How to Orange Pill Anyone with Daniel Batten | Bitcoin Infinity Show #190

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Daniel, welcome to the Bitcoin Infinity Show. Nice to have you here.

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Great to be here.

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You're one of the guests I've had on my wish list for a long time.

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We last saw each other in Amsterdam, if I'm not mistaken.

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That was after Madeira, right?

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Yeah. So we've been talking about doing this for a long time.

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But yeah, so for our listeners that do not know who you are,

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can you give us the TLDR on Daniel Batten, please?

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No problem. So I'm a climate tech investor. Before that, I was a technology entrepreneur

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and I was running two different climate tech funds. And at some point,

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I asked a question, which was a dangerous question, could we be doing more? And the answer was yes.

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And I realized that we were doing nothing about reducing methane emissions. We were doing nothing

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about using existing technologies better. And I thought, well, what if we had a focus on reducing

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methane emissions and we used an existing technology and that led us to bitcoin mining

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on landfills through a process of elimination and then started a fund and moved to costa rica

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to be at the hub of one of the places in the world where there's just massive leaks of methane from

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landfills everywhere and we have the chance to turn into a power and to do bitcoin mining with

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it because it's decentralized, it's cheap power. You're basically turning pollution into a really

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effective power source. And along the way, I just got interested in, oh, what is this thing called

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Bitcoin anyway? So I found out about Bitcoin mining before I found out about Bitcoin.

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And it was only through then subsequently talking to people like you and others and finding out more

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about Bitcoin that it got me curious. So it was really like a backdoor entry in a way to Bitcoin.

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but I just got absolutely fascinated by mining.

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Along that route, I also read a whole lot of information

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about mining from unreliable sources

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and then I was reading a lot of basically misinformation

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about Bitcoin mining at the same time.

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But because I was approaching it from first principles,

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it was relatively easy for me to tell,

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okay, this is correct.

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Bitcoin mining can accelerate the renewable transition,

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can mitigate methane, can stabilize grids,

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has all these amazing properties.

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And then I was reading things that would say the opposite.

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And I was saying, hang on, these just aren't anchored in facts at all.

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And so I started saying so.

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And that got more attention than I thought.

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And then before I knew it, I was giving talks and conferences and writing articles, debunking a lot of myths, but also promoting the real story about how Bitcoin mining is really a powerful force for utilizing human energy and resources just a lot better than we have done in the past.

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Oh, this angle is so super interesting to me because for a Bitcoiner, it's an odd one, but it really shouldn't be.

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But the misinformation you say is simply mind-blowing how much misinformation that has been spread about Bitcoin mining in particular.

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I mean, there's not at all as much FUD about the AI revolution now, for instance, that uses a lot more energy.

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But people want that because they want to generate silly cat videos on trampolines and cats on trampoline videos and stuff like that.

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And therefore, they're not annoyed with that for some odd reason.

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But when you're trying to revolutionize the monetary system, it's a different story.

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So the misinformation, I mean, I think most Bitcoiners, the circles I'm in with this Austrian economics angle and Capistan and all of that,

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we sort of, at least we feel we figured out why there's so much misinformation and we're very

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skeptical to anything a government says. And I wanted to pick your brain on climate science in

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general, because the way I see it, and I even had this in a talk, that there's like these different

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methodological approaches. And the talk was basically about how we shouldn't throw out the

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baby with the bathwater when we throw the science out the window. We shouldn't throw out science in

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general out the window. So what I said in the talk was something along the lines of, yes, the earth

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is getting warmer. The data on that is pretty clear. Whether humans are guilty or not of doing

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this is debatable. But what can be argued from a priori praxeological arguments is that it's

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absolutely a stupid idea to let politicians do something about it because they are useless at

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doing stuff about anything. They're always counterproductive. So I'd like to know your

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angle into this, like how much of climate science is actual science and how much of it has a

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political agenda behind it? How much is just human incentives, fear mongering and headlines

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settling and stuff like that? Yes. So I think there's two things going on here.

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And the first one is that if we look at how the renewable energy transition, for example,

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has been handled and some of the actions we've taken. So what's one action? One action was to

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close down all the nuclear facilities. In hindsight, not a great idea, let's say,

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as an understatement. In fact, it's taken us in the opposite direction where now we're using

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dirtier forms of coal and burning wood. So it's actually taken us backwards.

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So that's one thing. Now, you could say it was done for good reasons because it was

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in response to the Fukushima disaster. However, I think that what humans have a history of doing

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is kind of lurching from one side to the other. And so in response to that event, I actually met

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the guy I've talked multiple times to the person who coordinated the response effort from the

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American and the Japanese nuclear safety engineers to that and asked very specific questions.

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Of course, as you know, it's very hard to trust what you read anywhere, and often it's

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with an agenda.

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So I thought, well, what better way than to talk to the person who actually led that response

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effort?

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Very honorable guy, very smart guy, no agendas whatsoever.

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And he just told me, told it like it was.

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And he said, look, there was a huge amount of disinformation.

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people would say things such as we found these trace elements which could be traced back to the

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nuclear reactor in fukushima in california now that's technically true what wasn't said it was

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one part per quintillion and it was insignificant and so we had these stories that it was poisoning

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seaweed and all the rest of it which i myself got alarmed by back in the days when i used to be more

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trusting of what i read without scrutiny but then again it makes wonderful headlines but it didn't

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really relay the true picture. And he said, look, it was actually, it was a disaster. There were a

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whole lot of things that contributed at once, but the response to it, because it got so highly

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politicized and there was so much misinformation and fear, we ended up doing things which made no

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sense. So we didn't have a rational response. Should there have been a response to it? Yes.

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Should we evaluate things? Of course. But it was a really a knee-jerk reaction that took us in the

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opposite direction. Another example of where, and I want to be fair to politicians as well,

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So I want to cite one example where they have got things right, but I'm going to cite some areas where they haven't as well.

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Another area where they have not got things right is the incentivization and giving subsidies for renewable energy,

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where you're incentivizing the generation of energy, but you're not incentivizing the use of energy.

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So whether that do it meant that a whole lot of people were incentivized to set up wind or solar operations in different parts of the world

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where the power could not be effectively delivered back to the grid.

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So you had all these white elephants and it happened in Spain.

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It happened in Portugal.

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It happened in Darwin and Australia.

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It happened in Texas.

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It happened in Greece.

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It happened in Scotland.

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It happened all around the world that you just had these huge pockets of renewable energy that were just wasted.

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Now, I'm a great fan of renewable energy when it's used effectively and it's in the right place because it's a very cheap form of energy.

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the learning curve is coming down very rapidly so you can deploy very rapidly with very minimal cost

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it does have issues it has issues when you cannot transport that power it has issues because it

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doesn't have spinning reserve capacity which means that if there's a there's a freak event

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it doesn't have the same resilience to be able to power down generally which means you've got to

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have things like bitcoin mining to counterbalance that and it has issues with with variability

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Those issues have been kind of plastered over as if you're not allowed to say, look, it does have these drawbacks.

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It has positives, but you've got to look at it in totality.

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And what's been a disappointment has been that, again, it's been very highly politicized, whether you're either pro-fossil fuel or pro-renewable, but you can't look at a grid and say, well, what's the goal?

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What are we really trying to achieve here?

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So that's another example where a lot of that energy has been just squandered.

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And then a third example I'll give is in New Zealand, where I'm from, where there was an effort to decarbonize the grid.

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But part of that effort was to stop doing new gas exploration.

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OK, because gas is fossil fuel.

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We don't want to be doing fossil fuel anymore.

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Now, gas has about relative to coal.

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It has about 40 percent of the emission intensity of coal.

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So it's significantly less.

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But because we stopped doing new gas exploration, then we had a shortfall of energy on the grid.

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So guess what we did in order to meet that? We imported coal from China. Right. So even with those stated goals of decarbonizing the grid, the action that was taken was vastly ineffective. So there's been a lot of, I think, the misapplication of subsidies. There's been some knee-jerk reactions. There's been misinformation. There's been, I think, the issue with being a politician really is that you get swayed too much by human emotions and the science gets lost in the process.

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Now, I have seen some examples when politicians do occasionally get it right.

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Costa Rica is one good example where they did a very good job of Costa Rica had been basically farmland for a long time.

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And there was a big initiative to reforest.

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And that reforestation has meant that ecotourism is now one of Costa Rica's major export earners.

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And it's also just a more beautiful place to live.

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I probably wouldn't have wanted to live here 40 years ago when it was mostly farmland.

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I do now.

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So there have been cases where it's worked well, but there's certainly been cases where politicians have got things incredibly wrong.

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Yeah, even a blind hen can find a golden pebble, as they say.

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So, yeah, it's interesting.

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But you still use terms like, to me, coming from the Austrian economics camp, it's funny to me when you use terms like the transition and we, as in, like, is there such a thing as the transition?

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Like, I know everyone's in on this, but lately there's been in a lot of countries like this realization that these climate goals are, they're fantasy numbers, all of them.

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They're utopian. They cannot be reached.

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so they're trying to like just kick the can down the road to the next guy and and not talk about it

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too much right now because someone is going to have to take the the fall for it and say that

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and blame someone for why we couldn't reach the target or whatever or why it wasn't important in

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the first place well what are your thoughts on the whole climate change circus political circus

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yeah i think that you say some things that are correct there and it's not just with climate

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change, it's also with fiat money printing as well, where we see this habit of it's easier to

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say something, to kick the can down the road, to get re-elected, than it is to actually take some

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serious action, which is say, look, we're off target and we've got to stop printing money.

