>> rose: well court-martial to the broadcast. tonight, two conversations, two authors, two subjects. one is how to recognize failure, two is the evolution of god. first, jim collins, one of america's best-selling authors on business and leadership and recognizing failure. >> you would think-- at least i would have thought-- that the way great enterprises fall is they back lazy. they just become sort of fat and corps lent and they never really want to do anything new or innovative anymore. and sure enough, if you do become lazy and complacent and don't do anything new anymore you will fall. that doesn't really show how the mighty fall. it's undisciplined pursuit of more. it's overreaching. it's going too far. it's doing too much. it's undiscipline big thecht. >> rose: second, robert wright,

his new book authors a new perspective ond god. >> when people look at another group of people and think they can benefit from peaceful coexistence, collaboration, cooperation or just coexistence they will usually find a basis for tolerance in their religion. >> rose: and we end with an appreciation for don hewitt, the founder of "60 minutes". he died age 86. jim collins, robert wright, and appreciation of don hewitt. next.

captioning sponsored by rose communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. >> rose: jim collins is here, he is, as you know, one of america's best-selling authors on subjects of business and leadership. his books "good to great" and "built to last" have sold more than seven million copies combined. "fortune" magazine has called him the j.k. rowling of management literature. his latest is called "how the mighty fall." i am pleased to have jim collins back at this table. welcome. >> i'm very pleased to be here. >> rose: thank you, god to have you here. how did this come about? "how the mighty fall" and why some companies never give in and why some companies-- extending beyond your tut-- look like

they're falling but before it'so turn around. start with the title and what the inquire was that led to this. >> well, like everything that we do, it's all driven by curiosity. the interesting thing is that this study began... this little inquiry began in 2005 long before the mightystarted falling like dominos. and i've always been interested how great enterprise cans self-destruct but it's been in the back of my mind. and then i had two experiences in my life that came together to raise a question they'rereot in sequence but they came together and the first time it started to grab me as a question was when francis hassle bin asked know go the west point. and francis hasslebein who is one of america's great leaders

and she said "would you come to west point and teach a case discussion." i said "i'd be happy to." and i picture cad debts. i said "wonderful frances." and who will be the students? >> she said 36 people. 12 u.s. army generals, 12 "fortune" 500 c.e.o. types and 12 leaders from the social sectors all at tables of two, two, two, each. >> rose: i said. okay, what's the question, what's the case you'd like me to lead the discussion on? she said "you'll like it, the united states of america." so here's this case discussion with these students and i'm thinking to myself what can i think this group about america and i had a wonderful mentor named bill lazier. and he always impressed upon me you don't have to have the answers. what you have to have is the questions.

>> rose: my mantra. >> exactly. and if you have the questions, good answers will come. and i thought and ieo west poins question. the question was: where's america? is america at an inflection point? and if so, which way? because great nations-- athens, 500 b.c.e., rome, egyptian old kingdom, egyptiannew kingdom, minoans of crete have fallen. so i put to the group is america renewing its greatness or is the united states of america dangerously on the cusp of falling from great to good? the question was rhetorical but the room exploded into this really remarkable debate. there's no correlation by sector there was a lot of discussion and great passion for the question. but the real critical moment came at a break. chief executive of a very successful company comes up to me and he says "i'm very interested in the question that you asked this morning but i've been thinking about my company all morning.

we've had this amazing run of success and that worries me. it scares me. i'm frightened by our success. and what i want to know is when you're on top of the world, when you're at the height of your success how would you know i i you might be dangerously on the cusp of falling? >> rose: because it makes you immune to insight? >> it could be that all of your success covers up the fact that you are already in decline. and that by the time you wake up to see it, it might be too late. that was his fear. and this came hand in hand with a very personal experience. and i was reflecting back on the way home from this experience that my wife and i had been to, joanne, we're coming up on our 29th year of marriage which i consider to be a good start.

and in 2002 we went running outside of aspen and we ran to the top of the... i shouldn't say we.t running up towards the thing called the electric path. at about 11,000 feet altitude i started walking and i came out of the tree line and joanne kept running. i could see her heading up to the top of the pass which was almost 14,000 feet in this bright red sweatshirt. that was august. in october we received the diagnosis that led to two mastectomies. and what hit me was the image of being the extraordinary picture of health, the red sweatshirt pounding up the trails to the top of the path looking as beautiful and as strong as ever. but if you run the timeline, she was already sick. >> rose: inside her, cancer was growing. >> inside her cancer was growing. and these two experiences, the west point experience and the reflections of that came together and i thought, you know, there's something there.

