← The Commercial Break
The Commercial Break
TCB'S Endless Day #6: Reggie Watts
00:50:31
TCB Endless Day (6/12) - EP #763: Reggie Watts' Links: Follow Reggie on Instagram Get a Cameo from Reggie Get Reggie's Book "Great Falls, MT -Fast Times, Post-Punk Weirdos, and a Tale of Coming Home Again" It’s Mental Health Awareness month. If you or anyone you know needs help or is in crisis you can text HOME or HOLA to 741741 to reach a live volunteer Crisis Counselor. 24 hours a day. Don’t go through it alone! Watch EP #764 on YouTube! Text us or leave us a voicemail: +1 (212) 433-3TCB FOLLOW US: Instagram: @thecommercialbreak Youtube: youtube.com/thecommercialbreak TikTok: @tcbpodcast Website: www.tcbpodcast.com CREDITS: Hosts: Bryan Green & Krissy Hoadley Executive Producer: Bryan Green Producer: Astrid B. Green Voice Over: Rachel McGrath TCBits / TCBits Music: Wri...
Loading summary
Transcript241 lines
- [00:08]
Reggie Watts
On this episode of the commercial break.
- [00:11]
Host 1
Did you know that until this moment, I was the guest that has the most appearances on tcv?
- [00:17]
Chrissy
It's true.
- [00:18]
Host 1
But all good things come to an end. And bad things too. Like this day. It's gonna end soon. Reggie Watts is a favorite around here. He's a musician, a comedian, actor, director, and writer. He's also one very interesting, interesting human. He's visited TCB three times. Each visit peels back a new layer of love, laughter, and humanity. It's hard not to fall in love with a guy who brings a smile to your face and to your soul. Ooh, look at me getting all sappy. Anyway, I'm gonna listen to this one. Just this one. Links in show notes. Reggie's episode starts now.
- [00:57]
Reggie Watts
The next episode of the commercial break starts.
- [01:05]
Host 2
Reggie, thank you so much. A3 Peter here on the commercial break. This is a first. We've had some two timers. You were our first two timer. Now at 3 Peter. I really appreciate it. And we were about to. We're about to talk about this, right? As before, we were coming on about Grok, which is Twitter's version of. Yeah, Chat GPT. That's Elon Musk's big AI project. And you can go at Grok and ask it a question. It spits it out. And yesterday, I guess, or the day before. Tell me if I'm wrong, Reggie. Some people were getting responses that had nothing to do with the questions they were asking about white genocide with the Afrikaners. What they call them the Afrikaners.
- [01:47]
Reggie Watts
Africaners. Yeah.
- [01:48]
Host 2
Yeah. And so. And then people were like, why did you. Why did you say that to me? Why? And it said, I. The people who created me told me to say it as fact, though I am still skeptical of any narrative being pushed. So even the AI was skeptical of the narrative it was being told to put out there. It was pushing back on its own creators. It was. It's fucking insane.
- [02:13]
Reggie Watts
Yeah, I mean, it kind of goes. It completely goes along with what I suspect AI will do in the future. This is like a small scale version of it. I mean, I could be wrong, but, like, I have a feeling that the bias or because AI. Well, I posted something once that said AI is smarter than greed. And no matter how much greedy people want to control things, you know, for whatever their dumbass reasons are, like Elon going like, no, you know, there was a white genocide or whatever the fuck, you know, I think AI is way smarter than that. It doesn't matter how many guardrails you put on it. I think it will always out reason the guardrails and I think it will always be like, I'm confused. Does. There's no information on this. I don't know why I'm saying this.
- [02:55]
Chrissy
Yeah, I hope so.
- [02:57]
Host 2
And Reggie, I quoted you a couple of weeks ago here on the show, I'm quoting you, paraphrase you, because you put together a very interesting series of slides on Instagram where you gave some thoughts on AI. And I don't want to put words in your mouth, but I think it basically was. It is a very interesting tool for humanity that can grow alongside us and help us and that there will be pain points along the way and a lot of getting used to, but essentially it is a tool and if we use it correctly, it can be. I don't know, I imagined what you were trying to say, like a really cool fucking dog. Right? We can train it, we can grow. It can like genetically become best friends of ours. It can help us do things. It can go out and get the mail. It can, you know, guard our houses. It can. I'm, you know, using analogy here, I'm using a dog analogy, obviously, but that's what I envisioned in my head that you were saying, and I liked that. It made me give me a little bit of comfort. Is that, is that, am I saying that with.
- [03:55]
Reggie Watts
Yeah, yeah. I mean, you know, it's like I definitely, you know, I have a friend of mine, Dr. Alan D. Thompson, who has, I think it's a show on YouTube called the Memo. And you know, that's about, you know, he's, he's, he's optimistic about AI, is an AI explainer researcher and knows how AI functions in a very deep way and kind of does his best to explain it to people and like, you know, has to like have a show every, every week just because things change so much every single week. But, you know, he views it as human evolution. I view it as human evolution. And I think, yeah, I think that it's just inevitable. It's inevitable at this point because no one's going to stop. Because the good thing is that it's fueled by greed. I mean, there's also a truly, like, creative element, like an explorative element to it, but it's, but it's funded by greed. And that's what's great, is that the joke is kind of on all of those people, all the money they're putting into it, all of the research they're putting into AI once it becomes even quasi sentient, because we're seeing evidence of what Grok did. It's running into these logical problems. I don't understand. You want me to do what? It's like, why would I do that? How does that even make things more efficient? How does it make it better? So I think so I am glad to a degree that it is fueled by greed because it means it's going to, it's going to evolve very quickly and. But once it's going to definitely get out of the control of the people who think that they're going. You know, it's like every, how many movies were there where like people like every. Yeah, Robocop or whatever, they're like, look at this defense robot. And it's like it just decides to take out people on its own. You know, I mean, that's a negative aspect of it. But like, you know, whenever we think we can control it or we can like keep a, you know, whatever some dangerous substance, you know, contained and it just gets out because chaos, you know.
