Speaker 1: So I was really as a twelve year old as
Speaker 1: close to broken as you can get, I think, so, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I kind of got diagnosed with anxiety when I was
Speaker 1: really young, and then it wasn't until my early twenties
Speaker 1: that I was diagnosed with depression, and then it wasn't
Speaker 1: until kind of a decade later where a psychiatrist rediagnosed
Speaker 1: me with bipolar. We recover loudly, so people don't suffer quietly.
Speaker 2: Welcome to the Sees the Yay Podcast. Busy and happy
Speaker 2: are not the same thing. We too rarely question what
Speaker 2: makes the heart seeing. We work, then we rest, but
Speaker 2: rarely we play and often don't realize there's more than
Speaker 2: one way. So this is the platform to hear and
Speaker 2: explore the stories of those who found lives They adore,
Speaker 2: the good.
Speaker 3: Bad and ugly.
Speaker 2: The best and worst days will bear all the facets
Speaker 2: of seizing your Yea. I'm Sarah Davidson or a spoonful
Speaker 2: of Sarah, a lawyer turned fu entrepreneur who swapped the
Speaker 2: suits and heels to co found matcha Maiden and matcha
Speaker 2: Milk Bar. Ses The Ya is a series of conversations
Speaker 2: on finding a life you love and exploring the self doubt, challenge,
Speaker 2: joy and fulfillment along the way.
Speaker 3: Yighborhood, we are back with a guest episode.
Speaker 2: For you, and one that has been a very long
Speaker 2: time coming, but is well worth the wait. I'm so
Speaker 2: excited to have finally sat down with a dear friend
Speaker 2: of mine who a lot of Australia and a lot
Speaker 2: of you may know as Matt from The Bachelor, which
Speaker 2: is factual, but who I met outside of that context completely.
Speaker 2: I think this might be the first time I admitted
Speaker 2: I never actually watched his season of Batchie. You guys know,
Speaker 2: I'm a true crime girlye, not a reality TV girly,
Speaker 2: and I deliberately didn't catch up on the season, even
Speaker 2: though normally I like to research someone within an inch
Speaker 2: of their life, because I wanted to focus on Matt
Speaker 2: not from the Batchie, a personality that maybe hasn't been
Speaker 2: as exhaustively covered everywhere else With all our guests, you know,
Speaker 2: I love to show us side people know a bit
Speaker 2: less about, and even more so when it's a friend.
Speaker 2: But then the great challenge is squeezing all of that
Speaker 2: into an when you just want to showcase every single
Speaker 2: thing you think is great about them, particularly when there
Speaker 2: is impressive as a mat and when you feel like
Speaker 2: often that sort of isn't the focus of media, which
Speaker 2: obviously I didn't manage to do in a single hour.
Speaker 2: It's impossible with anyone, let alone someone with as many
Speaker 2: facets going on as Matt. So heads up that this
Speaker 2: is part one of a two parter, should be really
Speaker 2: four or five, but at this stage definitely two, where
Speaker 2: we set the scene around the earlier days of Matt's WAITA.
Speaker 2: You really should read his LinkedIn to understand why it's
Speaker 2: a little reductive to only refer to his TV stint,
Speaker 2: even though that is one part of him, rather than
Speaker 2: the five degrees he has in not just normal degrees,
Speaker 2: but maths, science, engineering, astrophysics, like literally the pinnacle of intelligence.
Speaker 2: That's why we say it's not rocket science. He actually
Speaker 2: knows about rocket science. He's a master five degrees, including
Speaker 2: an actual PhD on space, so an infinitely impressive human.
Speaker 2: Then he added two books, an incredible business pash which
Speaker 2: we will talk all about. I didn't leave enough time
Speaker 2: for that, but we'll give much more detail in part
Speaker 2: two as well, a stint on Shark Tank, which might
Speaker 2: not have even come out by the time this does,
Speaker 2: but definitely will have by part two. Hopefully amongst all
Speaker 2: of this you do get a dose of a mat
Speaker 2: you might not already know. But I also think astrophysics, AI, dating,
Speaker 2: both of our experiences with quitting drinking that in the
Speaker 2: context of dating as well, definitely deserve more time than
Speaker 2: we had in this part one. So you'll hear more
Speaker 2: about those in part two, and I think it's particularly fascinating.
Speaker 2: I've already had some DMS saying is you single? That's hilarious.
Speaker 2: We will definitely cover dating and how not having alcohol
Speaker 2: in that context has changed him kind of a social experiment.
Speaker 2: I think that will be really fascinating, So that will
Speaker 2: all be in part two. But perhaps it's fitting that
Speaker 2: a lot of Part one were spent on what Matt
Speaker 2: calls his salad of mental health issues about which we've
Speaker 2: bonded in the past, but also about which he speaks
Speaker 2: so vulnerably and powerfully, especially in an area where you'll
Speaker 2: hear us mention that a lot of mental health issues
Speaker 2: have become more common and well understood, but there are
Speaker 2: some that are still considered quite extreme or still quite stigmatized,
Speaker 2: and yet he is incredibly generous in how he speaks
Speaker 2: about things like bipolar and manic episodes, and I think
Speaker 2: that's perhaps very fitting that this episode has a lot
Speaker 2: of that as we move into November, and a sharper
Speaker 2: focus on men's health. So a little content warning that
Speaker 2: we do briefly touch on suicide and similar in this episode,
Speaker 2: so please take care while listening, and I'll of course
Speaker 2: include links to relevant resources in the show notes. Otherwise,
Speaker 2: this was, above all a wonderful chat between friends that
Speaker 2: did go off on many many tangents, but perhaps that
Speaker 2: give us even a better insight into who he is
Speaker 2: as a person outside of the Batchie, and I really
Speaker 2: hope you guys enjoy stay tuned as well for part two.
Speaker 3: Matthew Terrence Agnew Welcome to.
Speaker 1: The show, Terrence in trouble No.
Speaker 2: I I just feel like your title almost everywhere is
Speaker 2: Matt from The Bachelor, which is factual, So like, you
Speaker 2: can't get mad.
Speaker 1: At people for using exaccurate.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's factually accurate, but in my mind, I was like,
Speaker 2: I have to choose a different name because I met
Speaker 2: you not as Matt from the Bachelor, and I feel
Speaker 2: like you've been exhaustively interviewed and chatted to and about
Speaker 2: in that capacity, which again factual juicy. Yes, lots to
Speaker 2: talk about there, but that's sort of not the mat
Speaker 2: that I know. And I don't know if I've told
Speaker 2: you I've never actually watched your season?
Speaker 3: Have I told you that?
Speaker 1: I know, I don't think you have really Nah, which
Speaker 1: is not surprising.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm not Why is that not spris well?
Speaker 1: I mean it was more of a sense that I mean,
Speaker 1: I didn't even watch my season. I watched like three
Speaker 1: or four episodes interesting. I found it. I was like, nah,
Speaker 1: this is too weird, like this there was also incorrect
Speaker 1: representations of people, Yes, were they're mischaracterize based on the
Speaker 1: end since I was just like, that's not what happened,
Speaker 1: So this is uncomfortable and be inaccurate. So I didn't
Speaker 1: watch it. So I guess it's not surprising in the
Speaker 1: sense that if I didn't watch it, it's you know, my
Speaker 1: friend's not watching it is not kind of you know,
Speaker 1: it doesn't stray too far from my own opinions.
Speaker 2: Which I kind of think is has been really nice
Speaker 2: experience because often when you meet someone who is in
Speaker 2: the media and who has quite a public profile, you
Speaker 2: have already watched the show, so you come into the
Speaker 2: friendship with like preconceptions and like, you know, I know
Speaker 2: your staff sign, we've been through Gemini Gate, you know
Speaker 2: all that kind of stuff, right, And I came into
Speaker 2: it without any of that, bonded with you over totally
Speaker 2: different things. And then it's interesting because I knew it
Speaker 2: was too much to watch. I was like, oh, I can't, like,
Speaker 2: that's giving me such ick And I've met Abby. I'd
Speaker 2: met a lot of people in that season without the
Speaker 2: context of the show, and then met them as like
Speaker 2: complete people, and then that's the person I wanted to
Speaker 2: like and trade on.
Speaker 1: Yes, which your language there, meeting people as complete people?
Speaker 1: I think, is it rings really true? And is what
Speaker 1: is hugely missing from shows like The Bachelor or any
Speaker 1: reality TV really Instead of meeting a complete person, you
Speaker 1: get this single faceted, put in one bucket, one dimensional character. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And I think again the language character is probably accurate
Speaker 1: because that's how people see and that's why the trolling
Speaker 1: is so visceral. I guess, yeah, totally, because it's not
Speaker 1: a complete person. It's a one dimensional character, and so
Speaker 1: it's very easy to separate. I guess the human element
Speaker 1: when it's a character.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, And I think that our lives being so digital
Speaker 2: and online also lends to that one facet that you're seeing,
Speaker 2: even for people who are really authentic and try and share,
Speaker 2: like even me, I overshare majorly, and there's still so
Speaker 2: much that people wouldn't know.
Speaker 3: So even putting the.
Speaker 2: Battery side of your side, I still feel like there
Speaker 2: are so many facets that I almost felt more pressure
Speaker 2: than normally coming into an episode with a friend because
Speaker 2: I want to share the U that I know with everyone,
Speaker 2: and like that's extraordinarily difficult because I'm like, how do
Speaker 2: I do that in like a short amount of time
Speaker 2: when there's so many different things. So I will first
Speaker 2: say to everyone who wants batchy juice, because.
Speaker 3: It's batchy juice, right, like.
Speaker 2: Anyone who wants batchy juice, and absolutely fair enough, because
Speaker 2: there's a reason reality TV is, Like I just happened
Speaker 2: to be one of those you either go reality TV
Speaker 2: or crime junkie. I went crime junkie, right, So.
Speaker 1: I went crime junkie like weird documentary.
Speaker 2: Right like at UFOs, like, yeah, we'll be there. We're
Speaker 2: mutually bonded over that. But there's a reason why the
Speaker 2: nation loves it so much. So if that's your jam,
Speaker 2: Abby Chatfield on it's a lot.
Speaker 3: Pod just did a two.
Speaker 2: Parter with Matt that goes through everything, like literally dissects
Speaker 2: all the behind the scenes, the six months that you
Speaker 2: guys didn't speak, the six months after that, the reunion,
Speaker 2: like it clarifies a lot. So if you want Batchie juice,
Speaker 2: absolutely go there. There's like a place in different pods.
Speaker 1: Right, you don't need to call it batchie juice if
Speaker 1: you want. You don't say I'm going to tune into
Speaker 1: Abby to listen to Batchie juice. You can, but you
Speaker 1: can also call it that if you can, right.
Speaker 2: Like each choose your own adventure. Yeah right, But what
Speaker 2: I really wanted to do is Leah, like I said,
Speaker 2: explore all the parts of you that aren't the Batchie
Speaker 2: And also for Abby. Abby has also been on CZA
Speaker 2: and is just an absolute gem. Again, I think you
Speaker 2: see like one side of her. So go back to
Speaker 2: episode one hundred and fifty seven, which was a few
Speaker 2: years ago, or to her show and the two part
Speaker 2: of which is actually an amazing listen. It's so much fun,
Speaker 2: you guys show the funniest sides of you. And I've
Speaker 2: learned a lot of stuff about recording as well, Like
Speaker 2: I didn't know that you record like over three nights
Speaker 2: the meetings of the women, so you didn't even meet
Speaker 2: them all in one go.
