Great Houses

Gregory Treat: All right.

Hello, everybody.

Welcome to episode 34 of
The Great Houses Forum.

We're continuing, continuing our
conversation of, uh, the, the

cursus honorum of the AI future.

So, uh, last time we talked about how the
cursus honorum is, and, and systems like

that, these intense people-driven systems
where you, you progress through a series

of kind of cultural challenges, uh, is
an alternative to credentialing systems.

It's, it's an alternative to having
a big university where everyone comes

and gathers and is issued a piece
of paper saying, "Thou art entitled

to do a certain thing," right?

Um, and so one of the things I was
trying to do was, was give you an

idea of what would it look like in
terms of the tiers for an I- AI cursus

honorum to start forming in this,
this future that we're about to enter.

But as I, uh, as I reviewed the, the
episode and took feedback from some

people, it, I, I, it, one of the things
that came across to people that was not

exactly my intention, but we're gonna,
we're gonna correct that here today, uh,

was that, that e- everything came off
very much as something that only a, a

nation state, even something the scale
of a modern nation state could run.

You… The, the idea was, well, you need
a senate, a foreign office, a navy, or at

least, you know, a, a university before
you can form elites, uh, in this way.

And so the scale requirements that
people had for starting, um, were

much larger than I was wanting and
hoping for and all of those things.

And obviously, you know, Rome,
Virginia, and Britain, they,

they are imperial, right?

They, they are, they, they look imperial.

They are imperial because
empires grew out of this system.

This is, this is, you
know, what they became.

But the genius of their system, i- in
my view, was that what, what they had

worked really well, uh, at a local level.

You didn't need the, the… You
didn't need central processing centers

at the scale of tens or tens of
thousands or hundreds of thousands

or millions of people for it to work.

It could work really well and, and,
and feed people through the lower

levels, um, at, at, at something
much, much smaller scales than, than

let's call it the empire as a whole.

Okay?

So, uh, you know, one other thing.

I, I, I want to present to you the
idea that maybe you, you could do

something o- on the scale of six
houses within driving range, right?

You, you, you do need, I mean,
as, as is always true, right?

I'm, I'm, I'm wanting people to
understand that you can't do this as

an individual or as a nuclear family.

That scale is too small.

But there's a big difference between the
individual and the nation state, right?

Or even, you know, a, a capital
city, a state as, uh, uh, as in

the modern, you know, federal
states like California or Texas.

Um, you need something where a
neighbor can interact with you in

an afternoon or a night, right?

Something where it's, it's a day trip.

Um, you know, you need your neighbors.

You need the people around you to be
able to see how your son is turning out.

You know, what is, as, as, as Will
Tanner likes to say, what is the

quality of your tobacco leaf, right?

H- how are the accounts managed?

How, how does the militia
behave themselves?

You know, if you're, you know, the,
the British system had a, uh, kind

of the, the training method for its
nobles was, well, we're gonna have

all of our, all of our aristocrats are
gonna i- issue private IOUs that, that

operate similar to a private currency.

Um, and, and, and what you need for
these systems is for neighbors to be

able to evaluate each other and, and
to feel the, the right, to feel the

responsibility in some way to, to do that
evaluation and not defer that judgment.

Not say, "Well, no, it's only the special
people in the major credentialing centers

that can, that can do this thing," right?

So again, a, a cursus honorum
is a household back sequence

of, of, of real world tests.

So each rung is an office or some kind of
project which is watched and judged by the

people whose lives are directly affected
by the quality of the work put out.

Not… You know, one of the things
about that's just conceptually

difficult about teachers is when
a teacher gives a test, that, that

teacher's world is in no way affected
by the poor quality of your output.

If you fail every test, in some, some
abstract sense perhaps eventually and over

time a teacher might lose their job if
everyone that goes to their class fails.

Uh, there's no consequences for teachers
failing to teach or for students failing

to learn on the people around them.

This is all hyper-individual and
there's, there… You know, this really

is some kind of abstract fantasy land.

There are no consequences.

There is no skin in the game, right?

So one, one of the things that, that,
that I wanna distinguish from this is

we, we want… One of the pro- the ways
that we talk about this would be having,

having like a graduation project, right?

Or a, a, a portfolio project,
things that you're building as

we move through your education.

And to some extent you can, you know,
revamp, uh, your, your high school or your

college experience around stuff like that.

Um, but I think it's useful to think,
well, what, what if we just did this?

What if we just said, "Hey, education
in the formal sense doesn't matter

that much," or if it matters,
it's not a substitute for, for

getting out there and doing the
work and building your reputation.

And, and I really believe that, you know,
this is how you solve a, a leadership

shortage, uh, especially a, a high
quality leadership shortage, right?

In, uh, I don't think we're gonna
get to it today, but, uh, you know,

there's this con- idea of elite
overproduction and, and as always i-

in those, those contexts, it's, it's
useful to ask, what do we mean by elite

exactly in this, um- In this context.

So most of the time, you know, in a
credential-based system, an elite is

someone who has elite credentials, right?

Which again, the, the whole por-
problem we're having here is that elite

credentials do not line up, uh, neatly or
accurately with actual elite performance.

You know, having people that, that are
able to manage major projects, deal with

issues of life and death, deal with, you
know, all of these problems that, that,

that someone needs, someone needs help,
uh, people need help dealing with, right?

Uh, so if you have a leadership
shortage, you have a, a, a, a

shortage of high quality elites,
uh, then I believe that, that the

cursus honorum is the quickest way to
generate a, a surplus of, of elites.

Yes, uh, Robert, Robert Rowe
says, uh, the, the question

is, is whose elites, right?

Uh, you know, uh, because pro-
probably, uh, probably it's not just

that they're, they're, they're not
elites in, in some objective sense,

but there's a, there's a directional,
there's a directional issue there.

Uh, because they, they, they're, they're
elites embodying the values of some

group of people w- whose interests
might not be aligned with yours, right?

Okay.

So let's, uh, let's, let's take some
time and do a deeper dive into Rome.

Um, and, and again, one of the main
things I want you to be paying attention

to is the scale of all of this stuff,
because the, the important thing about

Rome, and the important thing about
all of these things, is to notice these

are attainable scales at something
much smaller than a nation state.

Okay?

Um, that's, that's, that's the thing
that I, I'm, I'm wanting you to, to,

to keep in mind as we move forward.

Okay?