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That's hard because you're not incentivized for that behavior because you'll get kicked out of

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power for being negative or being the one who said this emperor has no clothes, for shattering the

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illusion or for forcing governments to spend responsibly.

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So it's a really challenging position.

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I honestly don't know what I'd do if I was in that political situation.

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I'm not a politician and I'm glad I'm not.

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But sometimes I think, well, what would you do in that situation?

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I'm not sure I had a good answer to that.

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No, me neither.

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And I see it as an inherent flaw with democracy itself.

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Like, maybe it isn't this cure-all that it was promoted as, you know, because it has this inherent flaw that you're incentivized to lie just to get re-elected.

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And every politician is, and it's kind of, or not kind of, it's very sad.

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I mean, also, I think we've been talking about this before, but the fiat money is really the root cause of all environmental problems, perceived or actual.

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It doesn't matter.

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They're all, at the end of the day, caused by the same phenomenon, which is over-consumerism, which, in my view, is a direct result of fiat monetary printing.

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Going back to sound money standard is all about not misallocating resources anymore.

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It's all about like removing the theft and the lying and the insincerity from the equation altogether and get resources.

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Like when you have an asset that keeps appreciating in value you are less incentivized to spend frivolously on shit you don need And do you think that a I see this firsthand because we have a business model

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as a fund, which is to take power from landfills. So we see the end result of consumption on a

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regular basis, on overconsumption. And as you've done, if you trace back to say, well, why

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is it that we are consuming things that we don't need on a regular basis? There's two reasons.

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The first reason is, yes, because you have a fiat monetary system that incentivizes consumption

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over being prudent with your resources. There's a second reason, though, that happened earlier,

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and that was in the 1920s, when a guy called Edward Bernays was recruited by a number of the

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large industries at the time who were concerned that we were going to, basically humans wouldn't

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want to consume resources anymore because they had automobiles, they had different mechanics to be

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able to do different things for them. Clothes dries, I think were starting to come in washing

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machines that were early prototypes, but they're starting to get quite good and people were starting

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to get worried and say, well, won't there become a point where people need to consume less?

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and what Edward Benes was charged with doing was leading from a need-based economy to a desire-based

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economy and his uncle was Sigmund Freud and he consulted Freud about human desires and

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Freud gave him some tips on how to do it and over the course of the next 10 years

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there was an economic revolution there's a great documentary about it called Century of the Self

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where basically the needle was turned and we created this desire-based economy where you now

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have an entire advertising industry, pharmaceutical industry, just about every industry, which is

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playing to human psychological triggers. But it's all predicated on feeling incomplete and feeling

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inadequate. So the premise of that is I'm incomplete. I have some gap inside me, but by

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buying your product, I can fill that gap. That happened in the 1920s. So you put together that

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psychological manipulation with a fiscal manipulation through a monetary system that

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encourages consumption because it's only going to lose value anyway. And that's how you get these

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massive amounts of overconsumption and environmental ruination. So it comes from a combination,

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I would say, of psychological manipulation and physical manipulation.

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Do you think the two were connected?

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Like, was one a product of the other?

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Yeah, don't know.

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I haven't done enough research to see that, but it's an interesting question.

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Yeah.

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Speaking of psychology, you made an excellent little lecture video about how to debunk FUD.

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Because you've experienced, like, people don't want to be orange-pilled, do they?

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Like we're all wondering why normies, what's taking them so long to get this.

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Like it's pretty obvious theft is bad.

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Like it's not, counterfeiting is not good for anyone.

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Like to me, it's obvious, but to most people it isn't.

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So why did you make this?

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What was the incentive behind it and what's the main ideas in it?

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Well, a couple of things.

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Firstly, it was that, as you know, I've done quite a lot of debunking of FUD, mainly around energy FUD or environmental FUD around Bitcoin.

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But not only that, also I started going into other areas as well and finding that that was quite effective because I was using the same tactics of counteracting FUD.

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And then I could see that some people were just getting angry or exasperated or impatient or coming across as a zealot or an evangelist.

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And that wasn't effective.

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In fact, it was having the opposite response.

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and that I thought, well, in order for Bitcoin adoption to really accelerate it,

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there's a few things that need to happen across multiple fronts.

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One is I don't feel Bitcoin has had its worldwide web moment yet,

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just in terms of the complete usability of the tools.

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We're still getting to a point where for you and I, we're content, we're happy,

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we're the early adopters.

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But for the mainstream, it's not yet easy enough to integrate into their lives.

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They've still got to do some research to understand it.

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So we haven't had that moment yet.

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That'll be coming very soon.

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But the other thing is that people don't understand the utility of it because they don't understand the problem that it solves.

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And particularly in the West, they don't understand the problem that it solves.

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And this is particular to the West.

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And I've had many conversations with people in the global South who say, well, we don't have that problem in South Africa.

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Within two minutes, someone in South Africa will see the value of Bitcoin because they have lived with currency debasement to such a great extent.

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People in Lebanon or in Venezuela or in Argentina or Turkey, they get Bitcoin straight away.

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Someone in a country where you don't have access to good banking rails, they understand

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the value of Bitcoin immediately.

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Someone who has had the financial system weaponized against them because they tried to protest

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against death squads in Nigeria, they get it straight away.

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Human activists get it.

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Human rights activists get it.

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People who have tried to send remittance payments back to their family and have had to pay between

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5% and 15% fees to some middleman, they get the value of Bitcoin. But the people who don't get it

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to the same extent are people in the West, because we have, for the most part, relative to other

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countries, good banking rails. And of course, currency is still debasing, but it's debasing

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at a slower rate where we don't notice it to the same extent, or it's easy to imagine that our loss

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of purchasing power or the fact that we feel poorer is due to some other factor, particularly when we

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have multiple economists and politicians telling us that it is. So I wanted to help people create

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ways of engaging with Bitcoin's next wave of adopters. And so this kind of comes from,

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because I look, I'm a technology adoption person. So I worked in technology companies for about 20

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years and I saw how adoption cycles work. And you have this crossing the chasm moment where you have

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the early enthusiasts and the innovators who adopt it first, but then you have this early

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majority who's like about 48% of the population. And how they adopt technology is very different

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to how you and I might have adopted Bitcoin. Even the way you adopted it, because you are much

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earlier than I, would have been different. And the issue is that when we explain to other people

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Bitcoin the way that it had relevance and interest and insight to us, there's a disconnect because

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these people are different. They're not an audience of people who are going to do their own research.

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They won't necessarily connect things together in the same way.

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And they may not have some of the existing paradigms or understanding of economics that we might or we might have gained.

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And so how do we meet those people?

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So really, the video was an attempt to say, look, here's if we're really going to engage with Bitcoin's next wave of adopters.

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We've got a couple of options.

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One is have fun staying poor.

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The other is we use the same techniques that worked on us on them.

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either way we don't get adoption or we say look okay not everyone's going to listen but there are

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some people who are open but it's up to us to find the language that's going to invite them into a

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larger extent so i really wanted to share some of the things that i found successful with a larger

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community of people so the end intention is to encourage more bitcoin adoption faster yeah i

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highly recommend the video i mean there's a lot of great tips in it and it's all based on

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human psychology and what works and what doesn't work right so so so what is the

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most common error that people do when they try to orange pill another person is it is it that

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they don't meet where the where the other where the other person is but where they are what what

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is it yeah that's that's actually the main one there's two main ones i'd say and that is absolutely

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it's about not finding out the first action should not be to talk but to listen so that's

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the first mistake. It's not just about getting on your soapbox and telling them about how,

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look, I'll give an example. If you're going to talk to a corporate board of a major publicly

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listed corporation who's thinking about Bitcoin as a reserve, then the first action should be to

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find out what their values are, how they make decisions, and what their goals are for their

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business and whether and how Bitcoin can fit into those things. And if you don't take that action,

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it's a very simple action, doesn't take a long time, then you could have the most wonderful,

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eloquent message in the world about how money's monetary premium is going to be sucked out of

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other assets into Bitcoin, but it's just going to miss the mark. Similarly, if you go to a pension

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fund or a sovereign fund and you talk about how Bitcoin is going to be amazing as an asset class

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and how it's going to outperform all other assets.

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It might sound like the right message,

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but it's totally the wrong message.

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Most of these sovereign funds and pension funds

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already understand that Bitcoin has exceptional potential

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as an asset class for them to invest.

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They don't need to be sold on that for the most part,

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but there's a whole range of issues

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that stop them from adopting it

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because they perceive it as too risky,

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such as they're just not sure how to custody it

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or they're uncertain about the level of technical innovation

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or they're worried about how they will look or be perceived by the investors into their fund.

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So these are the issues that they need reassurance about.

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And we've just been missing the mark across the board by not really attuning ourselves

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to what these communities of people care about and need to hear to feel reassured.

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So that's the first mistake.

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And then the second mistake is being too attached.

283
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uh it sounds ironic if it's like have you ever i'm sure you have been in a conversation with

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someone where they were just too attached to trying to persuade you of something that they

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were too intense um to the extent they didn't really seem to be listening to you and they

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seem to have an agenda that they wanted to change your perspective well i i have to tell an anecdote

287
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here if you let me interrupt you here because there's a great one uh this is when the week

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where we formed the free madeira organization with andre and um funchal and jeff booth was there

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greg foss a lot of great other bitcoiners like a whole bunch of us we all gathered for a week on

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the island and one of the things we did first early on we had a meeting with the president

291
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and then he sent us out to basically orange pill

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the major institutions of the island.

293
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So we were at the tourism board and some financial center here

294
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and in these beautiful old buildings,

295
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official government buildings in Funchal.