we ought to go back and study great enterprises that fell, great enterprises that self-destructed and ask the question "are the seeds of their decline and are the markers of their decline in place long before you ever see it? are you strong on the outside but already sick on the inside? or to use that wonderful question from the person at west point, how would you know? >> rose: all right, stage one is hubris. >> yes. so we found these five stages. and i'll just quickly mention what they are and then we can circle back to them. stage one is hubris born of success. stage two is undisciplined pursuit of more. stage three is denial of risk and peril. stage four is grasping for salvation. and stage five, the stage you never want to go to, is a pip lags to irrelevant or death. now, two quick points on this. it does turn out that you look from the outside like you're

still climbing all the way to the end of stage three. you don't visibly fall until st' e through three of five stages before you know. you look great. certainly on the outside you look great. then stage four it reallll show. it's clear to everybody. if second is you can go to stage four and come back. >> rose: i want people to know out there what's interesting about these kinds of conversations which i try do in my head and i think back to your wife, what you try to say is that let's assume this perhaps can't extend beyond a corporate entity to life in general. >> exactly. i'll just share with you a little two asides on that. the first is that our work has always been about the questions. and it just so happens that we use business. one of the things that was interesting is i got a call from a professor of classics who said that he's teaching how the mighty fall with macbeth.

and he said "this is the tragedy " it happens to show up in business but it's the arc of strategy. and the second thing that was interesting, i shared this with chief executives before it was published and the c.e.o. came up to me and he said "do you mind if i share it with..." and i thought he was going to say "this framework with my management team. but the words out of his mouth were "with my children." i want my children to deunderstand hubris born of success, denial of risk and peril, the mighty can fall. and they've been privileged. >> rose: hubris means that... it does mean some sense of don't just think you're so damn good. it may very well be that a series of factors. and don't think that having done ititnce means you can do it forever. >> and to never believe that you actually understand all the reasons for your success. to always be questioning, questioning, questioning for the reasons. there's a wonderful moment that

taught this to me where i learned about in an experience with sam walton, arguably one of ther3h century. built what became the largest company in the world. a group of brazilian business people bought a discount retail chain in latin america and they wanted to learn about how to run a better retailing chain. and so they asked a number of people if they can visit in the united states and sam walton actually invites them up. so they show up in bentonville, arkansas, and sam walton drives up in his pickup truck and there's a dog and dog hairer where and these brazilians are driving around with sam walton who is in his typical low key sam kind of way, even though he's incredibly intense. what's striking is he was the most successful retailer in america and for the first two days, all he did was ask them questions. all he did was to say "help me understand, how does brazil...

how does this work? can we understand this better? " and finally they realized he'd invited them to learn from them. now, you think of the ones that i've got the answers, i know why i've been successful and here is the most successful turning it around and saying "what a wonderful opportunity to learn from these people." and when you go from being a knowing person to being a learning person, you're staving off the hubris. >> rose: i no what i know, i want to know what you know. >> that's exactly right. and further, in someone like sam's case, i think they always see everything they've done as a work in progress. i may have done the 5th symphony but i need to figure out how to do the 6th and the 7th. everything is just a start. >> rose: so then this idea of being able to undiscipline pursuit. >> yeah. so now what's very interesting. so you have the hubris born of success and it leads to stage

two. you would think-- at least i would have thought-- that the way great enterprises fall is they become lazy. they just become sort of fatp ur really want to do anything new or innovative anymore. and sure enough, of course, if you do become lazy and complacent and don't do anything new anymore you will fall. that doesn't really show how the mighty fall. it's undisciplined pursuit of more. it's overreaching. it's going too far. it's doing too much. it's undisciplined big theft. so, for example, you look at a company like rubbermaid which was number one for two years in a row. at the very moment it was in stage two, they were introducing a new product every single day, 365 days a year. this is not come play sent behavior. and yet five years later, they did not exist as an independent company. they were acquired. what we find is that the hubris leads to an obsession with

growth often, an undisciplined pursuit of big acquisitions. it can be an undisciplined pursuit of more fame, more success, more short-term value whatever can lead you to make a series of undisciplined moves. at the same time the question is how might big things happen? so if you take the case of texas instruments moving to digital signal processing chips, at the time they started that it was a little thing. and they had all their big businesses over here, semiconductor chips, other things, and they did that little speak and spell. and it was a little tiny fly wheel but it showed promise. just like microprocessors. intel didn't decide "we're going into microprocessors" in 1974. the logic functions were put on a single chip, it was a little step. but it's that little fly wheel gains momentum and it turns out wait a minute, we can put the logic functions on there, we can make a sickle d.s..chip and people can use them in communications and suddenly