So in Rome, the, the, the climb
of the cursus honorum opened

with being a, a military tribune.

Uh, you had to have command
of the soldiers in the field.

Um, so the way you got it
was that people elected…

You could either be elected, uh,
the, the people famously elect the

tribunes, the first four legions.

Uh, as Rome developed and matured
that, that very much became a minority.

Um, but other tribunates were,
were named by the commander.

So if you had a commander of, of
a unit or a legion, they would

just appoint their own tribunes.

Um, and, you know, e- either way, you're
putting… Some- someone is putting

that tribune over men i- in a situation
where real violence is going to occur.

At, at a minimum, uh, you know, clearing
bandits, um, and frequently going

out there and actually expanding or
defending the territory of the empire.

You know, Rome was basically always
at war from probably 300, uh, BC on,

uh, you know, as they're, as they're
fighting the Punic Wars and then kind

of consolidating their, their rule and,
and bumping up into, um, bumping up into

the, the Persians off, off to the east.

Uh, so you, you had to have skill in
leading men, um, i- through a violent,

um- through a violent e- encounter.

You had to have some
level of respect, right?

Military leadership in Rome, and,
and we'll, we'll, we'll talk more

about this later, was, was a,
a, a very in-depth thing, right?

If y- you had the right to tell
someone to go on a suicide mission.

You had the right to, to, to,
to send people to their deaths.

Um, and so they had to respect you, right?

'Cause, 'cause the downside of them not
respecting you… Like i- if, if, if

you're gonna tell someone, "I need you to
go on a suicide mission," and they've got

courage, and they, and there's, there's
something that they believe in, uh, many

times they'll do it, especially in a, in a
culture where that's the, that's the, the,

the way that things are expected to go.

But if they don't respect you,
these guys are gonna find some way

of, of, of taking you out, right?

Uh, there, there were… Now, if you
were of sufficient rank, maybe there'd

be an inquiry, but what are you gonna
do to guys that are, that are in, in,

you know, leading the charge, right?

There's, there's no effective way to
threaten guys whose, whose casualty rates

are, I think, above, you know, 25%, right?

'Cause just the, the odds of
them making it, you know, to

the point where the inquiry was
finished is, is effectively nil.

So they don't care.

If they don't respect you, you're
not gonna make it out, okay?

And Rome, of course, is doing this,
um, you know, i- is making this the,

the, the gate for their leadership
track because it wants itself to

be known as a city of soldiers.

It conceives of itself as
a city of soldiers, right?

And, and formally you, uh, you had
to serve 10 years as a tribune.

Um, though, you know, there's
a lot of evidence that that was

not always exactly how it worked.

People were… One of the, the, the
methods that we think happened was,

um, was that people would be listed
as tribunes and then not actually

join their unit in the field.

But no matter… So that
might happen for four or five,

maybe as much as eight years.

But you had to serve some
time in the field, right?

Um, that was, that was a big deal,
and if you, if you kind of cheated

your way through, people, people…
without a really good reason,

people thought less of you, right?

Um, so for instance the, um, the
Fabian family, the House Fabius, right,

they, they g- they got knocked down
to one member, a 13-year-old boy.

10 years later he's serving… Uh,
nine, uh, yeah, nine years later.

So between 13 and 22 he, he climbs
several ranks and is seated in the Senate.

Um, he pr- he didn't serve, uh,
right, by definition, he didn't

serve 10 years as a tribune, right?

Something else was going on there.

Uh, but generally that was the rule, okay?

So then next was the questor, someone
who audited the public money, either

figuring out how Rome's treasure was
being spent in the capital or watching

a pr- provincial governor's books.

This was both to prevent the governor
from being cheated by the locals and

of course to prevent Rome from being
cheated too much by the governor.

Um, the, the, the questor was
elected by, um, by the tribal

assemblies, and, you know, this is,
this is very interesting, right?

And we start getting into
these, these, the Roman tribes.

So, you know, the, the, the Roman tribes
are, are a fascinating, a fascinating

thing to, to explore, um, because
they, they very quickly just kind of

became like, like pure associations.

They didn't really hold any property.

They weren't… Uh, there wasn't a, a
relevance to them other than this was

the tribe, and if you were de-listed
from the tribe, like by the censors

for instance, um, then, then that
would cause you political problems.

The, the quaestor, uh, uh, was,
was elected by, by, by tribes,

and the tribes, you know, started
out as these geographic entities.

By probably 100, 200 years into Rome's
history, you know, the Roman Republican,

uh, phase, they, they really had ceased
to be any meaningful, uh, geographic

limitation, 'cause property changed
hands and people moved back and forth.

They were just these pure, uh, kind
of like historical associations.

Uh, similar in many ways to kind
of modern voluntary associations.

Though, though, though, there was
a, a clear bloodline component,

but you could be adopted into
a tribe, you could be listed.

There were ways of kind of
getting from one tribe to another.

Um, it was, uh, it was an interesting
sort of flexibility of these

self-constituting, self-constituting.

So, you know, one of the things
is, you know, like a, a, a censor

could ban you from the tribe, right?

Could require you to be de-listed from
your tribe, which would hurt you in

a, in a variety of political contexts.

But later, the tribe could, like, be,
"Oh, well, you know, we, we really want

this guy listed in our, in our, in our
tribe. We think he belongs here." Um, and

they could, they could put you back in,
which is a kind of a, a fascinating thing.

So.

So then above the, uh, the aedile, uh,
above the quaestor is, is the aedile.

Uh, and they, they ran the, the city,
the city of Rome's working order.

They controlled the markets, water supply,
you know, which involved aqueducts,

and was a, you know, the, the…
Rome was famous for the engineering

that went into its, its aqueducts.

Um, if you're not familiar with that,
I, I encourage you to, to watch a…

Well, I don't know if I encourage you
to watch, but, uh, you could watch,

uh, Life of Brian by Monty Python.

There's some fascinating, fascinatingly
historically accurate things in there

about how Rome conducted itself.

the tribal assemblies also a- a-
elected the aediles, uh, the aediles.

then you had the, the, the plebeian
ideals, uh, and then you had the,

uh, the, the standard, the, the,
the, the cheral ideals, And you had

to administer all of these things,
especially for the, the curial aediles,

the, the higher rank of aediles.

Uh, they, they administered the
games, and one of the things that

you were expected to do as a, as an
aedile was fund the games, uh, out,

actually out of your, your pockets
or out of the pockets of your house.