296
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Everything beautiful, everything very surreal week in general.

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And the thing is, I'm interested in psychology too

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And I think my experience from working at sea and being on ships and stuff, a lot of that, and being in bands for that matter, and different groups, I'm very interested in group dynamics and group psychology.

299
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And one of the things that happens with a flock of males, as you know, is that an alpha is chosen pretty quickly.

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and we had an obvious alpha in Jeff

301
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because when he speaks, people shut up

302
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and they listen to what he has to say

303
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and he does the whole hand of Booth thing

304
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and then everyone's mesmerized by this wise prophet

305
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that is in the middle of the room.

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And we had all these meetings and Jeff was leading

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and everyone was enjoying themselves

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until we were going to have a meeting

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with the energy company on the island.

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So we went up to this office with a big oak table and a dark wood room with a bunch of people in suits, most of them in their 60s, English very poor, of course.

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And Jeff wasn't there because he had to do some board meeting or something.

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So instead of listening to them and what questions they might have, they're all of a sudden attacked by this group of ragtag Bitcoiners who are simultaneously trying to figure out who the next alpha of the flock is.

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So you have Greg Foss throwing dollar bills on the table and you have people talking on top of each other.

314
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And it was a completely chaotic meeting.

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And I think they were more hostile to Bitcoin after it than before, to be honest.

316
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But it was a fun experiment.

317
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Yeah.

318
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Yeah.

319
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Look, I had a similar experience one time.

320
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Look, how I learned this was by failing completely one time.

321
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When I was at my first internet startup, I had a chance to pitch to the board about this new way we should release a software which was going to take us to the promised land and all the rest of it.

322
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And I was really excited because it's like my first chance to ever pitch to the board and the executive of the company.

323
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And I put forward all the ideas.

324
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And when I walked into the room, like everyone was kind of smiling and encouraging of me.

325
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By the time I walked out, they were all frowning.

326
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So they were more hostile towards my ideas at the end of the meeting than the start.

327
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And my general manager took me to one side.

328
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And he said, look, the logic was good.

329
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But basically you came across as if you were saying you guys are all idiots for not seeing the world the way I see it He said next time care less about your outcome and care more about the people in the room And I was like yeah that good advice Graham Thanks for that And he said good because you going to come back

330
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and you're going to pitch the idea again to them next week.

331
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And you're going to take on board what I just said.

332
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Before I could say, no, please, Graham,

333
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I don't want to do that again.

334
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He had already set it up.

335
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I don't know how he persuaded them,

336
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but they came back.

337
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We did the meeting again.

338
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I had the same presentation.

339
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I maybe changed one or two slides.

340
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The message was the same, but what was different was I was much more humble.

341
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When I walked into the room, they're still pretty hostile.

342
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They had the same frowns etched on their faces they did the week before.

343
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But by the end of the meeting, just by me listening, by me changing my disposition, by me not being attached and listening to my ideas, they were nodding their heads in agreement saying, yeah, Daniel's got some great ideas.

344
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We need to take this on.

345
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And they listened to me.

346
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And that was a successful pitch.

347
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I could not believe it because the only thing that changed, it wasn't even the message.

348
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It was just my internal approach.

349
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It was my mindset that had changed.

350
00:28:48,002 --> 00:28:48,983
When was this?

351
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How old were you?

352
00:28:50,483 --> 00:28:52,283
Oh, this is many years ago.

353
00:28:52,402 --> 00:28:53,743
I was probably in my late 20s.

354
00:28:55,023 --> 00:29:01,443
Oh, no, but it's funny how you remember certain key moments like that where you get an insight.

355
00:29:01,443 --> 00:29:02,602
It was an absolutely key moment.

356
00:29:02,602 --> 00:29:11,563
Yeah, because for me, I didn't know that your approach and what you thought and your attitude could have so much difference to how you communicate.

357
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But it absolutely does because we are more influenced by someone's disposition, their body language, their tone of voice than we are about their actual content.

358
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So you could have two people deliver the same content.

359
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But if one person's like, you know, I'm the Oracle of truth.

360
00:29:26,902 --> 00:29:28,283
You guys need to hear this.

361
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And the other person's like, well, I've got some things, some ideas.

362
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you might be interested to hear,

363
00:29:33,263 --> 00:29:35,402
it's going to lead to a very different presentation.

364
00:29:36,983 --> 00:29:40,223
But no, and it reminds me,

365
00:29:40,283 --> 00:29:41,422
it goes so deep,

366
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like the only thing you can really do,

367
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like if you study free will

368
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and how absurd it is that it really can't exist

369
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unless there's a soul and stuff like that

370
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because of the lag of consciousness

371
00:29:53,383 --> 00:29:56,602
and the neuron has to fire off

372
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before the decision is made.

373
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So who is really making the decision?

374
00:30:00,023 --> 00:30:22,002
So if we have free will at all, I mean, I love the Hitchens quote, we have no choice but to have it. But if we do, the extent of free will is basically just you may be able to choose your focus on what thoughts to focus on, what to hone in on.

375
00:30:22,002 --> 00:30:27,922
And if you can do that, it's so powerful, though, because the butterfly effects are everywhere.

376
00:30:28,162 --> 00:30:32,582
Like if you choose to focus on one thought than another, you change your reality.

377
00:30:33,142 --> 00:30:37,203
And we do not know to which extent the mind creates reality.

378
00:30:37,383 --> 00:30:40,303
So it's much more powerful than people think.

379
00:30:41,383 --> 00:30:44,543
Yeah, so I'll give you an example of how this looks in practice.

380
00:30:45,223 --> 00:30:51,523
So I was having a meeting with a wholesale investor into our fund.

381
00:30:51,523 --> 00:30:54,102
And he said, OK, so what are you up to at the moment?

382
00:30:54,243 --> 00:30:59,502
And I said, oh, I'm actually researching Bitcoin right now because we think it has potential.

383
00:31:00,422 --> 00:31:02,123
We may even form a fund around it.

384
00:31:02,362 --> 00:31:04,862
And his whole body language changed completely.

385
00:31:05,063 --> 00:31:08,682
And he folded his arms and he was like, I thought you were interested in doing things that were good for the environment.

386
00:31:09,342 --> 00:31:15,623
And this was 2022 when it was like peak FUD around Bitcoin and energy and Bitcoin and the environment.

387
00:31:16,763 --> 00:31:19,223
And I had a choice in that moment.

388
00:31:19,223 --> 00:31:24,963
I could have either ignored it or I could have got into a debate with him.

389
00:31:26,063 --> 00:31:30,043
But what I did was I said, well, sounds like you've heard some things about Bitcoin.

390
00:31:32,223 --> 00:31:33,723
This is an area I've been looking at.

391
00:31:33,842 --> 00:31:39,223
And I said, look, I can understand why you'd say that, because to be honest, that was my first impression when I first saw it.

392
00:31:41,043 --> 00:31:43,082
I've been researching it for the last couple of months.

393
00:31:43,142 --> 00:31:45,383
I'm happy to share what I found out if that's of interest to you.

394
00:31:46,642 --> 00:31:48,743
And his whole body language changed completely.

395
00:31:48,743 --> 00:31:50,082
He softened and he said, yeah, sure.

396
00:31:50,682 --> 00:31:51,763
Tell me what you found out.

397
00:31:53,203 --> 00:31:57,102
Now, what I said to him in response was nothing about Bitcoin.

398
00:31:57,822 --> 00:32:01,362
But he was feeling hostile towards some ideas.

399
00:32:01,582 --> 00:32:05,922
And so it's like people don't change their minds rationally.

400
00:32:06,143 --> 00:32:08,463
People change their minds based on emotions.

401
00:32:08,682 --> 00:32:12,162
People make decisions based on emotions and then they justify them rationally.

402
00:32:12,483 --> 00:32:16,203
So I could have given the best arguments in the world about why he was wrong and why I

403
00:32:16,203 --> 00:32:16,703
was right.

404
00:32:16,703 --> 00:32:20,322
but he wouldn't have heard a single one if I hadn't had that framing first.

405
00:32:20,443 --> 00:32:24,983
And I did three very important things, which was not my nature to do, but I had to learn to do.

406
00:32:25,582 --> 00:32:30,002
The first one was to acknowledge what the person had said.

407
00:32:30,342 --> 00:32:31,783
I hear what you're saying.

408
00:32:32,162 --> 00:32:35,662
Second thing is to make him not wrong for having an opinion.

409
00:32:35,922 --> 00:32:41,483
It's like if two people have diverse opinions, then we tend to lock on onto what's different.

410
00:32:41,783 --> 00:32:42,983
The difference is the opinions.

411
00:32:43,182 --> 00:32:45,703
But the question is, what can we be in agreement with?

412
00:32:46,203 --> 00:32:48,623
Well, I can agree that he has a right to express his opinion.

413
00:32:48,842 --> 00:32:51,242
I can say that I've heard what he's saying.

414
00:32:51,943 --> 00:32:54,783
And if I'm in agreement that he's got a right to have an opinion,

415
00:32:55,422 --> 00:32:59,162
and I focus on commonality, which is, hey, I understand why he had it.

416
00:32:59,283 --> 00:33:00,143
I used to have it.

417
00:33:01,242 --> 00:33:02,682
That's what caused the softening.

418
00:33:03,102 --> 00:33:06,662
And then I didn't presume that he wanted to hear what I had to say.

419
00:33:06,723 --> 00:33:09,703
I asked him, well, if you're interested, I'm happy to share what I've learned.

