This lesson introduces a framework for understanding how we learn, focusing on the interconnectedness of ideas and encouraging critical thinking. It posits that much of our perceived reality, including concepts like money, individuality, and nation-states, is a construct of power and imagination, rather than objective truth.
Mind Map
Click to expand
Click to explore the full interactive mind map • Zoom, pan, and navigate
Welcome to our first lesson. And today
what I want to do is provide the
framework for how we're going to learn during
the semester. What we are learning,
how we are learning, and why we are
learning. Very well, then this is a
class of ideas. Therefore, it is very
important that you pay attention and
understand how these ideas connect to
each other. If I'm not being
clear, ask me a question. In fact,
make it a habit. Ask as many questions as
possible, because that way you'll learn
more, learning will be more fun
for you, and everything will become much
clearer, right? So, let's get into the
habit of asking questions. So,
whenever I'm being confusing,
speaking too fast, or you don't
understand, just interrupt me, okay? Let's
create this habit, okay? So, I
want to start by talking about Emmanuel Cantestre,
because he is the greatest philosopher in
Western history,
and he teaches us, he has taught us how the
world works. And that's exactly what
he told us. He told us
very clearly that we can never
truly know objective reality.
There is indeed an objective reality that
he calls a number, right? or the
things themselves, in their own right.
This is not accessible to us. This is a
world we can never access.
Why? Because we perceive the world through
our senses.
Our senses, our perception,
distort the world and transform it into a
structure that we can process,
which are the things that appear to us,
right? So, the example is time and
space. Time and space do not exist outside
of ourselves. Time and space do not exist in
reality. But to understand
reality, we need to add time
and space, right? This is an example, okay?
So, that's how the world works. We
perceive the world, we perceive
phenomena, and we transform them into
phenomena that we can process. In
other words, and this is really
important, reality is what
we imagine it to be. There is no
objective reality. Reality is what
we imagine it to be. Life is a
constant process, a constant act of
imagination. All good? This is Immanuel
Kant. This is the first idea I want
you to understand. So, what I want to
do in this class, this semester, is to
train you, or teach you, or inspire
you to expand your imagination. Feed
your imagination so that you can see the
world with much more clarity. This lesson
isn't about what to think, it's about how to think.
think.
Right? So, let me explain the
course structure. So, there is the
past, there is the present,
and there is the future.
We will analyze all three this
semester: the past, the present, and the
future. Let's analyze all three
to build a more
objective reality for ourselves. We will not
succeed, we will fail, but the
process of trying will train our
minds to think much more
critically about the world. So, let me
explain how we have geopolitics in the present .
.
When we study geopolitics, for
example, why the war in Ukraine?
Why the war in the Middle East? What
will happen? Let's study geopolitics
and try to understand why this
is happening.
Let's try to formulate an
analytical model of geopolitics, shall we? An
analytical model.
So, we will use this analytical model
to make predictions about the future.
Why do we do this? Because these predictions
will tell us whether our
analytical model is correct or not. Right? Does
that make sense? It's no different from
artificial intelligence. How do you know
if your artificial intelligence, the
model, is correct or not? When you
test this in reality, OK? There is no
difference between this
artificial intelligence system and what we are
trying to do here. And why are we
doing this? Because if we are able to
have a model that makes
correct predictions, then we can take all of this
and go back to analyze the past,
to undo it, to reveal the secret history.
of the world. This is a project we are
developing this semester to
discover for ourselves the
secret history of humanity. Because
you might not know this, but all the
history you learn in school,
all that history you think you
know, is false.
The story you know,
the story you believe, is a
system implanted in your brain by
powerful people.
So, the real question we're
analyzing this semester is actually how
Because if we can understand this,
then you will achieve liberation. You
achieve freedom when you understand how you are
being manipulated by other people,
and therefore you will be free, you will have the power
to live the way you want to live.
So, let me give you three very
current examples. how energy really
works. OK? The first and most
important thing is money.
Let's do a mental exercise. I'm
a bank, OK? I've decided I want to open
a bank, and now you can deposit
money in the bank, okay? So you all get
together and deposit 5 million
dollars in the bank.
Now $5 million. Now, why are
you depositing 5 million dollars
into my bank? Because I promise you
1% interest, right? 1% interest.
This is a great deal. But now, since
I owe you money, right? I owe
1% interest. Now I need to earn
money for myself. So, I have a
friend who's building a
restaurant, and he said, "I need
$5 million to build a
restaurant, and after a year I'll pay you back
Interest of 10%.
Thus, I obtain a 9% profit that I can
use to pay my employees, to
pay myself a salary, and to build a
new building. OK? Now I want you to
reflect on this. I am the bank;
I received 5 million dollars in cash
as a deposit. So I grant a
loan of 5 million. How much
money is in the bank today? How much money do I
have now? I received 5 million
dollars from you, so I'll pass it on to
someone else, right? So how much
money is in the bank right now? Zero
is color zero, right? It
should be zero. Logically, the answer
is zero. In fact, zero is the answer
you learn in economics. That's what they
teach you. Yes. Great point. OK. Yes. OK.