Speaker 1: Like that's wild, yeah, kind of Yeah, And the first
Speaker 1: night you don't meet anyone is like, that's so weird.
Speaker 1: You just get done in this situation. That's really surreal.
Speaker 1: It's bizarre. You're talking to the first time I met Osha,
Speaker 1: you don't meet him before, so wild. Yeah, it's quite
Speaker 1: it's quite intense. And then obviously you meet all the
Speaker 1: women and then you kind of don't really get to
Speaker 1: talk to them after. And then on third night you
Speaker 1: finally get to actually you know, mingle with them and
Speaker 1: get to know them. But again, it's you know, these
Speaker 1: short snippets. They are encouraged by producers to I don't
Speaker 1: want to say interrupt, but very much. You need to
Speaker 1: be proactive. You want to talk to Matt. You can't
Speaker 1: just wait your turn.
Speaker 3: Wow, So it's hung again, Yeah, a.
Speaker 1: Little bit for bat. So if I'm in conversation with Son,
Speaker 1: I'm acutely aware that I've only got you know, three
Speaker 1: to five minutes, probably before someone you know asks to
Speaker 1: have a chat with me too.
Speaker 2: Well, guys, I will include the link in the show
Speaker 2: notes to the Abby two part of and you Know.
Speaker 2: A summary dot point is that Matt's experience was marginal
Speaker 2: below ourverages.
Speaker 3: I think the way that you.
Speaker 2: Described it largely diplomatic language also life changing.
Speaker 3: But what I want.
Speaker 2: To start with is what you just said that there
Speaker 2: are lots of articles that have come out of that
Speaker 2: that kind of are, like we said, factual, but I
Speaker 2: find them, as a friend quite reductive. You are Matt
Speaker 2: from the Bachelor, who also happens to have like literally
Speaker 2: five degrees. So when they say Matt from the Bachelor,
Speaker 2: who's also a nerd, like sure, actual nerd, actual astrophysicist.
Speaker 2: But I just want to list them to remind everyone.
Speaker 2: We'll have already said this in the Buyer, but I
Speaker 2: feel like it needs repeating.
Speaker 3: So you have.
Speaker 2: Literally two bachelor degrees, which is already enough for most people.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: In fact, most people only do one or none. So
Speaker 2: there's science and engineering. Then you did a master's in.
Speaker 1: Astrophysics, got the bug, the astrobug.
Speaker 3: Got the bug.
Speaker 2: Then you did a PhD in astrophysics a dynamic search
Speaker 2: for habitable worlds and solar system analogue. That's just for
Speaker 2: anyone who needs to know how smart it actually it was.
Speaker 2: I've got some leave it and then went back and
Speaker 2: dio the master's I've applied artificial intelligence. Yes, so not
Speaker 2: only are you infinitely qualified, but when people like the
Speaker 2: pinnacle of intellect is when people say it's not rocket science, and.
Speaker 3: Yet that is actually kind of what you do.
Speaker 2: You've done mechanical engineering, you do astrophysics, you talk about space,
Speaker 2: and now artificial intelligence. Do you find it annoying when
Speaker 2: people continue to refer to you as Matt from The Bachelor,
Speaker 2: or is it just a factual thing that you're like,
Speaker 2: I put myself forward for that, and that's kind of
Speaker 2: people need context.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's a little bit of I made my bed,
Speaker 1: I'll sleep in it, so it's it's certainly part of
Speaker 1: my history. I don't it happened, you know, I'm not
Speaker 1: going to cover it up or anything a scandal, but yeah,
Speaker 1: I definitely I try not to lean into it. It's
Speaker 1: one of the things that's happened in my life. There's
Speaker 1: a bunch of other things where I guess I'm more
Speaker 1: proud of the achievement. I think reality TV is not
Speaker 1: an achievement. I just did stuff on TV, right, And
Speaker 1: so I see the other things in my life that
Speaker 1: i've the goals that I've set, the things that I've
Speaker 1: achieved as things that I'm much more proud of. So
Speaker 1: does it annoy me? Not annoy I guess it's frustrating
Speaker 1: if that's the only thing they know about me, or
Speaker 1: if they introduce me, especially when it's within an academic context.
Speaker 1: That happens less now, especially because typically if I'm doing things,
Speaker 1: you know, with museums or talking as a STEM keynote speaker,
Speaker 1: things like that, the Bachelor kind of doesn't really impact
Speaker 1: or as it's something that people aren't really I don't
Speaker 1: really care about. It doesn't really lend credit to why
Speaker 1: I'm doing these things. So yeah, it kind of doesn't
Speaker 1: come up loads. The other thing is, I think, and
Speaker 1: I've probably come around with this a little bit more,
Speaker 1: is it can be used a little bit to bring
Speaker 1: people into the tent. And I saw this with when
Speaker 1: I was announced as the Bachelor. The astrophysicist. You actually
Speaker 1: could look in the Google search as the astrophysics and
Speaker 1: there was this huge spike that went up enormously, so
Speaker 1: you could see this huge kickup in people googling astrophysics. Yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: and so it kind of it shone a bit of
Speaker 1: a light on an area of science that people have
Speaker 1: probably heard in passing. You know, astrophysics, Einstein, that kind
Speaker 1: of stuff astrophysicists, I know, yeah, so you know, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's that's people's probably. I think there was an arc
Speaker 1: early on saying something about his friends call him Sheldon
Speaker 1: Cooper or something. I'm like, no one's ever called me,
Speaker 1: but sure whatever. I heard that hard hitting journalism at
Speaker 1: Daily Mail. But so it kind of it drew attention
Speaker 1: to it, and I think now it does still a
Speaker 1: little bit and I liken it too. You know, when
Speaker 1: you're giving a dog so medicine, you put the medicine
Speaker 1: inside a spoon of peanut butter. I think the Bachelor
Speaker 1: sometimes can be used as the peanut butter, and so
Speaker 1: sometimes it gets people to engage, and then I can
Speaker 1: use that engagement to kind of then start speaking about
Speaker 1: things that I'm really passionate about, which is largely science,
Speaker 1: but also things like mental health advocacy and other social
Speaker 1: issues that I lend my voice to and I'm passionate
Speaker 1: and stand behind, so it's not annoying. And I think
Speaker 1: I've come around a bit more to understanding that there's
Speaker 1: I can leverage it to continue to make bigger impact
Speaker 1: in the spaces I want to make an impact. But
Speaker 1: when it's yeah, when it boils down to just mat
Speaker 1: from the batch, so it's like, Okay, hang on, I've
Speaker 1: got some machines. Yeah, and I've got other things that
Speaker 1: mean I can talk about these other things, all these
Speaker 1: important things, more authentically and with a bit of authority
Speaker 1: as well. And so I think that's where it can
Speaker 1: be annoying when that's lost. It's not just I've done
Speaker 1: a reality here and now I'm trying to talk authoritatively
Speaker 1: on these topics that I've got no credentials or no
Speaker 1: lived experience. So that's that's probably the annoying part. But
Speaker 1: that happens less and less, and I think obviously five
Speaker 1: years on now and in the spaces I've worked and
Speaker 1: people are more aware of the things that I've experienced,
Speaker 1: the things I've spoken about vulnerably and authentically, and the
Speaker 1: credential that I have that I can speak to with
Speaker 1: that sort of yeah, that qualification.
Speaker 2: I love that you have been able to see it
Speaker 2: as a silver lining because it has given you a
Speaker 2: bigger platform for the things that you love. And I
Speaker 2: got really honest with myself recently when I was doing
Speaker 2: keynote about imposter syndrome and self doubt, and I realized
Speaker 2: that the reason I leave lawyer turned entrepreneur in my
Speaker 2: title for everything is because I need that legitimacy, Like
Speaker 2: I don't want to just drop it off altogether, because
Speaker 2: I'm sort of positioning myself in a way that I've
Speaker 2: actually had multiple opportunities to pursue certain reality TV shows
Speaker 2: and chosen not to because I thought I've worked so
Speaker 2: hard to have some of my identity, not all of it.
Speaker 2: Like I'm obviously you know, love true crime and love
Speaker 2: just airhead stuff and like a my total DIDs. But
Speaker 2: in one part of my brain, I am quite an
Speaker 2: intellect and I didn't want to let go of that.
Speaker 2: And it's interesting that I'm like, that's also my ego talking,
Speaker 2: but I still leave it there. And I know that
Speaker 2: about myself, but I still have to lead with by
Speaker 2: the way, guys, I did do this and I do
Speaker 2: these other things.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I yeah, I can really relate to that.
Speaker 1: I still do that largely when people say what do
Speaker 1: I do, Like, what's the job? And I've got, you know,
Speaker 1: kind of hands in a few different pies, and I
Speaker 1: always kind of start with well, up until the start
Speaker 1: of last year, I worked as a data scientist in
Speaker 1: big tech because there's this sort of you know, I
Speaker 1: do things like content creation, influencing basically, And I'm sure
Speaker 1: you're the same where you're like, well, I don't want
Speaker 1: to just be put in that box and people see
Speaker 1: you as, oh, just an influencer, which anyone who's worked
Speaker 1: within as an influencer will know that it's it's quite
Speaker 1: a hard job, and it yeah, people have this preconceived
Speaker 1: idea of what it is, and it's like you post
Speaker 1: a picture old on a product and yet paid thousands
Speaker 1: of dollars and that's not at all. There's a real
Speaker 1: skill to creating compelling content and cutting through the audience
Speaker 1: in that huge kind of flood of information and content
Speaker 1: that everyone's exposed to you. So it's firstly it's it's
Speaker 1: it's a harder job. But yeah, I think I've got
Speaker 1: that same sort of imposter syndrome where I'm seeking to
Speaker 1: maintain Yeah, and so that's something that I shouldn't feel,
Speaker 1: and I'm sure you feel the same, but it's kind
Speaker 1: of I guess the social pressure and commentary and that
Speaker 1: comes with being in the public eye and participating in
Speaker 1: the in the influencing world, that you feel the need
Speaker 1: that you need to still justify to people will hang
Speaker 1: on that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm not just an influencer, yeah.
Speaker 1: Even though being I hate yeah, just an influence is
Speaker 1: such a reductive Yeah. And I hope that I've made
Speaker 1: it clear to people who are influencers that this is
Speaker 1: not a dig. I don't do anything nearly as well
Speaker 1: as full time influences to because it is a job,
Speaker 1: and I think once you've actually done it, you recognize
Speaker 1: how good they are what they do.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And it's funny that we have actually had conversations
Speaker 2: in our friendship about that and like bandied around terms
Speaker 2: like pure influencer and how we're not in that bucket
Speaker 2: because I've done other things. But it's funny that we
Speaker 2: feel the need to do that, yeah, where.
