WEBVTT - The Science of Hell 0:00:03.120 --> 0:00:06.000 Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind from how Stuff 0:00:06.000 --> 0:00:15.760 Works dot com. Hey, welcome to Stuff to bow your Mind. 0:00:15.960 --> 0:00:18.200 My name is Robert Lamb and my name is Julie 0:00:18.239 --> 0:00:22.120 Dante Decklas. That's your that's your your nickname today. Does 0:00:22.120 --> 0:00:26.000 that make me Robert Virgil Lamb? Yes, I did that. 0:00:26.200 --> 0:00:28.600 I think that And um, you know we're talking about 0:00:28.760 --> 0:00:32.760 hell all Hell. Yep. We just did a whole episode 0:00:32.800 --> 0:00:35.519 which I think would be like an hour about the 0:00:35.840 --> 0:00:38.479 problem of Hell and about this our belief in Hell 0:00:38.560 --> 0:00:40.920 and where it comes from, why it's problematic, and what 0:00:41.040 --> 0:00:43.200 some of the what a couple of studies say about 0:00:43.200 --> 0:00:45.080 how it may affect the way we go about our 0:00:45.120 --> 0:00:48.720 daily lives. And so in this episode we're taking on 0:00:48.800 --> 0:00:51.279 the science of Hell, where we're gonna look at some 0:00:51.400 --> 0:00:56.200 scientific explorations about the structure of Hell, how it works, 0:00:56.240 --> 0:00:59.280 how big it is. Um, A lot of this deals 0:00:59.320 --> 0:01:02.240 with with doant but but but some of it gets 0:01:02.280 --> 0:01:06.160 a little Miltonian as well. It does, And we're covering 0:01:06.160 --> 0:01:08.959 this because it's sort of the ultimate magical thinking. We've 0:01:08.959 --> 0:01:13.800 talked about magical thinking before, about ascribing these supernatural properties 0:01:13.840 --> 0:01:18.399 to this construct. All right, and here we have an 0:01:18.400 --> 0:01:23.280 extension of our mind. Uh, that's troubled by being physically 0:01:23.360 --> 0:01:26.160 tethered to this body. This is how this is my 0:01:26.160 --> 0:01:28.760 read of hell, by the way, So we're unable to 0:01:29.000 --> 0:01:32.840 escape our physical selves or even our minds, and in 0:01:32.959 --> 0:01:35.600 that there's there's a certain amount of pain to be processed, 0:01:35.600 --> 0:01:39.760 physical pain and mental pain. And to me, this the 0:01:39.840 --> 0:01:42.440 repository for all of this is Hell. It's the pit. 0:01:43.319 --> 0:01:47.080 And we have put so much effort into Hell that 0:01:47.120 --> 0:01:49.760 we've actually mapped it out, or rather those of us 0:01:49.840 --> 0:01:52.360 who came before us, like Dante, have mapped it out, 0:01:52.520 --> 0:01:54.880 just so that we can place that angst, in that 0:01:54.920 --> 0:01:58.080 pain in very specific pockets. Yes, well, I think that's 0:01:58.080 --> 0:02:00.240 a pretty good read on it. Yeah, and it's only 0:02:00.240 --> 0:02:02.280 we've put a lot of effort into mapping it out, 0:02:02.400 --> 0:02:05.440 creating depictions of it. And a lot of it stems 0:02:05.440 --> 0:02:07.160 from the fact that if you're an artist, or if 0:02:07.200 --> 0:02:10.800 you're a writer, you're a poet. Um the idea of 0:02:10.800 --> 0:02:13.440 Hell is just a rich territory to play around in. 0:02:13.840 --> 0:02:15.600 And if you're living in a time when say, the 0:02:16.080 --> 0:02:19.520 Catholic Church holds way over pretty much everything, it's pretty 0:02:19.600 --> 0:02:22.520 much it's one of the few acceptable ways to say, 0:02:22.680 --> 0:02:25.360 draw a grotesque monster making love to a woman. You 0:02:25.360 --> 0:02:27.640 know that that kind of stuff in the same way 0:02:27.680 --> 0:02:32.280 that the Classics allowed the painters to to paint the 0:02:32.639 --> 0:02:35.240 you know, the the nude human body. And if it's 0:02:35.240 --> 0:02:39.480 incorporated into the right um, mythical or religious context, then 0:02:39.520 --> 0:02:42.520 it's okay. So before we get into all these explorations, 0:02:42.520 --> 0:02:44.480 I want to read just a quick bit from Chris 0:02:44.480 --> 0:02:47.920 Wright's Measuring hell Um, which appeared in the Boston Globe 0:02:48.160 --> 0:02:50.799 Um when he was talking about a publication that