Your, your, your household was
expected to contribute to the games.

So y- you know, technically you could run.

There was, there was ways for, uh, for
non-patricians to become, uh, the, the

curial aediles, but it was very difficult
to do unless you had a financial backer.

So someone, someone with a lot of money
had to back you, otherwise you wouldn't

be able to function, um, as, as an aedile.

So the, the … One of the famous stories,
Julius Caesar, when he was serving as,

as aedile, um, leveraged the assets of
House Julius basically, like, to the

brink, all, all the way up, um, in, in
various stunts, including he, he had 320

pairs of gladiators in silvered armor.

He had the, the armor c- you know, plated
in silver and was gonna march through.

He actually apparently had more than
that, and there was a, uh, there

was an act of the Senate to restrict
him so that he could only have 320

guys marching in the silvered armor
through the streets of Rome, right?

Um, this is an extreme case of an unpaid
office that, that, that cost a fortune.

And the, and the point here was if you
didn't have a substantial fortune behind

you, either personally that you'd created
somehow or, um, a, a, a household that

could, that could back you, whether
it was your own or some- some- some

other household, um, then, then you
were gonna be selected out of this.

You weren't gonna be able
to play this game, okay?

Um, another, another thing to think
about here is that, uh, many men would,

would stop at the rank of aedile.

this is the rank, this curial magistracy.

You would gain the, the ius imaginum,
the right to, the, the, the right of

images, which is a, a Roman death mask,
and I talked about the Roman death mask

with these, these wax images cast, uh,
at, at various times, including at death,

and they were kept in the family atrium,
um, so you could kind of walk through

and see your ancestors, see their faces.

It was a, it was apparently a very
lifelike, uh, semblance of the faces.

And then at certain times, uh, different
rituals that a city would have, you

could, you could have someone wear the
mask, and it was like your ancestor was

still walking around, you know, visible.

Um, and, and this was, this
was a pretty significant

incentive for a lot of families.

You know, in, in any given generation,
not every family is gonna have a consult.

Not every family is gonna rise
to the highest heights of, of

Roman, uh, you know, Roman virtue.

But basically, if you were a family of
means and your, your, your kids did well,

you, you could expect if you have two
or three sons, that at least one of them

is gonna rise to the rank of, of, of
the curial magistrate, the, the aedile.

Um- And so that was kind of the,
the, the thing that drew everyone in

was this, was this, this third tier.

This is actually, you know, three
tiers from, from the, the top.

Um, and that's, that was enough to,
to kind of get people out of bed, um,

in a way that I, I … You know, in
our current setup, you have to win.

You have

You, you keep running, um, and
you have to win at a, at a much,

much higher level, uh, distinguish
yourself, uh, from the crowd at a, at

a much different level in order even
really to be, to be able to survive.

If you become an aedile, and then the
next step was to be, to enter the Senate,

um, you're, you're pretty much set.

You're gonna be able to leverage that
into wealth and power and s- and,

at a minimum, sustain yourself for
the rest of, of, of your life, so.

So that brings me to the Senate, and
after serving as an aedile, uh, induction

into the Senate was traditionally
treated as a matter of right.

Again, the … If, if, if the censors,
uh, didn't like you, uh, they, they

could delay you, um, perhaps until
y- after you'd served as praetor or

otherwise distinguished yourself.

But the assumption was that if you
successfully served as an aedile, you

conducted yourself well, you did a
couple of games, people cheered your

name, right, and your family's name,
then that would mean that you were

gonna reach the Senate at some point.

And, and the Senate is, is
interesting 'cause it was

it's kind of this holding tank
for all of the top guys in the

emper- in the empire, right?

Uh, trad- uh, before, there's, there's
kind of two versions of the Senate.

Prior to Sulla, it was about the
top 300 men or so who had proved

themselves loyal and capable
in the service of the republic.

Um, and then after, uh, after, uh,
Sulla, who was, who was a dictator and a

and he, he reframed
certain things about Rome.

He's kind of a, a precursor to Caesar.

He was able to, um, get things to the
point where when he stepped down, there,

it wa- there wasn't an immediate, uh,
civil war that, uh, that, that happened.

There was a civil war within,
I think, 10, 10 or 15 years

of his death, but there wasn't

It, you know, it didn't immediately
collapse as soon as he died,

as opposed to Caesar, right?

As soon as Caesar dies, bam, people
are, people are going hammer and

tongs at this, uh, pretty quickly.

So that was the Senate.

Now, kind of alongside the Senate
is this concept of the, the, the

centuriate, uh, assembly, the,
the, the Comitia Centuriata.

And the two highest offices,
the praetor and the consul, were

both filled by that same body.

And one of the interesting things
about Rome was that, that every citizen

voted, but they did not vote as equals.

Men were sorted by property into
classes, and each class was broken

into voting units called centuries.

Um, you know, precisely how many
people were in these centuries kind

of varies from, from point to point.

Um, and then the political centuries,
uh, so, you know, initially, presumably

at some point in the, in the ancient
past, a century was 100 men, and

then traditionally in Rome, that
got knocked down to about 80 men.

Um- But then the political centuries had
very flexible amounts of people in them.

Sometimes they had, um, they had 100
people, sometimes they had way more.

Uh, occasionally they would have way less.

But, but the, the, the, the bulk of
the 193 votes were distributed to men

whose net worth would allow them to
buy their own Roman soldier's kit.

You know, like, like Paul talked about
the, the, the Roman soldier's kit and

the, the armor of God in Ephesians, right?

The belt, the breastplate, the shoes,
the shield, the sword, et cetera.

Um, and interestingly, this was also…
Like, the, the amount that it cost

to buy a kit for one person, the full
panoply, the full Roman panoply, uh,

was also the amount that it would
take to field, to, to, um, to, to

feed 80 men in the field for a year.

Uh, so, so there's, there's some really
interesting, uh, parallels there.

Um, and we'll, uh, and we'll, we'll,
we'll, we'll come back to that in a

second So, um, the, the, the, the next
assumption, um, position and the next rung

up from being, you know, kind of merely a
successful senator was to become praetor.

And, and the praetor was, um, was
Rome's chief legal magistrate.

So a citizen with a grievance brought
that grievance before the praetor

and, and the praetor would decide
whether the claim would be heard.

He, he would frame the exact question
in dispute, and then he would kind

of hand it to a private judge, uh,
to, to try the, to try the facts.