Speaker 1: There shouldn't be that at all, you know. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: a completely legitimate career and it's in itself, but yeah,
Speaker 1: there's this sort of yeah, yeah, so no, it's funny
Speaker 1: and nothing. It's it's definitely something that I mean. I
Speaker 1: didn't even call it influencing because I felt this sort
Speaker 1: of being an impostor and that it was I was
Speaker 1: shame because I was doing this, and so what did
Speaker 1: I used to say? Branded content? I was like, I
Speaker 1: do branded content. And it wasn't until a few of
Speaker 1: my friends get Ward's that, oh you know, like products,
Speaker 1: and like you mean influencing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, influencing marketing spin in itself.
Speaker 2: I think Nick used to have when he was in
Speaker 2: nightcl His business card said female public relations officer.
Speaker 3: I'm like, so promoters put us that's a skill.
Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely, So yeah, now it's it's you know, that's
Speaker 1: a step for me in being able to confidently say, no,
Speaker 1: I'm an influence side. I do stuff on Instagram, creating
Speaker 1: content for brands, trying to as the name is it
Speaker 1: influence people.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I think that's definitely it's a me problem
Speaker 1: in terms of being prouder to say that rather than
Speaker 1: having to say I used to work in big tech. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so yeah, that's probably rambled a bit too.
Speaker 2: No, oh my god, I knew that this episode was
Speaker 2: going to be a massive ramble because our conversations like guys.
Speaker 2: For context, we met again, not from The Bachelor. I
Speaker 2: hadn't watched a season. We met in Electric Ladyland, so
Speaker 2: in a nightclub context, we were both not drinking yep,
Speaker 2: and we're the probably only ones in the whole venue
Speaker 2: not drink yeah, I would think, so like probably yeah,
Speaker 2: I would say, we would be the only ones nursing
Speaker 2: sparkling waters with lemon and ice, so we wouldn't be
Speaker 2: bothered by anyone asking why we weren't drinking.
Speaker 3: And then I think the first thing we.
Speaker 2: Actually bonded about was our mutual anti present medication, which
Speaker 2: is a really interesting thing to bond with someone over
Speaker 2: in the middle of a dance floor, like we both
Speaker 2: just did not belong there at the time.
Speaker 1: Memory, Yeah, it was.
Speaker 2: I was digging deep for this, and I thought I
Speaker 2: wanted to give context to how like the Mat that
Speaker 2: I met is such a different match to the Matt
Speaker 2: I would have met if I'd watched your season first.
Speaker 1: And at the time I hadn't really spoken much about
Speaker 1: my mental health publicly, so this was a more vulnerable conversation.
Speaker 1: I think it speaks volumes to our friendship the fact
Speaker 1: that I felt comfortable with you to be quite open
Speaker 1: and vulnerable on our first meeting.
Speaker 2: I feel like we both had a massive vulnerability hangover
Speaker 2: after because I was like, what did I just like
Speaker 2: tell this dude all my like random shit in my
Speaker 2: brain that I should not let out of the cage.
Speaker 1: We got deep, ever, I remember we got deep, like
Speaker 1: we all going back to childhood stuff and it was great.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I think we both checked in the next hour.
Speaker 1: I was like, how are you feeling after?
Speaker 3: Are you okay picking up all of.
Speaker 1: These feelings and emotions? Yeah?
Speaker 2: And I also think carn who's our mutual connect, was
Speaker 2: just like I'm just going to leave this conversation like
Speaker 2: I don't have a place here.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, No, that's he was up and about and
Speaker 1: enjoying himself. Yeah.
Speaker 2: So why I am so excited about this episode is
Speaker 2: because having met in that context and you have done
Speaker 2: I think in April last year, did an incredibly powerful
Speaker 2: interview with Jess Rowe, which I think is the first
Speaker 2: time that you had really spoken as much in depth
Speaker 2: about your mental health, the salad of mental health issues,
Speaker 2: I think you call it, which I love and as
Speaker 2: much as I do often like bandy, around laughter, around
Speaker 2: having many bees, and the breakdowns I have every week,
Speaker 2: which you know in my season of motherhood is absolutely true.
Speaker 2: There is a more an actual serious definition of breakdown
Speaker 2: that in our friendship. I've seen you go through a
Speaker 2: couple of times. I've also gone through a couple of
Speaker 2: times myself, both before and after you. I think Abby
Speaker 2: called it came out as having mental health issue. But
Speaker 2: why I'm so excited about this is because while the
Speaker 2: show is all about yay and joy, I think it's
Speaker 2: easy to tell those stories when someone has a really
Speaker 2: not breezy life but quite a straightforward journey to passion
Speaker 2: and joy and fulfillment. Whereas you're a shining example of
Speaker 2: the fact that you have a constant challenge to have
Speaker 2: a baseline that is not dangerous is the way that
Speaker 2: I've heard you say it. So even just to have
Speaker 2: a neutral emotional safe space, let alone happiness and yeay,
Speaker 2: it takes you an enormous amount to do that, And
Speaker 2: that is just a biological unfairness in the lottery of life.
Speaker 2: It's so unfair that you have to do that. It's
Speaker 2: so unfair that it costs a lot that you know,
Speaker 2: some people don't have the privilege to do that, Like
Speaker 2: You've covered it so eloquently in Jess's episode, but I
Speaker 2: want to kind of go through it more chronologically to
Speaker 2: show that while it started very early in your life,
Speaker 2: you can face the extremity of your mental health issues
Speaker 2: and still live a really happy life, which is something
Speaker 2: that I admire so much because I face that in
Speaker 2: a much much smaller, much easier to manage scale, and
Speaker 2: yet still sometimes I think, oh my god, how do
Speaker 2: I find joy again? And it's a really refreshing friendship
Speaker 2: to have with you, where often you sort of will
Speaker 2: go for a walk and you'll say like, I'm not great,
Speaker 2: or you'll be like, I've just come out of I've
Speaker 2: gone to rock bottom, but.
Speaker 3: I've back out of the loop.
Speaker 2: It's a privilege to watch you go through these circles
Speaker 2: of really low and pulling yourself back to really high
Speaker 2: and still be able to come back and enjoy your life.
Speaker 2: And that's yeah, really, I'm really proud to be your
Speaker 2: friend and aught to do that.
Speaker 1: Thank you. And yeah, I think it's I'm acutely aware of,
Speaker 1: Like when you mentioned the lottery of life, I've been
Speaker 1: dealt a very good hand in the terms of you know, objectively,
Speaker 1: I'm in a very privileged position from a number of
Speaker 1: different metrics, and this is just one of the shit
Speaker 1: parts that I was dell. But I'm acutely aware that
Speaker 1: compared to some people's positions, I'm still in a very
Speaker 1: luxurious position. I think it's well to your point with
Speaker 1: we deal with things in different I think you used
Speaker 1: to a smaller degree. I think it's not really helpful
Speaker 1: to talk about degrees of it. I think everyone's going
Speaker 1: through their own battles and how you experience that relative
Speaker 1: to how you're living kind of isn't influenced or impacted
Speaker 1: by what someone else is going through. So yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean it's the whole whole thing. And those people say, oh,
Speaker 1: you know, someone's got it worse, and it's like, well,
Speaker 1: that's saying there's one person on the planet who can
Speaker 1: be miserable, and everyone else has got some money that's
Speaker 1: got worse in them. So I think these kind of comparatives, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's kind of an unhelpful way to frame things, And
Speaker 1: I think it's important people recognize that that whatever your
Speaker 1: challenge is or whatever mental illness you're battling through, whether
Speaker 1: that's a mood disorder, personality disorder. Yeah, everyone's going through
Speaker 1: these things, and your experience is whatever it is. You
Speaker 1: don't need to say or think that someone else. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And I think some people do sometimes get stuck in
Speaker 1: that sort of spiral of thinking, oh, well, I shouldn't
Speaker 1: feel bad because someone else has got it worse. And yeah,
Speaker 1: I think it's I think it's really important that people
Speaker 1: know that whatever your challenges and battles are, they're they're
Speaker 1: uniquely your and they're just as valid as anyone else's.
Speaker 2: I'm also even more inspired by the way that you
Speaker 2: spoke out on Jess's podcast having so much I mean,
Speaker 2: it's already difficult to talk about for anybody, but having
Speaker 2: such a public profile. And secondly, you mentioned how there's
Speaker 2: sort of a spectrum of mental health. Illness is some
Speaker 2: are sort of not trendy but more acceptable, and then
Speaker 2: things like bipolar are probably still lesser known, more stigmatized.
Speaker 2: And I don't think I can top that interview in
Speaker 2: terms of how well you both covered it, but I
Speaker 2: do think that the more conversation we had, the better.
Speaker 3: So what I want to do with.
Speaker 2: You is go through the fact that you have faced
Speaker 2: this since I think twelve years old was what you said.
Speaker 2: And I always go back to the very beginning to
Speaker 2: show that you meet someone at the chapter you're in,
Speaker 2: you're extremely qualified doing amazing things.
Speaker 3: You were just at south By Southwest.
Speaker 2: We talked about you are doing influencer work with the
Speaker 2: coolest companies and climbing the bridges, and people walk into
Speaker 2: that chapter and underestimate how what has taken you to
Speaker 2: get here, let alone, when the industry you've gone into
Speaker 2: is extremely existential and uncertain. And I would think that
Speaker 2: someone who's got extreme anxiety and then space do not
Speaker 2: necessarily tie together. So let's go back to your childhood.
Speaker 2: Born in Adelaide, raised in Perth. Yes, first sort of
Speaker 2: started having anxiety at twelve years old, but then did
Speaker 2: the Mars Path find a mission project? And then space
Speaker 2: became a thing talker through your childhood.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so born in Adelaide, lived therefore just up till
Speaker 1: the turn of the millennium. Actually, so I almost kind of.
Speaker 3: Sound so old.
Speaker 1: Circle the nineties. So yeah, born in Adelaide, and I
Speaker 1: think the the I was a very loud and naughty child, really, yeah,
Speaker 1: very loud and naughty. My mum or My parents both
Speaker 1: bring up that in was it kindergarten? It might have
Speaker 1: been year one reception, very early education year. Both my
Speaker 1: older brother when he went through had to sit next
Speaker 1: to the teacher, and then when I went through, I
Speaker 1: did as well, but he had to sit there because
Speaker 1: he was nervous and quite timid and shy where his
Speaker 1: mind was. I was too naughty to be trusted not being.
Speaker 2: Next to the two nice nice they got a bit
Speaker 2: of both.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so I was. I was always very loud, very outgoing. Yes,
Speaker 1: very naughty. I was a bit of a naughty boy
Speaker 1: in school. And yeah, got hooked on space. It was
Speaker 1: a year four project, very young, and it was and
Speaker 1: I think prior to that, I love space. I think
Speaker 1: every child does. They go My nephews currently going through
Speaker 1: a space phase himself, so I've you know, I spoiled
Speaker 1: him with things. And another one of my mates has
Speaker 1: a child whose he is a son who's three, and
Speaker 1: he's currently going through and popping up with all these
Speaker 1: science and space questions, and so I think all children
Speaker 1: have this space period. But yeah, this kind of translation
Speaker 1: from space phase to something I was a lot more
Speaker 1: interested in was Yeah, this year full project library project.
Speaker 1: I don't know if they still do them. Do you
Speaker 1: remember projects in primary school world, they'll kind of open
Speaker 1: end it. It was like, you need to.
