The Art of Manliness - #91： How Adam Smith Can Change Your Life With Russ Roberts

00:00:00.000 brett mckay here and welcome to another edition of the art of manliness podcast well all of us

00:00:19.480 know or probably should know who adam smith is he is the scottish enlightenment economist who

00:00:25.200 wrote the wealth of nations who made famous the idea of the invisible hand of the markets and

00:00:29.740 talked about the butcher and the brewer and the baker and all that stuff anyways before he wrote

00:00:34.560 the wealth of nations he wrote a book called the theory of moral sentiments that's not really about

00:00:40.020 economics it's about how to live a good life and how to maneuver and manage the relationships that

00:00:46.740 are closest to us like family community and the like and the end goal is to to live a good and

00:00:52.820 virtuous life that's what he's trying to explore in the theory of moral sentiments our guest today

00:00:56.760 has written a book about this little known book of adam smith his name is russ roberts and his book

00:01:02.340 is how adam smith can change your life russ is a research fellow at stanford university's hoover

00:01:07.520 institution he's also the host of the podcast econ talk and in today's episode we're going to talk

00:01:14.020 about what adam smith can teach us about living the good life right how to live a good and virtuous life

00:01:20.940 and how insights from 300 years ago from an economist the first economist can teach us about

00:01:28.040 how to live a good life now why celebrity culture is bad for the soul why we often deceive ourselves

00:01:35.680 in our goodness and how that can get in the way of our moral progress we're going to talk about why

00:01:40.260 we're so attracted to buying the latest gadget even though we know it's not going to bring us

00:01:44.580 happiness so it's a fascinating podcast i think you're really going to like this so let's get on with

00:01:48.980 the show rush roberts welcome to the show great to be with you okay so your book is called how adam

00:01:59.200 smith can change your life we're talking about adam smith the father of economics the invisible hand

00:02:04.160 guy and he's most famous for his book the wealth of nations but you took a look at a lesser known work

00:02:11.160 of his called the theory of moral sentiments for our listeners who aren't familiar with this work

00:02:16.480 could you just give a brief background of the theory of moral sentiments so it was his first book he

00:02:21.460 wrote it in 1759 he were it was reprinted six times it was printed six different editions during

00:02:27.740 his life including the last year of his life 1790 when he made some significant edits to it uh the

00:02:34.140 wealth of nations came out in 1776 so this is the book that he wrote before the wealth of nations and

00:02:40.040 kind of after it so i call it the book that was ever with him it is a book of what smith called

00:02:45.500 moral philosophy that doesn't help us much what it's about it's a book about how we behave with

00:02:50.820 each other it's a book how we what makes us tick what motivates us what brings serenity and tranquility

00:02:56.520 and happiness to our lives how do we interact with other people why is it that even though we're

00:03:02.360 incredibly self-interested we do selfless things which seems like a surprise and smith's really trying to

00:03:08.760 understand our interactions at a micro micro level as opposed to his more famous book the wealth of

00:03:15.420 nations which is really about markets and our commercial lives and how we trade and what that

00:03:19.800 trade implies for standard of living and for specialization and the whole range of economic

00:03:24.760 activity in this book the theory of moral sentiments he's trying to explain and understand how we behave

00:03:31.600 with each other and uh in doing so he gives us a lot of advice and surprisingly perhaps it's very

00:03:37.440 relevant for our lives today why do so few people know about it uh it's hard to read it's it's not

00:03:44.280 organized in a particularly easy way to read uh it's written in 1759 and and so the sentences tend

00:03:51.000 to be a little bit long it's a little bit like jane austin i sometimes call smith the jane austin of

00:03:55.100 economics he has a beautiful prose style he's still readable but it's a style that most of us are not

00:04:00.600 so accustomed to in 2014 and it's not very well organized he could use that editor but he didn't

00:04:06.720 have one i guess so when i first read it which i didn't do until quite late in my career i found it

00:04:13.500 very daunting and i put it down pretty quickly after i opened it i said this is this is hard uh and i but