420
00:33:11,283 --> 00:33:14,303
So I'm presenting it as this is not in a difference of opinion.

421
00:33:14,303 --> 00:33:19,063
there is a knowledge asymmetry here. I could have said, hey, I've studied this more deeply

422
00:33:19,063 --> 00:33:24,463
than New Buster. That would have had a different response. But I implied that and gave him the

423
00:33:24,463 --> 00:33:28,362
frame and then he accepted the frame. Okay, you're right. It sounds like you've studied this more

424
00:33:28,362 --> 00:33:31,883
deeply than I have. You've given me the option to hear what you've learned. Yes, I'm going to take

425
00:33:31,883 --> 00:33:38,162
that option. So he's now accepted. Okay, there is a knowledge asymmetry. Daniel isn't a raving

426
00:33:38,162 --> 00:33:43,082
evangelist who's going to try and push some ideas down my throat. He does respect my position. He

427
00:33:43,082 --> 00:33:47,783
used to hold it himself. I'm curious to want to know what caused him to change his mind.

428
00:33:48,303 --> 00:33:52,443
Very different frame. Now, people don't always respond and say, yes, I'm curious.

429
00:33:53,102 --> 00:33:58,963
But if they don't, then there's no point me getting into further discussion. So that's also

430
00:33:58,963 --> 00:34:03,842
a very good filter to work out whether someone's receptive, whether they're intellectually curious

431
00:34:03,842 --> 00:34:09,883
or not. And if they're not, that's OK. I will save my energy for someone who is open to

432
00:34:09,883 --> 00:34:15,102
learning more about Bitcoin. But from my side, I want to maximize the probability. It's like,

433
00:34:15,442 --> 00:34:21,302
maybe out of every 10 people, there might be two people who, no matter how badly I talk about

434
00:34:21,302 --> 00:34:25,962
Bitcoin, they'll be receptive to it. There might be two people who, no matter how well and how

435
00:34:25,962 --> 00:34:30,043
eloquently and how empathetically I talk about Bitcoin, will be close to it. But there's six

436
00:34:30,043 --> 00:34:35,643
people in the middle who, if I talk about it in a skillful way, in a respectful way, if I show

437
00:34:35,643 --> 00:34:39,982
curiosity towards them and empathy towards them, they're more likely to hear my ideas.

438
00:34:40,102 --> 00:34:41,403
Those are the people that I care about.

439
00:34:42,602 --> 00:34:45,782
And if I can do something to optimize the chance that those six out of 10 will listen,

440
00:34:46,242 --> 00:34:47,823
then that seems like energy well spent.

441
00:34:48,782 --> 00:34:49,163
Absolutely.

442
00:34:49,883 --> 00:34:55,903
That's why I, just one of the reasons why I love that there are so many different

443
00:34:55,903 --> 00:35:01,843
Bitcoin, type of Bitcoin evangelists, if you say so.

444
00:35:01,843 --> 00:35:04,543
We are everywhere.

445
00:35:05,643 --> 00:35:15,962
Yeah, sure, there's more and more of us are leaning towards libertarian, like freedom-minded.

446
00:35:15,962 --> 00:35:21,143
But we are in all political camps and in all cultural camps, really.

447
00:35:21,143 --> 00:35:28,802
You go to any village anywhere on Earth and you're bound to find a bitcoiner somewhere.

448
00:35:28,802 --> 00:35:31,883
The communities are small, but they are truly everywhere.

449
00:35:31,883 --> 00:35:35,403
And I find that super encouraging.

450
00:35:35,403 --> 00:35:40,462
So what's the biggest hurdle?

451
00:35:40,843 --> 00:35:42,663
Like, what's the biggest hindrance?

452
00:35:42,663 --> 00:35:49,183
Why don't, if we take the other perspective, if we take the perspective of the person being

453
00:35:49,183 --> 00:35:52,742
orange-pilled, what's hindering most people from getting it?

454
00:35:52,823 --> 00:35:55,442
What's hindering them from swallowing the orange pill?

455
00:35:55,582 --> 00:35:56,403
Why don't they?

456
00:35:56,502 --> 00:35:57,623
Why is it so hard?

457
00:35:58,543 --> 00:36:00,203
That is the right question to ask.

458
00:36:01,343 --> 00:36:03,782
So this is something I've been thinking deeply about.

459
00:36:03,782 --> 00:36:20,762
And there's a couple of things. The first thing is that it's a nascent disruptive technology. And our general human tendency when we're faced with something which is new is to be negative about it. And that's not because humans are negative. It's because that's very important for evolution.

460
00:36:20,762 --> 00:36:26,742
If you encounter something new you haven't seen for the first time, then there's risk involved.

461
00:36:26,903 --> 00:36:29,962
And this goes right back to back on the savannah.

462
00:36:30,082 --> 00:36:31,543
You see a large animal on the horizon.

463
00:36:32,602 --> 00:36:34,982
It's out of focus, so you're uncertain about it.

464
00:36:35,403 --> 00:36:37,643
You don't know whether it's food or it's your food.

465
00:36:39,102 --> 00:36:48,723
Now, in order for survival of the species, the algorithm should go, when something is unclear, assume in the negative.

466
00:36:48,723 --> 00:36:53,742
because if you assume that you're its food and you're wrong,

467
00:36:54,163 --> 00:36:56,143
the cost is you go hungry for a day.

468
00:36:57,163 --> 00:36:59,863
But if you assume in the positive and you're wrong,

469
00:36:59,942 --> 00:37:02,762
you assume that it's your food and it turns out you're its food

470
00:37:02,762 --> 00:37:04,363
and you run towards it and you're wrong,

471
00:37:04,462 --> 00:37:05,723
the consequence is you get eaten.

472
00:37:06,903 --> 00:37:10,323
So that's not even a psychological tendency.

473
00:37:10,323 --> 00:37:15,883
That's a neurobiological impulse which is very hardwired into us,

474
00:37:15,883 --> 00:37:19,683
which is the presence of something unclear, uncertain, assume, and the negative.

475
00:37:19,883 --> 00:37:24,703
So this is why the response to all nascent disruptive technology,

476
00:37:24,863 --> 00:37:27,223
whether it's a telegraph, the bicycle, the radio, the internet,

477
00:37:27,723 --> 00:37:32,203
the camera, television, computer, automobile, you name it, and Bitcoin,

478
00:37:32,742 --> 00:37:35,343
will tend to be negative for a good 15 years or so.

479
00:37:36,102 --> 00:37:37,703
And then people get to understand it more.

480
00:37:38,123 --> 00:37:40,023
They have their fears alleviated.

481
00:37:40,143 --> 00:37:42,102
Some of the early junk science gets debunked,

482
00:37:42,123 --> 00:37:44,883
and people start to say, oh, actually, it's not that bad.

483
00:37:44,883 --> 00:37:51,343
And in fact, it's really good because they understand its utility more and a lot of the fears they have get debunked as being unreasonable.

484
00:37:51,863 --> 00:37:53,183
So that takes a little while.

485
00:37:54,223 --> 00:37:54,982
So that's the first thing.

486
00:37:55,063 --> 00:37:57,323
And so Bitcoin is a continuation of that pattern.

487
00:37:58,102 --> 00:38:02,602
However, Bitcoin has an additional challenge that these other technologies did not have.

488
00:38:03,143 --> 00:38:14,403
And that's that if you were slow to the party with the bicycle or slow to the party, you rode your horse for a little bit long before you got an automobile or you used your fax machine for a little bit longer.

489
00:38:14,403 --> 00:38:16,502
in your print media before you jumped on the internet.

490
00:38:17,242 --> 00:38:19,183
There was no great penalty.

491
00:38:19,343 --> 00:38:20,623
There was no great cost to that.

492
00:38:21,942 --> 00:38:23,782
But if you're late to the party with Bitcoin,

493
00:38:23,883 --> 00:38:25,002
you see where I'm going here, right?

494
00:38:25,663 --> 00:38:27,742
You had the opportunity to invest early.

495
00:38:28,323 --> 00:38:29,223
You were smart.

496
00:38:29,442 --> 00:38:30,163
You encountered it.

497
00:38:30,262 --> 00:38:31,002
You dismissed it.

498
00:38:31,183 --> 00:38:33,223
You saw other people do very well out of it.

499
00:38:33,343 --> 00:38:35,082
And then it wasn't until 15 years later,

500
00:38:35,143 --> 00:38:36,323
you reconsidered it.

501
00:38:36,982 --> 00:38:38,462
Now you've got to,

502
00:38:38,582 --> 00:38:41,563
you have this major hurdle,

503
00:38:42,282 --> 00:38:44,343
which is that you have to admit that you were wrong.

504
00:38:44,403 --> 00:38:47,082
And there was a big financial cost to you being wrong.

505
00:38:47,903 --> 00:38:51,023
And so the psychological tendency is that that's painful.

506
00:38:51,163 --> 00:38:54,663
The ego does not want to acknowledge I was wrong because in saying I was wrong, I was

507
00:38:54,663 --> 00:38:58,063
saying, well, I missed out on a major financial opportunity.

508
00:38:58,482 --> 00:39:04,262
So it's easier for the ego to go, well, sure, I missed it, but Bitcoin is just a Ponzi or

509
00:39:04,262 --> 00:39:08,082
it's just a bubble or I don't like Bitcoiners and I don't want to be associated with that

510
00:39:08,082 --> 00:39:08,442
tribe.

