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Are Billionaires Crazy? With Nigel Denning · Democracy Tomorrow

• Scott Leckie: Hey everybody, it's Scott Leckie from Democracy Tomorrow. Today we're going to address the issue of billionaires and ask in particular: are billionaires crazy? Does something happen to an otherwise normal person when their wealth reaches the level of hundreds of millions or billions that changes the way in which they view the world and in particular how they view themselves vis-a-vis? other human beings. We're speaking at the end of October 2026, and the issue of billionaires is all around us all the time, it seems. The merger between politics, the political class, and money from the billionaire class is a dominant theme in the newspapers every day. The role of billionaires in supporting less than democratic initiatives across the world and very actively and publicly supporting Authoritarian and autocratic tendencies is clearly on the rise. Two fantastic books have just come out recently which address this theme. One is called The Nerd Reich, with the subtitle Silicon Valley Fascism and the War on Democracy by excellent author Gil Duran. This book is highly recommended to people who want to see the inner workings of the minds of those within Silicon Valley, most of whom are, of course, billionaires. And how there is a strong tendency in the direction of anti-democratic thinking. And we need to all think about the implications of that for our larger quest for global democracy for everyone, everywhere. The other new book that just came out is by Naomi Klein and Astor Taylor, the Fantastic Books, called the book called End Times Fascism, which is a takes a similar approach. Its subtitle is In the Fight for a Living World, which addresses This merger between the oligarch class, the three thousand four hundred billionaires of the world, and ever growing numbers of political structures and politicians leading in an extreme rightwards direction, the likes of which we all know is happening all across the world. I also write extensively on these themes, but more from a satirical perspective, imagining a totally different scenario, a world without billionaires. Which I just wrote in this book, Killianaire, which you can read as a as an accompaniment to those more serious books, and a new book of mine that's coming out in two weeks called Psychotic Despotic, which is all about the end of dictators. So we got the end of billionaires, end of dictators. What kind of world do we want to live in? That is the question that we're trying to strive for an answer for today. Do we want a world that's led by an increasingly small number? of individuals, most of whom are men, most of whom have more than a billion dollars, very few of whom believe in the underlying principles of democracy, human rights, freedom, and prosperity for everyone? Or do we want the better world that we all know deep inside of us is possible? A world of greater equality, greater s equal spreading of the wealth, greater enjoyment of human rights, mutual respect In a sustainable environment whereby the human race can continue for hundreds, if not thousands of years to come on this one and only planet Earth that we all share. The topic of billionaires is around us at all times right now. In two weeks' time, a little bit less, in the state of California in the United States, there's going to be a historic referendum voted upon. In fact, two. One is called Proposition 40, which will be a one-time tax. one time tax on billionaires, not a regular tax, not a permanent wealth tax, a one time tax, which will, for the first time in that state's history, I believe in the United States' history, raise many, many billions of dollars, most of which will be used to fund healthcare initiatives in the state of California. This has been resisted very, very vigorously by many within the billionaire class who have dedicated millions and millions of dollars to opposing it. And in fact, there's an opposing opposition referendum on the same ballot, proposition 42, which essentially states that never again in the history of the state of California will there ever be a referendum or a tax on the wealth of billionaires, if you can imagine that. So, this, in my view, is are the beginning signs of political jurisdictions realizing that giving Increased political power to those already with economic power is undermining us the basic fundamental principles of democracy. It begs us to ask the question should wealth and politics mix? Should not it be better? Would it not be better? Were we simply to have publicly financed elections with no private money allowed into the coffers of political parties? or political candidates in the interest of preserving the democratic structures that so many of us rely on and believe are the best systems that we have in place. Should we even allow the emergence of billionaires? This is another question that has largely been ignored, but we need to ask ourselves, what is it that billionaires give us that we could not get through other means were these same resources held, for instance, in the name of the public? Why does it need to be held in the in the hands of an incredibly small number of human beings? Should the very phenomenon of billionaireism even be allowed to continue to exist? Would it not be better to have a an idea of libertarianism, as it's called by many writers and researchers these days, in place, whereby there was a cap set on individual wealth in the interests of securing equality, preserving democracy? And making sure that politics and finance do not mix. Something seems to happen in the minds of people who suddenly amass great deals of wealth. And with us today, we are extremely fortunate to have one of Australia's leading psychologists, Nigel Denning, to talk to us about what happens to the mind of people who become suddenly