have to turn off the TV or doesn't have to act like they're sleeping or doesn't have to, does that make sense? - Yeah, no, no, I love that. - No, but I'm saying that's, - No, I'm just saying that. - That's not a bad thing of like the, that's what I would yearn for. Just be able to give that to someone. - Yeah, it's rough and tumble. And it's the different thing that dads bring. Mums bring, mums are very kind to the child. And dads are very kind to the potential. - Yeah, that's fine. - It's a different move. Like, I don't want to bring up good kids. I want to bring up good adults. - Yeah. - And you can't, so you can't ever let your kids do anything that will embarrass you or that you will resent. 'Cause you have to love them. Don't think that you want, so you have to kind of, they have to, you have to hold them to a standard where you go, we're all gonna have fun all the time. That there's, we got boundaries. You know, mums are very good at setting boundaries. Dads tend to be better at enforcing boundaries. - And enforcing them, yeah. - And actually, you know what I mean, saying that, I'm gendering that. But actually, it could be the mom and the dad could be - Rolls reverse, yeah, yeah, yeah. - Rolls reverse, yeah, yeah. But within the household, someone's good at setting them, is very good at going, "No, no, let's remember that this is the rule." That's how we do it. Someone chose 8 p.m. bedtime. And I was like, "Hey, it's 8 p.m." Does it look like you better be in bed? But the other one is like, "We're coming." It's that thing of like, as you speak about that and the audience and seeing them coming to the show and whatever you go, it's the resume points. You have enough. I'm here to tell you. You have enough. No, I don't think it's funny. I don't think that there's resume points. What I'm thinking of is the, like, I do smaller shows now than I've ever done. Which, like, thank God my team, like, supports, but, you know what, it's like, if you're lucky, you do well. People that we want more tickets and more shows and it gets bigger and it gets bigger. And sometimes I go like, "Oh, this has gotten so big that it is no longer," or it's starting to lose the feeling that I originally loved, which was, "I touch you and you touch me in a very intimate way." And it gets very big. It feels like you watch me and I tell you. And I, you know, yeah, I started, "Well, when I play the bigger rooms, I mean, this is getting off the tangent of going to push you on the fatherhood thing, but the, if I play a really big room, I now play it in the round. I learn it from Chipel. I was doing gigs with Chipel. Yeah. What was it? Australia. He invited me up. I had, like, one night off from my touring Australia and he was playing at night. So, and I, I come and open for you. And he played, and you walk in the room, the arena, like a boxer, like up onto the stage. You have the stage in the middle and you have 14,000 people around you, rather than being at one end and you're playing to them and some people have shitty seats. Everyone's got a good seat. It does shorten. And you kind of, and then you just rotate in that room and that's the, that's the way to do it. Okay. That's, yeah, that's a way to, like, the secret source. Yeah. But also, the thing that you don't realize from that is that the people that are watching you can see past you, the people laughing on the other side. That's actually amazing. That's fantastic. That's a good reason to do it, actually. Yeah. Yeah, that's a great reason to do it. Why did I play? I played the, is it the, I think it might be the, it's in Phoenix, Arizona, maybe the, the majestic theater, do you know it? No. It's like, it's in the round. I think George Carlin filmed his very famous, um, seven boys you can't say on television there. It's that special. In the round. It's phenomenal. But it's a really small room in the round. It's like, 2000. Yeah. It's amazing. So when, when you were becoming a dad, was there a part of you that was ever worried that you would be the dad that you had? Yeah. I didn't want to be a dad for the longest time because they didn't want to be my father. And then you were like, no, no, no, no, make my own mistakes. Yeah. I got mistakes for days. Um, what was it about him that you didn't want to repeat? Like, what, what, what, uh, I mean, he's, he's, he's not great, but the, the, the, the thing about, like, pregnancy makes a baby. Okay. Cool. But it also makes a mother. And a father isn't blessed in the same way. Yeah. We don't go through the same transformation, but it's, you, you, so you, you, people are waiting around thinking, well, I'm going to wait until I feel like I'm in and then I'm going to have some kids. Yeah. And then you have kids and you go, oh, no, it's, this is, this is a verb. This isn't a noun. Yeah. This is a doing. That's beautiful. I'm here to do the rough and tumble play. Yeah. Like, I love the, the, the, the, the, the, the kind of, because you, you want your kids to get, you know, it's, it's, it's bruises. Not scars. Yeah. Yeah. You, you want them to kind of have that fun and the, to be, to be the fun one in the house. And the, it's, it's, it's the most wonderful thing. I went out to lunch with a, with a friend who's, maybe the brightest guy I know, he's, he's a, Eric Weinstein, do you know him? No. He's a very, very clever guy. Physicist. And I was talking about how much I love being a father. And he kind of stopped me. He grabbed my arm and he went, you will die. And you will be reborn as someone else and you will love them. And I kind of went, oh, I, oh, I sort of get what reincarnation is now. I kind of get what it is. And there's this lovely crossover period of 30 or 40 years where you get to be with the next version. Obviously. So beautiful. I would never think of you as somebody who would like adopt or accept that type of philosophy because I've always seen you as somebody who, like, you said at the beginning of this conversation, you atheist, I wouldn't think of Jimmy as being spiritual, but it, but it what changed? What? I think that thing about going, it's the opposite of faith isn't doubt, it's certainty. And I'm not certain about anything, you know, I'm, I'm full of doubts, but the idea that you go to throw out everything spiritual because you don't have a religion seems to be crazy to me. Yeah. So there's two kinds of, you know, people, some people believe in fairy stories, I don't. And some people believe all religion is nonsense. I don't think church works because God is happy. I think church works because people come together. Yeah. And it's interesting. That is what the Bible says when three or more gathered in my name. Three. Yeah. Yeah. And there's actually science behind that funny. Two of us nothing. No, no, no, but there's actually science. Yes, I wasn't here. This would be some bullshit. But that's, that's, but that's like the interesting thing about like is like some, yeah, but some of these things. Yeah, but some of these things show you science is like the science behind it. Like group dynamic, when it's one person in a room, two people, once it gets to three people, something happens that you can't even explain. It just happens when there's a third body. It just happens. Yeah. And you know what I think it is sometimes? I think it's even the passive effect of an audience. So let's say you and I are having a conversation like this. There is, like now when I was talking to Jimmy, you were listening to us. Yeah. You were with us right here. Yeah. But you were listening. When you two were talking, I was listening. And then we said, you laughed. I laughed when you two were talking. That thing doesn't exist when there's two people in the same way. Because you can't always be listening in the same way you can't, two people can make a conversation. A third person can then watch that conversation that is being had by the two people. And we sometimes take that for granted. And that third person can influence the conversation with how they are listening to it and responding to it in a way that you don't appreciate. And so, Tyrannia, Peter, Dishon and so on and so on and so on and so forth. Yeah, yeah. It just becomes like a, oh wow. Oh wow. Getting something happen. Getting something happen changes. Yeah. Something changes. So it's interesting that even in the Bible, it basically talks about the power of the group. And people might just skip over that. But it's like when three or more gathered in my name, I think we've oversold for the individual in our society, definitely. And the idea that you go, even identity wise, people think that they are within their own skin. Our identities are dispersed. Yeah. Right. So you are different with me than you are with Eugene, then you are with your mother, then you are. But also, the thing that you don't know yet is who you are