came 0:02:50.800 --> 0:02:54.920 out dealing with Galileos calculations about Dante's Inferno, which will 0:02:54.919 --> 0:02:57.960 discuss shortly, But but this particular quote I think sums 0:02:58.000 --> 0:03:00.919 up a lot of why we're talking about it. He says, 0:03:01.080 --> 0:03:04.919 debating the mechanics of the inferno might sound like intellectual horseplay, 0:03:05.000 --> 0:03:08.080 the sixteenth century equivalent of M. I. T. Cafeteria debates 0:03:08.120 --> 0:03:11.600 about the viability of star trek teleporters. But there was 0:03:11.680 --> 0:03:14.600 more to the lectures than this. The insides Galileo gleaned 0:03:14.720 --> 0:03:18.600 from analyzing Dante's measurements in fact anticipated a vital principle 0:03:18.840 --> 0:03:21.280 of structural engineering by asserting that you cannot create a 0:03:21.320 --> 0:03:24.120 giant Lucifer by supersizing the model of a man that 0:03:24.240 --> 0:03:27.160 increasing an object's magnitude would create a whole new set 0:03:27.160 --> 0:03:30.839 of structural and material imperatives. Galileo was paving the way 0:03:30.880 --> 0:03:34.160 for the construction of everything from ocean liners to skyscrapers 0:03:34.240 --> 0:03:38.040 to Macy's parade floats, um. And he goes down in 0:03:38.040 --> 0:03:40.960 that article to even compare it to our our attempts 0:03:40.960 --> 0:03:43.560 to understand many other things in the universe that that 0:03:43.760 --> 0:03:47.120 are based in science, but we cannot see. You're trying 0:03:47.120 --> 0:03:50.200 to understand how this universe works, and so you're applying 0:03:50.520 --> 0:03:53.680 these thought experiments to aspects of it, which is pretty 0:03:53.680 --> 0:03:56.360 cool because it's not just a repository for our fears. 0:03:56.360 --> 0:03:58.640 It's a thought experiment, right, It's a way for us 0:03:58.680 --> 0:04:01.520 to try to figure out physical universe. And a lot 0:04:01.520 --> 0:04:03.320 of these these studies, they do have a lot in 0:04:03.360 --> 0:04:05.880 common with some of these fun papers that you see. 0:04:06.240 --> 0:04:08.760 There's one that came out recently dealing with the created 0:04:08.760 --> 0:04:11.480 world of George R. Martin's wester Ros in the Game 0:04:11.520 --> 0:04:15.320 of Thrones series, in the and in books, and and 0:04:15.320 --> 0:04:16.960 they were trying to figure out, well, how would the 0:04:16.960 --> 0:04:20.479 celestial mechanics of this planet work to provide it with 0:04:20.560 --> 0:04:24.440 this weird seasonal cycle you see. Any we've we've seen 0:04:24.480 --> 0:04:26.160 some other papers though there's a number of them that 0:04:26.240 --> 0:04:28.320 dealt with the Harry Potter universe, where they're like, well, 0:04:28.320 --> 0:04:31.760 how the genetics of muggles and vizards work? And it's 0:04:31.800 --> 0:04:33.960 it's it's fascinating because it allows people to take their 0:04:33.960 --> 0:04:35.479 science and sort of play around with it, put it 0:04:35.520 --> 0:04:38.120 into this this box and and see what comes out 0:04:38.160 --> 0:04:39.720 of it. I can't help but think that of gale 0:04:39.800 --> 0:04:42.200 Leo's studies came out today that he would have been 0:04:42.240 --> 0:04:45.760 awarded a Noble prize. Yes, but which is kind of great. 0:04:46.040 --> 0:04:48.600 I talked about that Noble prize. Noble prize wonderful because 0:04:48.600 --> 0:04:52.200 it's not merely in some cases a little mocking. But 0:04:52.200 --> 0:04:53.880 but in most of the time, it's not about saying, 0:04:53.880 --> 0:04:55.600 look at this idiot doing this study. It's like, this 0:04:55.640 --> 0:04:58.440 is awesome. This person is is taking the science, applying 0:04:58.480 --> 0:05:01.760 it to some some little corner of of our understanding 0:05:01.839 --> 0:05:04.239 and uh and creating something useful out of it, or 0:05:04.920 --> 0:05:09.080 you know, marginally useful, but still amazing. Alright, so let's 0:05:09.080 --> 0:05:12.080 talk about the troublemaker who started this all. Dante and 0:05:12.279 --> 0:05:15.960 his publication of a Divine Comedy in thirteen fourteen. Yes, 0:05:16.080 --> 0:05:20.000 Dante a Leghari born twelve sixty five and Florence, Italy. 