>> Announcer: Live from Las Vegas, Nevada,
it's theCUBE, covering Knowledge15.
Brought to you by ServiceNow.
(electronic music)
>> We're on, welcome to theCUBE special presentation,
here live at the ServiceNow Know15, it's theCUBE.
It's our flagship program, we go out to the events
and as you can see from the noise, I'm John Furrier
with SiliconANGLE co-host Dave Vellante of WikiBon.org
And our special guest, John Cleese,
distinguished Professor at Cornell, we just learned,
no-one knows that.
But apparently that's true.
Writer, comedian, thought-leader,
I got told that.
>> And a Doctor.
I'm a Doctor, Doctor of Laws.
>> Doctor.
>> And, what else am I?
I was offered a Peerage but I turned it down
because I had to be in England during the winter
and go and vote in the House of Lords,
so I said no to that.
And I also turned down a CBE,
but I would love to have an OBE.
But not an Order of the British Empire,
I'd like to have an Out of Body Experience.
(laughs)
>> But you're not a thought leader anymore,
you're a futurist, that's the new trend.
The futurist is the buzzword.
>> No, I'm not.
I'm very much living in the past.
I don't like the future.
And I don't think much of the present.
(laughs)
>> Well you're here speaking at the CIO Decisions.
What do you think of all the CIOs and all the geeks
here at ServiceNow?
What's your?
>> Well I like geeks because they all like Monty Python.
(laughs)
You know?
I'm about, three-quarters of the speeches I do
are to software people, and I usually tease them.
You know, I ask em how many Star Trek episodes
they can name, whether they've got a tee-shirt
with Moore's Equation on it, and all this kind of,
whether they wear a black backpack to formal occasions.
So I got a whole lot of geek jokes.
But they all like Python, cos they're extremely smart,
and as you know, people who like Python
are astonishingly smart.
(laughs)
>> So how to you tell smart people
from people who aren't smart?
How about people who are not smart?
>> Well as you've said, you like Monty Python.
>> I love Monty Python.
(imitates extreme gibberish)
>> You think, he doesn't like it.
Doesn't get the jokes.
>> So you've talked to a lot of software people.
In Vegas? Do you like Vegas?
Enjoy Vegas? >> Vegas?
>> Las Vegas.
(laughs)
You see a show while you're out here?
>> I can't get over this place.
(laughs)
Why people spend a lot of money to come here,
so that they can lose what money they still have left.
I really don't get it.
Do they come here, because they think
that the casino owners are so rich because they won
a lot of money gambling at other people's casinos?
(laughs)
The only good thing about it is the food.
>> Did you bring your wife with you?
>> Which one?
(laughs)
No I didn't.
She wasn't feeling well, said she's going to join me
in New York, cos I'm going onto New York.
And this weekend we are at the Tribeca Film Festival,
Robert De Niro's, and we are having
a Monty Python retrospective, for really smart people.
>> What's been the weirdest thing that has happened to you,
in the tech community here in ServiceNow.
Any highlights?
>> Not this visit, but the last visit when I arrived
at the hotel, I can't think which one it was,
Venetian I think, and the guy at the counter recognized me
and said, are you listening?
>> John F: Yes, I'm Tweeting away.
>> No you're not. I tweet.
>> I'm Tweeting away.
>> He's kind of rude that way.
>> What are you on your fucking keyboard for?
I'm telling you a joke.
(laughs)
>> Tweeting away.
>> Welcome to the future.
>> Do you have a Twitter handle?
>> Now, shall I start it again?
(laughs)
I was coming here to Las Vegas, right,
I was staying at the Venetian hotel.
Got any phone calls you need to answer or anything?
>> Hold on, let me check.
(laughs)
>> I arrived there at reception and the guy said to me,
"Mr Cleese, I really like your shows Monty Python,
Faulty Towers and all of that.
Could I have your autograph?"
So I said, sure, I write him an autograph.
Then he says, could I have your credit card
for extra expenses, and I gave it to him, and he said,
"I'm sorry to ask you this,
but do you have any identification?"
(laughs)
It's true.
>> So are you Tweeting, and live-streaming?
>> John C: Am I what?
>> Tweeting, using your Twitter account?
>> Am I, Am I?
Can we get a handkerchief.
>> Do you have a Facebook page?
>> Facebook?
I've heard of Facebook.
That's for people who aren't important enough
to get in the gossip columns and newspapers, right?
(laughs)
>> So we have some Facebook questions from the crowd.
