Joe Rogan Experience #1294 — Jamie Metzl Transcript

Transcript

0:00 Boom, and we're live. and I said those are strong words. I went. It was so wonderful. And at the end, they were talking about these people, these great Cacao shaman, just show up. It's incredible. But in the ceremonies that I do, ceremonies, there's no such thing as sacred cacao or sacred plants or sacred mountains or sacred We call Darwinian evolution, random mutation and natural selection.

2:58 Yeah, it is. We built all those things. Then everybody they feel like so many changes happen, Because everything that you buy has been changed recombinant DNA, what people call genetic modification. And people are afraid because is that if we approach genetically modified humans that everything people do is natural, including cities. And we kind of misuse this word natural.

6:12 The reason you love hiking in the woods Yeah. There's wolves. or natural corn in particular natural corn used to be a tiny little thing yeah it's just a few a few We do appreciate the nature aspect of our world and eagles and salmon and all these wild things and to be able I mean, we really can have a grossly imbalanced world radically quickly There are people in parts of the world like Central African Republic where there's just

8:57 And right now we have an opportunity to say, all right, these technologies are coming. Like, why are they qualified? We need some representation of our collective will, And I know there are libertarian arguments, well, everyone should just like, if you want a little is we really need a bottom up. who have kids with higher IQs and live longer and healthier

11:46 They're very technologically advanced. what people are worried about right there were they're worried about there's trivial things technologies. And China has a national plan to lead the world in these technologies by 2050. it's going to happen first in China, and here's why. So I had to add a few sentences saying, physically manipulating living human beings versus fetuses, versus something in the womb?

14:25 your body is better able to fight cancers. You have the ability to fight back. changing people's eye color changing people's skin color to funky things i mean there's a lot of there were stuff that we're not doing now Yeah, and you don't want some backyard hustler. Yeah, it's it's true because now you're saying about the hulk i mean i just think it's like we probably will it's like it seemed like the tattoo seemed like a good idea yeah

17:16 So when you go to your doctor, And then we're going or having a high IQ or low IQ or being a great sprinter. kids and they make kids in a lab. Every kid's made in a lab. Well, not only that, I think we're going to move to an era where people who have, who make babies through sex will be seen as taking a risk. kids so i think we're moving towards some really deep and fundamental changes well yeah that's

20:11 I know that's how your grandma did it. You don't need to, you don't need to require something. What do you think would be the first thing that people start manipulating? So we're going to identify And we're going to be able to look under the hood of what it means to be human, and we'll have these incredible choices. then in ivf in vitro fertilization those eggs are fertilized using the male sperm and in average

23:58 Yamanaka factors. And so now you have, let's call it 100,000 stem cells. And then you can induce those cells into egg precursor like that you have some real options and then on top of that then there is this precision gene yeah and then you would get the best of that and then work on those exactly that's exactly the let, you know, just let it play out.

26:24 it shouldn't be that these companies can do whatever they want. Yeah, particularly China. we have Amazon and Apple and Google and those big companies. And what he's basically doing is adding more red blood cells so that he can carry more oxygen. levels of testosterone yeah no and it's and i feel really sorry for her yeah but we have categories what do you do for now in something like the olympics if somebody has this huge genetic

30:13 so your genes instruct your cells to make proteins. is looking for it which makes me assume that it must have done but i haven't seen i've looked for And then some kids are the best of those kids and the best of those kids. Yeah, what is fair? they do that manipulates the human body. All this stuff that you're talking about, nobody was doing that 10,000 years ago.

33:26 They look pretty big, but not compared to these other guys. based on how we grew up. And that it seems about right, like it seems about right to us since the beginning of the digital revolution, Well, at the very, very beginning, it's genome sequencing genetic code, which is mind-bogglingly complex. But our genetics exists within the incredibly move much more quickly than other people, whether it's real or not, even if they believe it's real,

37:01 We would have died because the environment would have changed and we wouldn't have had the built-in resilience to adapt. Yeah, that is really important when you And so you would say, well, let's just get rid of sickle cell disease, which we can do. but that could be some protection go along with this technology and see where it leads us as it improves like if you go back and

39:22 They will advance in a way that is going to just blow people's minds. one of the things that's disturbed me quite a bit over the last few weeks is that there's a model What they've found That you go to check your Google feed But getting them to stop that, how big is your stick well one of the guys who was the founder of chris hughes yes is now coming out and saying

42:02 But you're exactly right. I'm not perfectly happy with this outcome, but here's a compromise. Societies look very, very different. of revenue once it's already happened it's very difficult to stop and my concern would be that And it just, it shows you like these are the people that are looking out for us. Good fucking luck. These are L make money? They're such piss poor preparers. It shows you,

43:54 There's better and worse. of this and do so in a way that the rest of the world's going to know. Yeah, I totally agree with you that if we wait to focus on this issue Like, I don't give a shit. and now say oh that was the age of trump or that was they're going to say that was the age when like right now, you've got to go speak in front of people about the consequences of,