0:05:20.200 --> 0:05:24.279 Died September fourteen one in Ravenna, Italy. And that's pretty 0:05:24.320 --> 0:05:27.839 key because because of course Dante loved Florence and this 0:05:27.960 --> 0:05:30.919 was his hometown and he eventually was not allowed to 0:05:30.920 --> 0:05:32.960 return to it, and it was it was a bitter, 0:05:34.120 --> 0:05:36.400 bitter fact for him, and and it factors into a 0:05:36.400 --> 0:05:38.960 lot of his writings. But Uh, Dante was orphaned at 0:05:38.960 --> 0:05:41.680 a young age, but he grew off with with well 0:05:41.680 --> 0:05:44.280 off relatives in Florence, and he was well educated in 0:05:44.320 --> 0:05:47.200 the classics and poetry, and he went on to be 0:05:47.320 --> 0:05:49.240 a number of things in life. He was a businessman, 0:05:49.360 --> 0:05:51.360 he was a soldier, he was a politician, he was 0:05:51.400 --> 0:05:54.159 a philosophy professor, and of course, most importantly, he was 0:05:54.240 --> 0:05:57.280 a writer. Uh and eventually, as I said, a writer 0:05:57.360 --> 0:06:00.680 in exile from his beloved Florence. And of course he 0:06:00.720 --> 0:06:04.200 was also extremely interested in the sciences um, which as 0:06:04.240 --> 0:06:08.440 we've discussed before, um, when we're talking about consciousness and philosophy, UM, 0:06:08.480 --> 0:06:10.839 to be interested in the sciences was to be interested 0:06:10.839 --> 0:06:13.479 in philosophy. They often went hand in hand, and for instance, 0:06:13.520 --> 0:06:16.480 he uh he read the works of of Aristotle, including 0:06:16.520 --> 0:06:20.720 Aristotle's Meteorology. So what do you do if you are 0:06:20.920 --> 0:06:25.000 exiled from your country and you have, uh, maybe some 0:06:25.200 --> 0:06:28.520 very interesting ideas to explore, Well, you maybe map out 0:06:28.560 --> 0:06:31.320 this terrain, not so much of your country, but of 0:06:31.400 --> 0:06:34.960 your psyche. And this terrain would be in the form 0:06:35.160 --> 0:06:38.880 of hell purgatory in heaven. And this is the divine comedy. 0:06:38.920 --> 0:06:41.120 No comedy does not mean like funny, ha ha. Comedy 0:06:41.120 --> 0:06:43.839 means that is going to end well, yes, which it 0:06:43.880 --> 0:06:49.279 does in Paradise, Um. But the divine comedies. Inferno is 0:06:49.279 --> 0:06:51.440 the part that we really want to talk about because 0:06:51.560 --> 0:06:56.080 it's it's part of this epic poem, and the detail 0:06:56.200 --> 0:06:59.840 is so florid, it's so imaginative, and it is so 0:07:00.160 --> 0:07:03.760 very complete. It reminded me of Um the author. And 0:07:04.120 --> 0:07:05.920 this is going to escape me. It's gonna dropping nuts. 0:07:05.920 --> 0:07:08.000 So I'll follow up with this. But we talked about 0:07:08.040 --> 0:07:10.760 this in one of our mapping episodes. He spent thirty 0:07:10.840 --> 0:07:14.920 years creating this world language for he mapped it out 0:07:15.160 --> 0:07:18.480 in great detail, the topography and in a way, Dante's 0:07:18.520 --> 0:07:21.680 Inferno reminds me of this, because there's so much detail 0:07:21.720 --> 0:07:26.200 packed into this that it really became for people the 0:07:26.320 --> 0:07:29.679 landscape of how and it became such a popular text 0:07:29.760 --> 0:07:32.160 because of this. Yeah, I mean you, you really can't 0:07:32.200 --> 0:07:34.800 underscore this is the amazing level of world creation's going 0:07:34.840 --> 0:07:38.440 on here, um, exceeding at least on part of not 0:07:38.480 --> 0:07:41.600 exceeding the work that you see in uh in George R. 0:07:41.640 --> 0:07:45.680 Martin's novels, or in Tolkien's novels, any kind of fantastic 0:07:45.680 --> 0:07:49.040 world that we we think of when someone has created wholesale. Uh. 0:07:49.120 --> 0:07:51.680 You know, Dante basically did this with with the Inferno. 