If Life Is Random, Is It Meaningless? (with Brian Klaas)

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4.7 • 4.3K Ratings

🗓️ 22 January 2024

⏱️ 60 minutes

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Summary

How did a husband-and-wife vacation end up saving a city from the atomic bomb while destroying another? And how did a century-old murder of one family bring another into existence? Easily, explains political scientist Brian Klaas of University College London, who points out that history is replete with chance events that profoundly shaped both society and individual lives. Listen as Klaas discusses his book Fluke with EconTalk's Russ Roberts. Klaas argues that recognizing the randomness of everyday life and history can lead to a newfound appreciation for the meaning of every decision, and to a focus on joyful experimentation instead of relentless optimization.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to Econ Talk, Conversations for the Curious, part of the Library of Economics and Liberty.
0:07.8	I'm your host Russ Roberts of Shalem College in Jerusalem and Stanford University's Hoover Institution. Go to Econ Talk. in to today's conversation. You'll also find our archives with every episode we've done
0:24.5	going back to 2006. Our email address is mail at econ talk.org we'd love to hear from you. Today is January 4, 2024,
0:40.0	and my guest is author Brian Kloss of University College London,
0:44.3	where he is an associate professor of global politics.
0:47.1	His latest book, which is our topic for today, is Fluke.
0:50.8	Chance, Chaos, and why everything we do matters.
0:54.8	Brian, welcome to Econ Talk.
0:56.2	Thanks for having me on the show.
0:58.3	I want to remind listeners to go to econ Talk.org
1:00.8	where you can vote on your favorite episodes of 2023. Thank you. And now Brian, you
1:07.1	open your book with two remarkable stories. One is about Henry Stimson and one is about yourself.
1:13.7	Let's start with the Stimson story and how it illustrates the idea behind your book.
1:18.6	Yeah, so the Stimson story starts with a vacation in
1:22.6	1926 to Kyoto, Japan.
1:24.6	It's a couple, Mr and Mrs. H.L. Stimson,
1:27.4	who go on this vacation and just fall in love with the city.
1:30.6	And this is relevant because 19 years later, the husband and the couple, Henry Stimson,
1:37.0	ends up being America's Secretary of War who's overseeing the targeting committee,
1:41.0	which is tasked with deciding where to drop the first atomic bomb
1:44.4	to end World War II.
1:46.2	And all of the generals, all the people on the targeting committee
	...

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