Real Coffee with Scott Adams - Episode 1621 Scott Adams： Let's Talk About Our Lying FBI and Everyone Else Too

00:00:00.000 Good morning, everybody, and welcome to the best thing that ever happened to you in your

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00:01:04.920 Ah. Do you know how hard it is to read and engineer and talk at the same time? Because that's what I'm

00:01:14.320 trying to do here. One more thing and we'll be good. So how many of you saw Senator Cruz interview

00:01:25.600 the FBI representative? Shelley was right. That's funny. All right.

00:01:35.340 Let's start with some of my favorite stories. So apparently at least one country is told their

00:01:47.520 athletes when they're going to the Olympics that they can't bring their laptops or their

00:01:51.800 smartphones to China. I forget which country. Was it Netherlands or someplace? Belgium? I forget who.

00:02:00.320 It doesn't matter. The point is, is there anybody here who knows you can't bring your own or doesn't

00:02:07.340 know? Is there anybody here who doesn't know that if you go to China on business, you can't bring your

00:02:13.180 own laptop or your own phone? How many of you know that that's a thing? Or to Russia? Yeah. I imagine

00:02:20.060 there are a number of countries that would be similar. But when I talk to business people who go

00:02:25.160 there, some of them actually will shred the laptop that they brought to China so that nobody can use

00:02:35.120 it. Like not ever even accidentally. You take it back and you never open it again after you leave

00:02:41.780 China because they give you a special one just to travel to China. And you literally put it in a

00:02:46.340 giant mechanical shredder. You don't even erase the data. You shred the whole device. That's how bad

00:02:52.820 it is. Now, how would you like to be a spectator at the Olympics? You're just a spectator. You're just

00:03:01.000 traveling there to, you know, watch the Olympics. And you can't bring your own laptop or your own

00:03:08.140 smartphone. Have you been on vacation anywhere without a laptop or a smartphone that's your own?

00:03:16.340 Have you ever tried that? Do you know what a giant problem that would be to travel? I can't even

00:03:23.880 imagine it. Now, I suppose you could have a burner phone and some kind of internet access,

00:03:28.640 but you wouldn't feel comfortable putting your password in anything, right? Would you sign up for

00:03:33.560 any kind of thing that required a password if you were in China? It doesn't matter what laptop you're

00:03:39.060 using. So I don't think that anybody should ever travel to a place where you have to shred your

00:03:45.340 laptop when you get home. Let me give you a travel tip. I'm not really a big traveler. So I don't

00:03:53.780 know the most about traveling. But I can give you this one travel tip. If you're planning on going to

00:03:59.540 a destination which requires shredding your phone and laptop when you get home, maybe don't. Maybe put

00:04:08.860 that a little bit lower on your bucket list until you can travel there without shredding your phone

00:04:14.640 when you get home. It makes me wonder if the Olympics are really some kind of giant honeypot

00:04:21.880 where the real play here is for China to get all their DNA and their digital access. Imagine how many

00:04:29.720 countries China will have access to digitally because I imagine a lot of people will actually

00:04:37.640 bring their own smartphone there. But China's going to have access to all of that if they want it. I

00:04:42.580 mean, they can get into everything, I think. So look out for that. I saw an article that in XXL

00:04:52.920 magazine, and I don't know if this is real. Can somebody confirm this? Is Kanye West, who I call

00:05:00.040 Ye, really going to be moving partly to Russia? And he's going to have a house there? Is that real?

00:05:10.280 I'm going to treat it like it's real. Kanye East, somebody says. If he moves to Russia, he'll be Kanye East.

00:05:17.060 It's pretty funny. Well, I'm not positive it's true, but I can't imagine anything that would be more

00:05:24.200 annoying to his ex-wife than moving to Russia to live like an oligarch.

00:05:34.540 It's not my imagination, is it? That everything Ye does is more interesting than everything everyone

00:05:40.900 else does. Because did you ever wake up in the morning and say, oh, what am I going to do today?

00:05:50.700 I don't know. I think I'll, I don't know. I think I'll move to Russia and live like an oligarch.

00:05:58.080 That's one of those things that I've never even said to myself. When I consider all of the things I could

00:06:03.240 possibly do in this world. Never once have I said, huh, I could get a dasha in Russia and live like an

00:06:11.460 oligarch. That sounds pretty good. So anyway, if it's true, I hope it is. But it also is another,

00:06:18.340 let's say, foreshadowing of the future of Russia and the United States as allies. I'll just keep

00:06:25.940 saying it until it happens. It might take 20 years. But we will be allies with Russia. It's going to

00:06:31.680 happen. It's just inevitable. It's a question of when. I'm wondering, what is your opinion on flying

00:06:37.560 thousands of people into China for the Olympics, then dispersing them back to every corner of the

00:06:41.960 world with a new virus? I think the Olympics is crazy in the context of the pandemic. It's crazy.

00:06:53.360 Now, as much as I think everybody should have, you know, freedom to do what they want and no mandates

00:06:57.880 and all that. This is a specific kind of an event, which is almost guaranteed to be a bad idea in a

00:07:05.300 pandemic. Seems like it. But maybe China is so good at crushing the virus that nobody will spread

00:07:12.220 anything when they're there. Maybe. Well, Rasmussen has a poll about the filibuster question. If you

00:07:19.060 don't know in Congress, if you want to get something passed and the other side doesn't like it, even if

00:07:28.780 you have a majority, it's not good enough. You've got to have 60 percent or else the team that doesn't

00:07:35.520 want you to win can do a filibuster, which basically is a way to stall until you can't get anything done.