as a father. You don't know what you're like as a dad. You haven't met that person yet. Yeah. As much as you will love your kids, you will fucking love yourself as a father. That is fascinating. Yeah. It's a whole new way of being. And you don't know. Yeah. You won't know. You're like, like, your favorite people in the world are the people you feel most comfortable with. The people that you, you can be yourself with. Right. You tell the kids. He tells me this all the time. And kids will see as a combination of all the personalities that you've told me this all the time. I've told them this all the time. And here's the real responsibility as well, the internal monologue in your head. That's your parents. The responsibility to know that's who you are to your kids. You will be the internal monologue that they have for the rest of their lives. It's a, it's a, it's a way to carry. It's an amazing place to be. Yeah. It tests you. It challenges you. But it also allows you to give yourself so much grace. When you see kids making mistakes and you know it's not final. If they spill something on the carpet, you're like, that's in their world. That's the ultimate thing that could have gone wrong. Yeah. They're juice out of the cup into the prop for that moment. It's so painful, bro. Yes. To them, that's like, you know, that's the life savings. Five million dollars. Yeah. Yeah. In a, in a company that went belly up. Hey, we've all done it. Yeah. The, the, the, but that's like it's Buddhist, right? Yeah. Yeah. What does it say? Hmm. Like the cups already broken. Yeah. Everyone's already dead. Yeah. Like, yeah, make peace with that. Yeah. What do you want to do? Yeah. Enjoy it. Enjoy it. Yeah. Enjoy it. Like a lot of mental health, I think, is the now. Yeah. Depression is the past. Yeah. Anxiety is the future. Mm-hmm. Right now, you're okay. Yeah. I love that. That's beautiful. The idea of like you learning grace because you're watching them sort of not have grace for themselves in those moments. But you learn so much from kids. Almost all kids will always have an outfit that they love and they can't accept that they've grown out of it. Sorry. Are we talking about this? Yeah. No. No. No, but you are. You are, you are dressed like a toddler. 100%. Oh, man. This guy can. Shots. I got, I got, I got a six year old. I wouldn't put it out. Do you know where to go? No. Where something with a collar. We're going out. The jacket. Do you know what this guy just did? Huh? Have you watched those, you know those, if you watch those mob movies where the movie is just trundling along. It's calmly. Everyone's having a great time. They're doing things. All of a sudden, they go, Hey, Billy, you want to come for a drive? We're going for a drive. Everyone's a good time. Out of nowhere. You, even as an audience member, us sitting there enjoying the movie. So you know, I was thinking, blah. Oh, shit. Oh, shit. Oh, shit. Yeah. You guys, that's as I just did. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm wiping his gun off him. Like, Jimmy, what did you do today? I changed. He's a rat. What did you do today? He's like, we had to do something about that outfit. It was coming. It was a long time coming. Trevor. - Someone had to say, "I'm coming in blood right now, Jimmy." "I'm coming in blood right now, Jimmy." (all laughing) - What a shot's fired out of no way, right? - Yeah. - There's something nice about the out of nowhere. - Oh man. - That's something like they've done nothing. They're just quietly sitting in the front row and then suddenly what? - What just happened? - Catching strays, my friend. - Catching strays. - Yeah, ringing strays, yeah, catching strays. - Look kids, kids will teach you that. They'll be like, "I wanna put this on, I wanna put this on." You're like, "No, it doesn't fit anymore." Then they'll be like, "Yeah, but I still like it." They're like, "No, you have to get something else." Then you have to convince them that something else is good for them. Then that's your job. Then they entrust you, then they'll believe you when you say something else is good for them. Because this thing that they've grown to love and find comfort in, doesn't work anymore for them. But as an adult, you take longer to understand that. - The language of it, I love the language of it. I was thinking about it when you were doing about Star Wars earlier, 'cause my kid, my boy hasn't seen Star Wars too scary. - Hold. - He's like sex, but we're pretty strict with screens or whatever, we don't fuck with that. So that idea, but he calls him, he's been on some of the rides at Disney. So he calls him, it's Dark Vader. - I like that. - And the American Falcon. And someone tried to correct him. I'm like, "No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no." Once he gets that right, he'll never get it wrong again. - And you love it. - I like to inform, I'm enjoying the, but he likes to wear a shirt, like a long sleeve. He calls it down sleeves. - Oh man. - I tried to correct him in a story, I went, "No, obviously we're sticking with down sleeves, "as long as we possibly can, it's joyful." - And I mean, down sleeves is a great name for us. - Perfect name. - Because long doesn't really tell us long in relation to down, I like actually more. - I think he's actually got a good deal. 'Cause if you're wearing shorts, this day you're wearing shorts. But if you're wearing trousers, the never say you're wearing longs, I actually like this a lot. - Yeah, could change things. - You just made me, you just made me sad that most people wouldn't know, I'm not for people who want, we're living in a world where fewer people are having kids and fewer people can have kids. And I wonder what society as a whole is going to be robbed of when people cannot have these magical experiences that you're talking about. - Well, I mean, the best stuff in life is available to everyone, right? It's weird how the very rich and the very poor both have tons of kids. No, weird. The poorest person you know that lives in a trailer bar. - Slums, yeah. - And the richest person, you know, tons of kids. - Tons of kids. - But the middle class is squeezed. It's really it's a societal thing because as we moved from the countryside, like 200 years ago, everyone's a farmer, everyone now lives in cities. Kids went from being an asset to a liability, right? In the city, kids are a liability. - Yeah, they're not accomplishing their sides. - I've got eight kids. How do you do it? Farm hands, great, they're working hard. They'll be in soon. That thing of like, it changed. So, and we need to rebalance that 'cause the future belongs to whoever shows up for it. - And I say this all the time. And I say this, I always say the middle class that can afford to have to some kind, the middle class, but they can't afford, they have so much to offer to these kids. People have five bedroom houses that are not occupied. People have all these experiences, all these excesses, but there's no one to give it to. - Who's the great guy that said Warren Farrell, who was great in the feminist movement in the late '60s, and he wrote the myth of male power. So he's like, he's like people think he's kind of men's movement. I think he's a brilliant man. He said this thing, kids want your time more than they want your dime. - There we go. - I thought it was a great line. He's got a great story. You wanna hear a great story about? - Oh, okay. - I'm a guy who likes great stories. - All right, so this guy Warren Farrell, he's working as a therapist in the late '60s. He's in New York, he's where we are now. And this guy comes to him and he's a wealthy man. He says, "I'm very rich, I'm involved in a big business, and I have regrets about how I live my life." Warren Farrell goes, "Okay, we'll tell me what's going on." He said, "Well, I had a first wife, and I didn't spend any time with her. I was way working all the time, and I had a kid. I didn't really connect with the kid. I just wasn't there, and I feel terrible about it." And my girl is pregnant, and what should I do? And Warren Farrell, like talks to the guy, and he goes, "Well, you don't point having money if you're not gonna do what you want with your life, right?" So, what do you wanna do? And he said, "Well, I wanna give up everything, and just be a father, and just be there for the kid." Warren Farrell goes, "Okay, well, that's what you should do." Do that. So he does. He shuts down the business, and he sits with the kid for like five, the first five years of his life, and he just bakes bread and hangs out in the house, and he's like a dad. Well, no one was like a full-time dad. He was a full-time dad. And the story gets interesting, when I tell you the guy was John Lennon. - Wow. - And no one knew that five years after that, - You did. - He'd get shot in the face. He would never have that time