#256 – Nationalism Debate: Yaron Brook and Yoram Hazony

The following is a conversation with Yaron Brooke and Yoram Hazoni. This is Yoron's third time on this podcast, and Yoram's first time. Yaron Brook is an objectivist philosopher, chairman of the Ein Rand Institute, host of the Yaron Brooks show, and the co author of Free Market Revolution and Equal is Unfair. Yaram Hazoni is a national conservative thinker, chairman of the Edmund Burke foundation that hosted the National Conservatism Conference. He is also the host of the Natcon Talk and author of the Virtue of Nationalism and an upcoming book called conservatism a rediscovery. Allow me to say a few words about each part of the two word title of this episode. Nationalism debate first debate I would like to have a few conversations this year that are a kind of debate with two or three people that hold differing views on a particular topic but come to the table with respect for each other and a desire to learn and discover something interesting together through the empathetic exploration of the tension between their ideas. This is not strictly a debate, it is simply a conversation. There is no structure, there's no winners. Except, of course, just a bit of trash talking to keep it fun. Some of these topics will be very difficult, and I hope you can keep an open mind and have patience with me as kind of moderator who tries to bring out the best in each person and the ideas discussed. Okay, that's my comment on the word debate. Now onto the word nationalism. This debate could have been called nationalism versus individualism, or national conservatism versus individualism, or just conservatism versus individualism. As we discuss in this episode. These words have slightly different meanings depending on who you ask. This is especially true, I think, for any word that ends in ism. I personally enjoy the discussion of the meaning of such philosophical words. I don't think it's possible to arrive at a perfect definition that everybody agrees with, but the process of trying to do so for a bit is interesting and productive, at least to me, as long as we don't get stuck there. Some folks sometimes do in these conversations, and now a quick few second mention of each sponsor. Check them out in the description. It is in fact the best way to support this podcast. First is Noom, a habit establishing system that helps you get fit. Second is inside tracker, a service I use to track my biological data. Third is simplisafe, the home security company I use. Fourth is ExpressVPN, the VPN I've been using for many years. Fifth, and finally is Blinkist, the app I use to read summaries of books, so the choice is habits, health, security, privacy, or wisdom. Choose wisely my friends. And now onto the full ad reads. As always, no ads in the middle. I try to make these interesting, but if you skip them, please still check out the sponsors. I enjoy their stuff. Maybe you will too. This episode is brought to you by Noom, which is a behavior and habit changing system that helps you get fit and lose weight. Go to trynoom.com Slash Lex to take a short survey about yourself and it'll generate a custom program for you. This includes helping you find why you want to do it. The why is the important thing. The what is the small details. The why is essential. It also helps you define small goals along the way and guides you 10 minutes a day to better habits. If you want to get anything done in this world, friends, you got to do it every day. 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I think services like Blinkus are just amazing because you can get the key ideas from the book without spending a humongous amount of time reading the book. Anyway, go to blinkist.com lex to start your free seven day trial and get 25% off of a Blinkist premium membership. That's blinkist.com lex, spelled blimkist. Blinkist.com lex. This is the Lex Friedman podcast, and here is my conversation with Yaram Brook and Yoram Zoni. I attended the excellent debate between the two of you yesterday at UT Austin. The debate was between ideas of conservatism, represented by Yaram Hazoni, and ideas of individualism, represented by Yaram. Brooke, let's start with the topics of the debate. Yaram, how do you define conservatism? Maybe in the way you were thinking about it yesterday, what to you are some principles of conservatism?