Over my nearly five years of hosting this show, one of the guests I've felt the most kinship with is the author John Green.

We both know something about being thrust into the spotlight without ever having ambitions to be there.

Green built his reputation, writing blockbuster young adult novels like The Fault

on Our Stars, and creating extremely popular YouTube channels, including Crash Course. I invited

John back on the show to talk about his latest work, through which I think he's found

his life's calling. We've reduced the burden of tuberculosis by 99% in the United States, in Australia, in Germany,

in Japan, all over the world.

We let this cure be where the disease is not, and we let the disease be where the cure is not.

I find that reprehensible.

Welcome to people I mostly admire with Steve Levitt.

I first had John Green as a guest on this podcast in 2022.

One of the things we talked about was quitting, which is something I'd talk about a lot.

In the past, John said that discussion influenced his decision to stop writing the novel he was working on and instead devote himself to writing his new book, Everything is Tuberculosis.

I started our chat today by telling him how flattered I was by his comments, but suggesting that

he should admit that I actually had nothing to do with his decision to write his new book.

I am generally in the business of buttering up interviewers, but I genuinely mean that

our discussion about quitting

and the importance of quitting really did reshape my understanding of the novel that I was working

on, which I can go back to any time, but it made me want to push TB to the four, and that's

what I've done over the last couple of years.

So when I first heard you were writing a book about tuberculosis,

I thought to myself,

...