again. And he took that time to move this kid to hang out. - Damn. - Mm-hmm. - Give yourself that gift. - I think we always assume that the time has promised to us. - Yeah. Because our obligations have claimed their time, we always assume that the things we actually want for ourselves will also claim their time. Do you know what I mean? - Yeah. - Your work, your debts, your everything. They've claimed their time well in advance. They're like, "Oh, here's your payments. This is how it's gonna work." You're like, "20 years? "Yeah, you'll be paying for this house for 20." The bank's claimed it's time, you know what I mean? Yeah. And so I think because of that, sometimes as people we assume, because the things that we owe, whether it's time, money, whatever, because they've claimed their time, we then I think assume that the things we want will also be able to claim their time. But that's not what you just said to me. - But it's you, it's also, you know, you're a good boy. You'd love your mom. - Yeah. - You wanna get a represent? (laughs) - You wanna get a gift you'll care about? - No. - The scent here's a spy. My mom sent you this podcast. (laughs) - Deep under cover. - It better looks like judging my outfit. It looks like my mom sent you this podcast. Do you? Do you? Do you want to send my bathroom both of my mom's? - Well, I think your mother's here somewhere. I think she's still dressing you. (laughs) I'm pretty convinced. - Why are you always dressed or shot, by the way? - I like it. It became like a thing. - It is also like an English thing. Like an English thing. - I don't think it is a particular English thing. But I mean, I love my Taylor is Tom Sweeney, I guess you. And he's one of my best friends, Luke. - That's a Taylor name. - He's the best Thomas. - I just love spending time with him. I love the whole thing of like going and buying a suit. The ritual of it going into the store, hanging out with the guys. I'll shoot some pool, we'll pick some fabrics. - Yeah. - It just sounds like. - It sounds like picky blinders in my head. - Yeah. - It's like the image I have right now. - It's kind of, it's the boys are very, they're very good. - You look at other people's shoes and go, who's one is that one and what is that? - I look at American men and suits and think, "Ilarus." (laughing) "Ilarus." I don't know who that was made for, but not you, clearly. (laughing) - I like to come correct. So that thing of like on stage, I think that thing about wearing a suit and a tight for me, it feels like a mark of respect for the audience. Different people sort of see themselves in different ways, but also it speaks to character and reputation. I'm, characters what you know about yourself. Reputations what the rest of the world sees. - Okay. - And people perceive me in a three-piece suit and a tie. Fine. - Right. - I'll lean into that. - Okay. It also suits you though. - Very myself. - It really suits your vibe. Like I don't know what it is, but it's like, you know when like, the thing just like suits you, every community has this thing. - You can imagine anything else. - I can't. - Yeah. - I can't. And I also think there's something about like, I remember the first time I watched you when you like, this guy's up there in a suit telling one liners, you, it makes you even feel like an assassin in a suit feels even more dangerous, you know? So if I see like a movie and there's an assassin and the wearing t-shirts where I'm like, "All right, you feel like they know what they're doing." - No, you kill people, but an assassin in a suit, I'm like, "Oh, don't mess with this guy." - Yeah. - He's gonna kill people wearing a three-piece suit. - I think that he knows this, you know what I mean? - You know what I mean? - You're going to the theater and like, someone's put on a bit of a show. - Yes, yes. Your production design as a comedian is whatever you, whatever you got on here. That's what we've been looking at. - That's very minimal. - So it's like, you don't need a big show. It's like, that's it, that's it. That's the set design. I bought a suit. Well done, everyone. Nice, a new tie. - Do you love my set? - Somebody wants a suit again. Maybe we'll wear suits again. - I'll try it a bit, that's all I wore when I first started. Remember? - Yeah. - Terrible suits. - Hey, some of them, you look good. - You look very good. - You look very terrible. - Some of them, you're even been kind to me because you're my friend. - My favorite one was that shiny- - The shiny silver one. - Yeah, you're a tinfoil looking. - Oh my goodness. - Oh man, that suit for me was like, yeah, another guy. - It's shimmied. It was like baggy and it's shimmied. It's like massive fat tie in the middle. And with a big collar. - That was a huge shoulder pads and ah, but I was loving it. - It's weird the way like it hasn't changed much in the last kind of 50 years. - Like I could do pretty much. Like whether I'm like, - Smart or casual, I could pretty much dress as JFK on any given day. - Yes, you could. - Yeah, you could. - You know what to do with JFK, the fashion wise. - No. - His guys were called the men without hats. - I've heard that term, but I didn't know what it was for his. - So when he came up, when he was running for office, none of his guys wore hats, he didn't wear a hat. Everyone wore hats. And he came along and he didn't wear a hat. And suddenly the hat business went from being a large industry to nothing in like two years. When he got elected, it was suddenly like, on our hats and for old-fashioned, Fuddy-Duddy dudes, modern, new people. This was America, this was JFK, yeah. Add a new suspect to the list. The head industry. A, you must always look at who benefits or who had a grievance with the person. - So you think, you think the Zagrubatite might have been someone on a grassy knoll wearing a hat. What did they shoot on his body? - His head. - Yeah. - I'm not saying that this is, I'm just saying, if I'm a detective, I've found a new lead. - Okay, the hat industry. And those people are famously crazy 'cause they work with Mercury. - And the beaver's hat has a hat. - Comes from that. - I'm sure the beavers were like, yeah, let's, we're seeing a reinsertions. Let's have more kids, guys. (laughing) - No one's up the hot pants anymore. - Good. - Don't press anything. We've got more, what now, after this? - What's the conspiracy theory you do believe? - The conspiracy theory. - Yeah, that you do believe. - Okay, all right. Here's, even if it's one of your own, two terrifying scenarios. - Cool. - Okay, so the first is, there's a Manhattan project currently underway in America. And they're building a, a Doomsday machine. And it's called Solstice. And it's artificial general intelligence, okay? Trillions of dollars are being spent on building this. Some are in America, we don't know where, but it's siloed off in their building this. Second terrifying scenario. Then not. (upbeat music) - Yo, by the way, what's happening in England these days? - In England? - Yeah, because I like asking people this, because when you're not in a country, or if you live between countries, you learn very quickly. The stories being told about a country are not felt in the same way, or they're being painted in a different way than the people who are experiencing it in the country. And I wonder, what's happening in England these days? - I don't know, I mean, it feels, it's a very interesting time at the moment in the UK, because it's kind of, there was the Brexit thing, and then we didn't really leave, and the country's in, we've had like seven prime ministers in 10 years, and there's political stagnation, the new guy I wish him well, Andy Burnham's come in, and he's capped bus fares at two pounds. And it's like rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic, like the economy is not going well, that the country's not going well, and no one quite knows what to do. And it seems to me like no one has the big ideas on how to change Great Britain. I mean, it seems relatively simple, but people don't want to do it, they don't want to grasp the nettle. What do you think the simple is? I always think they're like, there's no silver bullet. - Yeah. - There's no, I'm a big follower of this guy called Roger Bootle, who writes, he's an economist who writes very good papers about what to do, and he did this great paper, which was like eight examples around the world, of like different economies that've done different things. I think if you want to sort out Britain, certain things are necessary, but not sufficient. Okay, so if it was me, if I was in charge, I would devalue the currency by 20%. And I would do it on purpose, and I would be open about it, and the reason is it would make your holiday more expensive. But I don't care about the two weeks a year when you go on holiday overseas, I care about the other 