The Eric Metaxas Show - Eric Metaxas and Robert George discuss Professor George's new book: Seeking Truth and Speaking Truth

Episode Date: August 20, 2025

Dr. Robert George on his new book "Seeking Truth and Speaking Truth: Law and Morality in Our Cultural Moment".

Welcome to the Eric Mattaxas show. We'll get you from point A to point B. But if you're looking for point C, well, buddy, you're on your own. But if you'll wait right here in just about two minutes, the bus to point C will be coming right by. And now here's your Ralph Cramden of the Airways, Eric Mattaxas. This is an encore presentation of our Super Centennial segment. A look at history in America 250 years ago.

Many of you know that on Instagram every day, we're doing a super centennial minute. What happened 250 years ago in American history today. This harkens back when I was a kid on TV every night. I think it was like on CBS at 8 p.m. They'd say this is a bicentennial minute. They'd have somebody telling you what happened 200 years ago. We are doing the same thing except it's 250 years ago. And it's kind of cool.

We're calling it a super centennial minute. So, for example, today, July 9th in 1776, that of course, if you just did the math, that's 249 years ago today. Something wonderful happened. I'm really excited about writing about this episode in my book on The Revolution. What are we talking about? Well, July 9th, 1776, you know what happened on July 4th. on July 9th, news of the Declaration of Independence and the document itself reached New York City. I am right now in New York City.

It reached the document, reached New York City. I mean, imagine it was in Philadelphia. What, it took five days to go from Philly to New York City. Evidently it did. But the official document reaches the hands of George Washington. And once it was in his hands, he was able to read it himself to read it. And what did he do? This is kind of cool. This is to get the troops site. He read it aloud to the continental troops and the civilians gathered on the commons in New York. So this was an historic moment in American history. The entire army, of course, was gathered in New York, or I should say most of the army because in another, what, less than two months, they had the Battle of Brooklyn. So he read. read it aloud, or it was read aloud, I should say.

And that night, everyone was so excited about independence that they got a little rowdy and a crowd of jubilant patriots. I like the word jubilant. Jubilant patriots surged toward Bowling Green. Now, my wife and I were just down at Bowling Green like a month ago to get our global entry. You have to go down all the, a lot of stuff that happens, official stuff, you know, wedding, when we got our wedding license 29-half years or 29 years ago, you have to go down to Bowling Green.

Bowling Green is the very site where a statue of King George III was. The fence around the statue is still there. You can touch the actual fence. And in the middle of this, it's no longer there because 249 years ago today they tore it down, was the statue of King George III. a gilded lead statue. So the entire statue, amazingly huge made of lead. You can imagine how heavy it was, but of course it was gilded, so it looked gold. They tore it down and, you know, they're shattering the

image of British monarchy, British rule. So it was a big, big deal that they did that, that they tore it down, the statue of the king this day, 249 years ago. And when they tore it down, they discovered that it was made of lead. What do you do with lead? Well, in their case, they melted it down. This is a lot of lead. They melted it down into musket balls using what had been an image of the monarchy against that very monarchy. So it was a moment of extraordinary public defiance words on parchment, which is to say the Declaration of Independence gave way to action in the streets. That happened 249 years ago today in American history. That is the supercentennial fact for today, July 9th.

Since we have the time, I want to tell you what happened tomorrow in American history, July 10th. Now, this is actually, we don't normally do stuff this old. This is 270 years ago today, of course, tomorrow, July 10th, 1754. This is interesting because this gives you some context for what happened in the buildup to 1776. 270 years ago today, or again tomorrow, July 10th, 1754, Benjamin Franklin proposed or presented, I should say, what is called the Albany Plan of Union. It was the first formal proposal to unite the American colonies under a single government. Now, of course, this was long before anybody was dreaming of independence from Great Britain.