00:04:19.180 i stuck with it and it it's um it's a beautiful book it has wonderful insights into our our nature and

00:04:26.760 wonderful advice uh for life okay so you just kind of alluded this to a little bit so the wealth of

00:04:31.900 nations is about how we're inherently selfish but those selfish uh interests sort of coalesce to

00:04:37.720 something that it all works out in the end right with the invisible hand um but the theory of moral

00:04:43.080 sentiments has this sort of contrary idea that we're also altruistic so how does the theory of

00:04:49.080 moral sentiments complement the wealth of nations and how does adam smith make these two ideas that

00:04:53.380 we're selfish and altruistic jive together at the same time well i wouldn't use the word selfish i

00:04:57.620 would use the word self-interested or self-centered self self-focused we put ourselves first and smith

00:05:05.040 says so he says you know we think of ourselves as the center of the universe uh but he then says if we

00:05:09.860 act that way you know nobody's going to like us because they understand that there are other people

00:05:13.620 around including themselves so what his argument is is that we're not inherently altruistic or

00:05:18.920 compassionate not particularly he calls that the feeble spark of benevolence he says it's that's

00:05:25.380 not a very uh a powerful way to get us to do the right thing or to be nice to other people he says

00:05:31.460 what the reason we're nice to other people the reason we don't always put ourselves first is we

00:05:35.300 care what other people think of us and we look at the world around us we see that when people do kind

00:05:39.680 things they're people smile at them or nice to them when people do selfish and mean things they're not

00:05:43.680 so nice to them and they're not so pleasant and cheerful and we learn from that what's good and

00:05:49.100 where uh what what our culture expects of us what other people expect of us and we try to conform to

00:05:54.100 that and he says we act as if we have an impartial spectator watching us we act as if someone who's not

00:06:00.180 on our side not on the other side but someone just keeping an eye on us what would that person say

00:06:04.740 about us if we if that person would disapprove that puts pressure on us not to be selfish not to do the

00:06:10.300 the self-interested thing all the time so he's not he doesn't say we're saints and he says in the

00:06:15.500 heat of the moment we forget about the impartial spectator we kind of do what often what what what

00:06:20.380 pleases us at the expense of other people but he says nature has given us this way this and by

00:06:25.980 by this way he means this desire to be approved of and to avoid disapproval is a very powerful way

00:06:32.060 which we sort of regulate ourselves where people regulate each other um he says man naturally desires

00:06:38.780 not only to be loved but to be lovely and by loved he meant honored respected admired and praised

00:06:44.360 and by lovely he meant worthy of honor respect and praise and admiration and so what he says

00:06:50.700 what he's saying is that what really brings us happiness is that when other people respect and

00:06:55.140 honor us and when we earn that respect and honor honestly through our actions not through what we

00:07:00.220 imagine we're doing not by deceiving other people and it's a really beautiful idea for how we dance

00:07:06.860 uh with other people in this great uh society that that we swim in right we have all these people we

00:07:12.280 interact with on a day-to-day basis our family our friends our colleagues at work and smith's trying

00:07:17.740 to understand what we do in those settings and his his answer is is that there's a tension between our

00:07:23.380 self-interest and the fact that we want other people to to respect us and that is what encourages

00:07:29.140 sometimes at least to do the right thing okay so is the the impartial spectator like a conscience or is

00:07:33.260 like a sense of honor like what would be like is it is it driven by driven by guilt or shame well

00:07:37.680 since we're on the art of manliness you know in a way it's really smith was i think for his time which

00:07:43.200 was a very male-centric time uh he was thinking about what's it take to be a gentleman right so

00:07:48.840 you're you're not the art of gentlemanliness doesn't sound so good but i think smith was talking

00:07:53.340 about what it takes to be a good person in his time and it was his he was thinking about a conscience

00:08:00.260 but what's distinctive about smith's approach he's telling us where that conscience comes from

00:08:04.760 and the obvious place is when if you ask somebody you know why do people do the right thing why do

