Should We Have a Random-ocracy? With AJ Jacobs

[00:00:06] Should We Have a Random-ocracy Instead of a Democracy? And if you don't know what a random-ocracy is, it's actually fascinating. I'm gonna leave that as a cliffhanger. I talk with AJ Jacobs again about his upcoming book where he spends a year basically living the life of the Constitution.

[00:00:26] And he's done a deep dive on what every amendment and aspect of the Constitution means. He'll describe again what it means to live the life of the Constitution.

[00:00:35] But one thing he brought up which was fascinating and we discussed for quite a bit is the notion of a random-ocracy. And I'll let AJ describe what that is. At first, I thought this was ridiculous, but then it sounded intriguing to me.

[00:00:48] And I would love to know your opinion. You can tweet out at me at Jay Altucher. Please share this episode. And I'd love to hear as many opinions as possible on whether or not we should have a random-ocracy. So enjoy the episode. And he's not your average host.

[00:01:10] This is the James Altucher Show. Now let me ask you about... I'm curious about the Constitution. And well, first of all, one last thing on the puzzle thing. I have enough puzzle idea for you.

[00:01:28] I love doing these on YouTube, which is you play a sound like for one second and someone... It's like this... It's like there used to be a TV show named that tune. So like, right? Take Beatles songs and, you know, see...

[00:01:42] Okay, for five seconds how well someone does. Three seconds of a song. Can they name it one second of a song? We did this on this podcast, actually. Oh, you did? It was fun. Who do you play with? Who do you... Who did it?

[00:01:53] Just Jay, Robin and me did it. Oh, well, yeah, we actually have similar. We have one which named that supervillain evil laugh. So we play a laugh and you have to figure out what evil... We had one where it was named that, yeah.

[00:02:07] So there are all these songs with recognizable, yes, like the Beatles. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So we played name. So yeah, I love... That's one thing that I love the creativity of doing puzzles in audio form. And that is one thing that I've been to say this upfront.

[00:02:27] I think of you every day because every day, in my morning routine, after I do my puzzles, I spend 15 minutes brainstorming ideas, 98% of which suck and we'll never see the light of day. But I got that from you and... And it's key, right?

[00:02:47] Because A, you have to exercise that idea muscle. If this was the first day you sat down doing it, it would be really hard to even come up with ideas. Now you can come up with ideas and it's okay that some are bad,

[00:02:58] some are good because you know you're abundant with ideas. Yeah, it has definitely made my life better. Do you still use the waiter pad? I do, yeah, or I'll use whatever pad or piece of paper. I don't have as many waiter pads right now,

[00:03:11] but like if I'm at a hotel, I'll use the pad next to the phone. Like I'll take whatever is around. I do actually find writing it by hand makes the ideas flow more. Yeah, it's the only time I ever hand write is when I'm writing ideas down.

[00:03:30] Well you know, for my constitution book, I wrote a lot by hand. I mean, I have a quill ink. I can get it out now for you. I've been like, you know, a goose quill and an ink.

[00:03:42] Are you only doing like, are you only writing with the quill? Like you know how when you were living by the Bible, you only were doing things like if you did something that wasn't by the Bible, it wasn't good.

[00:03:52] Like you had it stick to the Bible 24 hours a day. So you're only writing with a quill? Well, I am trying to abide by the Constitution 24 hours a day, but there is nothing in the Constitution that says, you know, you have to write with a quill.

[00:04:05] So there's sort of two parts to the project. One is actually expressing my rights in a originalist way. And then the second part is sort of living as if I were in 1789. So I do do a lot of writing with quill. Sometimes I'll cheat and write with quill,

[00:04:21] take a picture and then text it to someone. So I sort of like combine the two. But let me ask you a question. What's what do you think is the hardest? What do you think is one thing people don't truly understand about the Constitution?

[00:04:35] Well, I will say this. I will get yelled at very, very loudly and angrily by my publisher if I talk too much about it. But let me just give you one and then that'll be a teaser on who's bush for when I come back.