Nonetheless, Benjamin Franklin, who I think it was the next year or two years later, moved to London for 18 years, he was a proud American and he was excited about the idea. of the colonies being united, but under the monarchy. So he proposed this. And so why is it called the Albany Plan of Union? There was a meeting in Albany, New York. Delegates from seven of the 13 colonies gathered to discuss a collective response to growing threats from French forces and their Native American allies. If you know history, you understand that two years later, the French and Indian War was begun.

So this was an attempt by the Americans, the American colonies, to say, what should we do about this? We should be united in our defense of our frontiers on the West against the incursions of the French and their Native American allies. So Benjamin Franklin's plan, the Albany plan, called for a central government to handle defense, Native affairs, Native American affairs, and frontier policy, complete with a president general and a grand counter. Council of Colonial Representatives. So it's interesting that this was happening. Ultimately, the plan was rejected by both the colonial assemblies and the British Crown. I think the British Crown got nervous at the idea of the Americans saying we want to be united. So the Albany plan was rejected, but it was a bold and visionary step toward intercolonial cooperation. And it gives you some thinking, some insight into what Ben Franklin was thinking. Obviously two days, two decades later,

many of the core ideas of this Albany plan would resurface this time, not in defense of an empire, but in the founding of a new republic in which we are blessed to live today. So since I've got a few minutes left, let me tell you what happened on July 11th, 1779. So that's 245 years ago today, July 11th, 1779. The headline is Norwalk in flames. Many of you know, I grew up in Danbury, Connecticut. Danbury was itself torched. But 245 years ago today, British forces under General William try on attacked and burned Norwalk, Connecticut as part of a larger coastal campaign to punish rebel strongholds and divert continental troops. Redcoats and loyalists landed by sea and stormed the town meeting fierce resistance from local militia. Despite the defense, however, the British

set fire to homes, churches, warehouses, and ships. By the end of the end. The end of the end of the of the day, July 11th, 1779. Most of Norwalk was in ruins. It was one of the most devastating civilian losses of the war. Trions raids inflamed Patriot anger. This is always what happened. When the British did anything especially cruel, it always backfired because the Patriots fought all the harder. It helped what Tryon did in Norwalk, helped rally more colonial support for independence. What the British hoped would intimidate, instead fueled the resolve of the American patriots. Norwalk rose again, but they never forgot the flames of that summer day.

Again, that is the supercentennial minute for July 11th, 1779. Stay tuned to this space for more supercentennial facts and follow our Instagram account, super centennial. God bless America. A major retail chain just canceled a massive order leaving My Pillar with an overstock of the classic My Pills, and this is your gain, because for a limited time, my Pills offering their entire classic collection at true wholesale prices. Get a standard My Pillar for just 1798. Want more upgrade to queen size for only 2298 or king size for 2498? Snag body pillows for 2998 and versatile multi-use pillows.

for just $9.98. Give your bet a whole new pillow set only while supplies last. Visit mypillow.com today. Use promo code Eric or call 800-97783057 to score these amazing deals while they're in stock. Plus, when your order totals $75 or more, you'll receive $100 in free digital gifts, no strings attached. That's right. Premium pillows at unbeatable prices and bonus gifts to top it off. Don't wait. Head to mypillow.com today or call 800-9783057. Now. Don't forget to use promo code Eric to grab your standard, my pillow for only 1798, only while supplies last. Folks, welcome back, as I think I already told you. My guest right now is Robert George. Who is Robert George, you ask? Well, I told you the details.

I'll say it again. He is McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence and Director of the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University. There is so much more to say he's someone I've known for many years, principally through my friendship with the great Chuck Colson. Robbie, as he lets us call him, has a new book out called Seeking Truth and Speaking Truth, Law and Morality in our cultural moment. Robbie, George, welcome back. Oh, it's a pleasure to be back with you, Eric. Well, you're just seeing your face as an encouragement to me. of those people. You give me great hope. You, there is so much to say about you, but let's just,