50 weeks of the year. And if you want to rebalance the country, you have to increase the manufacturing industry. - Right. - And the reason the pound is very high is because of the city of London. But London is like a really rich city, and it's surrounded by quite a poor country. You want that redistribution, you want people to have more, you need to make things. - Yeah, you do need to make things. - And then energy, we have the highest energy prices in the world, I believe. It's four times higher than it is in America. - Cheese. - And really, all I would all aspire to be is as good as 1970s France. In 1970s, the mid '80s, France built 56 nuclear reactors. They now have the cheapest energy in Europe. So they can give the fuck what the Russians say, 'cause they don't import the gas. They make their own energy. And you go, well that's a very, that takes 12, 15 years to. - Yeah, it takes a statement, not a politician. Politicians are on a four, five year cycle. - The French boy's been good at that though, if you look at their history, like if you look at how the Paris itself, how it was built, if you look at the ideas, many French leaders built beyond themselves. And then the person who would follow on from them carried it on in a strange, you don't always see that. - But that thing of the statement is planting a tree who shade you will never enjoy. - Yes, it's that kind of thing. And then we've got crazy levels of regulation in the UK that you just need to pair it back a little bit. You need to make it a bit simpler. Look at China compared to America or Britain, right? They've covered their nation in high speed rail. - Yeah. - And we've covered ours in environmental reports. Why? 'Cause China is run by engineers. And we're run by lawyers. And everything can't be run by lawyers. You know, you have to get some shit done. But it's, you know, and then the last thing is taxation, I think is very interesting. The idea that we haven't, we left Europe and then we never, we never took the benefit. You know, Ireland, where my people are from, have lower corporation tax than anywhere else in Europe. So all of the anthropics, all of the companies. - They're going there. - All of the tech companies. - They can base themselves in Dublin. And Dublin and Ireland does very well out of the tax revenue from that. - Well, I don't want to be a dick about it, but I would undercut them by 2%. - Are you over here? - But don't you think it just become like a race to the bottom? Aren't you worried about? - You have to be in competition with the rest of the world. You have to, like, the real politics is, you're in competition with every other country. - Yeah. - And different places have different specialties, right? - Yes. - Why would you want to live there? Why would you want to live here? Why do you want to be? - I feel like the tech guys, I feel like the tech guys have tricked us in all these corporations have tricked us tax-wise because what they've done is, they've made it a cat and mouse game where they make everyone offer everyone a lower tax rate. But all they're always going to do is keep moving. And if you, if everyone bends to their whims, at the end of it, everyone has just bent themselves out of actually being a place where you want to be or not what, 'cause here's what I mean. Okay, so think of this, and I'm not an economist, so just how I think of it in the world is, let's say you went to a bodega here in New York and you got there and you said, how much for this bottle of water? And they said, four dollars. And you're like, oh, the other bodega's gonna give it to me for three, seven, and then he's like, all right, I'll give it to you for three, seven, and then you leave and you go to next bodega and you're like, oh, they give it to me three, seven, and he's like, I'll give it to you for three. - That's an infinite bit. - Yeah, it can become an infinite bit. Now I know an economist will tell me, yeah, but it's supplied demand blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and I know it's complicated in tax, but I just feel like sometimes I think the race is the wrong way round. I know this is a little kumbaya of me, but I think if countries found a way to come together and the same way they have like international crime agreements, I think if they did a better job of having international tax agreements, then that wouldn't be able. It's weird to me that when I'm in Europe, when I'm in London, I catch an Uber and I get charged by Uber Amsterdam. I think that's weird. Because the Uber is in London. - Yeah. - Uber is in the UK. I even think this in South Africa, like one of the things that worries me the most in South Africa now is if you are a South African company and you advertise on Facebook, and it's necessary for you, you need to advertise where the people are. You're gonna advertise on Facebook, you're gonna advertise on Google all of these things. The money doesn't stay in South Africa, but you're a South African business. Think about that. - Advertising to South Africa. - You're a South African business. Advertising South African products, two South Africans. But the money that you pay for that advertising, back in the day, would go to South African advertising company as South African platform, as South African billboarder, as South African. And for me, I believe money is just like water. You want to keep it flowing. You know it's gonna start somewhere. It's gonna flow. And then you want it to evaporate and go back up and then rain back down and then freeze and then come down. - Well, money is a healthy system, right? - Money is upstream of the things that we want. We say we want more money for people, but really what we want. We want more healthcare. - Yes. Exactly, exactly. - And better nutrition. That's exactly it. The problem is, I'd love to run for politics, but in 1980, I wanna go back and be able to promise what we have now in 1980. The problem is the worst kind of inflation in the world is expectation inflation, right? And there's another word for expectation inflation. It's progress. People want more. We get used to shit being good really fast. But we want like a level for everyone. We want everyone to be at the level of kind of a. - Decent level. - Decent level. - Decent level. But you can't keep moving the gold posts. And for me, it's about desires as opposed to kind of memetic desires. Like, what's the example? Like a Ford car and a Ferrari do the same job. they get you from A to B, but one of them has like a metaphysical value. It's like what you think it says about you as a person and you're adventurous and sporty and whatever. But one of them's just functional, like provide the functional stuff that everyone, I'm then above that, you know, the people are going to be that's what you want. But that's what I'm that's what I'm that's what I'm saying. That's why I worry that the race will go to the bottom because if we are not careful, I think what will happen is the UK, let's say, will undercut Ireland. Oh, we'll give you less tax rate work and as the people come there. And then we've seen this happen corporations, companies factory. The only reason we have weekends off is because workers had to fight for it. Yeah, the unions. Let's never forget that as an idea. People don't, people forget the unions gave us that. People forget the reasons for things. People talk about the new deal, like the new deal just happened, just like Rose, what came in had the new deal. No, and the new deal happened because of labor riots that were brutal. Yeah. People think Pearl Harbor happened out the blue. Pearl Harbor didn't happen out the blue. America cut off its oil supply. So it had a choice. It could collapse or it could go for an unwinnable war. And it couldn't, it couldn't face back and down. You know, it's like, it's a weird thing of like knowing the history is really interesting. And we're, I think, you know, Britain, it's interesting, but we live in very interesting times. Like the bigger picture, I think we're living in a revolution. I agree with you. Depends how you define revolution, but I define a revolution as the replacement of elites. Yeah. And the elites are being replaced. Think about like their medical profession, post-COVID, people don't trust it. People don't trust politicians in a way that they used to. People don't trust academics, academia. We don't trust institutions. People don't trust institutions. And the bubbling up of not trusting institutions, what's the first sign of that? Conspiracy theories. Conspiracy theories are a symptom of a large problem, which is we don't trust the, yeah, the the institutions. So we're just, we're scrambling around, but I read a lot of Neil Howe. You've read that guy? Maybe. Maybe. He wrote the book called the fourth turning. Okay. About how history moves in like 80 years cycles. Oh, yeah, yes, I have read that. Yes, I have read that. And the idea that you go, the foundation myth of our culture is World War II. Like Western culture is World War II. