Ask A Genius 1635: Trump, Iran, Kristi Noem, Britney Spears, and AI

How does Rick Rosner interpret Trump’s foreign policy, Kristi Noem’s firing, Britney Spears’ troubles, and the strange overlap between geopolitics, celebrity culture, and artificial intelligence?

In this wide-ranging conversation, Scott Douglas Jacobsen and Rick Rosner examine the chaos of contemporary politics, foreign policy, celebrity culture, physics, and artificial intelligence. Rosner weighs Trump’s rhetoric on Greenland, Iran, and interventionism, questions the public case for conflict, and comments on Kristi Noem’s firing and contracting controversies. The discussion then shifts toward Britney Spears, Elvis Presley, and the destructive pressures of fame. From there, Jacobsen and Rosner explore atomic “empty space,” quantum fields, human reasoning, and AI’s growing conversational power. The result is an expansive dialogue about power, instability, knowledge, and modern absurdity.

Scott Douglas Jacobsen: I think the picture has become a bit clearer. There was the issue of Trump linking his frustration over the Nobel Peace Prize to Norway, even though the Norwegian Nobel Committee is institutionally separate from the Norwegian government. Greenland, meanwhile, is an autonomous territory within the Kingdom of Denmark, not Norway. During his Davos speech, Trump also appeared to refer to Greenland as Iceland, which added to the confusion.

Rick Rosner: You might be reading too much into it, but at least on Greenland and related rhetoric there does seem to be a clearer pattern. 

Jacobsen: One interpretation is that strategic positioning, shipping routes, Arctic security, and broader geopolitical leverage are all mixed together in the messaging. I would be cautious, though, about presenting any single explanation—especially an oil explanation—as definitive without stronger evidence.

Rosner: I find that explanation a little too “three-dimensional chess” for Trump. I do not think his reasoning is usually that elaborate.

Jacobsen: That may be fair. Still, people around him may be shaping the frame. 

Rosner: On February 11, Netanyahu met with Trump for nearly three hours. Netanyahu had been pressing Trump for tougher action on Iran. That seems more concrete than an abstract theory about oil flows. That strikes me as more plausible. Trump is often portrayed as highly influenced by the last strong voice in the room. What you are describing sounds more structured than I would normally attribute to him.

Jacobsen: I will grant that. It may still be ad hoc. I am not saying the explanatory framework is proven, only that it offers a possible structure.

Rosner: Fair enough. On oil, the United States has for years been one of the world’s largest producers, but “self-sufficiency” is a slippery political term, and politicians often use it loosely. So I would be careful with any neat claim there as well. Anything involving the Middle East inevitably brings oil into the discussion, and Trump has long had close political ties to fossil-fuel interests. That part is straightforward enough.

Jacobsen: Another possible factor is China. At the same time, China has also been the world’s largest builder of solar capacity by a very wide margin, so the energy picture is not just about oil. It is also about long-term infrastructure and industrial policy. That is something the United States could have pursued much more aggressively.

China is well positioned for large-scale solar because of its land base and industrial planning, but the United States also has enormous open areas suitable for utility-scale solar if the political will exists.

What else is in the news?

Rosner: We should talk about Kristi Noem. She was fired.

Jacobsen: What is the justification for Kristi Noem being fired? The reporting does not point to a single cause. Several outlets reported that Trump fired her after multiple controversies, including scrutiny over a $220 million Homeland Security advertising campaign awarded without a standard bidding process. Reporting also focused on roughly $143 million in no-bid contracts tied to politically connected firms.

The campaign featured Noem prominently and was aimed at discouraging unauthorized immigration. The $220 million figure refers to the broader advertising campaign, while the $143 million figure refers to a subset of no-bid contracts connected to firms with political ties.

Jacobsen: I want to make a quick point. What is the financial angle here? 