I guess, stick to the book. What led you to put out this book, seeking truth and speaking truth, law and morality in our cultural moment? Well, I've been teaching the young men and women entrusted by their families to my charge as students at Princeton for four decades now. And over the course of the last decade, I've written various essays on various topics. And looking back over those essays, I saw that they were really integrated around a set of central themes, themes that are very much on the minds of young men and women these days. What is truth? Why should we be concerned about truth? Why should we prioritize truth? Is there such a thing as truth? Or is there just your truth? truth and my truth. There are a lot of forces in the culture that are telling young people today, now there's really no such thing as objective truth. There's just your truth and my truth, and you can sort of choose. I also began to be worried, and this is for more than a decade, that people have given up on the two traditional sources of knowledge and wisdom,

and those are faith and reason. And faith and reason have been replaced in people's minds, and especially the minds of young people, with a belief that our access to truth, if there is any such thing as truth, is simply our feelings, simply our emotions. And, of course, if that's the case, then it generates the idea that, well,

since our emotions and feelings vary from person to person, you have your truth, and I have my truth. So I thought, you know, I'll gather these essays together, present them as an integrated whole, address these themes with a view to saying to a general audience, but particularly young people. And this is why I hope that parents and grandparents will get this book into the hands of their high school and college age kids, especially to young people. Look, truth matters. It's really important. It's really important to prioritize seeking truth. We'll never get at it perfectly. We'll never get at it fully.

but let's get out at the best we can. Let's deepen our understanding of truth because it really is much better to live in touch with reality than with fantasies. Let's stop relying on our feelings. Let's use the twin resources. The two wings is the late Pope John Paul

the second described them on which the human spirit ascends to contemplation of truth, faith and reason to get at the truth of things. And then let's be courageous in speaking the truth. I see my vocation as a teacher, Eric, to form the young men and women and trusted to my care to be determined truth seekers and courageous truth speakers. And I'm going to do that now with a broader audience of young men and women, not just my students at Princeton.

Well, when you just mentioned the two wings, you said faith and reason, right? Just so I'm getting this right. I always thought that originated with the late great Michael Novak. But obviously he got that from Pope John Paul II. He did, yeah. It's the beginning sentence of Pope John Paul's great encyclical Fides at Ratio, which is the Latin for faith and reason. The idea that faith and reason are the two wings on which the human spirit rises to contemplation of truth. Well, whenever I hear faith and reason put together that way, I always think of, you know, the famous, I guess, fourth century question.

What does Athens have to do with Jerusalem? Yeah, that's Turtolian's question. Yeah. And that is the question. I mean, I guess I was speaking to Melanie Phillips recently at a Socrates in the city event. And we were talking about what is the West. And for me, I think she differed with me on this. But for me, that is the West. Athens and Jerusalem, faith and reason. And it's something that we've taken for granted for centuries. And we've, you know, in various ways, struggles. to live up to, you know, what these things mean or mean to God, I think. But it is interesting right now that we're in a new part of the struggle where people are no longer even thinking of reason as reasonable, that we have people think of reasoning and logic as patriarchal constructs. What is it the root of the denigration of reason? Well, I think it's the loss of faith.

because reason really does depend for its support on faith, just as faith depends on reason to work on the data of faith to draw conclusions about what we ought to be doing and not doing, what it means to live a truly human, a fulfilled human life. You know, Eric, the historians are fond of breaking up the epochs, you know this, into the age of this and the age of that. And so some historians say the medieval period, that was the age of the age of. faith. And what they mean by that is that for the great medieval thinkers, whether they were Jewish or Christian or Muslim figures like Maimonides or Aquinas or Aquinas or Varroes,

the fundamental touchstone of truth, of justice, of goodness, of rightness, was conformity with the teachings of religion, the teachings of faith. And then these same historians tell us that, well, the Enlightenment comes along, and that's the age of reason. So now the touchstone for the great enlightenment figures, whether in Germany or in France or in England or in Scotland, the great touchstone of truth and rightness and justice is conformity with reason or with scientific inquiry. Now, both of those are partly true and partly misleading. The medieval certainly prioritized faith, but they were no slouches when it came to reasoning as well, and they did not neglect the importance of reason. And in many cases, enlightenment,