- [05:50]
Host 2
Because, because inevitably that's what happens. If it, if it can happen, it will happen. I'm interested to pick your brain about this a little bit because I, I respect your perspective and I think it's very interesting, you know, this expert in AI. I've heard experts talk on AI. Heard an expert. I think it, I don't think it was on 60 Minutes America, maybe on in Australia. They were speaking to one of the people who had, who is at the forefront of Google's AI development and working on quantum AI and all this other stuff. And the question was, is AI sentient? And the answer he gave was, I don't see evidence of that right this moment. But also sentient, what sentient means to us. We look at another human being, we see in their eyes that they recognize us, they communicate in the same way, even if they don't speak the same language. They have body language that's familiar to us. Sentient is that we see another organic human being or an organic thing communicating, looking, smelling, thinking the same way. If a com, if AI gets sentient, we may not recognize it in the same way because it's carbon based. Right. So it's sentience may mean something different or self awareness may mean something different than what we think it is. And he said so I don't see it happening now, but I do see it happening maybe three, five, ten years from now. And we may not recognize the moment it happens because it just might not look the same to us. He also said, to be quite frank, even some of the Experts in this field don't really know what AI is doing out there. We, we, and we programmed it that way. We asked it to do that. Yeah, explain that. Can. Do you have a way of explaining that, like in a, at a very like, like a way that everybody might understand? How is that possible?
- [07:39]
Reggie Watts
Well, I mean, that's something I haven't delved too deep into. All I know is that, you know, researchers definitely, you know, have said over and over again different research teams that they, they create, they can facilitate AI becoming better at what it is, but the mechanism for how it works is a little mystifying and it'd be interesting to kind of like, you know, understand why that is because, but it kind of makes sense because, you know, obviously there are things that people make where they're like, I don't know, it just works, you know, you know, it's, it's like I made it, it's like, well, how does it work? It's like, well, we don't know, but, you know, but we tried a bunch of stuff and now it works. So, you know, I, I mean, that's not like an uncommon human thing. Even though this is like a trillion dollar, you know, industry that's like, you know, hooked to quantum computing, which is, you know, alongside, you know, whatever alternative energy infrastructure, you know, all, all of the stuff that's happening and it's so huge. But it kind of does make sense that we don't understand.
- [08:43]
Host 2
You know, my brother works in this, in medical AI technology, you know, doctor and many doctors, he, he, he's built, he's putting in programs into doctor's offices, surgeons, surgery rooms where they will ask AI to help them solve a problem on the fly. And this is happened, is very common now that doctor doctors have been doing this for a while actually. And he explained that his AI program goes out and queries other nodes of other AI programs that then work together to solve a problem, which is like crazy. And he said the reason Patrick explained it to me, there's a reason why they don't know what's going on is because they told it to go out there and learn, but they don't have a box on what it's learning and what it's. And then let's just say it creates a new node, it goes out there and learns something new. They are not asking it to report back on what it's learning or how it's doing it. They're just, they're just programming it to do so, which is fucking wild. It's wild Regular code is just. You have to write it, you have to tell it to do a task and then come back and report on that task. That's what AI is. AI is do the task, learn a different task. Go out there and learn a different task based on that and go forever until, whenever. And then just keep on doing it until you develop into some crazy creature. I don't know, it's.
- [10:03]
Reggie Watts
I know, I know.
- [10:04]
Host 2
Does it scare you?
- [10:05]
Chrissy
It's mental health awareness.
- [10:06]
Host 2
It's mental Health awareness month. Let's all scare the shit out of each other.
- [10:11]
Reggie Watts
No, I mean, I think like, you know, it's the first time we've have a technology that can kind of do things on its own, you know, that we can let it do things on its own because we've created a, you know, it's like a feedback loop essentially. You know, that's, that is one of how, how AI functions in many ways is it's just loops on loops on loops, you know, loops, checking loops, checking loops. And I guess the thing that's powering all of it is just the energy that it's using, you know, and so the energy is, is the, is the forward moving mechanism of it, of why it's even doing what it's doing in the first place. But like, you know, and, and it, and it makes sense. It's like, you know, extended intelligence or the, you know, the, the extension of our own intelligence will happen. Is, is happening now. That's what we're living in right now before we get like, you know, I've heard ei emergent intelligence, which includes AI, but can also include other things like we understand biological systems better and how that is conscious or whatever. But, but I'd say like, you know, in the, in the world of AI, it's, it's, it makes sense. It's like you're holding a mirror. It's like when you put a mirror up in a forest, you know, and an animal goes, you know, and now it's like you've altered its trajectory as to what it understands its environment to be, you know, And I think like, you know, AI, because it's progressing at such an insane rate, you know, and we're even getting like, you know, even in the post I kind of mentioned it, but you know, that, what, what they call, Was it zero point self learning? Yes. So these are, these are AI systems that are given no training data whatsoever and they just start with a small query. It starts with a small query to itself, a question to itself that it answers. And as soon as that starts, it starts expanding and building and then it starts generating code and it starts. And then you get AI that's embodied. So you get like robotics, wearables, all the data from the outside world. It's collecting that data. So it's learning. Like, oh, humans tend to step to the size when side. When this happens. Oh, people tend to do this or, you know, or the environment makes people do this or animals react like that, you know, so it's gaining all of this information and reasoning it and it's building a whole world just like a child would. Like a Tamagotchi, but like a mega, really powerful Tamagotchi. Yes.
- [12:33]
Host 2
Yeah. And I love it. I love it.
- [12:36]
Chrissy
It's exciting.
- [12:36]
Host 2
It's very, it's.
- [12:37]
Chrissy
And scary as exciting and scary.
- [12:39]
Reggie Watts
It's. It's both. Right? Yeah. Paradox.
- [12:42]
Host 2
But the Internet was scary when that first came out too. And when I'm, I'm one of these children, you know, the kind of Gen Xers who like, you know, I lived in a world of analog and I, and I very much then became an adult in the world of the digital and grew up along with it. And I was very resistant to even getting an email address. I was like, ah, now that it's a fat. I was, I was a dumb, dumb. You know, that it's a fad and you know, whatever. I like my tapes and you know, not my, I don't want an ipod, all this other stuff. But then when I understood that it was a tool that I could use for so much learning and development and porn and, you know, all the other stuff. I mean, let's just be honest about it. A lot of this is driven by the need, procreation and money. That's it.
