Jeffrey Epstein’s Interview with Steve Bannon - Infograph

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Board

Rockefeller University

Joined late 80s / early 90s for financial expertise

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Trilateral

Commission Member

Young member (early 30s) invited by David Rockefeller

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Santa Fe

Institute Founder

Funded to study complex systems mathematically

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2 Calls

From Solitary

Made collect calls during 2008 financial crisis

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THE RISE: From Wall Street to Elite Circles

Joined Rockefeller University board (~1989/91) to provide financial expertise in a new quantitative era
David Rockefeller invited him onto the Trilateral Commission (first meeting in Tokyo, early 90s)
Observation: World leaders are often financially/economically illiterate
Belief: Finance is not understood systemically by most, including elites

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THE CRISIS VIEW: 2008 from a Jail Cell

Was in solitary confinement in Palm Beach County Jail during Lehman Brothers collapse
Wore a brown jumpsuit labeled 'TRUSTSY' (misspelled 'trustee')
Made two collect calls: one to Jimmy Kaine (Bear Stearns), one to JP Morgan contact
Analyzed the crisis as a systemic failure, akin to a medical emergency—needing liquidity ("blood") pumped in
Insists he never had a moment of self-reflection about his predicament during the event

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THE SANTA FE INSTITUTE: A Quest to Understand Complexity

Founded/ funded in early 1990s to apply mathematics to complex systems (finance, biology, etc.)
Involved figures like Murray Gell-Mann (Nobel laureate) and Chris Langton (artificial life)
Core goal: Find predictability in seemingly chaotic, interconnected systems
Conclusion: The project was a "total failure"—many phenomena (like the soul, intuition, market feelings) resist mathematical description
New insight: Science/math may be the wrong tools for the "unexplainable"; women's intuition, for example, operates in this realm

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PHILOSOPHY & THE UNEXPLAINABLE

Believes firmly in the soul ("the dark matter of the brain") as an animating, unexplainable force
Draws parallels to limits in physics: Newton's gravity (named but not understood), quantum mysteries
Great traders operate on "feel," not just math
Advocates for a new kind of thinking beyond traditional measurement to address the "unexplainable" aspects of life, consciousness, and complex systems

KEY QUOTES

"No one understands the [financial] system. It's a miracle."

"The soul is obvious to everyone that there's something different between things that are alive and things that are not alive. But we have no idea what it is."

"[The Santa Fe Institute] was a total failure."

"It's impossible to understand. That word understand simply means if this happens here, that will happen there. It's predictable. Understanding means it's predictable. It's not predictable."

Santa Fe Institute complexity theory financial crisis 2008 Lehman Brothers Bear Stearns Trilateral Commission Rockefeller University David Rockefeller Murray Gell-Mann quantum physics soul mathematics Wall Street solitary confinement