figures were not just people of science. Even those who were men of science were often also men of faith. Newton is a very good example, but of course there are many, many, many others. Well, if the medieval period was the age of faith and if the Enlightenment is the age of reason, in what age do we live? What's our touchstone of goodness of truth? I'm afraid, I fear that it has become feeling. We live in the age of feeling. And that is the high road to catastrophe because our feelings are extremely unreliable indicators of goodness, of justice, of truth, of rightness. We do need to return to faith and reason. And there's no way you just go back to one without the other. For the great Christian thinkers, again, going all the way back to Augustine, reason really matters. It doesn't displace faith.

It's not a competitor to faith. But faith and reason work. in a kind of harmony. That's true for the great Jewish thinkers as well. I mentioned Maimonides earlier, a very good example of that. Well, that's where we need to go. We need to recover the true sources of wisdom, and those are in faith and reason. Where did this go wrong? I always go back to Rousseau, I guess.

This idea that somehow our feelings, I mean, yeah, where did that idea come from in history, an intellectual history. Well, the trouble, Eric, as you know, when you start trying to trace things back, especially where things have gone wrong, you go back and you go back and you go back, and the next thing you know, where in the Garden of Eden and that serpent

is presenting himself and tempting our mother Eve. But you certainly put your finger on a key moment. Rousseau's abandonment of the idea of reason and the idea that we live by a kind of natural instincts, and they'll guide us in the right way that, you know, human beings are naturally good, and where human beings have gone wrong is by basically having civilization imposed on them.

That's a very bad idea. But it's not just Rousseau. You might recall the very famous passage from Hume, David Hume, the 18th century skeptical British thinker. Hume said that the reason is and ought only to be the same. slave of the passions and may pretend to know office other than to serve and obey them. For Hume, and he was very influential. For Hume, reason cannot tell us what to want.

It can't adjudicate among competing wants. It can only play the instrumental role of helping us more efficiently to get what we want, whatever we happen to want. So Mother Teresa might want one thing, and Hitler might want another thing. on Hume's reading, no reason, no rational, there's no rational basis for adjudicating between Hitler's wants or desires and Mother Teresa's wants and desires. All reason can do is tell Mother Teresa how to save more people on the streets of India and it can tell Hitler how to kill more people in the ovens of Auschwitz. That's obviously a very bad idea. But Hume itself didn't invent it.

I mean, go a generation or two, a couple of generations earlier, back to Thomas Hobbs, a very influential thinker. who says the thoughts are. We're going to go to a hard break here. Oh, sure. We'll get back to Thomas Hobbs, ladies and gentlemen. Don't go away. Welcome back, folks. I'm talking to Robbie George, or, as the title of the book says, Robert P. George, who's at Princeton, the city, the university, or the town of the university.

The new book is called Seeking Truth and Speaking Truth Law and Morality in our cultural moment. Robbie, you were just making a statement about Thomas Hobbs. Please continue. So I quoted that famous passage of David Humes, the great 18th century, a British skeptical, a philosopher. Our reason is and ought only to be the slave of the desires and may pretend a no office other than to serve and obey them. But I was pointing out that even before that, you go back a couple of generations to the figure of Thomas Hobbs, an enormously influential figure in the history of Western thought, especially Western political thought, who's writing in the context of a great civil war. And Hobbs says that the thoughts,

by this he means the intellect, the thoughts are to the desires as scouts and spies to range abroad and find the way to the thing desired. It's that same idea that's now filtering in with the idea that our thoughts can't tell us, our intellect can't tell us what we should want. It can only find the way to whatever we desire it and can only help us more efficiently to attain what we want, whatever we want. The great teaching of Christianity, of Judaism, and of the classical tradition, the tradition of Plato and Aristotle and Cicero, is that the intellect has something to say, it has a role to perform, not only in instrumentally figuring out how to get what we want, but in figuring out what it's, in figuring out what it's worth wanting, in deciding

what is good and what is bad. Well, this is, there's so much here. It's amazing. And I'm always fascinated about how people can, can push things too far. I mean, I know that Martin Luther, about whom I've written a book, really despise, I always find these things funny, despised Aristotle. I don't know why, maybe because he was just forced to read and study Aristotle so much, you know, in the very early 16th century. And he really seemed to have problems with reason. And so people can make us or feel they want to make ourselves make a false choice and to say you must choose between faith and reason, which is, to me, self-evidently ridiculous. But talk about that idea that there are people. who seem to think it's got to be one or the other.