That's really very good. So, in
economics you learn about the idea of the
fractional-reserve banking system,
okay? What is fractional reserve banking? As
you said, you need to leave a certain
amount of money. It could be 7%, it
could be 10%, it depends on the country,
you understand? Let's say 10%. So, I can't
lend $5 million, I can only
lend $4,500,000.
OK? You're right, OK? That's also the
law. Well, actually, let's say
I lend 4,500,000,
OK? So, how much money do I have in the
bank? Yes, half a million, right? OK.
So, once again, this is what you
learn in economics. That makes perfect
logical sense, right? The
correct answer, what actually happens in
real life, is that you now have £500,000.
OK? That is the correct answer. That
makes absolutely no sense, right? But this
happens in reality. Because in the
last 20 years, Chinese banks, such as the
Bank of China, the Industrial and
Commercial Bank, and the Agricultural Bank of China... If
you search for these banks on Google, you'll
see that in the last 20 years they have
become the largest in the world. How did this
happen? Was it because the Chinese
got rich and put all their
money in the bank? No, that's not what
happened. So, what happened, guys?
Right? What happened was that these
banks started lending money
to companies, to the government, to
individuals, to build skyscrapers,
to build roads. In other
words, banks started creating
money out of thin air to finance
China's infrastructure projects. And that's what
banks are allowed to
do. They are allowed to print
money, to create money out of thin air. Does that
make sense? So the question is:
wait a minute. That's kind of absurd.
How did this system come about? How was it
created? Right? Well, actually there's a
very simple explanation for where we got
this system from. All good? So, let me
explain the history and origin of the
system. So, in the beginning, it was the
merchants who handled finances,
because merchants needed
money to facilitate trade. And
some merchants became
extremely wealthy. And when they became
very rich, they founded banks to
support trade and other merchants,
right? So, these banks traded in
gold because that was the main source and
supply of money at that time. So,
what would happen was that you would come and
put your money, your gold, in the bank
to keep it safe. And the bank would give him
a contract, right? A contract is simply
a statement saying, "Thank you for
giving me your gold. I promise to return
your gold whenever you
want." And that's what we call a
receipt, right?
This would allow for better and
easier trade, because now I can take
this contract and go to England,
right? I may be based in
Italy, but now I can go to
England and say, "Listen, I need to
buy cotton or bananas from you." And the
person says, "Well, what are you going to
give me?" "I'll give you gold, right? Then
I'll get the receipt and hand it to you, right?" And
why do we do this? Because it's much
easier than giving gold to other
people. And so, this system
would facilitate trade around the
world. It makes sense? Now I'm the
bank, I have all this gold and I want to make
money with it. So, I want to
give it to other people. Then other
merchants will come to me and say,
"Listen, I need gold. Can you
lend me some gold?" Right? I tell him:
"Yes, but if I give you the gold, you'll have
a security problem. That's
inconvenient for you." So why do
n't I give you a receipt, a
contract? It makes sense. Because all
I need is a contract. All
I need is a receipt so I can
do business elsewhere, right?
So, by doing that, what I managed to do
was double the gold in my bank, right?
I created money out of thin air. Therefore, the gold is
still worth 5 million dollars. That has
n't changed, but the receipt now shows 5
million plus 5 million. So,
theoretically I now have 10 million in the
bank, right? This is how money and
finances work. Now, there is a
problem with this system. What's the
problem with this system? What do you
mean? Right? That's a good
question. OK? Why do people
believe me? Right? The answer is
very simple. The answer is that for
most of human history,
people didn't need money. If
you were just an ordinary person, what would you
do? Were you in a village cultivating
crops? If you wanted to, like,
achieve new things, what would you do?
You'd trade places with someone else, right?
Maybe you have a goat that I
want. Well, then I'd trade a cow
with you for it. So, in reality, we didn't need
money. Therefore,
for most of
human history, nobody needed money.
money.
You would only want money under certain circumstances. So,
for example, marriage, right? Okay.
So, for most of
human history, money represented
a debt that might not be repaid. Oh,
sorry, a debt that could never
be repaid.
So, for example, something very common is:
"Maybe you and I will fight and I will
kill you." Well, in theory, his family
shouldn't come and kill me, but obviously
that would create a lot of problems, right?
So, the way to resolve the dispute
would be for me to give money to his family,
because the money was symbolically
meant to say: "I'm sorry, I
killed you." This is a debt that
can never be repaid. That's what
money was used for in most
circumstances throughout
human history. The money didn't actually have
any practical use. It was
symbolic, but with the rise of
trade, it was the merchants who
became the protagonists. They
needed money to facilitate the
transaction, but all these merchants
knew each other. So, even so, they
trusted each other. Thus, money
was a mechanism that allowed them to
negotiate more easily. OK? It makes
sense? All good? Okay. So let's go
back to the question. This system looks
great. I can print money out of
thin air, but there's a problem with that
system. What's the problem? There's a
problem here.
OK. That's a really great question.
Right? So yes, it's possible to forge
a contract, right? That's a very
good point. The problem is that the answer is that
they all already knew each other, right?
Because it's a very small circle.
Again, we haven't gotten to the
morning period yet, when there are a lot of people
using cash. If that's the case,
then wealth becomes a problem.