00:08:09.280 they have a conscience where's it come from i think people would say well they have religion

00:08:12.620 they have their parents and certainly religion and parenting matters has an impact on us but smith

00:08:18.320 was saying that we don't really rely on that what we really rely on is those people around us to keep

00:08:23.400 us in line through their judgments and vice versa we judge the people around us and so he's really

00:08:28.420 explaining where our conscience comes from in a very unusual way okay so it does sort of seems

00:08:33.980 like we care about what other people think about us we do good and there's sort of a self-interested

00:08:39.000 motive in that right because if you are lovely there are benefits that come with that correct

00:08:43.400 that's right but unlike the standard economist way of looking at the world which is it's all about costs

00:08:49.060 and benefits i don't think smith was really saying that that was the way we behave you could say that we

00:08:54.380 act as if we were behaving that way but what smith really saw i think was a different kind of

00:08:59.940 way of looking at human nature and what motivates us when we face moral dilemmas and decisions about

00:09:05.780 how to spend our time the crucial things that make up our daily existence he's really saying you know

00:09:11.220 we don't always say oh what's it what's in it for me he's saying i might say that when i get on

00:09:16.020 on on the web and shop for something what's in it for me but when i'm interacting with you and you're

00:09:21.700 saying to me can you give me a ride to the airport and i said oh gee i gotta finish that thing for work

00:09:27.320 i said i'm just because you're my friend i'm gonna do it not because i'm saying oh well later he'll do

00:09:31.520 it for me i'm i'm just doing because i think it's the right thing to do and yes i'll feel good about

00:09:36.440 it it's good to feel lovely but smith's saying that's not why we do it we do it because it's just

00:09:41.000 the right thing to do gotcha okay so this idea of being lovely that's it's a word we don't really

00:09:46.260 used that much anymore to describe a person correct your character so i mean what did he

00:09:50.780 mean by being lovely so he had two things in mind i think and he again he didn't mean it the way we

00:09:55.840 mean it as you say it wasn't uh attractive which is what lovely usually means in our um our language

00:10:02.420 in america at least um by although in in in england in the uk lovely is a different is a phrase that

00:10:11.380 people use all the time to mean i like it right oh that's lovely uh but we don't we don't use it

00:10:16.460 that way we use it to mean oh it's a lovely lovely outfit uh you might say about about somebody's

00:10:21.600 clothing but smith meant it in a very um broad way he meant it as i said to to recognize the fact that

00:10:28.640 we are worthy of respect and honor and admiration and praise and to be lovely he said there are two

00:10:36.740 things you have to do you have to be proper you have to act with what he called propriety

00:10:40.900 and by that he for us propriety kind of means stiff and conformist he meant conforming in a good way

00:10:48.000 he meant conforming in the sense that if you have a tragedy or a success and you share it with someone

00:10:53.140 that person will try to respond in the way you'd like to be responded to and vice versa someone comes

00:10:58.800 to you to tell you about a success or tragedy you try to empathize with their tragedy you try to enjoy

00:11:04.140 their success with them and he explains that our ability to do that's very limited because we're not

00:11:08.740 the other person we're we're a separate person and therefore when we share our successes and tragedies

00:11:14.500 with people around us we take into account how close or far away they are from us emotionally

00:11:19.140 so it's a very subtle and nuanced understanding of social interaction and what we would call

00:11:25.300 perhaps manners or etiquette but again it's much more than that that use of the word so that's the

00:11:30.240 minimum standards propriety so if you want to be lovely you got to be proper you've got to behave

00:11:34.520 according to the norms of the society around you but more than that you have to be virtuous and

00:11:39.780 smith saw three great virtues prudence justice and beneficence prudence take care of yourself

00:11:46.140 take care of your body take care of your financial life don't be reckless with either of them

00:11:50.240 justice don't hurt other people beneficence help other people when you can and when it actually helps

00:11:55.960 them not just it looks like you're helping them so smith had this really beautiful idea of