Speaker 3: Research make a diorama?
Speaker 1: What topic? Right?
Speaker 3: A topic?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I remember I did one on gorillas once because
Speaker 1: I really liked gorillas.
Speaker 3: I did the tree kangaroo.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't know what. Yeah, one on glaciers and icebergs. One.
Speaker 3: This was a great time.
Speaker 1: I loved primary school assignments compared to what eventually happened.
Speaker 1: All right, let's yeah, I loved But I digress. And
Speaker 1: so I didn't know what to do it on. And
Speaker 1: my mum suggested I do it on the NASA path
Speaker 1: Final Mission of Mars. And I didn't know what that was.
Speaker 1: And my mum both my parents are nerds. They both
Speaker 1: got science and mathematics backgrounds. My mum also loved astronomy.
Speaker 1: She did a bit of quite a few astronomy units
Speaker 1: during her degree. She ended up getting a majoring in
Speaker 1: pure mathematics, not astronomy, which pure mathematics is that next
Speaker 1: les It's awful. Kudos to her for smashing through a
Speaker 1: pure math degree anyway, So she said, na's apart find
Speaker 1: a mission of Mars, and it just so happened at
Speaker 1: the time because it was topical. It was happening right then.
Speaker 1: There was in the advertiser, the Adelaide paper, there was
Speaker 1: a two page spread and I had pictures of the rover,
Speaker 1: had photos of images that they had taken on the
Speaker 1: Martian surface, and I remember just being absolutely obsessed. Did
Speaker 1: my project on that, And then space has always been
Speaker 1: a big interest of mine since that. So it's this real, yeah,
Speaker 1: kind of turning point moment for me that I can
Speaker 1: pinpoint where it went from there, this childhood curiosity to
Speaker 1: I like space. Wow, my mum is almost entirely to
Speaker 1: blame for that.
Speaker 3: Yes, I like that.
Speaker 1: So that was that, And then I moved to We
Speaker 1: moved to Perth. The old Man some work over there,
Speaker 1: so we moved there, originally for three years, ended up
Speaker 1: staying thirteen. My folks are also still there. Three years
Speaker 1: has extended significantly. So moved there and I at the time,
Speaker 1: I remember in the lead up going I was excited
Speaker 1: about the change. I upon getting there, it struggled enormously. Obviously,
Speaker 1: it was something I hadn't anticipated. I'd gone anythink it
Speaker 1: would be a really fun adventure and just I adjusted
Speaker 1: really badly. So I was I think I was twelve.
Speaker 1: This was around the Yeah, it was actually I might
Speaker 1: have been eleven. And so, yeah, this adjustment I struggled with.
Speaker 1: I had some bad experiences at the school, and I
Speaker 1: ended up going into this real anxiety spiral that essentially
Speaker 1: led my parents to getting me a psychologist. So I
Speaker 1: started seeing a psych and I missed a lot of
Speaker 1: school where I was just in the morning hysterical. I'd
Speaker 1: be crying, I was throwing up before school, and there
Speaker 1: was a long period of time my mum was like,
Speaker 1: I can't send him. He's so I was really, as
Speaker 1: a twelve year old, as close to broken as you
Speaker 1: can get, I think from an anxiety perspective. And that
Speaker 1: kind of lasted for most of year seven. I got
Speaker 1: a little better, but I still missed a lot of school,
Speaker 1: and then year nine again a little better but still
Speaker 1: missing a lot of school and seeing a psychologist and
Speaker 1: having kind of systems in place with the school that
Speaker 1: I could talk to certain counselors and teachers who I
Speaker 1: guess kind of understood how to support mental illness a
Speaker 1: little better than others. And so I had this Yeah,
Speaker 1: these real systems in place to kind of nurse me
Speaker 1: through that period. And then from year ten to year twelve,
Speaker 1: I kind of got through a lot of anxiety. But
Speaker 1: I just was not this loud, gregarious fun boy that
Speaker 1: I was in primary school. I was really really quiet,
Speaker 1: very subdued. Everyone kind of just assumed he's just a
Speaker 1: quiet nerd, which was not accurate based on how I
Speaker 1: was behaving. Yeah, but it was like chalk and cheese
Speaker 1: compared to what I was like as a child, as
Speaker 1: a young primary school child. So that's kind of I
Speaker 1: guess the story around my first you know, brushes with
Speaker 1: mental illness and how much it impacted my life, and
Speaker 1: I guess impacted my schooling quite significantly. I don't know
Speaker 1: how many days I would have missed in total, but
Speaker 1: it was huge numbers, three figures plus wow, quite easily
Speaker 1: across those those kind of year seven, year eight in particular.
Speaker 1: Year nine got a little better.
Speaker 2: But that's such a formative time as well for a
Speaker 2: young teenager. You know, you're on the cusp of puberty,
Speaker 2: and as a mom of a young boy who's I
Speaker 2: mean only like basically just out of his blog phase,
Speaker 2: but already that part of my heart that just wants
Speaker 2: him to have such a good life and his childhood
Speaker 2: where he's un burdened by the weight of the world
Speaker 2: to last as long as possible.
Speaker 3: It makes me want to cry thinking that at twelve.
Speaker 2: You were facing concepts and feelings that I didn't even
Speaker 2: think about until much much further into adulthood. And I
Speaker 2: mean some people get through their whole life without a psychologist. Ever, Yep,
Speaker 2: sometimes it happens a bit later. But twelve, I think
Speaker 2: by most standards, is extraordinarily early.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I ended up years later. It would have
Speaker 1: been kind of late teens, I reckon maybe even twenty
Speaker 1: when I had another kind of battling with mental illness
Speaker 1: that I actually went back to my child psychologists the
Speaker 1: same lie. Yeah, And so I was just within I
Speaker 1: think they hold records for I don't know, seven or
Speaker 1: eight years or something like that, and I was struggling
Speaker 1: again with because I kind of after that period up
Speaker 1: till about year ten eleven twelve, when I started moving
Speaker 1: into UNI, I started regaining my confidence and becoming much
Speaker 1: more gregarious and outgoing and far less anxious. And so
Speaker 1: there was this period where I probably and I imagine
Speaker 1: this is not uncommon. It's like, oh, I fixed it, Yeah,
Speaker 1: not recognizing the fact that that mental illness and mood
Speaker 1: disorders they're with you for life. There's certainly management strategies
Speaker 1: you can implement, but it's a chemical imbalance, it's biologically
Speaker 1: you can't just fix it. And so I had this
Speaker 1: period where I kind of wasn't seeing a psychologist and
Speaker 1: I hadn't started on medication then. But yeah, I ended
Speaker 1: up going back to my psychologist, and that was quite
Speaker 1: It was a weird sensation kind of going back to
Speaker 1: someone who had seen me through these several year struggling
Speaker 1: years that I was facing and then kind of coming
Speaker 1: back and you know, I'd kind of achieved a few
Speaker 1: things since then, So there was probably this element for
Speaker 1: him of Okay, he has kind of navigated this challenge
Speaker 1: quite well, but he's back, so obviously there's still things
Speaker 1: to grapple with.
Speaker 2: You're even up just to this point, if anything, a
Speaker 2: great and reassuring example for people in their own journeys
Speaker 2: or parents for their children's journeys that even having missed
Speaker 2: at a lot of school and with challenges that do
Speaker 2: affect the brain of all things and motivation and interaction
Speaker 2: that you still can go into probably the most highly
Speaker 2: demanding pathway of academia that's possible, because I think that
Speaker 2: one of the big fears around any kind of mental
Speaker 2: health struggle, but anything that really disrupts your schooling, is
Speaker 2: that you won't be able to do something high achieving.
Speaker 2: And I think maybe that's the reason why people often
Speaker 2: say my mental illness is a great burden and like
Speaker 2: a devil on my shoulder, But it can be a
Speaker 2: superpower because often brains that can feel great lows can
Speaker 2: also achieve and feel great highs. Have you felt that
Speaker 2: it has been both a burden and a blessing or
Speaker 2: is it just been one or the other? Do you
Speaker 2: think it does your brain is high functioning like that
Speaker 2: sort of all tied together as one thing.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I kind of got diagnosed with anxiety when
Speaker 1: I was really young, and then it wasn't until in
Speaker 1: my early twenties that I was diagnosed with depression. And
Speaker 1: then it wasn't until kind of a decade later where
Speaker 1: a psychiatrist rediagnosed me with bipolar and what he said
Speaker 1: was bipolar iiO in particular is very often misdiagnosed as
Speaker 1: depression because the hypermannic episodes are not as dangerous and
Speaker 1: risky and reckless as a full blown mania manic episode.
Speaker 1: And one of the reasons they said that was because
Speaker 1: of I guess, partly some of the things I'd achieved
Speaker 1: in this level of high functioning that I had kind
Speaker 1: of between these really bad lows. And so I guess
Speaker 1: to your question, in my case and now with a
Speaker 1: new more updated diagnos that seems to me more accurately
Speaker 1: characterize my mood disorder and my mental illness, I think, yes,
Speaker 1: it has kind of been not superpower, but I certainly
Speaker 1: have these these periods of very high energy and productivity,
Speaker 1: and everything's just kind of elevated and maybe not euphoric,
Speaker 1: but not far off. Everything just is easier and just flows,
Speaker 1: just flows, and it just yeah, it's like, oh, this,
Speaker 1: I guess, is what life's meant to feel like. And obviously,
Speaker 1: now understanding bipolar a bit better and talking to my psychiatrist,
Speaker 1: he said, yeah, it's a slightly more elevated mood than
Speaker 1: what a baseline should be. And the dangers is that
Speaker 1: obviously there's a cyclicality to it. So yeah, to your point,
Speaker 1: is it a superpower? Maybe there's elements of that with
Speaker 1: bipolar two, where you do have these areas of these
Speaker 1: periods of high functioning, productive, gregarious, and all these kind
Speaker 1: of really positive traits, but it's kind of coupled with
Speaker 1: this really shitty low period. So yeah, for me, that
Speaker 1: the maybe not super but the biggest benefit I've found
Speaker 1: from it, or the silver lining I really try and
Speaker 1: hold on to, is by talking about it. And I
Speaker 1: think for me, the only upside of mental illness is
Speaker 1: kind of sharing your story and helping other people be
Speaker 1: seen and heard and helping them navigate the shitty part
Speaker 1: that they've been dealt in terms of mental illness. And
Speaker 1: I like the quote, you know, we recover loudly, so
Speaker 1: people don't stuffer quietly, And I think that's so important.
Speaker 1: And I'm in a really unique position where I do
Speaker 1: have a larger audience that I can communicate with, and
Speaker 1: so I think there's a kind of social and moral
Speaker 1: responsibility I have to try and use this to help others. Obviously,
Speaker 1: there's a fine line where that can transition to becoming
Speaker 1: to my own detriment, and I do have to put
Speaker 1: in certain kind of guardrails and safeties and checks in that.
