The Reason Interview With Nick Gillespie goes deep with the artists, entrepreneurs, and visionaries who are making the world a more libertarian—or at least a more interesting—place. Please donate to Reason's annual webathon, the one time a year when we ask our online audience to support our principled libertarian journalism with tax-deductible donations. Click here for details, swag, and more information. Today's guest is the science writer Matt Ridley, author of best-selling books such as The Red Queen, The Rational Optimist, and, with Alina Chan, Viral: The Search for the Origin of COVID-19. At a live event filmed in New York City, Ridley tells Nick Gillespie that political and cultural elites had already turned science, our best tool for understanding and improving the world, into a centralized, hyperpoliticized priesthood even before COVID. He walks through the collapse of public trust in 2020 as experts flipped on masks and transmission, declared Black Lives Matter protests safe but religious services dangerous, and insisted on certainty where none existed. Ridley also explains how the lab leak hypothesis went from being a forbidden conspiracy theory to the most plausible explanation for the pandemic. He shares his thoughts on why climate alarmism is finally waning, the future of innovation in an age of overregulation, why he's bullish on the future of nuclear power and AI, and how America can spark a new technological renaissance—even when leaders seem determined to smother dissent. 0:00—Introduction 1:59—Bill Gates' climate change reversal 6:15—How COVID diminished public trust 14:27—Centralization and confirmation bias 17:53—Vaccine skepticism 21:29—Sex and evolutionary theory 29:47—Politicization of science 31:34—COVID lab leak theory 37:50—Human progress 46:10—The role of storytelling Subscribe at YouTube: http://youtube.com/reasontv Like us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Reason.Magazine Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/reason Visit the archive: https://reason.com/tags/reason-podcast