you've gone from one turn to five turn to ten turns and this little thing... not your big thing you're paying attention to memory chips, you pay attention to that and renew it as if your life depends on it, because itft starts to grow over here and then you prove its success empirically, then you can make a bet on something that's proven. where companies get in trouble is they abandon the big thing they already have and they make a big uncalibrated bet on something that they think is going to be the big thing. one of the great stories of decline is ames department stores. they invented the model that wal-mart won with. one of the big differences between those two companies, ames was in the northeast, wal-mart was four years behind, they were in the southeast. both of them started to build momentum with that and all of a sudden ames inexprickbly decided that they were going to launch a big acquisition to move into a whole different model of retailing. and one of the big differences, sams just kept marching out

across the country in concentric circles. ames went on a big uncalibrated leap, big uncalibrated bet and that was the start of the decline and eventually wal-mart came in and they stopped. >> rose: you are getting to a later point in terms of what are you... grassing for salvation. frequently those kinds of moves also are grasping for salvation. >> yes. >> rose: you realize you're in deep. >> yup. >> rose: so therefore you reach for things. what we have to do is change our business model, what we have to do is change our strategy. we're in the wrong business. >> revolutions rarely work. >> rose: success is around the corner if we just do something else rather than what we do we'll be able to keep the thundering herds at the gate. >> yeah. and by the time you get to stage four, that's exactly what happens. we had to briefly hit stage three because it takes us bright into the.... >> rose: denial of risk and peril. >> denial of risk and peril. so you've got this amazing success. and the interesting thing about stage two is everybody,

including you, can feel that you are really great. >> rose: right. >> but you enter stage three and warning signs start to mount. there's internal evidence, maybe inventory turns are coming down orst the risk profile of certain businesses or there's mounting evidence that something that you really believe in may not work after all. and there starts to be what i would call a cultural denial. instead of a high questions to statements ratio on the part of the chief executive, you have a high statements to questions ratio. and you discount negative data. you amplify positive data. you lose that productive paranoia. you know, we had to predict 11 of the last three recessions. that's a good approach. and the real issue is not that they're mounting but that you deny them. that you discount them. then you combine that with hidden risk and there's a wonderful concept called the water line. it was advanced by w.l. gore, bill gore, and he basically said

all companies must take risks, all people must take risks, all nations must take risks. the question is are they above the water line or below the water line? if you take a risk that's above the water line where if it goes against you and blows a hole on the side of the hull, it's above the water line, you'll patch it, it will be painful but you'll be able to sail on. but if you take a risk below the water line where if that... it explodes a hole below that water line, you'll go down. so the question is is risk taking good or bad is the wrong question. the question is, is it above the water line or below the water line? and what we find is companies can ask themselves as people by taking a risk where the upside is bound but the down side is gigantic. whether it be massive leverage ratios, whether it be launching a huge uncalibrated satellite system. whether it be in case of climates, put a little story in the book about climbers that were going up to do a climb and there were storm clouds in the difference.

famous climb called the naked edge. and they didn't ask the question "what's the up side if we go up? what's the down side if the storm turns really bad?" well, the up side is we get to do our planned climb.epide. what's the down side? >> rose: we die. >> we could die. they went ahead anyway, the storm turned against them, they were hit by lightning and they died. and so what we find is there's this notion of not just risk by asymmetric risk. >> rose: oh, i see. in other words the down side is worse than the upside. >> much worse than the upside. and that leads into things going against you whether it be the gradual erosion or whether it be the risk turned bad and you start heading downwards and that's when you enter stage four. the essence of stage four is not that you're falling, it's grasping for salvation in response to falling. >> rose: give me the story. >> well, first of all, those are great positive stories because ib i don't mean, xerox, new corps, these are all companies

that were in decline that came back. in the case of i.b.m., what's very interesting is that you have... there was a say your brought in, by the way, very rarely do outside saviors, certainly outside charismatic saviors produce great results. the weight of evidence is very much against that. it can happen. he was the exception of a successful outsider. now, gersh her came in and the first thing everybody wanted to do with the "what's your plan? what's your direction." remember that famous moment where he said "the last thing i.b.m. needs is a digital." what he meant is i need to make sure i have my team in place, i need to make sure i have the right people in my seats. >> rose: make sure we can execute. >> make sure wee can execute and i've got to confront all the difficult facts we have to confront and it's not going to happen in five days or ten days or even a hundred days. when a newspaper asks "can we track your progress over 100 days" he says "no, we're going dark, we have work to do."

