Opus 2025-296: Michael and Zuby

I just finished listening to a podcast from about a year ago, where a man named Zuby interviewed Michael Shellenberger.  It was interesting and full of surprises.  It also contains some clarification.

I’ve never listened to one of the Zuby’s podcasts before.  I was very impressed with him.  He asked intelligent questions, questions that were not easy to answer, and had the potential of embarrassing his guest.  He still asked them.

With Shellenberger I have very mixed emotions.  I have listened to him before.  I think I read one of his books.  At times he seems to be just a left wing clone.  At other times he seemed to actually have his brain turned on.  It was interesting that Zuby noticed this, and at one point when Shellenberger had listed a bunch of positions that had drawn him to the left, Zuby pointed out they were actually positions of the right.  Shallenberger gave a somewhat embarrassed laughed and acknowledged the point.  All I could do a scratch my head.  Knowing he was being deceptive did not keep him from being deceptive.  For instance, he said that one of the things that drew him up to the left was their encouragement of free speech and rejection of censorship.  I know, I hear you screaming.  When it was pointed out that that is a position of the conservatives today he gave some mumbo-jumbo about how that used to be different.  Now I am older than he is and I don’t remember a time when it was different.  Since I was not raised in a liberal family maybe I was not paying attention.

It became clear that he lived in a mysterious La La Land that time had forgotten.  I came to the conclusion that Shellenberger was a liberal at heart but a conservative in the thinking part of his brain.  It left me, wondering whether reading his books would be worthwhile.  If he is so confused, how can I accept his logic or his principles.

It’s a good thing the world doesn’t depend on me and my ideas of right and wrong.

homo unius libri