[00:04:51] Well, one thing is I think you have on one side, you have people saying the Constitution is, you know, it's perfect. It's flawless. It was, you know, written by these gods. And then on the other side, you have people who say that it is just, you know,

[00:05:08] it is a terrible document that it was designed to keep oppression and other horrible things happening. And I think both are true. I think it can be both at the same time that there is a strain in the Constitution

[00:05:25] that is wonderful and democratic and about the common good. There is also a strain in the Constitution that is about making sure the elite stay the elite. So it is almost like Schrodinger's cat there. You know, it is two things at once.

[00:05:40] So the key is to focus on the good part and try to fulfill that, the democratic part of the Constitution as opposed to the other part. But do you think though the elitist part has been trending over the centuries towards non-elitist?

[00:05:56] So for instance, the idea that initially the Senate, a senator was elected by their legislature as opposed to the population of the state. Now, of course, there was that change. There was an amendment to change that and senators are elected by the people,

[00:06:11] not just the elite in the legislature. I would say that is the big story that we, the people initially meant. We, the white, wealthy educated people. And we have been, the fight over the centuries has been to try to expand that to women,

[00:06:29] to black people, to people who are 18. The voting age used to be 21. So that has been a long fight and it continues. But there are elements. It's a complicated document. I feel that when I did the Bible, people would say,

[00:06:50] Oh, the Bible says this, the Bible says that. And I'm like, well, parts of the Bible say that and parts of the Bible don't. Bible is complicated and I feel the same way about the Constitution.

[00:07:01] And you know, I know, I know you can't, I'll just ask one more thing because we'll definitely do a deep dive on the Constitution later. But what was the pamphlet about that you wrote in order to hand it out in order to demonstrate free speech?

[00:07:14] Well, that one, I was, I decided that Twitter, I think a lot of the founding fathers would be horrified by social media because it's so fast. They wanted ways to slow down our thinking as opposed to speed it up.

[00:07:31] So I decided instead of tweeting something or xing, whatever it is now, I would, I would write it with my quill pen on parchment paper and hand it out in Times Square. So I did. And I did, I did tweets on.

[00:07:47] So they were mini pamphlets is what I called them. So I did one about, I said like, among all types of voting methods, ranked choice voting is my number one favorite. There's something like that. All right. And, and I did a couple of others.

[00:08:07] And it was, I will say it was interesting to lock eyes with people as you were handing him out. As you're tweeting something that never happened. I was tweeting. Yeah. And I couldn't like say, you know, something incredibly horrible about, you know, you're, you're an idiot or whatever.

[00:08:25] Cause I was looking these people in the eyes. There's a reason why it's like the most important amendment of the constitution, this idea that you can't punish somebody for what they say and the reason they have to put that in there is because people

[00:08:53] were punishing people for what they said, particularly in other societies. So I wonder if maybe this is the only type of question I have, you know, that I, where I'm pushing at you. But like maybe you need to hand out something where most people

[00:09:10] are not going to agree with you and, and yet you have this right to free speech. Well, I will say yes. The idea of disagreeing with someone is great and that is totally American, but I was actually just reading the federalist

[00:09:28] papers and Hamilton wrote something that I loved and I'm going to botch the quote exactly, but it said something like no one was ever converted to a religion truly by iron and, and violence. I'll get the exact quote, but his idea was if you want to

[00:09:49] change someone's mind, do not go in attacking them. It's all about listening and making reasonable arguments and being thoughtful and seeing the world from different lenses. So that there was a lot that I think the founding fathers got wrong obviously slavery and but there were, but there were

[00:10:14] some things that they were very wise about and that is one of them. Like it's all about trying to have a reasonable civil debate. But like I wonder if you wrote a pamphlet which was reasonable and civil, but it was about a more controversial topic and

[00:10:32] obviously there's a whole spectrum of controversial out there, but let's just say you wrote a pamphlet that said nobody should it is it is useless to vote and because this is related to the Constitution and voting is part of the constitutional process argument right.