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We're the goodies that are baddies. We do this. And it's falling away. You can see it like statues of Churchill are being torn down. Right. So, and you go, so that myth is kind of fading, because it's the, the people don't remember it. People that would add a whole less than less of a meaning it does. So you go, so, you know, civilization is declaring in the forest. We have to relitigate everything. It's not like we can cope without institutions. Yeah. We just need new institutions. And at the moment, like politically what's happening, like the postmodernists, it's a war on truth. Yeah. And we can live without truth, if I'm honest. We live without truth pretty easily. But we can't live without trust. And we need truth to make trust. And trust is, that's the fundamental. Trust is very delicate. I think it's so to me, one of the reasons it's happening is because because of what you said earlier, we are catering to audiences of one. I remember talking to Mark Hes Brownley, MKBHD. And we're just chatting about this. And he was talking about it, like, amongst big YouTubers and YouTube in general. And he said, everyone talks about this race to the audience of one. If you look at your world and your entertainment and your information, we're now living in a world where it is all specifically for you. You do not have to be in friction. You do not have to share. You do not have to. And if it's not for your friends, if it weren't for them, if think about how many things you've shown me, taught me, shared with me, that I wouldn't otherwise. Neil Brennan sends me stuff all the time. I talk to him. But it's like, those things, have you seen this? Have you done this? If we, if it weren't for that, we literally now would live in ideological silos and truth silos. Well, here's because there's no other world. Here's my take on this. So we gathered round the fire. I don't know, two, three hundred thousand years, maybe longer. We gathered round the fire and we talked. And then we bought TV sets. No, we bought radios first, right? Radios. And we gathered round the wireless, the radio. And we listened to it and we talked. And then we bought TVs and TV. It's kind of like a proxy for a fire. We watched that together and then we turned it off. Exactly. And whatever it was, whatever mom was watching, we were watching. Exactly. And then we talked about it. And TV ended. And suddenly, yeah, finished. Suddenly, yeah, we're doing this and we're in separate rooms. And why do people want to go to festivals and comedy shows and things now? That's what I mean. Because we missed that connect. Yeah. Like that, that we have this dispersed identity. We have to kind of come together. I don't know. I presume that we, we relicicate, we reinvent everything now. Everything gets recreated. But we've been, we've been in tougher times than this before. When you look back, I'm very pessimistic in the short term and very optimistic in the long term. I like that. Like we, we have to get through this little precipice. But if we do, good times. Yeah, man. That's why that's why I love that's what when we're going back to appreciating it. Those are the things that I look at. As I go, I'm not just here doing a show thinking of the resume. I've started to think of comedy and anything that I do, anything that we do. I go like, what is this also a part of? What do I wish to try and like contribute to? And what do I wish was in my world? And how do I, do you get what I'm saying? Because I genuinely think it makes a huge, listen to what you said. Ah, when I was at the Taylor Swift show, it has left something with you that'll connect you to other people, by the way, that you maybe otherwise wouldn't have been connected with. One moment. It gives you a different memory. It gives you a different and you were forced to share it with people who are singing at each other. Same thing with Oasis and Wonderwall. It's this thing, even Star Wars, funny enough, where you have this, I can see you as you're like, oh man, when I get to show my kid's Star Wars. Yeah. It's this. Yeah, because they then get to see how you perceive literature, fiction, storytelling, movies, whatever it may be. And they get to understand you a little bit. I always hop on about this, man. Yeah. It, look at, look at societies that are generally homogenous. One of the things they really good at doing, by the way, do you say homogenous or homogenous? I always want to ask like an English person. I say, I would say homogenous, but I often pronounce stuff incorrectly because I'm an auto-dick that. So most of what I learned, I've learned reading it. But because you actually all think that's the right one. Yeah, you would just think I'm going to go with you then. So homogenous, I'm going to go with you just with safer. Yeah. So if you look at homogenous societies, they're very good at agreeing on something now, like you're talking about a really smart gay guy. You see now. You see now. It does sound like, yeah. That's why I've always said homogenous. He's a homogenous. He's a homogenous. He's a homogenous. Leonardo da Vinci was a homogenous. What a homogenous. So when you look at these cultures, you know he invented the rich around. Exactly a homogenous. When you look at these cultures, one of the things they're really good at doing is coming to consensus quickly and moving forward in a direction. What are they generally bad at doing, innovating or rather choosing an outfit that may be better for them, even though the outfit they've kept for so long worked and was their favorite. Yeah, I think that idea, you know, it's Thomas Sal, isn't it? There's no solutions only trade-offs. Yes, yes, yes, completely. You can go to places that are very, very high trust. Yeah. You know, if it's Japan or Denmark, where everyone's the same, and it's super high trust, great. But I like that kind of the multiculturalism, the idea that you go to places like London, where people are from 200 different nations, right? And they come together. But you know, it's not as high trust, but okay, I'll take that. I love that idea that people can proper, properly enjoying travel and other cultures is very valuable. But a lot of people are just like tourists. They say they love other cultures. And what they mean is music, food, festivals. But they never want to engage in the real stuff they don't. And I think the privilege of our job is we get to travel the world and talk to people and engage with the difficult stuff. They think about that about different word, yeah. That's actually fascinating. He literally, when he came back from Cape Verde, it was more about, you always said the people, but the ideas is what you will know. The people and the ideas that they share, their philosophy towards life, them realizing where they are. They know that they're in the middle of the ocean. They are floating in tiny rocks, seven tiny rocks in the middle of the ocean. They know that for a fact. And they're like, we've only got each other. So them as a society and as a community, like, no, no, we've got a philosophy. It served us well. It makes us survive this thing. Therefore, we've got each other to take care of. I think there's often that in the cultural memory of a place. My girl is Canadian. And I think there's something about the Canadian winters that makes Canadian people much nicer. Because if someone knocks on your door and says, can I come inside? Yeah. Because if you don't, you're going to freeze the death. The cultural. You're going to die. It's why Africans have more time for people. Yes. We're not as precious about time. We just generally aren't. And it's the biggest friction. Like you'll see with like Europeans and Africans when they're in Africa, they're like, they've been called African times. Yeah, they'd be like, they'd be like, yeah, but nothing. You know, have you been to Africa? Yeah, nothing runs on time. Yeah, everything is. But I'm like, yes, because it didn't need to. You must remember this time that you have created as a construct that you very desperately needed to facilitate your survival. Because if the snow was coming, you had to make sure that the things were, you know, reaped at the right time, your fruits were taken away, your stuff was stored. If the carriage didn't pick you up before the storm, you were dead. If you're. But in Africa, those things didn't exist as a concept. So time is just a thing we're experiencing. But if you look at the cultural memory of time, Africans never thought of it as a scarce thing because it didn't affect their existence. So Africans didn't go. So. There's a fascinating book I remember reading about it because