Making Sense - Sam Harris - #457 — More From Sam： The Epstein Files, The Newsom Factor, Don Lemon's Arrest, AI Market Disruption, and More

00:00:00.000 Welcome to the Making Sense Podcast. This is Sam Harris. Just a note to say that if you're

00:00:11.780 hearing this, you're not currently on our subscriber feed, and we'll only be hearing

00:00:15.740 the first part of this conversation. In order to access full episodes of the Making Sense

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00:00:26.260 it's made possible entirely through the support of our subscribers. So if you enjoy what we're

00:00:30.240 doing here, please consider becoming one. Okay, we're back so soon again with another

00:00:38.020 episode of More From Sam. Hello, Sam. Hey, good to see you. Yeah, good to see you as well. Before

00:00:43.300 we begin, I just want to run through a little housekeeping. I want to apologize to all those

00:00:47.380 in Dallas and Austin this week for having to postpone our shows due to a family medical

00:00:52.060 emergency. We have rescheduled those shows for May 20th in Dallas and May 21st in Austin. We are

00:00:57.660 sorry for any inconvenience this may have caused, but in time, I'm sure Sam will share more. I don't

00:01:02.720 know, Sam, if you want to say anything quickly now, or if we should just move on. Yeah, it's, um,

00:01:07.460 this is the thing, as you know, that I really hate about live events. They're like the one thing that

00:01:12.040 if life goes haywire, it's really difficult to cancel or reschedule. I've been to events, you know,

00:01:19.180 my own events where people have come up and said, I mean, I think I was, there was one in Vancouver

00:01:23.600 or Toronto and a couple came up and said they had traveled from Australia for the event. And

00:01:28.660 obviously that's just amazing to hear and wonderful. But I think of those people on the rare occasion

00:01:34.300 that an event has to be rescheduled or canceled because I know there are people who are just coming

00:01:39.020 out of a hotel expecting to go to, um, an event in Dallas, um, and, uh, they're getting their email or

00:01:45.220 not seeing their email that it was, it was rescheduled. So that just gives me serious brain

00:01:49.680 damage. And it was not likely that we canceled this, but we're, yeah, we're, I've got a family

00:01:55.080 member who had to go in the hospital yesterday and, um, I don't want to get into private details,

00:02:00.040 but it's a, it's a big deal and it's, you know, it's stable at the moment, but it's very good that

00:02:04.220 I'm in town. So. Okay. Well, thank you for sharing that. We are still coming to Portland and Vancouver in

00:02:09.140 March and then Toronto, DC and New York city as well in May. If you want to get tickets,

00:02:13.480 you can find all that information at samharris.org. Also, we talked about the waking up, uh, app last

00:02:18.720 week, getting, uh, featured in the Apple store. Things continue to heat up there again. Thanks in

00:02:23.360 part from that Apple promotion. But, um, I, you know, I make this joke often. I think this podcast

00:02:28.180 and media in general makes everyone crazy. And then we sell the app that offers the cure. We're

00:02:32.220 kind of like the mafia over here, but seriously, if you're listening to this podcast and you feel

00:02:37.880 unsettled anyway, you'd like to learn how to fix that, go to the app store and you can download the

00:02:41.880 waking up app. And if you can't afford it, you can get a free account. If you can pay,

00:02:46.620 please do that. But if you can't, don't worry about it. You can take it free. And also while

00:02:51.200 I'm just talking about that, we don't offer free accounts over here in the podcast anymore,

00:02:55.480 but we still offer steep discounts. So if you can't afford to pay the subscription price,

00:02:59.840 there is a button on the right side of the subscription page, just under Sam's picture that

00:03:04.080 reads for more pricing options, click here. So click there. If you need a scholarship,

00:03:07.940 I think there are a few additional pricing options. Okay. With all that out of the way,

00:03:12.760 we've been saying the Epstein files were going to be a nothing burger and it appears we may have

00:03:16.460 gotten that wrong. Where do you want to start, Sam? Well, it turns out that I'm in them,

00:03:21.200 which I was not anticipating. So we should talk about that.

00:03:24.960 Well, you don't need to start there. We can come back to that unless you want to start there.

