WEBVTT - The Santa Claus Machine 0:00:03.800 --> 0:00:06.680 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind from how Stuff 0:00:06.680 --> 0:00:10.639 Works dot com. This podcast is brought to you by 0:00:10.680 --> 0:00:14.000 Audible dot com, the Internet's leading provider of audio books, 0:00:14.160 --> 0:00:17.080 with more than eighty five thousand downloadable titles across all 0:00:17.120 --> 0:00:20.320 types of literature. For Stuff to Blow Your Mind, Audible 0:00:20.400 --> 0:00:22.880 is offering a free audiobook to give you a chance 0:00:22.920 --> 0:00:25.799 to try out their service. One audiobook to consider is 0:00:26.120 --> 0:00:29.400 Physics of the Future. How Science will shape Human destiny 0:00:29.400 --> 0:00:31.760 in Our Daily Lives by the Year twenty one hundred, 0:00:32.080 --> 0:00:35.400 by Michio Kaku. Kaku predicts what the world will be 0:00:35.479 --> 0:00:38.360 like in one hundred years based on interviews from over 0:00:38.400 --> 0:00:42.360 three hundred top scientists from computers to robots to medicine. 0:00:42.720 --> 0:00:46.880 Kaku predicts an exciting future world. That's Physics of the Future, 0:00:47.120 --> 0:00:49.920 How Science will shape Human destiny in Our Daily Lives 0:00:49.960 --> 0:00:53.320 by the year twenty one hundred, available from Audible. To 0:00:53.400 --> 0:00:56.400 try Audible free today and to get a free audiobook 0:00:56.440 --> 0:00:59.800 of your choice, go to Audible podcast dot com slash 0:01:00.120 --> 0:01:08.560 mind stuff. That's Audible podcast dot com slash mind stuff. Hey, 0:01:08.720 --> 0:01:10.360 welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind. My name is 0:01:10.440 --> 0:01:14.840 Robert Lamb, and if you're listening to this episode. Uh, 0:01:15.000 --> 0:01:18.080 ideally you're listening to it during a holiday season, when 0:01:18.160 --> 0:01:21.039 this is like a cheerful kind of a thing, like, oh, Santa, 0:01:21.080 --> 0:01:23.800 It's kind of need to do in a Christmas holiday 0:01:23.920 --> 0:01:26.520 kind of episode. That's awesome because if you're listening to 0:01:26.600 --> 0:01:28.080 it in March, you're kind of like, oh, that's a 0:01:28.160 --> 0:01:30.400 Christmas episode. Or maybe maybe you even skipped it. I 0:01:30.440 --> 0:01:34.280 don't know. That's the danger of of seasonally specific episodes. 0:01:34.640 --> 0:01:36.360 But hang on, don't don't leave us if you are 0:01:36.400 --> 0:01:39.840 listening to this in July or something. Because we're getting 0:01:39.840 --> 0:01:42.720 down to some of the the science or the theoretical 0:01:42.800 --> 0:01:47.000 science of Santa Um. We have a really good UM 0:01:47.120 --> 0:01:49.720 article or two on the How Stuff Works website to 0:01:49.760 --> 0:01:51.560 deal with some of this, like how is Santa Slay 0:01:51.640 --> 0:01:54.480 actually work? And it's kind of fun to to take 0:01:54.560 --> 0:01:57.880 something that's magical like Santa Claus and try and translate 0:01:57.920 --> 0:02:00.960 into the real world. How would Santa Clause travel around 0:02:00.960 --> 0:02:04.320 the world in a single night? How would reindeer pull 0:02:04.400 --> 0:02:07.360 a sway through the air? Um? And one of the 0:02:07.360 --> 0:02:09.600 big ones, how does he make all those toys? Is 0:02:09.600 --> 0:02:13.000 it really dependent on elf labor? Where is there may 0:02:13.000 --> 0:02:16.520 be something a little more science going on. Oh, there's 0:02:16.560 --> 0:02:20.560 something more science going on for sure, something I dare 0:02:20.560 --> 0:02:23.720 say dangerous going on. Actually that could be menacing, right, 0:02:23.800 --> 0:02:25.440 we'll talk about it. I mean it depends on how 0:02:25.560 --> 0:02:27.480 do you think Santa Claus is the right person to 0:02:27.560 --> 0:02:31.600 command this technology? Or I mean is it safe? Do 0:02:31.639 --> 0:02:34.080 we need to see about securing it? I see, And 0:02:34.160 --> 0:02:35.639 this is a podcast where we will take you from 0:02:35.639 --> 0:02:38.280 Santa Claus to the singularity. Don't think we could do it, 0:02:38.320 --> 