0:07:51.800 --> 0:07:54.920 He figured out exactly what the landscape would be, he 0:07:54.960 --> 0:07:57.560 figured out who the characters occupying it were, and and 0:07:57.600 --> 0:08:00.520 to your point, it is as much uh dante psyche 0:08:00.720 --> 0:08:04.360 as place as it is uh an imagined version of Hell. 0:08:04.520 --> 0:08:08.640 Because too, to read Inferno and and to read the 0:08:08.640 --> 0:08:10.920 Divine Comedy as a whole, is to get to know 0:08:11.200 --> 0:08:13.880 Dante's mind in and out. He doesn't hold back about 0:08:13.880 --> 0:08:17.000 his feelings about about this person or that person, about 0:08:17.040 --> 0:08:19.960 this subject or or this subject, And certainly along those lines, 0:08:20.680 --> 0:08:23.600 the Divine Comedy is a crash course in in medieval 0:08:23.600 --> 0:08:27.200 Italian culture, everything from the body stories and a little 0:08:27.200 --> 0:08:29.320 bit of dirt on this guy to what the church 0:08:29.400 --> 0:08:32.640 was doing. Who you know, what kind of heresies we 0:08:32.640 --> 0:08:34.760 were we're taking place in the world, and when we're 0:08:34.760 --> 0:08:38.760 still resonating, um, he's at times pursuing sort of petty 0:08:38.840 --> 0:08:43.040 vendetta's with individuals and and other times he's championing individuals 0:08:43.040 --> 0:08:47.200 who who who are are kind of scandalized, but that 0:08:47.280 --> 0:08:49.360 he had a lot of empathy for their. Plenty of 0:08:49.400 --> 0:08:52.080 characters there's there are one or two characters in particularly 0:08:52.080 --> 0:08:53.640 the encounters in Hell that he kind of kicks them 0:08:53.679 --> 0:08:56.880 on there down because they weren't they weren't friends with Dante. 0:08:57.120 --> 0:08:59.560 But there are others that he's really sympathetic for. Right, 0:08:59.600 --> 0:09:01.760 So you see some of the Florentine politicians who didn't 0:09:01.760 --> 0:09:03.960 square with him end up in Hell. See a number 0:09:03.960 --> 0:09:06.559 of popes are down there as well. Yeah, I mean 0:09:06.640 --> 0:09:09.920 popes that they send as well, right in uh in Dante. 0:09:09.600 --> 0:09:13.199 So let's walk really quickly through the landscape of this 0:09:13.280 --> 0:09:15.679 so we can kind of get rooted in what is 0:09:15.800 --> 0:09:19.880 important here when we talk about the science of Dante's Inferno, 0:09:20.120 --> 0:09:23.400 all right, so you can find maps of this everywhere. 0:09:23.400 --> 0:09:26.320 I encourage anyone listening to this who's not driving a 0:09:26.400 --> 0:09:29.160 vehicle whatnot, to look up a map and I'll try 0:09:29.160 --> 0:09:31.440 and include one on the blog posts that accompanies this. 0:09:32.080 --> 0:09:36.240 But to imagine Dante's Hell, Dante's Inferno, imagine, first of all, 0:09:36.320 --> 0:09:39.120 the round Earth, the Earth, that is the center of 0:09:39.160 --> 0:09:43.440 the universe. Okay, and uh, then Lucifer falls from about 0:09:43.520 --> 0:09:47.000 falls from Heaven like a rogue asteroid, and his impact 0:09:47.080 --> 0:09:50.559 forms an enormous crater in the Earth, all right, craater 0:09:50.760 --> 0:09:53.240 all and the crater goes all the way down to 0:09:53.280 --> 0:09:56.200 the core of the Earth. And that's where Lucifer stops. 0:09:56.200 --> 0:09:58.800 That's where he hits the bottom, okay, And that there's 0:09:58.800 --> 0:10:00.960 this enormous crater up aroun on him. Now, then you 0:10:01.000 --> 0:10:03.840 cover that crater with a vast vault, okay, So you 0:10:03.880 --> 0:10:07.040 have this vaulted crater in the Earth. The Earth has 0:10:07.080 --> 0:10:10.679 been pushed up for this entrance into Hell. Yeah, and 0:10:10.720 --> 0:10:12.600 the and the some of the displaces Earth too, has 0:10:12.720 --> 0:10:14.640 come out on the bottom the other side of the 0:10:14.640 --> 0:10:17.000 planet in the form of the Mount of Purgatory. But 0:10:17.080 --> 0:10:18.720 more on that in a little bit. So let's go 0:10:18.760 --> 0:10:21.400 to the very bottom of this this crater again where 0:10:21.440 --> 0:10:24.760 Lucifer fell. He's down there still his his crotch. Is 0:10:24.800 --> 0:10:29.040 basically the center of the of the world, kid. Yeah, 0:10:29.600 --> 0:10:32.000 