Do you mind if we ask you some of those?
Somebody wants to know, what the air speed velocity is
of an unladen swallow?
>> Oh, I used to know this.
I used to know this, in 1971 I could have answered that.
Pass.
(laughs)
>> Dave: You're lucky.
>> Are you back with us again?
>> I'm back, I'm just going through the questions.
So the question on my Facebook page is,
what about this Cornell study about the
double curse of incompetence?
>> The double what?
>> John F: Curse of incompetence.
>> The double what you say?
>> Dave: Curse. Double curse.
>> Of incompetence.
I don't know.
>> Good question.
>> Oh, now I know what you're talking about.
There's a great guy there, a Professor called David Dunning,
and he's one of the most amusing
and entertaining guys I've ever met.
And he's spent his career studying
how good people are at knowing how good they are at things.
What he calls Self Assessment.
And what he's discovered, which I absolutely love,
is that in order to know how good you are at something,
it requires almost exactly the abilities that it does
to be good at that thing in the first place.
So if you're absolutely no good at something,
you lack exactly the abilities that you need
to know that you're no fucking good at it.
And that explains the planet, better than anything else
that I've ever come across.
Is that there's a whole lot of people out there,
who have no idea what they're doing,
but they have absolutely no idea
that they have no idea what they're doing.
And those are the ones with the confidence and stupidity,
who finish up in power.
That's why the planet doesn't work.
(laughs)
>> So, honestly they don't know about Monty Python.
>> They're not smart enough.
>> What do you mean they don't know about Monty Python?
This is a very smart man, David Dunning.
(laughs)
He's very smart, he's also shown, oh it doesn't matter.
>> What did you talk about, the CIOs,
when you out talking to the CIOs-
>> John C: C-I-Os?
>> John F: The Chief Information Officers.
>> Geeks, well, what was interesting was that they were
quite receptive to what I was saying,
which is so counter-cultural.
You see, I think we're living
in the nadir of our civilization.
I think as you wake up in the morning,
that sound you can hear is our civilization cracking.
And it's because of technology,
because nobody talks to anyone anymore.
They all go in restaurants and then they do this.
I mean, we all know this,
I'm not making a clever observation,
but it's insanity, you know?
When my daughter was 16, she would get together
with all her friends but instead of talking to each other
they'd be emailing or texting everyone who wasn't there yet.
Do you see what I mean?
They never actually-
>> Texting selfies.
What do they do when they get together?
Just continue to talk to each other on their phones?
>> It's completely vacuous, vacuous civilization.
With the celebrity culture at the heart of its rottenness.
>> Hollywood.
>> So what effect do you think that has on the human brain,
creativity, thinks like that?
>> Well people are on technological devices all the time.
They think now that the kids have less good social skills.
And the point about human beings is
we've always been good at technology, you know?
In the 13th century when we were in the Holy Land,
slaughtering Muslims, we were still able to build
beautiful cathedrals.
You see what I mean?
So we can build things, and put men on the Moon.
The only thing is we can't get on well together.
So, which is more important?
The answer is getting on well together,
so we're now giving kids all the things
that stop them from acquiring social skills.
It's beyond mad, but people are after money,
and so they will always do things, and always come up
with excuses why what they're doing is actually good
for the world, when it's all about that.
>> What about the Hollywood situation.
You mentioned in your speech about, when you were creative,
when you were younger, and the process you went through,
what's the state in your mind, of the Hollywood culture.
I mean, they do a movie about Korea,
and then Sony gets hacked.
>> It's all a bit crazy, but I wrote two film scripts
about ten years ago cos I thought to myself,
can I make a living writing film scripts.
And I did an adaptation of a children's book by Roald Dahl,
called 'The Twits.', and I wrote something
for Jeffrey Katzenberg about cavemen as an animation-
who are you talking to?
>> John F: He's saying we only have one minute.
>> That's Greg Stewart.
>> Oh okay.
I can't be bothered to go on talking for one minute.
(laughs)
Though I have so many fascinating things to say,
that I'm afraid
(speaking off mic)
>> Thanks, thanks for that.
>> Thanks Greg, you're fired.
(laughs)
Greg's fired.
>> The guy's going to lose their job if you walk off the set.
>> John C: Good.
>> Good, >> you're fired.
(mic thumps on the desk)
(laughs)
>> Thank you very much.
(laughs)
You don't see that everyday.
>> Okay, that's an out.
That's a wrap.
Say goodbye.
(upbeat music)