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John Braithwaite discusses an autobiographical review about a research life unusually oriented to the long-term study of organizational crime, peace, and crisis prevention.

Image courtesy of interviewee. December 19, 2023

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The speaker discusses how graduate students often seek current hot topics for their research but cautions against merely following trends, as this can lead to "fighting yesterday's war." He emphasizes the importance of long-term thinking and interdisciplinary approaches, highlighting the structural issues within academia that make reform challenging.

Reflecting on his early activism in consumer protection, he shares experiences with the Australian Consumer and Competition Commission, where he initially criticized the appointment of industry insiders, only to later acknowledge their competence and engage in fruitful discussions. He recounts a significant legal case surrounding the dangers of passive smoking, which drew international attention and influenced smoking regulations.

The speaker also delves into his personal life, emphasizing the importance of collaboration and learning through relationships, particularly with his partner Valerie. Throughout a long marriage, they've contributed to each other’s intellectual growth, fostering interdisciplinary dialogue.

He expresses optimism for universities, asserting their crucial role in promoting new ideas and societal change. Although he notes challenges such as corporate influence, he believes universities remain vital institutions for innovation and progress. The speaker concludes by reflecting on the importance of collaboration and the impact of younger generations in transforming academia and society, affirming that the collective contributions of students often surpass individual efforts.

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Graduate students often say to me, what's a really hot,

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hot topic that I can focus on with my, with my work?

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And I say, well, you know, to ask an old guy like me,

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a question like that is maybe not the,

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not the right question, because the answer you might get is,

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you know, you might end up fighting yesterday's war,

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and there's a danger if you think what to do yourself there,

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you'll, you'll end up fighting tomorrow's war rather,

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rather than today's war.

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But that's not as big a mistake

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in the long term if you are backing the wrong horse

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in the short term, that's all right.

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If your thinking is sound in the long run,

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there will be people who will come to your project

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and see the value that you see in it, you know, failure's.

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Okay? Especially if you have that long run view.

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And it's not as if I stayed with the same

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long run race.

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I mean, I didn't make radical shifts in the short term,

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but in the long run, I made big shifts by gradually changing

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my focus and, and adjusting.

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And I think that, that, that, well, it worked for, for me.

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Um, I, I, I did try to reform a lot

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of institutions, including universities.

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I mean, universities are very hard institutions to reform

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because they're, they're pretty balkanized institutions

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where you have these, these kings

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and queens that, sit on top of, disciplinary,

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empires, and they defend them.

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If, and if you are a change agent who says that, you know,

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we, we should be thinking about a more

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interdisciplinary project.

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And I mean, I, I have a pretty radical view about the

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problems with the current structure of the social sciences.

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I think it's a pretty dumb idea to have a bunch of people

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who study an institution called the economy

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and call themselves economists

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and another group who study political institution,

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call 'em political sciences, lawyers, do legal institute,

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cri we criminologists,

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do criminal justice institutions

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like the police and the prison.

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I think that's a really dumb way of organizing,

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the advancement of knowledge.

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And I think we could learn a lot from the big shifts

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that have occurred in the biological sciences, for example.

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It's enabled them to be rather better at breakthroughs than

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we have been in the social sciences.

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You know, trying too hard, hard to bang your head

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against those disciplinary barriers is, is not a good as,

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as good a path as just doing your own thing, showing,

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trying to show that what you do is valuable.

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And again, that long run race of bringing people

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to see the value in your project

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because you do something well

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and hopefully do something a bit better

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because it is interdisciplinary.

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Well, in the, in the days when I was young,

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the consumer movement was a big thing.

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You know, Ralph Nader was a friend of, of, of mine.

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And, and we were,

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we were change agents on things like consumer product

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safety, making cars safer,

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and getting seat belts made

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mandated in motor vehicles and, and so on.

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That was what I was doing when I was young.

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Uh, not being a, an an an academic,

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but being, being an advocate.

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And in that role, I, I issued a press release, saying

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that recent appointments

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to our National Competition Authority

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and Consumer Protection Authority, the Australian Consumer

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and Competition Commission, as it's called, today,

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was putting the foxes in charge of the chickens coop.

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That was how, how my press release was, was, was headed.

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And, and indeed it was, it, it, there was some of that,

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in it that, there, there, there was one person

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who was from the company.