511
00:39:08,582 --> 00:39:12,063
And if that's the way to make money, then I'd rather make it honorably and ethically than

512
00:39:12,063 --> 00:39:17,563
this useless asset that's just speculative and does nothing. So it's all complete nonsense and

513
00:39:17,563 --> 00:39:22,762
falsehood, but it's so much easier to believe that for the ego than to acknowledge you are wrong and

514
00:39:22,762 --> 00:39:28,063
acknowledge the financial consequence of you being wrong. Wasn't the case of the bicycle or the

515
00:39:28,063 --> 00:39:32,823
internet or the automobile. So that is the additional challenge that we have. Yeah. And

516
00:39:32,823 --> 00:39:40,962
the saddest part about that is that it keeps on, people's egos keep on preventing them from using

517
00:39:40,962 --> 00:39:48,163
the same because it doesn't matter when you came in like these perceived disadvantages you have

518
00:39:48,163 --> 00:39:54,883
they're only disadvantages in relation to people who were before you but that's like reading the

519
00:39:54,883 --> 00:40:02,663
newspaper and comparing yourself to to rich people uh why don't i own a skyscraper in dubai and and

520
00:40:02,663 --> 00:40:08,002
so on and so forth but it's not in an absolute sense it's not a disadvantage it's just hop on

521
00:40:08,002 --> 00:40:13,502
the train and do whatever the last generation did, hodl for 10 years, and you'll be better off.

522
00:40:13,602 --> 00:40:17,962
Because the greatest lie ever told is not only that inflation is needed, but that

523
00:40:17,962 --> 00:40:25,703
no inflation means 0% inflation. It doesn't. It means ever dropping prices because we get better

524
00:40:25,703 --> 00:40:31,602
at doing stuff. And to me, Bitcoin is like, it's just the lens to view the world through that

525
00:40:31,602 --> 00:40:37,623
actually accurately reflects the deflationary nature of the free market, that we can actually

526
00:40:37,623 --> 00:40:43,442
see that everything does drop in price if we just measure with the correct or see the

527
00:40:43,442 --> 00:40:45,422
world through the correct lens.

528
00:40:45,422 --> 00:40:54,823
And so it's a very sad story if humanity is so, I wouldn't say stupid, but so egotistical

529
00:40:54,823 --> 00:41:02,863
that we shoot ourselves in the foot by being unable to take the humble approach and to

530
00:41:02,863 --> 00:41:05,102
ever think, well, maybe I'm wrong.

531
00:41:05,102 --> 00:41:11,563
like it's it's truly sad it's an additional hurdle there's no doubt about it what was the

532
00:41:11,563 --> 00:41:18,262
quote from and rand was everything always all at once and and i think this is what the solution is

533
00:41:18,262 --> 00:41:24,422
there's no one solution to this it is everything all at once so for example some people have

534
00:41:24,422 --> 00:41:30,302
responded like there's a guy i'm i'm coaching who has done something quite amazing he's basically

535
00:41:30,302 --> 00:41:33,942
orange-pilled a whole lot of charities who are now using bitcoin he's also orange-pilled

536
00:41:33,942 --> 00:41:46,383
50 people who are now using Bitcoin because he has worked out that rather than talking about Bitcoin he better just to target charities and people who like to give to charities and say

537
00:41:46,504 --> 00:41:50,684
well, rather than give once and that money gets squandered and gets used on something,

538
00:41:50,764 --> 00:41:55,184
then the charity has to come back and beg the next year. So your gift keeps on dying. What if

539
00:41:55,184 --> 00:42:00,204
you could give and that gift would not die? Because with Bitcoin, it's possible because you

540
00:42:00,204 --> 00:42:05,843
can give into a Bitcoin treasury and then that can become the principal and then the profits from

541
00:42:05,843 --> 00:42:10,184
that can go into the charity. It's just a fundamentally better business model. Now,

542
00:42:10,224 --> 00:42:15,644
he doesn't lead with Bitcoin. He leads with what if your gifted charity did not die?

543
00:42:16,244 --> 00:42:19,964
And then people find out, oh, and by the way, we're using Bitcoin to do this.

544
00:42:21,044 --> 00:42:26,843
And he's had like 98% of the people who were doing this were not Bitcoiners beforehand.

545
00:42:26,843 --> 00:42:33,883
They find out that Bitcoin is a mechanism and then they will say things such as, wow, I had no idea that Bitcoin was such a noble asset.

546
00:42:35,124 --> 00:42:39,684
So this is a strategy where he hasn't had to talk to people about Bitcoin at all.

547
00:42:40,044 --> 00:42:44,604
He's just had the approach of let's just keep people using it for something they care about.

548
00:42:44,684 --> 00:42:47,464
And then they find out afterwards it's Bitcoin and then they get orange pill.

549
00:42:47,984 --> 00:42:49,744
So that's another way that we can do it.

550
00:42:49,823 --> 00:42:51,964
It's not all about using language.

551
00:42:52,084 --> 00:42:53,904
Sometimes it's just getting people using it.

552
00:42:53,904 --> 00:43:02,944
But there's a lesson here, which is to lead people to Bitcoin rather than to lead with Bitcoin.

553
00:43:04,264 --> 00:43:07,504
And for different people, the message will be completely different.

554
00:43:07,644 --> 00:43:16,544
So, for example, I'm not, but if I were talking to the Democrat Party in the US, it's like, well, find out what these people's values are.

555
00:43:16,784 --> 00:43:21,704
Maybe they care about, or some people do, about social justice or about environmental justice.

556
00:43:21,704 --> 00:43:25,144
So show them how Bitcoin can be a tool for social and environmental justice.

557
00:43:25,924 --> 00:43:30,424
Show how when you have a world where Bitcoin exists, that more people can get more remittances

558
00:43:30,424 --> 00:43:33,823
and they tend to be poor people, so that less goes to financial middlemen.

559
00:43:35,704 --> 00:43:40,303
Show them how in a world with Bitcoin, it helps to reduce the wealth inequality between

560
00:43:40,303 --> 00:43:42,504
nations in a very tangible way.

561
00:43:42,764 --> 00:43:47,764
And Bhutan's an example, because rather than becoming an indentured state, a vassal state

562
00:43:47,764 --> 00:43:54,524
basically with a large imf loan they were able to avoid that reality and stack bitcoin and now it's

563
00:43:54,524 --> 00:43:59,024
40 of their gdp and they're using a small portion of that to refurbish the airport now they're

564
00:43:59,024 --> 00:44:04,544
building an echoes city a mindfulness city it's like incredible things i mean that that's just

565
00:44:04,544 --> 00:44:11,044
such an appealing insightful um inspiring message to so many people um so so these are the stories

566
00:44:11,044 --> 00:44:16,644
that will inspire people or or the stories about how people are using it in south africa to avoid

567
00:44:16,644 --> 00:44:21,784
currency debasement, how people are able to run their taxi now without getting robbed because they

568
00:44:21,784 --> 00:44:28,444
have Bitcoin, how people in Afghanistan, women in Afghanistan are able to set up businesses and pay

569
00:44:28,444 --> 00:44:34,024
women because they can get around the gender level discrimination from the state because they have

570
00:44:34,024 --> 00:44:38,744
Bitcoin. And there's a whole raft of people around the world who care deeply about these messages.

571
00:44:39,843 --> 00:44:44,264
And so Bitcoin just becomes a tool which enables something which otherwise would have been

572
00:44:44,264 --> 00:44:50,624
impossible. And different people will respond to different stories differently. So we have some

573
00:44:50,624 --> 00:44:56,883
incredible inspiring stories and sharing them, but knowing which stories to share to whom when

574
00:44:56,883 --> 00:45:02,164
is really important. Yeah, I absolutely agree. The first lesson you talked about there, the

575
00:45:02,164 --> 00:45:09,664
importance of listening first and talking later, that's very true for podcasting too. I just

576
00:45:09,664 --> 00:45:15,604
thought of uh yeah that's a lesson i've been forced to learn over the years i'm not sure that

577
00:45:15,604 --> 00:45:21,944
the lesson is entirely over yet but uh yeah it's definitely a good tip in all in all uh

578
00:45:21,944 --> 00:45:31,024
in all aspects of life i think there's also something to people you know not being you know

579
00:45:31,024 --> 00:45:36,424
there's always this uh um i i always say that the orange pill is the remedy to the black pill

580
00:45:36,424 --> 00:45:43,244
but I don't think people are as black-pilled as you might think they are if you are on the internet a lot

581
00:45:43,244 --> 00:45:48,444
and like being Bitcoiners we are on the internet a lot and we see all of this

582
00:45:48,444 --> 00:45:58,343
it's the same brain thing fear sells like that's why headlines and clickbait is always

583
00:45:58,343 --> 00:46:02,544
on the fear spectra rather than no one clicks on happy things

584
00:46:02,544 --> 00:46:09,724
but most people are too busy with their with their lives just having their normal careers and

585
00:46:09,724 --> 00:46:16,804
their normal families and doing normal shit to even to even be worried about what whatever it

586
00:46:16,804 --> 00:46:25,323
is israel palestine or ukraine russia or or inflation or whatever the worry of the day might

587
00:46:25,323 --> 00:46:32,104
be so it might just be that people are too happy to to even bother with bitcoin because they they're

588
00:46:32,104 --> 00:46:38,964
not worried. They don't know how bad inflation is. They don't know how bad, how much better their

589
00:46:38,964 --> 00:46:44,343
lives could have been. They're just happy going to work and taking care of themselves and their

590
00:46:44,343 --> 00:46:49,544
families. I think there's a lot of examples of that too, especially in developed countries,

591
00:46:49,544 --> 00:46:56,564
of course, more than undeveloped ones, or less developed ones. What are your thoughts?