[00:10:51] So, but you can make an argument to not vote because like oh you're one vote among whatever it mean there's arguments on both sides and then it's interesting because because the thing is everybody says you have to vote if you want

[00:11:02] to have a voice but my whole thinking is the Constitution says I have a right to vote. But I don't have to vote. I also have a right not to vote. Well, I will say two things.

[00:11:11] One, I think the best things that I the things I like to read and which is why we did good or bad. It's all about nuances. So it's not I don't think you would ever actually say voting is useless.

[00:11:26] You would say there are pros and cons to voting here is why I maybe choose not to in this particular case and that is reasonable. That is something that I will listen to but if someone says a black and white thing that I'm going to tune it out.

[00:11:44] So I like nuance. I like yeah, that's interesting. You do like nuance. That's your books are about nuance. I love a nuance. I love and here's the second thing that I'll just mention is that you might be interested.

[00:11:58] I have a little section on this in the book and then I can't talk about it anymore but there are people some very smart people who want to abolish voting and you think that is the craziest least democratic. That's the definition of tyranny. How would you like anybody?

[00:12:17] Well, there you go. Their argument is a random democracy. It's like the jury pool. You choose your governor, your senator, your mayor randomly. So you have to pass a certain civil test. So you have to like, you know, you got a few thousand people

[00:12:39] who pass the test that they know enough that they're reasonable and then once it goes there, it becomes random. It's a lottery and the idea is what Adam Grant who I'm sure you've had on the show. Oh yeah, many times.

[00:12:56] He wrote about this in the New York Times and he endorses it. There's a Yale political science professor who endorses it. It's been tried a tiny bit in Iceland and France in very small ways but it's a very interesting idea because

[00:13:10] it's not the worst idea I've ever heard. No, it is not the one thing. One argument for it is that the studies show the people who are attracted to politics have the dark triad. They are narcissistic sociopathic and I forget the other one but Machiavellian.

[00:13:29] So they are not, that is who was attracted to running but if you do it as a random democracy you're gonna get people who are much lower on that scale perhaps. So it's an interesting idea. It's dangerous. I don't really, I don't want it to become

[00:13:47] a random democracy tomorrow but- I mean the danger is is that then the lifelong government workers would get a lot more power. Well one solution and I don't wanna get into too much detail but one solution is you get a lifelong pension.

[00:14:04] So you are the senator or your congressman for five years and then that's it, you're not allowed to work anymore because otherwise you would have to, you could be corrupted while you're in office. So it's almost like you're sacrificing. You're doing this one thing, that's it.

[00:14:26] You get a lifelong pension, a life of leisure afterwards and that's your duty to country. And that's very interesting but what I was saying though is let's say you get the job as secretary of state. Like, oh, I guess that's not an elected position

[00:14:44] so that you would still have to appoint someone. Like let's say I randomly was picked to be president. You'd still have to appoint someone to be secretary of state. Well you could make that random too. You could get rid of appointments too, which may be a good idea.

[00:14:57] But at some point you need a layer of people who actually know what to do. Well that exactly, that's a big counter argument like expertise is this a terrible idea. And people who are the name of it is sortition.

[00:15:12] That's the fancy name but I just call it random democracy. The random democracy people say that actually having a lower level of expertise is not bad because they're more humble and they will ask actual experts and listen to them when they make decisions. Maybe if that's formalized,

[00:15:33] like there are councils of expertise out there that help the random people. And that has to change a lot too so that nobody, no one person in those councils could get too much power or influence. Right. I mean it's a, the interesting.

[00:15:51] I might have to switch my beliefs on this. Switch to a sortition. One thing I did love that this Yale professor said was, we are still basically using ideas from the 18th century. These 18th century people came up with some radical new ideas about representation

[00:16:11] and balance of powers. And we're 300, 250 years later we're still coasting on those. So maybe it's time. It makes sense for the Senate and Congress because in general, particularly Congress like in general the average Congress person does not have a lot of expertise before they enter Congress.