00:12:01.880 loveliness and of course it's easy to say be nice to other people that's very difficult he understood

00:12:07.340 that he said the rules for beneficence are loose vague and indeterminate unlike the rules for justice

00:12:13.080 which are black and white justice pretty clear don't hit somebody over the head don't kill them

00:12:17.380 don't steal their stuff but beneficence helping others is much trickier and he has a lot of interesting

00:12:23.160 things to say about that uh it's a lot of subtle and useful things to say about how to be a good

00:12:28.060 person uh but that was his that was really his uh his guideline he said you know when because we want

00:12:34.400 to be loved he said the easiest way to be loved the way most many people choose is to be rich or famous

00:12:38.960 or powerful and he says that's the wrong way he says the pursuit of wealth or fame or power it will

00:12:45.920 inevitably leave you unsatisfied and you'll do things along the way to get there that you're not

00:12:51.560 going to be happy about or that are that are shameful you'll regret later so the first economist

00:12:56.200 the person who wrote the wealth of nations says pursuing wealth is not really a great idea it's

00:13:00.340 not really worth it nothing wrong with having it but you shouldn't pursue it for its own sake

00:13:04.460 and uh that's i think timeless advice generally good advice and uh it's fun to hear it coming from

00:13:10.480 the first economist yeah i thought that was interesting he's like he had like a little bit equation

00:13:13.700 for happiness yeah and being lovely was part of that um and money didn't play a role in that i think

00:13:20.660 it was just like don't get into debt was yeah he says uh he says what more can be added to the

00:13:25.980 happiness of a man who is who is in health uh out of debt and has a clean conscience and uh that's

00:13:32.640 a paraphrase but it's close and he's you know what he's saying there is that if you pursue wealth for

00:13:37.940 its own sake you're going to end up without a clean conscience or you're going to end up in debt if you

00:13:41.760 pursue material stuff so uh that's that that'll get you a long way being satisfied with your health

00:13:48.800 and uh and and you're um and being debt free it'll get you a long way did smith have any insights

00:13:55.100 because i think one of the reasons why people decide to choose you know pursuing wealth or fame

00:13:59.980 because there's something tangible right when you have you can look at your bank account and say well

00:14:03.640 my bank account is higher than it was last year but it's hard to say well i'm in my you know i'm

00:14:08.560 more virtuous than i was last year did smith provide any insights on how you track your progress

00:14:14.620 in your in becoming lovely not really uh but it's a great it's a great observation i what he would add

00:14:20.780 to it is that not only do you look can you look at your bank account and see that it's higher than

00:14:25.180 it was last year you can look at your car in the driveway and see that it's nicer than your neighbors

00:14:28.960 and he says that that pushes us to acquire nicer cars and more gadgets because he's correct people who

00:14:38.120 are wealthy people who are successful people who are powerful people who are famous they get a lot

00:14:43.640 of attention and people like that they want that so there's this natural uh seduction that takes place

00:14:50.660 where we are drawn to these things and smith's counseling us to avoid that so you make a great

00:14:55.720 point so smith says don't do that be lovely how do you get how do you give yourself that pat on the

00:15:01.580 back the way your bank account does with your loveliness account you know a lot of people in this

00:15:06.180 business i'm not an expert on it but i've read some of these books you know that encourage this kind

00:15:11.440 of thing there are a lot of ways we can do that we can we can keep a notebook we could do a uh a uh

00:15:17.840 accounting uh it's a in judaism you're encouraged at the end of the day to think about what you've done

00:15:23.980 that day and whether you did the right thing or not so it's not as dramatic as looking at the bank

00:15:29.320 account it's not as precise but there are ways that we can keep track of our moral choices and to

00:15:36.240 and to encourage ourselves to do the right thing smith of course also understood and he writes

00:15:40.900 very eloquently on it that we are prone to deceive ourselves so when we do something not so nice

00:15:46.020 we might leave that out of the bank account whereas when we uh spend money frivolously it does leave the