We'll discuss this in future classes,
okay? Falsification. But at this point,
wealth isn't a major problem. In
fact, there is a bigger problem, and it's a
huge problem. What's the problem?
I have 5 million dollars in gold,
right? There are about 10 million
dollars worth of gold out there in receipts. What
's the problem with that? The problem is,
if everyone wants the gold at the same
time, I'll go broke, right? Because I lose
my reputation. The contract states that
whenever you want the gold,
I must deliver it to you. But if I
have, like, if there are $100 million
in gold contracts, but I only
have $10 million in gold, it only takes 15
million people wanting the gold back for me to
be in trouble. That's what we call
a bank run, right? a bank run.
bank run.
This is a big problem for
merchants. There is also another problem
with the system. And the problem is
this: who do I normally
lend my money to? Do you know? If
I'm a bank, if I'm a
merchant, who do I normally
lend my money to, okay, folks? Today
we lend money to
entrepreneurs, but back then there were
n't really any entrepreneurs, only
kings and nobles. And what
did they do all the time? Why did
they need money to
fight in wars? OK. That's why there's a
demand for gold, because if I
'm king, I need to wage war.
Normally it's my brother or someone else
who controls that territory, right? The
problem is that I could end up dead.
And in that case, oops, but what's much
more common is for the king to say something like, "If you
give me the bank, I don't need to pay you
back." OK? Therefore, there are many
risks associated with this system.
Therefore, over time, develop a
system to mitigate or reduce this
risk. OK? What would they do? What
they would do is create cartels.
Cartels are just partnerships. So
maybe this bank works with another
bank, works with another bank across
Europe. And the way they
established these cartels
was usually through marriages among themselves,
right? They married each other, they united.
united.
So, let's say 15 million in
receipts want the gold back, but there are only
10 million. Well, guess what? You're
simply going to another bank, right? Let's
say a king decides: "I'm not
paying you back, bank." Well, your bank
is working with other banks to
create a new enemy, to kill
the king, in order to recover the money. Do you
understand? And this system is what we call
today the central banking system.
And what you're going to learn in this lesson is
that the central banking system controls
the world today. Now, what's really
important about this system is that it
's based on power, right? And what is
power? He can transform nothing,
money, a contract into everything, right? That's
what money is. OK? So,
we live in a world where banks can
print money, right? So, let's ask ourselves
a question. Wait a
minute. If banks can print
as much money as possible, why do we
still have poverty? Right? Because
we can simply give money to the
poor and they will cease to be poor.
Why do we have poverty? If all the
food in the world that we desire exists, why are there
still people going hungry? OK?
Therefore, we don't have limited resources,
we have scarcity. OK? Right? This,
therefore, is the common answer. Scarcity.
Poverty exists because of scarcity. But I
already told you that. They can print
money out of thin air. Therefore, money is
infinite. Money is an
infinite resource. So, why are we like this?
Because we have poor people. That's kind of
strange. Do you see what's
happening? You all believe that
money is scarce. OK? I've just
spent the last 10 or 20 minutes
explaining that it's not scarce, it's
infinite, because it's just a number.
We can print any
amount of money we need at any time,
OK? This is how energy works.
Power has brainwashed you,
leading you to believe something that isn't
true. From day one, you
learned that money is scarce, but it
's not scarce, it's infinite. And no matter
what I say, you still believe
it, OK? So you need to get that out
of your head. Money is not scarce, it
is infinite. So let's return to the question:
why does poverty exist in the world? Why do
people die of hunger? Why does
inequality exist in this world? Why do
poor people exist? Why do some
people become rich? What is the answer?
Because they don't print. OK? Because it is
scarce. So, guys, this is
amazing, okay? You can't get out
of your own heads. Do you think
money is scarce? Do you think it
's impossible to print infinite money?
When I already told you it's possible,
why does this happen all the time? Yes.
Because we don't want everyone to
have money. Powerful people
don't want that. That's exactly the
answer. And here it is. And why? Because
otherwise nobody would work. Do you understand?
The purpose of printing money is not to
give you money. The purpose of
printing money is to create the illusion that
money is valuable and therefore
you work hard to obtain it. But
in order for you to truly want to make
money, I need to create
artificial and meaningful suffering. Do you
understand? Right? If there were no
poor people, you wouldn't want to be
rich. It's as if, upon seeing people
suffering, you want to make money
for yourself. What did your parents tell you
? His parents tell him: "Study
hard, earn a lot of money, otherwise
you'll end up in poverty." Right? Well,
guess what? If there were no
poor people, your parents couldn't tell
you that, and you wouldn't want to try so
hard in school, right? That's why
poverty exists, because poverty
creates the illusion that money is
valuable. In other words, poverty
is not something you do to yourself, it's
what the powerful do to you. Now
let me ask you another question
. You studied a little bit of
economics. Why do crises exist? Crises,
Crises,
for example, cause a stock market crash
or the economy to enter a
recession and people to lose their
jobs? Because crises exist.