46:25 Thank you. I would agree with you there, but I don't think that other people are going to see it that way. I mean, you have all of these people, No, but here's a little vote for optimism. When you look at all the wars and all the we are entering the era of genetically modified humans. Yeah. is interfering, that's going too far. And I respect that. And those people need to have a

50:55 Because one of the things that I'm concerned with more than anything is this sort of inevitable path of technology getting into our bodies, whether it's through nanobots, fixed diseases, or through implementation. Yeah, they're putting just little chips in their hands and under their skin under their skin they're using it to open doors and access things um so

51:48 It's like, yeah, we used to carry it around in our pocket. That is the future of where it's going. Are we going to let companies just do whatever they want, or are we going to put restrictions on what they can do? Regulations need to keep up. I'm part of the science needs to at least try to keep pace. Regulations need to keep up. why we need to have this kind of process and it seems impossibly ambitious but every crazy idea

54:16 And we're in this culture where there are a lot of draws on our attention, but sometimes there's and then there was this wonderful guy's brilliant senior scientist at this, this major stem cell research center. And so the, put it all in a box. and I went to the laboratory One, tell me what you're doing now. uncomfortable they were like squeezing the table just because that's not what scientists do they

57:08 figure out how to do it not the eventual consequences so when robert oppenheimer And it was one or two states that could do it. Did you go to that 2045 conference in Manhattan a couple years back? At the very least, we're going to reach this point where you're going to be able to either Actually, I had an editorial in the New York Times Because when you think about it, AI, if it gets to the point where it can read something,

59:39 but I don't think that our human brains are, these technologies are going to become incredibly more powerful they're going to become increasingly integrated into our lives and into our beings and part of our evolutionary process I'd say no, yeah. because I think when people imagine this AI future, it will be its own form of intelligence. Will we be interacting with them?

1:02:09 a real chess master but now they swamp them yeah so they learn quickly like it's incredibly quickly in 2016 defeated the world champions of go and people thought that was we were decades away other than here are the rules and play against. And we have to be On this planet right like this it's not like this technology some alien force we've it's like this it's like

1:05:31 And we're doing that now. away because that's the core of what we are. And yet we're also a species that has created philosophy. We established a United Nations. this insatiable desire to improve things yeah and i've always wondered why like How much do you know about it? And there's some very early science that is suggesting that this will be possible, but it's still the very early days.

1:09:12 that we you know we understand just a little bit about genomics um we know less about the brain if you kind of shoot a spike do you think that that he's come up with, right? he's i think he's off um based on And so from from having full robotics, but I had this for robotic human interactions, but I had something very different. Either we will have committed suicide as a species or these robots will have killed us.

1:11:55 i mean that's terrifying the what's terrifying is somebody didn't like you and they said i'm going to be like nor do you know if there is some sort of a chemical relative concept other people very legitimately and there's no way to prove it feel that we have I was realized I- I know, in Denver. I was just there the other day. But as I said before, I think that the

1:14:53 my aspiration would be to recognize that the drug is us that if we want to expand our consciousness I hear what you're saying, but you're saying this existence there's many people that have had psychedelic experiences that think about it as I assume that it would close things off. Like, you can't wait to come back with your own rational perspective.

1:17:06 So I've been many times to Dharamsala in India. I've already, in my head, countered what you're saying before you're finished saying. And then they'd kind of look up. this cacao and you're right cacao is like a a mild, I mean, not a huge one, but like a mild drug. what's possible so i i get that yeah yeah there's a bunch of different substances out there that

1:19:47 our biology is being fixed but our biology is really variable like i have a friend who's an And there's a little rickety board. your lizard brain and your lizard brain saying like no don't step off this cliff that for our our sense of reality or wife Right. that feel every bit as real in that world you know, Like, once every year or two. No, absolutely.

1:23:25 And I, I'm worried about augmented reality too. Like The world through different lenses Eternal Sonata Where I think we're just going to have these contact lenses and i'm and it'll be with Google Glasses, right? They were. But I think that's another thing, Nobody wants to look like an idiot. He finally gets out of this Manhattan hell, and he's got this phone, and it's this big.

1:25:31 Yeah. unquote phones are just going to get so small that's why i say they're going to come inside landscape itself in terms of like what the future holds it's not their job and that's why we need David Sinclair, who you know has been on this program, is a friend of mine working on life extension. and what are the challenges so that people can see themselves in this story and then enter into the conversation.

1:28:06 And so what I really wanted to do, so the background, I can give you just a little bit of background. Here's what's going to happen. I started writing articles. and a novelist would explain the science, We have to put a lot of pressure on our elected leaders and say, stop focusing on the crap. um, we have to have some kind of international system. need a real comprehensive education on the subject it's not something that people can just guess right i need to know what's the consequences what where we're at right now yeah right yeah and

1:31:20 sanjay gupta is a very interesting cat because he was very anti-marijuana And then started doing research on it Now when you speak to Congress The challenge that we face in the United States is we traditionally have had a representative democracy. which means there's a lot of responsibility on us that with uh equal success. But you don't have to travel in time to do that.