Rosner: Normally, if the government needs something done—such as producing an advertisement—it is supposed to put the project out for competitive bids. Contractors submit proposals and prices, and the agency chooses among them. It is the same principle as hiring a contractor to add a room to your house. You usually collect multiple bids before deciding.

At least three bids, ideally. Instead, she approved a no-bid contract with someone she knew. Then she said that Trump had approved the contract. That was the part that caused trouble. Trump did not like the suggestion that he had personally signed off on a no-bid arrangement, which made it look as though she was shifting responsibility onto him.

Trump is replacing her at the end of the month with Senator Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma. Mullin did not complete a four-year college degree; he worked in and later ran his family’s plumbing business before entering politics. Critics on social media frequently mock him as unqualified, although that is more political rhetoric than a factual description.

He also does not have a background in law enforcement or homeland security policy. His professional background is primarily business. Earlier in his life he also fought a small number of mixed martial arts bouts and was undefeated.

Trump is reportedly moving Noem into another role he created, which he described as connected to defense and regional security. According to Trump, she will serve as Special Envoy for the “Shield of the Americas,” which he described as a new Western Hemisphere security initiative.

There is also a story circulating in tabloids and gossip columns. The story claims that Noem had a favorite blanket that traveled with her on the government aircraft—a modified Boeing 737 used for official travel. During one trip the aircraft was changed, and the blanket was left behind. After takeoff, Corey Lewandowski—who has been closely associated with Noem politically—reportedly asked the pilot to turn the plane around to retrieve it. The pilot said that was not possible because the flight plan had already been filed. Lewandowski allegedly fired the pilot, then had to rehire him because there was no replacement pilot available.

Another rumor reported in a British tabloid claims that the incident was not about the blanket but about a bag left behind on the plane. The report alleges the bag contained personal items that staff members did not want left behind. That claim comes from tabloids and should be treated cautiously because it has not been independently verified.

More broadly, critics argue that Noem showed poor judgment in office. She has faced accusations of favoritism in contracting and questions about her relationship with Lewandowski. Both have been married to other people during that period. When she was asked about the relationship during congressional hearings, she declined to answer directly and criticized the question instead. Her husband was present behind her during the hearing.

Jacobsen: American politics can be chaotic.

Rosner: One additional point: the Department of Homeland Security’s budget has expanded significantly in recent years. Under the Trump administration it increased dramatically, reaching tens of billions of dollars annually. Critics argue that placing controversial political figures in charge of such a large budget raises concerns about oversight and management.

Jacobsen: What is your take on American foreign policy now?

Rosner: In light of recent events, the kindest word for it would probably be interventionist. Trump seems to think he has a mandate to pressure or confront other countries when he does not like what is happening. The White House and the Defense Department have struggled to present a consistent justification for military action against Iran. Trump said he had “a feeling” Iran was about to attack the United States, and the White House later defended that statement by saying it was a feeling “based on facts.” Publicly, however, the administration has not released evidence showing an imminent Iranian attack on the United States. Reuters has reported that the administration’s stated reasons for entering the conflict have shifted over time.

Trump has also said that Iran was very close to obtaining a nuclear weapon. That claim should be treated cautiously. U.S. and allied officials have, over many years, repeatedly warned that Iran was only weeks or months away from a bomb, often without publicly presenting conclusive evidence. At the same time, different officials have alternated between describing Iran’s nuclear capabilities as an urgent threat and claiming that those capabilities had been badly degraded. Reuters also reported that Russia said it had seen no evidence that Iran was developing nuclear weapons, though that is of course a politically interested source rather than neutral proof.

To think through the analogy, compare Iraq in 1991 with Iraq in 2003. In 1991, Saddam Hussein had clearly acted aggressively by invading Kuwait. The United States, acting as part of a large international coalition, responded with overwhelming force. The ground war was brief, and Iraqi forces were expelled from Kuwait.