[00:16:29] They're just supposed to vote based on the beliefs ideally of their constituency, their district. But I guess like for things like foreign policy it's useful to have a long term, the idea is it's useful to have a long term Congressman but maybe it's not like who's to say?

[00:16:46] Well, I would be terrified if this actually came to pass. I mean, I think it'd be interesting to start like in a tiny, tiny way, like one council person from a town in North Dakota is selected by lottery. Then we see what happens.

[00:17:01] But this is not something I wanna see ever in the next year. Like maybe in a hundred years when we've worked out the kinks, it'd be good to- But you know what it reminds me of though? Have you ever seen the Isaac Asimov story franchise?

[00:17:16] No, what's the idea? Okay, basically with polling today, obviously you don't have to poll everybody in the United States to know who's the likely winner for presidency. You have to poll enough people to be statistically significant. So maybe a few thousand people in every state

[00:17:36] like to know how each state's gonna go and then you figure out the electoral college. So they get polling, they master the art of polling so well that instead of a few thousand people then it became like just you just need a few hundred people

[00:17:49] to be statistically significant. Then you just need a dozen people. And then they figured out that you just need one person and the computer, like this is the beginning of mainframe computers. So they have this multi-vac computer figures out who is the average person in the U.S.

[00:18:09] And that person picks the president. Like that, you only need one vote to pick the president. That's a great idea. It kind of reminds me of the Nielsen's, which I think I have lost some power, but it was just crazy how much power these,

[00:18:26] I don't remember a few thousand people had over what millions of people saw on television. And my friend Joel Stein, who you might have had on the show who's hilarious, he once pitched a sitcom to one of the networks called The Nielsen's.

[00:18:45] And it would be about a Nielsen family and his theory was everyone who's a Nielsen family would watch the Nielsen's to see what it was like. So we would get 100 rating, 100 share. Everyone was a Nielsen. That is a brilliant idea.

[00:18:59] That is like, that's kind of like very life hackish. It is very life hackish. Yeah. Like it's a guarantee to have the fewest possible viewers but still get like the highest Nielsen ratings. It's true. You know what else I love about Nielsen's

[00:19:14] is that the moon landing only got a 93 share, meaning there were 7% of people in the world or in the United States who were like, yeah, let's see what else is on. Right. I'm so bored of this already. I honestly. Put it back to Wheel of Fortune. Yeah.

[00:19:34] I honestly think it was the three stooges is my memory. I could be totally fabricating that but I have a vague memory that that was the counter programming. That is fascinating. You can never please everyone. That is whenever I think about, oh, this guy, you know,

[00:19:51] said he hated the show or whatever. I'm like, you know what? Moon landing got a 93 share. You could never please everyone. That is fascinating. Well, AJ puzzles, constitution, writing. As usual, I can't wait to the next time you're on the podcast, please. When you finish this book

[00:20:10] and you come on a little more regularly, like okay, we'll do good or bad I want more puzzles. I want more constitution. I love this stuff. Are you kidding? Yeah, just give me one month and then I'm done because it has to close soon.

[00:20:21] They want it out very soon before the election. And then I'm yours and you come on mine. Oh yeah, definitely. And in order for it to get out, like people don't realize like you've been like right now we're 13 months to the election

[00:20:33] but you basically have to finish the book then it goes through six months of editorial then it's gotta be designed and interior designed and they have to send it out to all the bookstores and it takes 13 months from finishing for your book to come out.

[00:20:46] It's a super slow process still. And yeah, I don't know whether that's good or bad but I have to finish it by early November. Did we ever do a good or bad about using self-publishing versus traditional publishing? No, but I'd love to hear your thoughts on it.

[00:21:05] I know very little about self-publishing but I'd love to. We'll do that. The good thing about an AJ Jacobs book though being traditionally published is that it's in all the airport bookstores. Your books, you and Tucker Max and Malcolm Gladwell and John Grisham are reliably

[00:21:21] in all the airport bookstores. Well bless you for saying so. I do love seeing him there. Thank you James. Thank you so much AJ. So fun as always. Loved it.