00:07:42.080 Now, what that does is it makes it hard for even the majority to get anything done. So they only

00:07:50.640 get things done that really have a lot of support on both sides. So is it bad to get rid of a, let's

00:07:58.500 say, a safeguard in Congress that makes you really, really have to get some of the other side on board

00:08:04.280 to get something done? I would say that's a good idea. Conceptually, it's a good idea, wouldn't you say?

00:08:10.160 Forget about the detail of what bill you're talking about, but conceptually, don't you like the fact

00:08:16.160 that it's really hard to get anything passed? Because you have to get both sides on board.

00:08:21.220 I mean, it seems a pretty good idea, or at least some people on the other team.

00:08:25.580 And that's a very credible system, in my opinion. Well, it turns out that because the Democrats have

00:08:31.060 some specific things they want to get passed, and the filibuster would presumably prevent that,

00:08:36.780 they're trying to get that changed. And down to just a 50% majority would get something done.

00:08:43.100 And how many Democrats favor getting rid of one of the most important safeguards in all of our

00:08:48.860 republic? Two-thirds. Two-thirds of Democrats want to get rid of one of the most important safeguards

00:08:56.640 in the republic, because they want to get something done.

00:09:00.120 Have I ever mentioned that Democrats consistently fail to understand human motivation?

00:09:08.360 It's the same problem every time. It's never even a different problem. It's the same damn problem.

00:09:16.540 They act like humans will not respond to incentives and enticements. But of course,

00:09:23.900 the very minute you make this rule go away, the filibuster, will be about the same minute

00:09:31.420 the Republicans take charge of Congress. So do they really, have they not planned ahead

00:09:38.300 to know that they would be giving up all of their power to get a few things in the short

00:09:44.360 run that the Republicans would presumably try to reverse? They'd have to get a president in

00:09:50.380 there too. But I mean, they only have a few years to get done whatever they're doing and

00:09:55.100 it's going to get reversed because the filibuster will be gone. So when you see the incredible

00:10:02.520 consistency of the same mistake, I don't know why more people don't call this out. You always

00:10:10.340 have the same flaw with your system, Democrats. A complete blindness to how human beings act.

00:10:16.120 It's weird. All right, let's talk about the, you all saw, or I'll bet many of you saw,

00:10:24.880 Ted Cruz grilling an FBI, some spokesperson or head of, I don't know who it was, but somebody

00:10:34.560 at a high level in the FBI was talking on a Zoom call, official, I assume they're under

00:10:40.540 oath because we're talking to a member of the Senate in that context. And I want to see

00:10:47.380 if we can go through how to detect lies. You ready? So the question was to the FBI, and

00:10:55.160 Ted Cruz asked it a whole bunch of good lawyerly ways, was the FBI involved or any FBI people

00:11:03.220 in any way associated with the FBI, were any of them involved in January 6th, meaning undercover

00:11:10.620 people in the crowd? And of course, Ted Cruz asked it a number of ways, you know, to get

00:11:16.100 at it in different angles. And the FBI spokesperson, Jill Sanborn, said, let me give you a direct

00:11:27.760 question. Did any FBI agents or confidential informants actively participate in the events

00:11:34.480 of January 6th? Yes or no? Ted Cruz asked. FBI's Jill Sanborn answered, I can't answer that.

00:11:43.200 Now, is it fair for the FBI to say we can't answer questions about, you know, sources and methods?

00:11:49.420 Is that fair? Do you agree that generally speaking, you know, you don't want to force your intelligence

00:11:59.040 or your law enforcement people to give up their sources and methods in public? Right? I mean,

00:12:05.220 that seems fairly safe. But didn't you ask yourself why she can't just say no? If the answer was no,

00:12:13.900 would you be giving up any sources and methods? Would you? If you had no involvement,

00:12:24.320 what sources and methods would you be giving up? Now, is there anybody in the United States who

00:12:29.660 doesn't understand that the FBI and law enforcement routinely put their assets in organizations they

00:12:38.920 think they want to watch? We all know that. So what exactly source and method would they be giving up

00:12:45.860 if they said that Ray Epps or anybody else was working for them? What would that be giving up?

00:12:53.260 That's the part everybody knows, that they have informants and assets, right? So

00:12:59.980 how would you take that answer? What would be your interpretation of I can't answer that when

00:13:09.500 the answer is a yes or no question? Somebody said she did answer it. She did answer it. She said,

00:13:16.100 I can't answer that. Later, when he asked a more specific question, let's see, the more specific

00:13:26.240 question was, was anybody associated with the FBI or under their direction involved in any of the

00:13:33.420 no, involved in any illegal activity? Did you see that question? So Cruz asked if anybody at the FBI

00:13:40.260 or anybody that the FBI had, you know, worked with was involved in anything illegal. And what was their

00:13:47.020 answer? Not to my knowledge? Doesn't that sort of indicate they might have been there? And isn't

00:14:01.480 that a very specific answer? Because she could have said, no, we didn't have anybody there. And then when

00:14:08.060 asked about the violence, she could have said, I just told you that we didn't have anybody there.