00:15:51.680 bank account and we do see that it's gone so it is much harder when we do the moral accounting

00:15:56.840 and the kindness the loveliness accounting to do it uh honestly and scrupulously so i encourage that

00:16:03.800 you know smith says that self-deception is responsible for half the disorders of of modern life and

00:16:10.020 he's he's onto something there we we do tend to neglect our shortcomings and over remember our

00:16:16.740 good side so uh that's a just a good general warning yeah he i like the his insights about

00:16:21.820 self-deception um i mean how how do you overcome that because we do have a tendency to paint ourselves

00:16:27.440 in a positive light even though we might not uh do great you know it's like a cognitive dissonance

00:16:33.420 right yeah sure how do we overcome that well what i suggest in the book uh smith doesn't say this but

00:16:39.060 what i suggest in the book is that uh you rely on some actual spectators not just the imaginary ones

00:16:45.120 that smith says sometimes we have in mind when we're trying to decide what to do when you face

00:16:50.040 a moral dilemma at work say or you have a personal issue you know a friend wants you to come visit or

00:16:56.960 you have a funeral to go to or you have a project at work at the same time you're trying which should i

00:17:03.020 work on your kid needs you to help with the homework but you want to watch the football game

00:17:07.460 it's always easy to convince ourselves that the personal benefit thing is the right thing oh i

00:17:12.900 need to watch the football game because then i'll be able to help my kids even better later because

00:17:16.280 i'll be more relaxed you know we have stories we tell ourselves oh there'll be a lot of people at

00:17:21.380 the funeral i don't need to go she won't miss me it'll be okay and i found that you know it's better

00:17:26.280 to have uh and smith does suggest something along these lines better to have hard and fast rules

00:17:30.540 you almost always try to go to a funeral where a friend has had a loss uh it's true that any one

00:17:37.180 time it's not the end of the world if you skip it but you'll often find yourself skipping lots of them

00:17:41.580 and then you'll miss a chance to comfort a friend and um smith understood there's a slippery slope in

00:17:47.640 life that if you start justifying things as being good when they're maybe just self-interested

00:17:52.560 uh you'll often choose the self-interested thing uh without really doing the right thing so

00:17:58.020 what i suggest besides having some hard and fast rules is ask people ask ask your spouse ask your

00:18:03.620 friend say i'm in this situation what do you think the right thing to do is and a good friend who's

00:18:08.380 honest will suggest to you well you know from the outside looks pretty clear you ought to do x uh

00:18:14.140 whereas sometimes from the inside you can you're always going to say oh well i'm sure that the best

00:18:17.700 thing to do is is why when that that's actually the thing that i want because it benefits me yeah you

00:18:22.740 made a good point in the book where you talked about don't deceive yourself that you don't you

00:18:27.800 aren't deceivable right like yeah you know i think i have a tendency to do that it's like oh i read all

00:18:32.760 these psychology books that i'm like yeah you know we we deceive ourselves all the time okay i can't

00:18:37.440 deceive myself but i i know that i'm probably doing it even though i don't know i'm doing it yeah and i

00:18:41.400 spend a lot of time thinking about self-deception and i still fool myself sometimes uh of course it's

00:18:46.900 a human frailty and it's you know it's very common i was a great uh internet meme this this last

00:18:52.420 couple weeks over the election it had a a picture of um obi-wan kenobi from star wars that said this

00:18:58.780 is what my my politician looks like and then there was a picture of darth vader this is what the other

00:19:02.940 guy's politician looks like then there was a picture of um is it jojo binks is that his name

00:19:08.700 says it says that's what he's but that's what they're both like but you know our my guy my guy's

00:19:14.080 great it's that other guy that's awful or we do that in you know with economics you know my theories

00:19:18.920 my models they've got all the evidence the other side's evidence that's crummy evidence and we see

00:19:23.380 a report or a study we don't like it's really easy to find the things that are wrong with it but

00:19:28.040 somehow your study the one that supports your side or my side i go oh no that's that's perfect