00:03:27.680 Yeah. Well, I mean, I guess, well, you know, we're going to make light of this because it's

00:03:32.800 kind of funny the way I'm in them, but I don't want there to be any confusion around, you know,

00:03:37.900 how I perceive the larger issue here. I mean, I'm not, obviously nothing I'm about to say is going

00:03:43.900 to make light of what a monster Epstein was and how good it is that, I mean, in my view, at least that

00:03:50.040 the files are coming out. And, you know, obviously anyone who participated in his actual crimes

00:03:58.420 deserves to be prosecuted and all of that. And I think we're probably going to differentiate the

00:04:04.200 degrees of culpability that we perceive insofar as we've seen what has been released in this

00:04:09.080 recent tranche. Because I think there's a fair amount of confusion around just how implicated

00:04:12.320 people are. But obviously the man himself was awful and he did awful things. And there are people

00:04:19.460 who enabled those things or participated in the abuse and trafficking of young girls. And it's

00:04:25.500 just, you know, we want nothing but justice for those people, et cetera. And I also don't mean to

00:04:30.420 make light of the people who are like me in these files in a way that is peripheral to one or another

00:04:35.760 degree. And it may be properly fucking up their lives and reputations because people are not disposed

00:04:41.660 to differentiate the degrees of culpability, et cetera. So, you know, I know, I'm sure I know many,

00:04:47.020 many people who are mentioned in these files because now I see how, you know, how the network

00:04:50.620 is kind of strung together based on these email chains. And, you know, some of them are, might

00:04:56.240 really be sweating it out for no real reason, except they have institutions that may want to fire

00:05:03.800 them as a result of, you know, some weird implication that may be meaningless, et cetera. So I don't mean to

00:05:10.300 make light of any of that, but I'm going to make light of my own situation because I got a big laugh

00:05:15.160 out of it last night. So. Yeah. Well, let's, uh, do you want to start there? Do we want to kind

00:05:19.860 of talk about how there are gradations here? I'll start wherever you want. I just think we

00:05:23.760 should go back to the, the, the, the idea that there's a spectrum here and how this is very similar

00:05:28.420 to me too. At a moment when, you know, someone like Matt Damon had early on said that there are,

00:05:32.960 there are gradations to this. There's a difference between slapping a girl in the ass and, and, 0.99

00:05:37.020 and raping somebody. And he just got killed for that. I mean, obviously early on, 1.00

00:05:40.760 everybody wants to lump everybody together and, you know, here Epstein is the Harvey Weinstein and

00:05:46.200 the, we really need to put everybody on a spectrum and, and, and be clear-eyed about this. And I

00:05:51.240 didn't know if you wanted to set that up, what that might look like to you. Well, I guess, again,

00:05:55.580 I don't consider myself a, a deep student of, of what has been released or, or the, the reporting

00:06:01.580 that's been done on Epstein and the, and his victims and the specifics of all his crimes. So, I mean,

00:06:06.460 this is kind of like a high level reaction to what I've seen, which is typical of, of scandals like

00:06:12.160 this though, which is to say people don't tend to want to differentiate gradations of guilt. Well,

00:06:18.120 first, I mean, I think you, I forget the words you use. I think you differentiated, you know,

00:06:21.980 criminals from pigs, from jerks, from people with poor judgment. Right. Yeah. And I think there's all 1.00

00:06:27.440 of that. So, yeah, I mean, there, I do think it's a little too soon to vindicate the proper conspiracy

00:06:35.460 theorists, you know, the pizza gators, the QAnon lunatics, uh, who really are lunatics. I mean, 0.72

00:06:41.160 when you look, look at the rest of what they have claimed is true, I mean, even, even if the worst

00:06:45.520 allegations about Epstein or the worst, um, uh, assumptions about Epstein and his network are true,

00:06:52.540 this does not redeem pizza gate or QAnon. I mean, those people are just mad, but I think we should

00:06:58.340 be slow to, um, imagine that there are a ton of guys out there who want to have sex with 13 year 0.99

00:07:05.440 olds. From what I've seen, I mean, and I don't even imagine that of president Trump as much as I'm, 0.93

00:07:10.840 I'm capable of imagining the worst about him. Uh, I mean, I think he is a, just a genuinely awful 0.75

00:07:17.180 person and a psychopath. You know, I would be surprised again, this, I think there are yet 0.85

00:07:22.840 3 million more documents that have not been released. Uh, and presumably those are being held

00:07:26.880 back for some reason, some strategic reason on the administration's part. So perhaps there's worse

00:07:31.940 to come for Trump, but I would, would find it difficult to believe or, or to assume that he's

00:07:37.080 the sort of guy that if you put him on an Island and, and handed him a, a 13, 14 year old girl,

00:07:42.100 that's the kind of situation he wants to be in sexually. I just, I mean, I don't think that,

00:07:47.880 I think that's a pretty rare person who shared Epstein's proclivities, right? So my assumption about