our whole lives we know it. And then I read a book that talked about it. It's why Africans open their mouth more when they speak, why they speak slower, so it doesn't matter where you're from in the African continent, there'll be that thing, you know, like plus a more lump flow am, how sapila, it's big and it's open. Why? The air is warmer generally. Right. You don't worry about losing your body heat and there's no rush. And then when you go to the coldest places, you look at like the Scandinavia, the Sweden, tak, tak, hit it. Small words. It's been lit on to open your mouth. I don't know. Interesting about spicy food. Yeah. So the further south you go, the spicy the food is. Yes. It doesn't matter whether you could be in South America, you could be in Africa, spicy. And it's about the pathogen load. The spices kill the pathogens. I didn't know that. There's no pathogens in the North. So if you got a Scandinavia and you kill a chicken and you cook it, you can be okay. You've got to, if you got Africa, you better put some spices in there to kill the pathogens. Kill the pathogens. It's like morning sickness. You know about morning sickness? Yes. So morning sickness affects women from this week to this week. Okay. Why? Because that's when the organs are being born, are being made. Okay. So if you're making the organs and you get sick, that's a real problem. So your sensitivity to pathogens during those weeks goes through the fucking roof. Morning sickness then goes away when the baby's just getting bigger, when you're just growing it. But the organs are there. So what is a congenital heart problem? So when someone got sick on that day, something went wrong on that day, there's no do overs in nature. You have to be healthy on that day. Interesting, right? All of this is interesting to me. And that's why I, well, what did you think now that, but you said friction. I think friction is one of the, like my kind of theory at the moment, yeah. Friction is good. Friction is very good. Right. Low friction. Tiktok. Very low friction, right? Right. Yes. TV shows. A little bit more friction. Then you're going to sit down, watch these things. It's on our lungs. Yeah. Okay. Put it on. Okay. Right. Okay. We'll watch it. Pay attention. Movie. Two miles, three hours maybe. More friction. Okay. But better. You can remember what? Book. Jesus. They might have friction. Difficult. But you never forget what you read. Yeah. Like more friction is better. And who wrote it? Yeah. The show, which I really loved. Remony was talking about like life. And then he was talking essentially about the idea of. Assuming that things will come with friction. What do you say? He said friction makes easy things difficult and difficult things impossible. Just the friction. It makes an easy thing seem difficult. And a difficult thing seem impossible because of the friction that's attached to it. Right. And when you think of it through that lens. It's funny you say that because I've literally been on this for long. You and I talk about this all the time. In our friend group now, we try and engage with friction purposefully. Yeah. Like purposefully. We drive each other to the airport now. Like we'll ask each other, can you drop me off at the airport? And we know why we're doing it. It's not going to be fun. Yes. But that drive to the airport. Yeah. We'll bring you some of the greatest to memories of friendship that you will ever have. Yeah. And it's not going to be fun. there wasn't someone interrupting you, are you guys gonna order something else or are you gonna, and that's what I worry about in society is a lot of how we come together as people is governed by our financial means now. - Yeah. It's becoming more and more of that. Do you wanna go on a date? Can you do it without money? No, so then how do you date? Let's go out for a drink, let's go out for a, so many of these things have become, When I was a kid, I think of like the luckiness of it. Yes, the parks and everything, but there's the mall. You know kids, parents would just drop the keys at the mall. No money. And all of us would just run around in a mall for 10 hours and it was just like our place of like being. - With each other. - Yes, with each other. Kids who had money, kids who didn't have money. - I think about this, and it's slightly different way, but like to say, I took about this in the show at the moment about how Men need therapy because women have got each other. Women are very good at talking to each other. Men have, we've got friends, but we don't talk to our friends. We do things with our friends. - I feel like we're living the same life. - We need an excuse to do something. So we go, we're gonna go and see the football. - Yeah. - We have to go and see the football or we're gonna play pool or we're gonna go for a drink or we have to have an activity based. We can't just say, I wanna have a conversation. And it's actually, there's something about testosterone that makes it very difficult to look people in the eyes and have a long conversation. It's much better if you have a friend that's having a crisis to play a game of pool or go on a drive, be doing something, be, have a distraction, have something else that's going on while you're talking to them, seems to work. - Yeah, to speak. - I don't think the concept of distraction- - I don't think the concept of distraction. - That's why I always love hanging with you. I genuinely feel like we are like connected by some invisible force. I'll play the audio from the show, literally. - Yeah. - This is what I'm talking about right now to the audiences. is as men we're living in a world where the things that we take for granted that used to connect us are now becoming harder and harder for us to just attain, you know what I mean? So whether it is the local pub and being able to afford just being there, whether it's because you can't afford your electricity, you can't afford a afford of, like all of these things? - I bet on, I'm very pro. I did a bit recently where I said, I'm pretty pro drinking. I'm pro gangs, and I'm pro gambling. - No, I haven't seen this. Pro drinking, pro gambling, pro gambling. - Okay, so I'm, okay, so I'm pro gangs because some gangs deal drugs and shoot people. They're not good, but most gangs, it's groups of men that come together and where should men be together. - Yeah, if you go to anyone that's having relationship difficulties, I'll tell you what, that problem is, all relationships have the same problem. It's one person, say, every argument that's ever been between a man and a woman, is someone going, "You're not enough people." You're not enough people. - That's the problem. - We want one person, yeah, that's the problem, the genius on this. - No, she literally talks about this all the time. - You go, "You need more than that. You need your friends, you need your buddies." And men are very good at checking other men, right? I've set up a group of youth clubs across Britain. They've got like they've got pool tables. They've got dartboards. They've got music. They've got drinks. They're called pubs. And they're the greatest youth clubs that have ever been, right? They're everywhere. We should lower the voting age, the drinking age to 16. Because if you don't think 16-year-olds are drinking, you're living in a fucking dream world, right? Good luck in your fairy tale land. but I'd rather they were drinking in pubs with other people than on their own in the park. So I'd say the drinking age should be just wine and beer, no hard stuff. You can drink in a pub when you're 16, but you have to bring three friends. Can't go on your own. You've got to have four people have to be there in order to drink, right? So I'm pro gang, a little gang of youths. A little gang. You're allowed to go to the pub, you're allowed to watch football in the pub. The pub probably has a football team that you can join. Like other men will check you. If you start to be a dick, you'll get thrown out. They'll let you know real quick, right? The bartender will cut you off if you get drunk. You'll get each other home. You'll be all right. That's like, it's the real world as well as opposed to the practical, as opposed to going, I guess young people shouldn't drink. So just they'll, what are you talking about? The drinking age. It's crazy. And then pro gambling is like, the gamble though shouldn't be sports betting or casinos. It should be the big gamble. What are you going to do with your life? You could do anything you want with your life. You just have to face the consequences. And I think men have, you know, people often talk about how 90% of the CEOs in the world are men. But you have to also consider 90% of the people in prisons are men. And it's the same drug at the center of that. It's testosterone. Same personalities as well sometimes. Yeah, yeah. Men take