00:19:33.180 and so there is this terrible temptation to overstate the quality of one's own stuff and be

00:19:38.620 skeptical about the other side and we should be more open-minded a little more humble i think okay

00:19:42.760 um so i thought this interesting smith had some insight uh over 300 years ago about why we feel

00:19:48.620 compelled to buy the latest ipod or the latest you know gadget even though you know we i think we

00:19:53.940 know in the back of our mind that we're going to get quickly get used to it yeah so what did smith

00:19:58.880 say i have to say about the the you know so he he warned against uh trinkets of frivolous utility is

00:20:05.540 what he called them uh things that that we like to show off and and impress people with uh and he says

00:20:11.900 they don't really make our lives that much better they we like them because they do their job so

00:20:15.560 elegantly they're impressive and i my example that in the book is uh you know i have so many apps on

00:20:21.580 my iphone that i bought just because i love what they can do what they do you know i have somebody's

00:20:25.860 dna mapped out on my iphone that you can you can get and you think that's just so cool but it really

00:20:31.760 doesn't make your life any better it's just a beautiful thing and and if you're not careful you

00:20:35.960 could accumulate those things and you can find yourself uh not it's not a tragedy that you have too

00:20:40.940 many apps on your iphone the tragedy is when you uh spend money on stuff that doesn't really bring

00:20:45.540 much of a return and smith was warning us about uh gadgets as a as a way of um of spending our money

00:20:52.600 that might not be a fruitful way to spend our money the interesting question is what kind of gadgets

00:20:56.680 that they have in 1759 and he lists an ear picker a toothpick a machine for cutting the nails

00:21:03.500 not that exciting and yet in 1759 people showed those things off the way we do and he ironically

00:21:09.920 right this is right after the just about a month ago uh tim cook of apple announced the new apple watch

00:21:16.500 and he's talking about how uh accurate it is and i think that's kind of funny my book comes out

00:21:22.220 comes out right around the same time when smith in his book says this is a crazy thing people will

00:21:28.180 spend a premium they'll pay a huge amount extra for a watch it's a little more accurate

00:21:31.620 it doesn't make them any more punctual they're still not on time for their meetings or appointments

00:21:36.120 and of course we know that's true having the apple watch which is going to be

00:21:39.480 accurate to some number some i think it's five milliseconds is not going to make anybody more

00:21:45.220 productive as a worker because there's improvement over the iphone which might be off by 20 seconds oh

00:21:51.460 the horror so smith was uh he's on to something there even in 1759 yeah i do that all the time with uh

00:21:57.560 like my you know using to justify my smartphone like oh you know i can get all these

00:22:01.320 apps right and it'll make me more productive and like yeah no it's it's not i could use pen and

00:22:06.500 paper and i'd be just as productive a lot of times yeah a lot of times okay so uh right now

00:22:10.960 currently into the 21st century we are a celebrity culture i mean everyone wants to be famous i think

00:22:16.300 they've done polls on young people and like young people today would rather be famous than you know

00:22:21.980 have money or do good or so but no one really thinks about the costs that come with fame

00:22:28.320 but smith thought about this yeah what do you say about the cost that comes with with fame so he's

00:22:35.480 very eloquent on this and uh he understood that we want to be famous because we want to be loved as

00:22:40.800 he said it's it's inside us it's hard we're hardwired to to want attention and uh as we said earlier

00:22:46.740 he says the right way to do that to be a good person the wrong way is to get is to try to be famous

00:22:51.640 for example and what he says about it is that you know you get fame by doing a lot of things that are

00:22:59.580 not so attractive that's number one uh in his in his time he's talking about people who you know

00:23:05.700 climbed the ranks in court in the royal societies of his day the it's an amazing uh you know time they

00:23:13.220 didn't have cable television or anything like like we have or talk radio but uh in his day they still

00:23:19.500 had celebrities and still had people who cared about about being famous so he says it's a bad

00:23:23.720 idea he says it's not good for you and one of his best examples i don't use this in the book in my