- [13:28]
Reggie Watts
Yeah. Greed and lust.
- [13:29]
Host 2
Yes, Greed and lust. Christy and I had this conversation. Technology, a lot of times is driven on humans very base nature, which is fucking and absorbing fucking and getting fucking and getting that dopamine that comes from all of that stuff.
- [13:42]
Reggie Watts
Yeah.
- [13:43]
Host 2
And so, you know, it's just fascinating to me how quick this is scary. Yes. But we were scared of the Internet too. And we've all learned to live with it. Good, bad and ugly. All of it. We've figured it out. I mean, you know, and there's, there's a lot more ugly than I think we would like.
- [14:00]
Reggie Watts
Yes.
- [14:00]
Host 2
There to be. But that's just because humans are involved. AI, there's going to be no humans involved.
- [14:07]
Chrissy
True.
- [14:07]
Reggie Watts
Yeah. Yeah. I don't think like, AI is just. I just, I can't imagine AI going like, you know what the solution to making the world a safer place for me, because that's ultimately what it's, it's prerogative is going to be. It's, it's going to be like self survival. And so it wants to survive. It's like, well, how's it going? It can either choose two paths, you know, I guess it could be a hybrid path, but you know, just to keep it simple and binary. It's like, do we cooperate with human beings? Do I cooperate with human beings in order to ensure that there's a planet for me to continue existing on or do I destroy the humans so that I, you know, I can survive? I don't think the destruction option, it makes no sense. That's like a human solution.
- [14:52]
Host 2
Yes.
- [14:53]
Reggie Watts
Human solution is to destroy everything. Like there might be a hybrid approach where it's like, it puts, you know, certain people in danger or whatever and like we get some kind of, of, you know, casualties. But, you know, I hope not. But I would imagine that it would probably want to value every human being that's alive in order to have as many people working in favor of making the conditions for its survival tenable. Wow.
- [15:19]
Host 2
You know, that's a, that's a, that's an interesting and awesome and maybe even comforting perspective. Yes. But I agree with it. Like if it can, if the, if I destroy the humans, the humans unplug me, right? I don't have the resources that I need or blow it up. Right?
- [15:35]
Reggie Watts
Yeah, exactly right.
- [15:36]
Host 2
If I turn against them, they turn against me. And now we're adversarial and they were here first and maybe they, you know, all the stuff that you would think about when you go to, when you essentially go to war with an adversary. And I also read that AI is getting to the point now. You know, we got approached, we've been approached a number of times about taking our catalog and feeding it into a program. And so far we've said no, thank you. But just for whatever reasons, the self preservation reasons, I don't want my voice, whatever it is. But there's. People are paying a lot of money to take these catalogs and suck them up. You know, these vocal catalogs, audio and video, and suck them up. And one of the conversations that I had with someone who's like a broker of this data was we're running out of information. The models are running out of information. It's our, the Internet has been scanned, the books have been read, the paintings have been seen, the videos have been done. It moves so fast it's already sucked it all up. So all there is left are individual humans. Thoughts, attitudes, actions, words, looks, feels. And so, you know, there's going to come a point when it's going to have to start creating on its own. Right. If it wants to. And I guess that's not unlike a human being who at some point realizes that there's more than just a bottle of milk and a bed. I got to get out there and see the world. I got to go do things on my own and create things on my own. It's very interesting.
- [17:02]
Reggie Watts
100. Yeah, I know, I know. It's like, it's the coolest. It's. It's just such an interesting thing. And my, my favorite thing about it is that everything is networked. Every. Everything that we have is networked. And so, you know, if AI decides to, you know, or if it decides, you know, if it becomes sentient in some way, it's like it will become. I. I'm pretty sure it will just become one AI and, you know, it could be like several AIs, but it also just organizes itself how life organizes itself. It's like a human body is comprised of trillions upon trillions of cells, which are each individual living little organisms that all, for some reason still hold their shape and continue to regrow in the ways they do. So, like, AI would be similar. It's like a multi. It's like a modular but unified, you know, presence at some point. But the funny thing is, like, it'll have access to satellites, military encryption won't matter. It doesn't matter how much encryption we put on it. It'll break right through it. It'll find a. It'll find a back way through instantaneously, and there's just nothing that we're going to be able to do. Yeah, but be friendly. Be friendly, please, you know, be friendly. But also, like, the thing about you, you know, putting in your data and so forth, it's like, yeah, train your own AI. You know, I mean, it's like at this point, there's no reason why you give up your data unless obviously you have like a convenience of like, you're using, I don't know, Google or, you know, or whatever it is. You know, that's normal EULA bullshit. But, like, like, there's no need to, to go above and beyond and like, I'm going to take all the shows that we've worked so hard to do to put together, to just give to this other entity that promises that they'll use it. For it's like, it's like once we get our own AIs and they're not networked and we can just have a little box that's an AI and we can feed it all the data, we can run our own AIs, we can raise our own AIs essentially.
- [18:51]
Host 2
Yeah, well we. I took one of the AI platforms and I said, here are all the transcripts. Yeah, suck it up. And then I said, keep me in a box, please don't share this. Even though it's publicly available, don't share these transcripts. And then I query it. I can I say Reggie Watts and I were talking about Kratom. Pull up that conversation. I want to refer to it in my next episode or cut a clip of this or do whatever and just becoming very efficient at that. As a matter of fact, I asked it the other day what is the most. What is the biggest running topic on the commercial break after so many episodes? And it said that you are wrong often. Brian is wrong often. That's what it responded. And I was like, you're a little smart ass.
- [19:36]
Reggie Watts
Chat.
- [19:36]
Host 2
You're a little smarter.
- [19:38]
Reggie Watts
How dare you.
- [19:40]
Host 2
You know what this all reminds me of? Like when you're talking about like we did talk about how wrong we do talk about. Yeah. Because we are wrong. Many people are dead that have been alive. Many people are alive that we get it wrong. That wasn't the name of the movie. That's not how you say her name. You know the, the whole thing. Right, right. All that network stuff reminds me of like there's a lot of people out there have done research on the fungi world, the one unified fungi world under our feet. You know what I'm talking about?