and it was this very almost pedestrian quantitative disciplined process of figuring out where i.b.m. could still be the best in the world. and then making a series of very disciplined decisions that were not sexy,o n traction and rebuild the culture and rebuild the confidence of results that then led to the transition. that's a completely different approach than "we need to do a big miracle acquisition." he never did one of those. "we need to do a complete cultural transformation and toss out everything from the p.a. " as he said "i fell in love with i.b.m. and what it stood for." so it was building on strength in a very almost peter drucker way, step by step, turn by turn. of course he stopped the lead bleeding but that's not how you build greatness. it was a very pedestrian process. anne mulcahey of xerox came into another company that was in late stage four decline. an insider, almost no one knew who she was. she did all the same types of activities of right people, it's

not about her, disciplined steps producing great results. the antithesis of silver bullets. >> rose: let me come to general conclusions. here is the problem that i or others have. it's not about this book, it is a larger issue. you look after... you look at these companies and you want to know how would we know? so you go look at case studies, what happened and figure out what are the lessons from those case studies after the fact. what is always... it's a bit like you need to have good judgment. well, that's... i know that. what is good judgment and how would good judgment apply in circumstance a, circumstance b, circumstance c? you clearly have to have principles and you have to have createive renewal and you have to have a capacity in a sense to the absence of hubris. you have to have a certain humility and at the same time you have to have a certain boldness and confidence. all those things speak to you. those are words that speak to

you. on the one hanan humility, on te other hand boldness. on the one hand risk taker, on the other hand prudence. on the one hand this, on the other hand that. it is all there and you understand that those are the. you're still left with the hard, tough decision making responsibility of saying "within those choices, how do i make the right choice?" and i'm not sure this book or any other book has the capacity to tell you that. >> no. >> rose: because in the end, you've learned from history or you will repeat history. on the other hand, new waters are constantly flowing into every river and so it's constantly changing. >> i'll offer two thoughts about that. the first is that i... the more i look at things, the more i come to the conclusion that at

the root of much of it is what is the truth of the ambition of those in power? and if your ambition as a leader is really about you, it's about the success you have, it's about the attention you get during your time, it's about the wealth you accumulate, that leads to... is more likely to lead to the absence of the disciplined decisions that would produce great results. if it starts with those people like anne mull kay hi who are deeply passionate about the cause, about the company, about the work, it really isn't about them. and it really is about something bigger that they're going to create that is going to go long beyond them, whether it be music or a building or a set of ideas

or a company, that that leads to a different set of decisions that flow from that root question when you have,ts it ull about? what you're creating that is bigger than you or is it about you? and if i take all of our work and i just sort of come back to... when i look at those who make one set of decision versus the others and i say where's the root? that is, i believe, one of the roots. >> rose: "how the mighty fall and why some companies never give in." jim collins. his probably most famous book is called "good to great." back in a moment. stay with us. >> rose: robert wright is here. his books include "the moral

animal" "non-zero" and "three scientists and their gods." his new book is called "the evolution of god." it offers a new perspective on religion and the scriptures. i'm pleased to have robert wright back at this table. welcome. >> thanks for having me. >> rose: tell me what you see as... and we could just... i could ask this question and then 0 minutes later you could say "that's the answer. this pattern. pattern. which in the essence of this book, this pattern in the evolution of judaism and christianity. >> so in the scriptures of all three abrahamic religions, the bible and the koran, sometimes god is saying, you know, be nice to the unbelievers in the koran, you know? he advises muslims to say "you've got your religion, we've got ours." other times he says "kill the infidels." on the one hand he's saying "wipe out a city because they don't believe in me"" and at

other times "the israel lits not only suggest peaceful co-exist tense of w the neighboring people who have another god but actually invoke that god to validate the relationship." they say you've got your god; we've got our god,tg? so i wanted to see what the pattern is in terms of explaining those mood fluctuations with an eye to seeing what brings out the best and worst in religion. the basic idea is pretty simple. when people look at another group of people and think that they can benefit from peaceful co-existence, from collaboration cooperation, or just co-existence, they will usually find a basis for tolerance in their religion. and i think today that's true. people will find the tolerant scriptures in their scriptures when it's in their interest to do so. >> rose: let me understand that. if you are looking for tolerance you can find hit in the scriptures? >> well, certainly all the scriptures are now sufficiently ambiguous. >> rose: that's my point, yeah. >> you can find anything you