extremely wealthy and what. What mental processes actually take place when one suddenly finds oneself on the top of the global and national financial pyramid? So with that, I'd like to welcome Nigel Denning here today to Democracy Tomorrow to talk about these and other themes. Nigel, welcome to Democracy Tomorrow. Nigel Denning: Thank you, Scott. I am a prominent psychologist, specializing across a number of different different areas, including psychedelic medicine, institutional abuse, relationship psychology, and complex trauma. interestingly there's there's not a lot of literature on the psychology of billionaires. they they don't tend to make themselves welcome to psychological profiling. But what we can see in the literature that does exist on the psychological or the psychology of the wealthy, the extreme wealth, is certain personality characteristics. And one of the most kind of prominent is a lack of agre agreeableness or low low levels of agreeableness, which is a a measure on the the big five, which is a personality inventory. And agreeableness is really about our you know capacity to kind of you know be part of a community, to have empathy for others, to see ourselves as part of community, to be generous towards other people, and if you're looking to accuse Significant wealth, agreeableness is one of the things that you reduce. And interestingly, there's a kind of a cycle that starts to build as you accumulate wealth, then the feedback around agreeableness and things like sharing and consideration of others starts to diminish. And there's a fairly clear kind of pathway of literature that that kind of demonstrates this. So at one level, allowing people to accumulate Vast amounts of wealth is is helping them to become increasingly withdrawn from society, increasingly separated from their fellow people, fellow humans. Increasingly it it it builds a sense of entitlement because these people become disconnected from relationships with normal humans and they start to experience themselves as entitled and r to to to to have the rights to you know just just to a as you were pointing before, to to not pay tax, to not participate in community, to to not you know, think with generosity of other people. It's it's quite a toxic kind of combination. And what it what it maps onto quite clearly, even though there's not a lot of research linking it yet, but there there's very similar profiles to the profiles that have been developed in authoritarianism. And, you know, the accretion of of power and control in authoritarian systems is is very similar. You know, this agreeableness, this entitlement. there there's also what what what's sort of also included in the authoritarian literature is fear. authoritarians elicit fear and are presented through fear. And so when you see this kind of concatenation of billionaires and authoritarianism, what what you see is a kind of maturation of a fair amount of cultural toxicity. which mutually supports, creates mutual delusion, and creates a mutual separation from the rest of the population, who are increasingly just seen as things out there. Scott Leckie: Right. And, we all know about the private yachts of billionaires that cost hundreds of millions of dollars, sometimes more. We know about their private planes. We increasingly know about their private apocalypse bunkers that are spread all across the planet where they hope to retreat to in the age of apocalypse, whenever that may come. We've even heard some of them utter phrases trying to bring on and expedite the end of the world. So that they can suddenly take it over in a more easy fashion than they are already, without having to worry about the eight point three billion of us. Nigel Denning: And and and that's that's kind of one of the you know, you're you're highlighting one of the points that that the the literature very clearly kind of demonstrates. That the th there there's a l th the more wealth that's accumulated, the more power that's accumulated, the more detached from reality they become. And so human beings that are not part of their immediate need system are are seen as objects that either impede or or can maybe be used for some sort of purpose, but but increasingly with the r the rise of AI, human beings are simply impeding their capacity to move as they wish around the world. Their their their sense of entitlement. It's you know quite a quite a I I I you know, your your kind of point about craziness, I think in some ways is is is more pointed to the rest of the population who have allowed the emergence of this kind of constellation of wealth and this this constellation of power in in such a toxic and destructive manner. You know, it's it's it's we all need to wake up to to what's going on here and and and how how just how toxic it is. Scott Leckie: we've been through various phases of history which could be classified as as eras of oligarchy where a small elite and a declining number of people have increasing political control. And we're clearly in one of those now. We're probably in the worst one ever to affect humanity. The inequality levels in the world today have never been higher. Concentration of wealth has never been more intense, and you have a clear merger. Of AI, together with neo fascist thinking, combined with support of authoritarian regimes, and finally the embrace of anti democratic principles and decision making by a very small number of people who have been, as Bandy Lee would say, essentially infected by the sentiments of those holding this incredible political and economic power. to the point where they begin following them around thinking they're gonna somehow benefit by them making all of the decisions, as is common in a fascist scenario, and ending up always as the flotsum and jetsum of the the detritus that ends with always in a in a horrible blaze of of awfulness. Nigel