00:14:11.900 All right. So if she'd answered the other question differently, that would have been easy.

00:14:18.640 But did anybody see Ray Epps do anything illegal on video? Because I'm not sure I did. Did you?

00:14:27.800 I saw him do things that look sketchy as hell. And if he had been working for the FBI,

00:14:33.720 would any of that been illegal? I don't know. I feel like a prosecutor could probably find

00:14:43.140 something. But if the FBI's spokesperson here, Jill Sanborn, if she said something like,

00:14:50.540 not to my knowledge, wouldn't she simply be saying, I don't know if what he did was a crime?

00:14:56.800 That would be different from saying, I don't know what he did. You're just saying,

00:15:01.260 I don't know that what he did is a crime. Because I don't know. I watched the video and

00:15:06.320 did any... But is inciting a riot if he's just telling you to get close to the building or to

00:15:15.100 go inside? Is that exactly illegal? So here's the question. It might be illegal. But was she lying

00:15:22.620 if she said, not to my knowledge, because she's never looked into it? If she had never looked into

00:15:29.060 it, could she say, not to my knowledge? She could. That's a little bit overly specific, isn't it?

00:15:38.760 Because if she knew that no FBI people were there, she could say for sure, no, there was nobody

00:15:46.980 involved in the FBI or in any way with anything illegal. But she said, not to my knowledge.

00:15:52.380 That's overly specific, isn't it? Let me give you a lie detection tip. The overly specific answer.

00:16:01.820 I'm going to give you an example. Let's say you suspected that your girlfriend, boyfriend,

00:16:08.240 husband, wife, let's say somebody said they were spotted at some kind of restaurant or something.

00:16:15.920 And somebody gets back to you and you say to your boyfriend, girlfriend, you say, I heard

00:16:23.760 that you were with X at this restaurant. Is that true? And what if the person you question

00:16:33.320 says this, as if I'd have time to take an Uber to that restaurant? That's an overly specific

00:16:42.460 answer because the question had nothing to do with an Uber. In fact, maybe the restaurant

00:16:49.320 was next to work or walking distance or maybe it was only five minutes away. But the answering

00:16:57.800 with a question, you know, or sarcasm, as if I'd have time to take an Uber there, that wasn't

00:17:04.640 even in the question. So Ted Cruz's question wasn't, do you have knowledge? He asked, did

00:17:13.100 it happen? And she said, I don't have knowledge of it. That's a little too specific, isn't

00:17:19.680 it? So always look for the overly specific answer. Here's some other ways to tell a lie.

00:17:27.480 The angry accusation, if you ask somebody if they did something, did you take that last

00:17:36.120 cookie? You left the seat up on the toilet. What? What? What's that have to do with taking

00:17:45.880 the last cookie? So if somebody angrily accuses you of something unrelated, that's basically,

00:17:53.220 you know, a confession. You should take it that way. So if you see the overly specific

00:17:59.100 denial, that's a lie. And the attacking you when you simply ask a question that could have

00:18:05.500 been a yes or no question. And then there's also the half confession. Do you know what the

00:18:12.860 half confession looks like? Did you murder Bob? I did not murder Bob. Well, here's some

00:18:19.740 evidence of you with Bob with a gun in your hand. Oh, I was definitely with Bob with a

00:18:25.180 gun in my hand. But I didn't murder him. And then you say, but the video, I can see you're

00:18:31.520 actually firing the weapon in the direction of Bob. I mean, I can see it right on the video.

00:18:37.960 And then the person said, yeah, yeah, I had a weapon and I fired it in the direction of

00:18:41.920 Bob. But I wasn't firing at Bob. Like, that's crazy. So that's the admitting half of the thing.

00:18:52.600 That's always a tell. All right, here's my provocative question. Do you know what kind

00:18:58.260 of people the FBI employ? Well, lots of people. But one of the kinds of people named Bob, one of the

00:19:05.960 kinds of people that the FBI employ are people who are good at detecting lies. People who are good

00:19:15.860 at detecting lies, because they do that for a living, right? There are FBI experts who are good

00:19:22.980 at interviewing people just to see if they lied. How much would you like to hear an FBI expert on

00:19:30.080 lying tell you if Jill Sanborn was telling you the truth? Wouldn't you like to hear an FBI agent who is

00:19:40.940 an expert at this tell you if the FBI is lying to you? I would. I would. Let's see. Maybe if there's

00:19:51.200 somebody who's a producer who's watching this, it can't be hard to find that person. I think if you

00:19:55.660 Google, on YouTube, you'll find an FBI, an ex, well, an ex-CIA person, I think. But I think you'd

00:20:03.120 probably find an ex-FBI person who is an expert at this. Just put them on the show. Say, what do you

00:20:09.180 think? If somebody said this who was a, you know, a perpetrator, a suspect, would you believe them?

00:20:17.320 All right, let's make that happen. As I've said many times, the default assumption from your

00:20:23.580 government is if they won't tell you what you want to know, you have to assume that they're lying.

00:20:29.220 Assume they're lying. If they're not transparent, the assumption of guilt has to be given. So

00:20:34.100 we would assume, we don't know, but the assumption is that that's a confession that the FBI was involved

00:20:40.780 in January 6th. So personally, I accept it as a confession, that my worldview now incorporates the

00:20:48.820 FBI response as a confession. Anybody else? Is there anybody else who processed that as a confession?