00:07:54.560 all of this is still, you have a bunch of, um, guys who are, uh, eager to, you know, cheat on their

00:08:01.700 wives or to sleep with young, beautiful women who they, they don't want necessarily want to be seen 0.93

00:08:06.300 with in public, but these young, beautiful women are not underage for the most part, right? So you 1.00

00:08:11.480 have these, I mean, and we can be very judgmental about all this behavior, sure, but it still strikes

00:08:17.120 me as extraordinarily unlikely that there are many people who are guilty the way Epstein was of,

00:08:22.760 you know, targeting underage girls, knowingly targeting, uh, underage girls. I just think

00:08:27.520 that's, that would be a surprise and, you know, obviously awful, uh, and worth, and because how

00:08:32.440 it's so awful, it is worth investigating to the last line of these emails and by all means find all

00:08:40.400 these people. But I, I just, I will be surprised if we find a lot of those people. What will not

00:08:44.680 surprise me is to discover that people like, you know, Donald Trump and Bill Gates and all the other

00:08:49.960 people who are named are happy to find themselves on airplanes or islands or anywhere else with,

00:08:54.960 you know, 20 year old Russian models who are eager to sleep with them because they're basically 1.00

00:09:00.320 functioning like prostitutes and these guys are pigs. That would not surprise me. So that's why I'm 1.00

00:09:05.860 certainly expecting we're going to find evidence of, and that in many cases, that's probably embarrassing

00:09:09.960 enough, especially given that many of these guys had relationships with Epstein that were deep

00:09:15.740 enough and long enough such that you can't believe they didn't know what he was into. And I, and I,

00:09:21.260 I, I don't believe that Trump was ignorant of, of Epstein's actual appetites and behavior because I

00:09:26.760 mean, cause he, he, we have it from his own mouth where he said, um, you know, he, some say he loves,

00:09:32.580 uh, beautiful women as much as I do. And there, and you know, his are on the young side or something

00:09:37.640 like what, what the only thing that could mean is that Trump was aware of, uh, cause he had Trump's,

00:09:43.460 uh, conquests were surely young enough so that when he's talking about the young side,

00:09:48.120 he's talking about what Epstein was actually into. So I think Trump is, can probably be hung 0.81

00:09:52.880 based on his, the extent of his friendship with Epstein. You know, I, I trust that could all be

00:09:57.700 forthcoming, but again, I would be surprised if Trump is the sort of guy who wants to sleep with 0.97

00:10:02.440 a 13 year old. That would surprise me. Right. I think you're right. The awareness factor when people 0.94

00:10:07.560 knew and what they knew will come into play. Yeah. But there is, there is a difference between

00:10:12.560 what Epstein was doing and piggish behavior. Yeah. A huge difference. I mean, again, it's not to say

00:10:20.160 that the piggish behavior isn't going to be enough to destroy some reputations because you, you have 1.00

00:10:24.760 guys who are cheating on their wives, et cetera. And. But that's not what this is all about. I mean,

00:10:28.960 that's not. No, but the thing that it's about, in addition to Epstein's crimes and anyone else who,

00:10:35.000 who's participating at that level, what it's about is a network of very rich, uh, very connected,

00:10:41.420 in many cases, very smart people, many of whom you have to assume knew about his crimes and tolerated

00:10:49.260 and enduring association with him, you know, under the shadow of that knowledge. Uh, and that seems

00:10:54.720 like a, you know, a kind of culpability that a lot of people are getting hammered for now.

00:11:00.160 You don't think it's possible that he had two operations going and one that was more secretive

00:11:04.580 for himself? At the beginning, I suggested that, but I do, I just think that, I think a lot of people

00:11:09.360 knew that they knew about his earlier conviction. They certainly knew when the, the big story broke

00:11:15.520 in 2018 and they maintained a friendship with him and they hung out with him enough to know that,

00:11:20.200 you know, he was into, you know, 14 year olds or whatever he was into. I mean, so you really,

00:11:25.100 you really think they knew that it was some sort of rumor around there and they hadn't seen it and

00:11:28.520 they just kind of looked the other way because there was convenience there. And, you know,

00:11:32.740 again, I do not consider myself especially well-informed about, I mean, I've not gone down this

00:11:38.480 rabbit hole, uh, to know just how many allegations there are and what they're like and just how

00:11:43.800 plausible it is that it could all have been hidden. I mean, you're talking about people who,

00:11:47.560 you know, some, in many cases who went to his Island, who went to his ranch and in New Mexico,