Denning: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And then you you you're point you're pointing there to the architecture of of, you know, autocracy and there was a lot of that l a lot of really solid literature, Theodora Dorno and Hannah Arndt and Eric Fromm all writing as emigres after the Second World War where they they witnessed, you know, the rise of this this what If if if the if, an autocrat was sitting in my office, I w I would be assessing them for psychopathy. I would be looking at someone who, you know, w very often does not have the capacity for empathy that ordinary people have, and doesn't have the capacity for emotional functioning that ordinary people have. And there's something about you know, th th this is the the lack of agreeableness, the entitlement, the separation from other that that's a feature of autocrats and billionaires. That that that there's a th th there's a movement towards a very mechanistic understanding of of other people, you know, what what Hannah Arnt talked about is the banality of evil when she was, you know, looking at the Nuremberg trials and and and and seeing just how matter of fact the the the head Nazis were in in in what they did. They weren't monsters. They weren't, you know, three headed beasts of evil. They were boring mechanistic, uncaring people who saw humanity as as simply something to be moved around at will. Is it it's it's the absence of, you know, the qualities that that we we really admire in our in in human beings the capacity for justice, the capacity for care, the capacity for mercy and and and decency, which is which is often removed as power and wealth amplify. Scott Leckie: Now th that's very true. We need to, also point out, of course, that there are a large number of of billionaires who give billions of dollars to philanthropy every year, to very progressive causes, who truly do care about life on this planet, who care about fellow human beings, and who want their life to mean something in terms of, let's just say, reducing human suffering and acting in a compassionate way. Towards their brethren. Now, what separates them from those who don't do that whatsoever? What is it in the mind of the billionaire class that keeps more of them from joining the compassionate, caring side of billionaireism from the ultra-selfish, ultra autocratic, ultra fascist side? Nigel Denning: think th there's when when you when you look at the profile of of the the philanthropic and the decent ultra wealthy, ultra powerful, often what they will do is is make very conscious choices to retain humility. They might stay in, you know, a home that they've lived in for for decades, they they they connect with their their their workers, they connect with the people around them, they do things that keep them active in the world. And so they they make conscious choices. To value and perpetuate their relational experience with other humans. And so they they don't separate. They don't become kind of caught in the pocket of exceptionalism that comes about with the you know the the less savory members of the the team. Interestingly, some some that, you know, in some of the work I've done, people that have taken psychedelics have had experiences that have connected them and have helped improve that kind of sense of connection and community and relationship. But that tends not to kind of be the the people that are, you know, on the far right and then conversion. It tends to be sensitizing people who already have an inclination towards, you know, common decency and and I think, you know, sometimes, you know, having having an experience that creates a felt sense of connection will help people on the path of, decent behavior and and community involvement. Because of course, you know, that that kind of wealth and that kind of power also creates the capacity to do incredible amounts of good. And and can transform people's lives and the lives of countries. Scott Leckie: The amount of assets that is currently held by the world billionaire class measures into the many trillions of dollars. And you know, any any small proportion of that could help end cancer, it could end homelessness as we know it, it could promote disarmament across the world, it could promote infinitely stronger United Nations sort of structure, countless other things. and yet it doesn't go that way. And I I think in the last thirty to forty years in particular, there's been a lot of the taboos associated with extreme wealth have y been thrown out the window. And in the past it seems to me that there was a lot more you know, trying to remain behind the scenes, trying to remain subtle about it, trying to kind of be quiet about your wealth. And now it's just completely open and completely flaunted and they know they can get away with it. And you know, particularly the The American billionaires, more than generally speaking, more than the billionaires of of some other countries where there's quite a few. but you know, when when it comes to taxes, when you add it all up, I mean it depends on which study you read, it's in a minute percentage that they pay in tax, both on income and on wealth, compared to the average person. And that to me is really one of the arguments that's the strongest that the general public, I think, can use to put forward to politicians that, these people, just like anybody who's on a higher income should pay higher tax than people on the lower or middle incomes, the same should apply to the billionaire class. one of the arguments that I often use to support one of my ideas of of having a global democracy and a world parliament where all of us are governed essentially by the same political structures in a highly democratic, highly participatory political structure. Is that now the world we live in is just one gigantic field of escape hatches, as I put it. If you're a billionaire and Country X decides to tax you at a normal rate of 