Um, though again, the, the judge, the
praetor is serving in this context i- in

the role that we in, in, in modern America
would think that a judge serves, right?

So the, the, the private judge that
they talk about, that guy functions

much more similarly to what we would,
we would think in the modern day of

that, that's the role of a jury, right?

Determining the facts, figuring
out what actually happened.

But the praetor was the
person who decided, you know,

matters of law, as it were.

Um, so, uh, his jurisdiction,
yet there were two types.

There was the, the, the, the praetor
urbanus, which, um, which heard

disputes between citizens, um, and,
and the praetor peregrinus, which

handled cases touching foreigners.

Um, and then Rome, you know, kind
of added more and more praetors, and

they, and they, they would go out
and, and serve in the provinces, uh,

dealing with provincial governors.

Um, and so they also, Sulla restructured
them so that they would stay, they

presided over the standing criminal
courts for crimes like extortion,

murder, treason, uh, electoral bribery.

And, and the thing about the praetor
was, uh, within his domain, um,

he, he was responsible for seeing
that the law was executed, right?

Uh, you know, the, the, the deeper
power of, of, of the praetor was that

he could, he could issue edicts, right?

Uh, so, uh, uh, when he took office, he
would kind of publish… This is, this

is early in, in the Roman Republic.

He would publish the claims and
defenses that he would recognize that

year, and critically, where there was
a problem that the, that the old law

offered no remedy, he could create one.

Um, he couldn't create an infinite
amount, but one of the interesting

things about Rome is there, there
isn't, a lot of these things, there

aren't hard and fast rules, right?

It was, "Hey, you can solve problems
within your ambit, but we're not gonna

say you can only create one rule."
Like, that's kinda how we would,

it would be portrayed in, like, a
modern historical, you know, fantasy.

"Ah, you get, you become this, this
position. You get to create one rule."

Well, I mean, it typically was one
rule, but a, but a praetor could,

could, could solve the problems.

A- a- and this is interesting because
it, it- It solves a problem that we're

having right now, which is that we have
many, um, we have many district attorneys,

we have many, you know, law enforcement
officials that don't seem very concerned

with actual law and order, right?

Many of them and their, their
promotions, their incentive structures

are built around, uh, basically
prosecution success rates, right?

So there's a percentage of cases that
they've tried and a percentage of

cases that they've won, and they're
trying to make that, that, you know,

the, the percentage of cases they've
won compared to how many they've tried

as high as possible, which means not
taking difficult cases, um, even when

they're pretty sure that this was a,
a, a bad dude that did a bad thing.

And frequently, um, and more and more
we're, we're seeing that taking technical

cases, uh, against people who are kind of
living their life in an ordinary fashion.

And many, many of those things, uh, strike
people that, that are involved with them

as very unfair, deeply unfair, okay?

And I'll note, you know, again,
we're, we just hit, uh, this

is, this is the, the 250th year
of, of America by some accounts.

And, um, and we're really struggling
with how to solve this problem.

We are really struggling to,
you know, make sure that laws

are actually being executed.

Uh, right?

The, the, the, one of the chief questions
before the Supreme Court is, you know,

the, the executive's, uh, m- mandate in
the Constitution of the president is, you

know, he shall, you know, take care that
the laws be faithfully executed, right?

Uh, we have a problem with that
throughout our entire system.

There really, uh, um, even though that's,
that's the text of what he's supposed to

do, the president really in many ways,
his power to take care that the laws be

faithfully executed is deeply constrained.

Um, and, and it's causing
a bunch of problems.

Rome did not have many of those problems
while its praetors were strong, okay?

Um, so after the year of serving as a,
as a, as a magistrate generally in Rome,

uh, he would often be sent out to govern
a province and command his legions.

Uh, he wielded the power of imperium,
um, over a whole province with the legal

right to call Ro- Roman citizens to arms,
to requisition, requisition property, and

to command with anyone with a military
rank under his own, which was basically

anyone, uh, every w- every Roman that
w- happened to be in his territory.

It'd be very unusual for there to be
somebody higher rank than the provisional

governor in, in his, uh, in his province.

So, uh, and again, you've, you've got
that, that military command structure.

You can tell somebody, "Hey, go out here
and take a hill." And, uh, and if it's

a valid cause and, and there's, there's
any reason, you know, why, why this is

a good idea, the, the, the laws of Rome
are gonna land pretty hard on, on, on,

hey, if a c- if the commander tells
you to do something, you need to do it.

Okay?

Um, and you know, this is the
point, this goes back to the point

I, I made on, on Will's show.

Rome had a, a unitary structure
of, of, uh, of authority.

You were not a full praetor unless
you both judged and ruled, right?

And so, and, and in addition to having
the ability to tell someone, "Hey,

you know, go, go take that hill,"
or, or, "Go, go, go, go accomplish

this military objective," um, you
were also the chief judge, right?

So you retained your judicial
powers and authority.

So if he gives you an order and you don't
obey it or you, you know, violate the

laws of Rome in some way, he could charge
you with a crime, and he would decide

the law as, as applicable to the facts.

Again, you know, there, there would
be a, a private judge, which is, you

know, more similar to our jury, but,
but the praetor had immense power.

Okay?

So that's the praetor.

Then, uh, the, the, the The top in,
in terms of rank, the thing that

people were trying to climb to i- in,
in the normal track was the consul.

And, and the consul was similar to the
praetor except he was a judge and then a

military official, except his jurisdiction
included the entirety of Rome.

Um, there, there tended to be two consuls
unless some emergency was happening.

Usually one of them died or, you
know, the, the, the most common

way for there to only be one consul
is if one of them died in battle.

And there were two, number one, so they
could be a check on each other, but

also so that one of them could go out
into the field and one of them could

stay home and, and govern Rome in the
absence of the other consul, 'cause

they wanted that, that authority.

Okay?

Um, you know, it's, and it's interesting
to think about, you know, 20 men enter as

questors, uh, each year for most of Rome's
history, and only two would reach consul.

Um, that, that's, that's, you know,
over, over time, that's creating an

enormous pool of guys that have some
level of experience governing, um, and,

and don't reach the top of their system.

Okay?

Um, so again, they, they would serve for
a year, and then they would go back into

the Senate and, and, and they would stay
in the Senate for the rest of their days.

So that was the, uh, the highest
office that was regularly filled.

Um, and yes, there was a lot of honor,
there was a lot of, uh, there was a,

there was a lot of sense that, that
this guy represented Rome, right?