00:21:00.100 A few of you, right? I think some of you agree with that.

00:21:06.100 All right, let's see what else is going on here.

00:21:08.160 Do you know somebody named Vox Day? So he's become my new mascot, so he's criticizing my

00:21:19.080 record of predictions. And he went through my record of predictions and said, where I said

00:21:25.560 I got it right. And then he analyzed and said, no, you got that totally wrong. And I'm thinking,

00:21:33.180 reasons? No reasons. You just got it totally wrong. What about the next one? I make my claim. And he

00:21:42.000 goes, no, you got that one totally wrong. What? Yeah, and how weird that his name sounds like Vax.

00:21:49.860 But anyway, there's this weird situation I've told you about, which is the people who got everything

00:21:54.840 wrong because they're not good at analyzing things. When it's all said and done, and we actually learn

00:22:01.920 what was true and what wasn't about the pandemic, you know, did the vaccinations help us or hurt us and

00:22:07.460 all that other stuff. Once we know it, the people who were not smart enough to analyze it in the first

00:22:13.960 place will also be not smart enough to know if they were right when it was done, which is really

00:22:22.020 annoying. The people who got everything wrong are going to be positive they got everything right

00:22:28.040 because the same lack of understanding of how anything works would go in their original prediction

00:22:34.120 as well as their analysis of how it turned out.

00:22:38.340 They don't become smarter toward the end of the process.

00:22:42.320 And let me just give you this one example from Vox Day.

00:22:46.520 So he says that I made the wrong decision by

00:22:49.500 taking the vaccination.

00:22:51.080 That I definitely, no doubt about it, made the wrong decision by getting vaccinated.

00:22:59.200 What would you say?

00:23:01.260 Would you say that was, could you score that as wrong?

00:23:06.020 Like you're sure of it?

00:23:07.380 It's wrong.

00:23:10.060 See some yeses?

00:23:12.540 Okay.

00:23:13.960 Well, none of his business, but I say it publicly, so it is his business in a way.

00:23:17.500 Because you did.

00:23:19.800 So some people say I made a mistake.

00:23:22.640 Now, let me ask you this.

00:23:25.280 Was it, was the vaccination a yes, no question?

00:23:29.760 Was it yes, no?

00:23:31.640 Because the only way it could be a yes, no, meaning it's definitely a bad decision or it's

00:23:36.720 definitely not, the only way it could be definitely yes or no

00:23:40.060 is if you knew a lot more about the vaccination, right?

00:23:46.180 So if you knew the future, you would know if it was a bad idea.

00:23:52.240 But if you only know the present, do you know that?

00:23:56.680 Because in my worldview, people who got vaccinated are protected from the more,

00:24:03.860 the more, let's say the worst outcomes.

00:24:06.760 Does anybody disagree with that?

00:24:08.620 Has anybody seen any news that would disagree with the fact that vaccinated people are dying

00:24:14.840 less, they're still getting infected just as much, but they're dying less and by a lot.

00:24:21.280 That's still true, right?

00:24:23.100 I mean, I believe that's universally considered true.

00:24:26.740 So how could somebody say that I made the wrong decision with our current information?

00:24:32.220 Is it possible I made the wrong decision?

00:24:35.940 Well, it's possible I chose wrong, but it's probably not possible I made the wrong decision.

00:24:44.280 Do you see the difference?

00:24:46.200 It's definitely possible that I chose wrong.

00:24:49.960 It's not reasonable to say that I decided wrong.

00:24:53.900 Because the decision is without information.

00:24:57.820 So whichever way I went, vaccinated or not vaccinated, it would have been without information.

00:25:03.620 Because there was no option of having information about the future.

00:25:07.340 I only had information about the past that I didn't totally trust, and the present that

00:25:13.240 I didn't totally trust.

00:25:14.340 But I didn't have any information about the future.

00:25:17.860 You know, is long-haul COVID worse than, you know, long-haul getting vaccinated?

00:25:22.520 I don't know.

00:25:23.840 Nobody knows.

00:25:25.420 And so, if somebody is positive that the decision was right or wrong, that would be somebody

00:25:31.300 who's just bad at analysis.

00:25:34.760 Would you agree with me with this point?

00:25:37.520 If somebody said, I think you made the wrong decision, that's a reasonable opinion.

00:25:42.660 I think you made the wrong decision.

00:25:45.320 Completely reasonable.

00:25:47.300 You totally made the wrong decision.

00:25:49.880 Guaranteed.

00:25:50.740 Is that reasonable?

00:25:52.520 Given that I didn't have information either way?

00:25:56.940 No way to know either way.

00:25:59.880 So, I would say that it was a risk management decision that was really closer to a guess.

00:26:06.140 Now, what kind of background would one have to have to think that in a situation where

00:26:11.400 the information is not available, and you are just guessing, that you made the wrong decision?

00:26:16.820 What kind of background would you have to have?

00:26:19.640 Yeah, you'd have to be an artist.

00:26:21.520 I wonder if Vox Dei is an economist or more of a writer of science fiction.

00:26:32.200 Yeah, he's an artist.

00:26:33.220 So, when you get criticized by artists, the correct response is, hashtag artist.

00:26:41.300 Because the moment you start dealing with it like you're having a rational conversation,

00:26:46.740 you almost immediately realize you're not.

