Lex Fridman Podcast

#231 – Alex Gladstein: Bitcoin, Authoritarianism, and Human Rights

Oct 16, 2021

02:40:35

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Highlights

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Episode notes

Bitcoin Is the Mechanism of Peaceful Revolution

03:35

How Can Bitcoin Be Used to Fight Authoritarianism?

03:57

Bitcoin Project - If Bitcoin Project Didn't Work

01:50

Introduction

2min

Automate Machine Learning Using Gradient

3min

Get 15% Off Code Academy Pro at Codecademy.com

3min

What Are Some Universal Human Rights That All People Should Have?

2min

Do You Think Authoritarian Regimes Can Manipulate the Negative Rights?

2min

Is Free Speech a Fundamental Right?

3min

What Is the State Doing?

2min

Is AWS a Good Place to Start?

2min

We Live in a Profit-Seeking World

2min

10.

Is Free Trade Really Good?

2min

11.

How Do You Know if You Live in an Authoritarian State?

3min

12.

Is Your Government Going to Be Good All the Time?

2min

13.

What Kind of Systems Protect Us From Our Own Human Nature?

4min

14.

Is Bitcoin a Tool for Abuse of the Citizen?

4min

15.

The Threat From Big Data Analysis

3min

16.

The Chinese Government's Laboratory for Digital Leninism

2min

17.

Is Big Brother Enabled by Big Data Analysis?

2min

18.

Is It a Free Society Versus a Fear Society?

2min

19.

Snowden and the NSA: What Should We Be Thinking About?

4min

20.

What Is Money?

3min

21.

How Can Bitcoin Be Used to Fight Authoritarianism?

4min

22.

Bitcoin

5min

23.

Could Bitcoin Be Adopted by a Sufficient Majority?

2min

24.

Bitcoin Is the Mechanism of Peaceful Revolution

4min

25.

Is Bitcoin Going to Survive the Legal Pushback?

6min

26.

Bitcoin and TV

4min

27.

Bitcoin Scales Through Lightning Network

2min

28.

The Bitcoin Blockchain Is Not Centralized, It's Decentralized

3min

29.

Bitcoin and the Blockchain

2min

30.

Bitcoin Proof of Work Is the Fundamental Idea

2min

31.

Bitcoin Project - If Bitcoin Project Didn't Work

2min

32.

Bitcoin - What Goes Wrong With It?

2min

33.

I'm a 99 Skeptic

2min

34.

I Love America, So as an Immigrant, I Love This Country

3min

35.

The Human Rights Foundation's Most Important Project Right Now

4min

36.

Do You Think We're Going to Have a War With China?

2min

37.

We Don't Know When the Chinese Empire Will Fall

2min

38.

Is There a Solution to Censorship?

3min

39.

Is Twitter That Bad Right Now?

5min

40.

Is There a Way to Decouple Data and Privacy?

4min

41.

Signal Isn't a Bad Idea, but Killer App

3min

42.

The Human Rights Foundation - Gary Kasparov

3min

43.

Gary Karamurza's 'Stop Propping Up Putin'

3min

44.

Conversations Save Us, They Don't Destroy Us

4min

45.

Is It Fair to Interview Like a Distort?

3min

46.

Is There Anything You're Afraid to Ask?

2min

47.

The Man Without a Face by Masha Gessen

3min

48.

Is There Room for Nuance in This World?

4min

49.

Are You Really Concerned About Bitcoin?

2min

50.

The Journey of a Thousand Miles Starts With One Step

3min

51.

Are We Going to Destroy Ourself?

3min

52.

The Power of Money

2min

53.

The Power of Permissionless Money in the Third World

2min

54.

The Invasion of Iraq

3min

55.

Is Bitcoin a Good Idea?

2min

56.

The Meaning of Life

3min

57.

Let's Continue Pushing

2min

58.

Is There a Difference Between Laziness and Ignorance?

3min

Alex Gladstein is the Chief Strategy Officer at the Human Rights Foundation and the Oslo Freedom Forum. Please support this podcast by checking out our sponsors:
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EPISODE LINKS:
Alex’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/gladstein
The Little Bitcoin Book: https://littlebitcoinbook.com/
Human Rights Foundation: https://hrf.org/

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OUTLINE:
Here’s the timestamps for the episode. On some podcast players you should be able to click the timestamp to jump to that time.
(00:00) – Introduction
(08:36) – Universal human rights
(22:35) – Authoritarianism
(32:46) – AIs impact on civil liberties
(44:09) – Edward Snowden and government surveillance
(47:48) – Money
(52:01) – Bitcoin
(1:07:48) – Government response to Bitcoin
(1:18:19) – The blockchain
(1:23:42) – Can Bitcoin fail?
(1:26:33) – Bitcoin scams
(1:30:17) – Patriotism
(1:32:41) – Human Rights Foundation
(1:37:15) – Conflict with China
(1:40:05) – Corporate accountability
(1:55:27) – Garry Kasparov and the HRF
(2:00:36) – Journalism, conversations, and truth
(2:07:50) – Alex’s book recommendations
(2:15:56) – Attacks on Bitcoin
(2:17:35) – The future of humanity
(2:21:57) – Advice for young people
(2:33:13) – Meaning of life