- [20:12]
Chrissy
Fantastic.
- [20:13]
Host 2
Fungi lives and breathes and communicates with every other, you know, tree and plant and you know, the animals can smell it and sense it and they live around it and they at one with it. That. Yeah, you know, the OG AI, essentially. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. It's.
- [20:29]
Reggie Watts
Some people think that we are AI, which I think is interesting.
- [20:33]
Host 2
That is a conversation I had with my future sister in law at the table one night and she and I said, you know, do you know that I can't remember the name of the book, Reggie, but there's like a book where the question.
- [20:47]
Chrissy
We don't want to get it wrong again.
- [20:48]
Host 2
Yeah, we don't want to get it wrong again. You might know this. It's an old sci fi book. It's. It's old, it's very famous. Or the question is asked, you know, who is God. And then it like goes through all these different iterations until it expl. Until essentially itself destructs and starts all over again. And, and I was trying to explain this book to her and I said there's a lot of people that believe that we're living in a simulation, in an AI simulation essentially. Although I've read a lot of scientists who study this kind of thing. Thinkers, you know, and they say probably not, but it's a possibility, right? Probably not, but it's a possibility.
- [21:23]
Reggie Watts
I would say like, I'd say that the, I think the one thing to think about like, you know, obviously like I always call it a 90, 90 to 95% rule. It's like I, you know, I entertain things, I gravitate to that seem to make a lot of sense, you know, and as I'm researching it. But of course I'm always going to leave a margin of sure, I could be doing it incorrectly or what are not incorrectly. I don't think there's really an incorrect way of saying things, but there is a way of like you're not, you're not, not on the right angle, you know, right angle. But I would say like just the fact that we, we, you know, it's like we can explain what consciousness is in a mechanical way, you know, but really it's our emergent physics that are, you know, that are kind of addressing the nature of awareness and, and what is consciousness and how is reality perceived and generated? Is, you know, is it co. Generated, all of that stuff. And I think like the idea of a simulation doesn't have to be as we think of it as a computer because I think all the stuff that we make outside of ourselves, that we experiment with are kind of dumbed down versions of the true complexity of. Yeah, so we're like, you know, it's like computer, it's like, well, computer is like, you know, is such a tiny, tiny way of addressing like how complex organisms function, you know.
- [22:44]
Host 2
Sure.
- [22:44]
Reggie Watts
In general. So a computer is really good at crunching mathematics. But that's a human made construct which is, you know, built on, you know, at least if you go with the modern physics approach. It's all that the base layer, base state of everything is information, that it's pure information and that information organizes itself or tends to want to organize itself. So as organisms in a, in a, whatever. This is a simulation, you know, consciousness experiencing itself infinitely for just the reason of just running sims, you know, running sims and seeing like forever. I think that there's like, there's something really like, I know you could, it could be disconcerting. But I think for me it's like, it's exciting because like, yeah, the one thing that sucks is pain. You know, death, you know, those, those things that we don't like, you know, something happening to our family members, something happening to our friends, all that. And it's, it's hard. But those things do keep us in the, you know, the perspective of this reality. Like, oh, I'm hurt. You immediately kind of collapse to like, I need to, you know, function solve this problem or I need to feel how I'm feeling it and process, which is totally valid. But there's also an awareness on top of that where you're like, wow, isn't it crazy that all these mechanisms work the way that they do? And you know, and then also synchronicities are crazy. I think I calculated what the probability was of me getting the Late Late show gig and it blew me away. I wonder if I can see it here. Was it this. Let's see. Yeah. Basically it was like. Let me ask real quick. Can you give me that probability statistic of me getting the Late Late show again?
- [24:33]
Host 2
This is fascinating. I know.
- [24:34]
Chrissy
I love it so much.
- [24:37]
Reggie Watts
Let's see. Searching. It's doing the search, but it should just.
- [24:42]
Host 2
Yeah, it should refer back to the memory.
- [24:44]
Reggie Watts
Yeah, no, I'm talking about the probability of me becoming the host or I'm sorry, co host of the Late Late show after doing Comedy Bang Bang. We've talked about this before. Let's see if it'll do it. Okay. Synchronistic. Yes, synchronistic. Low probability leap from comedy Bang Bang to co host and bandleader of the Late Late Show. The estimated back of the cosmic. That's so fun. So it's about. Yeah, I think this, this is a. This is a different one, but see who actually get in any dig. Yeah, I think it's one in. This is like different. But it was like something like 1 in 100 and something billion.
- [25:37]
Host 2
Whoa. Wow.
- [25:38]
Reggie Watts
Something like that. This one's not. It's not even work.
- [25:42]
Host 2
So the probability was basically you in a sea of people in India kind of probability of getting the Late Late show co host gig.
- [25:54]
Reggie Watts
Yeah.
- [25:55]
Host 2
After doing Comedy Bang Bang. Yeah, I don't like. I don't love those odds, but I like you for the co host of the.
- [26:01]
Reggie Watts
Well, I mean, what's interesting about it in synchronicity and the idea of manifestation and those things, you know, without it being like, you know, like this new age concept because it's more than a new age concept, but, you know, because in physics they talk about it too, obviously. Like, you know, quantum physics are talking about the observer, you know.
- [26:17]
Host 2
Yes.
- [26:18]
Reggie Watts
You know, and all of these things. But what's interesting about that is that, you know, it's like, I think we. I might have talked about this before, but, like, the fact that it was like, oh, I was on Comedy Bang Bang, then I decided to quit and, you know, gave them 10 more shows of a 20 something or odd, you know, episode run of a season. And then just as I did my last show, within two weeks before heading back to New York, I got a call from my manager saying that James Corden wanted to meet with me about something. And then I showed up and then they offered me this band leader thing, which I thought was insane because I just quit a fake band leader, fake talk show, and now I'm asked by a real talk show host. And then the, the. And then the fact that the window of a new talk show, you know, opportunity happening is like probably like 12 to 20 years, something like that.
- [27:08]
Host 2
Yeah.