00:26:51.640 That you're not.

00:26:52.480 I've said this before.

00:26:54.300 If I have a disagreement with somebody who's a trained economist, here's how the conversation

00:26:59.920 goes.

00:27:00.780 I believe X.

00:27:01.900 No, I believe Y.

00:27:03.520 Why do you believe X or Y?

00:27:05.060 Well, here are my assumptions.

00:27:07.320 Oh, well, one of those assumptions I don't agree with.

00:27:10.260 Where's your data?

00:27:11.260 Oh, here's my data.

00:27:12.580 Oh, I don't think that is reliable enough.

00:27:15.420 Well, I think it might be.

00:27:16.460 And then you know exactly where the difference is.

00:27:20.240 Usually a difference in assumption, right?

00:27:22.940 Not a difference in analysis, because two people who are trained economists would probably

00:27:28.640 analyze things similarly, meaning they would do it correctly.

00:27:32.720 They would know what to compare and what not to compare.

00:27:37.300 But an artist, an artist is just going to be like, I'm pretty sure I'm totally right.

00:27:43.680 Can somebody tell me when it's 15 minutes before the hour?

00:27:50.900 I don't seem to have a clock here.

00:27:54.240 Oh, yeah, I do.

00:27:55.280 Okay.

00:27:58.020 All right.

00:28:02.260 A couple more things.

00:28:04.360 There will be approximately 12,000 athletes in the Beijing Olympics, the Omicron Olympics.

00:28:11.720 Place your bets.

00:28:12.720 12,000 completely vaccinated athletes.

00:28:17.440 Now, I don't know how many of them are boosted, but we would assume that they're all double

00:28:22.300 vaccinated, would you say?

00:28:25.080 Fair to say.

00:28:26.880 Fair to say all 12,000 athletes will be vaccinated.

00:28:30.740 At least, probably at least two shots, right?

00:28:33.400 All on the same page?

00:28:34.320 Based on your belief of how dangerous or not the vaccinations are, how many people do you

00:28:44.000 expect to die during the Olympics?

00:28:47.260 And of 12,000 vaccinated athletes, 12,000 vaccinated athletes, would you change your mind about the

00:28:55.320 safety of vaccinations if zero people have a heart problem during the Olympics?

00:29:00.440 I just want you to commit.

00:29:04.700 Would you commit that 12,000 vaccinated people working as hard as they can, you know, during

00:29:11.600 the competition and training for it, would you agree that if zero of them die, you would

00:29:17.920 at least question how dangerous it is?

00:29:21.640 No?

00:29:22.380 That wouldn't make you question it?

00:29:24.180 12,000 is quite a few people.

00:29:26.180 If the vaccinations were safe enough that fewer than 1 in 12,000 had a problem, would you

00:29:36.220 consider that dangerous?

00:29:38.400 Suppose one.

00:29:41.800 Why not?

00:29:43.020 So I'm saying most people say no, but give me a why not.

00:29:47.920 Comments are going by pretty fast.

00:29:50.260 Are you saying it's because it wouldn't be statistically significant?

00:29:53.600 There are 12,000 vaccinated people.

00:29:57.120 Remember, now here's the context.

00:29:58.960 Here's the context.

00:30:00.220 It is widely reported, although I believe not true.

00:30:04.180 This is my personal opinion, not based on facts.

00:30:06.880 My personal opinion is it's not true that high-end athletes are dying on the field in Europe

00:30:13.500 and other places.

00:30:15.040 Because a lot of people who say that the vaccination is dangerous, I think Dr. Malone said this as

00:30:19.920 well, that if you look at the high number of high-end athletes who are dying, just like

00:30:26.500 falling dead on the field, that there can be no other explanation than the vaccinations

00:30:31.900 people say.

00:30:33.500 Now, other people say, well, if you Google this, you'll find out this has been happening

00:30:37.340 since 2018.

00:30:39.080 So the high number of people inexplicably dying while competing has been happening since

00:30:45.120 2018, two years before the pandemic.

00:30:47.060 It is something's happening.

00:30:50.000 There's definitely something happened.

00:30:52.040 But it was before the pandemic.

00:30:54.700 Now, how many NBA players have died after getting vaccinated?

00:30:59.740 How many NFL players have died after getting vaccinated?

00:31:03.760 Now, the total number of NBA players isn't that much, right?

00:31:08.280 But also the total number of professional soccer players in Europe isn't that much, wouldn't

00:31:13.520 you say?

00:31:13.800 What would be the total number of professional soccer players in Europe?

00:31:20.120 5,000?

00:31:22.160 Would you say 5,000 maybe?

00:31:24.780 Just guessing.

00:31:26.280 So if maybe out of 5,000 athletes, you believe, I don't believe this is happening, but if you

00:31:31.340 believe that out of 5,000, you could tell that there's a problem because enough of them

00:31:36.320 are dropping dead, then wouldn't you expect that 12,000 top athletes, all vaccinated, somebody

00:31:43.240 would drop dead, wouldn't they?

00:31:47.980 I'm not saying that you could prove it.

00:31:49.940 I'm going to put my prediction out there.

00:31:52.280 My prediction is that there will be zero confirmed vaccination illnesses that happen during competition.

00:32:02.280 Now, can I make a commitment to you?

00:32:08.940 Let's reverse this.

00:32:10.060 Let's put the pressure on me.