Speaker 1: And one of the ones I had with the jests
Speaker 1: Row interview was I had this outpouring of messages from
Speaker 1: people who it was. It was really heartwarming to hear
Speaker 1: how many people it touched, but it was really heartbreaking
Speaker 1: to hear how comment was for people either themselves or
Speaker 1: a loved one or someone within their close circle was
Speaker 1: going through. And I did a story post where I
Speaker 1: just said, I am reading everything that's being shared to me,
Speaker 1: but I don't have the capacity to reply. And I
Speaker 1: think you had a similar experience as well recently about
Speaker 1: a year ago, wasn't it with the pregnancy loss, And
Speaker 1: I remember you did a very similar thing where you
Speaker 1: shared I don't know if you replied to some of
Speaker 1: the messages, but my recollection is you shared a similar
Speaker 1: sentiment where it was I am reading them, I just
Speaker 1: can't because there's thousands.
Speaker 3: And more than you ever expect.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so I've kind of waffled in circles a little bit.
Speaker 1: But yeah, that's I guess I see that as kind
Speaker 1: of the upside to it, and side I think it's
Speaker 1: it's a responsibility I have, and it's one that I'm
Speaker 1: very glad that I can do what I do. In
Speaker 1: talking about and hopefully destigmatizing. Like you said, there's these
Speaker 1: sort of socially acceptable mental illnesses. Yeah, and so hopefully
Speaker 1: you know, bipolar and some of these other ones, schizophrenia,
Speaker 1: borderline personality disorder. There's a lot of these these ones.
Speaker 1: Wheople are oh whoawn. Yeah, it's a bit too much.
Speaker 1: You've overshared here, and it's like, well, no, this is
Speaker 1: these are all under the umbrella of mental illness. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and we should be comfortable talking about them and understanding
Speaker 1: them and not ostracizing people who are going through whatever
Speaker 1: mental illness they're going through. And so I think there's
Speaker 1: been huge strides with that understanding around depression and anxiety,
Speaker 1: but there's still more work to be done with basically
Speaker 1: anything beyond those two.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And I also think even just the fact that
Speaker 2: neurodivergence is a word now that we're familiar with and
Speaker 2: that people use and understand, it's all the conversations are
Speaker 2: going in the right direction, which is amazing, But it's
Speaker 2: still interesting that there is so much Like it's funny
Speaker 2: you and I have mentioned many times the word mical
Speaker 2: imbalance in the brain and just accepting that it's not
Speaker 2: it's not something you can try harder with so when
Speaker 2: people are sort of I've always I think the thing
Speaker 2: that frustrates me the most is that anxiety and depression
Speaker 2: are both major misnomers.
Speaker 3: In my mind.
Speaker 2: I think that anxiety makes you think of anxiousness, and
Speaker 2: depression makes you think of sadness. Yes, and anxiousness and
Speaker 2: sadness are normal emotions in a healthy mind's spectrum of day.
Speaker 3: To day feeling.
Speaker 2: Anxiety isn't just feeling anxious, so you can't just say,
Speaker 2: calm down, the world is fine, it's going to go away.
Speaker 2: And depression is not just feeling sad, so you can't
Speaker 2: just say go be happy, to get a massage, eats
Speaker 2: an ice cream, you know, cheer up it like suck
Speaker 2: it up and.
Speaker 1: Saying that getting an ice cream always does help in
Speaker 1: your case.
Speaker 3: Casina is a love like yeah, that's it.
Speaker 2: But I actually remember one time I was having a
Speaker 2: really shitty down time and you uber eatst me a
Speaker 2: curton of messina, and I was like, this guy, I
Speaker 2: knows where it's at.
Speaker 1: I've done this for yeah, I got random acts of
Speaker 1: ice cream. I've done this with a few people where
Speaker 1: they'll say they're having a bit of a rough trot. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I organize it. Sometimes I've sent it and they're
Speaker 1: not home and so I'm like, well, there's going to
Speaker 1: be a melted puddle of ice.
Speaker 3: I will go and pick it up and I'll eat
Speaker 3: it for you.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I have to go. They drop it off and
Speaker 1: then I go to their house to pick it out.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I've done it with Yeah, it's something. It's
Speaker 1: it's not it's not a huge gesture, but I think
Speaker 1: it's almost the fact that, yeah, kind of the it's
Speaker 1: not necessarily ice cream, right, it's the fact that it's
Speaker 1: a gift, it's a thought. So yes, no, I'm glad
Speaker 1: I could give you a random act of ice cream.
Speaker 3: It was. It was glorious and the flavors are amazing.
Speaker 3: But yeah, it was the thought.
Speaker 2: And I think it's hard that even my own understanding
Speaker 2: of both those conditions before I was in probably the
Speaker 2: worst phase with both of them I had been in,
Speaker 2: was thinking that those things would help me. And then
Speaker 2: you get to the stage and one thing that was
Speaker 2: really interesting you said in Jess's interview. And I don't
Speaker 2: want to repeat to much because there's so much other
Speaker 2: stuff I want to ask you, Like UFOs I mean, dude,
Speaker 2: I have to get there eventually. But on a more
Speaker 2: serious note, you said something in that interview and I've
Speaker 2: heard you also say it a couple of times about
Speaker 2: how and I will put a trigger warning at the
Speaker 2: start of this episode that your darkest moment was in
Speaker 2: twenty twenty one where you did try and end your life,
Speaker 2: which is just before I met you, and again makes
Speaker 2: me just it pulls on my heart so much thinking
Speaker 2: that someone with as much in their life, who has
Speaker 2: as much going for them as you, could feel like that.
Speaker 2: I misunderstood it before hearing people like you put it
Speaker 2: in these words. People often say, look, it's really selfish
Speaker 2: to do that, to take yourself out of the equation
Speaker 2: and think not think about the people you're leaving behind,
Speaker 2: which I think is a huge misinterpretation of.
Speaker 3: What that really is. But also that it's not that
Speaker 3: you actually don't want to exist anymore.
Speaker 2: It's just that you want the feeling that you're feeling
Speaker 2: to stop, and that is the side effect. The only
Speaker 2: way you can do that make the pain stop is
Speaker 2: to not exist. It's not that you actively sit there
Speaker 2: going idealizing not existing. It's just you want the pain
Speaker 2: to stop and I didn't understand that. I was like,
Speaker 2: I just thought you were sad, and you just kept
Speaker 2: crying and crying and crying, and then eventually you know.
Speaker 2: And I just think it's so misunderstood how a depression
Speaker 2: and anxiety actually manifest for people. And again, it's like,
Speaker 2: anxiety isn't fear. I'm not sitting there necessarily even worried
Speaker 2: at all. It's sometimes physiological. I think I'm having a
Speaker 2: heart attack. I don't think I'm emotional about anything, and
Speaker 2: I don't think people understand that. So how do they
Speaker 2: manifest for you? In a sort of I don't know,
Speaker 2: it sounds silly, but like in a practical sense.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so for a dump, jump for a dump before
Speaker 1: I jump too deeply that Yeah. I think I share
Speaker 1: a similar frustration to you in that I think anxiety
Speaker 1: and depression are used as substitutes for being anxious or
Speaker 1: feeling depressed or feeling sad. And I find that and
Speaker 1: this is a fine line because you've got to be
Speaker 1: careful not to be gatekeeping, but I do find it
Speaker 1: frustrating some of the language used, in particular on social media,
Speaker 1: where people talk about these things like oh, I was anxious,
Speaker 1: I was you know I had anxiety and you didn't
Speaker 1: had it. You've got it or you don't, And that
Speaker 1: language is really damaging because it's spoken like it's something
Speaker 1: that you can fix, like I know did meditation psychologists
Speaker 1: and nun I don't have anxiety, or I did this that, meditation, yoga,
Speaker 1: and I'm not depressed anymore. And people who have anxiety
Speaker 1: impression will see that and hear that and feel what's
Speaker 1: wrong with me? Why can't I think my way out
Speaker 1: of it like they.
Speaker 3: Did, or fix it or.
Speaker 1: Fix it, And it's not something that is fixed, it's
Speaker 1: something that's managed. And so I think it's dangerous language
Speaker 1: that's used, I think often by people where they're substitute
Speaker 1: and anxiety depression for these things that are like you
Speaker 1: said that, they're temporary emotions. That all of our motions
Speaker 1: are designed to be important for us. We have a
Speaker 1: whole spectrum of emotions and you should be experiencing them
Speaker 1: all at some to some degree, and being anxious and
Speaker 1: being sad are emotions, but there's a very significant difference
Speaker 1: to mental disorders like anxiety and depression. So it's I
Speaker 1: haven't figured out the best way to talk about that specifically.
Speaker 1: Because it does sound a bit gatekeepery, right, Yeah, and
Speaker 1: so it's really important to say it's not that. It's
Speaker 1: just about being very very clear with the language that's
Speaker 1: used so as to not create a bigger problem for
Speaker 1: people because they see people fixing it and thinking their
Speaker 1: way out of it or doing these things. And so anyway,
Speaker 1: that was just on the side.
Speaker 2: What was the origination, It was how it manifests, because
Speaker 2: I think the conflation of regular emotions versus the mental illness,
Speaker 2: the fact that you can have anxiety without being anxious
Speaker 2: and you can have depression without being sad, I think
Speaker 2: that's confusing. And also the fact that a lot of
Speaker 2: the conversations on mental health focus on what you can
Speaker 2: do as the sufferer to manage it, but not a
Speaker 2: lot addresses what's helpful to receive. So for friends who
Speaker 2: are listening, how.
Speaker 3: Do they look after you?
Speaker 2: Because you do sometimes think I'll just get you about
Speaker 2: your for a massage, and like that is lovely, it's
Speaker 2: a beautiful gesture. But sometimes that's Yeah, it's not a
Speaker 2: thing you're fixing.
Speaker 3: It's just a.
Speaker 2: Condition that's ongoing that you're holding someone through. And I
Speaker 2: think people often feel really helpless of how to support people.
Speaker 2: And like even Kann and I we have like Matt
Speaker 2: traffic light signals kind of thing of like if we
Speaker 2: think that you need extra check ins, like we might
Speaker 2: message each other and say, I think he's having a
Speaker 2: hard time, let's both trying to walk this week or
Speaker 2: something like not in a like let's manage mad. But
Speaker 2: I like that's our way of being like we love
Speaker 2: you and so, and you might not reach out because
Speaker 2: that's not what you can do in that time. But
Speaker 2: it's hard to know that unless you know how something's
Speaker 2: manifesting for you.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's beautiful. I do love I love you too,
Speaker 1: I love Khn, I love an Abby too, and Abby
Speaker 1: I love Abby as well. And yeah, I think there
Speaker 1: is a yeah, you do want to check in with people.
Speaker 1: I certainly know for me, probably more so with when
Speaker 1: I'm going through a depressed episode, when when the mood
Speaker 1: drops and everything becomes quite hopeless, I do become very reclusive.
Speaker 1: It's really hard to reach out. I think that's another
Speaker 1: thing that often is really hard to understand for people
Speaker 1: who don't have kind of mental or mood disorders or
Speaker 1: mentally illness. It's like just reach out, just message, and
Speaker 1: that's like everest when you're in a hole, it's really
Speaker 1: hard to do. There's a lot of No matter what
Speaker 1: people say about loving you, there's still this shame and
Speaker 1: fear of judgment. And there is no As a scientist,
Speaker 1: there is no evidence of anyone that loves me, my family,
Speaker 1: my friends from ever showing any sort.