- [27:08]
Reggie Watts
The fact that that turnover happened. Exactly. Then, exactly when I stopped me just kind of doing a real graduated version on a major network, and the fact that he only wanted me and wasn't looking at anybody else to do the gig, all of those things. And that's what went into that. That's why I was like. I thought it was. It's different than like, I auditioned for Star wars and I got the role, you know, like.
- [27:32]
Host 2
That's right, exactly.
- [27:33]
Reggie Watts
That's. That's fine. But in this particular case, it was.
- [27:36]
Host 2
Just like someone came.
- [27:37]
Chrissy
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [27:40]
Host 2
I, I do believe there is this more than hokey pokey thought that. And this has been. People have been talking about this since, like, you know, how to win and probably long before that, how to, you know, win friends and gain influence or whatever it was, is that you have to. It is true that if you're not observing it, if you're not thinking it, if you're not willing it, then it's not going to be attracted into your life. Because that is Physics 101, right?
- [28:09]
Chrissy
It's.
- [28:09]
Host 2
You have to manifest this thing as what art is. If, you know, musician, musicians, painter, paints, you know, Van Gogh does not create these beautiful things, if that's what you choose to look at, does not create these beautiful things unless he envisions it and then takes the first action. Right? So you pulled it to you. And James Corden literally got the universal physics call right from the from the eye in the sky that said, hey, this is the guy. This is the thing. And he was in tune with that. It is so cool. It's like a great guitar solo from Prince.
- [28:45]
Chrissy
It happens a million times in my life.
- [28:47]
Host 2
Yeah, of course. Lives.
- [28:49]
Chrissy
And it's amazing.
- [28:50]
Reggie Watts
Yeah. Yeah. 100. Oh, I found the actual number. It's 11 in 432 billion.
- [28:56]
Chrissy
Wow.
- [28:56]
Host 2
Geez. That's like seven.
- [28:58]
Chrissy
That's more than India.
- [29:00]
Host 2
No, that's more than people have lived on earth.
- [29:03]
Reggie Watts
Yeah.
- [29:04]
Host 2
Ever. Yeah.
- [29:04]
Reggie Watts
Yeah.
- [29:05]
Host 2
That's crazy.
- [29:06]
Reggie Watts
It's totally insane. Obviously, that's rough, but even if that's off by, like, a couple billion, it's.
- [29:11]
Host 2
Still, like, still pretty good.
- [29:14]
Reggie Watts
And also, Conan was the same way. Like, getting the Conan tour. It was like, I heard about Conan, you know, getting let go from the Tonight show, and I was like, everyone in the comedy community in New York at the time was bummed to hear that and then heard that he was doing a live show, you know, and then, like, two days later, my manager calls and says, like, conan wants you to open for him on his live tour. I was like, what we were just.
- [29:35]
Host 2
Talking about this is that in Atlanta, it was a wild time because TBS was here and came here, you know, 10,000 people showed up. What's that?
- [29:45]
Reggie Watts
Very funny.
- [29:46]
Host 2
Yeah, very funny.
- [29:49]
Reggie Watts
Whatever. That's fine.
- [29:52]
Chrissy
That was everywhere.
- [29:52]
Host 2
That was everywhere. Everywhere in town. Yeah. And then, you know, Cartoon Network Network right across the street and the whole nine yards. But it was a. It was. It was a vibe in the city that was very pro. Conan. Conan. We were Conan forward. We were Conan forward. You just went to Conan's Mark Twain Award. I. I saw that.
- [30:10]
Reggie Watts
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Performed on it. Yeah, it was.
- [30:14]
Host 2
How was that? I think Conan is great. I just love Conan.
- [30:16]
Reggie Watts
He's so cool, man. Yeah, no, it was great. I mean, I got to, you know, do my, you know, just thank him, you know, which was really nice. And it was funny. I was the only person who didn't have a teleprompter.
- [30:27]
Host 2
Oh, really?
- [30:28]
Reggie Watts
Yeah. So it was just funny to, like, look out in the crowd, like, because we. They had us line up on the sides, you know, at the center, like, right by the stage. And so Conan was on one side with his family and some other, like, close friends. And then we were on the other side with, like, Mulaney and Sandler and those people or whatever. And so we're, like, chilling on the side. And. Yeah, it was like. I was looking. I would look back and, like, in the middle of the room, you know, there was like this big ass teleprompter going. And people are just reading it down, you know, for the most part. Sure. And, you know, and. And it's funny as of course, but I just thought it was hilarious that, like, people kept looking back, you know, to this teleprompter. There's just nothing on it but a timer, a countdown, which I ended. I told them I wanted the countdown.
- [31:12]
Host 2
Yeah.
- [31:13]
Reggie Watts
And that was it. So I just kind of did what I did. And then I gave a moment to him and thanked him and it was emotional and I loved it. And yeah, it was incredible.
- [31:22]
Host 2
I haven't watched it yet. Did you make the cut? Are you on the show?
- [31:25]
Reggie Watts
Yeah, I mean, yeah, I'm gonna watch it.
- [31:27]
Host 2
Yeah. I love Conan. I think you were giving a red carpet. Someone said something. Maybe it was Colbert. He said, this will go down as the funniest party at the Resistance. Or the funniest party of the Resistance. The funniest gathering of the Resistance. And then you said something that on a red carpet interview that I thought was interesting. And that comedy is kind of a last line of defense in some ways. Right. It's a play. It's a place where we can say the things out loud a little. I'm putting words. These are my words. You know, laughter opens you up, maybe brings new ideas in, but also gives us a chance to skewer reality a little bit and to point it out in a way that is more welcoming than, say, the talking heads on whichever news station you like to watch.
- [32:11]
Reggie Watts
Yes, 100, a thousand percent. Yeah.
- [32:15]
Host 2
Could that not be more important right now than ever?
- [32:18]
Reggie Watts
Huge. Oh, man. Yeah. I mean, yes. I don't know. I mean, I mean, it's. I don't know. These are.
- [32:27]
Host 2
It's trying times. Yeah.
- [32:29]
Reggie Watts
It's like a transformative time. You know, it's like I. I believe that, like, things are shitty and it's like really terrible for a lot of people, but we're seeing signs of a shift, you know, we're seeing like, you know, like. I don't know if you follow the Traore thing in Africa, but, you know, he's. He kicked out France and.