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It was the CEO of the company

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who had the worst compliance record,

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the worst criminal prosecution conviction record of,

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any Australian, company.

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And I was a bit embarrassed a few years later when the,

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when the government, a new government responded, to

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that critique by pointing me to the commission.

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And then I found that some of those people,

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about whom I was saying that was the, the foxes in charge

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of the chicken coop were actually a lot more competent at

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the job of being commissioners of the a accc by virtue

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of their business background, than I was,

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they were very kind to me.

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And we had many jokes, about,

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about my history in getting in into that position.

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But it was a rewarding institution to engage

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with because it was a conversational institution

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where we could talk to each other about our differences,

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those who came from a business background, those

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who came from an academic background.

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And by then, I'd morphed from being,

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an activist to being an academic, other kinds of background,

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again, practicing lawyers.

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Uh, one of the people who was appointed at

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that time really was so much better at the job

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that ended up, other people thought that, not just me,

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'cause he ended up becoming Chief Justice of Australia.

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But with an institution like that, I mean, again,

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your role is a small one.

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You are a contributor.

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You engage in a conversational way with the institution.

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And if you engage in good faith in a genuine way,

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and with some good ideas, which are sometimes right,

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sometimes are wrong, other people who are

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better at the craft of institutional change than you are

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end up joining your cause.

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And together, you can at times,

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bring about some big changes.

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And there, there were some, in those days

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with the Competition Commission, the chairman

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of the commission at the time

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that I put out my famous press release, was also,

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from a business background.

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Uh, he, and he came,

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from the largest tobacco manufacturer in Australia.

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Uh, I was critical of his appointment,

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but I learned that he was a very capable lawyer

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and was bringing some lawyerly excellence to the work

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of the commission that wasn't there before.

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But he also,

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brought some baggage from his background in the industry.

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And very early on, there was a case

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where the Australian Tobacco Institute, Institute

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representing the tobacco industry,

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put out an advertisement in all of the big newspapers,

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women's magazines, everywhere in Australia at the time

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of passive smoking becoming an issue.

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And this advertisement said that passive smoking

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is not a health risk.

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If you are just getting indirect smoke from other people,

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it's not gonna adversely affect your health.

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We had a complaint from the NGO sector,

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including from my own old NGO, that said,

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this advertisement was in breach of

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what was then called the Trade Practices, act

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because it was a false claim pass.

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The evidence now by now is clear, this is in the 1980s,

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that, sm a passive inhalation

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of cigarette smoking is very dangerous for yal,

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especially for children.

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And, what he did, the chair of the commission,

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having come from the tobacco industry, literally in a smoke,

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smoke-filled room, negotiated

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a remedial advertisement.

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So the Tobacco Institute put out a new advertisement saying,

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we want to correct somewhat what we said in our former ad.

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This resulted in a court case.

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Uh, it also resulted in me, going

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to the commission, the going to the chairman

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and saying that was inappropriate.

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I in particular, should have been in that smoke filled room

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where you did that deal, with the old industry.

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And I agree with this new complaint that's come in

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that says, the new ad is also in breach of our act,

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in breach of the act that you have a responsibility.

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Any rate. The, on appeal federal court

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and Australia found exactly the same thing.

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And it was a very influential case.

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It changed behavior in the United States, in Europe

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because it was the first time that a court,

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an appellate court, had made a formal decision that, yes,

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we find that the factual situation is that tobacco,

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passive smoking is dangerous for your health.

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And that mean meant that all of the organizations

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that we work in realize that that could be used

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for lawsuits against them.

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That judicial authority would be followed by the judiciaries

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of other countries,

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especially in the English speaking world.

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So, in no time, even in,

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American baseball grounds, everyone was amazed

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that a high degree of compliance was achieved.

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And even in an open air stadium, people in no time

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as a result of that court decision,

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were being prevented from smoking, in the,

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in the stadium, there was a lot of opposition,

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but people complied.

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Even, even those American baseball fans, complied.

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So that was a big, that was a big change.

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That was a result of robust engagement.

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And it wasn't so much my personal contribution as again,

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again, sure I started the, the contest over it,

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but it was other people that made the real difference,

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that drove that throughout the world system

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as a big change in how we live our lives in regard

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to smoking cigarettes.

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Valerie Brafa and I, we came from different,

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disciplines.

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Um, it was a long-term relationship.

