Will the Moral Tech Billionaire Please Stand Up

Hi Everyone and Welcome Back!

This week on The Nick Halaris Show we are featuring Evan Armstrong, the author of the popular Napkin Math newsletter and the lead writer for Every, a technology publication focused on the intersection of AI, finance, and business. Evan regularly writes thought-provoking, extensively researched, original articles on the most important trends and issues in the tech world. His Napkin Math newsletter has become a must-read for executives, venture capitalists, technologists, and investors around the world and something I always look forward to reading. 

Ready to dive in? Listen to this episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music and YouTube or on your favorite podcast platform.

I wanted to have Evan on the show to highlight his important and compelling writing and get his take on how technology is impacting our civil society, both for good and bad. Evan stands apart from many writers because he’s willing to explore beyond the usual boundaries of technology and business and seriously consider things like morality, society, and culture. He’s also someone who is not afraid to put forth challenging opinions and hypotheses. Tune-in to this fascinating episode to learn:

• Just how hard it is to find an example of a moral billionaire and why

• What you can learn about a person from the way he/she earns and spends money

• Why the fatal flaw of the crypto industry is its over-reliance on retail investors

• How technology companies came to rely so much on deliberately addictive products

• Why the incentive structure of the internet produces ever greater moral promiscuity

• Why AI and advanced robotics could shape a whole new world and way of being

• And much, much more

Stay tuned to the end to hear Evan’s take on why, in a world where we’ve already reached peak screen time (i.e. we’re already spending 12 hours a day in front of screens), competitive forces are incentivizing companies to brew up a toxic storm of addictive, attention-grabbing, and often morally dubious content, products and services. 

As always, I hope you all enjoy this episode. Thanks for tuning in! 

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Summary

Evan Armstrong, author of Napkin Math and lead writer for Every, discusses the concept of finding a moral billionaire. He explores the idea of whether it is possible for individuals who have amassed great wealth to also be morally upright. Armstrong shares his frustration with the negative behaviors often exhibited by successful entrepreneurs and investors. He delves into the difficulty of defining and evaluating morality in the context of wealth and power. Armstrong presents a thought experiment and examines the characteristics of billionaires who could be considered moral based on criteria such as their net worth, marital status, and family relationships. He highlights Chuck Feeney, co-founder of duty-free stores, as an example of a mostly moral billionaire who gave away his entire fortune and lived a simple lifestyle. In this conversation, Nick Halaris and Evan Armstrong discuss various topics related to technology, morality, and the crypto industry. They explore the dangers of writing about the crypto industry, the issues with over-promising and under-delivering in the industry, and the impact of retail involvement in crypto. They also touch on the potential of AI and advanced robotics, the addictive nature of technology, and the internet's propensity for moral promiscuity. Armstrong recommends Bern Hobart's publication, The Diff, for a deeper understanding of the intersections of technology and finance.

Keywords

moral billionaire, wealth, power, success, thought experiment, Chuck Feeney, technology, morality, crypto industry, over-promising, under-delivering, retail involvement, AI, advanced robotics, addictive technology, internet, moral promiscuity

Takeaways

• Successful entrepreneurs and investors often exhibit negative behaviors despite their financial success.

• Defining and evaluating morality in the context of wealth and power is challenging.

• A thought experiment explores the possibility of finding a moral billionaire.

• Characteristics such as net worth, marital status, and family relationships can be used to evaluate the morality of billionaires.

• Chuck Feeney, co-founder of duty-free stores, is an example of a mostly moral billionaire who gave away his entire fortune and lived a simple lifestyle. The crypto industry often over-promises and under-delivers, which is a major concern for Evan Armstrong.

• Retail investors should be protected from the risks and losses associated with the crypto industry.

• AI and advanced robotics have the potential to greatly enhance productivity and improve living standards, but the timeline for these advancements is uncertain.

• Technology companies have created deliberately addictive technologies, leading to concerns about their impact on society, especially on children.

• The internet promotes ever greater moral promiscuity, with platforms incentivized to prioritize engagement and addiction over genuine utility.

Sound Bites

• "Most writing online around technology companies, around finance was just like wrong and it was boring. And I thought that I could do it better."

• "The root of the problem is the unfair amount of wealth and opportunity and access that these super successful people have."

• "When you start looking at the biographies of people, even these phenomenally successful people, they start asking this question later in life about, hey, wait a minute, was this the right decision? Did I lead my life in an appropriate way?"

• "Taking advantage of people and over-promising something is deeply immoral and upsetting to me."

• "Most crypto projects are nonsense, right? Like how many tokens are there? No, there's probably like 10,000 tokens or something crazy like that."

• "There's more interesting and immediate ways that technologists could be spending their one wild and precious life than trading cryptocurrencies."

Chapters

• 00:00 Introduction and Background

• 12:27 Evaluating the Morality of Billionaires

• 29:03 The Potential of AI and Advanced Robotics

• 40:11 The Addictive Nature of Technology