00:32:11.900 I was putting the pressure on you to make a commitment.

00:32:14.780 Let's reverse that.

00:32:15.860 Let's put it on me.

00:32:16.520 If two people who are competing in the Olympics have some kind of a heart or, you know, something

00:32:27.040 that makes them pass out, no, not just passing out.

00:32:30.340 Let's say it's a confirmed, like, real problem.

00:32:33.120 They didn't just pass out.

00:32:34.580 A real problem, like a heart problem.

00:32:36.160 If there are two of them during the Olympics, and we learn that that's unusual, I would need

00:32:43.260 to know what past Olympics have been like, if two people have a heart issue or something

00:32:48.340 that seems coronavirus-related, or no, vaccine-related, if two of them have a vaccine-looking problem,

00:32:55.180 I will change my opinion.

00:32:58.620 Fair?

00:33:00.100 I will only take two examples.

00:33:02.480 And again, this is not science, of course, right?

00:33:05.080 It's not a randomized controlled trial.

00:33:06.640 But in terms of my opinion, two incidents during the Olympics would make me say, holy

00:33:14.060 shit, we've got a problem here.

00:33:16.740 Is that fair?

00:33:17.940 Now, I'm not saying that two would confirm it, and I'm not saying that zero would confirm

00:33:21.720 there's no problem.

00:33:23.100 Can we get on the same page there?

00:33:25.280 None of this would confirm anything.

00:33:27.820 But if you're looking for, you know, strong signposts, I'd say two problems would convince

00:33:33.980 me that there might be something there.

00:33:35.520 There, zero problems should at least nudge you in the other direction.

00:33:40.920 Doesn't have to put you all the way there, but nudge you.

00:33:44.660 All right.

00:33:47.220 I saw a comment from user AstroBotJones on Twitter.

00:33:53.720 He said that in 2010, and of course, this is long before the pandemic, he had a really rough

00:33:59.100 flu, you know, just your ordinary seasonal flu, but sometimes you get really bad ones.

00:34:02.800 He said, although the symptoms went away after a few bad days, he said he looked awful for

00:34:09.340 two weeks, felt it for months with weakness, malaise, and fatigue for months.

00:34:17.300 And he believes that it aged him by a few years.

00:34:23.260 In 2014, there were 8 million professional soccer players in Europe.

00:34:29.560 Really?

00:34:30.640 8 million professional soccer players in Europe?

00:34:32.900 I think that certainly questions what professional means.

00:34:38.540 Whatever the top league is, I doubt, I mean, I guess I'd question that statistic.

00:34:46.140 But if that's true, that is an important statistic to put in the mix.

00:34:51.260 All right.

00:34:51.600 So here's my point.

00:34:52.400 I believe I've had the same experience.

00:34:55.580 How many of you have had the experience of just having a bad regular flu, like one that

00:35:00.920 just kicked your ass, and you didn't feel good for months?

00:35:05.160 Anybody?

00:35:06.560 I feel like I've had that experience.

00:35:10.440 Yeah, a lot of people are saying yes.

00:35:12.440 So when you're looking at long-haul COVID, the thing the economist would tell you to look

00:35:18.300 at is not compare it to how you feel when you feel good.

00:35:23.320 So if you're trying to decide if you have long-haul COVID, don't say, how do I feel today,

00:35:28.820 a month after the COVID, versus feeling great?

00:35:34.060 Don't do that.

00:35:35.000 That's the wrong comparison.

00:35:36.760 Compare how you would feel after a regular flu that happened to be just bad, compared to

00:35:43.020 a month after the COVID.

00:35:43.960 And if both cases, you know, often you feel like you're still getting your ass kicked,

00:35:49.060 then maybe it's just the flu, right?

00:35:52.380 Now, it doesn't prove anything.

00:35:53.940 I'm just giving you a little extra context.

00:35:56.840 I'm still concerned that long-haul COVID could be a thing, but also concerned that long-haul

00:36:02.240 getting vaccinated could be a problem.

00:36:04.060 We don't know.

00:36:05.500 Here's something that was revealing.

00:36:08.040 Adam Kinzinger, I guess he's part of this January 6th committee, and when asked if they

00:36:12.780 will have enough to, you know, have some kind of a finding, he answered that question in

00:36:17.680 a very unusual way.

00:36:20.360 He said that they will have a, they believe they will soon have a, quote, powerful and

00:36:25.860 substantive narrative.

00:36:28.920 Narrative?

00:36:31.000 Narrative?

00:36:32.980 Wait, what?

00:36:33.720 And then he went on to say that even though they didn't have everything maybe you could

00:36:39.420 have, they have a lot.

00:36:41.360 And so he says, I think if everything shut down today, we'd be able to put out a powerful

00:36:46.280 and substantive narrative.

00:36:48.260 We still have more information, obviously, we want to get, he added.

00:36:52.980 Now, who uses the word narrative in that context?

00:36:56.480 Now, I do understand it's a correct use of the English language.

00:37:02.500 I do understand that if he has no political intentions whatsoever, the word works, right?

00:37:09.240 It is actually a correct word to describe somebody who could put together a story, a story, with

00:37:17.300 all the facts that they know that would give you a good idea of what was happening.

00:37:20.960 I guess you could call that a narrative, right?

00:37:23.040 But don't we almost always use that word to mean bullshit?