50% on your income and wealth, like most European countries would for the higher income groups, you can always say, I'm going to Argentina, I'm going to South Africa, I'm going to Mauritius, I'm going to some British Virgin Islands or other tax-free tax haven. And I'm to put my money there, and therefore your country's going to suffer. And this this argument is used all the time. And if if a billionaire is pressured in a given country to pay tax that they don't want to pay, they can always leave. My objective in the long term would be creative political structure in the world where these escape hatches are closed. Because as long as you have all these escape hatches, the same applies to being a dictator and getting asylum, once your population rises up. And you get asylum in another dictatorship. So we need to have, the vision out there and a movement of people that sees the benefit of us all unifying together into a democratic space. And that's where we are now. We're at the very beginning stages of something like that. And we need to find the best and most peaceful evolutionary way to reach that destination. And I think one of the ways is to. Simply treat billionaires as all other citizens are treated. Nigel Denning: Yeah, I I I agree. I think what what we're really looking to do, and I think from my perspective and you know, the work I do and where I come from, psychological literacy becomes a really kind of key focus for the community. what what allows for the growth of autocracy and there's this constellation of wealth is the lack of coherence and cohesion in the general population. And the more that you can create fear and the more that fear exists in the general population, the less likely the population will be to be coherent and unify collectively in opposition to you know, this this elite tiny fragment of the population. So y you see this kind of fa this this feature has been going on for quite a long time, for a hundred years in the United States. Started a little after the American Civil War where the whole the whole onus on success is very much yours, your personal onus. And what you do is is you remove the capacity for collectivism. So the American response to the generation of trade unions in in the tw early twentieth century, the refusal to accept collectivism, this kind of demonization of socialism, you know, which means that by providing health services to your population is somehow equated with the evils of communism. And so you have poor people in some bizarre and and andexplicable way thinking that providing health for them and all of their citizens is somehow a a a a demonic force. So you've got this this horrible kind of combination of in invocation of fear by creating uncertainty, unpredictability in the population, along with these kind of ideas that that strong men, rich men create that coherence and that safety. It's it's it's it's a an extraordinary sleight of hand. You know, and a a a complete illusion that's that's that's created and you know, whil whilst we can kinda get a bit carried away with conspiracy theories, it doesn't mean that there aren't powerful people conspiring to support their self interest. Scott Leckie: Yeah, certainly. And, it's it's as if history is simply repeating itself again, just in more grandiose style than before. many of us thought, many of us who are international lawyers and who focus on, the relations of of of all nation states with all other nation states, the UN, etc., there was a pretty strong presumption that at the end of the Second World War, that era of fascism was over and over for good. And everyone knew the the terrible outcome that would emerge would fascism ever emerge again. And yet it's as if it's sort of forgotten. And, you know, that's what I would urge everybody to do. Look at history. Look what happens when a state becomes fascistic. It doesn't only take your freedoms away and and criminalize dissent and generally result in greater impoverishment of greater numbers of people, but it always ends in some form of disaster. And another phenomenon that you often have, of course, as happened particularly in Germany following the Second World War, the masses of the people that were supportive of the Nazi Party during that horrible twelve year period of nineteen thirty-three to forty-five collectively said, Wir haben das nicht gewusst, we didn't know. We didn't know what was going on. We we had no idea. We just wanted the trains to run on time. And that's my worry now is that you're gonna have a growing number of people. It's already happening in the United States. We didn't know that he was going to do this, but he did. And now they have no money, they're in debt, and they're desperate. Nigel Denning: Well And Exactly and and and that's that's why that's why you attack the media. Because you attack and you undermine the capacity for anyone to get information, to get any form of education. You've already impoverished people's education and health and s social infrastructure. If you're poor you can't drive on the right roads. If you're you know, you're you you're poor you can't get the right education. Postcodes still determine, you know, success in life. And so you you you create an increasingly anxious, frightened and helpless population. And it's it's it's that and and that that part of the human brain kicks in something called the the the hypothalamic paturity adrenal axis, which is, you know, at at some level it's a three hundred million year old survival system. It it it doesn't do anything other than scan the environment for threat and opportunity. And that that that under stress, under the lack of any kind of coherence and safety within our community, that's that's what people get stripped back to. So by making it making our societies incredibly individualistic, what we're actually doing is is exposing the most vulnerable to the highest levels of