#419 — "More From Sam": Elon vs. Trump, Religion, Jordan Peterson, & Rapid Fire Questions

Sam hopped back on with his manager and business partner, Jaron Lowenstein, to talk about current events and answer some of the questions you all submitted on Substack. This episode was originally recorded on June 4th, but in light of today's events, Sam and Jaron recorded an additional segment (on June 5) about the latest news on Trump and Musk's fallout, which is included at the end of this episode. They also discuss the real results of DOGE, the Big Beautiful Bill, Jordan Peterson, the role of religion in modern society, and other topics. Produced by Griffin Katz

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:06Sam Harris?

  Welcome to the Making Sense Podcast. This is Sam Harris. Just a note to say that if you're hearing this, you're not currently on our subscriber feed, and will only be hearing the first part of this conversation. In order to access full episodes of the Making Sense Podcast, you'll need to subscribe at samharris.org. We don't run ads on the podcast, and therefore it's made possible entirely through the support of our subscribers. So if you enjoy what we're doing here, please consider becoming one.

• 0:36Speaker 01

  Hey, Sam. Thanks for coming in so quickly. We recorded an episode yesterday that was about to come out, and we discussed Trump and Musk, and in light of today's events, we decided to jump back in here. So thanks for jumping in so quickly.

• 0:48Sam Harris?

  Yeah, a few things have happened. So I guess we're going to record an addendum now and then tack that on to the back of the episode that was destined to arrive today.

• 0:56Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 0:57Sam Harris?

  Yeah.

• 1:02Speaker 01

  Okay, we're back. Hey, Sam, how are you?

• 1:05Sam Harris?

  Hey, good to see you.

• 1:06Speaker 01

  Good to see you, too. Okay, we have a lot to get to today, but...

• 1:09Sam Harris?

  What's happening?

• 1:10Speaker 01

  Well, just a quick housekeeping before we do. I need to clarify some things. Many of...this isn't for you, this is for the audience. Many in the audience have already picked up on this, but again, just to clarify, the goal of this series is more from Sam on current events more often. My job here is to draw more energy out of Sam to surface his ideas in a format that's a little looser than the podcast. So the tone will be more casual, if the pacing is faster, that's all intentional. I'll sometimes play devil's advocate and even exaggerate positions, whatever it takes to keep things moving. None of this is about me, so don't get caught up on what you think my positions actually are.

• 1:46Sam Harris?

  This is your response to some hate mail?

• 1:48Speaker 01

  Well, this is just to clarify. I think a lot of people...most people got it, but some people were confused. And, you know, and one of the things...one of the reasons why we didn't bring on the another academic or intellectual is that they would show up with their own agenda, and that's not what we wanted here. We wanted to really push you around, and so this will feel different from the polished conversations and essays that the audience is used to. Again, that's intentional, and this series is not meant to be a replacement for anything. So all those wanting more science podcasts, those are still happening. It's simply in addition to what we're already doing, or what you're already doing, Sam. And lastly, it's a work in progress, so who knows where this still may go? I hope that helps.

• 2:25Sam Harris?

  Well, it is a thankless job, so thank you for it.

• 2:28Speaker 01

  Well, thank you for making the time for us because I do think that many in the audience do enjoy hearing more from you. And so we're going to do more of these as long as that is the case. All right. Yesterday, Elon Musk tweeted, I'm sorry, but I just can't stand it anymore. This massive outrageous pork filled congressional spending bill is disgusting abomination. Shame on those who voted for it. You know, you did wrong. You know it. Any thoughts there, Sam?

• 2:52Sam Harris?

  The first thing I noticed is the phrase anymore, right? So like, just how long has he been putting up with this stupidity and incompetence that he can now no longer stand? I mean, he obviously, he's been shilling for this administration to a degree that would be impossible to exaggerate. On his own account, he loves Donald Trump more than any, as much as any straight man can love another man. Let's see how long that lasts.

• 3:14Speaker 01

  And Trump was right about everything, too.

• 3:15Sam Harris?

  Yeah, Trump was right about everything. He has shown nothing but contempt for anyone who would take the opposite side of that debate to any degree. I mean, I don't know what to, how to interpret his utterances at this point. The man seems so dysregulated. I mean, having watched that press conference last week, or at least long sections of it, something's obviously not right with him psychologically.

• 3:41Speaker 01

  Right. Well, he had apparently a phone call with Speaker Mike Johnson on Monday, and he said that Elon Musk seemed to understand the virtues of the legislation. And he was very disappointed and surprised to hear him come out, I guess, a couple of days later.

• 3:55Sam Harris?

  Yeah. So I think Elon is capable of surprising a lot of people, it seems. He's one person, one moment, another person, the next. I certainly have experienced that surprise over a longer time course.

• 4:08Speaker 01

  Does it not concern you that he couldn't make a real dent in reducing the debt? I mean, it looks like Trump's new bill could add 2.4 billion to the debt. And I mean, Elon, for all of his, all the stuff you say about him, he's obviously quite gifted in some areas. And the fact that he just took a wrecking ball and still ended up, I mean, just in some accounts, adding more to the debt.