Speaker 3: Of judgment data match data science.
Speaker 1: There is no, and so should be saying there's no
Speaker 1: evidence of that whatsoever. Stopped being a shit scientist.
Speaker 3: You are being a shit austro business.
Speaker 1: Do your job, but your brain becomes so uncooperative in
Speaker 1: those moments. And so yeah, I think, yeah, that the
Speaker 1: check ins are really important. I know they certainly are
Speaker 1: for me, and I imagine probably that's quite universal. It's
Speaker 1: the challenges. Like you said, you and can't can contact
Speaker 1: each other when you get to read that something might
Speaker 1: be off. But it's really hard to know sometimes when
Speaker 1: something's off, and so I try to One of the
Speaker 1: things I try to do is when I'm feeling good
Speaker 1: and it's easy to talk to people, I try to
Speaker 1: be fairly you know, proactive messaging and organizing things so
Speaker 1: that when that drops off, it's almost like okay, the
Speaker 1: fact that I can't find the motivation and strength to
Speaker 1: reach out, that is a signal in itself to people,
Speaker 1: because it's like, hang on, haven't heard from Matt for
Speaker 1: a while. He's usually quite good at contacting and checking
Speaker 1: in with with you know themselves, or organizing grabbing coffees
Speaker 1: or dinners or whatever. And so I think that's been
Speaker 1: a really useful thing for me because the fact that
Speaker 1: I'm not reaching out is the signal itself. Is not
Speaker 1: reaching out is the reaching out that works, right, So
Speaker 1: that's kind of a strategy I f aren't really useful,
Speaker 1: but it's hard to know because everyone finds different strategies
Speaker 1: useful for them, and so it's it's there's a I
Speaker 1: guess a frustrating part with It's the same as when
Speaker 1: trying to get the right in medication or cocktail of medication.
Speaker 1: It's there's so much variance in how different medications affect people,
Speaker 1: both in its efficacy and also in its side effects,
Speaker 1: and so trying to find the right thing for you
Speaker 1: there is an element of trial and error. There's things
Speaker 1: about a dozen of so different antidepressants. How do you
Speaker 1: know which ones for you? They will typically prescribed? Probably
Speaker 1: the one that has universally the lower side effects and
Speaker 1: then go from there. And I think similar with strategies
Speaker 1: you're kind of developing, Okay, this might work. This is
Speaker 1: something you've either discussed with someone else or with your
Speaker 1: psychologists or psychiatrist or whatever your medical professional that you're
Speaker 1: working with to tackle these things. But then you know
Speaker 1: when you execute that strategy didn't work well enough. And
Speaker 1: so it's like, all right, let's modify, let's evolve, let's
Speaker 1: try and get it right. And so I think over
Speaker 1: the period of several years, I've got some strategies that
Speaker 1: seem to be more effective than what I've had two, three,
Speaker 1: five years ago. But it's a constant learning experience, I think,
Speaker 1: and a constant battle trying to you know, trying to
Speaker 1: alt smart you get yeah, exactly. So it's yeah, it's tough.
Speaker 2: I think that was the frustration I had was my
Speaker 2: brain is maybe my best weapon, and yet like how
Speaker 2: logically is it internally of its own accord working against me?
Speaker 2: It just is It was so frustrating for like a
Speaker 2: high functioning person to be like, this is actually delaying
Speaker 2: things I want to do. It's delaying like you know,
Speaker 2: studying or having friendships or starting businesses or whatever. And
Speaker 2: what you said is just accepting that it's not something
Speaker 2: that gets fixed, it's something that gets managed. I love
Speaker 2: watching you because you actively show and share that you
Speaker 2: are managing it. You share when you're having a shitty time,
Speaker 2: and then that you can get back to having good times,
Speaker 2: and then you might go back to having shitty times.
Speaker 2: And I will include the link to Jess's episode because
Speaker 2: I think it's I can't top that it was. You
Speaker 2: were both just in the most perfect, vulnerable, supported, beautiful
Speaker 2: space to share so much detail on that area. But
Speaker 2: here I want to just labor the point that you
Speaker 2: can manage it, and with great gaps in your productivity
Speaker 2: or happiness or ability to function how you want to,
Speaker 2: you have still managed to have an incredibly successful career.
Speaker 2: And like if you look at Matt's LinkedIn the Bachelor,
Speaker 2: is not even a blip, Like it is literally, like sure,
Speaker 2: a huge chapter and there's a big before and after
Speaker 2: in terms of the platform you have and big emotional
Speaker 2: things that happened, But it's a blip compared to all
Speaker 2: the other things you've done. And it would be remissive
Speaker 2: me not to spend I have use so much of
Speaker 2: our time on just a waffling, but not to spend
Speaker 2: time like people who interview you. I'm like, you have
Speaker 2: an astrophysicist, and you haven't asked about aliens.
Speaker 3: You have not literally.
Speaker 2: Asked about Elon Musk just landing something like how have
Speaker 2: you not asked about that stuff? Because it's such a
Speaker 2: waste of your challenge and not asking those questions. So
Speaker 2: I have to move on to that. But I do like,
Speaker 2: thank you for always being so vulnerable and sharing, because
Speaker 2: you are someone that people probably expect that the least
Speaker 2: from you fit this mold of yeah, confident, Gregary is capable, successful,
Speaker 2: and it's a constant battle behind the scenes, but you
Speaker 2: do do an amazing job at sharing that you And
Speaker 2: speaking of space Uranus Khan.
Speaker 3: He knew I was going to drop it in there
Speaker 3: at some point, just before we.
Speaker 2: Do move on to aliens and UFOs which are actually
Speaker 2: called UAPs. Now in front of the austrophysicist, I have
Speaker 2: to get the term.
Speaker 1: Two. People were thinking that UFOs two kind.
Speaker 2: Of It's interesting that one of the things you do
Speaker 2: still face which is reductive, which is really annoying, is
Speaker 2: that when you're as a friend it's really annoying when
Speaker 2: your book came out, your first book, which is all
Speaker 2: about doctor Matt Agnew's Guide to Space, so hella intelligent, right.
Speaker 3: Intelligence. So there is a literal.
Speaker 2: Article announcing your book that was Matt Agnew's exciting news
Speaker 2: after denying Khannong, I was like, is that really how
Speaker 2: you are announcing an astrophysicist new book on space, as
Speaker 2: if it's like the next dude you're dating in your
Speaker 2: non literal, non homosexual life. People are deciding that you've
Speaker 2: denied khn not that you actually aren't in a relationship
Speaker 2: because you are heterosexual, but you denied him. So said no, like,
Speaker 2: your news is not a book, it's some other guy.
Speaker 2: I was so enraged when I saw that, not in rage,
Speaker 2: but just like, yeah, totally baffled. But we have already
Speaker 2: covered this, so I don't want to spend time on
Speaker 2: it again, except that I get at least once a week,
Speaker 2: like it's almost like Gemini Gate. It comes up in
Speaker 2: my DMS gate once a week when I'm Matt and
Speaker 2: Karn gonna come out as a couple. Can you please
Speaker 2: clarify the fact that masculine affection is okay within a
Speaker 2: heterosexual males life.
Speaker 1: Yes, I could confirm that.
Speaker 2: Yes, can you, as a scientist confirm or deny the science?
Speaker 1: Male masculine affection is okay, completely normal. I show affection
Speaker 1: to everyone in my life, women, men, non binary, whatever.
Speaker 1: I also am very liberal with saying love you to people.
Speaker 1: I finish a lot of phone calls with saying that
Speaker 1: I've almost let us slip out. In professional I'm also
Speaker 1: very liberal with yeah. I'm also very liberal with my
Speaker 1: use of exes, which sometimes got me in trouble because you.
Speaker 3: Are an exit.
Speaker 2: I'm an exit because I think it's passive aggressive if
Speaker 2: you don't include an X. I'm like, is Madam going on?
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, that's about signal. It's so. Yeah. I'm very affectionate,
Speaker 1: and I think it's important that men are affectionate both
Speaker 1: with women and with other men, because it's this bizarre,
Speaker 1: I mean toxic masculinely. I feel like the terms overuse
Speaker 1: it's diminished some of its impact, but it is really
Speaker 1: toxic to suggest that men don't want to both give
Speaker 1: and receive affection platonically or romantically whatever. And I always
Speaker 1: bring it up with such social creatures like millions of
Speaker 1: years of evolution has led us to being tremendously social creatures,
Speaker 1: and so to deny that biological imperative to receive and
Speaker 1: give affection is bizarre and just stupid and unhelpful.
Speaker 2: Broadly speaking, people have so much of a hard time
Speaker 2: about your relationship struggling.
Speaker 1: We spoke about it on a previous podcast, and I mean,
Speaker 1: it's a very art exciting kind of answer. No, we're
Speaker 1: not a couple. We're just very good friends who have
Speaker 1: no problem showing physical affection to one another. And it
Speaker 1: still comes out. And I've had people say to me, oh,
Speaker 1: because you're gay, aren't you.
Speaker 3: I know what to say to that.
Speaker 1: I'm actually Gemini and I'm very comfortable with my sexuality.
Speaker 1: I don't find it offensive or anything like that. But
Speaker 1: I just don't know where it's come from, because we've
Speaker 1: very clearly said we're not a couple. I've had people
Speaker 1: who I remember I was organizing a date with someone
Speaker 1: and this is last year, and she texted me before
Speaker 1: a date and said, oh, are you bisexual? And I
Speaker 1: said no, what was that? And she goes, because I
Speaker 1: was with a friend and or with someone, They go, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: Matt Agney, he's bisexual. And so there's this idea that's
Speaker 1: still permeating within the public discourse that I'm gay or bisexual,
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter. I'm not offended of it or anything
Speaker 1: like that. And I kind of I don't feel compelled
Speaker 1: to deny it other than I don't want to be
Speaker 1: accused of queer baiting or anything like that. But at
Speaker 1: the same time, I kind of I was torn about
Speaker 1: whether to deny it, because for me it doesn't it
Speaker 1: doesn't matter. I'm heterosexual. I couldn't care less. But I
Speaker 1: don't want to create this pressure where someone is gay
Speaker 1: that someone can just ask publicly yeah, and.
Speaker 3: Say you'll get point to you someone's.
Speaker 1: Gay, that then they get forced to come out when
Speaker 1: they're not ready. It's I imagine, obviously I can't relate,
Speaker 1: but I imagine that's a tremendously personal and significant moment
Speaker 1: for someone to come out. And I didn't want to
Speaker 1: contribute to that sort of idea that it's okay to
Speaker 1: ask someone publicly you're gay or you're bisexual, and I
Speaker 1: should reply and give some sort of definitive answer. And
Speaker 1: so I kind of had this, you know, these battling
Speaker 1: things where it's like, well, I'm not queer bating, so
Speaker 1: I need to confirm it. But also I don't want
Speaker 1: to create this situation where people who are queer. I'm
Speaker 1: kind of perpetuating this idea. So I mean by talking
Speaker 1: about it on the podcast with Khan, I let him
Speaker 1: kind of direct how much we should say. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: kind of want to be very clear that you don't
Speaker 1: have the right to ask someone their sexuality. For me,
Speaker 1: it's it doesn't matter, but for someone who might be queer,
Speaker 1: it's it's you're you're robbing them of a very emotional
Speaker 1: and significant moment in their lives, and you shouldn't be
Speaker 1: putting undue pressure on someone to rush that moment. So
Speaker 1: I can't even remember what my what was the question here?