00:37:29.480 Don't we?

00:37:30.740 When was the last time you heard narrative without knowing that the context meant bullshit?

00:37:38.580 I don't think I've ever used, I've never heard narrative used outside of the context of

00:37:44.960 obvious bullshit.

00:37:46.420 Have you?

00:37:46.960 I mean, seriously, have you ever heard the word used in any other context?

00:37:53.040 Other than bullshit.

00:37:55.560 I feel like Adam Kinzinger just admitted that the entire process is bullshit.

00:38:02.540 Can I get my FBI lie detector guy?

00:38:05.520 Hey, I've got some more work for you.

00:38:08.020 Get over here, FBI lie detector.

00:38:10.440 What does it mean when somebody says that their own story is a narrative?

00:38:16.280 It only means one thing.

00:38:18.960 Am I wrong?

00:38:19.560 Well, what is the second possible interpretation of that?

00:38:26.640 Did you become aware in 2017?

00:38:29.580 Aware of what?

00:38:34.940 Oh, yes, when I ask for an explanation in narrative form, but not in politics, right?

00:38:40.340 Yeah.

00:38:40.720 If you're doing a writing class, yes, you might ask for a narrative in written form.

00:38:44.860 But if you're talking about politics, it only has one.

00:38:48.220 There's only one definition, politically.

00:38:51.720 All right.

00:38:52.260 Well, I've been trying to ignore this Novak Djokovic story, you know, the number one tennis

00:38:57.620 player trying to get in to compete in the Australian Open.

00:39:00.120 But they wouldn't let him in because he's not vaccinated.

00:39:03.940 And then he said that he wanted to get in because he'd been previously infected.

00:39:08.980 And then that almost worked.

00:39:10.700 But then we find out that after he was infected, he gave an interview with a guy and didn't tell

00:39:16.600 him he was infected.

00:39:18.340 So he had a deep, like a long interview with a reporter after knowing he was positive and

00:39:25.060 didn't tell the reporter.

00:39:25.900 So Novak Djokovic managed to go from one of the most popular athletes in the world, people

00:39:32.840 really like him in the tennis world, if you don't follow tennis, he's really popular.

00:39:37.760 And he just turned into just an asshole, basically.

00:39:42.780 Now, we have to reserve judgment.

00:39:45.160 He might have a reason for whatever he did.

00:39:47.740 It would be good to hear his side of the story.

00:39:49.700 But in terms of what's happening to his reputation, wow, this is a bad week.

00:39:55.900 That was a really bad week.

00:39:59.320 Too bad about that.

00:40:01.460 There was an abstract, meaning nothing like a confirmed trial or anything, in which some

00:40:07.820 folks put some, looks like some marijuana cannabinoid acids from hemp to see if it would

00:40:18.340 defeat COVID.

00:40:20.020 Now, I'd like to read exactly how they explained it, because I know a lot of you like to get

00:40:28.280 tips on writing.

00:40:30.320 So I'm going to show you how well written this was, really easy to understand.

00:40:35.840 Usually when you hear science stuff, you might say to yourself, well, I'm not a scientist in

00:40:39.820 some of these words I don't understand.

00:40:41.020 But here's some good, clean, scientific writing in this abstract.

00:40:46.400 It says, affinity selection mass spectrometry was used for the discovery of botanical ligands

00:40:55.540 to the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein.

00:40:58.920 You with me so far?

00:40:59.720 Cannabinoid acids from hemp, cannabis sativa, were found to be allosteric as well as orthosteric,

00:41:11.300 ligands.

00:41:12.320 So this is important.

00:41:13.660 The ligands were both allosteric and orthosteric, because sometimes when your ligands are just

00:41:19.860 one or the other, those are like bad ligands.

00:41:24.240 But these are like good ligands.

00:41:25.500 They're both allosteric and orthosteric, and that's good.

00:41:29.160 With, oh, this is even better.

00:41:31.180 They have a micromolar affinity for the spike protein.

00:41:35.160 Micromolar affinity.

00:41:37.200 Yeah, a lot of your compounds won't have any micromolar affinity for anything, but this

00:41:43.820 is good stuff.

00:41:45.500 And then more, in the follow-up assays, so they were just doing this in test tubes, not

00:41:51.940 in people, essentially, the cannabigerolic acid and cannabidiolic acid prevented infection

00:42:00.480 of human epithelial cells by pseudovirus expressing the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein and preventing

00:42:08.600 entry into the cells.

00:42:10.460 Importantly, okay, science, science-y stuff.

00:42:20.060 So this could explain why I've not yet been infected.

00:42:23.820 Do you know how many potentially useful COVID treatments I'm on right now?

00:42:31.180 So I'm already on a prescription PEPCID anti-acid, which is suspected to be one of the things

00:42:39.740 that helps with COVID.

00:42:42.060 I'm also on Budesonide, which is just a normal asthma inhaler that you use every day just to

00:42:51.320 keep you from getting asthma.

00:42:52.920 That also is indicated as useful for it.

00:42:56.620 And now marijuana, the thing I have, I have more marijuana in my system than blood.

00:43:02.400 So if you figure out my good BMI, so my BMI is good, and I'm full of chemicals that automatically

00:43:11.920 fight COVID, I don't know, I think I'm pretty good.

00:43:15.700 I think I'm pretty good.

00:43:17.280 Looking good.