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I I met her at kindergarten when we were five years of age,

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and we, we had some conflicts at that time,

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but we gradually got to know each other

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and married at quite a, quite a young age.

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So we've been married

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for much more than half a century, by now.

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Uh, and while we were very different kinds

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of intellectuals from different disciplines, we shared

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this interest in interdisciplinarity,

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and we talked to each other in our relationship,

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and I learned so much from Val and acquired good things.

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I think about, her style, which took off some

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of my rough edges.

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And, in, in particular.

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So you, you know, you learn in life conversationally,

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from colleagues and especially from ones that you are,

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you are, close to.

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So it's, it's not just relevant to an academic couple,

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it's relevant to all of us.

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You, you know, you trust your friends so much

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that they will talk to you bluntly about

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what are your weaknesses, how you could do

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better, what are your strengths?

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This is your strengths. You should do

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more of this kind of stuff.

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Um,

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and, that, that's certainly the way it worked with,

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with Val and I, and we ended up doing a lot

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of things together when we were young.

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We used to fight a lot.

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You know, when you, like, when you come home from work,

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you like to complain about your colleagues at work

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to your partner, but when the co-author you want

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to complain about is in fact your

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partner, that's a bit difficult.

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So we had to adjust to that,

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and we gave up with collaborating

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with each other for a little while.

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And then when we were more mature

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In our relationship, we came back again,

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to working together.

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So it went, that went on and off.

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The relationship didn't go on and off,

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but that went on and off.

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Uh, during that half a century, macro Criminology

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and Freedom Book was a book that brought together

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my life's work as, as it were.

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Uh, most people find it far too long a, a book,

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but it's available open access.

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So you just look up John Braithwaite macro criminology and,

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and freedom, and, you can jump in

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and read those bits, that are of interest to you by,

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by searching on the search function.

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But when you do try to bring,

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a life's work together in a more integrated way,

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it integrates it in a different way than most people

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integrate lots of little different bits of knowledge

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with a big macro theory about how you change the nature

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of society to become a society in which there's less

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crime and less war.

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War is important. And there's the idea of cascades of crime

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and war in importance.

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So crime is seen as a cascade phenomenon.

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So in the United States, they have a real problem

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with mass shootings.

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And one big reason that they have such a big problem

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with mass shootings compared with other societies, is

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that they've had so many other mass shootings

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in the recent past.

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So crime cascades to more crime, unfortunately.

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So each extra incident that occurs, it becomes,

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a lot more difficult, to shut it down,

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even if you succeed in shooting down wrong metaphor.

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Uh, the initial causes, such as inadequate gun,

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gun control.

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So also crime tends to cascade to war

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and war to crime, as we see at the moment, with a lot

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of hate crime associated

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with the conflict in Gaza at the moment,

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but in many different ways, war cascades to crime,

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and also regrettably war cascades to more wars.

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So if you live in a neighborhood where some

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of your neighbors are getting themselves into wars,

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unfortunately your country will be more likely,

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to end up in more wars.

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And that's something that's exercising the minds

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of diplomats in Europe at the moment, for good reasons.

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Uh, of course. So it's about those big macro questions that,

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in the end come down to very, private matters

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and how to make the public private.

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It seeks to get there by integrating an explanatory theory

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of crime with a normative theory of crime.

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So an explanatory theory is an ordered set

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of propositions about the way the world is,

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and a normative theory is an ordered set of

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Propositions about the way the world ought to be.

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So I try to find propositions

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that come from explanatory theory,

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that advance normative theory, that are a fit

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to both kinds of theory.

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And the book argues that, that improve both kinds of theory.

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That's been a long-term joint project of mine

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with the great philosopher, Philip Petit.

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And then the book that's coming out soon is called,

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simple Problems to Complex Catastrophe.

15:23.585 --> 15:25.885
And it's about the ideas. Take, take the example

15:25.885 --> 15:28.685
of reforming, universities.

15:29.245 --> 15:31.125
I was saying earlier, it is very hard to know

15:31.955 --> 15:33.045
what you should do.

15:34.305 --> 15:38.155
Precisely. It's a complex matter to create a really

15:38.795 --> 15:40.275
excellent university.

15:40.935 --> 15:42.595
But what's a simple matter?