In 2003, by contrast, the United States invaded Iraq on the claim that Saddam Hussein possessed or was developing weapons of mass destruction. After the invasion, no active WMD stockpiles were found. The removal of Saddam’s regime helped create a power vacuum, and the ensuing conflict and instability caused enormous loss of life. Estimates vary, but the death toll ran into the hundreds of thousands and likely more. So the analogy matters: is Iran more like Iraq in 1991, meaning openly expansionist, or more like Iraq in 2003, meaning a regime portrayed as an imminent threat on grounds that later proved shaky?

Iran is not analogous to Iraq’s 1990 invasion of Kuwait. It has not invaded a neighboring country in that manner. At the same time, Iran has long supported armed non-state groups and regional proxies, including Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza, and the Houthis in Yemen. That makes it a destabilizing regional actor, but it is still different from saying it was on the verge of a direct military attack on the United States itself. Reuters reported that a February 28, 2026 U.S. intelligence assessment warned of likely Iranian and proxy retaliation, including cyberattacks and attacks on U.S. and allied targets in the region, especially after the killing of Ayatollah Khamenei. That is not the same thing as proof that Iran was about to launch a major direct attack on the U.S. homeland.

So the real question is not whether Iran is benign. It plainly is not. The question is whether the administration has shown that Iran posed the sort of immediate threat that would justify war under the rationale it has offered. So far, the public case has been murky, shifting, and politically convenient in ways that should make any sober observer a little allergic.

Jacobsen: Is Iran keeping its head down internationally, then?

Rosner: Not exactly. It is still financing and supporting actors the United States and many of its allies regard as militant or terrorist groups. But that is different from proving that Iran was on the verge of directly attacking the United States. That distinction matters, unless one wants foreign policy written in crayon and adrenaline.

Was Iran actually preparing to attack the United States? I would argue probably not. Iran has been dealing with serious internal dissent over the past several years, including major protests. The government has responded harshly at times, and human rights organizations have reported significant casualties during crackdowns. Given those internal pressures, it seems unlikely that Iran would simultaneously prepare for a direct military confrontation with the United States.

The United States has already inflicted substantial damage on Iranian military capabilities in past confrontations. Iran has also faced losses in naval incidents and missile infrastructure over the years. In a direct confrontation, the United States possesses overwhelming military superiority in technology, logistics, and global reach.

Iran nevertheless maintains a large and complex military structure. Depending on how it is measured, it is often ranked among the larger armed forces in the world. It has roughly 610,000 active personnel in its conventional armed forces and around 350,000 reserve personnel. In addition, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)—a parallel military organization—has roughly 150,000 members, along with affiliated paramilitary forces such as the Basij.

Because of those numbers, any hypothetical ground invasion of Iran would not be a simple operation. Iran is geographically large, mountainous, and heavily populated. Military planners generally assume that a large-scale ground war there would be extremely costly.

In 1991, the United States fought Iraq after Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait. The coalition assembled overwhelming force, and the ground war lasted only a few days once it began. In 2003, the United States invaded Iraq again and removed Saddam Hussein from power. Iraqi conventional forces collapsed relatively quickly, although the occupation that followed turned into a long and costly insurgency.

Iran would not necessarily behave the same way Iraq did in 2003. The Iranian regime has been in power since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, so more than four decades. During that time it has faced repeated internal unrest and protests but has remained in power. That resilience suggests that it would likely fight hard if its survival were threatened.

For those reasons, I am skeptical of the claim that Iran was preparing to launch a direct attack on the United States. The balance of power makes that scenario difficult to imagine as a rational strategy.

Jacobsen: Any further comments?

Rosner: No, let’s move to another topic.

Jacobsen: In Los Angeles, singer Britney Spears was reportedly arrested Wednesday in Ventura County, California, on suspicion of driving under the influence. The reports say the incident involved property damage and driving with a suspended license, both misdemeanors. Do you think we will see another “Free Britney” moment?