insane risks, right? That's what we do. Sometimes crash and fail, sometimes we do very well. But I think of like channeling that into making good bets. - And I'll call Jay, he said it yesterday, right? - Yeah. - He said if it wasn't a great prolific musician and an actor, - Yeah. - York would have been a different place. - Yeah, he's like, he would have been in the streets doing, so he's like, that same energy. He would have taken it somewhere else. And he's like, good luck, New York. You would have known my name in a very different way. Because it is that same energy that's going somewhere. But that, that friction thing you're talking about has become my newest passion because I've realized even in my own life, how convenience is a thief that steals things you didn't even know you had. - Yeah. - It's really, really powerful. - Well, I mean, the AI thing with me, don't outsource any skill you are not comfortable losing. (whistling) - Because you're gonna lose it. You're not gonna be able to do it, you're gonna have to work on it. If you play your instrument, You play your instrument, right? You get good. You have to keep on playing. You have to practice. You have to put the practice in, and if you outsource that, it's gone. But that's what I mean. It's the convenience. It's just. just the convenience of the, you know, the food arriving, the convenience of the car that picks you up, the convenience, the convenience, the convenience, the convenience, and then you go, like when I think, the biggest thing I like, I get sad about, and it's like, it's a command room, I know, it's like, you know, like in South Africa, I think of like, townships when we were growing up. It is the most inconvenient experience. Your neighbors play music at 6 a.m. - Loudly. - On the weekend, loud. You're all, you, everyone here's everyone's music. Everyone knows everybody's business. Everybody's talking to you. You can't walk anywhere without having a conversation with somebody, so you can't like just pop to the shops and come back real quick. There's no such thing. - No privacy. - Everyone's asking you if they can borrow money from you. Everyone, if you've got a car, then you have now become the de facto transportation person for everyone. Hey Eugene, we heard you got a car. Oh, we heard you, can you help us move this, oh, can you do this? And if you have something-- - It's a little drop off. - And if somebody dies, then you all have to go and cook for them. It's all, the whole thing is just friction. It's just friction, friction, friction, friction. But can I tell you what it is? I never once heard a story once in the township ever. And so it's never, I never heard a story of like, do you know someone died and no one knew for like two months? Those stories that I read on the newspaper now in life. - Don't exist. - They literally never existed. Never, never, never, never existed. There was literally no homeless person. - Think about it. - Yeah. There was literally, this is a place where people had been pushed into the worst types of poverty imaginable. And yet there was not a single person homeless sleeping on the streets, which doesn't make sense because you like, but no one had money. Or saying that family is poor, right? - That wasn't a thing. - They just had less poverty? It's not a real thing in the township. Someone who interfered. Because the friction that came with it meant, and a friendship is friction. 'Cause now it's like, okay, what do you want to watch, Jimmy? - Yeah, what do you want? - I know what I want to watch. What do you want to watch? Ah, damn it, Jimmy wants to watch his own thing. So now I have to like, we have to negotiate, we have to find a comment. But you know what that friction gives us in return? It gives us the friendship. A relationship is friction, hell of friction, terrible friction. This person wants to do, I mean, kids are friction. You gave me, can I tell you? You gave me the most, you sent me the most beautiful message about that literally changed my whole perspective. You said, man, you're like kids, it is the most insane journey. You said, I cannot wait to get out of the house and leave. And he's like, and as soon as I walk out the door, man, I'm even more excited to come back. You're like, ah, I cannot wait to get back. It's the friction of it, but we've been sold. Everyone has been sold and I mean everyone. We've been sold on the convenience of relationships, the convenience of opinion, the convenience. Now it's like, oh, yeah, if you're gonna go to your family, don't talk about the, just ignore the, rather talk about it, it's like, yeah, but that friction, you know, leaves you, where does it leave you? I was trying to do a guy recently, Alex Tomozzi, do you know Alex? He's a really smart guy, really smart guy. So Alex Tomozzi is, he's like runs gyms and things. He's lives in, I saw him in Vegas for a year. He's kind of a public intellectual, but he's also, he's a great fun guy to talk to. So we're chatting about friction. And then he started chatting about optionality. Like we've oversolved for options, right? You've got a lot of options right now, right? But actually constraints are freeing. Because your problem is you've got too many options, young people, they've got too many options. You could be with anyone, you could do anything. It's, it's a lot. But once you've decided who to be with and what to do, you can stop thinking about how to live and get on with living. Get on with it. It's like limiting, limiting what you, what you have options wise. Because if you never cash in the option, it's nothing. Yeah. Options are there to be cashed in. Oh, I like that. Options are there to be, I've never, options are there to be cashed in. Yeah, the freedom that comes with that. So now that's, that's the thing I'm preaching ever. Freedom is overrated. Yeah, freedom is really little about. Have you seen that video? It went viral in South Africa. It was of the prisoners. And they made, they had some kind of the phone who was making a video. And one of the prisoners, they were like interviewing each other. It was really funny. And then got people very angry in the country. But they were like, yo, what's it like being in jail? Then he's like, he's like, ah, he's like, Jay, he's like, I love this place. I know what time I have to go to bed. I know when I'm going to get my food, I've got my friends every day. We know what we're going to do. I don't worry about what's going to happen tomorrow. I don't, and people got very angry because they're like, we need to make prisons more shit in South Africa. Yeah, what is it, what is the 28th, isn't it? Oh, no, no, this wasn't, no, this wasn't like in the, but that's like, that's the gang. No, this wasn't a gang. This was just prisoners in a, I'm sure you remember the video, but it went viral. And people were like, is this, they went like, people are suffering in the streets, but in prison, people are having a good time. Yeah. And I get what they were saying. But I think what some people might have missed in that moment was just that guy in his perspective, first of all, 'cause I don't think he speaks for all prisoners, but he was going, it's surprisingly liberating being in a world where you have so many constraints. Because all I have to do is find my freedom within these constraints. Sure. And it's exactly what you're saying. And look forward to those gaps. You've chosen it. And it's like, because you've chosen it's like, okay, you're stuck. Yeah, but because you've, you've anchored yourself to this, you're free now to like, you know? Yeah, but so, so it's kind of stoic. It's the idea that you go, the guy didn't choose to be in prison. I don't know what he did, but he's there now and he's making the best of it. Yeah. That's the, whatever the life is. You can only do what you can with what you have where you are. That's it. Yeah, in all movies, you always see them talking about going home and getting that leave. But inside, I say, if I movies and the spaceship and the Starship Enterprise, you never hear them on deck talking about leave. They have actually never thought of that. Yeah, they're here. But soldiers were like, yeah, we're going for downtime and R and R and we're going away. And then they go and come back again to battle. But in the Starship Enterprise, no one has ever said, have you kept in your lead to electrical cabanas? No one has ever said that. They know where they are. They having fun where they are. They've made peace with the fact that they in this never-ending journey that is voyaged. You know, Stonewall isn't a documentary, right? I believe it is. What? What's the ground footage? What's the conspiracy theory you do believe? A conspiracy theory. Yeah, that you do believe. All right. Here's even if it's one of your own. All right, two terrifying scenarios. OK, so the first is