592
00:46:56,564 --> 00:47:15,164
Yeah, I think that's correct. And I've made this mistake myself. So last year, I was giving a presentation online to 162 regulators and policymakers. And it was about Bitcoin and energy and Bitcoin and the environment.

593
00:47:15,164 --> 00:47:21,444
because policymakers and regulators have to go through a checklist of things

594
00:47:21,444 --> 00:47:25,264
to get them comfortable with a nascent technology or a new asset class.

595
00:47:26,284 --> 00:47:28,343
And one of them, of course, they've got their ESG box.

596
00:47:29,044 --> 00:47:33,704
And at the moment, their understanding of Bitcoin is that it crosses that box.

597
00:47:33,804 --> 00:47:36,044
And the reason they believe that is a whole lot of misinformation,

598
00:47:36,044 --> 00:47:38,764
which came from a certain Dutch central banker.

599
00:47:38,764 --> 00:47:43,383
Now, so I could either just spend the whole time talking about

600
00:47:43,383 --> 00:47:46,404
why that information was wrong.

601
00:47:47,004 --> 00:47:48,823
But I don't do that because that's defensive

602
00:47:48,823 --> 00:47:50,944
and the best you can get is to parity.

603
00:47:51,383 --> 00:47:54,624
And also, if it sounds like you're spending too much time

604
00:47:54,624 --> 00:47:56,823
just attacking one person,

605
00:47:56,964 --> 00:47:58,084
then they're probably going to be thinking,

606
00:47:58,204 --> 00:47:59,484
well, what's the other side of the story?

607
00:48:00,064 --> 00:48:01,224
So rather than do that,

608
00:48:01,343 --> 00:48:03,383
I spent more time on the positive side.

609
00:48:03,484 --> 00:48:04,444
But the mistake I made,

610
00:48:04,604 --> 00:48:07,464
which luckily was picked up by the person

611
00:48:07,464 --> 00:48:08,924
who was curating that presentation,

612
00:48:09,444 --> 00:48:12,484
was I assumed that they had heard

613
00:48:12,484 --> 00:48:15,924
a lot of that misinformation, which actually they hadn't.

614
00:48:17,104 --> 00:48:21,464
So whilst there's been a lot of misinformation out there, these were people who, because

615
00:48:21,464 --> 00:48:27,464
they didn't come from the, most of them are coming from places like in Africa or in the

616
00:48:27,464 --> 00:48:31,084
Middle East or in Latin America, basically outside the West.

617
00:48:31,204 --> 00:48:35,164
And outside the West, they haven't heard, they haven't been dealt that same level of

618
00:48:35,164 --> 00:48:37,023
misinformation and FUD about Bitcoin.

619
00:48:38,184 --> 00:48:42,104
So I got my audience wrong and I thought I needed to handle that.

620
00:48:42,104 --> 00:48:46,924
And the person who is curating the event said, no, they don't have really any understanding of Bitcoin.

621
00:48:47,044 --> 00:48:48,064
They haven't been fed that.

622
00:48:48,144 --> 00:48:49,684
You can start assuming they're neutral.

623
00:48:50,644 --> 00:48:55,104
And thank goodness I got that advice because otherwise I could have seeded some doubts they didn't even have.

624
00:48:56,883 --> 00:48:57,704
That's hilarious.

625
00:48:58,323 --> 00:48:58,744
You're right.

626
00:48:58,823 --> 00:49:07,863
It's very easy just to assume, of course, the people you engage with or where you spend a lot of your time, that you think that that's representative of the whole world.

627
00:49:07,904 --> 00:49:10,304
And we need to continuously remind ourselves that it's just not.

628
00:49:10,304 --> 00:49:12,444
So, again, know your audience.

629
00:49:12,624 --> 00:49:18,224
I mean, I tell people about the importance of knowing your audience, and I didn't take adequate time to know my audience.

630
00:49:18,404 --> 00:49:22,304
And someone had to give me the coaching to say, you don't quite know your audience here.

631
00:49:22,323 --> 00:49:23,744
You've made an assumption.

632
00:49:23,984 --> 00:49:25,964
And everything I said could have been brilliant.

633
00:49:26,144 --> 00:49:30,504
But because I'd started at the wrong place, the presentation would have been less effective.

634
00:49:30,504 --> 00:49:31,744
But for that one thing.

635
00:49:34,444 --> 00:49:35,184
It's hilarious.

636
00:49:35,184 --> 00:49:40,124
It reminds me, this knowing your audience stuff, it reminds me of...

637
00:49:40,124 --> 00:49:45,064
I spent one year in an electronics engineering course,

638
00:49:45,184 --> 00:49:48,144
like the bachelor's degree in electronics engineering.

639
00:49:48,264 --> 00:49:49,964
I dropped out after one year,

640
00:49:49,964 --> 00:49:52,544
but there was one course we had,

641
00:49:52,764 --> 00:49:53,964
the university course,

642
00:49:54,204 --> 00:49:56,484
where a lady was talking about

643
00:49:56,484 --> 00:49:57,843
how to captivate an audience.

644
00:49:58,984 --> 00:50:02,383
And I will never forget the lecture

645
00:50:02,383 --> 00:50:04,604
because people, after half an hour,

646
00:50:04,784 --> 00:50:06,883
people started, one guy dropped off

647
00:50:06,883 --> 00:50:08,883
and then another guy followed.

648
00:50:08,883 --> 00:50:12,584
And pretty soon there was just like five of us left in the room.

649
00:50:12,704 --> 00:50:16,284
I didn't have the heart to leave, but she was so boring.

650
00:50:16,484 --> 00:50:18,164
There was like nothing in there.

651
00:50:18,823 --> 00:50:26,804
And it must have been devastating for her to just see everyone walk away when she was talking about that specific subject.

652
00:50:27,264 --> 00:50:27,984
Wow, amazing.

653
00:50:29,164 --> 00:50:29,404
Yeah.

654
00:50:29,764 --> 00:50:31,544
But some people, yeah.

655
00:50:32,104 --> 00:50:37,984
I mean, you can learn this stuff to a certain degree, but there's also some people are born speakers.

656
00:50:37,984 --> 00:50:41,523
and some people definitely aren't and they have to work harder, I guess.

657
00:50:42,244 --> 00:50:48,804
Well, I definitely was in the second category and that's probably why I'm so interested in the

658
00:50:48,804 --> 00:50:54,584
science of it and so interested in coaching other people in it because it didn't come naturally to

659
00:50:54,584 --> 00:51:00,624
me, but I saw firsthand that example of when I stuffed things up, how badly it went in terms of

660
00:51:00,624 --> 00:51:04,944
outcomes. And then when I got it right, how well it went. And you got to remember, I spent like

661
00:51:04,944 --> 00:51:10,823
probably three years of my life pitching for capital. And the great thing about pitching for

662
00:51:10,823 --> 00:51:15,564
capital is you get instantaneous feedback, right? Either you get capital or you don't. Either you

663
00:51:15,564 --> 00:51:20,244
proceed to due diligence or you don't. And so the company's the same, but depending on your message

664
00:51:20,244 --> 00:51:24,523
and your delivery of the message, you'll get very different outcomes. And so I went through this arc

665
00:51:24,523 --> 00:51:30,264
where over a nine-month period, that's how long it took, I went from being told by one investment

666
00:51:30,264 --> 00:51:35,363
group that that was the worst pitch they'd ever heard, right? They were brutal. To then

667
00:51:35,363 --> 00:51:42,224
basically kicking off the angel investment scene in New Zealand, same person, same company,

668
00:51:42,383 --> 00:51:48,424
but the message has evolved and the way I delivered it had evolved because whilst I'd started off at a

669
00:51:48,424 --> 00:51:53,604
pretty poor point, the one thing I had going for me was I had people around me who said,

670
00:51:53,784 --> 00:51:56,584
at the point where I was ready to give up and say, I'm just not good at this,

671
00:51:56,644 --> 00:52:00,204
you need someone better. They said, no, no, no, you've just been given some really good feedback.

672
00:52:00,264 --> 00:52:04,883
get your ego out of the way, take it as a recipe to improve, not an indictment of failure,

673
00:52:05,284 --> 00:52:11,624
get back up again, pitch again, hear what they've said, not to say Daniel's no good at doing this,

674
00:52:11,704 --> 00:52:17,964
but a recipe for how the next one can be better. And that one shift kind of got me to basically

675
00:52:17,964 --> 00:52:24,184
treat it like a game to the point where it was successful. So I think this is something that

676
00:52:24,184 --> 00:52:28,544
anyone who wants to learn can learn. And a lot of the people that I've coached in this stuff,

677
00:52:28,544 --> 00:52:32,424
pre-Bitcoin, they were scientists, they were technical people, they were engineers, they were

678
00:52:32,424 --> 00:52:37,204
computer scientists, they were mathematicians, people who didn't see themselves as natural

679
00:52:37,204 --> 00:52:43,484
communicators. But because they understood the science of stuff generally, once they understood

680
00:52:43,484 --> 00:52:49,144
the science of how to communicate for influence, not to inform, they got it really fast.

681
00:52:50,704 --> 00:52:57,624
Maybe this is actually another one of those hurdles to Bitcoin adoption, because I think

682
00:52:57,624 --> 00:53:04,944
this trait of self-reflecting, changing and improving is something I see in all Bitcoiners.