fear. And that fear ripples through society because we're a highly collaborative species. We're only where we are because we work together. You know, we're not alpha predators. You know, so Scott Leckie: Uh-huh. Nigel Denning: we have to be together. So when we're fearful, we bond through fear. And it Scott Leckie: Right. Nigel Denning: becomes an infection. And that that's that's what happened in in Europe in the in the thirties, It was after the the the end of the First World War, the the collapse of the economies, the the the the the constraints placed on the ac on on the the German and their their allies in terms of, you know, kind of economic constraint. People were were distressed, people were abandoned, people were alone, people were scared, people had la a lack of access, and along came the strongmen. And what we've got now is not just the strong men, we've got the rich men. And there's there's a there's a skewing, they they can support each other. And whilst the population remains subject to fear and incongruence and doubt and a lack of entitlement, you know, like every every human being should be should should have the opportunity to get an education and to have their health attended to. You know, that that's a universal principle of being a citizen on the planet. Scott Leckie: Mm-hmm. Nigel Denning: Yet there are so many nations now that don't provide that and and see health and education and roads and bridges as some form of indulgence, Scott Leckie: Right, right. Nigel Denning: all trickling down from the ultra wealthy who build their own freeways. Scott Leckie: That's right. And their own neighborhoods and their own airports and their and their own ports in bodies of water and their own ev and their own rocket ships. Their own islands. That's right. That's right. And they just Nigel Denning: Their own neighborhoods. Yeah. Yep. Yep. Yep. Their own islands. Yep. Yep. Scott Leckie: they all go this is happening at this very minute. They all go from isolated spot to isolated spot to isolated spot to isolated spot. Protected, Nigel Denning: Yep. Yep. Scott Leckie: walled, essentially enclaves where they can all luxuriate together. Nigel Denning: And the psych the psychological effect of that is a com a a continuing amplification of the delusional sense of separation. That I Scott Leckie: Right, right. Nigel Denning: am special, I'm entitled, those other things out there are just trying to get my money off me and aren't working hard enough and you know, if they just did what I did, you know, we could all share it together, so you know, I'm I I'm I'm just here because, you know, I worked hard. So you're not working hard enough, so you deserve to be out there. It it's a complete delusional bubble that they create. And, you know, w we we all know what happens at the end of delusions. You know, they Scott Leckie: yeah. Nigel Denning: they shatter into in in exactly the way that, you know, kind of senior members of the the Nazi Party shattered into reality in the most extraordinary ways. You know, the the the disbelief on a number of them is they were being led off be executed. The the the the disbelief on the face of Choșescu and his wife when their time had come. You know, the the sense of complete entitlement to abuse the entire nation. It's a complete delusional cycle that feeds itself. And if we're not as community awake to psychological education, then we've got no way of measuring this. You know, we we we see it with Donald Trump and you mentioned Bandy Lee before and what a what a great job's being done of really educating the public about the kind of psychological profile that you really don't want to hand the keys of the country over to. You know, a a sociopathic narcissist who abuses people, who you know, i i contravenes laws randomly because of the level of entitlement. I mean it it it's it's it's public knowledge that this is the case. But we we need as a community to recognise, hey, hang on, we've we've handed over power to this person. We haven't we haven't done anything reflective about looking at the character, the personality and the psychological functioning. Is this person fit to hold wealth? Is this person fit to hold power? You know, if if we want to have leadership in our community, which you know we kind of need to keep the the wheels turning, what characteristics? Are we really looking for as a community? And that Scott Leckie: Right. Nigel Denning: kind of psychologic psychological education is, you know, as you know, Scott, that's you know, my my passion in life is to is to raise psychological awareness. So that we're not hit by these kind of, you know, how did that happen? I Scott Leckie: Right, right. Nigel Denning: didn't expect Elon to do that. Scott Leckie: Mm-hmm. Well, the only, one of the good things about all of this happening now is that it really allows a growing number of people to make that choice. What type of future do you want for you, yourself, your family, your community, your nation, your world? You know, a world run by these guys, which they're clearly trying to do collectively, or a world run by all of us, in which all of us are equals, members of the same earth community, and Who create structures designed to ensure the fullest possible life for every single human alive today. And that's the crossroads where we're at now. And one of the saving graces, I guess, is you could say is that it's clear that enough people in the in the United States have seen enough of Trump to know that he is absolutely not worthy of that position. And his popularity has never been lower. It's the same with many autocrats across the world today. Their their popularity within their countries and globally has never been lower. So there is something inherently positive about the fact that a good solid majority, 60, 70, 80 percent of the human race is already able to see that they actually want something