there's a Manhattan project currently underway in America. And they're building a Doomsday machine. And it's called Solstice and it's artificial general intelligence, OK? Somewhere in America, we don't know where, but it's siloed off in their building this. Second terrifying scenario, they're not. I think I take the second one. OK, so the Chinese are doing it. It's got trapped me. It's got trapped me. But I think someone's working on AGI at the moment. I think that's a-- I think it's a pretty safe bet that they're working on AGI. And remember, we were-- everyone was fascinated with aliens in the 1950s and '60s, because like the dummies that we are, we think drones came out four years ago in Ukraine. They've been working on that shift. Well, yeah, listening to me yesterday. No, but obviously they've been around a long time, right? So I'm saying the same thing. Jeremy! Of course. Of course. But that idea you go, what's going on now? What are they working on right now? And people worry about the wrong thing with AGI. They worry about their job being taken. Obviously, we can see all the jobs AGI will take. We can't see any of the jobs it will create. Right, and they're thinking about the wrong thing, because the barriers to entry for running an authoritarian regime have come down by 10 orders of magnitude in the last two years, right? So you could run the Stasi off my laptop now. That is a worry, because politicians will have to resist that temptation, and that's a big temptation. The other thing is physics, right? Peter Tiel said this, I think. "If you minus the screens from the room, we're living in the early 70s. Nothing has changed in 50 years, right?" So physics has, you know, general theory of relativity and Newtonian physics, and they don't quite match. There's no general theory that unites everything. Well, with this new technology, could there be? Because wealth is energy transferred. And if physics gets to another level using this technology, everything changes. Everything. Is this the part of the show where you start asking the audience for questions? Yeah. [LAUGHTER] We're just sitting there in the audience. Well, Jimmy. [LAUGHTER] How you feeling New York? Yeah. It's terrifying, and then sometimes I'm like, ah, electricity just turned it off. That's like the part of my brain that sometimes-- it's not very logical. But I'm just like, yeah, we'll turn it off. We'll unplug everything. That's what-- that's one of the outcomes that I think is very possible. Well, it's weird. We thought, for the longest time, everyone thought that was involved or interested in AI. Thought, oh, the big thing will be the Turing test. The big thing. Yeah, yeah, can it pass as a human and we flew past that in an afternoon and then we just shifted the goalpost Yeah, yeah, like well that the touring was really just a benchmark It wasn't the I was like oh you said it was then it's like well really it's not the and so it'll just get to a place where it's I I just think it's funny that a lot of the people who are selling it as the panacea Like they'll be like oh, you know, there's it will create infinite wealth and money won't mean anything And yeah, but then I'm like, okay, if that's the case give us your money then well, wait, wait, no one will be poor anymore That's just I mean I won't be rich anymore You guys haven't thought this through this is terrible this is terrible news Well, what what do we got we got we got what we have here is paleolithic emotions Medieval institutions and godlike technology What a great role the dice. Yeah, let's do what happens This has been farm man, that's great to see you by the way, so when are you gonna be touring the US again? I think next year, okay, I'll I'll come back Have a doubt at that because every time I hear you in Austria massive in Australia man. Yeah, Australia New Zealand It's very good to me. I mean, I do 50 countries on the tour now. It's a 50. Yeah, how do you bring that down? Well, how much time are you on the road in a year? I do maybe 200 shows at 200 nights a year something like that But the UK's my biggest market probably and I like if I'm there I can be in my own bed every night That is I feel like I I get to spend let work life balance like what you work and have a family that's it Right forget the percentages. They'll change over the years. Yeah But yeah, I spend a lot of time kind of traveling around the world. It's great Okay, so you'll be and then come back to the US Do you have like a favorite city performing favorite US city? Yeah, I don't I mean, it's all good It's all kind of brilliant. I'm just saying is that like a spot where you go. I find every comedian has a A place it might even be a venue where it feels like lightning just keeps hitting you when you stand on that stage I think I mean that the Chicago theaters pretty special you go the Boston Wang pretty amazing the beacon here Like that there's an era in which America belt theaters that are just better because They they won't ever do it again because the fire restrictions and the health and safety won't let them do it again Like they the seats are too close together and the aisles are too small. Yeah, that's the reason they can't you if you build a thousand cedar theater now It's the same size a 2000 ct used to be because the seats are a little bit bigger and the aisles are a little bit bigger And they now have a thing called fire safety fire safety be used to be a guy going with a whistle I guess I guess don't have a fire It's probably the best idea that's the best we got is don't have a fire while people are smoking you know one The idea is from that era are very special because they're they're grandfathered in they're just better Ah, okay, you learn something here every day. Mm-hmm. I like this by the way grandfather. It is a racist term You know that's Samaril we're talking about this grandfathered in is a racist term. Yeah Do you remember we're talking with Samaril? Mm-hmm. Do you remember this? We're talking to him. Yeah, we're talking with So Samaril was on the podcast and then someone said grant. He said grandfathered in I think and then we I said as a joke to him I was like, you know, that's we're talking about the history of terms and whatever you know nursery rhymes blah blah I'm with racist races and he said yeah, grandfathered and then I said oh, that's also racist Then he said is it I was like no, I'm joking. I just then he's like but probably is and then I went and I read up on it And it actually is a term that comes from America's sorted past Sorted past what what do they do? What I'm sure we're going to find out What what yeah, we're going to end on a cliffhanger Apparently America has a sorted past the find out the bible and America I don't want to split it I don't want to tell you the endings. Yeah, go up and enjoy it I can't believe it Sorted past is the Kim Kardashian section. I can't think what you could be talking about Oh, man, this is fun. By the way, it's the book out. It's the book down in October. I it's really it's um It's I'm so excited for this comedian. I got your copy the uh the last The last book I read there was like I felt like a textbook for comedians was Stuart Lee All right, it was one of my favorite books. I remember it was one of my favorite you know why because For 20 years of my life, I have and obviously this was before but then still for 20 years of my life I have worked in a profession where there is almost like no Instruction. There is no guidebook guidebook. There is no but there isn't like it almost feels like there isn't even a even for posterity Yes, like music people can go here's the the notation and this is how it was and then we are in this industry That as you said keeps growing changing the world doing things. We're in it. We're and there's no like There's no there's no one to point someone that wants to start in this or get better at this and this wasn't just me This is my friend Amanda Baker and Abby Grant as well Uh, like we put this thing together and we think we have something but the proof is in the pudding like if If you can become a comedian post reading this then it works. Yeah, and for people that want to do public speaking and I think comedy is For me, it's that thing of like you want more people to get involved in this. Yes, it's it's more the merrier. Yeah The more the merrier quite literally Finding joy in these things. Great That's fun. Thanks. Thank you. Thank you. What a pleasure What now with Trevinoa is produced by day zero productions in partnership with Sirius XM The show is executive produced by Trevinoa Sonaziamin and Jess Hackel Rebecca chain is our producer. Our development researcher is Robyue music mixing and mastering by Hannes Brown random other stuff by Ryan Hadooth Thank you so much for listening Join me next week for another episode of what now