want in the koran or in the bible. >> rose: that, in fact... you go to islam, is there any place in the koran that people are... the radical fundamental edge such as al qaeda that osama bin laden can find things that he can say "ah, the bible speaks to me"? >> on the one hand, he can find a verse that literally says... well, it says "kill the polytheists wherever you find them." but on the other hand if you look closely at the context of that verse, then what it says is basically unless they're on your side in this particular war. and that illustrates. what i'm saying is that when he saw it being in his interest to ally with people. they are allies and think would be on his side. if you look at the koran closely

that's what's going on. he was a warrior for much ofñi e covers. there are a a lot of belligerent verses in there. but it's clear in context that i would argue it's actually not fundamentally about religion. i argue the religious conflicts are not fundamentally about religion, the so-called religion conflicts. people will always manage to invoke their religion to justify the killing they do just as they'll manage to invoke patriotism to justify killing if it's a nationalist war. the argument i make in the book is that in ancient times as now, what brought out the question of whether a religion would be belligerent or tolerant was not some intrinsic inherent feature of the religion, some internal character, it was much more facts on the ground, what's in your interest to do now. there's much more pragmatism to religion than i think is

appreciated. >> rose: suggesting religion was created in order to... >> i start the book... the term "the evolution of god" in the title refers to the evolution of ideas about god. what antipolgss call cultural revolution. i start back in hunter gatherer days when so far as we can tell every society on the planet believed in mini gods. and at that point, religion is not what we think of as religion today as n that it didn't have a moral component. it wasn't about doing good or don't cheat, don't steel. >> rose: no code there. >> because hunter gatherer societies, you've got 30, 40 people, it's not that much of a problem keeping people in line really. religion was about more what science is about today, which is figuring out how the world works in particular why catastrophes strike and trying to figure out how to increase the number of successes and decrease the number of catastrophes and the theories they came up with were

okay, out there there are these beings we can't see and they're like humans. if they do something bad to you, they're mad at you. you must have done something to offend them. that lodge sick the main thing early religion is about. and as time goes on and society getue cities and states, religion changes in the character of god changes. it becomes more about morality and good. >> rose: when did that happen? >> before the god of israel israel. one theme is that there's more continuity between prison israel looits religion and israelite religion. everyone wants to say their religion is spececl. we have this revolution and then everything changed.

i try to show it's an evolutionary path. there are gods that are much about goodness. >> rose: does this book have some place between pro-faith and atheist literature. or believers or non-believers? >> ion't subscribe to any claims of special revelation so i'm not a christian, muslim or jew. but i wouldn't call myself an atheist. i tell my story from the point of someone outside of the faith, but but i argue in the book and i believe that there is evidence that there is a larger purpose working through nature. so that doesn't necessarily

imply an interventionist god or the kind of god these people believe in. i don't know if i'm right in this kind of directionalty in, for example, human history, a moral direction that i demonstrate in human history or try to demonstrate. if thatr&, i can't team you anything with great confidence about what's behind it. >> rose: but there is a... nature has purpose? >> i think so. and i think more than scientists realize, saying that is not incompatible with science. and it doesn't mean there's spooky forces out there. >> rose: exactly. >> it can be a strictly materialist physical system abiding by the laws of nature was set in motion for some purpose. we think of a car as having a purpose, it was designed to do something but we don't think there's anything special about it. it's just a machine. >> rose: but who set it in motion? >> well, i don't know.

and i wouldn't say it's necessarily a who. could be an intelligent being. but, you know, we have? science examples of things that are purposeive but not set in motion by an intelligence, and that's like you and me. animals have goals and purpose, right? i mean, they pursue goals, but they're designed by a process, natural selection, not by an intelligent being. could be there's a god behind it but i just don't know. >> rose: and if you don't know, that means what? >> well, even though... i mean, in my case... people are different in terms of what gives them spiritual sustenance. what would b bgreat is if i could believe there's a god and if i'm good i'll go to heaven although there's a down side thinking you have to be good to go to heaven. that would be my favorite. but in the absence of that, people are different in terms of what does give them spiritual sustenance. people like to say "well, we're made of the same stuff as stars

and that makes me feel good." that doesn't do much for me but it does help me to think that there is a purpose unfolding whose direction you can discern and it has a moral dimension. i'll tell you where think we are in history. i think-- and this gets back to... we'veen the history of religion, as i tried to show in the book. the social system is now a global one, okay? and social systems are fragile. they can collapse or cohere. i would say the coherence of the social system depends on moral progress. that is to say, depends on people getting better in putting themselves in the shoes of people halfway around if world, appreciating that and so on. so the kind of salvation in society in the kind of hebrew bible sense of the word, just meaning holding the society