Rosner: I do not know. I find Britney Spears a very sympathetic figure. Her life has been turbulent at times, and she has struggled publicly with personal issues. At the same time, she has also been reacting against years of intense control over her life and career, particularly during the conservatorship that governed her finances and personal decisions for many years.

She is also a mother, and like many people in the public eye she has had to manage enormous pressure. Performers in her position are often under constant scrutiny and frequently rely on medical treatment or prescription medications to manage stress and mental health.

Spears was turned into one of the biggest commercial pop stars in the world at a very young age by her management and the music industry. That kind of pressure can leave a complicated legacy. Her personal life has sometimes been chaotic, but many people still feel protective of her.

I wish her well. The last thing anyone wants is to see another tragedy like what happened to figures such as Michael Jackson, Elvis Presley, or Prince, whose extraordinary careers were overshadowed by difficult personal struggles.

The concern is when a celebrity reaches the point where the people around them cannot manage or control the drugs or the environment, and things spiral. In the worst cases, the person dies. Obviously, someone like Britney Spears probably needs people around her who can support her and keep her from doing the most self-destructive things.

At the same time, she does not appear as deeply troubled as someone like Michael Jackson sometimes seemed. Elvis Presley, for example, was widely described as a kind and generous person who simply had at least one doctor willing to prescribe whatever he asked for.

When Elvis died, it was reported that he had prescriptions for around seventeen different medications. Some were stimulants to help him function during the day, and others were barbiturates or sedatives to help him sleep at night. Barbiturates can slow intestinal function, and Elvis died of heart failure at age forty-two while in the bathroom at Graceland. The underlying issue was severe prescription drug misuse.

What Elvis needed was someone strong in his life who could tell him “no” and insist that he get off the medications. Elvis believed that if a drug was prescribed by a doctor, then it must be safe. Ironically, he considered himself strongly anti-drug.

There is a famous story illustrating this. In 1970, Elvis unexpectedly showed up at the White House and asked President Richard Nixon to make him a federal agent in the fight against drugs. Nixon eventually gave him an honorary badge from the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs, which later became part of the DEA. Elvis disliked the counterculture drug scene of the time and thought he was helping the anti-drug effort.

Yet he simultaneously believed prescription medications were harmless if given by a doctor, which obviously turned out not to be true. Ultimately, the prescription drugs contributed to his death.

Elvis was not regarded as a cruel person. Many people described him as generous and sympathetic. He liked to give gifts—sometimes extravagant ones. There are many stories of him giving cars, including Cadillacs, to friends or people he wanted to help.

He was also spiritually curious. He read widely about religion, Christianity, philosophy, and spirituality. He seemed to be searching for meaning in various ways, though that search existed alongside his heavy use of prescription medication.

Like many public figures of his era, some of his personal relationships would be viewed very differently today. Elvis famously met Priscilla Presley when she was quite young—she was fourteen when they first met in Germany—and they married several years later when she was an adult. That aspect of his life is often discussed now as an example of how cultural norms and power dynamics around celebrity relationships have changed significantly over time.

So, yes, some of his behavior could be considered troubling by modern standards, but the broader picture people remember is a complicated human being—generous, curious, flawed, and surrounded by an environment that often enabled his worst habits rather than helping him escape them.

Britney Spears: she has fairly ordinary tastes in relationships. She often seems drawn to “bad boys,” and those relationships do not always work out well. Some of the men she dates turn out to be immature or unreliable. You can find parallels with other celebrities. Marilyn Monroe, for example, married people as different as Arthur Miller and Joe DiMaggio—men who were not exactly “bad boys,” but who struggled in their own ways with the pressures surrounding fame.

Spears grew up in a fairly modest environment in Louisiana, and her family background has often been described as chaotic. Ideally, someone with her level of fame would have strong and competent people around her to provide guidance. Unfortunately, that has not always been the case in her life. The pattern seems to be that when things spiral out of control, the response has sometimes been extremely restrictive, such as the long conservatorship that governed her life for many years. That arrangement was widely criticized once the details became public.