0:02:40.600 but we will from Santa Claus to possibly the end 0:02:40.600 --> 0:02:45.320 of the world in one night. Let's begin. So toys, 0:02:45.760 --> 0:02:47.880 if you've ever watched like an old Timmy Santa Claus 0:02:48.000 --> 0:02:52.400 film that tries to depict a toy manufacturing facility, they're 0:02:52.400 --> 0:02:56.560 generally making really basic toys. Stop animation. Yeah, it's elves 0:02:56.600 --> 0:02:58.960 hammering together some stuff. And sometimes it will be like 0:02:59.040 --> 0:03:01.440 children only get three or four things, like I think 0:03:01.480 --> 0:03:04.560 like in Santa Claus versus the Martians, it's like there's 0:03:04.600 --> 0:03:06.799 the doll, there's the bat, there's the you know, it's 0:03:07.280 --> 0:03:09.799 there's not a lot of variety. And the Martian kids 0:03:09.800 --> 0:03:11.679 did need it, but need a lot of variety and 0:03:11.680 --> 0:03:14.600 their gifts. But but ideally, if you had Santa Claus 0:03:14.600 --> 0:03:19.880 actually bringing gifts to everyone, he would need a universal constructor. Yes, 0:03:20.480 --> 0:03:23.480 he would need a device that's not unlike the technology 0:03:23.560 --> 0:03:26.000 see on Star Trek when they when they go in, 0:03:26.080 --> 0:03:27.920 they push a button and any food comes out of 0:03:27.919 --> 0:03:30.680 their little microwave like device. The idea that you would 0:03:30.680 --> 0:03:35.880 have a machine that could build anything, anything from the 0:03:35.920 --> 0:03:42.560 bottom up. Anything dog food turns into a lovely dress, right, yeah, 0:03:42.720 --> 0:03:44.920 in theory, in theory, yeah, they could build everything and 0:03:45.200 --> 0:03:47.720 everything from an iPhone to um, you know, a wooden 0:03:47.760 --> 0:03:50.800 horse too. I don't even like a puppy or something 0:03:51.280 --> 0:03:54.800 becau Santas to Clus sometimes brings live animals and possibly 0:03:55.120 --> 0:03:57.280 I'm just thinking about that. We were talking about stem 0:03:57.280 --> 0:04:01.640 cell generated organs. Why not a dog son out of 0:04:01.680 --> 0:04:04.240 that um So basically, to me, it's like a computer 0:04:04.320 --> 0:04:07.360 version of a golem, a computer that constructs at our bidding, 0:04:08.320 --> 0:04:11.480 but does so autonomously. And this is this is sort 0:04:11.480 --> 0:04:14.040 of a theoretical framework that we're talking about, but this 0:04:14.080 --> 0:04:17.000 is something that people want and actually, Philip might come 0:04:17.080 --> 0:04:19.640 into play some day in the future, right right, We've 0:04:19.839 --> 0:04:23.000 we've spoken a little in the podcast episodes about nano manufacturing. 0:04:23.360 --> 0:04:26.840 The idea of using nanotechnology and building things from the 0:04:26.839 --> 0:04:29.160 bottom up at the smallest level. The idea that if 0:04:29.160 --> 0:04:32.599 you're if you're building something at a molecular level UM 0:04:32.720 --> 0:04:35.880 or an atomic level, the way nature builds things, then 0:04:36.200 --> 0:04:39.040 you can build anything. Right. So the smaller the particle 0:04:39.040 --> 0:04:41.080 of the more you can manipulate it. Right. It's not 0:04:41.120 --> 0:04:43.640 like what can I build out of wood? It's what 0:04:43.760 --> 0:04:45.919 can I build out or even what can I build 0:04:45.920 --> 0:04:49.080 out of some sort of iron um molecules. You're dealing 0:04:49.120 --> 0:04:51.520 in an even lower level, like a base level, to 0:04:51.640 --> 0:04:55.480 where everything is possible. So this is the universal Constructor. 0:04:55.640 --> 0:04:59.400 John von Neuman, a Hungary Hungarian American mathematician, created a 0:04:59.400 --> 0:05:03.280 proposal centered around the combination of a universal constructor, which 0:05:03.320 --> 0:05:05.560 could make anything it was directed to make, in a 0:05:05.680 --> 0:05:10.039 universal computer which could compute anything it was directed to compute. 