Famously, there's the, uh, there's
the, the, the line from, uh, from the

series Rome, uh, where, where one of the
consuls was killed by, by the Egyptians.

Those t- terrible people, those Egyptians.

Um, and, and his enemies are
very upset that a consul was, was

killed and, and especially that,
that his body was dishonored.

That was, that was seen as, um,
as an offense against Rome itself.

Not a good thing, right?

So kind of in parallel and, and,
and, and in a way that, that-

was in some ways over the, the
consuls and in some ways under

them are the censors, right?

So the censors are also elected
by the centuriate assembly, um,

and, and by the middle republic,
they're, they're normally, uh,

former con- for- former consuls.

You don't, you don't really
want someone who hasn't served

as a consul to be the censor.

Um, and so they, they would serve for
18 months, uh, once every five years,

and they would, they would do a census.

They would investigate the citizen body.

They would add and remove names from
the senate roll, and they had broad

powers to censor citizens for a
variety of, of poor conduct, right?

This is obviously… This is where we
get the English word to, to censor,

like as in, as in censorship, right?

So their main thing was what
was called a nota censoria.

Uh, so that, that, that nota
censoria could force a guy to be

dropped from the rolls of his tribe.

It could make him an, an, it
was called an orarius, make him

tribeless if he was a knight who…

Which mean- meant he'd been assigned a
public horse by, by Rome, uh, 'cause,

you know, early in Rome's history,
horsemanship was a very new technology.

It was very expensive.

It was very hard to get, uh,
breeding lines of horses that could

carry a, a man in battle, um, even
an unarmored man, uh, in battle.

And, uh, so, so those things were
restricted to, to, uh, to Rome, and

then, um, then they were assigned out.

There was 18 centuries, uh, so, so 1,800
men that were Knights of Rome at any

given time for most of Rome's history.

Um, later on, you know, horse lines that
could carry knights in battle, carry

men in battle became more and more and
more common until basically if you were

rich enough, you could just buy one.

Um- But for, for a while there,
they were kind of restricted assets

that only the state could have, and
the state kind of doled them out.

Uh, but a censor could say,
"Hey," a- a- and the censors would

actually figure out, like, were
you ta- taking care of your horse?

And if you weren't taking care of your
horse to their satisfaction, they, they'd

strip you of your knighthood, and you'd,
uh, you'd kind of have a bad time there.

Um, now it w- it was public shaming
rather than a criminal conviction,

um, and the next pair of censors
could, could reverse it, and it didn't

always bar a, a later magistracy.

But the main thing about the, the
nota censoria was they, they would,

they would publish their reasons.

They'd go through, and they'd say, "Well,
here's what we found out about this

guy, and here's why we think he's a bad
person, and y- he should not be trusted.

we should not, as a city, give
him power, and here is why." Now,

the people could ultimately, you
know, reject that over, over time.

There were ways of kind of worming
your way back into all of the rights

that the censors could strip you
of, except membership in the Senate.

If the, if the censors stripped you
of membership in the Senate, that

was very difficult to come back from.

I think only, um, only a couple
people actually managed that.

Um, but if, you know, if the
evidence was severe, it could easily

end a political career, right?

Uh, now, m- m- a lot of this revolves
around the, the, the story of Paulus

Emilius, um, which, which I talked
about in, in one of my early episode.

S- uh, so the, the censors
stripped him of his tribal identity

because as dictator, he restricted
heavily the powers of the censors.

He made, he, he, he, he took
away a lot of their, their,

their abilities 'cause they were
interfering in the governance of Rome.

Um, so they cut him off, uh, from, from
the tribal assembly and, and therefore

from election as, as an ideal until, until
the tribe was able to enroll him again.

Um, there is some dispute about
whether the censors had the power

to strip a man of the right to hold,
uh, any kind of office, um, with,

with thinkers and writers in the late
republican, early imperial period

arguing persuasively against it,
though I'll, I'll note that the context

suggests that, that the earlier censors
would have not agreed with that.

The earlier censors would have said,
"Nope, we, uh, we have the right to

completely strip somebody of their
ability to serve in Rome," okay?

But regardless of the, the precise
legal powers held by, by people that,

that, that, that were called censors
across five, uh, centuries, a notice

censuria, uh, against a man while he
was trying to be elected, uh, any,

uh, uh, into any office higher than a
questor would injure his, his tribe,

his patrons, and the voters' confidence.

Um, and, and this is particularly
true when you understand what the

censors were allowed to consider in
wielding their vast powers, right?

In, in the modern day, and, and this
is typical, you know, most of the, the

Greco-Roman, uh, world had this concept,
well, you know, I mean, yeah, it matters.

If, if you have a scandal, that's bad.

But we really care about,
like, public fitness.

That was not Rome's opinion.

They did not, they did not dis-
draw a distinction between private

actions and, and public actions.

Uh, more than, than any other city in the
Greco-Roman world, and arguably more than

any other polity in history, uh, with the
possible exception of, there were certain

Chinese dynasties that, uh, that, that
had a, a legal framework called legalism.

Like, they, they, they o- they
really heavily indexed on what is the

law, what is the letter of the law.

But they, they focused on this
household, this household qualification.

Greek observers treated this as
Rome's distinctive oddis- oddity.

Dionysius of Halicarnassus describes
censors looking into people's

private lives, and, and Plutarch
says no household was free of them.

'Cause I mean, these people, they could
basically show up and demand to be taken

through your house to observe how you
behaved, how you treated your family.

And, you know, the theory
was, was pretty simple.

Uh, private government was the,
was the sample, the training

ground for public government.

A good paterfamilias was the working
model of a magistrate 'cause you,

you were judging your household.

and positions within the house
were, were constantly referred to.

Uh, Cicero, uh, kind of alludes to this
in, when he's talking about, he says

that the, the statesman is the field
superintendent and the, the household

superintendent of the commonwealth, right?

If we view the whole of, of, of the Roman
state as one household, then learning

how to serve your house, to manage
disputes, to, to get people to work hard

together, um, was, was, was critical.

the other, uh, recorded grounds for, for,
uh, a nota censoria in, in their private

life included neglecting your land.

Uh, if a man let his fields,
orchard, or vineyard run to waste,

uh, the censors would, would
severely, severely, uh, punish him.

Um, another one was luxury and waste.