Exactly. You don't learn this in
economics class. That's kind of strange, is
n't it? The goal of crises is to destroy
money. Why do we need to destroy
money? Because if there's too much money
in the system, people don't need to
work. So, it's necessary to destroy
this money so that people feel
that money is scarce. OK? Does that make
sense? So, why do we have wars,
right? So why are there wars in the world
? Because they are fighting for
scarce resources, right? I already told you,
scarcity is a lie. The real
reason is that war serves to
destroy wealth, to make you
believe that money is valuable. Do you
understand? You guys play World of Warcraft
or similar games, right? Guess what,
guys? In our
world, there's actually no difference between World of Warcraft and ours.
You end up running around aimlessly, working
hard to earn credits and buy
things. What if the credit just
fell from the sky because they could do
it, right? They could program the
engine to generate money out of thin air. You would
n't spend every day with nothing to do
. You wouldn't play that game,
understand? It's only because you believe there
is scarcity in the world and that you have to
work hard to get
wealth, that you do any kind of
work. Do you understand this? OK.
Therefore, this world we live in is
a complete illusion created by
central banks to make us work as
much as possible, because the real
value is in money, the real
value is in the work we do.
Right? Does that make sense, guys? Okay. Yes.
OK. That's a great question. OK.
So the question is, isn't there a
food shortage? Food is a finite resource,
right? Do yourself a favor, OK? Go
to a garbage dump anywhere in
Beijing and see the amount of
food that is wasted every day.
If food were scarce, why would we
waste food, right? So,
if you simply do the math,
you'll find that there's enough food
to feed everyone. There doesn't have to be
hunger and starvation. It's an artificial crisis.
Right? Does that make sense? So you're
right in saying that yes, food isn't
infinite, but it is abundant. There is plenty of
food. Enough to feed the
people, right? All good? So, once again
you're trapped in a
scarcity mindset,
and it's very convincing.
So, let's move on, OK?
This is something we'll come back to
later, because I can't convince
you today, this morning, that everything you've
believed about the world and about
yourselves is wrong.
You're still stuck there, okay? There is a shortage.
shortage.
And you're right, there is scarcity, but we
also live in a world of
abundance. Go to any garbage dump in
Beijing and see the amount of food that
is wasted every day. If
food were scarce, why would
we have food waste? Well, if
you do the math, you'll find there's
enough food to feed
everyone. There doesn't have to be hunger and
starvation. It's an artificial crisis, right? It
makes sense? Then you're right. Yes,
food isn't infinite, but it's
abundant. There is plenty of food
to feed people. OK everything is fine?
So, once again, you're stuck in a
scarcity mindset,
and it's very convincing. So, let's move on
, OK? So, we'll come back to this
subject later, because I can't
convince you today, this morning, that
everything you believed about the
world and about yourself is wrong. Are
you still stuck there, like, okay,
is there a shortage?
And you're right, there is scarcity, but we
also live in a world of
abundance. And many of the things you
believe are just misconceptions about the
world, right? So we'll come back to that
later, OK? All good? So let's move on
, okay? So we've already talked about
money, right? Now let's move on to another
question. Let's ask a question about happiness.
happiness.
The question for us today is: What
makes us happy? Let's go. What makes you
happy? How can you live a
happy life? Well, obviously, money, right?
Having a lot of money doesn't
necessarily mean being happy. What else?
Exactly. Power, right? Of course. Power. Excuse me .
.
True freedom.
OK. Well, freedom,
yes. What else? Relationships. Yes of course.
course.
You have good friends, right? Like,
lots and lots of friends.
What else do I have?
Good friends.
OK. Love, right?
Love, for sure. What else? Like
video games, I think.
Vacation, OK? Many, many things. OK.
What you'll discover about this list is
this: you're thinking about
individual happiness, and that's truly
something unique in the history of humankind.
If you could go back in time 5 years and
ask people: "How
can you be happy?"
They would focus more on
collective happiness. In other words, if your
community wasn't happy, you
couldn't be happy. So, the very
idea of the individual is new in the history of
humanity. We used to understand that if
you wanted to live a happy life,
you needed to take care of your family, you
needed to take care of your community. For
them, for us, for most of
human history, happiness meant
helping others, being generous to
others. So, for example, let's suppose
I go away and I'm thinking, and
then I find a lot of gold, right? And what
's the first thing I do with all
this gold? Do you know? This takes us back to the
distant past. Dig.
Make a hole and put it inside.
Okay. Yes. Great, right? Let's dig a
hole and put that money in there
because we want to give it to our children.
That's a modern mindset. But what did
they do before? This has
happened in all societies. If I
became rich one day, what would be the
first thing I would do?
No, that's fine. So, let's learn
this, shall we? But the first thing
people did was give a big
banquet for everyone. They spent all their
money on a grand banquet because
what mattered was their reputation
within the community. What mattered
was his generosity. If you ever became
rich, you would ensure that everyone in the
community benefited from your
wealth, usually by throwing a large
feast. And guess what, guys? That's
true in China for most
of Chinese history, right? If you come
from a Chinese village, go to Beijing,
open a restaurant, make a lot of
money, and return to your village, what's the
first thing you do? Let's go,
everyone. You're throwing a big party
for everyone, right? So this is
ingrained in us, OK? But as you
said, nowadays what we believe is that
if you have a lot of money, hide it or
put it in the bank, right? But back then
, for most of
human history, we simply
spent everything on one big feast.