00:23:28.120 book but it's uh it's a great example he talks about the king of macedon the king of macedon was uh

00:23:34.400 a con was conquered by the romans and he's led through the streets and he says

00:23:38.000 you know he's miserable and he says why is he miserable this is you know he's he's been captured by

00:23:42.600 humane people they're going to take care of him they're going to feed him they're basically

00:23:46.160 going to put him under house arrest he's not going to be tortured he's not going to be killed

00:23:50.160 like the the zarb and the revolution he's just going to be he's going to lose his kingdom 0.97

00:23:54.140 and he says boy look how depressed he is about that and why is he depressed he says depressed

00:23:59.280 because nobody's going to fawn over him anymore no one's going to be sucking up to him he's not

00:24:03.420 going to get any of that thrill he used to get whenever i was paying attention to him saying you

00:24:07.180 know he's basically saying is this pitiful it's just so unattractive and so he says if you pursue fame

00:24:12.560 and when you lose it and people don't pay attention to anymore it's just it's the worst because you

00:24:17.740 become essentially addicted to to the attention that other people give you and he also talked about

00:24:22.880 how you sort of uh become restricted uh the more famous you get like your choices become because the

00:24:30.040 more people know about you they'll be more concerned about your security um and like you know where you

00:24:34.880 know who are around you can't be as free roaming as you were when people know you absolutely um so i'm

00:24:40.960 guessing it sounds like fame is sort of a counterfeit loveliness would that be a good way to describe

00:24:46.520 it well it's a counter it's it's not counterfeit it is it it's a he basically says it's the glittering

00:24:56.480 path that that draws us fame and money and power draws us to those things because we as we know people

00:25:03.500 are going to pay attention to us but uh he's you know he's saying stay away from that stuff it's bad

00:25:07.600 okay uh so he had some insights on how us focusing on being good lovely and virtuous can actually

00:25:16.280 contribute to a better world like small actions on our part can you brief i know it's sort of nuanced

00:25:21.240 and complex but can you briefly describe what smith had to say about how just little small actions on

00:25:25.560 our part can contribute to a better world yeah what he's saying is that the culture that we live in

00:25:30.040 the expectations of the people around us and and what we can expect from them uh that all comes from

00:25:36.600 our own personal individual actions and come from anywhere else there's no memo that goes out and

00:25:40.320 says be trustworthy uh and yet we live in a culture in america that's pretty trustworthy and i give

00:25:46.280 examples in the book of when i was in situations where somebody trusted me and i trusted them and it

00:25:51.720 worked out of course doesn't always work out but it's remarkable how often it works out in a world where

00:25:56.180 there's no often no real cost other than shame and embarrassment uh you're not likely to get sued for

00:26:03.020 being dishonorable in those situations and when you i give the example often you buy a house

00:26:07.520 there's this really complicated contract design but there's a lot of things thousands of things

00:26:12.100 that don't go into the contract they're just sort of accepted that you know you leave the house clean

00:26:15.660 you don't there's no details about how clean it has to be because you can't really specify that

00:26:20.120 and yet everybody understands that you can't leave the house a mess when you leave and most people

00:26:24.460 don't they don't take advantage of the fact that it's not in the contract and i think that's a

00:26:28.920 wonderful thing and smith says where does that come from so it comes from the fact that we watch

00:26:33.360 the people around us we see what's honorable we see what's dishonorable and we try to do mostly

00:26:37.900 what's honorable and we're lucky in america to live in a world where what's honorable is to be

00:26:41.600 trustworthy for most people in other cultures being a uh trustworthy is a sucker you know being being uh 0.99

00:26:48.420 give it passing up a chance to to take somebody's money it's like you're a fool but in america it's like 0.95

00:26:52.840 honored if you don't if you if you give up a chance to steal something from somebody take advantage of a

00:26:58.100 something left out of the contract and that's just a great thing and where that comes from is

00:27:02.480 from us it comes from our choices that we make on a day-to-day basis about how to behave with each