this is the very bottom of the crater. It's also 0:10:32.080 --> 0:10:33.800 the center of the Earth and kind of the bottom 0:10:33.840 --> 0:10:37.360 of the universe too. And so Lucifer is frozen in 0:10:37.640 --> 0:10:41.280 the Lake of Cassias. Okay. And also you'll find other 0:10:41.320 --> 0:10:43.920 traitors frozen here as well. Uh. This is also the 0:10:43.960 --> 0:10:47.320 Well of Giants where we find the Titans of Greek lore. Uh. 0:10:48.080 --> 0:10:50.720 And it's also the ninth circle of Hell overall the 0:10:50.800 --> 0:10:54.600 domain of treacherous fraud. Okay. So let's we're walking out 0:10:54.720 --> 0:10:58.240 outward from the center and and emerging out of Hell. Okay, 0:10:58.440 --> 0:11:00.600 so we're going up, We're going it up. Yeah, we're 0:11:00.600 --> 0:11:02.959 doing the reverse of Dante on this. Okay. So when 0:11:03.000 --> 0:11:04.839 we reached the edge of this domain is a high 0:11:04.880 --> 0:11:08.240 cliff that rises up to a region of ascending terraces, 0:11:08.280 --> 0:11:10.840 each composed of the pit and this is the Maliboca, 0:11:11.280 --> 0:11:14.280 the eighth circle of Hell, and each bolgia, each each 0:11:14.400 --> 0:11:17.400 terrace that's kind of a pit unto its own uh 0:11:17.720 --> 0:11:21.319 and ringing all the way around. Okay. Uh, it's devote. 0:11:21.360 --> 0:11:24.040 Each one is devoted to a different form of simple fraud, 0:11:24.320 --> 0:11:26.640 such as there's one for panderas and seducers, there's one 0:11:26.679 --> 0:11:31.400 for flatters, one for sorcerers and astrologers, one for hypocrites. Um, 0:11:32.080 --> 0:11:35.080 it's worth exploring on your own, believe me. And then 0:11:35.120 --> 0:11:37.520 there are these demons who work there as well, the Malibraca, 0:11:37.840 --> 0:11:41.120 and they are in charge of tournamenting the individuals that 0:11:41.160 --> 0:11:44.199 are imprisoned. There one thing you mentioned when you were 0:11:44.920 --> 0:11:47.160 looking at this, you you were a little surprised to 0:11:47.200 --> 0:11:49.000 find that that Lucifer at the very bottom of this 0:11:49.120 --> 0:11:51.320 is just stuck and he's they're chewing on the three 0:11:51.360 --> 0:11:54.680 great traders of all time, Mark Anthony, Brutus and Judas right, 0:11:54.720 --> 0:11:58.120 because my satan is it is tethered into the version 0:11:58.360 --> 0:12:02.560 of of Paradise Lost, where he's just he's ruling and 0:12:02.600 --> 0:12:05.559 he's causing all sorts of mayhem. Yeah, he's a sympathetic character. 0:12:06.320 --> 0:12:09.440 But here falling more in line with some of the 0:12:09.480 --> 0:12:12.680 traditional accounts of hell previous, a lot of them would either, 0:12:13.120 --> 0:12:15.679 because Dante was again wasn't the first person to describe 0:12:15.720 --> 0:12:18.520 a trip to to even a Christian hell, but in 0:12:18.520 --> 0:12:19.839 the past a lot of times they would just sort 0:12:19.880 --> 0:12:23.439 of reference Lucifer or Satan from Afar. They wouldn't really 0:12:23.440 --> 0:12:26.360 get into him as a character. And so here Lucifer 0:12:26.520 --> 0:12:28.920 is very prominent, but he's not really a character. He's 0:12:28.920 --> 0:12:31.560 more just a force. He's the he's the force that 0:12:31.760 --> 0:12:35.000 formed this whole entire region. So he's really more asteroid 0:12:35.000 --> 0:12:38.320 than character. He's kind of in suspended animation because he's 0:12:38.600 --> 0:12:40.720 trapped in this ice. But what I do of is 0:12:40.760 --> 0:12:45.000 the imagery of his, not his public region, but his 0:12:45.120 --> 0:12:47.719 you know, his his hairy legs sticking up and then 0:12:47.840 --> 0:12:52.079 traveling across it. But we'll get okay, so um, so 0:12:52.120 --> 0:12:54.440 again we we we came out of that pit, out 0:12:54.440 --> 0:12:59.400 of the casitas. Then we encountered the mal the mal Bojo, 0:12:59.480 --> 0:13:01.600 with all these olds and all these little terraces where 0:13:01.600 --> 0:13:04.520 people were pubnished. Okay, and if the limits of this 0:13:04.600 --> 0:13:07.360 circle again we're