683
00:53:05,064 --> 00:53:10,704
We have the ability to self-reflect or a lot of Bitcoiners do and then change their lives

684
00:53:10,704 --> 00:53:16,184
into something else. Like, I mean, that's what everyone living on a Bitcoin standard now had

685
00:53:16,184 --> 00:53:21,644
to have done that at some point. Like there's no way that you just stumble upon Bitcoin and then

686
00:53:21,644 --> 00:53:24,704
you're a Bitcoiner without changing your life.

687
00:53:24,883 --> 00:53:27,784
It requires you to change your life quite a bit

688
00:53:27,784 --> 00:53:29,184
to go on a Bitcoin stand,

689
00:53:29,264 --> 00:53:30,764
especially if you have a family and stuff.

690
00:53:31,004 --> 00:53:33,904
But for everyone, it's a huge leap.

691
00:53:35,664 --> 00:53:37,823
A leap of reason, I'd call it.

692
00:53:37,823 --> 00:53:42,504
So maybe this ability to self-reflect,

693
00:53:42,764 --> 00:53:47,264
like we like to brag about how humble we are, I know,

694
00:53:47,264 --> 00:53:53,284
But maybe this is actually one of the defining traits that Bitcoiners have.

695
00:53:53,564 --> 00:53:59,724
And maybe that's another hurdle to adoption that most people just don't self-reflect that much.

696
00:54:00,744 --> 00:54:02,584
Well, yeah, it's a good insight.

697
00:54:02,724 --> 00:54:04,604
And it's something that I've observed as well.

698
00:54:05,464 --> 00:54:08,744
And it can be a hurdle, but it can also be an opportunity.

699
00:54:08,744 --> 00:54:15,644
Because if we do have this ability to self-reflect, then we also have the ability to say,

700
00:54:15,644 --> 00:54:22,564
well, who's responsible for mass adoption of Bitcoin? Is it the people who haven't adopted

701
00:54:22,564 --> 00:54:27,004
Bitcoin? Are they responsible for seeing the light of day? Or do I personally have a responsibility

702
00:54:27,004 --> 00:54:32,684
for communicating better to increase their chance of getting it? And how we answer that question

703
00:54:32,684 --> 00:54:41,464
will have a pronounced impact on our behaviors and on the results and how fast Bitcoin adoption

704
00:54:41,464 --> 00:54:46,284
goes. If we say, well, this person's an idiot, so I'm not going to waste my time. Well, okay.

705
00:54:47,184 --> 00:54:50,704
That may be true sometimes, but it's not true all the time. But if we say, look,

706
00:54:50,764 --> 00:54:55,304
it's my responsibility to do triage, to work out who's going to get it, who's not,

707
00:54:55,484 --> 00:55:01,084
and who's kind of in the middle, where if I change and I get curious and I gamify this into more of a,

708
00:55:01,424 --> 00:55:07,204
I wonder, how could I get through to this person with this values, not being attached to what they

709
00:55:07,204 --> 00:55:12,784
do, but how could I maximize my chance that even this skeptic would see value in Bitcoin

710
00:55:12,784 --> 00:55:13,744
at the end of the conversation?

711
00:55:13,863 --> 00:55:16,644
For me, that's a fun game to play.

712
00:55:17,764 --> 00:55:22,164
And if you treat it more like a fun game, then I think you're probably going to be more

713
00:55:22,164 --> 00:55:22,764
successful.

714
00:55:24,104 --> 00:55:30,124
And it's a standard of, we talk a lot about self-sovereignty and radical responsibility

715
00:55:30,124 --> 00:55:30,684
taking.

716
00:55:31,484 --> 00:55:32,843
So for me, powerfully.

717
00:55:32,885 --> 00:55:38,245
of that responsibility taking is saying anytime that i'm blaming some other thing in life whether

718
00:55:38,245 --> 00:55:44,965
it's another person or an external circumstance i've lost my self-sovereignty whereas every time

719
00:55:44,965 --> 00:55:51,605
i take responsibility then the self-sovereignty rises so if i can take responsibility i can't take

720
00:55:51,605 --> 00:55:56,885
responsibility for what the person does with what i say but i can take responsibility for communicating

721
00:55:56,885 --> 00:56:02,325
in such a way that I maximize the chance that they can see the value in Bitcoin.

722
00:56:02,805 --> 00:56:09,365
And I can take responsibility for improving my communication to the point where that's likely to happen more often than not.

723
00:56:09,725 --> 00:56:17,865
And I can take responsibility for putting myself into an environment where I have the chance to meet with people who can make a difference to Bitcoin adoption.

724
00:56:21,525 --> 00:56:24,345
That's just fantastic advice. I love it.

725
00:56:24,345 --> 00:56:31,885
So a personal question on that, like, have you ever met a person that you disliked so much that you didn't want to orange pill them?

726
00:56:34,065 --> 00:56:35,225
Oh, that's a good question.

727
00:56:36,225 --> 00:56:37,885
Bitcoin's for enemies and everything.

728
00:56:38,185 --> 00:56:50,905
And it's probably good, like this is the asterisk here or whatever, that it's probably good for Bitcoin if you orange pill even your enemies.

729
00:56:51,365 --> 00:56:52,425
I think it is.

730
00:56:52,505 --> 00:56:53,105
I really do.

731
00:56:53,825 --> 00:56:57,945
It's so important because I think the answer to that is honestly no.

732
00:56:58,005 --> 00:56:58,765
I don't think I have.

733
00:57:00,745 --> 00:57:01,825
I don't care.

734
00:57:02,445 --> 00:57:06,645
Like if Bitcoin gets adopted by Pakistan, great, because then India will have to adopt it.

735
00:57:07,005 --> 00:57:10,045
If it gets adopted by India, great, because then Pakistan will have to adopt it.

736
00:57:10,465 --> 00:57:14,485
So it doesn't matter because of the way the world's set up.

737
00:57:14,485 --> 00:57:18,685
We're not going to change geopolitics, but we can work with that in our favor.

738
00:57:19,285 --> 00:57:22,145
And so it doesn't matter who does it first as long as they have enemies.

739
00:57:22,145 --> 00:57:42,065
So it's actually good if someone adopts it who has geopolitical enemies, because then the enemies will have to adopt it. So if the US does a Bitcoin strategic reserve, China will have to adopt it. I think China probably is forming a Bitcoin strategic reserve on the sly. But if that information ever gets out and we know with certainty that that's the case, that'll force Western nations to have to adopt it.

740
00:57:42,065 --> 00:57:51,065
yeah that's uh i mean the on a more personal level i'd say that uh the question to ask yourself is

741
00:57:51,065 --> 00:57:57,805
uh yeah i dislike this person but would i dislike him more or less or them more or less if they were

742
00:57:57,805 --> 00:58:02,265
a bitcoiner or not so and probably you'll like them more if they were bitcoiners well you have

743
00:58:02,265 --> 00:58:07,625
something in common right at least yeah and they at least there's a chance that they'll change if

744
00:58:07,625 --> 00:58:08,725
they become Bitcoiners.

745
00:58:08,785 --> 00:58:09,125
Yeah.

746
00:58:09,425 --> 00:58:13,665
With the strategic reserves, I'm still skeptical.

747
00:58:13,665 --> 00:58:17,525
I mean, Bitcoin's for enemies, but that doesn't mean I have to like my enemies.

748
00:58:17,525 --> 00:58:30,768
Like if I still want most of the Bitcoin to be in the hands of individuals and not in the hands of institutions The one phrase I miss hearing from at all of these Bitcoin conferences now that I

749
00:58:30,768 --> 00:58:34,448
traveled around for almost 10 years here is not your keys, not your coins.

750
00:58:35,088 --> 00:58:36,348
People don't say that anymore.

751
00:58:36,528 --> 00:58:40,968
And like, I'm going to reintroduce that and promote it because it's just as true now as

752
00:58:40,968 --> 00:58:41,808
it ever was.

753
00:58:42,468 --> 00:58:43,708
Paper Bitcoin is not Bitcoin.

754
00:58:44,448 --> 00:58:45,028
Yeah, absolutely.

755
00:58:45,028 --> 00:58:49,028
And that's why I still have...

756
00:58:49,568 --> 00:58:53,428
group discussions with my friends or friends of friends and say,

757
00:58:54,088 --> 00:58:57,608
hey, I'm just having this chat where I'm going to be talking about Bitcoin.

758
00:58:57,728 --> 00:59:00,108
If you know some people who'd like to come along, come along.

759
00:59:00,608 --> 00:59:02,748
And I typically do one or two of them a year,

760
00:59:02,808 --> 00:59:04,848
and maybe it will be 20 people who come along

761
00:59:04,848 --> 00:59:07,628
and who are all new to Bitcoin, all curious about it.

762
00:59:08,048 --> 00:59:10,048
And for me, those events are just as important

763
00:59:10,048 --> 00:59:14,928
as talking to policymakers, regulators, people in sovereign funds.

764
00:59:15,388 --> 00:59:17,168
Because as you say, for me, it's not about,

765
00:59:17,168 --> 00:59:21,028
is it a big organization and would this be better for Bitcoin price?

766
00:59:21,108 --> 00:59:22,748
It's just one human at a time.

767
00:59:23,528 --> 00:59:28,308
And you never know what the impact, the flow on effect of one individual will be.

768
00:59:28,448 --> 00:59:32,328
They could do more than a nation state leader for Bitcoin

769
00:59:32,328 --> 00:59:36,428
because you just don't know what the, it's the power of one, isn't it?

770
00:59:36,448 --> 00:59:39,948
The power of one individual to use it in a different way

771
00:59:39,948 --> 00:59:42,088
and to introduce it to a whole new community of people

772
00:59:42,088 --> 00:59:43,608
who otherwise weren't using it.

