*Interview conducted October/November, 2024.* Scott Douglas Jacobsen: What’s going on with Trump’s party? Rick Rosner: Yesterday, Trump was holding another rally, and it was hot. Two people fainted. That somehow gave Trump the excuse to stop taking questions from the audience. He’d only taken four, and then he decided instead to play music. For 39 …
Continue reading Ask A Genius 1158: Trump and Walz at the Time
*Interview conducted October/November, 2024.* Scott Douglas Jacobsen: So, in an article in Noesis, the journal of the Mega Society years ago, you wrote an article about road rage. Do you still have it? Why is it more? Why is it less? Rick Rosner: It’s mostly less because I’m older, and not necessarily wiser, but people’s …
Continue reading Ask A Genius 1157: You Can’t Have Road Rage If You Don’t Drive
*Interview conducted October/November, 2024.* Scott Douglas Jacobsen: What about 2085? Rick Rosner: In 2085, everyone will have an all-purpose robot that does everything. It’ll be like a smartphone, but with more functions—a Swiss army knife of technology. They’ll be called “Obes,” I’d guess. They’ll start as “omnibots,” then shorten to “obots,” and eventually just “obes.” …
*Interview conducted October/November, 2024.* Scott Douglas Jacobsen: I've heard commentary from Democrats suggesting that if they lose the next election, it will be the last Democratic election. I've also heard Elon Musk say that if the Democrats win, it will be the last Democratic election for the Republicans. So, let’s talk about it. Rick Rosner: …
Continue reading Ask A Genius 1155: Demoblicans and Republicrats
*Interview conducted October/November, 2024.* Scott Douglas Jacobsen: Who is your favorite philosopher? Rick Rosner: That I have one? What Wittgenstein’s or Kierkegaard’s or most people’s most famous philosophers’ philosophy was, I don’t know. I can say one sentence about existentialism. I started taking a grad-level course in phenomenology when I was at CU, but I …
*Interview conducted October/November, 2024.* Scott Douglas Jacobsen: Do you think Walz is doing a good job and a bad job at as the running mate? Rick Rosner: Yes. He’s behind. He had little glitches that the Republicans tried to make hay off of, but they don’t seem persuasive. Walz claimed to have been in Hong …
Continue reading Ask A Genius 1151: Walz to the Wall at the Time
*Interview conducted October/November, 2024.* Rick Rosner: So Project 2025 has been around longer than a year or two, but it had different names in the past. I'm not sure how old the Heritage Foundation is, but it’s probably 40 or 50 years old. It's their agenda, but it’s not necessarily Trump’s agenda. Even if Trump …
Continue reading Ask A Genius 1150: Pre-Election Project 2025
Rick Rosner: I was born in 1960, so I saw the second wave of feminism more or less firsthand. It started kicking in during the late 70s, maybe mid-70s, or even early 70s as a reaction to the general culture and also to the chauvinism of the left. The anti-Vietnam War movement and other hippie and …
Rick Rosner: Okay, so this will be it because I'm pretty tired. It's about 20 hours until the debate between Biden and Trump. The betting market—I'll take one step back. The betting markets have Trump favored to win, although it's not clear if he's as favored as it appears. More people are betting on Trump, …
Rick Rosner: In the Spike Jonze movie Her, Joaquin Phoenix falls in love with his phone’s operating system, voiced by Scarlett Johansson. Spoiler alert, but the movie is already nine years old? I believe it was released in 2015. One of the factors leading to their separation is that the operating system becomes increasingly frustrated with …
Rick Rosner 