moving out. We climb another steep cliff, 0:13:07.400 --> 0:13:09.839 and now we're at the seventh circle, the violent, and 0:13:09.920 --> 0:13:12.440 this is where the violence against other self or God. 0:13:13.080 --> 0:13:15.960 It's a fiery plane. At first we crossed that, and 0:13:15.960 --> 0:13:18.640 then we pass through the wood of the suicides. We 0:13:18.640 --> 0:13:21.360 have these individuals whore grown into trees. Uh. And then 0:13:21.400 --> 0:13:24.440 we pass over the boiling blood river of the Flagathon 0:13:24.840 --> 0:13:27.920 and then there's another sheer cliff wall okay, and we 0:13:27.960 --> 0:13:31.160 climb that wall. Then we're in the sixth circle. Okay, 0:13:31.200 --> 0:13:33.120 this is the domain of the heretics, and beyond that 0:13:33.160 --> 0:13:36.200 we find the walls of diss. This is this basically 0:13:36.200 --> 0:13:40.439 a medieval fortress, walled fortress, and it goes again. It's 0:13:40.440 --> 0:13:42.600 a circle, it's a ring wall. It's all the way around. 0:13:42.800 --> 0:13:46.000 So you can almost think of this wall existing to 0:13:46.120 --> 0:13:48.400 keep the horrors of inner hell from spilling out into 0:13:48.440 --> 0:13:50.720 the outer hill. Uh. Not that it's actually doing that. 0:13:50.760 --> 0:13:52.640 They just think of that in terms of a dividing point. 0:13:52.960 --> 0:13:55.559 It's a fiery fortress. Um. As you said, it's kind 0:13:55.559 --> 0:13:59.679 of where um it's staff only works right, and just 0:13:59.840 --> 0:14:02.600 in the train it's it's situated on a plateau here. 0:14:03.960 --> 0:14:05.920 So beyond the gates of Disk we pass into an 0:14:05.920 --> 0:14:08.800 outer region of lighter sins. First there's the angry the 0:14:08.800 --> 0:14:11.320 fifth circle, and then there's another cliff wall, and then 0:14:11.320 --> 0:14:14.280 there's the fourth circle of average, and then there's another wall, 0:14:14.559 --> 0:14:17.200 and then there's the third circle of Gluttony. Then there's 0:14:17.200 --> 0:14:19.480 the second circle of lust, where the souls are whipped 0:14:19.480 --> 0:14:21.400 about in the vortex of winds. And then there's another 0:14:21.440 --> 0:14:24.120 cliff and we find the first circle of Limbo, where 0:14:24.120 --> 0:14:27.080 the noble thinkers of old reside, people who are basically, 0:14:27.600 --> 0:14:29.680 you know, they're they're too good for Hell, but they're 0:14:29.880 --> 0:14:33.240 stuck there in the technicality. So so that's where they live, 0:14:33.280 --> 0:14:35.920 on the outskirts of Hell basically. But then finally we 0:14:35.920 --> 0:14:39.240 get to the we cross the River Acron and we 0:14:39.320 --> 0:14:42.160 find the real very outskirts of Hell, and that's where 0:14:42.160 --> 0:14:45.520 the lukewarm are, like, you know, the whole thing with Jesus, 0:14:45.520 --> 0:14:47.800 the luke you know, the lukewarm a warm I spit 0:14:47.840 --> 0:14:49.320 you out. You know you're not you know, you know 0:14:49.360 --> 0:14:51.160 they're good, they're bad. You really don't have a place 0:14:51.160 --> 0:14:52.760 in this And that's where these guys are. They're not 0:14:52.800 --> 0:14:54.840 even bad enough to get into Hell, but they're not 0:14:54.880 --> 0:14:56.600 good enough to be anywhere else. I guess you could 0:14:56.640 --> 0:14:59.320 say ne'er do wells or loafers. Yeah, right. They didn't 0:14:59.320 --> 0:15:01.240 really commit to need one thing, and so that's why 0:15:01.280 --> 0:15:03.840 they haven't done any wonderful deeds in there in heaven 0:15:04.120 --> 0:15:07.840 or anything terribly bad. And they're cast about into another level. Yeah, 0:15:07.840 --> 0:15:09.680 it's like yeah, they're just like, yeah, we don't have 0:15:09.720 --> 0:15:12.560 a place for you here. You can hang out outside 0:15:12.600 --> 0:15:15.120 the gates, I guess. Yeah. So, as you guys can see, 0:15:15.120 --> 0:15:18.480 this is a vast hell. We're talking about nine circles 0:15:18.520 --> 0:15:24.000 featuring three rivers, one very cold lake. There's fire, there's ice. Uh, 0:15:24.040 --> 0:15:26.680 there's