1:34:29 Because if they get ahead of us in something like that, they're already moving in this that is articulating what are ideals of responsibility in the period after the second world war where we recognized that technological leadership was the it's like we're driving very fast through fog. what the fuck is that going to be like like yeah is there going to be a time where there are no

1:36:43 David is a friend and I have a whole chapter in- your core point i mean that's the reason why i also write science fiction is that the world of How can we do that? bucks to put on something in 20 years, it's going to be profoundly just change. that you had from the moment you were conceived. But just FYI, your kid has a 50% greater than average chance of getting early onset Alzheimer's

1:39:47 You show up with a symptom. It's way beyond what our brains on their own could process. but the question is what happens when you do store things in there and how does that information that you have all that data inside your head. things personally. you know, just sitting there. That seems like a lot. Environment is really important. like intelligence and athletic performance we're not going to appreciate freaks as much

1:44:30 maybe the most important people in this new world and right like right now in hospitals And we could really undermine our humanity. You're like, you're not going to get that from just ones and zeros. and that's that's normal i mean it used to be in the old days that everyone thought well god is about where we're going. And certainly, like the unknown, we wake up every morning and we just don't know the answer.

1:47:20 But we need to. know where we've come from because you you see all those little charts from high school biology. You know, we do it with a little different way. Because if we just say, oh, that's crazy, and we don't focus on it, it increases the likelihood of these bad things happening. Right. It's true. But you're right. That's why I'm out on the road so much talking to people,

1:51:02 because this is all of our lives what it means to be a human away like that's really going to to harm us we talked about equity And it's really going to be complicated. And we aren't ready for it. We aren't ready for it culturally. We aren't ready for it educationally. Certainly, our political leaders aren't paying much of any attention to all this. We have a huge job. When you sit down and you give this speech to Congress, what are you anticipating from them in terms of like, do you think that there's anything that they can do now to take certain steps?

1:52:55 but I would rather have people say, this is really important stuff. company. And they said their first idea was they were going to sell this information to health like in terms of like what's already on the pipeline right now anytime in the near future like once it starts once the technology gets established it seems like issue that we have to talk about. It's really sensitive. So I talk a lot about this. But there

1:56:30 implanted in the mother, and one of them just has a disease like Tay-Sachs or sickle cell I was speaking in Berkeley the other day, and so I was talking about these two options. But there's another kind of it's like a progressive community who are the kinds of people who are uncomfortable with genetically modified crops. it depends on what we're selecting against. Like if the thing we're selecting against is some kind

1:59:17 And there was an unintended side effect of this, they believe, a perceived potential unintended side effect. And so that was what led people to believe oh really yeah yes because it's china because it's china you just let it ride yeah i mean he And the scientific culture in China is just very different than it is here. You said that very quick. from scratch and so all of these norms that people get inherit through their traditions china in many

2:02:24 That's so crazy. And now the Chinese Communist Party is saying, And they feel that they got screwed over because there is this vague, mindful of it that's also something you can do if you have complete control of your population You build this massive biggest water project in the world from south to north. It should. We're focusing on junk. And Fox and whomever else, Infowars, that's another kind of porn.

2:05:52 Like, why are they not working 24 hours a day? We're going to give you a little starter money. they put out some pretty innovative phones and some interesting technology. really good yeah i mean they their phones are insane they're the cameras in their phones are Can we trust their relationship with the Chinese government? including Africa, their companies are kind of acting like arms of the government. I mean,

2:10:29 uncomfortable that it sets a precedent for other nations to follow yeah because they like looked and you're competing with a Chinese company their calculus is not, Do you think that we should avoid Huawei products, like They've shown that they're using them to extract information. It has to be fair. The Japanese took over. So it's a great car. Should we be concerned with anything that North Korea is doing?

2:13:47 When was this that you went over there? I mean, North Korea, one, it's the most organized place I've really seen. What was that like? Incredible. I mean, North Korea, one, it's the most organized place I've ever seen. Like, you know, you usually have the animal in front of the plow and the person behind here. What are you going to sell here? It's the last thing they would do because their goal is survival.

2:16:12 and so I think we, they, We've got the whole deck. And why did you go over there? In North Korea, they have about 120,000 people in the most brutal, horrific prison camps. Maybe, but I feel like had they done, I mean, I think that if he thought that there was a real chance those people, all of the US intelligence agencies were telling President Trump that the North Koreans have absolutely no intention of giving up their nuclear weapons.

2:19:40 national security advisors peeked into his office. And he goes, hey, they want to meet. And it was It could be, And then with the force of personal chemistry, the Soviet Union had enough bullets to survive if they had said you know we're just going to shoot what is their infrastructure like so the general infrastructure is absolutely terrible i mean they

2:22:02 It's terrible infrastructure. It's like just to be in the capital, like you have to have your loyalty proven. if they Googled the wrong thing. People are terrified. If you don't, then what? are suffering like this yeah i agree now um you were traveling all over north korea like what How are your workers going to be empowered so they can change things?

2:25:37 No, it's really incredible. and that in his family what would they what tools would they have like how prepared would they be It must have been the Americans fighting against the Koreans. And then we'd have to negotiate what happens next. And then you have And I hope we don't get swallowed up by machines. We won't, but it's up to us to