0:05:10.520 --> 0:05:14.240 This combination provides immense value because it can be reprogrammed 0:05:14.520 --> 0:05:17.839 to make any of a wide range of things UM. 0:05:18.040 --> 0:05:22.279 So we could do it um at a very low cost, right, 0:05:22.320 --> 0:05:25.400 which would be really important. And the ability of the 0:05:25.440 --> 0:05:28.039 device to make copies of itself, which would just simply 0:05:28.120 --> 0:05:31.320 be a means to achieve low cost, rather than the 0:05:31.360 --> 0:05:36.360 ability to continue to to stamp out versions of itself. Right. Yeah, 0:05:36.360 --> 0:05:39.479 that the idea of the self replicating machine especially is 0:05:39.480 --> 0:05:41.920 is kind of like the Holy Grail and the also 0:05:42.040 --> 0:05:46.760 the the ultimate um nightmare, right because but it's like 0:05:46.800 --> 0:05:49.720 the Holy Grail, and that that's what life does. I mean, 0:05:49.960 --> 0:05:52.479 the whole point of life as a as a larger 0:05:52.520 --> 0:05:57.280 concept and not just you know, goldfish or humans or cactus. Uh. 0:05:57.600 --> 0:06:01.520 It self replicates, like its whole programming is to make 0:06:01.560 --> 0:06:05.760 more copies of itself and make and make better copies 0:06:05.800 --> 0:06:09.760 of itself that will continue to to copy and copy 0:06:09.760 --> 0:06:13.200 and copy forever. So there's two issues with the universal constructor. 0:06:13.279 --> 0:06:15.440 One is the ability to have this sort of like 0:06:16.200 --> 0:06:19.440 uh Ford assembly line on steroids, right, to continue to 0:06:19.440 --> 0:06:22.880 punch out products. But then there's the other idea where 0:06:23.040 --> 0:06:26.479 it has the self replicating technology that it just begins 0:06:26.520 --> 0:06:29.039 to make copies of itself. Right, So all of a sudden, 0:06:29.040 --> 0:06:33.440 you have a universe that's populated by universal constructors. Yes, 0:06:33.720 --> 0:06:36.000 and my mom jumping ahead of a bit much, but 0:06:36.240 --> 0:06:39.040 just to see where we're going with this idea, right, 0:06:39.040 --> 0:06:40.479 because that's that's the whole thing. It's like, if you 0:06:40.480 --> 0:06:43.520 had a universal constructor, you can make another universal constructor, right, 0:06:43.640 --> 0:06:45.320 and it would be really helpful if you were going 0:06:45.400 --> 0:06:47.560 to construct something like the Dyce and Fear right, like 0:06:47.640 --> 0:06:50.200 we've talked about. Here's this idea about the Dyson Fear 0:06:50.680 --> 0:06:53.200 sphere that you could you know, harness the energy of 0:06:53.240 --> 0:06:57.400 another planet. You could build another habitat. But you have 0:06:57.480 --> 0:06:59.599 to have the technology for obviously, you can't send a 0:06:59.600 --> 0:07:01.600 bunch of people up there to do, you know, to 0:07:02.120 --> 0:07:04.599 Mars for instance, to do this. Yeah, and especially if 0:07:04.600 --> 0:07:08.320 you're talking about building mega structures to be at a 0:07:08.560 --> 0:07:13.880 and a particularly enormous skyscraper, a space elevator, or some 0:07:13.920 --> 0:07:16.560 sort of structure that you know, encloses a star or something. 0:07:16.560 --> 0:07:19.800 You're talking about taking the mass of planets and and 0:07:19.880 --> 0:07:24.880 transforming them into say, you know, carbon nanotubes. Yeah. Yeah. 0:07:24.920 --> 0:07:27.559 And actually the person who termed the Santa Class machine, 0:07:27.560 --> 0:07:30.840 physicist Ted Taylor, said, quote, it is possible to imagine 0:07:30.840 --> 0:07:33.160 a machine that could scoop up material rocks from the 0:07:33.200 --> 0:07:36.440 Moon or rocks from asteroids, process them, process them inside, 0:07:36.480 --> 0:07:39.800 and produce just about any product washing machines or teacups 0:07:39.880 --> 0:07:43.600 or automobiles or starships. Once such a machine exists, it 0:07:43.640 --> 0:07:46.960 could gather sunlight and materials that it's sitting on and 0:07:47.120 --> 0:07:50.680 produce on call whatever product anyone wants to name, as 0:07:50.760 --> 0:07:52.920 long as somebody knows how to make it, and those 0:07:52.920 --> 0:07:55.520 instructures can be given to the machine. I think the 0:07:55.600 --> 0:07:58.400 name Santa Class machine for such a device as appropriate. 