a lot going on here, and just to get 0:15:26.720 --> 0:15:29.240 into the detail of it would probably take us hours, 0:15:29.240 --> 0:15:31.280 but we wanted to try to at least steep you 0:15:31.320 --> 0:15:34.440 guys at the beginning here with the basic geography. Yeah, 0:15:34.440 --> 0:15:37.040 with the vestival at the very top in the city 0:15:37.080 --> 0:15:40.720 of disc in the middle of just fiery compound, and 0:15:40.760 --> 0:15:43.200 then at the very bottom because site is the lake. 0:15:43.640 --> 0:15:47.040 So there you go, basic geographic summary of Hell. It's 0:15:47.120 --> 0:15:49.240 very important because this is the this is the world 0:15:49.240 --> 0:15:52.680 that these scientific inquiries and papers are going to deal with. 0:15:53.160 --> 0:15:55.320 So after the break we're gonna come back. We're gonna 0:15:55.320 --> 0:15:57.680 look at how the roof of Hell works, We're gonna 0:15:57.680 --> 0:16:00.280 look at how the weather in Hell works, and we're 0:16:00.280 --> 0:16:03.000 going to look at another a couple of other scientific 0:16:03.400 --> 0:16:18.720 concerns as well, regarding the inferno. All right, let's get 0:16:18.720 --> 0:16:21.640 back to Galileo and in what might have been his 0:16:21.760 --> 0:16:26.880 ignoble Prize for his studies about Hell and the measurements 0:16:26.920 --> 0:16:30.040 concerning them. Yeah, the year was galile I was just 0:16:30.080 --> 0:16:31.960 twenty four years old, hadn't really made a name for 0:16:32.000 --> 0:16:35.240 himself yet, He's a medical school dropout. And then he 0:16:35.320 --> 0:16:37.920 was invited to deliver to deliver a couple of lectures 0:16:37.960 --> 0:16:42.760 on Dante's Divine Comedy um and particularly about the structure 0:16:42.760 --> 0:16:45.760 of Hell, how hell might work from a a an 0:16:45.880 --> 0:16:50.920 architectural physical standpoint. Now, just put this in the proper context. 0:16:50.960 --> 0:16:55.640 By this time, Dante's Inferno or Divine Comedy would have 0:16:55.680 --> 0:16:59.360 been extremely well known and was the authority on Hell. 0:17:00.160 --> 0:17:03.240 People took a lot of stock in this is, taking 0:17:03.240 --> 0:17:05.400 it really as a sort of gospel of what Hell 0:17:05.480 --> 0:17:08.119 might look like. So for this upstart to come in 0:17:08.320 --> 0:17:15.080 deliver this speech about how the mathematics don't really hold up. Yeah, 0:17:15.160 --> 0:17:18.359 the very least, this was a highly regarded text. It 0:17:18.440 --> 0:17:20.600 was this is like you know, I mean, it stands today, 0:17:20.600 --> 0:17:23.359 it's still one of one of the greatest works of 0:17:23.400 --> 0:17:26.920 Western civilization, and at the time it was was still 0:17:27.080 --> 0:17:29.960 very well regarded. And so for anyone to come along 0:17:30.000 --> 0:17:32.280 and start knocking at the science of it and saying, well, 0:17:32.359 --> 0:17:35.400 you know, pointing out plot holes essentially. You know, people, 0:17:35.400 --> 0:17:36.760 you can get a little up in arms over there 0:17:36.800 --> 0:17:42.280 and to be weaving science with a little story here. Yeah. Now, 0:17:42.320 --> 0:17:45.520 in particular, the interesting thing he did um in this 0:17:45.680 --> 0:17:49.320 talk was that he dealt with a couple of existing theories. 0:17:49.400 --> 0:17:51.280 He was not the first person to do a little 0:17:51.280 --> 0:17:55.280 science thinking about the structure of the inferno. Uh So 0:17:55.640 --> 0:17:58.720 what he did is he attacked one particular architectural model 0:17:58.720 --> 0:18:02.640 of the inferno for an inferno, one proposed by Alexandro 0:18:03.040 --> 0:18:07.199 Valtulio of of Luca and while while he supported a 0:18:07.320 --> 0:18:12.679 second model that was suggested by the Florentine architect Antonio Manetti. Now, 0:18:12.760 --> 0:18:16.920 of course Florence again the birthplace of Dante. Uh it's 0:18:17.080 --> 0:18:18.600 important to keep in mind, well, it's kind of like 0:18:18.640 --> 0:18:20.480 the Bloods and the Cripts here too, because Luca is 0:18:20.560 --> 0:18:22.760 