We want everyone to share in the
happiness, and that's what made us
happy. Did you understand? Any questions? Yes.
So you're asking, does this have to
do with individual reputation? And again, I
mean, this is difficult, OK? But the
individual, the concept of the individual, did not
exist before. We just
created it. The idea that I am
a person independent of my
family, independent of my
community, independent of the world around me
, makes no sense. What was the worst
punishment that could have been inflicted on you
in the past? Let's suppose we're going to
fight. I'll kill you. Okay. Exactly.
Banishment, exile. No, death. Okay. And
today, if I killed you, the police would come and
get me and then kill me.
But we didn't do that before, because
the worst thing we could do was
exile you. This means: "You are no longer
part of us." Do you understand? So, the
concept of individuality didn't exist,
right? Okay. So, let's move on
. All good? Now I'm going to
present two understandings of the world, and
you're going to tell me which understanding you
think is correct. And the first
understanding is: we humans have no
agency. In reality, we have no control.
Why? Because there are powerful gods out there
, you understand? There are
powerful gods like Apollo and Dionysus.
Ah, the problem is that they are also
controlled by other, more
powerful gods, such as fate and
fortune. And there are also these
very ancient gods who control the structure
of the universe. For example, perhaps anger and pride.
pride.
So you really understand the
limits of individual action, because there's
always a God interfering in your
life, you see? You can become rich,
but then the God of pride looks at
you and says, "No, no, no. I need to
teach this mortal a lesson." Then the
God enters me, makes me
too arrogant, and I end up making a mistake.
Therefore, we are always being
controlled by these forces beyond
our comprehension. Okay? That's the first
point of view. The second point of view
is this: We are synapses that generate
memories. We are memories. Our
understanding of the world comes from our
experience, which is controlled by
synapses. Synapses come from a
combination of DNA and environment.
Our genes and our interaction with the
environment, our experiences. And what
this means is that we can now have
control over our own individual destiny.
individual destiny.
If you are angry, it's because some
experience or some gene made you
angry, and that anger ends up being
reinforced in your memories.
Therefore, if you do the
proper therapy, if you reflect properly, and if you
practice exercises, you can
better control your anger and, consequently,
your destiny.
Okay? So, in the first worldview,
there are many, many gods. They are
evil and random
and not... We have absolutely no
control over our destiny.
We can only hope to be lucky in life and not
anger the gods. In the second
worldview, we are merely a collection of
our memories and we are just synapses.
Therefore, we are able to manipulate
memories and synapses appropriately.
appropriately.
We can be free from all
problems. We can be free from
anger. We can be free from
depression. We can be free from
suffering. Let me ask you a
question. Which of these worldviews is
a more accurate reflection of reality?
Obviously the second, right? Because that
's neuroscience.
Science or psychology or psychiatry. That's what
you learned in school. That's what
you all believe.
Our entire society is structured around
that idea. And what you're going to learn
in this lesson is that this is completely wrong.
wrong.
It's the first one that reflects reality
more accurately. The first one gives you
more information, gives you a
more accurate assessment of how the world really
works. So now let me ask you
this question. If the first
worldview... And that's what we call polytheism.
polytheism.
And polytheism for most of
human history was... The
dominant religion, right? Now we live in a
world where religion is science.
Science is basically a religion.
So why do we make this transition?
What is the benefit? If you are a
powerful person, why would you prefer the second
over the first? Why? What are
the benefits for powerful people?
What the powerful want to believe in, the
second, but not the first. So, the
idea of individual responsibility,
OK? So, there is more control.
Controlling people within the system is
easier. First benefit. Second
benefit, you will work harder, right?
right?
Because in the first system you think, you
know what? I don't need to make
a lot of money, because if I make
a lot of money, the gods will punish me
and it makes me proud. So I'll just
kind of enjoy life and take it
easy. In the second system, no, no. I
have control over my own
life, so I need to work hard,
right? And again, the whole goal of the
system is to make you work as hard as
possible, because when you work
hard, it generates real wealth for
powerful people. Money doesn't do
anything, right? Money only serves to
incentivize you to work. It's tough. So this
exists to make you work even
harder. There's another benefit, or there are
more benefits. But what is the other benefit?
benefit?
The other benefit is this powerlessness.
It makes you feel
powerless. Why? This system is
designed to leave you completely
powerless. Why? Why?
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
Watch it again, again. That's how you
're manipulated.
You believe that number one leaves you
powerless, but that's not correct.
Number two is what leaves you powerless.
Why? What's the difference between one and
two? Why is it in number two that you
feel powerless? The problem with number
two is that you become incapable of acting
collectively because you believe that the entire
source of your problems lies within the
individual, within you, and not in society.
But in number one, you are able to act
collectively, and the only way to change
the world is through collective action. Does that make
sense? This is an important point. The
game wants you to believe that the
origin of your problems lies within
you. Ignore the What others do and
And therefore, you are unable to
identify with other people.
You are incapable of collective action.
If you are not capable of
collective action and feel truly
miserable, what will you do is play
video games or watch pornography all day
, okay? And that's what's happening
in society today. Yes. So,
secondly, who has authority, who do
you listen to, you listen to
scientists, right? Scientists,
because this system was created by
scientists to deceive you, you understand?