15:43.295 --> 15:46.995
Uh, what's a simple prescription is that

15:47.815 --> 15:52.795
if you live in a society with a strong university system

15:53.505 --> 15:58.355
that is well funded as a university system by the society

15:58.695 --> 16:02.745
and has genuine independence, is not captured by the state,

16:03.125 --> 16:06.225
is not overly captured by big business, either

16:06.565 --> 16:09.265
by the military industrial complex, for example,

16:09.265 --> 16:12.985
which is a particular worry at this period of, of,

16:13.205 --> 16:16.545
of history, then you'll have good outcomes

16:17.125 --> 16:19.785
on solving a range of complex problems

16:20.215 --> 16:24.345
that are in focus in this book, as,

16:24.345 --> 16:27.945
simple solutions for complex catastrophes, climate change,

16:29.045 --> 16:32.785
war and crime prevention again,

16:34.105 --> 16:36.465
pandemic, prevention.

16:37.005 --> 16:41.625
Uh, and, and so some other big, financial catastrophes,

16:42.445 --> 16:43.945
big questions like those.

16:44.635 --> 16:48.665
There are some simple institutions like a rule of law

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that works like an independent university system

16:51.765 --> 16:54.225
that's genuinely, independent,

16:54.225 --> 16:55.305
that make a big difference.

16:55.565 --> 16:59.625
But we also need away from moving on from those

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simple solutions.

17:02.125 --> 17:04.785
We want those institutions to be generative.

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And that's a good thing about universities too,

17:07.815 --> 17:11.625
that they're always generating contestation of ideas

17:11.765 --> 17:12.905
and new way, and,

17:12.965 --> 17:16.145
and that's what you want in an institution that's going

17:16.145 --> 17:19.265
to be, adaptive to complexity.

17:20.105 --> 17:24.515
I do think, universities have become overly captured

17:24.815 --> 17:26.795
by corporate interests and,

17:27.015 --> 17:30.355
and by, by the national security state,

17:30.895 --> 17:32.155
as well.

17:32.295 --> 17:36.195
Not just the military corporations like the Lockheed

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Corporation manufacturing nuclear weapons and and so on.

17:40.015 --> 17:44.365
But it's true even of areas of scholarship

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that seem unexceptionable.

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Yeah, finding a solution to

17:49.185 --> 17:52.535
The, the covid, catastrophe.

17:52.995 --> 17:54.135
Uh, for example.

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Um, now unfortunately, what the data shows

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is that, research in universities that's funded

18:06.145 --> 18:11.005
by big pharma is four times as likely

18:11.745 --> 18:15.805
to find that the particular product is effective,

18:16.625 --> 18:18.965
and has minimal side effects

18:19.675 --> 18:22.645
than research on the same product funded

18:22.825 --> 18:25.365
by an institution like the National Institute

18:25.425 --> 18:27.125
as Institute of Health.

18:27.225 --> 18:30.365
Now in the United States, for example, where most

18:30.365 --> 18:33.685
of this, more of this research gets done than,

18:34.165 --> 18:37.325
anywhere else, the proportion of,

18:38.445 --> 18:43.125
research evaluating the efficacy of pharmaceutical drugs,

18:43.785 --> 18:45.405
the proportion funded

18:45.505 --> 18:47.805
by big pharma has more than doubled

18:48.225 --> 18:50.965
during my career in universities.

18:51.325 --> 18:55.045
I also obviously think that in the social sciences, we need

18:55.045 --> 18:57.965
to become more like the biological sciences in, in,

18:58.465 --> 19:00.965
in the way I mentioned earlier, becoming more,

19:01.345 --> 19:02.565
interdisciplinary.

19:03.145 --> 19:05.445
But universities, I continue

19:05.505 --> 19:08.445
to be passionate about universities.

19:08.475 --> 19:11.765
They are wonderful, institutions.

19:11.905 --> 19:15.245
We get cranky about our own universities all the time.

19:15.315 --> 19:19.285
They're important things that we fight about within,

19:19.465 --> 19:21.045
within the institutions.

19:21.145 --> 19:24.205
But, you know, with my peace building work, I go

19:24.305 --> 19:27.285
to societies that are caught up in wars.

19:28.105 --> 19:32.365
And when a society is in the midst of a war, that is

19:32.365 --> 19:37.125
where you really see how important a university is.