They don't see them working together. Yeah, and you see this from both sides. You'll see this in religious people, and you'll see this in hardcore secularists. My old Oxford colleague, I knew very well in the old days, Richard Dawkins, for example. For religious people, some adopt a view that has come to be known in philosophy

as Fideism. And that's the idea that the only knowledge worth having, and certainly this is true, they say, of moral knowledge. only moral knowledge worth having is knowledge that we have simply in virtue of revelation. If it's not in the scripture, we can't know it. We can't rely on our reason to get us anywhere in the vicinity of genuine, important moral knowledge. And then on the other side, you know, the hardcore secularists, people like Dawkins and Hitchens and so-called new atheists, think that reason is our only guide to truth and that faith proposes itself as an alternative to reason

and must therefore be rejected. Why? Because we have no rational basis for affirming it. But I'm with you, Eric. I think that they are both wrong. I think there's a very good reason why the early Christian church did look for wisdom not only in the scripture, which is very important. and preeminent, of course, but also in the teachings of the great pagan, to be sure, ancient thinkers. The idea for the early Christians and going forward was, all truth is God's truth. If it's spoken by somebody who's a believer, that's great. If it's spoken by somebody who's an unbeliever, it's still true. If it's spoken by someone who's a pagan, especially a virtuous pagan, well, learn from it, take it on board, integrate it into

our overall knowledge, which is exactly what Christianity did. Well, I guess that's the, I've made this point innumerable times. All truth is of God. So if an idiot says one plus one equals two, it's no less true because it was spoken by an idiot or a fool. And it is interesting how some people, I mean, I guess, you know, the idea that reason is something that we shouldn't trust, there's a point to be made, right? In other words, we know that if we are fallen, reason, which can lead us to truth, also can lead us away from truth. I mean,

we call that sophistry. So there's a reason to be suspicious of pure reason. And if our reason is leading us away from what the scripture says, then we have more reason to be suspicious of the way we are reasoning. But that doesn't mean we throw away. reason away. And so I guess when people like you mentioned, Richard Dawkins, his understanding of what faith is and what we can know, to me, becomes absolutely preposterous. I mean, this idea that the only things that we can know, we can know through scientific investigation, I mean, most people know that's preposterous, that you're reducing everything to a materialism, which is just silly. You can't live your life that way. And so it's interesting that we have these, I guess,

people, as you were saying earlier, on both sides, getting it wrong on both sides. And I know that in your book, you're trying to help us understand what it means to use faith and reason, as I would say, God wants us to do. We'll be right back, folks. I'm talking to Robbie George. The new book is called Seeking Truth and Speaking Truth. Welcome back, folks, talking to Robert P. George. The new book is called Seeking Truth and Speaking Truth, Law and Morality in our cultural moment. And it is a grouping of essays. One of the first ones by Patrick Lee or with Patrick Lee is called The Nature and Basis of Human Dignity. that's a fascinating concept. If you do not believe in the biblical account that there is a loving God who created us in his image, there really is no basis for human dignity. I mean, if we just evolved out of the primordial soup via accident, then the concept of human dignity, I would argue, goes out the window. But there are people who they kind of want to have it both ways. They sort of believe in human dignity. They say, what do you have to say about that?