You think: "Ah, this system is science,
therefore it must be real." Guys, let
me give you some advice, okay?
If you are feeling sad and
depressed, what should you do? What
should you do? What were you taught to do?
You feel sad? You are depressed,
what should you do? Hmm, right, yes, the
correct answer is to take a walk, but that's
not what you were taught, right? What were you
taught to do, okay? Tell
your friend, your parents, that's
really That's great, right? So,
walking, exercising, resting,
talking to a friend about your
problem—all of that is very good. But
actually, what did they teach you to do in
school? If you're feeling
very, very sad, what should you do?
You should see a psychiatrist,
right? You should talk to a
psychologist, and what will they do? What will they
do? Okay. Well, I'll give you some
advice, okay?
And you can test this for yourself.
But if you're feeling sad and
you're feeling depressed and you feel you
need to talk to a psychiatrist and you
do, I bet you the
psychiatrist will make things much worse.
You'll feel worse after
talking to a psychiatrist. And the reason
is that the system wasn't created to
cure you of any problem. The system
exists to make you dependent on
authority. You know that if you're
feeling sad, well, you know what?
Just go for a walk, talk to
a friend, and eventually you'll feel
better. But the system teaches you that's not the case.
If you're sad, go talk to... The
psychiatrist who will give you medication. It's
designed to make you dependent on
authority. Right? That's a really
great question. OK?
God is authority. OK? That's
a really great question. Thank you very much.
So, I need to spend some time
explaining the two systems to you, and
I will do that. But what's really
important about number one is that the
gods are very bad people, right?
The gods of number one, the
polytheistic system, fight all the time. They
are vengeful, they are angry,
they are proud, but because they are gods,
they can get away with it. And that's the difference
between humans and gods. We are all the
same. We are all angry. We are all
jealous. We all fight, OK? But the
gods can get away with it. Humans can't
. The gods can be arrogant. We
can't be arrogant. You
understand? So, the idea that, oh, the
people in power are benevolent,
the people in power are
authority figures who seek our best
interests. That's a new,
modern concept. Before, it was assumed that the A king is a
king. Why? Because he is favored
by the gods. It's not because he's a good
person, it's not because he's a
just ruler. It's just because the gods like him
for whatever reason. But guess what? The
gods give and the gods take away. Maybe
today the king will rule us, but maybe in
5 years he'll be unlucky and the
gods will kill him. What a pity. If you read
Greek mythology, and we're going to do that
in this class, right? We're going to explore
Greek civilization. We're going to study Oedipus,
we're going to look at Homer, the Iliad, right? They
talk about it all the time. Destiny
is something you can't control, it's
something that happens to you. Therefore,
you should live life to the fullest
. Okay? So, the difference is
this. The difference is that, in the first
case, they have a concept called eudaimonia.
eudaimonia.
If you don't have control over your
destiny, things can happen to you
tomorrow that could kill you. So, live
your life to the fullest today.
Seize the day. Be the best you
can be today. And that's how you...
Winning the favor of the gods—eudaimonia,
The goal of life is to live it in the best
way possible. And that's why,
guess what, folks? The ancients, the
Greeks, they were superior to us. If
you read Greek literature, if you read
Greek philosophy, Plato, Homer,
Aeschylus, Euboides, they were the
best. Today we are terrible.
Why? Because instead of eudaimonia, we have pleasure.
pleasure.
Instead of flourishing as
creative people, we think: "How do I enjoy
my life today?" "How do I avoid
feeling sad?"
So, in the first system, even if it
seems like we have no control, no
agency, it inspires us to live
the best way possible.
In the second system, we think: "Ah, you
have total control over your life."
This enslaves us, right? Now let's
move on to the third and final example.
And I know this is shocking, I know
this is surprising, but throughout the
semester I will give enough proof to
convince you that all of this is true.
OK? Today I just set up the
structure in the framework. Very good. Let's
go. Let's go to school.
Guys, why do you have class? Why are we
in school? Why are you
here? What?
Somewhere? Exactly. It's not to learn.
learn.
What else? Yes, to get the diploma,
ready to graduate. What else?
Giving
the great, immense power that it
really has to brainwash
students. I think giving a chance to the power to brainwash.
brainwash.
Brainwashing. Okay? Guess what,
guys? The correct answer is brainwashing.
Cerebral. Everything else is a lie. Very
well. What do you do in school? You come
to class, attend lectures, read books, right?
right?
And then you have to take a test and you
have to write a paper. And then, and
then the teacher gives you a grade, that's how
you learn, right? Let me
ask you this question. For most
of human history, how did we learn
the answer is experience, doing. Right.
Let me ask you this question. Let's
suppose you're 12 years old. You want
to be a doctor? There are two paths. The first
path is: I'll put you in a
hospital. Maybe in the first year all
you do is like wash the floor.
OK? But you'll observe the doctor and
then eventually the doctor will
tell you how to treat patients. Right?
That's the first system. The second
system is: you go to the best school
in the world, then you go to Harvard
for undergraduate studies, then you go to
Harvard Medical School, the best
medical school in the world, right? At
30, who is the best doctor, number one
or number three? Two?
Obviously the first one, right?