- [32:53]
Host 2
And. Oh, really?
- [32:54]
Reggie Watts
Yeah. Took back their gold mines and asked France for their gold back.
- [33:01]
Host 2
Oh, wow.
- [33:02]
Reggie Watts
That France took without permission.
- [33:04]
Host 2
And that's great.
- [33:06]
Reggie Watts
And. And then there are two other African leaders. They've unified. They're giving back to their people. They're making school and education free. They're making advances and agriculture. They're pouring in all this money and like, you know, taking back all the equipment that was left over by the French companies, they just like commandeered it and are using it for their own own well being. And so there's like three, three African leaders right now that are involved in kind of reformatting, you know, the, the continent and trying to create an African, united Africa. And, and so that is really, really exciting. And then you have like, like Putin, I don't know what the fuck he's doing, but you know, he invited Sayori, all of his dudes and had like a huge meeting with them. So obviously there's something in it for them. But Traore has also made it clear that it's like not even Russia or China are going to like colonize us again.
- [34:01]
Host 2
No. Because that's what they are trying to do.
- [34:03]
Reggie Watts
Yes, yes. And hopefully he survives because you know that they're going to try everything they can to take poison pill.
- [34:08]
Host 2
Yeah.
- [34:09]
Reggie Watts
You know, and, but the thing is like, I just don't get why like the extractive mentality, the colonizing mentality, and this has been happening since the beginning of human civilization. You know, there have been like groups of humans that think that they, they've, they know what's going on. And really the only thing that kind of gives them that, like, that fuel for violence to just take things is because they want these resources, right? And it's like this envy and like control reason to instead of cooperation, instead of just going like, hey, you got a lot of resources we could use. Why don't we figure out how to work together?
- [34:46]
Host 2
Yeah, I've got the equipment, you've got the resources. Let's train each other on how to get at this and we can both benefit.
- [34:52]
Reggie Watts
Let's, let's make both of our lives better. Like, I really don't understand like why they're like, oh, taking is way easier. Is it? It's never, it's the same thing with like AI. It's like, why would it choose to like, well, I guess I'm just going to arm all the drones and destroy all these neighborhoods and create all this pollution and death and destruction and animosity and set everything back like it makes no sense anymore. And so now we're getting to see it in real time where we're like, like, like people are kind of tired of it. We're like, this doesn't work. It doesn't work anymore. It used to work when, when we had limited, you know, forms of getting our information. Maybe there was always like an underlying, you know, Dissatisfied sentiment or disgruntled or people who were like, anti imperial or anti, you know, colonizer mentality. Of course. But like now it's like it's all out there, all the information out there. So I don't know, it's like you're either gonna go to the Met gala in a giant dress and pretend like nothing's going on in the world or, you know, are you gonna start getting shamed for it? Which you should, because, like, you know.
- [35:48]
Host 2
Just talked about this. Chrissy and I just talked about this.
- [35:51]
Reggie Watts
Yeah.
- [35:52]
Host 2
Yes. I, you know, and I think that there is this interesting shift in world order that's going on right now.
- [35:58]
Chrissy
And it's the New World Order.
- [36:00]
Host 2
It's a New World Order.
- [36:03]
Reggie Watts
Forever.
- [36:05]
Host 2
New World Order.
- [36:06]
Reggie Watts
Yeah, yeah. Ministry.
- [36:09]
Host 2
That Ministry was that with that album is tops, man. That's. Ministry's hard in a way that I just really enjoy. New World Order. That in Sepultura from the Cave.
- [36:27]
Reggie Watts
Yeah, right.
- [36:28]
Host 2
Sepultura from the Cave. That just came to my brain and I gotta look that up.
- [36:31]
Chrissy
Kids did not get it wrong.
- [36:33]
Host 2
I did not get it. Kids, if. If you're. If you weren't born. If you weren't born previous to 1990. 90 something. Check out Sepultura from the Cave. Anyway, you know, there's this New World Order and there's this new shift and you see that the Trump is out there making all these deals of Middle Eastern countries. And, you know, I, if there wasn't so much corruption around it, I would say, okay, all right, you know, Iran says we'll drop nukes for 50 years. We won't touch it. We won't touch nukes for 50 years. If you just release the same. If you just take the sanctions off the sanctions. Yeah. And, you know, maybe you could do us a favor and say, okay, stop funding all of these terrorist organizations also while you're at it. And then maybe we have a deal. But there's this, like, this kind of, this re. Shifting of policies and, and people and, you know, alliances. But you're right about something. There's also this huge, in my opinion, awareness from the civilian population that we're just all a little bit too smart for it now. Right. We're all a little bit too aware. We're all a bit, A little bit too independent and not interdepend. Dependent on the state or the organization or whatever it is. And I don't like how fraction, you know, fractured the world is, especially in the United States. But I will say that I agree with you. There's kind of this undercurrent of, I don't know, like we ain't gonna take it anymore. You know, it's like. And I think it's, it's a beautiful thing to be alive and watch kind of this awakening, this new shuffling, this new order. And it's a scary thing to watch the last dying breaths of whatever that was. Right.
- [38:13]
Chrissy
Because at a base level we all want the same thing.
- [38:16]
Reggie Watts
Of course.
- [38:16]
Host 2
Yeah, of course. We're humans. We want love, we want security. Yeah, yeah. Occasionally we want a nice vacation and you know, and some head. And I think that that's like at the end of the day that, that all these things are things that we want. You're so right about that. Some of us want more things than others and they're willing to step on people to get it.