Well, what does it mean to say? What is the Bible telling us when it says that man, though made from the mere dust of the earth, is nevertheless fashioned in the very image and likeness, as you say, of the divine creator and ruler of all that is, the Amago deity, the idea of man being made in the image and likeness of God? Well, it doesn't mean that God has five fingers on each of two hands, and hair on his head and a nose, because God is an immaterial reality. What could it mean then? Well, Thomas Aquinas, I think, has done better than anybody else in Christian history of giving

us an account of what it means. What it means is that human beings, like God, enjoy reason and freedom, the godlike, literally godlike powers of reason and freedom, the power to envisage a state of affairs that does not exist, grasp, understand the intelligible point, the value of bringing that state of affairs into existence, and then to act reasonably, freely to bring that state of affairs into existence and not act like a brute animal acts on the basis of pure instinct or impulse. Well, a secularist, Eric, like my colleague at Princeton, Jeffrey Stout, that's a very good example of it. A secularist, someone like Professor Stout will say,

well, I can recognize that human beings have those godlike powers. We really are free. We really do have the power of reason. We really can envisage states of affairs that don't exist and freely on the basis of our rational grasp of the intelligible point of bringing them into existence, bring them into existence.

Those are godlike powers. The thing is, someone like Stout would say, I believe we don't get them from God, that we're not created in the image of God. We have created God in our image. We have these godlike powers. They are, as you insist, Professor George, the basis of our dignity. But there is no divine source of them. Now, I'll then ask the next question, well, Brother Jeff, where did they come from?

How is it the case that the world includes creatures who have these literally godlike, immaterial powers of reason and freedom. And his response to that, or a great secularist response to that, an intelligent secularist response to that will simply be, I don't know, it's inexplicable, I'm not buying the God version of the story. All I know is that we do, in fact, have these qualities. They distinguish us from the brute animals, and they are the foundations of our dignity as human creatures. There's so much in the book, and I look forward to speaking you at Socrates in the city, soon on all of this. But I just wanted to touch at the end of the book, part four

of the book is called Seekers of Truth and Bearers of Witness. You have a chapter on Alexander Solzhenitson. I assume talking about, I assume you're touching there on his 1978 speech to the Harvard undergraduates. That's right. I talk about that speech. I was actually at Harvard at that time. I wasn't in the yard,

but I heard the speech over the broadcast system. I was outside the walls. There was a simultaneous translation. I talk about that speech, and I talk about his 1983 Templeton address as well. I talk about two speeches, and it's the Templeton address in which he says the root of our problems is simply this, we, man, men, have forgotten God. And I think he's hit the nail on the head there. And with the collapse of faith comes the collapse of faith in reason.

You also have a chapter on Heinrich Heine, which I quote him in my Bonhofer book. He's essentially prophetically prophesying the rise of Nazism. And you have a chapter on Rabbi Jonathan Sachs, whom I had the privilege of meeting. He spoke at Socrates in the city a number of years ago, as did you. but the final chapter, and this is where we out you, Professor George, as a banjo player. I've heard you play banjo a few times. You have as your final chapter, Ralph Stanley, the famous bluegrass phenomenon, Ralph Stanley. Why do you have him in the book?

Well, Eric, I will plead that I came by my banjo picking honestly. I was born and brought up in West Virginia, right in the heart of Apple H.I. I had a kind of Huckman boyhood hunting and fishing and playing bluegrass banjo. And Stanley was a banjo hero of mine. I had three great banjo heroes. Of course, Earl Scruggs, who's usually credited with founding the bluegrass style of banjo playing, a guy named Don Reno and then Ralph Stanley. Stanley's in the book because of the way he combined his musical vocation with his

witness to the Christian faith. I particularly was arrested by a PBS broadcast that I saw in which he was interviewed. I don't know what the interviewer's name was, but he was one of the standard issue, PBS, secular, news people. And he was just flummoxed by Ralph Stanley's absolutely effortless, unselfconscious proclamation of the Christian faith, just in his ordinary explanation of what he did and why he did what he did and how he came by his music and what he thinks his music means, he was expressing his Christian faith and just bearing witness to this guy who, coming from a completely alien sort of culture, the culture that you're very familiar with there in New York City, the culture of PBS, the culture I'm familiar with at Princeton, just was trying to make sense

out of this. It was an amazing episode, and it was the impetus to write that. What it began was a tribute to Stanley after he died. Well, I'm just thrilled that you squeezed him into the book. That's amazing. We're at a time, Robbie. I will see you soon to continue the conversation.