Because the second person, the person who
went to Harvard and Harvard
Medical School, never worked in a
hospital, you understand? Now let me
ask you another question.
In the first system, you need to be
very, very intelligent to be a good doctor.
doctor.
No, simply,
actually, you don't need to.
Anyone can be a doctor in the first
system. Anyone. We,
human beings, are all born with the capacity
to learn anything if we want to
learn, right? You can be an
engineer, you can be a lawyer, if you
want to be a doctor, if you want to be a
scientist, if you want to be anything,
right? You just need to find a mentor who
can teach you how to do it. And I
guarantee you will learn to do it
well. And anyone can do
that, but instead, we have a system
in which we tell students: "You are
smart, you are dumb."
Smart students go to good schools and
good universities and get good
jobs. Dumb students go to wash dishes,
right? And that wasn't true for most
of human history. That's
true today. But for most
of human history, if you
wanted to learn Something, all you
had to do was find a
teacher and that teacher would teach you and
then you would learn, right? So,
school isn't a place to teach you how to
learn. School doesn't teach you
knowledge, it doesn't do that. School
is a place that indoctrinates you, right? Now
the question is: in what does it indoctrinate you? In
what would it indoctrinate you?
Right? Okay? To answer that, I'm going to
give you a little history, okay?
We're going to study a lot of history in this class,
but I'm going to tell you about the three
societies that first introduced
compulsory and free public education in the
world, okay? The first is called
Sparta, okay?
Sparta was a small city-state in
Greece, like 4000 years ago, 3000
years ago. And they had a new
system where children as young as 5 or
6 years old were put in
school. And at school they were beaten up by
older children who were about 9 or
10 years old. That's Sparta. The second
society was called the Aztecs. Aztecs.
And they also provided
free and compulsory education. for all
their children. Pretty good, huh? And the
third society is called pressure. And
actually, pressure is a system that
everyone uses nowadays. Look at how it was in
history, right? What is common among
these three societies? Sparta, Aztecs,
and Prussia. What is common to all three? War.
War.
All three societies are fundamentally
war societies dedicated to
defeating their neighbors. Sparta was one
among thousands of city-states in
Greece, the only society among those
thousands that had compulsory education.
Why? Because Sparta was first and
foremost involved in war. Sparta, you've
heard of the Spartans, right?
So, the Spartan warrior, the Aztecs
were the greatest warrior society in
Central America before they rivaled
the Europeans. They defeated everyone. They
were involved in wars. They
also made many
human sacrifices. We learn about the Aztecs
later. Prussia, the Prussians, the
largest army in Europe. For
centuries, they were also
involved in wars. Right? Do you
understand that? The reason for The reason we have schools
is because schools are very good at
preparing people for war.
Why? How is that? What is it? Why? Why?
Let me ask you this question. Why did
n't they have schools before? Because
people were the type to say, "We don't want
schools?" Why? Again, Sparta,
the Aztecs, and Prussia were some of the
few societies that had
free public education? Why did
n't other societies simply copy them?
Why? Right. Let me ask you this
question. Let's say you're a mother or
father and you have a child, right? What's the
worst thing that could happen in your life?
life?
Hmm. Really? Is that so?
No, no. Your mother or your father? You have
a child, right? What's the worst thing that
can happen to you in life? Your
child was taken away from you, right? What does
School is designed to take your child away from
you. Right? Let me ask you this
question. If school is about
learning, why don't parents and children
go to school together? It's because No?
Why? Because parents need to work
to survive, right? Actually,
there's a better reason for that,
right? It's about brainwashing, isn't it?
Because how do you
brainwash someone, right? If you're
with your father or mother, you're going to be
indoctrinated. No, because you feel
loved, you feel safe. Your parents
will protect you. You're going to ask
your father or mother, "Hey, that teacher, is
he or she lying to me?" And your
father or mother will say, "Yeah, she's
lying to you." OK? It's only because
you were taken away from your parents that now
you're willing to be indoctrinated.
Why? Because what happens if you
move away from your parents? How do you
feel? How are you feeling? Yes.
Exactly that. Insecure. You're
anxious, you're scared, you
understand, you lost one of your parents,
you're 4, 5, 6 years old, you lost a
parent and you feel very insecure. So,
who do you trust? Your teacher. Everything
your teacher says now. That's
correct. Yes. OK. That's a great point.
Right? Weren't our parents
indoctrinated too? That's right, your parents were
indoctrinated. But what I'm saying is
that when a parent is with a child,
the child feels safe.
And if you feel safe, you're much
more willing to disobey
authority. You're much more
willing to ask questions. You're
much more willing to think for
yourself because you feel safe because
your parent is there to protect you. But if
you take away the parent, you can't do
that. Now you need to trust the
teacher who can indoctrinate you. I
am indoctrinating you. Right? So the
question is: Am I indoctrinating you? OK.
