38: Who is John Galt? Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand

“If you saw Atlas, the giant who holds the world on his shoulders, if you saw that he stood, blood running down his chest, his knees buckling, his arms trembling but still trying to hold the world aloft with the last of his strength, and the greater his effort the heavier the world bore down on his shoulders—what would you tell him to do?” “I . . . don’t know. What . . . could he do? What would you tell him?” “To shrug.”

In this episode of Made You Think, Neil and Nat discuss Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand, a piece of philosophy disguised as a novel. Probably the 10th longest book in Latin language, Atlas Shrugged is a controversial, polarizing book that attacks Socialism, references Postmodernism and develops Objectivism, Rand’s philosophical system.

So you think that money is the root of all evil?” said Francisco d’Anconia. “Have you ever asked what is the root of money? Money is a tool of exchange, which can’t exist unless there are goods produced and men able to produce them. Money is the material shape of the principle that men who wish to deal with one another must deal by trade and give value for value. Money is not the tool of the moochers, who claim your product by tears, or of the looters, who take it from you by force. Money is made possible only by the men who produce. Is this what you consider evil?

We cover a wide range of topics, including:

• Money as the root of all evil or source of all good
• Why academics and politicians see successful businessmen with distrust
• Wealthy kids arguing for socialism
• The truth about law (spoiler: you are not obliged to obey it)
• A 3 hour long discourse
• Writing sex scenes

And much more. Please enjoy, and be sure to grab a copy of Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand!

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out our episode on Sovereign Individual by James Dale Davidson, a book that foresee how governments will react with new tech, as well as our episodes on Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari (part 1 & part 2), a book about the power of myths and humans collaborating for a greater outcome.

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Links from the Episode Mentioned in the show

• Ford [11:11]
• Delta [11:11]
• American Airlines [11:11]
• Cup & Leaf – Nat's Tea Project [24:05]
• Effective Altruism [32:03]
• CMU [33:09]
• Tony Robbins on the Tim Ferriss Show [34:22]
• UBI – Universal Basic Income [35:52]
• Crypto episode [36:48]
• Patreon [37:30]
• Drizly and Minibar [42:56]
• AirBnB [44:09]
• Uber [45:32]
• IRS [46:25]
• Neil Soni on Nat Chat [55:30]
• Harari on UBI [56:33]
• Al-Qaida [1:02:40]
• ISIS [1:02:40]
• Amazon [1:05:02]
• NASA [1:06:16]
• SpaceX [1:06:16]
• Boeing [1:05:40]
• Voldemort Effect [1:15:17]

Books mentioned

• Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
• Harry Potter [6:49]
• Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari [20:47] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode part 1 & part 2)
• Money Master the Game by Tony Robbins [34:22]
• Sovereign Individual [36:48] (Nat’s notes) (book episode)
• Finite and Infinite Games [41:55] (Nat’s Notes) (book episode)
• Homo Deus by Yuval Harari [42:44] (book episode)
• The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand [1:17:59]

People mentioned

• Ayn Rand
• List of Atlas Shrugged characters
  • Francisco d’Anconia
  • Hank Rearden
  • Dagny Taggart
  • John Galt
• Plato [5:10]
• Socrates [5:20]
• Tony Robbins [34:22]
• Peter Thiel [48:30]
• Aristotle [50:40]
• Ron Paul [1:09:23]
• Nathaniel Brandon [1:17:02]
• Leonard Peikoff [1:17:45]
• Simone de Beauvoir [1:21:07]

Show Topics

6:55 – The structure of the book is an interwoven of essays spoken by the characters. Re-reading the book may help understand better the concepts.

9:05 - The book starts with a parallel world set in the 50ties, with two kinds of people: the industrious productive ones running big infrastructure businesses of the Nation, and the socialists, government ones (described as parasites). The main plot is that the productive ones start disappearing, and the socialists intervene to try to keep the economy running and avoid collapsing.

13:19 – The idea is that the more one tries to control the economy, the worst it's going to get. The example of limiting book sales to 10k.

15:24 – Introducing the characters of Francisco d'Anconia and Hank Rearden. Money as the root of all evil. Criticism of money made by people that never understood how someone actually makes money.

19:00 – Tangent. Most of the critiques to money as the origin of all evil originates between academics or congressman, people that project their experiences "playing politics" and assume businessmen are filthy rich because of a more aggressive political game.

21:11 – Examples of activities that make money without creating value. High frequency trading, hardcore rent seeking. The money test, or how to know if you are effectively creating value. Feeling guilty when asking money, cutting through bullshit.

25:05 – Counter-argument: money as the source of all good. Money allows us to cooperate.

29:47 – We don't see that m