Folks, the book is seeking truth and speaking truth, law and morality in our cultural moment. Professor Robert P. George, thank you. My pleasure, Eric. Thank you. Welcome back to the Eric Metaxus show. Here's an Ask Metaxus segment from the archives. One of the week, when we air a segment we call Ask Metaxus.

I, of course, am Metaxus. That's you. That's my last name. I go by that. And Ask Metaxus means that people write in with questions. And, Albin, you ask the questions, and you ask Metaxus. And I, as Metaxus, try to answer the question. So let's see what we got.

I know that Elbin has been your sidekick for years, but you guys were, if you guys were to switch, what do you think that Elbin would do well as a host, and what would you do well as the sidekick? You know, there are certain things, certain questions you have absolutely no answer. I have no clue. I mean, it is so, it's such, it's such, the whole thing of doing a show like that, there's something about it. I can't even imagine. You know, first of all, when people say sidekick, what is a sidekick? You do what you do, and they say you're a sidekick.

But, I mean, when you think of Ed McMahon, Ed McMahon actually didn't do anything. He was, you know, people say, you're the Ed McMahon. But Ed McMahon actually did very, very little. You do more because there's comic bits that you're going to be involved in that Ed would not, would do and stuff like that. So I honestly, I have no answer to that. with George Hamilton where he said he wanted to be your sidekick and he and I got into a little t-to-tay or whatever you want to say argument.

He threatened your whole life. George Hamilton, can you imagine this guy at age age 83? He's a Hollywood icon and he felt the need to say, you better watch it, Alvin, because I'm going to have your job. I'm going to have your job. But Albin, if something ever happens to you, it's kind of like

it's like the first runner-up. If Miss America, you know, stumbles and loses her crown, runner-up comes right in there. So if anything happens to you, George Hamilton will just, he'll just sweep in as the first runner-up, he'll be able to be the psychic.

So it's good to have that insurance. Yes, I feel better about that. Okay, what is the most annoying word in the English language, Eric? Most annoying. All right, there are many words that I find profoundly annoying, but the one that pops into my mind right now

is the word gloaming. There's certain words that it's almost like, Like, if you're a poet or a writer who isn't that good, you kind of lean on these kind of crutch words that sound like poetic and wonderful. And gloaming to me is like at the top of that list. If you have to use the word gloaming, strike three. Okay. Have you heard of wordle? Please have a segment on the air where you play wordle need to know if your English skills are up to snuff? I've only heard of it.

I think because it's affiliated with the New York Times, I may refuse to play it because they're communists now, and I don't want to give them any credit. But I love Scrabble. I love word games. And I love Scrabble. So we can talk about that another time. I'll have to look into this.

But I'm a Scrabble guy. Okay. There's the next question. What's your plan for the rest of August? My plan for the rest of August is rest. actually, well, we're going to be doing this show. You know, you're traveling. Yeah, I'm going to Europe. You and the wife are going to Europe.

You're taking off. You've had enough. His wife. And the twin brother and the twin wife. Four of us, yeah. And so I'm going to be all alone here doing the show. So I'm going to be doing the show. I'm going to be traveling to Houston.

I'm speaking in Houston. Now, if you're in Houston or know anybody in Houston on the weekend of not this weekend, but the following weekend, I'm traveling to Houston. I'm speaking in Houston. Go to Ericmetaxis.com, and you'll see on the website, it'll give you details. I'm pretty sure it's Second Baptist Church, but I'm so tired right now.

I'm not a thousand percent, but I'm going to be in Houston. And then I hope that Suzanne and I can get away to the beach a little bit because I'm tired. I need to rest. I'm not going to Europe.