together depends on moral progress. that's been the case again and again and religion has played a role. >> rose: exactly. what role has religion played? they have given the framework to find the moral purpose? if religion of the israelites succeeded in uniting 12 tribes that have not been united. so christianity helped the roman empire cohere. islam founded a multinational empire. time and time again religion has played a role in expanding the social system, in bringing people who are previously not in the same tribe into the same tribe. i mean the story of history at one level is the story of expanding social organizations. i'm arguing that that expansion entail it is kind of moral progress as people haveto expand that i recall moral circle and say, yeah, okay, those people are... they're one of us, too. different nation, but we're in the same empire, they're one of us, too. i'm saying the world is at a

point where we're all going to have to get better about saying that to everyone in the world and just that traditionally religions have played a role in expanding this kind of moral imagination and i try to show that christianity, islam and judaism are all capable of playing that. they've done it before. they've adapted their doctrines. >> rose: do they play it the same way? >> there are differences.t thate same thing but their impact is the same. the consequence of them being there, whether it's islamic or christian or jew dayic. >> what they have in common is this pragmatism that when they.... >> rose: you can find what you wfind what's necessary in your doctrine to hold the social system together. that's what they have in common. now, in individual salvation, the idea that, you know, you personally can go to heaven and that's large play the religion is about is very big in christianity and islam and much less so in judaism.

in judaism, the term salvation in the hebrew bible is usually talking about the social system. >> rose: do you think people would be different if they did not think there was-- for lack of a better word-- merit in doing good? >> i mean, it used to be thought in the 19th century there were people who were like, you know, i don't believe in god but if we tell everybody there's no god, society will fall apart. it's interesting that now among those so-called new aitiests, chris fir hitchens, it's almost the opposite claim. which is that religion is the source of all evil which i think is a false and dangerously false to think that all of our problems, all the problems in the middle east derive from just religious fervor as opposed to actual problems on the ground that we can work out. >> rose: right. >> but it's interesting it's just flipped. i think it's largely a post-9/11 think. i think between radical islam and kind of christian fundamentalism in america, certain people who just like... dislike both of those things and

there are things i dislike in both of them, i have to say, have kind of generalized and said "well, religion in general is the source of the problem." and one point in my book is that no, religion has very often played a very constructive role and it still can. the question you're asking is will society fall apart without it is a question we don't know the answer to yet. >> rose: take a look at christianity and islakt mohammeu look at jesus, what do they share and how are they different? >> i think more than people realize because i argue in the book that jesus... the jesus of the gospels is misleading and that real jesus was less about universal love. i think that doctrine comes much more from the apostle paul and i think jesus was more an old-fashioned fire and brimstone.... >> rose: social activist? >> no, the opposite. this is one common interpretation of him mow is the kind of left wing revisionism that the sufficient that's true is all the stuff about feeding

the poor. and he may have been big on feeding the poor, that's possible. >> r re: but he was in essence... you were going to say. >> i think he was a firee and brimstone apocalyptic preacher if you want... judgment day is coming. that part is clear in the gospels. but i think that was much more the core of his message and i think they was jewish apocalyptic preacher. he was talking to fellow israelitis. he wasn't... i don't think he was interested in spreading the gospel to the nations. i think he was a local apocalyptic preacher with fiery rhetoric and that's what mohammed was in the days when he was a street preacher in mecca. now, unlike jesus, mohammed actually acquires power before he gets killed. his movement, unlike jesus's, actually succeeds in getting power before anyone kills him. so then you see a second mohammed in medina who becomes a statesman and a warrior and all of that part of the koran is...

stands in stark contrast with the jesus... even the jesus that i think really existed, just because he has remained a street preacher. >> rose: of all the fire and brimstone preachers at the time and to succeed... and to follow and all of the qualities that mohammed had, why did those two succees and mohaed? >> rose: yes. >> they succeeded in different ways. i mean, jesus himself, his followers, i'm sure, when he was crucified did not think they had succeeded. that was not their plan. i mean, messiahs were thought of people who saved you in a conventional... the way a political leader would, the messiah was going to save all of israel as a leader. so he didn't succeed by the expectations he had during his life. now, the memory of him became a