0:07:58.640 --> 0:08:02.240 Of course you would. So then again we you've got 0:08:02.240 --> 0:08:06.120 the guy John von Newman, and um, he's trying to 0:08:06.120 --> 0:08:10.160 figure out this hypothetical machine, and he succeeds in figuring 0:08:10.160 --> 0:08:13.880 it out, at least theoretically, when he found a mathematical 0:08:13.920 --> 0:08:16.800 model for such a machine with very complicated rules on 0:08:16.840 --> 0:08:20.120 a rectangular grid. So it's based on a cellular automating 0:08:20.360 --> 0:08:24.040 a mathematical grid of cells that exists in a finite 0:08:24.080 --> 0:08:27.240 number of states, such as like an on or off position. Okay, 0:08:27.280 --> 0:08:29.120 And it kind of it comes back to, um, I 0:08:29.160 --> 0:08:31.640 think the whole, the whole thing about nanotechnology. The smaller 0:08:31.680 --> 0:08:33.920 the building blocks that you used to create something, the 0:08:33.960 --> 0:08:37.840 more command you have over the properties of the materials 0:08:38.000 --> 0:08:40.720 and then ultimately the things that those materials composed. Right, 0:08:41.080 --> 0:08:43.599 And I mean this has really taken off, especially in 0:08:43.640 --> 0:08:46.000 the seventies. People took this idea and they sort of 0:08:46.080 --> 0:08:49.480 ran with the cellular automating, and in fact, there's something 0:08:49.480 --> 0:08:51.920 called Conway's Game of Life, and this was created by 0:08:52.000 --> 0:08:55.760 British mathematician John Horton Conway. He created the game of 0:08:55.800 --> 0:08:59.400 Life based on cellular automating and described by John von Newman. 0:08:59.720 --> 0:09:02.440 A person essentially interact with a model by creating an 0:09:02.480 --> 0:09:06.840 initial configuration and then observes how it evolves. So this 0:09:06.880 --> 0:09:09.920 isn't a mathematical model, right, we're talking about computer science here, 0:09:10.440 --> 0:09:14.000 and it's really cool because it's a it's been a 0:09:14.040 --> 0:09:18.160 crowdsourcing sort of event, and people have created some really 0:09:18.240 --> 0:09:22.920 amazing theoretical models based on this. And what he did 0:09:22.960 --> 0:09:26.079 is he took of this idea that von Newman had 0:09:26.120 --> 0:09:29.040 and he created simple rules rather than complex rules. Okay, 0:09:29.080 --> 0:09:30.800 so he made sort of a miniature version of this 0:09:31.520 --> 0:09:35.160 um and the simple rules lead to emergence or self 0:09:35.280 --> 0:09:38.840 organized structures. And current developments have gone so far as 0:09:38.840 --> 0:09:42.680 to create theoretic emulations of computer systems within the confines 0:09:42.720 --> 0:09:46.280 of a life board. And Conway chose his rules really carefully. 0:09:46.320 --> 0:09:49.640 He said, one, there should be no explosive growth in 0:09:49.679 --> 0:09:52.880 these models. Okay, there should exist small initial patterns with 0:09:52.960 --> 0:09:56.840 chaotic unpredictable outcomes, there should be potential for a von 0:09:56.880 --> 0:10:00.079 Newman universal constructor constructor, right, because that's really the that 0:10:00.440 --> 0:10:02.280 the end all of what we want to get to here. 0:10:02.760 --> 0:10:05.240 The rules should be as simple as possible whilst adhering 0:10:05.320 --> 0:10:09.040 to all the above constraints. Okay, this is a gigantic 0:10:09.160 --> 0:10:14.120 thought experiment that eventually could get us to a place 0:10:14.160 --> 0:10:18.599 where it would have real world applications, right if that. 0:10:18.720 --> 0:10:22.880 Cognitive scientist Daniel Dennett has used the analog of Conway's 0:10:23.040 --> 0:10:27.440 life universe extensively to illustrate the possible evolution of complex 0:10:27.480 --> 0:10:32.400 philosophical constructs such as consciousness and free will from um 0:10:32.440 --> 0:10:35.680 this sort of simple set of deterministic physical laws that 0:10:35.720 --> 0:10:38.960 govern our own universe. So there's this idea that that 0:10:39.040 --> 0:10:43.800 free will consciousness was is a self organizing principle based 0:10:43.800 --> 0:10:47.360 on simple rules. Yeah, which means that I don't know, 0:10:47.520 --> 0:10:49.400 you know, to when we talked about this all the time, 0:10:49.440 --> 0:10:51.839 but you know whether or not free will really exists? 