different and they want something better, and they they know, I I believe everybody everywhere knows deep down inside that there is a s infinitely better. future available should we make the right decisions to reach there. Nigel Denning: And and y yeah, exactly. And and I think, what what psychology at the mo psychology at the moment is really very good at being able to pick what's wrong with people. It's not so good yet at being able to pick, what we need to develop for us to be better citizens and a and you know, a more stable community. We haven't got to that level of scientific maturity. you know, there there's there's plenty of, you know, kind of attempts at it, but really what what we We've only we've only named trauma, for instance, since the nineteen eighties. First time in human history where we've actually said, you know, sending young people into war probably isn't good for their psychological well being for the remainder of their life. You know, blowing cities up isn't really good for for psychological well being. You know, this this is new knowledge. We've only been able in the last thirty years to have an understanding a a deeper understanding of how brains work and how brains organize and how you know kind of impoverishing people's brains is not healthy for their development. so th this is all new knowledge. So i it it it's now at a point where we need to raise awareness, raise an understanding so that not just we understand this stuff conceptually, but we can feel in our bodies when we're becoming reactive. We can feel in our bodies 'cause that that that that's what, you know, hate, anger, conflict is all about. You see this in in the United States as really clearly, polarizing Democrats and and and Republicans as if, you know, it it's God and the devil. You know, it's it's it's it's it's polarizing by amplifying fear. It's it's it's not understanding the role of trauma in people's lives. It's not understanding the need to downregulate, to to breathe through, to recognise, in order to kind of just hold that that that you know, it's okay if someone's different to me. Doesn't mean they're coming to kill me in my sleep. Doesn't Scott Leckie: But I think the I think most people, most places realize that these divisions are actually created by the ruling classes, essentially, t for their benefit. And, you know, if you go to an a an average football game or a big party somewhere, or you're hanging out on the beach with thousands of people, whatever it may be, doesn't matter what people's political views are. People tend to get along and they tend to have common ground on most things. It's these it's these false senses of division that that politicians in particular see as beneficial to their own standing that are Nigel Denning: Yeah, yeah. Scott Leckie: augmented greatly hot greatly beyond what they actually are in the minds of most people. Nigel Denning: Create create fear. Create fear in the population just before an election and then offer a solution. I don't know if you if you remember years ago Kim Beasley Scott Leckie: Right. Nigel Denning: was on the on the verge of winning federal election and Scott Leckie: Yes, yes. Nigel Denning: John Howard started showing photos of boat people being throwing their children into the ocean. And created Scott Leckie: That's right. That's Nigel Denning: this whole terror that we were being swamped by, you know, a f an armada of boat people, Scott Leckie: Yeah. Nigel Denning: and it shifted. the voting intention within weeks of a a federal election. And you Scott Leckie: Absolutely. Nigel Denning: know, it became a you know a remarkable victory for fear and and and stupidity. Scott Leckie: Yeah, a sad outcome. Well, let's see how it goes. at the California election in a couple weeks' time, see how it goes and the national election in the United States. That will have big implications for the billionaire class there and globally. And let's hope that the reasonable billionaires out there, the ones that do truly care about the rest of the humanity, Nigel Denning: Okay. Scott Leckie: can begin to form a coalition amongst themselves which can surpass the coalition of those who clearly have opposing views. and again, if you want to read a a hopeful vision for no no billionaires and no dictators, have these have check these out. And you know, let's hope and pray that reasonableness prevails again and that all of us, including the billionaire class, can draw on our higher selves and reach the highest possible level of consciousness individually and collectively. Nigel Denning: It's it's a it's an evolutionary choice. We have a dissipative system, we we move those s systems into greater stages of coherence by adding energy, and the energy is will. We choose Scott Leckie: That's right. Nigel Denning: we choose to evolve and there's there's extraordinary opportunities. Scott Leckie: And have in your mind's eye the vision of the world that you want to see and d live that life. And if you want to see a world run by a handful of men with the deepest pockets in the world, all in their own benefit, well, that's one vision. There's a whole nother series of visions you can also have in which all of us play a role and all of us are treated as equals among equals. So thank you very much, Nigel, for another engaging discussion. Hopefully we'll do it soon. And I should say that Next year in October twenty twenty seven, Nigel and I will be hosting a online course for eleven weeks called Democracy Mind, which will explore some of the issues that we talked about today and how the the psychology that exists in the world has direct implications on the politics of the world and where and how that can play itself out in a far better fashion. Democracy Mind, October twenty twenty seven. So thanks again, Nigel. We'll see ya again. And thanks for watching everybody. See ya next time on Democracy Tomorrow.