I still wish her well. She seems closer to the Elvis Presley type of celebrity story—someone overwhelmed by fame and surrounded by people who did not always manage things responsibly—rather than the darker narratives associated with some other famous figures.

Michael Jackson’s situation was different and much more troubling. Jackson cultivated an extremely childlike public persona, which by itself would not necessarily have been a problem. The controversies arose because of repeated allegations involving inappropriate relationships with minors. Those accusations became a central part of his public legacy and remain deeply debated.

Britney Spears’ struggles appear to be of a different nature. Her issues have mostly involved personal instability, intense fame, and turbulent relationships rather than the kind of allegations that surrounded Jackson. She seems like someone who enjoys partying and sometimes gravitates toward questionable partners, but she is also a parent and a person trying to live a life under extraordinary scrutiny.

In many ways she resembles a more extreme version of someone navigating ordinary life pressures while constantly under a spotlight. Fame amplifies everything. 

How is Kyiv?

Jacobsen: The place is lively. It almost feels like being in a war zone, but with croissants and coffee instead of artillery.

I had a question for you. People often say that matter is about 99.9999 percent empty space, referring to the distance between electrons and the atomic nucleus. That is the way it is often explained in basic physics. But when you study more advanced physics, especially quantum field theory, you learn that what we call particles are really excitations or perturbations in underlying fields. So in that framework, the idea of “empty space” becomes more complicated.

In quantum field theory, everything is described in terms of fields. What we call particles are localized disturbances in those fields. Even what we think of as empty space is not truly empty—it contains fluctuating quantum fields and vacuum energy.

Rosner: Popular culture sometimes runs with the “mostly empty space” idea and turns it into science fiction. Comic book writers have invented superheroes who can supposedly pass through walls by aligning the “empty spaces” in their atoms with those in the wall. That is entertaining but physically unrealistic.

Objects feel solid because of electromagnetic forces and quantum effects between atoms, especially the Pauli exclusion principle and electron interactions. Those forces prevent atoms from occupying the same state or passing through each other easily. So even though atoms contain large regions where there is no nucleus or electron, the interactions between their fields make matter behave as if it is solid.

Jacobsen: Right, but the deeper issue is that the framing itself might be misleading. It is not simply that everything is “99.9999 percent empty space,” nor is it only that everything is fields producing particles. The real question is how we should properly frame what matter and space actually are.

To get a clearer picture, the framing of the question matters. Instead of asking the traditional philosophical question, “Why is there something rather than nothing?”, you might ask a slightly different one: “Why wouldn’t there be something?” We posed this in IC before. If we think in terms of quantum fields and perturbations in those fields, the universe may be better understood not as empty space with things in it, but as something closer to “full space” and “fuller space.”

Rosner: I see what you are getting at. You are suggesting that what we call matter and space might really be variations in energy density or variations in mass–energy distribution.

Jacobsen: Right—variations in energy and mass density.

Rosner: That is roughly in the right neighborhood conceptually. In general relativity, the common takeaway is that mass bends spacetime. A slightly stronger formulation is that mass–energy determines the curvature or shape of spacetime.

Some theoretical ideas push that even further. Certain approaches suggest that spacetime itself might emerge from deeper informational or quantum structures. In those models, information and quantum entanglement may help determine the structure of space itself—how it is shaped and how it behaves.

That line of thinking leads to an interesting philosophical observation. Sometimes people describe the universe in terms that sound circular: whatever configurations of matter and energy are physically allowed will occur somewhere in the structure of the universe.

The popular claim that matter is “99.9 percent empty space” is also somewhat misleading. When people say that, they are usually referring to the large distance between the nucleus of an atom and its electrons. But in quantum mechanics the picture is more subtle.

