You Have Certain Wants but You Will Also Can Have Wants About Your Wants

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The Jewish version of this, I think it's in the Talmud. It says in a place where there are no men, be a man and old-fashioned language. But what it means is in a place who have no values and are not high quality, stand against them. And it's that outside set of values you bring to the table in theory that insulates you from that loss of authenticity.

When the 20-year-old overachiever Johnathan Bi's first startup crashed and burned, he headed to a Zen retreat in the Catskills to "debug himself." He discovered René Girard and his mimetic theory--the idea that imitation is a key and often unconscious driver of human behavior. Listen as entrepreneur and philosopher Bi shares with EconTalk host Russ Roberts what he learned from Girard and Girard's insights into how we meet our primal need for money, fame, and power. The conversation includes the contrasts between economics and Girard's perspective.