0:10:52.240 --> 0:10:54.960 You know, if there's uh these simple rules and only 0:10:55.120 --> 0:10:58.400 certain amount of outcomes are possible, then is it really 0:10:58.480 --> 0:11:02.680 free will? So again, this whole idea of universal constructor 0:11:03.440 --> 0:11:09.800 heavily theoretical, not experiment, but what if it actually did exist? Right, 0:11:10.040 --> 0:11:12.720 what we actually were able to create a machine, not 0:11:12.760 --> 0:11:16.440 in our lifetime. But let's not yet, not even not 0:11:16.600 --> 0:11:20.199 creating this little thing. But uh, but yeah, let's say 0:11:20.240 --> 0:11:23.280 nano technology really takes off next hundred two hundred, three 0:11:23.360 --> 0:11:27.080 hundred years, right, we end up the amount of freedom 0:11:27.080 --> 0:11:28.800 that we have over what we can do at the 0:11:28.880 --> 0:11:31.840 nano scale, the things that we can make eventually reaches 0:11:31.880 --> 0:11:34.920 the point where we can make virtually anything out of anything, 0:11:34.920 --> 0:11:36.720 out of anything. I mean it all comes to you 0:11:36.760 --> 0:11:40.040 cannot matter, Energy cannot be created or destroyed, be transferred, 0:11:40.120 --> 0:11:42.199 So you would have to have matter to transform into 0:11:42.240 --> 0:11:44.600 more matter. It's kind of like your your dog has 0:11:44.640 --> 0:11:46.440 to eat something if it's gonna go to the bathroom, right, 0:11:46.480 --> 0:11:49.760 I mean, it's just transfer right. Uh. The an atomic 0:11:49.800 --> 0:11:53.400 explosion is is matter becoming energy and all this. So 0:11:53.480 --> 0:11:55.439 for this machine to work, you would have to say, 0:11:56.160 --> 0:11:58.320 all right, Santa, Santa has this right, he needs to 0:11:58.360 --> 0:12:01.760 make toys, So he as the elves bring in, uh, 0:12:01.880 --> 0:12:05.760 I don't know, a mountain top that they've harvested, and 0:12:05.800 --> 0:12:08.040 they put the mountain top in a machine, and now 0:12:08.080 --> 0:12:12.720 he can transfer x amount of mass into x amount 0:12:12.840 --> 0:12:15.480 of presence the mass, it's the same. I don't know. 0:12:15.480 --> 0:12:17.800 He might lose or gain some energy in there somewhere, 0:12:17.840 --> 0:12:20.400 but I mean, he could even throw an elf in there. 0:12:20.559 --> 0:12:22.240 I mean, I'm not trying to get dark, but that's 0:12:22.320 --> 0:12:25.120 that's really what we're talking about, a society where every 0:12:25.240 --> 0:12:28.520 raw material could be repurposed to make a finished good 0:12:29.440 --> 0:12:33.040 with this universal constructor. Um, so what happens to big 0:12:33.040 --> 0:12:36.680 box retailers, right, Um? Presumably they become extinct, they become 0:12:36.679 --> 0:12:39.679 a small box, they become right that sits right next 0:12:39.720 --> 0:12:43.120 to you, and there's only one small box. Yeah, yeah, um. 0:12:43.200 --> 0:12:45.320 And so it also kind of makes a question about 0:12:45.320 --> 0:12:49.120 what happens to original design or even intellectual property, right 0:12:49.200 --> 0:12:53.520 because what we're talking about here again is a mass production, 0:12:54.400 --> 0:12:58.240 the ability to to take almost anything and not not 0:12:58.240 --> 0:13:00.600 only just feed it to a machine and and get 0:13:00.640 --> 0:13:03.160 something on the other side, but the design elements would 0:13:03.200 --> 0:13:04.840 have to be in there. I can't help but think 0:13:04.880 --> 0:13:08.600 about my Space in this. Remember how I don't know 0:13:08.600 --> 0:13:10.719 if you were ever on on the my Space back 0:13:10.720 --> 0:13:13.960 in the day. Uh No, I wasn't, but I'm familiar 0:13:14.040 --> 0:13:17.000 with it, and I I know that sort of um, well, 0:13:17.040 --> 0:13:20.320 it seems like the web ridden cave that it is now. 0:13:20.760 --> 0:13:23.320 Well you remember how some of you