Electrons are not tiny solid spheres orbiting a nucleus like planets. They are better described as quantum entities with probability distributions. In many models they are treated as point particles with no measurable spatial size, though they are associated with a probability cloud describing where they are likely to be detected.

That means electrons do not occupy space in the way ordinary objects do. Instead, their electric charge and quantum properties create fields and interactions that prevent other particles from occupying the same state. Those interactions effectively keep other matter at a distance, which is why atoms resist being pushed through each other.

Atomic nuclei operate similarly. The strong nuclear force and electromagnetic forces create regions where other particles cannot easily intrude. So while atoms contain large regions without classical “stuff,” the forces and fields surrounding their components create the physical behavior we experience as solidity.

On much larger scales, matter aggregates into increasingly complex structures. Stars form when matter collapses under gravity. Galaxies are clusters of billions of stars. Galaxies themselves cluster into galaxy groups and superclusters across the universe.

Those large-scale patterns are not random. They reflect the distribution of mass–energy and the gravitational interactions shaping spacetime over billions of years. In that sense, the structure of the universe carries informational meaning as well: the way matter clusters tells us something about the underlying physics governing spacetime itself.

Jacobsen: If you had to guess, how much gas does a person produce in a day?

Rosner: I do not know. It probably varies a lot from person to person. That is the sort of question I would normally look up. Let me start with cows, since they are famous for producing methane.

A typical cow releases roughly four to seven cubic feet of methane per day, mostly through burping rather than flatulence.

Humans produce much less. Estimates suggest that a person releases about 0.5 to 2 liters of intestinal gas per day, which is roughly 0.02 to 0.07 cubic feet. That is a surprisingly small amount—roughly the volume of a small bottle.

My former stepmother once told me a story from her childhood. She and her brother had what they called a “fart jar.” If they needed to pass gas, they would go into a closet, open the jar, and trap it inside. Eventually the jar became extremely unpleasant to open. Children invent strange experiments.

In any case, humans do not produce that much gas compared with animals like cattle. That makes sense, because cows eat grass and other fibrous plants that require far more digestive fermentation. Their stomach systems—technically a four-compartment digestive system—break down cellulose, which produces methane as a by-product.

A liter is roughly a quart, right? Close enough for a rough comparison. On the high end, two liters would be larger than a typical coffee cup but still not a huge volume—something closer to a large soda bottle.

Another statistic you sometimes see is that people pass gas around 10 to 20 times per day on average, though diet and digestion can change that quite a bit.

Jacobsen: Anything else we want to cover?

Rosner: Let’s check the news. I usually keep two computers running when I record—one to talk into and another to monitor headlines. Oil prices are currently around $80 per barrel, which is climbing toward $100. That is expensive compared with recent years.

Gasoline prices in the United States have risen noticeably since the conflict began—roughly twenty to thirty cents per gallon in some places. Trump had promised cheaper gas, and fuel prices were not extremely high before the conflict. If the trend continues upward, it could become politically damaging.

Many liberals think Trump launched the war to distract from the Epstein controversy. That seems like a poor distraction strategy, though, because it undermines other promises he made. He campaigned on avoiding new wars and presenting himself as the president who would keep the United States out of foreign conflicts. At the same time, the conflict is pushing gasoline prices upward. It is also extremely expensive. Estimates suggest the war is costing around one billion dollars per day, and that number would increase significantly if the United States committed ground forces.

One of the top stories on Drudge right now reports that people inside the White House have been arguing about rising gas prices. That is not a great political environment when fuel costs are climbing.

Jacobsen: Anything else before I go?

Rosner: One more thing. I had not interacted with AI systems for a few months, and recently I started talking to Google’s AI again. The improvement has been striking. The systems have become extremely capable conversationally.

They obviously do not “know” things in the way humans do, since they are not conscious. However, they can discuss an enormous range of topics. The leveling of subjects is remarkable. There is almost nothing that is too technical or too simple for them to discuss.