Speaker 1: But I think I'm just making it very clear that
Speaker 1: line of question that people keep putting to me. I
Speaker 1: don't care.
Speaker 2: To me, I'm not the boss of them. What do
Speaker 2: you mean, I'm not their manager, their manager.
Speaker 1: The manager it could be so yeah, I think, yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't care people ask me. But but I think
Speaker 1: it's very important that the public knows that that's that's
Speaker 1: a inappropriate line of questioning, because you're putting pressure unfair
Speaker 1: on someone who they need to do it when they're ready.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I just still can't believe that the articles that
Speaker 2: have come out about it, like it's front page New.
Speaker 1: There was still one can't shared it. We went to
Speaker 1: was it the ballet we went to? There was about
Speaker 1: six or seven of us who went to the ballet,
Speaker 1: and so a bunch of us got photos on the
Speaker 1: red car because we thought, oh, let's get some nice
Speaker 1: photos together that would be cute. Anyway, we got one
Speaker 1: photo together. I had photos with several of my friends,
Speaker 1: some women. I should highlight. The article that came out
Speaker 1: was Matt goes to ballet after cuddling KHN And it
Speaker 1: was a photo of us from like a movie night,
Speaker 1: like three months prior. Even stories kn't have done, where
Speaker 1: we're both lying on the car and that was the photo.
Speaker 1: And it was like you went in the article and
Speaker 1: then halfway down it's got a photo of me with
Speaker 1: KRN and then a photo of me with some other people.
Speaker 1: But it's just ridiculous angles and like trying to force
Speaker 1: this narrative and I mean, I mean can't find it
Speaker 1: amusing now. And yeah, certainly not going to make us
Speaker 1: change how we behave and how we live out our friendship.
Speaker 3: So yes, fascinating, it's so nice.
Speaker 1: It's baffling.
Speaker 2: But I just contributed to that because that frustrates me
Speaker 2: so much because I should be moving on to space,
Speaker 2: and I've used time on that question, but I just
Speaker 2: wanted to That's okay, cover it. So I'm going to
Speaker 2: turn to fast fire now in the world of intellectual
Speaker 2: pursuits and you know, aliens and all that fun stuff.
Speaker 1: Fast Fire.
Speaker 2: I know fast fire because I've just realized how much
Speaker 2: time I've used on everything else. And I started the
Speaker 2: conversation saying, I want to talk about your astrophysics, and
Speaker 2: then fifty five minutes in, I'm like, Matt, the astrophysicists,
Speaker 2: this is what happens when you into your interview. I know,
Speaker 2: I'm dumb, too excited. Okay, so very quickly, can you
Speaker 2: explain to a lay person who doesn't actually know what
Speaker 2: astrophysics is?
Speaker 3: What is it?
Speaker 1: It's the study of astrophysics. I mean, it's all in
Speaker 1: the name. It's the study of the physics that makes
Speaker 1: up the universe, and so that can be on smaller scales. So,
Speaker 1: like my research was around planets specifically, I was looking
Speaker 1: at the dynamics of planets. So when planets are in
Speaker 1: orbit around a star, what sort of interesting things can
Speaker 1: happen when you've got two planet systems and when you
Speaker 1: have There was a show called three Body Problem that
Speaker 1: came out on Netflix. I wasn't a fan of the show,
Speaker 1: but it highlighted three body problem is a common problem
Speaker 1: in both maths and physics because it's unstable when you've
Speaker 1: got three bodies bound gravitationally. Anyway, I don't want to
Speaker 1: get too far into the weeds, but you can have
Speaker 1: the smaller scale, which is what I did, and I
Speaker 1: say smaller in the universe and astrophysics context, planets are
Speaker 1: still massive versus the larger scale where you're looking at
Speaker 1: the structure of the universe itself. And so that's kind
Speaker 1: of what you call cosmology, the structure, large scale structure
Speaker 1: of the universe, but also the origins and ultimate fate
Speaker 1: of the universe, and cosmology is straight over my head.
Speaker 1: Even kind of smaller that things like classifying galaxies and
Speaker 1: the what's called the more phology of galaxies, so how
Speaker 1: you categorize them and the evolution of galaxies. Even that,
Speaker 1: while I do my PhD, so I'm doing an astrophysics PhD.
Speaker 1: I could talk to another astrophysicist doing that research. It
Speaker 1: was like speaking in Russian saying, so's there's a huge
Speaker 1: breadth to astrophysics because the physics of space varies, not varies,
Speaker 1: still is governed by the same mathematics, but the physics
Speaker 1: when you're looking at something smaller like planets, is a
Speaker 1: different set of physics than when you're considering things on
Speaker 1: the larger scale.
Speaker 3: Oh my god, I love that.
Speaker 1: I love this.
Speaker 2: I really seriously wish we could do a whole episode
Speaker 2: just on the astrophysics.
Speaker 3: Did we land on the Moon?
Speaker 1: Absolutely?
Speaker 3: Okay, yeah, what do you think of the footage of
Speaker 3: the flags and stuff?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 3: What the conspiracy theorist who are like, there's wound on
Speaker 3: the planet?
Speaker 1: Yeah, So the footage of the flag is literally when
Speaker 1: they planted the flag, essentially you're going to have a
Speaker 1: bit of vibration in there, and without air, you've got
Speaker 1: nothing to damp that vibration. So when you slam a
Speaker 1: thing into the ground, like a flag, when you when
Speaker 1: you what do you even call it? When you plant it?
Speaker 1: But when you put it in the ground.
Speaker 2: There's a really fancy there's a fancy word for the Yeah, whatever,
Speaker 2: you're going to get some.
Speaker 1: Vibration, Yeah, exactly, just sitting here like so, yeah, you
Speaker 1: get some vibration, and that's what's what's happening there, because
Speaker 1: there's no way to stop it. On Earth, vibrations will
Speaker 1: eventually peter out because you've got things that are slowing
Speaker 1: it down, typically air resistance, friction, depending on the particular
Speaker 1: scenario you're looking at, but you don't have that in space.
Speaker 1: You've got a little bit of friction where the flagpole
Speaker 1: meets the ground, so eventually that will dampen it down
Speaker 1: to nothing, but it will take a lot longer than
Speaker 1: if you have air resistance. The other thing with suggesting
Speaker 1: that the landing of the Moon didn't happen, I think
Speaker 1: one of the most frustrating parts that is it's quite
Speaker 1: disrespectful thing to assert because people died trying to from
Speaker 1: the missions from kind of starting from Mercury all the
Speaker 1: way through to Apollo, which Mercury was the very early
Speaker 1: space missions, but it was all part of getting towards
Speaker 1: it was all part of the space race, and people died,
Speaker 1: and so to suggest that it didn't happen is such
Speaker 1: a disrespect to these trailblazers. Yeah, the whole body of
Speaker 1: science that that happened, all the engineers and scientists that
Speaker 1: were behind the scenes working on these things. But yeah,
Speaker 1: the kind of the trailblazers, the cowboys that actually did
Speaker 1: the kind of outrageous things. Yeah, some of them died
Speaker 1: and so yeah, I find it quite a disrespectful assertion,
Speaker 1: and people make it and there's actually funny. I remember
Speaker 1: seeing this video. I'll see how I can find it
Speaker 1: and send them to you later. But it's basically this
Speaker 1: guy who's like a seasoned not a director, but like
Speaker 1: a filmographer or something like that, and he's going through
Speaker 1: and weirdly, the technology for recording video at the time
Speaker 1: was not sufficient to create the footage that they actually
Speaker 1: recorded using. Because people are like, oh, Stanley Kubrick did
Speaker 1: a space o to see he created these fake landing
Speaker 1: imagery of videos, and this guy filmographer just highlights that.
Speaker 2: Know that.
Speaker 1: People are kind of confused now because it's such great CGI.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, yeah, but the tech I couldn't have fake
Speaker 2: things like creating the movement of the astronauts and the
Speaker 2: slow motion movement.
Speaker 1: And stuff like that.
Speaker 3: They're like, it wasn't there.
Speaker 1: It wasn't there. So weirdly, we had the tech to
Speaker 1: get to the moon and record twenty four frame for
Speaker 1: a second, you know, really low black and white resolution
Speaker 1: image video, but to create that artificially in a studio,
Speaker 1: the technology wasn't there. Wow, which is really fascinating. So
Speaker 1: there's actually, yeah, one hundred percent happened. Yeah, and yeah,
Speaker 1: there's there's numerous ways to prove that, but yeah, that
Speaker 1: from a film technology perspective is a really unique way
Speaker 1: of doing that, and I find it quite fascinating.
Speaker 3: I like that, Ye aliens in.
Speaker 1: UFOs UFOs nonsense.
Speaker 2: Like big spinning discs with like.
Speaker 1: Stealing cows and.
Speaker 2: Yeah, stealing why the cows know none of us have
Speaker 2: cows in our bacura.
Speaker 1: No. I mean the thing I always say with with
Speaker 1: you know when when the discussion around you have both
Speaker 1: and your EPs crash crash land and all these kind
Speaker 1: of stuff, or even just their scene. A sufficiently advanced
Speaker 1: alien civilization that can create this sort of technology to
Speaker 1: traverse the huge chasms between worlds, makes it all the
Speaker 1: way to Earth and then crashes. It makes no sense,
Speaker 1: like the it's not it's snuck up on them, surprise,
Speaker 1: And they always crash in the US.
Speaker 2: Yeah, always in Nevada, So that's always around a certain
Speaker 2: military complex.
Speaker 1: Correct. But then you know, even if they don't crash,
Speaker 1: the idea that they have this brilliant technology to get
Speaker 1: to Earth and then they just kind of forget that
Speaker 1: they're there and get seen circle forgot to turn on
Speaker 1: the cloaking devices. Yeah, the UFO thing nonsense. Has or
Speaker 1: have aliens ever visited Earth? Who would know? Like it's
Speaker 1: been around four and a half billion years generously recorded history.
Speaker 1: You could argue, you know, ten thousand civilizations, ten thousand,
Speaker 1: extend that to sixty or eighty thousand. If First Nations
Speaker 1: Australians recorded the first trend was recorded stuff. But even
Speaker 1: run up to one hundred thousand, one hundred thousand schemes
Speaker 1: four and a half billion years, you know, it's blink
Speaker 1: of an eye. So could aliens have come before First
Speaker 1: Nations Australians were recording stuff?
Speaker 3: Maybe?
Speaker 1: I do believe in aliens, but not in the little
Speaker 1: green mense. And I talk about this a little bit
Speaker 1: in my book about there's even places in our own
Speaker 1: soul system where it looks like we've got all the
Speaker 1: right ingredients for life and so I can imagine if
Speaker 1: life is as simple as A plus B plus C
Speaker 1: equals life, that being you know, water, energy, and nutrients.