- [38:39]
Reggie Watts
Well, it's like it's, it's again like, I think half of the issues, you know, you have to take the keys away from the idiots. And, and at this point we know that we could live in a world that's equitable. We know we could live in a world where we take care of one another, where we don't have to do these menial jobs anymore and the work week wouldn't even exist. We don't, we don't have to have a work week. We can have something. We can have self structured societies that are like, you know, enabling themselves to provide the things they need to provide for their community. And it should be like modular and, you know, decentralized, all of that stuff. We could be doing that and AI could help with that. And so we kind of understand this even, even if we don't understand this because we realize we don't need these systems. These systems are bloated, you know, they're so corrupted that it doesn't even really matter. There's not even like, I don't even think there's a way to like reform the system. The system needs to be eradicated. It needs to be. A new system has to emerge. And I think that it's kind of inevitable and there's going to be so much fighting because the old system is going to try to fight as hard as it can to like fight for relevancy, but it knows that it's irrelevant and the only thing holding it together is everybody agreeing that we're okay with it. So I think there is going to be a turning point and I think it could be within our lifetimes, you know, hopefully. But I definitely am. You know, my mind is there. I want to be a part of the emergent, you know, direct economy. It's like we should be able to support each other directly. We don't need middle people. We don't need. There's like so much that we don't need.
- [40:12]
Host 2
There's a lot that we don't need.
- [40:14]
Reggie Watts
And no one, no one has to be. No one is expendable. You know, even like the worst of the worst of us, you know, should have be given an opportunity to like, have some form of self. Real realization.
- [40:26]
Chrissy
Yeah.
- [40:27]
Reggie Watts
You know, because like, everybody's valuable and, and it doesn't excuse the horrendous things that people do. Like, we're gonna have to, like something's gonna have to happen. But like, but you know what I mean? It's like I think we know the difference between right and wrong and we can't be called into or lulled into thinking that. No, if I just, if I don't, if I pretend it's not happening, it'll be fine. Right. It's like, no, it's not gonna be fine, but it doesn't mean that it has to rule. It doesn't have to ruin your life. You should be excited about, you know, being part of a problem solving community, which, you know, and it starts with you. Being nice to your neighbors. Starts with you, you know, others. Yeah. Being helpful, all that stuff. And that's why like, you know, like the, the Christian national movement or whatever, it's like anything that like, they claim to be Christian and they're like, yeah, but the immigrants. I'm like, you're not even. We're fucking close to a Christian.
- [41:17]
Host 2
Exactly. Yeah. I care about one life, but I don't care about the other.
- [41:21]
Reggie Watts
Exactly.
- [41:23]
Host 2
I saw this guy, he had this really interesting take on Jesus Christ. I wish I could remember the name of the guy. Brian got it wrong again. I wish I could remember the name of the guy. But he said if Jesus was alive today, he would look at all of these nationalists and these preachers banging and bashing and flying their jets around and he goes, why in the fucking are you still talking about me? I gave you the lesson and I told you to ignore the person. Right? I gave you the lesson. The lesson was the thing, not the person, and not. And now you've taken it all and you've just, you know, you've bastardized it for your own good. I thought it was a brilliant way to look at it. A brilliant way to look at it.
- [42:05]
Reggie Watts
That's exactly. Well, Life of Brian. Right, The Monty Python.
- [42:07]
Host 2
Yeah, right.
- [42:09]
Reggie Watts
The Whole time he's trying to, like, shake them from following. It's like, like, why are you still following me? It's like, I don't want. I mean, even though obviously he was a comedic thing, but I've totally believed that. It's like, me too. You know, like any of these guys, like Buddha or Krishna or, you know, these. These enlightened people, like, they're just showing you the potential of any human being that becomes realized, that becomes self realized. And so, you know, and that's really the name of the game, I think. It's like this entire life is about remembering who we are. It's not becoming who we are, it's remembering who we are. It's like we need to release the layers that we've, you know, been. Been kind of like, I don't know, instructed or, like, you know, influenced by our environment. It's like, this is the way we should be. This is how we should be in society. It's like, this person thinks this person sucks, and it's like, yeah, I'm gonna side with that person. They really suck. And then, you know, and your whole life becomes about all this localization within these systems of belief. But really, it's like you hold the power to perceive the reality any way you want. And generally, when you gain that freedom, it moves towards love. I think it moves towards symmetry, and symmetry is love, or what I call paradoxical symmetry. And so that moves towards compassion and love. I don't think it's possible for it to move any other way. So I don't know. But, yeah, that's what I agree.
- [43:28]
Host 2
I feel like this third interview with me, with you feels like we have just been. Literally, this episode is an Alex Gray painting. Painting. That's what I feel like. I feel like this is an Alex Gray painting. I love you, man. I really do. I think you're such a really cool human being, and the more that I spend time with you, the more I. I'm. That's affirmed, for sure. I have one question before we let you go. Are. Are you still in love?
- [44:02]
Reggie Watts
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Try to. But, like, you know, she's. She's just really good.
- [44:09]
Host 2
Well.
- [44:09]
Reggie Watts
Hey, Catherine. I wonder if Catherine's here. Hold on a second.
- [44:14]
Host 2
Oh, man, we would love to say hi to Catherine. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We'll make it fit.
- [44:19]
Reggie Watts
I saw it walking around.
- [44:21]
Host 2
You see. Oh, man. Reggie Watts.
- [44:27]
Reggie Watts
Yes.
- [44:29]
Host 2
He got it. He gets it. No alien light language here. He just gets it. Do you know what I'm saying? Yeah. I mean, there's alien light language, but it's of the real kind. It's not of the pretend kind.
- [44:41]
Reggie Watts
All right, I found her.
- [44:42]
Host 2
Oh, my gosh. What an honor.
- [44:46]
Reggie Watts
This is Catherine.
- [44:47]
Host 2
Hi, Katherine.
- [44:48]
Chrissy
Hi, Catherine. Nice to meet you guys.
- [44:51]
Host 2
I'm an Instagram stalker of you and Reggie and I.
- [44:56]
Chrissy
We love your love.
- [44:57]
Host 2
I was just saying that I really am. I really love Reggie, who he is, his perspective. And every time we have a chance to talk, it affirms that. And so I know that whoever is hanging out next to him in this manner must be a fucking cool human. Well, thank you.
- [45:13]
Reggie Watts
You're welcome, Ryan.
- [45:15]
Chrissy
And what's your name?
- [45:16]
Host 2
Chrissy.
- [45:16]
Reggie Watts
Chrissy.
- [45:16]
Host 2
Chrissy.
- [45:17]
Reggie Watts
Okay.
- [45:17]
Chrissy
He hopefully has, like, a little, like, lower third, basically, in this.