religion that succeeded i think by changing a lot after his death. but i think that's more of a tribute to the apostle paul and how fertile the roman empire was. how ready it was for a multinational religious movement. i think christianity was designed to be a successful multinational movement designed large baby paul. i think that's where the doctrine of a love that crosses ethnic and national bounds comes in. >> rose: so without paul... >> i think it would all be.... >> rose: no wait, finish. without paul... >> well, it might be very different. there were different forms of christianity and some were more like paul's than others. i think any christianity that succeeded would have had to be pretty much like paul's in the sense of emphasize ago brotherhood that crosses national boupdz. >> rose: so jesus would not have succeeded without paul? >> he would have had to adapt his message but people are adaptable. mohammed changed a lot in his career. >> rose: why did mohammed succeed? why is it today the two huge faiths... stand where they are?

>> i think because both of them fell on fertile ground. >> rose: there was a need for them where they existd? >> mohammed was on the periphery of two empires, both of which were kind november a state of decay. and the movement... which actually spread largely after his death. he did acquire power and did start expanding but it only became an empire after his death. largely kind of took over the instruments of empire from thos. but i think mohammed himself got to where he got before he died by being a very crafty and pragmatic leader, much more pragmatic than people realize. they think of mepl med the stereotype is, you know, fervent religious guy, the stereotype on the right wing of america would be, you know, religious whacko, probably. but if you actually read the koran, i think he he's a very pragmatic person who's willing to amend doctrines as necessary to expand his coalition, to keep it going together, to keep it going. so when he thinks he can bring

christians and jews on board you see the koran saying things like "jesus is the spirit of god, jesus is the word of god." right out of the the bible." the hebrews are the chosen people by god." all this is in the koran. and that comes at a time when mohammed still thinks he can bring christians and jews on board in a common faith or common political movement depending on how you want to look at it. and then there's much less flattering stuff after the mission seems to have failed. so.... >> rose: but m mammed was more of a political leader than jesus was. >> yes. he succeeded as a political leader in a way that jesus didn't. >> rose: but he was more of politics than jesus. >> and very adaptable. and i think in his religious doctrine in order to be a successful political leader. >> are we at a moment in religious evolution? >> i think so. >> rose: and that moment is? >> the moment is either religions take what they've always been good at, which is holding the social system

together and adapt to a time when the social system is the whole world, which will mean probably changing some of their doctrines and certainly moderating some of the more radical elements in them. or thehe whole system may fail. i mean, actual chaos. i think that's the moment that we're at and there's simultaneously this challenge from sciences the problem. and is reducing the number of kind of well educated people who are professoring religions. they have these two challenges happening at the same time. >> rose: the book is called "the evolution of god." robert wright author of "the moral animal" and "non-zero." thank you. >> thank you. >> rose: pleasure to have you. >> rose: don hewitt, the famous creator of "60 minutes," died today at age 86.

he was a legendary producer at cbs. he was there for the first kennedy/nixon debate. >> the first question now to senator kennedy. >> rose: he went on to have an illustrious career at the "cbs evening news". >> this is the "cbs evening news" with walter cronkite. >> rose: and then the founding of "60 minutes." it is perhaps america's greatest broadcast in the history of news broadcasts. it is a show that has stood the test of time, the principles therein where created by don hewitt. he once said ""60 minutes" is about four words: go tell a story." he chose correspondents who could tell a story and the stories they told. remember this. every piece you saw on "60 minutes" while don hewitt was executive producer bore some imprint from him before they went on the air they had to pass his muster. here is some of the appearances he made on this program over our

19-year history. you are there almost at the creation of television. 1948 was your first job. >> yeah. yeah. i came to television... i didn't even know what it was. i was working at united press as a picture editor and a guy called me with a friend of mine who worked at sebts and he said "they're looking for a guy with picture experience." i said "wait a minute, what the hell does a radio network want with picture" and he said "no, television." and i said "what vision? you mean you sit home and look at pictures in a box? so that's it. i went over there and my god i felt like dorothy in the emerald city. i couldn't believe it. cameras and lights and booms. i was mesmerized. >> rose: what was the first show. >> douglas edwards with the news. preceded cronkite. i did that and i used to do the brooklyn dodger baseball games. >> rose: directing them? >> no, no, i was the

associate... i came in as an associate director and six months later they made me a director and i took over the evening news and it just... it's one of these careers that i can't really believe it all happened to me. i'm constantly pinching myself. >> rose: take me back to... first of all, doug edwards. i mean, it was story true that you once wanted doug edwards because there was no teleprompter, you wanted him to use braille? >> but, charlie! think about that. suppose we didn't have teleprompters and you were doing a story every night. you sat there and they flame it had shot and you ran your hands over a braille script and you (. >> rose: (laughs) >> i don't think any of us could ever sit down and tell you what it is that "60 minutes" does that's different. >> rose: you started "60 minutes" and at the very beginning i remember specifically you said "tell me a story. tell me a story." and that really is the formula for most of it.