If you had, you know, silver plate,
bl- uh, banquets, expenditures that

showed a man could not keep his house
in order, if you, if you engaged in

too much conspicuous consumption,
especially early in the republic, right?

They, you know, this was, this
was one of the values of, of

guys like Cato the Elder, right?

Cato was very much, "Hey, the
problem with Rome is that there's

too much money floating around and
people are spending too much money.

Um, if you, if you wanna spend money,
do a public triumph, do a public feast,

uh, invite all of Rome to celebrate.

But if you're having private banquets
where you're spending money, um,

just to, just to benefit yourselves
and to benefit your faction," that

was, uh, that was frowned upon.

Okay?

So, uh, another interesting thing
was celibacy, when a man ought to

have been producing, uh, citizens.

Um, so they, the people, there, there's
this famous speech by a guy named, uh,

uh, Metellus that, uh, "The city cannot
be safe without frequent marriages."

Uh, on the other hand, if you had a
disreputable union, if you, um, if you

worked as, as an actor, if you had a freed
woman or a prostitute as a wife, uh, the-

these were things that were not okay.

Um, we didn't, th- th-
they didn't like that.

And the censors, again, would take note
of that, and they would write up these

things saying, "This is why we don't like
this guy," But most of all, the, the, the

main thing that the censors were concerned
with was bad household government.

Uh, so if you had an improper divorce or
a broken betrothal, something that showed

that you weren't, you weren't willing
to carry out orders… Now, the critical

thing about the betrothals, um, and,
and marriages too for that matter, many

of these were not, like, your choice.

They were arranged by your father
or by some, you know, elder male

in your, in your clan or tribe.

And so if you broke a betrothal, if you
show you didn't have concern for the, for

the wishes of your immediate ancestors,
that was seen as, as being disrespectful,

as something that indicated, hey, this
guy is not going to, uh, not going to,

to be respectful of, of the traditions
of, of, of the ancestors of Rome, right?

And, and, and everything that we're,
that we're trying to do here, if you

were too harsh or too indulgent with your
wife and your children, if you put your,

your sons in the wrong schools, right?

There was a, there was an edict in 92 BC
against, um, against putting your, your

children in, in schools, uh, i- under
tutors that would kind of stir up dissent.

Uh, if you were cruel
to slaves or clients.

You know, it's, it's really interesting
because we think of, you know, the,

the paterfamilias, the power of life.

He's got the power of life and death
over everyone in his household.

Yeah, but, right?

Um, if he behaved in a way that,
that showed that he was cruel,

that showed that he was, um, he
did not care about the people under

him, um, then he would be shamed.

He would be publicly stigmatized.

Um- And I think that's, that's important.

Now, there was a practical
reason for this, right?

In a, in a world where household loyalty
is the core of morality, which, which it

was in, in, in early Rome, a man could
be expected to steal from his employer

or from the state if his father or his
father's patrimony was in need, okay?

Um, and the solution to this was, well,
let's… We're, we're gonna restrict some

of these key offices, especially offices
where somebody is handling money, to

people whose households are rich, okay?

Um, that's, that's why the, the,
the idols had to, had to fund the

public games out of their own purse.

They weren't, they weren't
given money from the state.

Now, uh, higher ranks, obviously
a praetor or a consul, they

are dispersing public money.

That's, that's how that works.

but you, you need those guys to be people
that their households are doing okay.

They're not, they're not ever
put in a position where they're

tempted to take from the public
household to, uh, from the…

Sorry.

From the, from the public funds to
boost their, their private household.

So… And, you know, one of the things
is, y- formally, the censors hold the, the

same power over, over everyone of rank.

Um, the only office they could
technically bar you from was the Senate.

Uh, but for praetors and consuls, these
higher ranks that held imperium, Rome

relies really heavily on the judgment
of the censors, both to reveal the state

of a man's character and his purse.

Rome was being asked to trust this
man with a court, an army, a province.

They were much less likely, To do that
with a man that had been marked by the

censor's disapproval, And obviously, um,
you know, I, I mentioned this a little

bit last week, Paul incorporates language
that would have struck the original

hearers as very similar to this, right?

He talks about in the, the pastoral
epistles, "An elder must preside over

his own house well, must manage his
household well. He must keep his children

in submission with all dignity," right?

Um, "If a man does not know how to preside
over his household, how will he take

care of the church of God?" Uh, you know,
these, these things would have struck

people as, as hitting similarities to
taking on public responsibilities to the

city, especially to the city of Rome.

And, and, and my view, Paul is trying
to communicate to, to the early

Christians that they should view
eldership as a high office, right?

That, that, that… As equivalent to
wielding the imperium of Rome even.

Um, which, you know, kind of shifts
the mindset, I think, that, that,

that we have towards those, those,
uh, those verses when you understand

that, that this is the language.

And I'm not saying that Paul
was, was, was trying to draw a,

a direct immediate comparison.

Obviously, Paul views the, the
kingdom of God and the kingdom of

the world as very different, right?

There's, there's, you know,
there's a few bits on that in

the Bible, in the New Testament.

Uh, but, but in terms of if these
are similar competing kingdoms,

the elders had a, a rank.

They, they were able to dispense
the, the, the, the sword of

Christ, if you will, right?

All, all of that language is, is much
more natural when you understand that

Paul is drawing on kind of this rich
heritage of people thinking publicly

about what kind of person and what kind
of household should a person, uh, that

we entrust with the imperium have, okay?

In, in the Roman, in the Roman context.

And this is particularly true,
uh, because, you know, these guys,

the, the household has to serve
while the main guy is away, right?

Uh, so the household… A household that
remains faithful while its head serves

elsewhere shows that he formed people,
delegated authority, and set habits that

do not depend on his, you know, standing
there, there making them happen, right?

A prospective elder or prospective
prater's house should show that his wife,

his children, and the children he has
entrusted can exercise real responsibility

without disorder or concealment, that is
a, a critical piece of, of what's going

on in these, um, in these passages, right?

We're, we're thinking about how
do we get super high quality

guys, super high quality guys.

So we're gonna take a, a
little bit of a deviation.

Uh, at this point we're talking about
the, the, the centuriate assembly.

and again, I, I said, as I said
earlier, every citizen of Rome

voted in the centuriate assembly,
but they did not vote as equals.

Voting as equals is not
really a thing that they did.

Um, the Athenians flirted with,
with some level of voting as equals,

especially, especially as they moved
into, uh, the, the, the hoplite or the,

the, the… There was a period of time
where, uh, Athens actually had citizens

rowing in its, uh, in its, in its navy.