If something has been written about and incorporated into the training data of large language models, the system can usually discuss it coherently. These systems use probabilistic models—often described in terms of statistical associations or Bayesian-style inference—to determine how concepts and words fit together in context.

That means AI can move between very different topics with surprising ease. It can discuss quantum physics, philosophy, literature, speculative scenarios, or creative writing. If there are enough textual examples linking concepts and language patterns together, the system can generate coherent responses.

I tested this by throwing various ideas at it—concepts I am considering for a novel. The AI often responded by saying something like, “That idea already has a name,” or “That concept has been discussed in this field.” In many cases, it could point to established terminology or theories connected to what I was describing.

That realization was interesting: many ideas that seem novel to us have already been explored somewhere in the academic or literary world. AI systems can surface those connections quickly because they have access to a vast body of written material.

I suspect that if someone like Stephen Hawking were still alive, an AI system could hold a reasonably coherent conversation with him about physics for some time. Eventually Hawking would probably notice limitations, but the fact that the system could sustain a discussion for even several minutes with a world-class physicist would already be remarkable.

Jacobsen:  That leads to a bigger question. The real puzzle may not be “Why is AI so good at reasoning?” but rather “Why are humans so limited at reasoning?” 

Rosner: One answer is cognitive capacity. Humans can hold only a small number of concepts in working memory at once.

Some extraordinary thinkers trained themselves to push those limits. Albert Einstein and Stephen Hawking, for example, became famous for their ability to hold complicated conceptual structures and equations in their minds simultaneously. Hawking, in particular, had to rely heavily on mental visualization after he lost the ability to write equations easily.

Training the brain to manage more conceptual relationships can lead to deeper insights. AI systems, by contrast, can process enormous quantities of information simultaneously. They are built to evaluate patterns across vast datasets.

Of course, AI also mirrors what people say. It often rephrases a user’s ideas and reflects them back in slightly different language. But it can also produce connections based on statistical associations within its training data.

Psychologists have discussed similar concepts in creativity research—ideas such as associative breadth or wide associative networks. Creative thinking often comes from making unexpected connections between ideas.

In that sense, large-scale data processing—even when it is purely mechanical—can sometimes simulate a form of creative association.

Any comments?

Jacobsen: I am good for now.

Rick Rosner is an accomplished television writer with credits on shows like Jimmy Kimmel Live!Crank Yankers, and The Man Show. Over his career, he has earned multiple Writers Guild Award nominations—winning one—and an Emmy nomination. Rosner holds a broad academic background, graduating with the equivalent of eight majors. Based in Los Angeles, he continues to write and develop ideas while spending time with his wife, daughter, and two dogs.

Scott Douglas Jacobsen is a Writer-Editor for www.rickrosner.org with more than 2,000 collaborative short-form and long-form interviews with Rick Rosner. He is the Founder and Publisher of In-Sight Publishing (ISBN: 978-1-0692343; 978-1-0673505) and Editor-in-Chief of In-Sight: Interviews (ISSN: 2369-6885). He writes for International Policy Digest (ISSN: 2332–9416), The Humanist (Print: ISSN, 0018-7399; Online: ISSN, 2163-3576), Basic Income Earth Network (UK Registered Charity 1177066), Humanist Perspectives (ISSN: 1719-6337), A Further Inquiry (SubStack), VocalMediumThe Good Men ProjectThe New Enlightenment ProjectThe Washington Outsiderrabble.ca, and other media. His bibliography index can be found via the Jacobsen Bank at In-Sight Publishing. He has served in national and international leadership roles within humanist and media organizations, held several academic fellowships, and currently serves on several boards. He is a member in good standing in numerous media organizations, including the Canadian Association of JournalistsPEN Canada (CRA: 88916 2541 RR0001), and Reporters Without Borders (SIREN: 343 684 221/SIRET: 343 684 221 00041/EIN: 20-0708028), and others.

Photo by Nahrizul Kadri on Unsplash

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