• 4:32Sam Harris?

  Yeah, I mean, we're going to find out more about what Doge actually accomplished. I think at this point, it's pretty easy to see that the main thing it accomplished was chaos and the reduction of morale among otherwise well intentioned and competent people in our government. And colossal brand damage for Elon and his companies, right? And that that's the main effect. Yes, he found some waste and abuse presumably. But I think that the lesson that people are drawing now is that there's not nearly as much fraud or waste or abuse to be found in in government spending as many of us would expect. You know, Elon claimed he was going to find 2 trillion. Uh, then he knocked that down to 1 trillion.

• 5:16Sam Harris?

  He claims to have found something like 150 or 170 billion. I think estimates are that it's much less than that. And that, you know, perversely, you know, all of this chaos may have in fact added cost to the government. I mean, it's been a disaster and it should be viewed as a disaster. I'm sure right of center, they still imagine great things were accomplished because of, you know, the level of lying, you know, frankly, that Elon and Trump perpetrated. I mean, you know, they they stood before the country and said that, you know, millions of people are receiving social security checks and they're and they're 100, 150 years old or, you know, otherwise dead. That's just not true, right? They lied about that. Trump said it, I think, in his State of the Union, lying about that. I'm sure Elon is still lying about that.

• 6:00Sam Harris?

  And this is just that sits atop a long list of lies. It's just the truth of the matter, per, you know, Matt Iglesias's Substack article this morning, is that, you know, social security just had some weird practice of keeping lots of of void accounts still on the books for some data keeping, you know, bureaucratic principle that I don't understand. But no one was getting these checks and everyone knew over there that no one was getting these checks. And, you know, the Doge team just didn't know how to interpret what they saw there. And they quite recklessly announced to the world that millions of people were getting paid. Uh, and that's just, everything you hear about what they were up to suggests a level

• 6:43Sam Harris?

  of callousness and contempt and recklessness that is, um, was like, that those moods were their guiding principle. And again, it's, it remains to be seen whether the real goal was efficiency and not just the demoralization of.

• 7:00Sam Harris?

  You know, the so-called deep state, right? I mean, that certainly that has been announced by people like Russell Vogt that they're like, you know, the, the goal is to have everyone working for the government get up in the morning and feel nothing but depression and terror or something, you know, that was, that's not the verbatim quote, but pretty close, like they, just to be afraid to come into work because of how fucking awful their lives are. Do we really want an approach to government that maximizes for that attitude?

• 7:24Speaker 01

  You know, given this fallout, both of these men are two of the most powerful people in the world and they have massive platforms and they're petulant and they're babies and they're bullies. How do you feel about what's, what could happen between the two of them?

• 7:36Sam Harris?

  I hope they collide appropriately and, and we get to see in the scattering of controversy, their true characters at this point. I mean, I just think our society has to, our culture politically and, and elsewhere has to lose its patience with failures of integrity and dishonesty. Above all, we should want competence and integrity from the people who purport to be guiding our society towards some end, right? And, and in so far as you, people are revealed to be liars and crooks and double dealers and just fatally compromised by their own conflicts of interest, you know, just avaricious

• 8:16Sam Harris?

  lunatics of the sort that we see in Trump and company, you know, his rapacious family that's just grifting, you know, is on everything that can be put within arms reach. We should lose our patience for this. I mean, this is disgusting, right? It's like, we have to feel a capacity for moral revulsion over this sort of stuff. This is not normal. This is not, much less good. And how we get to the point where we all just vomit in unison, I don't know, but I mean, we, we have to get there.

• 8:46Speaker 01

  Yeah. Well, I mean, is it possible that we needed a Trump or a Musk type or both of them in Doge to begin to pop the hood?

• 8:54Sam Harris?

  To, no, to realize how bad Trump and Musk and Doge are?

• 8:58Speaker 01

  No, no, no, no, no. To realize, to start taking the debt seriously. I mean, do you really think if Kamala Harris was elected, we'd be doing that? Do you think there'd be an abundance movement without Trump? I mean, is there some credit that goes there?

• 9:09Sam Harris?

  I may have to say interesting question, but I mean, basically you're saying that any kind of pendulum swing back to sanity can be credited to just how bad things have gotten. Well, okay, but like, do we have to rush toward the cliff in order to finally, you know, to be safe? I mean, no, I think.

• 9:27Speaker 01

  No, I'm saying we were rushing toward the cliff. The, no one was addressing.

• 9:31Sam Harris?

  We're still rushing toward the cliff. I mean, we, we still haven't figured out an appropriate response to the debt.

• 9:37Speaker 01

  Okay, but the last administration wasn't focused on, on that.

• 9:41Sam Harris?

  No, and then nor is this one, apparently, right? Is adding trillions.

• 9:44Speaker 01

  Well, this one is at least pretending to.

• 9:46Sam Harris?