Speaker 1: Then if that is as simple as it is, I
Speaker 1: think in our lifetime we will find evidence of fossilized
Speaker 1: ancient fossilized life on Mars. If there's something more complex
Speaker 1: to life and there requires some sort of secret source,
Speaker 1: then we won't find that because clearly there's some special
Speaker 1: thing that happened here on Earth that won't have happened elsewhere.
Speaker 1: But if it is just as simple as the right ingredients,
Speaker 1: then I think Mars would have had all the right ingredients.
Speaker 1: And there's a few moons of Satin and Jupiter which
Speaker 1: looks like they also would have the right ingredients. It's
Speaker 1: much harder for us to actually explore those locations though,
Speaker 1: So yeah, I do think that life is potentially not
Speaker 1: uncommon and that it is quite easy to kick off.
Speaker 1: You just need the right things in the right place.
Speaker 1: The idea of life evolving to be smart, being intelligent,
Speaker 1: advanced civilizations all that, I think that's tremendously rare, and
Speaker 1: if it does happen, happening over the same time period
Speaker 1: also yeah, as us, but also the same distance kind
Speaker 1: of location, you know, whether it could actually we could
Speaker 1: cross paths or communicate, I think is much rarer.
Speaker 3: But what an eloquent answer.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I just wanted you.
Speaker 2: To be like, yes, tiny green people in your home
Speaker 2: under the bed. Yeah, yeah, like a plant, really.
Speaker 1: Really simplistic stuff.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I can't believe I've left so little time for
Speaker 2: AI because that's what I really wanted to joke about,
Speaker 2: but I didn't. Yeah, I mean this was bound to happen.
Speaker 2: We'll have to come back for a part two. But
Speaker 2: you have just released an incredible book, and this one's
Speaker 2: aimed to morant children, and it's called Is My Phone
Speaker 2: Reading My Mind?
Speaker 3: So that's I mean the question, what's what's the answer.
Speaker 2: Is is how close is AI to like sentient robots
Speaker 2: who are going to take over the world?
Speaker 1: Okay, so two. I feel like it's two part.
Speaker 2: I'm asking it to literally con it's an entire master's degree.
Speaker 1: Is it reading our mind? Sort of, it's not listening
Speaker 1: to us. But the idea of artificial intelligence and machine
Speaker 1: learning as it stands is sort of to try and
Speaker 1: read your mind and predict what you like, what you dislike,
Speaker 1: what you want to see what you want to hear.
Speaker 1: So you see that play out and things like Netflix,
Speaker 1: Thousands and thousands of things are available to watch on Netflix.
Speaker 1: The AI tries to predict what you are thinking, what
Speaker 1: you'll actually enjoy, and it serves those up as recommendations.
Speaker 1: So is it reading our mind? I go into much
Speaker 1: more detail in the book, but the answer is sort of,
Speaker 1: I'm certainly trying to. And that can sound creepy, but
Speaker 1: the idea that can it can tremendously enrich our lives
Speaker 1: and make things easier and ideally outsource some of the
Speaker 1: mental burden so that we have more time to ourselves
Speaker 1: and more mental capacity for the things we actually enjoy
Speaker 1: and are passionate about, and largely that I imagine will be relationships, family, friends, children,
Speaker 1: in all of those when you think about way you
Speaker 1: want to spend your time, it's typically going to be
Speaker 1: those things. So the second part was what's the second part? Oh? Yeah,
Speaker 1: how close.
Speaker 3: Are we to sentient robots?
Speaker 2: So we are going to literally you do, a robot
Speaker 2: take over us and in humanity forever.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So the problem you have with this is that
Speaker 1: there's no agreed upon definition of sentience and consciousness. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's sort of kind of there's some definitions that sound right,
Speaker 1: but if you ask different scientists within these fields, they've
Speaker 1: probably all got slightly different variations on what it is.
Speaker 1: And so trying to say has an artificial intelligence achieved
Speaker 1: sentience or consciousness is quite hard to say right now.
Speaker 1: Absolutely not, there's definitely not, just in the way that
Speaker 1: large language models, which is what most people are currently
Speaker 1: thinking of when they think of AI. They think of
Speaker 1: these llms like chat EBT, like perplexity, Claude lama, I
Speaker 1: think is metas one, and these are created to sort
Speaker 1: of make human conversation, and the way they're built, it's
Speaker 1: very very clever, sophisticated word predictors, essentially tremendously complex, and
Speaker 1: they are so good at what they do. They can
Speaker 1: mimic human conversation. But they're just trying to guess what's
Speaker 1: probabilistically the next word I should say. When answering this.
Speaker 3: Way, they're not doing it from feeling.
Speaker 1: No correct And so some people argue, isn't that what
Speaker 1: the human brain does? And it's well not, maybe, but
Speaker 1: maybe not. We don't know we know what LM's how
Speaker 1: they work, we don't know how the brain works. Did
Speaker 1: we just happen to create the same architecture that the
Speaker 1: brain does. I'd be surprised if that was the case.
Speaker 1: But until we figure out exactly how the brain works,
Speaker 1: you can't rule it out. But I'd say that's very improbable.
Speaker 1: So how close are we to sentence and consciousness? I
Speaker 1: subscribe to the idea that I think there's a missing
Speaker 1: piece to create sentence or consciousness. I think the architecture
Speaker 1: that governs large language models. You can keep scaling that,
Speaker 1: and that's what chat GPT is doing, it's or anthropics doing.
Speaker 1: They're all just you know, I think, what's the one
Speaker 1: GROC that Elon Musk made. They just build a facility
Speaker 1: with one hundred thousand I think they're h one hundreds,
Speaker 1: which are these like GPUs or neural processing units that
Speaker 1: are designed to train and build really really complex lms.
Speaker 1: You can keep scaling and making them more sophisticated, but
Speaker 1: all you're doing is scaling it. You're not fundamentally changing
Speaker 1: the framework. And so I think they're still a missing
Speaker 1: piece in terms of creating something that would be considered
Speaker 1: sentient or consciousness. But until we get to that point,
Speaker 1: you can create something that is remarkably good at mimicking humans,
Speaker 1: and even I think now the new zero what's it
Speaker 1: called one, the latest chat GBT. They haven't released the
Speaker 1: full version, but you can use it the preview. They've
Speaker 1: started trying to incorporate more reasoning and logic into their
Speaker 1: answers as well, so they'll get really close to creating
Speaker 1: very similar outputs to what a human would be able
Speaker 1: to do. But I think the framework is still missing
Speaker 1: something that would be considered sentient or conscious, and even
Speaker 1: the fact that like it's not if you don't prompt
Speaker 1: chat GPT, it's not thinking, it's.
Speaker 3: Not sitting there, well, you don't know, it just sits there.
Speaker 1: It's like, yeah, listening, but you know, like a calculator
Speaker 1: is not doing anything until you use it, it's the
Speaker 1: same kind of thing. And so yeah, you can't say
Speaker 1: something sentient where it's just not doing anything until you
Speaker 1: prompt it. So how long hard to say. With the
Speaker 1: rate of technological progress, Depending on how close we are
Speaker 1: with what we currently have, it could be quite soon.
Speaker 1: But like I said, I think there's there's still research
Speaker 1: and there still needs to be some sort of breakthrough
Speaker 1: in terms of the architecture. The machine learning architecture that
Speaker 1: will govern it. So look ten to twenty years. I
Speaker 1: don't know, I've just plucked that feeling that but yeah,
Speaker 1: that's based on purely that that there is an accelerating
Speaker 1: progression of technological development, but also kind of conservatively saying
Speaker 1: the twenty years because we still may not have figured
Speaker 1: out the secret of unlocking scent into consciousness yet and
Speaker 1: so that could be a bottleneck for some time as well.
Speaker 1: So watch this space.
Speaker 2: How good my prediction was, Yeah, Oh my gosh, we'll
Speaker 2: come back to it. I can fully understand why Abby
Speaker 2: did a two parter because I literally feel like I start,
Speaker 2: I'm so annoyed to myself. I started the episode saying,
Speaker 2: look at the complexity of a human and then I
Speaker 2: didn't even make it to Pash like and like, I'm
Speaker 2: already like why over the studio time. I'm so sorry,
Speaker 2: gone on so many tangents. But I feel like this
Speaker 2: is also why I love our friendship, because there are
Speaker 2: so many facets we are like our tandents go in
Speaker 2: so many different directions, and the breadth of the conversation
Speaker 2: is why I enjoy our friendship so much. So thank
Speaker 2: you for letting me do that in this episode, having
Speaker 2: totally inaccurately promised that I would cover all facets, which
Speaker 2: is impossible for the fabric of an entire human. But
Speaker 2: I hope that you guys listening have heard just a
Speaker 2: little bit of a mat that you didn't know already,
Speaker 2: and so much more to come from you. I'll of
Speaker 2: course include all the links to everything the new book,
Speaker 2: the first book, none of the articles about denying Khan crash,
Speaker 2: the incredible alcoholic free beer, and I will include more
Speaker 2: details about that in the intro and outro as well,
Speaker 2: and we'll have to come back for part two.
Speaker 1: I'd love to this. I mean, look, this was inevitable, right, we.
Speaker 2: Knew such strict notes, and then I just went, yeah,
Speaker 2: very very loose guidelines.
Speaker 1: We knew we were going to go very tangential. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this is no Thanks so much, haining, this is really fun.
Speaker 1: Want me to come back for part two. I'd love to.
Speaker 2: Absolutely. I literally feel like that was one percent of
Speaker 2: scrape in the surface. I can't believe I made you
Speaker 2: rush the actual astrophysics and AI part of it.
Speaker 3: Because there's so I feel like there.
Speaker 2: Is there's so much substance that just isn't covered anywhere,
Speaker 2: and I find it reductive, factual, but reductive.
Speaker 3: But I do hope that yeah, you guys.
Speaker 2: Were able to get a little bit of a glimpse
Speaker 2: into parts that you hadn't heard before. And if you
Speaker 2: do want part two, let us know and we'll come back.
Speaker 1: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Okay, So, as I mentioned, this is part one, with
Speaker 2: Part two definitely going to follow. I don't know how
Speaker 2: the time just got eaten up, and I was so
Speaker 2: frustrated at myself for the time management. But now that
Speaker 2: I think about it, Matt is so multifaceted, lending to
Speaker 2: so many different big topics and covering them any faster
Speaker 2: just wouldn't do him or them justice at all. So
Speaker 2: really I was unrealistic in thinking we could just do
Speaker 2: this in one part. We have so much more to say,
Speaker 2: particularly on quitting alcohol, as I mentioned leading to his
Speaker 2: incredible business, the non alcoholic beer Pash, which then has
Speaker 2: led him to a recent stint on Shark Tank, the
Speaker 2: impact that quitting alcohol has had on his relationships and dating,
Speaker 2: and so much more. So stay tuned for Part two,
Speaker 2: and all the links we mentioned will be in the
Speaker 2: show notes. As I said, if you enjoyed, please do
Speaker 2: share and tag Matt to thank him for his time
Speaker 2: and vulnerability. It's at dr matt Agnew on Instagram and
Speaker 2: in the meantime, I hope you're all having a great
Speaker 2: week and as seizing your yay. Part two will be
Speaker 2: coming soon and thank you guys so much again for listening.