773
00:59:43,608 --> 00:59:49,388
like a one person you're talking before about the environmental movement imagine if someone who was

774
00:59:49,388 --> 00:59:56,808
a not just an environmentalist but a de-growther and an environmental activist prominent within an

775
00:59:56,808 --> 01:00:01,488
environmental organization suddenly realized that bitcoin was a great asset i mean it's going to

776
01:00:01,488 --> 01:00:06,408
make them uncomfortable people will be skeptical about them but just imagine now you've got this

777
01:00:06,408 --> 01:00:11,888
whole community of people who had previously been attacking bitcoin who now will be curious at least

778
01:00:11,888 --> 01:00:17,548
some of them. So that one person can actually do a lot of good potentially. So I agree with you. I

779
01:00:17,548 --> 01:00:23,388
think that's the importance of the individual. And we should never make an assumption that orange

780
01:00:23,388 --> 01:00:27,248
pilling one person is more valuable than orange pilling another. It's just individuals at the end

781
01:00:27,248 --> 01:00:33,708
of the day. Absolutely. Especially if you take Kevin Bacon numbers into account, like the degrees

782
01:00:33,708 --> 01:00:40,508
of separation between people are much shorter, much smaller number than people think. So you don't

783
01:00:40,508 --> 01:00:45,848
know if you tell someone about Bitcoin, that person may tell someone else that may tell

784
01:00:45,848 --> 01:00:51,908
someone else that may tell Donald Trump, like who knows? You don't know. Or Greta Thunberg

785
01:00:51,908 --> 01:01:00,228
for that matter. So what's going on with you like in the near and midterm future? Are you

786
01:01:00,228 --> 01:01:05,028
going to keep on coaching or what other projects are on the horizon? What are your plans?

787
01:01:05,028 --> 01:01:06,828
Yeah, two things for this year.

788
01:01:06,828 --> 01:01:22,151
So one is stepping away from doing so much on the front line with FUD fighting and talking about Bitcoin and energy and really helping to empower a bigger community of people So it more decentralized So there no central point of failure

789
01:01:22,911 --> 01:01:28,991
So it's much more, there's a whole community of people who are routinely holding the media to

790
01:01:28,991 --> 01:01:34,071
account, but also educating these policymakers and regulators. So that's important. I'm stepping

791
01:01:34,071 --> 01:01:37,831
away from doing that, coaching other people to do it. Part of the coaching as well is just finding

792
01:01:37,831 --> 01:01:42,991
people who are leaders within the Bitcoin space and coaching those people because that's something

793
01:01:42,991 --> 01:01:46,711
I've done for about 20 years. So coaching and leadership, coaching and pitching and

794
01:01:46,711 --> 01:01:52,371
communication, some of these things we're talking about now. And then the other thing that I'm

795
01:01:52,371 --> 01:01:58,391
really intent on doing is getting CH4 Capital its first project this year because we've been

796
01:01:58,391 --> 01:02:01,751
talking about it for a while. I feel like we've been talking about it for too long.

797
01:02:02,411 --> 01:02:07,791
It was an ambitious project to set up doing Bitcoin mining on landfills. I had to find out

798
01:02:07,791 --> 01:02:12,011
about four things I knew very little about, Bitcoin mining, carbon credits, landfill gas

799
01:02:12,011 --> 01:02:18,031
to energy projects, and infrastructure financing. And the best way to find out about four things is

800
01:02:18,031 --> 01:02:22,491
not to try and find out about four things, but to recruit people who know those things much better

801
01:02:22,491 --> 01:02:27,151
than you ever could. So we've done that. We've found the capital. We've found a number of sites

802
01:02:27,151 --> 01:02:31,071
we can do it. So we've ticked off a number of things. And now we're in the final stage, which

803
01:02:31,071 --> 01:02:37,771
is really finding those Bitcoin mining companies who are going to be enthusiastic miners on land

804
01:02:37,771 --> 01:02:59,631
And why would a Bitcoin mining company want to set up on a landfill? There's a whole lot of really good reasons. Number one, it decentralizes the network more. It turns pollution into a source of money, which also means that because it's stranded energy, you tend to get power for about one cent per kilowatt hour. So it's very cheap. It also means you have more capex to chase that. So there's more costs up front.

805
01:02:59,631 --> 01:03:25,071
But the way the halving cycles and hash prices working, it makes a whole lot of sense because it's the model of if you can own the energy asset or at least own the infrastructure investment up front, then by the time you've fully depreciated that and you've paid off the interest on those assets, then you can reap the reward from about year five onwards of that very cheap cost of power.

806
01:03:25,251 --> 01:03:29,411
So you're set up really well through multiple different halving cycles.

807
01:03:30,211 --> 01:03:35,471
So it works well for the landfill owner because they get to turn pollution into a monetizable asset.

808
01:03:35,611 --> 01:03:39,111
It works well for the Bitcoin mining company because they get a low price of power.

809
01:03:39,351 --> 01:03:44,391
And it works well for us because we get uncorrelated returns into the fund.

810
01:03:44,631 --> 01:03:46,731
That's going to be a big focus this year.

811
01:03:47,771 --> 01:03:51,791
I don't want to be coming back and jumping on your podcast next year and still talking about it.

812
01:03:51,791 --> 01:03:56,871
I want to be sharing some photos of our first installation that we have helped finance.

813
01:03:56,871 --> 01:04:17,155
Yeah that would be awesome We see fingers crossed I mean yeah well sounds hopeful Speaking of miner centralization geographical centralization is one thing but block template centralization is another thing

814
01:04:17,515 --> 01:04:20,015
Have you picked a side or whatever

815
01:04:20,015 --> 01:04:22,795
in the whole core versus not debate?

816
01:04:23,095 --> 01:04:26,075
And have you looked into ocean and all of this?

817
01:04:26,295 --> 01:04:27,855
Like, what are your...

818
01:04:27,855 --> 01:04:28,835
I honestly haven't.

819
01:04:28,955 --> 01:04:30,895
I've just, I've seen that and I've thought,

820
01:04:30,895 --> 01:04:40,995
I'm involved in so many different, not fights, but I wanted to just, this is what I did.

821
01:04:41,095 --> 01:04:45,835
I said, okay, I recognized I could probably go into first principles and form a viewpoint

822
01:04:45,835 --> 01:04:47,415
on this, but it would take a lot of energy.

823
01:04:47,515 --> 01:04:48,715
I'd have to do it very sincerely.

824
01:04:49,735 --> 01:04:50,655
That would take time.

825
01:04:51,235 --> 01:04:52,715
And then I'd have to have an opinion.

826
01:04:52,855 --> 01:04:56,315
And that would kind of defocus me from where I think my energy is better spent.

827
01:04:56,315 --> 01:05:00,255
And that's in basically fighting the FUD that I'm fighting right now.

828
01:05:00,615 --> 01:05:05,995
And just knowing there's probably some other people smarter than me who know more about that than I in that area.

829
01:05:06,095 --> 01:05:11,855
So I've actually stayed away from that for a very kind of in terms of my own personal focus.

830
01:05:12,735 --> 01:05:17,515
And so what I say is, look, I haven't researched it well enough to have an opinion either way.

831
01:05:18,815 --> 01:05:21,335
Oh, that's a beautiful answer, I think.

832
01:05:21,335 --> 01:05:28,395
yeah so if if people want to know more about you if they want to find out more about the projects

833
01:05:28,395 --> 01:05:38,715
where can they do that what's the best way to follow you on x at ds batten and ch4capital.com

834
01:05:38,715 --> 01:05:43,975
and particularly whilst we are looking at more investors we kind of got that sorted it's more

835
01:05:43,975 --> 01:05:50,935
bitcoin mining companies that we want to talk to at this stage all right so if you're a miner

836
01:05:50,935 --> 01:05:53,755
talk to Daniel

837
01:05:53,755 --> 01:05:58,915
Daniel I've enjoyed this conversation immensely

838
01:05:58,915 --> 01:06:03,155
is there anything else you want to say before we wrap this up

839
01:06:03,155 --> 01:06:05,475
I actually think we've covered a lot

840
01:06:05,475 --> 01:06:08,715
I'm looking forward to seeing you again in Madrid

841
01:06:08,715 --> 01:06:10,095
a few months time

842
01:06:10,095 --> 01:06:12,735
yeah Madrid will be the next time I guess

843
01:06:12,735 --> 01:06:14,055
that's in May

844
01:06:14,055 --> 01:06:15,215
yeah yeah so you should

845
01:06:15,215 --> 01:06:16,135
MadBitcoins

846
01:06:16,135 --> 01:06:18,835
I don't know if I have the promo code or not

847
01:06:18,835 --> 01:06:21,455
but use code infinity and see if it works.

848
01:06:21,955 --> 01:06:25,395
It works on most, you know, honorable websites.

849
01:06:25,975 --> 01:06:27,995
So MadBitcoin should be one of those.

850
01:06:28,375 --> 01:06:29,195
We'll see.

851
01:06:29,915 --> 01:06:31,715
But looking forward to seeing you.

852
01:06:31,955 --> 01:06:33,175
Always, always a pleasure.

853
01:06:33,895 --> 01:06:34,795
Thank you very much.

854
01:06:35,175 --> 01:06:35,975
Likewise. Thank you.

855
01:06:37,495 --> 01:06:39,295
This has been the Bitcoin Infinity Show.

856
01:06:39,875 --> 01:06:44,355
Like, subscribe, brush your teeth, tell your friends, and adieu.

857
01:06:48,835 --> 01:07:18,815
Thank you.