00:11:53.120 went to his house many times or on his plane. If you're imagining that he kept two sets of books

00:11:58.720 sexually so carefully that he just, you know, he always knew to be with a, with a girl 18 or above

00:12:06.200 in the presence of, of normies and then, you know, let his, his pedophile freak flag fly, 0.95

00:12:12.340 uh, in the presence of other freaks. And he kept all that straight. That seems a little far

00:12:17.740 fetched to me. I'm sure. Again, I think Trump's statement about he likes him on the young side

00:12:23.120 is absolutely damning. Right. But just because Trump knew doesn't mean, you know, someone like

00:12:27.520 Bill Gates knew. I mean, it's entirely possible that, uh, people are on these trips and they didn't

00:12:31.820 see anything. And I mean, just the explanation to me makes more sense that someone like a Bill Gates

00:12:36.740 just maybe heard rumors or, uh, it just, it makes sense that he'd be willing to look the other way,

00:12:43.040 um, and just shrug it off to some rumor. I don't think he would have seen it or witnessed it. I just

00:12:48.320 have a hard time believing that he would continue to put himself in this guy's presence. If he saw that,

00:12:55.480 if he really knew. I have a hard time believing that in many, many cases. I don't have a hard time

00:13:01.120 believing that in Trump's case, given what he said, what a pig he is. But, um, yeah, I, and this 0.99

00:13:07.460 is, so, I mean, like just a little, perhaps just jump to my case now, which I've spoken about on

00:13:12.400 the podcast before, which is a, I met this man exactly once, as far as I know, uh, it's totally

00:13:17.680 possible. I was at, at some kind of, you know, party or dinner party, you know, at a TED conference,

00:13:22.680 very likely, where he was also in the room. But the only time I'm aware of having met him was at a

00:13:26.780 lunch at TED that had maybe 12 people at it. And I described the immediate impression I got,

00:13:32.580 which was that he's a, he was a colossal douchebag because he had a, um, you know, very attractive 0.98

00:13:38.280 young Asian woman on his knee, kind of bouncing along on his knee, you know, the whole, during 0.98

00:13:43.940 the whole lunch. And it was pretty clear they weren't newlyweds or, or, or, uh, newly engaged

00:13:48.880 or people who just, you know, who were going to spend the rest of their lives together and just

00:13:51.740 couldn't be apart for 10 seconds. Uh, I guess there's some perhaps romantic version of this

00:13:56.420 is not invidious, but the scene I saw was of a guy who was with a woman who was at least 30 years

00:14:02.200 younger than him. Uh, again, zero implication that she was underage. I mean, she seemed like she was

00:14:07.260 probably in her early twenties, but, um, just very young for him. And also he was the way he was

00:14:12.840 relating to her. He was as a kind of, you know, accessory, you know, it was just a weird sugar daddy

00:14:17.660 vibe where he thought he was coming off like, you know, Cary Grant and he was, you know, he was

00:14:23.420 coming off like a total sleazebag. So that was the impression I formed of him. And as far as I knew,

00:14:30.180 that was my only interaction with him ever. And now we discover that he, um, had sent me an email

00:14:37.340 inviting me. I mean, do you want to take it now? Do you want to read that email?

00:14:41.060 Yeah. Let's start with this. So this is what was discovered. Epstein to you, Sam, we met with

00:14:45.820 John Brockman at the Ted event. I thought you might enjoy a dinner with Woody Allen Chomsky

00:14:49.860 and me. It should be fun. What do you write? By the way, this is May of 2015. What do you write

00:14:54.880 back? Oh my God. You could have been killed for this. You said only if we film it, smiley face.

00:14:59.980 Oh my God, how bad this could have been. Only if we film it. Meanwhile, this guy's head must've been

00:15:07.060 like, he must've been like, how does he know? Does he want in on the cabal? So he writes back,

00:15:13.780 are you ever in New York? You write back, no plans at the moment. I guess then maybe the final one,

00:15:20.020 which this really, I mean, you could have been in trouble had he not exonerated you with this.

00:15:25.080 He said, I just finished your reading, reading your Chomsky email exchange in arts, I guess,

00:15:30.460 letters. I now understand your film it comment. I spent quite a lot of time. I mean, do you want

00:15:35.200 me to read the whole thing, but I mean, you can't, I mean, this is so.

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Making Sense - Sam Harris - February 05, 2026

#457 — More From Sam： The Epstein Files, The Newsom Factor, Don Lemon's Arrest, AI Market Disruption, and More

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