They had, they had citizen rowers, and so
they needed a huge amount of people to,

to cooperate to make their navy dominant,
and that, that drove, uh, demands

for, for broader democratic rights.

Rome did not do that.

Rome, Rome needed… You know, Rome's
navy was never super good, frankly.

Um, they, they kinda were outmatched
in, in, in most times and places.

Their ar- their army, their, their, their
military was pretty good as a whole.

Um, but they, they did not do that.

They, they always preserved this idea
of, hey, the property that you have,

the, the, the voice that you speak
with, um, is, is mediated against

how much you're managing and how
successfully you're managing it, right?

So to, to understand the centuriate
assembly, uh, you have, you have

the knights, um, and initially they
had no property, uh, requirements.

The knights later on, they would,
come to a place where, they'd, they'd

eventually assign the knights a income
requirement or, or excuse me, a, a

wealth requirement that was about two
to three times, two to three times

the, the requirement for class one.

Uh, especially as, again, you know, being
a knight, riding a horse became just a

matter of can you, can you buy a horse,
'cause horses were no longer restricted.

They had 18 votes, uh, for the centurions
of, of the knights, and then, uh, 80 votes

for, um, for the first class, which had,
uh, 100,000 units of, of copper that…

Then the unit of copper is
pronounced asses, right?

Or asses.

Um, and that's… It,
it's really interesting.

That would be about
$470,000 of copper today.

And those two groups, the, the
first class and the knights,

constituted a flat majority of,
of the centurion assembly, right?

So they could, they could
set policy, they could elect.

They, they could elect the censors and
the consuls and the, um, and the praetors.

And if those people were unified, if they
were all on the same page, which meant

if there was a threat to their interest,
a global threat to their interests, uh,

then they could just, they could just pass
policy Now one of the things, you know,

obviously you're looking at, at, at vast
historical differences, vast economic

differences, but there's a real argument
for, uh, pricing things in metals.

Uh, so pricing things in metals
creates, uh, possibilities

for cross-cultural parallels.

Gold is one example.

So for instance, 200 silver dimes
is one of my favorite statistics.

200 silver dimes in, in 1962 or
1964, the last year they were issued,

bought one hour of, of, of legal time,
the, by the average billable hour.

Um, interestingly, uh, those same 200
silver dimes in a weight of silver

still buy about an hour of legal time.

Um, you gotta have, you gotta have
rolling averages of how you're

counting the silver, but, uh, but,
but that's, that's been a very durable

relationship despite all of the,
the games we play with currency.

Um, so, uh, selected prices
repeatedly return to recognizable

gold and silver ranges even after
decades of dollar inflation.

So a good men's suit, uh, lo- you know,
there's lo- lo- a lot of people that

have said, you know, for an ounce of
gold you can have a good bespoke suit.

housing has, uh, the median American
home has been near 200 ounces of

gold for a lot of times, especially
when you, when you understand that

the, um- when you take it on, on like
a five to 10-year rolling average.

Um, a military equivalent personal weapon,
um, is about, uh, one ounce of gold

and, and you know, we've, we've recently
had… Gold has recently increased

massively in the last four to five years.

Uh, but um, so we'll, we'll have
to see if, if these things, uh,

if these things come up, right?

Uh, but, but a military-grade firearm
is, is about an ounce of gold.

Um, right now at this moment because
we have this massive upswing it's,

it's not, uh, but, uh, we'll see
if, we'll see if it catches up.

We'll see if it catches up.

Uh, one of my favorite, uh,
statistics in this vein is the, the

44 ounce, uh, the 44 ounce metric.

So, uh, it is a fact that, uh, in, in
no year in our, in our history in which

American workers were paid less on
average, uh, than, than 44 ounces of gold,

uh, has, uh, replacement fertility, right?

A replacement fertility is, um, is,
uh, 2.1 children per woman, um, and 44

ounces of gold, uh, is about $200,000
a year at, at, at current gold prices.

And, and you know, i- in, in modern
surveys, this, this number has held fast.

Uh, so that, that 44 ounce is drawn
from similarities, uh, between how

much Henry Ford paid his workers
priced in gold and certain modern

surveys that have said, "Well, kind
of the middle class has low fertility.

The, the poor have relatively high
fertility," um, because they get paid

for, for more children, kind of like the
welfare queen, welfare baby type of thing.

And then at the other end of the spectrum
in, a K-shaped sort of a way, once

you get above a certain number of
your household income, then fertility

also starts to, to tick up, and that
number is about 44 ounces of gold,

which is, which is really interesting.

So anyway, I wanted to include
that 'cause, 'cause that,

that stuff fascinates me.

But back to Rome.

Livy's the, the, the, the copper units
that Livy's talking about, these,

this is liberal bronze, you know,
and it's, it's really interesting.

Um, you know, copper is the
main ingredient in bronze,

so this is about 33,000.

So for a first class family you need
about 33,000 kilograms of copper, which is

about $470,000 in today's metal markets.

Uh, it's about, uh, two
semi-truck loads of copper, right?

Uh, if you, if you wanted to think
of what it would look like or, uh,

an, an interesting statistic that
the, uh, the AI suggested to me

was, um, about 24,000 flock cameras.

Uh, which, which is, you know,
enough to blanket a small town.

what I find fascinating was that, you
know, in the ancient world, the, um,

the first class fortune would feed
about 80 men in the field for a year.

And that same weight of copper, if sold,
uh, would also feed about 80 men, uh, for

a year in, in the modern context, right?

If you're, if you're buying food.

Um, so, so that, that, that
number appears to have an

interesting durable relationship.

if you, if you price what it costs
to deploy a company, it's also

about, you know, $370,000 a year,
to deploy on, on a per man basis.

That now If you say you, you have to,
you have to look at that, that number

is drawn from what does it cost to
deploy a company, not what does it

cost to deploy an individual soldier.

Um, and, and these figures don't
include pay, but the Roman calculation

didn't, didn't include pay either.

one of the things that I wanna, I wanna
make clear to people is that, that this

is, this is something the size… This
is not a nation-scale project, right?

Uh, if you've got a mega church, you
know, 2,000 people per weekend or a

mid-sized RIA, you know, $2 to $5 billion
under management, um, that is enough

scale to build this machine, right?

That is the size that you would need to
have in order to, to play this game, which

is a, again, that's, that's a lot more
substantial than an individual household,

but it's not, it's not unattainable.