That's a good question and it's a
fair question. And again, that's why I'm
telling you this, right? You have the ability
to ask me questions, you have the
ability to challenge me. You have the
ability to think for yourself,
right? So all I'm
saying is listen to me, ask me questions, and
then think for yourself whether what I
say makes sense or not. Because the
difference between My class, and other
classes, are like, I don't test you,
right? I don't give you grades. It's a
pass or fail class. You can
actually choose to say, "You know
what? That's nonsense. I don't want
to hear it anymore. I can't stop you,
okay? But at school, guess what
happens if you don't come to class? "Your
parents are in prison." Do you understand? That's the
difference. You decide whether you want to pay
attention or not. Okay? So, another
question is: if schools are designed
to brainwash you,
what are they teaching you?
Well, they planned to
brainwash you into believing in
a concept called the nation-state.
The nation-state. Schools are
designed to make you believe that
the nation-state exists. It's a person,
Mother China. You must love this person.
You must be willing to sacrifice
for this person. You must be
willing to dedicate yourself to this person
because it's Mother China. And how do we
brainwash you? We teach you
the language, right? We
teach you history, we teach you
geography, we teach you all of that
to make you believe that the nation, the
state, Mother China, the United States,
France, they all exist. But
guess what? For most of
human history it was absurd to think that the
nation-state existed. Right? Before, did
n't you say "I am Chinese"? Before, you said "
I am from Beijing" or "I am from Haidean" or "I am
from..." Xoyang. Right? Because that makes more
sense. You're from a place where you know
people, but now, because of the
nation-state, you're forced to believe you're
the same person as someone from Yunnan
Tibet, Guanchi. Even though, guess what,
folks, you have absolutely
nothing in common, but you're all
Chinese. And that's what school was
created for. School was created to implant
in you a false memory of a nation,
of a state. That's what history is.
History is the false memory of a nation,
of a state. And that's what happened. And that's why
you're all forced to go
to school. The purpose of school is to
serve the nation, the state. Do you
understand? Right? Does that make sense? If
you believe in the nation-state, if you
believe in Mother China, then you must
serve her, you must obey her, you must fight
for her, you must die for her, right?
So, the idea of the nation-state was
created to make you obedient to
authority, and it works
very effectively, right? All countries,
all the Countries are nation-states,
right? So, I mean, I'm not
saying that China is different from
other places, China is exactly the
same as other places, right? What
you're going to learn in this lesson is how
we got to this point, because again,
the three things we learned, right?
Money, the individual, the nation-state,
these are all ideas and concepts beyond
human experience. If you try to
understand this from first
principles, trying to figure it out on your own,
you wouldn't be able to. You need to be
indoctrinated to believe in these three
things. If someone from the past, maybe from
1000 years ago, came to
today and you explained the concept of
money, the individual, and the nation-state, the
person would say, "Wait a minute." That
means you're all slaves.
So now the question is: where do
these three concepts come from? What you're going to
learn in this lesson is that these three
concepts come from a revolution in
human thought called monotheism, the
one true God.
This idea, monotheism, forever changed
the course of human history and
gave us these concepts of money, the
individual, and the nation-state.
Monotheism is An idea so powerful
that it transformed nothing into everything. That's what
you're going to learn in this lesson.
We're going to learn about monotheism and
discover how it created money, the
individual, and the nation-state, and basically
created the world we live in today.
Right? Any questions? Okay. Yes. There are
three major monotheistic religions,
right? Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.
What I'm going to show you
later is that it's basically the same
religion, right? Okay. So, I don't want to
give you too much information, okay?
okay?
Because it's a lot to process, but
I want you to remember the concept.
Money, the individual, and the nation-state are
all powerful concepts that are
embedded in our daily lives. You ca
n't escape it. You've been
indoctrinated to think that all these
things exist when in fact they do
n't. And that's how
power works. What is power? Okay.
What power really is, is what
we call alchemy.
Alchemy, throughout human history,
has been the quest to transform lead into
gold, lead into gold. Nothing into everything. That's what it
was. Alchemy.
And maybe in science class you
learned that alchemy is a
false science, a pseudoscience, and that it didn't
work. What
you're going to learn in this lesson is that we
achieved alchemy, right? We
transformed nothing into everything.
We transformed lead into gold. Or is that
what power is? Power is the ability to
transform nothing into everything. Power is the
ability to make you believe that
money is valuable, that the individual can
achieve happiness, that the
nation-state exists. That is power. And as a
result, today we live
extremely miserable lives. OK? So you
were taught to think that, oh, life just keeps
getting better and better. What you're going to
learn in this lesson is actually, um,
no. OK? And what's really important
is that you'll also learn in this lesson
OK? It was just an accident. It's an
accident of human imagination. It was
because we didn't know what we were
doing that we created this system. So
you'll also learn that if you're able
to control human imagination, you can
use it to To create a new system that
allows for eudaimonia, or the flourishing
of the human intellect. Okay? Any
questions? Okay. So that's it for today,
everyone. I hope you enjoyed it and found it
useful, OK? See you in the
Click on any text or timestamp to jump to that moment in the video
Share:
Most transcripts ready in under 5 seconds
One-Click Copy125+ LanguagesSearch ContentJump to Timestamps
Paste YouTube URL
Enter any YouTube video link to get the full transcript
Transcript Extraction Form
Most transcripts ready in under 5 seconds
Get Our Chrome Extension
Get transcripts instantly without leaving YouTube. Install our Chrome extension for one-click access to any video's transcript directly on the watch page.