may remember how 0:13:23.320 --> 0:13:24.880 it started off. It seems like all the profiles were 0:13:24.920 --> 0:13:27.320 pretty clean, and I don't know if people were I 0:13:27.320 --> 0:13:31.280 don't remember if people were were given the power to 0:13:31.520 --> 0:13:35.520 change and customize their profiles over time, or if they 0:13:35.559 --> 0:13:38.200 merely learned how to do it, or probably a mix 0:13:38.200 --> 0:13:41.360 of column A and column B. But emergence, Yeah, it 0:13:41.440 --> 0:13:44.599 got to the point where people's profiles were just unreadable 0:13:44.640 --> 0:13:47.640 because they were they were adding like glitter script and 0:13:47.960 --> 0:13:51.200 changing the fonts in the background, and adding animations and 0:13:51.280 --> 0:13:54.160 video and sound, and it just became a nightmare where 0:13:54.200 --> 0:13:56.880 you'd like go to somebody's profile and it would like 0:13:57.280 --> 0:14:01.600 crash the computer or or your brain just trying to 0:14:01.640 --> 0:14:05.680 look at it. So, you know, in Facebook has been 0:14:05.840 --> 0:14:08.360 pretty ingenious and is avoided a lot of that by 0:14:08.720 --> 0:14:12.079 limiting what you can do to the profile. It's the 0:14:12.200 --> 0:14:17.240 Conway game of life. Yeah, yeah, I mean simple rules rights, 0:14:17.320 --> 0:14:20.480 the constraints are pretty yeah. Yeah. You give people enough 0:14:20.480 --> 0:14:23.840 creative rope there, they are going to hang themselves and 0:14:23.920 --> 0:14:27.800 create an unreadable profile. So the idea of a universal 0:14:27.800 --> 0:14:30.200 constructor where there there is no big box, there's no 0:14:30.520 --> 0:14:33.680 there's basically no mass production anymore. Do people end up 0:14:33.720 --> 0:14:36.960 just having horrible things that they've customed to. You're talking 0:14:36.960 --> 0:14:39.600 about like the Etsy of of I don't mean to 0:14:39.600 --> 0:14:41.360 say that a lot of Etsy is good, but if 0:14:41.360 --> 0:14:43.640 anybody has ever gone to regrets dot com, you know 0:14:43.720 --> 0:14:46.880 exactly what I'm talking about, the regret c flacation of 0:14:46.960 --> 0:14:51.440 life itself exactly. It's possible there could be like, uh, 0:14:51.480 --> 0:14:54.160 you know, pink boa is coming. I don't know where 0:14:54.160 --> 0:14:56.840 pink Boas came from, but generally they're not I think 0:14:56.880 --> 0:15:03.120 that they were Jesse Ventura. Yeah, yeah, nice, you get 0:15:03.160 --> 0:15:06.360 your wrestling thing in there. But so anyway, yeah, I 0:15:06.360 --> 0:15:07.960 mean there's this idea that there could be a lot 0:15:08.040 --> 0:15:10.320 of bad design, and only that that you would spend 0:15:10.320 --> 0:15:13.440 your life feeding the machine with whatever resource you had. 0:15:14.200 --> 0:15:16.920 And then here's where things get particularly dark. If the 0:15:16.960 --> 0:15:19.280 machines start to self replicate, which at point, at that 0:15:19.280 --> 0:15:22.200 point they'd be able to write, okay, because we're talking 0:15:22.360 --> 0:15:25.240 in the far far away land. The mission of a 0:15:25.240 --> 0:15:28.320 self replicating robot would be, you know, to continue to 0:15:28.360 --> 0:15:31.720 create versions of itself, and then you need more energy 0:15:31.760 --> 0:15:33.840 and matter to do this because we end up in 0:15:33.920 --> 0:15:37.280 like a matter economy or a mass economy. Yes, yes, yeah, 0:15:37.280 --> 0:15:40.880 I mean you know, currency is now dirt or or 0:15:40.920 --> 0:15:44.360 whatever material you can find. And not only that, you 0:15:44.440 --> 0:15:46.760 have a population that could be, you know, much more 0:15:46.960 --> 0:15:49.920 machine dominated than human dominated. And that's where the singularity 0:15:49.920 --> 0:15:52.000 always comes in. Right, So I mean basically, what I'm 0:15:52.000 --> 0:15:54.000 talking about here is the armageddon that could be ushered 0:15:54.040 --> 0:15:56.400 in by machines that are just gobbling up all the resources, 0:15:56.480 --> 0:15:59.000 including us. Right, So let's go back to the North Pole. 0:15:59.000 --> 0:16:01.600 You're at Senta's. You're trying to take it to the 0:16:01.680 --> 0:16:03.840 nice place again. No, well we're gonna We're gonna go 0:16:03.880 --> 0:16:05.720 through the nice place to the darkness. That's all right. 