00:43:19.820 Well, although our FBI can't be trusted and all of our other systems are broken, thank God

00:43:25.020 our election systems are completely credible.

00:43:29.820 Thank God.

00:43:31.920 Oh, oh, I've got a challenge here.

00:43:34.260 I'm sorry.

00:43:35.120 No, no way.

00:43:36.860 PK-83, I don't want to have to block you for this, but this is the most objectionable comment

00:43:41.980 I've ever seen.

00:43:43.620 And hold on to your hat.

00:43:45.300 This is what he says.

00:43:47.000 He says, I smoke 10 times more weed than you, Scott.

00:43:50.000 I don't know if I can take that kind of insult.

00:43:56.020 I might have to block you.

00:43:58.120 No, I'm going to let you go.

00:43:59.320 I'm going to let you go.

00:44:00.760 You get a pass.

00:44:03.040 But that's a provocative statement.

00:44:06.120 All right.

00:44:07.940 Rasmussen did another poll, and they asked, would you be more or less likely to vote for

00:44:12.480 a candidate who would advocate reducing prison time for criminals?

00:44:20.320 What the hell?

00:44:22.920 Can somebody tell me what time it is?

00:44:25.940 Oh, I think I have to go in a minute.

00:44:27.900 Last story.

00:44:34.840 Would you be more or less likely to vote for somebody who wants to get rid of jail time?

00:44:38.340 18% said they'd be more likely to vote for somebody who was reducing jail crime for serious crimes.

00:44:46.180 18%.

00:44:46.700 7% said they weren't sure, said they weren't necessarily against letting criminals out of

00:44:51.900 jail to commit more crimes.

00:44:54.480 So let's see.

00:44:54.980 So 18% thought they'd be more likely to vote for the person who was in favor of more crime.

00:45:02.020 And 7% weren't opposed to it.

00:45:04.120 So let's see.

00:45:05.320 18 plus 7.

00:45:06.340 18 plus 7 is...

00:45:09.220 18 plus 7.

00:45:11.140 25.

00:45:12.400 So 25% of the people surveyed, surprisingly, surprisingly, were not too unhappy about extra crime.

00:45:23.300 So, you got that.

00:45:25.480 I saw a tweet about how many people in Congress had traded and made a whole bunch of money

00:45:31.280 and beat the market average.

00:45:32.580 And the implication is, the implication is that they did something sketchy because it

00:45:38.940 looks like insider trading because their trading success was way too good.

00:45:43.400 And the list had about 30 people who beat the S&P 500, which would be a sign of good investing.

00:45:49.900 So out of Congress, how many people in Congress?

00:45:54.520 435?

00:45:55.700 How many people are in Congress?

00:45:58.820 430?

00:45:59.620 What's the number?

00:46:01.140 I'm bad with my politics.

00:46:04.660 All right.

00:46:05.040 Well, so there were about, you know, 30-some that beat the average.

00:46:11.360 But about 10 of them only beat the average by a little bit.

00:46:15.260 So that doesn't mean much, right?

00:46:16.800 Because people are all over the average, some below, some above.

00:46:19.680 So if you throw away the people who beat it by only a little bit, and only look at the

00:46:23.780 people who killed it, like really made a lot of money, there are about 20 of them.

00:46:28.880 Okay, there's 438, somebody say.

00:46:32.900 Or 430.

00:46:35.060 Oh, and we're counting both.

00:46:38.140 I don't know if they were counting Senate, too.

00:46:40.300 I guess they were.

00:46:41.680 538 if you count the Senate.

00:46:43.080 Okay.

00:46:43.780 So let's say out of 538, they found 20 people who really, really invested well or lucky,

00:46:50.540 but they had really big returns.

00:46:52.840 Do you think you should be alarmed if 20 people out of 538 had a really good investing year?

00:47:01.600 Yes or no?

00:47:02.160 Well, that's exactly what you'd expect.

00:47:07.600 You would exactly expect something like 20 people would kill the market, and probably

00:47:13.660 20 people lost a bunch of money.

00:47:15.940 It's the most expected thing you could possibly see.

00:47:18.900 Now, apparently the timing of some of the trades was suspect.

00:47:22.940 Completely different question.

00:47:24.720 If the timing of the trades is suspect, you have to look at that, right?

00:47:28.740 That means something.

00:47:29.620 But the fact that 20 people out of 538 had a really good year, and like really good,

00:47:37.200 one of them is, well, it doesn't matter who, but one of them had a pretty big return,

00:47:44.140 and it could have been one company.

00:47:46.580 Like if somebody bought Apple Computer three years ago, they killed the S&P 500, didn't they?

00:47:53.200 But just buying Apple Computer, simply the most ordinary thing you could do.

00:47:59.060 If any of them invested in Tesla, but maybe had three stocks, so you bought three stocks,

00:48:05.580 one of them was Tesla, you would have killed the market.

00:48:09.880 It wouldn't mean anything.

00:48:11.400 It just meant you bought what a lot of people bought, Tesla.

00:48:15.000 All right.

00:48:15.560 That's all I got.

00:48:16.260 I got to run.

00:48:17.360 See you tomorrow.

00:48:18.020 See you tomorrow.

Real Coffee with Scott Adams - January 12, 2022

Episode 1621 Scott Adams： Let's Talk About Our Lying FBI and Everyone Else Too

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