Back to episode — Episode 1745 Scott Adams - Later And Better Than Usual
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ilbert dunker. It's been around since at least World War II. And the idea was that Navy aviators would have a risk of crashing and being underwater in their plane, and the pilots would have to figure out how to get out of their cockpit while they're submerged in the water. And they created something to test it. It was called the Dilbert dunker. And the reason it was a Dilbert dunker is that Dilber…
← Previous segment →g, you have to spend less money on the old thing. That's it. Just like every company, every household, everybody else in the world makes do with what they have. They don't just say give me some more. They just make do. So that was his philosophy. I don't know if it was a good one or a bad one, but it's the cleanest one I've ever heard of.
Now let me — I'm going to close on my favorite Michael J. Goodwin story. He was working with me when I worked in a laboratory, and part we were always connecting different equipment with cables to see if this equipment works with this equipment. You know, do the protocols work, etc. And so mostly we're just testing different configurations of equipment and that required tools. So we had a little tool drawer that would be the screwdrivers and stuff that we'd use for connecting equipment. But there was a discussion in the lab — there were just a handful of us who worked there — about whether that drawer should be used for the tools or the screwdrivers mostly the screwdrivers or the snacks because we also kept some snacks in there. And so we're like that drawer should be the tool drawer or the snacks.
And so I thought I was pretty funny and I said well this question boils down to this: would you rather screw or eat? And I thought okay that's pretty fun, right? Screwdrivers versus snacks. Would you rather screw or eat? And I thought I nailed it. I thought I'd like to drop the mic. It's like would you rather screw or eat? Drop the mic, walk away. And then Michael Goodwin said the funniest thing I've ever heard after I said would you rather screw or eat. He sat there and he said, depends how hungry I am. And with that one sentence Michael Goodwin described all of human nature. There was nothing left. There was no corner left unexplored. There was no phenomenon left to be understood. Michael J. Goodwin, magnificent bastard, had described all of human nature with one sentence: depends how hungry I am.
And so this man not only gave us the name for Dilbert which I believe changed the world — I do because if Dilbert didn't have that name I'm not even sure if it would have worked honestly. There's something about the name that gave it weight. Am I right? Could you imagine the Dilbert comic with any other name? It's hard to do, isn't it? There's something about that name that makes it work. It is now because of that that allowed me to have some exposure. It allowed me to talk about politics. You saw with your own eyes if you've been watching that I got some things done. For example during the pandemic I recommended an executive order to let doctors make a phone call to help you across state borders, which was done. And so I recommended that during the pandemic and the president at the time signed an executive order. And now telehealth is a way bigger market, should make a huge difference in people's lives eventually. Now that's just one thing. There are other things that I managed to accomplish that I can't tell you about
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. These are the good ones, but trust me. Well that could be another example. My book How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big. It introduced the ideas of systems are better than goals and talent stacks. Now I don't think it's bragging to say that those two things made a huge difference in the world because I hear about it all the time. You know, talent stacks is the way smart people rec…
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