0:16:05.760 --> 0:16:09.920 So it's Santa's laboratory, his workshop. However, you want to 0:16:09.920 --> 0:16:11.400 look at it, because all it has in it is 0:16:11.400 --> 0:16:16.360 that universal manufacturing device. So this nano manufacturing wonder machine. 0:16:16.800 --> 0:16:19.000 And Santa has taken off early because he's a little tired, 0:16:19.240 --> 0:16:21.800 and he's left one elf in charge. And the elf 0:16:21.960 --> 0:16:24.720 h does something wrong with the settings, like he he 0:16:24.800 --> 0:16:28.440 accidentally flips it over, or he spills a little eggnog 0:16:28.440 --> 0:16:31.680 on the keyboard and it goes hey wire. So suddenly 0:16:31.960 --> 0:16:34.760 it's making a copy of itself. That is, that suddenly 0:16:34.760 --> 0:16:36.720 makes a copy of itself, and it's making a copy 0:16:36.720 --> 0:16:40.000 of itself, and it's self replicating without end. It's like 0:16:40.040 --> 0:16:44.280 a it's like a cancer cell, except it's transferring matter. 0:16:44.320 --> 0:16:47.200 And suddenly elves are disappearing right and left is they're 0:16:47.200 --> 0:16:50.160 sucked into the machine. Then the then it's like ice 0:16:50.320 --> 0:16:53.640 and polar bears, and then where does it end. We 0:16:53.720 --> 0:16:55.800 end up with this gray goose scenario. Right, this is 0:16:55.800 --> 0:16:59.120 the nano apocalypse, the idea that you could create nano 0:16:59.160 --> 0:17:02.680 machines or some sort of nano manufacturing device that ends 0:17:02.720 --> 0:17:06.800 up transforming all available matter into itself to where it's 0:17:06.840 --> 0:17:11.439 just a nothing but nano machines everywhere. It's just at 0:17:11.600 --> 0:17:14.720 what looks like gray goo covering the entire earth, and 0:17:14.840 --> 0:17:17.960 eventually is the earth well. And that's the interesting part 0:17:17.960 --> 0:17:21.040 of it, that's right, is that there's this ability to imitate. 0:17:21.280 --> 0:17:23.440 So it's very possible that all of a sudden you 0:17:23.480 --> 0:17:29.360 have machines that are able to imitate us, imitate uh, flora, fauna. 0:17:29.520 --> 0:17:32.040 And you know what I'm saying, it's not just replacing 0:17:32.080 --> 0:17:34.920 of the human being or even using humans as um 0:17:34.960 --> 0:17:38.280 as fuel, but but just sort of taking over the 0:17:38.280 --> 0:17:41.399 earth and in as many ways as possible. Well, indeed, 0:17:41.440 --> 0:17:43.000 you can go crazy on this and say that this 0:17:43.520 --> 0:17:48.440 apocalyptic Christmas that we're describing actually happened millions of years ago, 0:17:49.160 --> 0:17:52.080 and then after the gray goose scenario occurred, the gray 0:17:52.080 --> 0:17:58.280 go like reformed itself into some approximation of century life. Alright, kids, 0:17:58.359 --> 0:18:00.840 I know you're you're shaking your heads. Gonna happen, But 0:18:01.440 --> 0:18:04.960 we were talking about, you know, nanotechnology. We're talking about 0:18:05.080 --> 0:18:07.640 nano carbon tubes that are a hundred times stronger than 0:18:07.760 --> 0:18:10.840 steel and just tinier than a thread of hair. Yeah, 0:18:10.880 --> 0:18:13.280 the seeds have already been planted. It's just a question 0:18:13.320 --> 0:18:15.520 of how big will the nano tree grow and will 0:18:15.560 --> 0:18:20.480 it consume her happy holidays? All right, well, let's uh, 0:18:20.600 --> 0:18:22.800 let's call the robot over here. Surely we have time 0:18:22.840 --> 0:18:26.159 for a quick quick listener mail from the mail folder. 0:18:27.040 --> 0:18:30.119 You won't call the robot, Arnie William I'm still warming 0:18:30.200 --> 0:18:32.600 up to the idea that this robot as a person. 