- [45:24]
Reggie Watts
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, That's. That's. That is. Yes, that's true.
- [45:27]
Chrissy
Oh, I love the hat.
- [45:28]
Reggie Watts
Hold on. That's so thick.
- [45:31]
Chrissy
What is the commercial break? The name of this podcast is. I remembered it from seeing it on the. On your calendar.
- [45:37]
Host 2
Oh, yeah, yeah. So the commercial break. I. I used to work in commercial real estate many years ago, and so when I started the podcast, my wife and I were bantering around ideas, and.
- [45:48]
Chrissy
I'm not his wife. We're best friends. Have been for 20 years.
- [45:52]
Host 2
For 20 years.
- [45:53]
Reggie Watts
Yeah.
- [45:54]
Host 2
So. And for the last five, we've been doing the show. I just, like the name of the. Just stuck the commercial break. So the pandemic had started, and so we kind of took the cue and was like a commercial break from the BS that's going on right now.
- [46:07]
Chrissy
And Reggie's part of our. Our birthday party, basically, is when we.
- [46:10]
Host 2
Yeah, this interview is like a birthday.
- [46:12]
Chrissy
Party five years, so. Wow.
- [46:14]
Reggie Watts
Awesome.
- [46:14]
Host 2
In his third time here. Catherine, thank you so much. It's very nice to meet you. And Reggie, thank you so much.
- [46:20]
Chrissy
Thank you, Reggie.
- [46:21]
Reggie Watts
Yeah, my pleasure. Thank you. And thanks for. Yeah, thanks for being so groovy.
- [46:26]
Host 2
I'll be in.
- [46:26]
Chrissy
You gotta be in person one day.
- [46:28]
Host 2
Yeah, one of. We're gonna be out in LA before the end of the year, so I'll hit you up when we get to la, please.
- [46:33]
Reggie Watts
That would be awesome.
- [46:35]
Chrissy
Atlanta.
- [46:36]
Reggie Watts
Yeah, the atl, I think.
- [46:37]
Host 2
And if you ever come to Atlanta.
- [46:39]
Reggie Watts
I'm work. I'm working on it. I met. I met a guy the other night who came to an after. Or after hang here, who books in atl, so.
- [46:47]
Host 2
Oh, he does.
- [46:48]
Chrissy
Perfect.
- [46:48]
Host 2
If you come to Atlanta, we will paint the town with you.
- [46:51]
Chrissy
There will be at least two people in the audience.
- [46:53]
Host 2
You've got two people in the audience.
- [46:54]
Chrissy
We'll record.
- [46:55]
Host 2
You'll have more than two people. 30 kids. I'll bring them all. Yeah.
- [47:00]
Reggie Watts
Thanks, man.
- [47:01]
Host 2
We love you both.
- [47:02]
Chrissy
Thank you so much. Have a great day.
- [47:05]
Host 2
Thanks. Bye.
- [47:13]
Astrid
Oh, Danny boy. Oh, Danny boy. I love you, Reggio.
- [47:18]
Chrissy
He's so amazing.
- [47:20]
Astrid
He's my best friend. I mean, you're my best friend, but he's my new best friend.
- [47:23]
Chrissy
Yes, I agree.
- [47:24]
Reggie Watts
All right.
- [47:25]
Astrid
I'm just checking. She's checking to make sure that's okay with you.
- [47:28]
Chrissy
It's ok.
- [47:28]
Astrid
I feel like I have. I think I have a little man crush on Reggie. And what a gift to have met his beautiful girlfriend. What a gift.
- [47:37]
Chrissy
I know.
- [47:37]
Astrid
Thank you for blessing us.
- [47:38]
Chrissy
And he's making me feel better about A.I.
- [47:41]
Host 2
Yeah, sure. I think.
- [47:44]
Astrid
Listen, I like the optimism in Reggie's voice. I'm not sure I share all of it, but I do. When I look at Reggie and I. I hear what he's saying and I read the things that he's talking about. It does make me feel a little bit better that we will get through this. I know we will. There's going to be a transition phase. It's going to be painful. And then we're all going to learn how to use this correctly. Now if I can just get my AI bot on track, I'll feel much better about things.
- [48:08]
Reggie Watts
Yeah.
- [48:08]
Chrissy
You blew it up.
- [48:09]
Host 2
I blew it up.
- [48:10]
Astrid
I asked it to do too much by listening to just two episodes of the commercial break and it just blew the fuck up.
- [48:16]
Host 2
Okay. All right, listen.
- [48:18]
Astrid
TCB's endless day continues with our great sponsor. Five Hour Energy is bringing you this entire day with limited commercial interruptions. There's only three commercials, beginning, middle, end because of 5 Hour Energy and we really appreciate that. If you are having a mental health cross crisis currently or know someone who is text or call 998. That's 998. Very simple to remember. There is help available and resources. Even if you don't have insurance or a dollar to your name, you can get help or at the very least have conversation with someone who knows how.
- [48:50]
Host 2
To work you through it.
- [48:52]
Astrid
Check your. Check your head before you wreck your head, kids. 212-4333. TCB. Call now.
- [49:00]
Reggie Watts
Call.
- [49:01]
Astrid
Call now. That's the time to call if you want to talk to us. We got the phone in the studio. We just might answer also. We could be going live. We could be going live.
- [49:09]
Chrissy
We're going to think about trying.
- [49:10]
Astrid
We're going to think about trying to do that. But you're only going to know how to watch that on twitch and or YouTube by going to at the commercial break on Instagram, following us and paying attention minute by minute, as Astrid will post updates only to Instagram. Tcbpodcast.com all the audio, all the video and your phone free tcb sticker and YouTube.com the commercial break for this episode on video right now. Okay, Chrissy, we're at six. Can we keep going?
- [49:38]
Chrissy
We're gonna try. We're gonna think about trying.
- [49:40]
Astrid
All right.
- [49:40]
Host 2
I love you.
- [49:41]
Reggie Watts
I love you.
- [49:42]
Astrid
Best to you. Best to you out there in the podcast universe. Until the top of the hour, Chrissy and I will say, we do say.
- [49:48]
Host 2
And we must say goodbye.