It's… And it's also not
something that, that requires

the scale of a nation, right?

so I, I was, you know, going through, this
is, again, this is the, the, the cursus

honorum of an, of an AI, of the AI future.

Uh, so what else could you buy?

What, what, what could you buy
in the AI space for, uh, 33,000

kilograms of, of, of copper?

And the answer is, one eight P GPU
machine with, uh, 1.1 terabytes of fast

memory, which is enough, um, over a…
I, I think the, the way that I, uh,

that the AI explained to me, Nothing,
nothing probably that you can have in

your house is gonna be as good, uh, on a
one-shot level, as the frontier models.

But if you're looking at, well, what
would you need to compete in terms of

coding or penetration testing or the
other kinds of base- the basic things

that you need to be able to do that people
are using AI for, um, in the present,

certainly any kind of content creation.

Um, if you're doing a five-hour session,
you can be competitive with local models

and locally licensed models, um, at,
at 1.1 terabytes of, of fast memory.

Like, you, you, you can-- That can
allow you to have one serious household

operator or maybe a small practice
sharing, sharing the machine, right?

And again, that's priced right at
about four hundred and seventy thousand

dollars, um, which, which is interesting.

Now, I mentioned earlier that the, the
knights had, uh, later on… Initially,

the knights didn't have a, a property
requirement, but later on they were,

they were given a property requirement.

Um, and that property requirement,
it was, was kind of a combination of

copper and silver, but it was, it was
ba- somewhere in the vicinity of eight

hundred and twenty-five thousand to one
point s- uh, uh, one point oh six million.

Um, and then, and then senators, uh,
after Augustus raised the qualification,

had to show about four to five
times the first class, which is, you

know, two to two and a half million.

it's fascinating to think about,
well, well, what, what could you buy?

Um, so you could buy two of those eight
GPU machines in the knightly band, right?

Um, or four of them, two of the,
the newer eight GPU machines in the

senatorial band in that, that, you
know, one point eight to, to two

point three million dollar range.

Um, the other thing you could
buy, we talked earlier, uh, in the

series about the, the weede- the
weeder, the, the laser-based weeder.

The Carbon Robotics laser weeder
is also in this, in this senatorial

fortune class, I give you all of these
things because I want us to understand,

hey- You don't need something the
size of a nation state to do, to do

this type of cursus honorum stuff.

Um, again, as, as I said at the
beginning, I, I think six houses,

um, coming together, maybe six to 10
houses, the, the, the Jewish minyan is

famously 10 houses that come together.

They, they are able to build something.

That, that's the- they consider
like that minimum household unit.

That's the… Or the, excuse me, that,
that minimum, uh, public unit that, uh,

that allows them to start a synagogue and
start playing these kinds of public games.

That's the size that you need to, to,
to foster children between houses.

It's the size you need to, you know,
start acquiring some of these properties.

Um, that's a very doable size, right?

And so that, that, that was kind
of the point of this episode.

I wanted to present all that to you guys
and, and make sure that I was kind of on,

on the record as the cursus honorum is
a thing we can start and start producing

and start producing high-quality people.

Uh, it does take a certain scale, right?

It's not something, uh, it'd be
difficult for you to start with

just your family living in like a, a
prepper, you know, a prepper compound.

But if you've got any kind of scale
at all, even something the size of

a small town by modern standards,
you can play this game, right?

A single, you know, mid-sized,
uh, megachurch or mid-sized RIA

firm is going to be able to, to
provide the necessary structures.

I mean, assuming everyone's on board
or most people are on board, they're

gonna be able to start doing this.

They're gonna be able
to start recognizing.

You know, I, I know, um, pastors of
local churches that, that de facto

act as censors, that, that, that,
that go in and they investigate.

They know the, the condition of a guy's
household, and people come to them and

say, "Hey, should I invest in this guy?
Should I go into business with this guy?"

And the pastor, you know, will usually
not, like, divulge exactly what he knows

in, in kind of the way of the old censors.

Though every now and then you find
a pastor that does exactly that,

which is, which is hilarious.

Um, but, but they will say, you know,
"Let's, let's, let's guide the community

away from that." Um, there are, uh,
you know, in, in, in many contexts,

there are local investors that kind of
serve this function of, of the senior

statesman of the house kind of dr- saying,
"Hey, let's, let's mentor some people.

Let's, let's give some
people a project," right?

Um, if, if there's some folks that
would say that the, the modern kind

of aristocratic path is, uh, i- in our
current culture is to, to do a startup

and have an exit and maybe do an IPO,
and that's kind of what gives you the

wealth to, to play the higher level games.

Um- You know, again, you don't
need, you don't need a, a

infinite scale to do that, right?

Any, any mid-sized community that
decided to throw its weight behind,

especially in the age of AI, right?

Where what you need are people that
know what they want building, people

that can describe the attributes that
they're looking for building with AI.

And the main cost is basically keeping
those people working, keeping those

people fed while they do something
that has a long-term payout.

A community of any size
can accomplish that.

there's, there's several communities
that, that, that sponsor this, uh,

or sponsor might not be the right
word, but that, that I have, I have

welcomed in, uh, to, to the forum.

Exit Group, uh, Joshua Sheats'
Radical Personal Finance Community,

and the Classical Society.

and all of those, I, I… are, are either
at or very quickly approaching the scale

where they could do this by themselves.

If you consider, you know, the larger,
maybe we might call it the liberty

community, the conservative community,
there are lots and lots of players who

could do this, start doing this, start
producing high-quality leaders, um,

that would be, be able to participate
in, in more interesting things

at, at state and national scales.

I don't know that that's like a magic
bullet solution to our political process.

Ag- again, one of the things I wanna
distinguish is, is I don't want you to

think of it as, well, we, we just need
to produce high-quality people, we're

gonna then be able to get them elected.

Though, it would be great if we
did that, and we got them elected.

But I think more in terms of
just basic competence, right?

Can your government or can some local
body get the roads paved and make

sure that there's internet and make
sure that there's, you know, housing

and food and all of this stuff that,
that, that we need to, to, to survive

and thrive and, and move forward?

And again, as I've said before,
I think all of those are gonna be

increasingly mediated by and through AI.

So, um, all right, folks, that, uh,
that concludes, uh, my prepared remarks.

So thank you all for, for being here,
and let's, let's move into the Q&A.

All right