0:18:33.240 --> 0:18:36.480 So this one says, dear Santa. Oh, this is a 0:18:36.480 --> 0:18:40.880 Santa letter. I mean, these are all Santa letters. Wait 0:18:40.920 --> 0:18:44.359 and take this back, Arnie. All right, now, okay, now 0:18:44.359 --> 0:18:47.399 I have the right folder. Here's one from Robert different 0:18:47.480 --> 0:18:52.239 Robert Obviously it's not not me, Um, Robert him, hear me, Hi, 0:18:52.359 --> 0:18:54.280 Robert new Julie. I'm sitting in my car right now. 0:18:54.359 --> 0:18:56.800 Don't panic. I got to work early. I love the podcast, 0:18:56.840 --> 0:18:59.480 and I'm currently listening to the Quest for Cyber Immortality. 0:18:59.640 --> 0:19:01.119 And I want to let you know that I have 0:19:01.200 --> 0:19:03.960 seen this concept twice in fiction, both times to very 0:19:04.000 --> 0:19:07.040 creepy effect. The first example is in the Orson Scott 0:19:07.040 --> 0:19:09.679 Card novel Speaker of the Debt, which I actually just 0:19:09.720 --> 0:19:11.639 finally bought that the other day for like a nickel. 0:19:11.760 --> 0:19:15.320 I love used bookstores. Um. In this story, the protagonist 0:19:15.400 --> 0:19:18.760 goes through the universe, effectively living hundreds of years via 0:19:19.240 --> 0:19:22.439 relativistic travel, and seeks out the dead whose memory is 0:19:22.480 --> 0:19:25.200 being perverted. He does he does extensive research with the 0:19:25.280 --> 0:19:27.920 help of a galaxy spanning AI, and then performs the 0:19:27.960 --> 0:19:30.760 ceremony in which he represents the dead person as accurately 0:19:30.800 --> 0:19:34.520 and fairly as possible. The second example is from Doctor Who, 0:19:34.880 --> 0:19:37.919 Let's be honest, what haven't they done anyway? In the 0:19:37.960 --> 0:19:42.680 episode Forest of the Dead, astronauts consciousnesses are briefly preserved 0:19:42.760 --> 0:19:46.280 in their communications equipment, a phenomenon called ghosting. I find 0:19:46.280 --> 0:19:49.119 it interesting that there are these two opposite ideas about memory, 0:19:49.320 --> 0:19:53.119 the terrifyingly tragic ghosting and the catharsis of speaking for 0:19:53.160 --> 0:19:56.160 the debt. They make me wonder whether any middle ground 0:19:56.240 --> 0:19:58.520 is possible there. Thanks for reading, and if you use 0:19:58.600 --> 0:20:00.040 this in the show, give a shout out to my 0:20:00.160 --> 0:20:03.440 friend Matt for recommending the podcast. Thanks, and indeed thanks 0:20:03.480 --> 0:20:06.880 Matt for turning your friends onto our podcast. So word 0:20:06.880 --> 0:20:10.880 of mouth, that's the big way it spreads, like like nanoparticles, 0:20:10.880 --> 0:20:15.879 self replicating or viruses. Yeah. So if you have some 0:20:16.000 --> 0:20:18.359 holiday cheer you would like to share with us, or 0:20:18.400 --> 0:20:20.560 something about the end of the world, or just do 0:20:20.680 --> 0:20:23.399 some general ramblings about I mean with the big thing 0:20:23.480 --> 0:20:25.160 about our I love about our podcast is the idea 0:20:25.160 --> 0:20:28.440 that gets people's brains moving and gets people thinking about 0:20:28.480 --> 0:20:32.400 the philosophical or futuristic implications on the subject. So which 0:20:32.440 --> 0:20:34.719 gets us percolating. Yeah, yeah, so share it with us. 0:20:34.720 --> 0:20:37.320 You can find us on Facebook as stuff to Blow 0:20:37.400 --> 0:20:40.800 the Mind, and our handle on Twitter is blow the Mind. 0:20:40.920 --> 0:20:43.240 And you can always write a letter to Santa, send 0:20:43.280 --> 0:20:45.280 it to us and we'll afford it on And you 0:20:45.320 --> 0:20:47.680 can do that at below the Mind at how staf 0:20:47.720 --> 0:20:55.600 works dot com. This podcast is brought to you by 0:20:55.640 --> 0:20:58.879 Audible dot com, the Internet's leading provider of audiobooks, with 0:20:58.920 --> 0:21:02.560 more than and downloadable titles across all types of literature 0:21:02.760 --> 0:21:06.000 and featuring audio versions of many New York Times bestsellers. 0:21:06.119 --> 0:21:08.680 To try Audible free today, and to get a free 0:21:08.720 --> 0:21:12.200 audiobook of your choice, go to audible podcast dot com 0:21:12.240 --> 0:21:18.000 slash mind Stuff. 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