  No, but it's not even pretending to at this point. That's why Elon can't stand it anymore. You know, anymore is probably means the last 30 seconds, but he can't stand it anymore. This is an abomination, this bill on his account.

• 9:56Speaker 01

  I'm going to shift gears. Yeah, thank you for that. I know you're going on Jordan Peterson's podcast soon, so I don't want to talk about him for a moment. He's been credited for bringing so many people back to Christianity 2.0, more of the, I guess, live and let live Christians versus the 1980s, or I guess the 1480s for that matter. I think there are a number of reasons why Jordan has been so effective here, and I want to come back to him in a moment. But coinciding with his efforts is a massive loneliness epidemic, and it's very real. Given your concerns with religion and the current inability for any other organizations to recapitulate a communal experience in quite the same way religion has been able to, do you feel differently now about people finding their way back to faith? You know, until AI, as you said, maybe could, you know, dream up something that solves all of these concerns, isn't religion a better alternative for some people?

• 10:41Sam Harris?

  Well, I don't know. I mean, it might be, I mean, it's, if you caveat it that way, I think I can probably say, yes, it might be a better alternative for some people. But, you know, prison is a good alternative for some people. I mean, it's just, is it the best alternative? For any person, I doubt it, right? I mean, just, you know, Christianity, if we could edit the homophobia out of Christianity, if we could edit the expectation that-

• 11:08Speaker 01

  What they have. I mean, a lot of new, that's what I'm saying, 2.0.

• 11:11Sam Harris?

  Well, no, no, but like really edit it so that it made absolutely no sense to be homophobic. Like there's no recourse to the teachings that could get you homophobia.

• 11:18Speaker 01

  Okay, but there are a lot of people that are looking away that these days and just don't pay attention to that. They're ignoring that. So I think there is a new version of it and people who are looking for purpose and community, after what so many people have seen social media do, it's just ripped society apart and it's also just made people feel so alone, or it's at least contributed, I believe, in a big way. Why not encourage people, as Jordan has, to find faith? And I'm sure there's other reasons there as well, but for purpose and community. I mean, I don't necessarily understand the Catholicism part, feels very ritualistic. I would imagine people would look for something a little bit more lightweight for their connectivity, but I kind of get why people are doing it. You know, as somebody who was a former practicing

• 12:01Speaker 01

  Jew, as I've said this before, I really miss community and there's just nothing that's replaced that for me.

• 12:08Sam Harris?

  Yeah. Well, I mean, I do think that's a void and we need to fill it, but the question is, can we fill it with something better and more reasonable and not intrinsically divisive, not intellectually embarrassing, doesn't require any lies to oneself or to one's children?

• 12:27Speaker 01

  But I think this new brand of Christianity has minimized those sort of self lies.

• 12:31Sam Harris?

  But it hasn't really. I mean, listen, it takes me 15 seconds to drill down in a conversation with any Christian to get to the crazy part, right?

• 12:39Speaker 01

  Well, I mean, you're still going to hell, but I mean, there's still some benefit.

• 12:41Sam Harris?

  Yeah, I mean, there is no, if there is no crazy part, then it really isn't fulfilling. That's the thing, right? If there's no chewy center of superstition and otherworldliness and expectation of redemption after death.

• 12:55Sam Harris?

  There has to be some magic in there. Otherwise, we're just talking about, you know, who's going to bring the egg salad for the picnic. Right? I mean, it's like, can we figure out some other way to picnic? It's not just a tailgate. You're tailgating for God here. You're tailgating for eternity. And that's what makes it especially meaningful. Right? And Jordan doesn't disavow that. I mean, I don't know what I'm going to talk about with Jordan. It's been a very long time since we've spoken and I haven't really followed all of his kind of the vagaries of his.

• 13:24Speaker 01

  Well, did you see that clip of him going? Well, we're going to talk about that too in a second. Did you see that clip going around with him on the Jubilee podcast episode where?

• 13:32Sam Harris?

  I saw that it exists. I actually didn't watch. I think I saw, maybe I caught part of a clip, but I just decided to not pollute my brain with it in advance of my conversation with him. I just, I mean, I could see that there was some kind of consensus forming online that he had not acquitted himself well in those conversations. And.

• 13:50Speaker 01

  But do you not want to talk to him about that? I think it'd be very interesting to talk to him about it because he seemed very evasive there.

• 13:56Sam Harris?

  I didn't, oh, I just didn't want to prejudice my like, I can't imagine he wants to talk to me about it. Right? And I don't know what I can say to him. I mean, I, listen, I know how Jordan debates atheists because I've debated him. It would be unsurprising to me that if he stuck 20 atheists in a room with him, it wouldn't go very well. It's not like anyone on his side has good answers to the questions atheists pose. There are no good answers, right? I mean, the atheists, religious people are slow to recognize it, but they're standing on a, just a mountain of non sequiturs. And they, and they recognize it in other people's faith, right? I mean, no Christian is convinced by the reasoning of.

• 14:35Sam Harris?

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