kind of like Bloods and and Florence is the Cripts 0:18:22.760 --> 0:18:25.920 and they have a long standing rivalry. Yeah, and Florence 0:18:25.920 --> 0:18:28.560 had just suffered a humiliating defeat by Luca in four 0:18:29.600 --> 0:18:31.719 and so this is on everybody's mind. So what does 0:18:31.720 --> 0:18:33.840 Galileo come It comes in. He comes in and says, 0:18:34.119 --> 0:18:36.960 Belatulo's his argument, his structure for the inferno that would 0:18:37.000 --> 0:18:39.359 just collapse. The guy's got it right, is our boy 0:18:39.359 --> 0:18:42.760 from Florence. And so he hands uh, he hands Manetti 0:18:42.800 --> 0:18:47.240 the victory and uh and then leaves. Basically, now, after 0:18:47.280 --> 0:18:50.560 the fact, he probably realized that both models would collapse 0:18:50.600 --> 0:18:52.639 because that is a huge vault that would have to 0:18:52.680 --> 0:18:57.240 be constructed to cover this enormous crater in the earth. Yeah, 0:18:57.240 --> 0:18:58.919 but he did. He took all the measurements that he 0:18:58.960 --> 0:19:02.000 could from the town X, like the blasted canyons and 0:19:02.040 --> 0:19:04.440 the valleys and the rivers, and he did find out 0:19:04.440 --> 0:19:06.760 that they did not stand up to mathematical scrutiny. As 0:19:06.840 --> 0:19:10.280 you say, he did sort of discredit one of um, 0:19:10.320 --> 0:19:12.640 one of them, But then later on he just quit 0:19:12.680 --> 0:19:15.040 talking about that whole thing. Yeah, and he knew that 0:19:15.080 --> 0:19:16.919 both of them were wrong, and a lot of Galileo 0:19:17.040 --> 0:19:19.879 scholars they kind of just they just kind of cast 0:19:19.920 --> 0:19:21.960 this this aside. It's just being sort of an early, 0:19:22.520 --> 0:19:26.640 kind of fun but not really important aspect of Galileo's life, 0:19:26.680 --> 0:19:28.239 And really it is more of a footnote to the 0:19:28.240 --> 0:19:30.240 great things that he would do later on. Yeah, But 0:19:30.280 --> 0:19:32.920 as Chris Wright had said, you know, it's his measurements 0:19:32.960 --> 0:19:37.480 of Hell inadvertently contributed to the foundation of theoretical physics. Exactly. 0:19:38.040 --> 0:19:39.680 All right, let's get out of the weather in Hell. 0:19:40.040 --> 0:19:41.879 And I believe they're used. My wife was telling me 0:19:41.880 --> 0:19:43.159 they used to be a website. We could go and 0:19:43.160 --> 0:19:44.840 you could get the weather in Hell, like whatever the 0:19:44.880 --> 0:19:47.000 weather is going to be, and it's gonna be like 0:19:47.000 --> 0:19:49.520 like a flash floods of ran said, yogurt and stuff. 0:19:49.560 --> 0:19:53.200 But you know, even better would be David Lynch reading it. Yes, 0:19:53.280 --> 0:19:55.200 there's a website where you can also get the weather. 0:19:55.240 --> 0:19:57.679 It's the weather than the normal world, right right by 0:19:57.720 --> 0:20:02.080 David Lynch. So Dante was of course possessed of an 0:20:02.080 --> 0:20:05.240 amazing curiosity, and and as I mentioned earlier, he'd already 0:20:05.280 --> 0:20:09.000 certainly read Aristotle's work on meteorology. He found rich poetic 0:20:09.160 --> 0:20:11.600 use of not only the weather, because certainly everyone loves 0:20:11.640 --> 0:20:13.760 to throw a little weather into a poem or whatnot, 0:20:13.920 --> 0:20:15.680 but he also understood the mechanics of weather, and you 0:20:15.760 --> 0:20:17.920 like to play with that as well. So meteorological themes 0:20:17.960 --> 0:20:20.479 pop up throughout his work in some of his earlier poems, 0:20:20.480 --> 0:20:24.000 and certainly uh with in the Divine Comedy. He lacked 0:20:24.000 --> 0:20:28.439 our modern understanding of meteorology. But but the relationship between 0:20:28.520 --> 0:20:31.040 water and earth, all of it factors into some of 0:20:31.080 --> 0:20:34.720 his earliest poems, and it's certainly a part of the Inferno. 0:20:35.600 --> 0:20:37.760 So yeah, he would have taken this knowledge and then 0:20:37.800 --> 0:20:41.880 applied it to this mapping of Hell, in this descent 0:20:42.000 --> 0:20:45.800