00:27:07.060 other and smith's saying that you know if you want to make the world a better place make a contribution

00:27:11.500 to that be honorable and honor people who are honorable and dishonor people who are dishonorable

00:27:17.200 judge them accordingly don't just let things go sometimes and when you have a chance to do the

00:27:22.320 right thing do the right thing and it's tempting to say any one thing oh what's the big difference

00:27:26.180 but smith says all those actions add up and eventually not eventually together they create

00:27:30.860 a culture and we we have a good one we should honor it and try to sustain it how do you like

00:27:35.920 dishonor i feel like we're kind of uncomfortable with that this day is like making people feel bad

00:27:40.420 yeah we are so i mean how do you do that i mean do you have not as we're not as judgmental as i think

00:27:45.420 people were in smith's time in smith's time if you did the wrong thing uh there's a lot more stigma

00:27:49.640 a lot more shame i think we're encouraged in america to not feel shame not feel guilty uh and

00:27:57.140 i think i don't you know there's something good about that but i do think we paid a price in that

00:28:01.020 it does tend to if we're not careful make us less responsible and to be a little more selfish

00:28:05.540 um but being judgmental is is a strong phrase i think what smith had in mind was very subtle it

00:28:15.180 wasn't just oh if your friend does something uh that's not that's not 100 uh great you should

00:28:21.800 then stop being friends with them that's not what he meant what he meant was you know there's an

00:28:26.960 enormous range of judgment and and praise that we give people we we can raise an eyebrow uh somebody

00:28:33.140 tells a joke that's in bad taste that's cruel say to somebody that we were we know and it's sometimes

00:28:39.820 it's funny and it's fun to sometimes make fun of other people and smith's i think would say you

00:28:44.720 know that's wrong so what do you do when someone tells a joke like that at work or you know hanging

00:28:50.280 out with your buddies you know what should you what should your response be should you say that's a

00:28:54.500 cruel joke shame on you well that kind of language doesn't fly very well in 2014 but you don't have

00:29:00.700 to laugh and you can kind of make a you can raise an eyebrow and say you can make a noise and if

00:29:06.460 somebody does that all the time you can stop hanging out with them so there's an enormous range

00:29:10.380 of ways that we respond socially i think to appropriate and inappropriate behavior and

00:29:15.140 our age has a different set than smith did but it's still the same idea same idea okay um so this

00:29:21.320 has been a fascinating discussion i know we just scratched the surface but uh besides going out and

00:29:25.740 buy your book where can people find out more about your work uh you can go to my website russroberts.info

00:29:31.500 you can listen to my weekly podcast econ talk where every monday at 6 30 a.m uh release an

00:29:38.300 interview we have over 425 episodes that we uh that we keep up there and uh those would be the

00:29:44.900 best ways i'd say fantastic well russ roberts thank you for your time it's been a pleasure

00:29:48.460 thank you our guest today is russ roberts he is the author of the book how adam smith can change your

00:29:54.120 life and you can find that on amazon.com and bookstores everywhere and you can also check out his

00:29:59.380 website russroberts.info or if you're interested in economics you can listen to his podcast it's

00:30:05.040 econtalk.org well that wraps up another edition of the art of manliness podcast for more manly tips

00:30:12.960 and advice make sure to check out the art of manliness website at artofmanliness.com and

00:30:17.300 today in the podcast we were talking about becoming virtuous in order to be lovely and happy well we just

00:30:22.420 recently launched a new journal slash record keeper inspired by benjamin franklin's 13 virtues chart

00:30:29.700 it's a really cool journal that's bound in leather really nice looking you can find those in the art of

00:30:36.120 manliness store that's at store.artofmanliness.com makes a great gift for the men in your life for

00:30:41.880 the holiday season so there you go until next time this is brett mckay telling you to stay manly

00:30:47.960 you

The Art of Manliness - November 29, 2014

#91： How Adam Smith Can Change Your Life With Russ Roberts

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