19:37.425 --> 19:40.685
The university is the place where ideas

19:41.425 --> 19:42.445
for a new piece,

19:43.185 --> 19:45.245
and you've gotta keep trying one piece agreement

19:45.295 --> 19:47.965
after another until you finally have one

19:47.965 --> 19:51.605
that succeeds on the ashes of many, that have failed.

19:51.705 --> 19:56.165
So it, it suits the ethos of the iterative ethos

19:56.225 --> 19:59.565
of science in university, the work of peace building,

19:59.665 --> 20:03.885
but also the activism for transformation in times

20:03.945 --> 20:05.045
of great oppression.

20:05.665 --> 20:08.725
So much in oppressed societies do come,

20:08.755 --> 20:11.845
from the undergraduate students of our university

20:12.145 --> 20:13.325
who are in conversation.

20:13.425 --> 20:16.805
And with me, we, silly old academics

20:16.805 --> 20:19.245
with our older ideas, they're the ones

20:19.785 --> 20:23.285
who really energize change on the streets

20:23.385 --> 20:26.925
and then grow up to become mature politicians that,

20:27.195 --> 20:30.525
that follow through on the changes that are needed

20:30.625 --> 20:34.885
to authoritarian societies, in, in particular.

20:35.505 --> 20:37.645
So that in the end, I'm,

20:37.745 --> 20:41.045
I'm very upbeat about the future of universities.

20:41.075 --> 20:45.085
They keep going through, bad periods, for example,

20:45.085 --> 20:46.485
during wars,

20:46.545 --> 20:50.685
but they can emerge the other side strengthened by the,

20:50.945 --> 20:53.885
by the travail of a time of conflict

20:54.435 --> 20:57.645
because of the energy of the new generation of students

20:58.075 --> 21:00.645
with their new and better ideas than we had.

21:01.025 --> 21:03.285
We really need that with climate change, of course,

21:03.905 --> 21:07.525
or mostly we fail in scholarly ri life.

21:08.265 --> 21:13.245
You know, most articles, I'm, you know, a a more successful

21:13.245 --> 21:14.965
and average academic perhaps.

21:15.705 --> 21:19.165
Um, but most of my articles fail.

21:19.865 --> 21:22.045
Uh, very few people read them,

21:22.555 --> 21:25.045
very few people cite them.

21:25.565 --> 21:28.565
I have one that a lot of people read and,

21:28.665 --> 21:30.845
and cite very often.

21:31.145 --> 21:33.605
That's because of the quality of my co-authors

21:34.185 --> 21:36.445
or things I've learned from my own students.

21:37.185 --> 21:40.445
So I've found a new way of thinking about that

21:40.445 --> 21:44.645
through thinking, through listening to the wisdom

21:44.745 --> 21:46.085
of the younger generation.

21:47.385 --> 21:52.005
So, you lead the contented scholarly life

21:52.225 --> 21:56.525
by thinking that it's not mainly about my individual,

21:57.345 --> 21:59.165
successes and failures.

21:59.195 --> 22:01.685
It's about being a contributor

22:02.385 --> 22:05.605
to making the institution more effective in the

22:05.605 --> 22:06.685
long run of history.

22:07.105 --> 22:11.285
An institution, the university is an institution,

22:11.475 --> 22:13.645
that is very effective.

22:14.265 --> 22:17.325
Uh, what we hope for is that,

22:17.385 --> 22:19.645
and this is certainly true in my case,

22:20.115 --> 22:24.965
that my students add a lot more value than I do personally.

22:24.975 --> 22:26.525
There are a lot more of them, of course,

22:26.905 --> 22:30.485
but a lot of them are doing much more exciting things than

22:30.625 --> 22:32.565
I'm doing, these days.

22:32.865 --> 22:36.325
And so we contribute collectively,

22:36.625 --> 22:41.405
and if we're lucky in University of life, we bump into some,

22:41.825 --> 22:45.365
very interesting people like Valerie Braithwaite in my

22:45.365 --> 22:48.005
case, as I was mentioning earlier, who just make

22:48.435 --> 22:51.645
what we do together a lot better than

22:51.755 --> 22:54.205
what we might have done, individually.

22:54.665 --> 22:58.445
So the contented scholarly life is about being patient

22:59.265 --> 23:02.525
for those great collaborations, those great moments

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of learning from the wisdom of others to,

23:07.095 --> 23:10.365
smack us in the face and change us in hopefully good ways.

23:10.365 --> 23:11.085
Every now and then.

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