tell me a story. that story that leslie stahl did last night was... >> tell me a story. >> it was a drama. >> rose: it was ready for broadcast. >> it was. "chorus line." >> "chorus line. exactly." >> i think we know something that nobody else in this business has figured it out. mortar.is you're more than youre that keeps you at the television set. what you hear is what keeps you there. see, i believe very strongly, charlie, that it is you're more than your eye that keeps you at a television set. >> rose: people hear... you're saying people hear... explain it to me. i believe it, too, but explain what you mean. >> i can live with a picture that's a little bit grainy and out of focus. i can't live with grainy sound or out-of-focus sound. the minute the sound or the words don't mesh or the inflections aren't right, i

don't care what's on there. see, before "60 minutes," the accepted wisdom in television was that what we did was we put words to pictures. well, no, we're going to put pictures to words. we're going to start with a story and decide how to illustrate. i believe that what you hear is more important than what you see. i have been in television 44 years and i never saw a picture that excited me a a much as a well-turned phrase. i may have learned that from murrow. >> rose: murrow didn't write at a typewriter, he stood up. he would talk it through and somebody would write it down. >> rose: sgr he wrote it. >> rose: but he would talk it. >> i do that. i talk... listen, as far as sound and what i said on "60 minutes," mike wallace and i have hadadhe same conversation for 4 years.

for 4 years mike has done a narration at the end of which he invary i can't bebly says to me "okay, kid, how was it?" for 24 years i said "i give you an a. you want to do it again and see if you get an a-plus?" >> rose: (laughs) and you listen to... >> when i get in the control room, i don't even look. i know what ed bradley looks like. i know what leslie looks like.tr the track. >> sometimes i put my head on the desk and listen and i whip may head up and i say "wait a minute, wait! that inflection is wrong." or "that's wordy." or "there's a better word we can use there." and i edit with my ears. >> rose: when he comes into the room and you have toiled and your producer has toiled and your associate producer has toiled and you've said it together, you know the story, he comes in and said "i think what you need to do is you need to put the beginning in the middle, put the middle in the beginning." >> he does a lot of that.

>> rose: he does new >> he does a lot of that. >> rose: and your sweat and your blood reason r on the table. >> well, you know, it's a collaborative process in distance. there's a great thing to be said for distance. producers will work on this with associate producers for six or eight weeks. certainer or later you reach a block. i can look at it with aet of fresh eyes and then don comes in at the end when we've actually done a cut of it and he looks at it and immediately see two or three things we can do to make the piece better. and some of it is... he's the best at it. >>. >> rose: that, in my estimation, is the single most important reason that "60 minutes" works the way it has over the years is... and he knows i feel this way. >> son of a gun has fingers or gut or whatever it is and you come in with a pretty good piece and he'll find out how to make it better. >> i think the success of "60 minutes" is that i have never in my life hired anyone smarter

than i am. because if they're smarter than i am, why do i need them? >> rose: you know what they say? >> it's not true. honest to god. i look at a lot of guys, i look at guys like you and moyers, wallace, every one of my contemporaries is better educated than i am, they're better read than i am, they're more learnedi am, and why all this good luck rained on me i can't figure out. i think the mosos important person on "60 minutes" bar none, forget, mike, morally, steve, leslie, don hewitt. >> rose: what is it that's brought you the most... what do you want to tell your grandchildren about don hewitt's tenure at cbs?

>> you know it's like one of those things what would you like on the epitaph and the answer is i don't want one. what would i tell them? i don't know. i would tell them that that i was very lucky. that i was there at the right time. that i sort of had an affinity for television that i may not have had for anything else in life. that it all seemed to work for me. that i was this guy who never graduated from college who got all this and i wouldn't recommend that to anybody else. i knew when i was four years old that i wanted to be in the news business. >> rose: don hewitt dead at age 86. he was a remarkable producer and a remarkable man. i have had great and good luck in television toreate this program perhaps most of all, but secondly being part of the "60 minutes" family which i still am today.

it is something that wherever i go makes me feel very proud and whoever i see around the world it is something that registers with people because it stands for quality, it stands for finding out the story. don hewitt created that standard and we will miss him. captioning sponsored by rose communications captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org