WEBVTT - Could aliens teach us science? 0:00:08.400 --> 0:00:12.040 When I say the phrase aliens have arrived, what comes 0:00:12.039 --> 0:00:15.160 to your mind? Do you think about humans getting sliced 0:00:15.200 --> 0:00:18.280 to pieces and served for dinner, or alien ships blasting 0:00:18.280 --> 0:00:21.720 our cities from space. Well, here in our happy corner 0:00:21.760 --> 0:00:24.920 of the podcast Universe, we like to be optimistic. There 0:00:24.960 --> 0:00:28.240 are potentially huge upsides to an alien arrival for the 0:00:28.400 --> 0:00:31.040 curious among us, and among those I count not just 0:00:31.200 --> 0:00:33.760 the host of this podcast, of course, but you, the 0:00:33.840 --> 0:00:37.120 listeners in our community of wonderers. For those of us 0:00:37.159 --> 0:00:40.080 who are curious about the universe, meeting aliens who are 0:00:40.120 --> 0:00:43.280 technologically advanced enough to arrive on Earth seems like a 0:00:43.400 --> 0:01:02.320 great opportunity. Pie. I'm Daniel, I'm a particle physicist and 0:01:02.360 --> 0:01:05.560 a professor at UC Irvine, and I want to know 0:01:05.720 --> 0:01:09.080 the secrets that aliens have learned about the universe. And 0:01:09.120 --> 0:01:12.600 Welcome to the podcast Daniel and Jorge Explain the Universe, 0:01:12.640 --> 0:01:15.440 a production of I Heart Radio. My co host Jorge 0:01:15.600 --> 0:01:17.840 Champ can't be with us today, so it's just me 0:01:17.920 --> 0:01:21.319 and a guest to talk about the secrets of aliens science. 0:01:21.840 --> 0:01:26.160 Imagine for a moment the best case scenario, aliens arrive 0:01:26.280 --> 0:01:29.319 on Earth and they are friendly, and we can figure 0:01:29.360 --> 0:01:31.880 out how to talk to them, and our scientists can 0:01:31.920 --> 0:01:36.040 talk to their scientists. Maybe these aliens know things about 0:01:36.200 --> 0:01:39.559 space and time or quantum mechanics that we haven't figured 0:01:39.600 --> 0:01:42.679 out yet. Maybe we could fast forward human science a 0:01:42.720 --> 0:01:46.640 thousand years or a million years. In this picture, you 0:01:46.680 --> 0:01:50.160 can imagine human and alien scientists are like together, engaged 0:01:50.240 --> 0:01:53.600 in some grand project to unravel the secrets of the universe. 0:01:54.280 --> 0:01:56.560 If we can talk to them, and if they do 0:01:56.640 --> 0:01:59.279 science like we do, and if we can make sense 0:01:59.320 --> 0:02:02.480 of what they've learned, it could be an incredible moment, 0:02:02.760 --> 0:02:05.760 really a pivot in human history. But is that possible? 0:02:05.920 --> 0:02:08.640 As one listener asked a few weeks ago, could we 0:02:08.720 --> 0:02:12.919 even rocket or would they be too advanced? So today 0:02:12.919 --> 0:02:20.840 on the podcast, we'll be asking the question, could aliens 0:02:21.040 --> 0:02:25.120 teach us science? Could we establish a common enough understanding 0:02:25.160 --> 0:02:29.640 to communicating about complex intellectual questions like particle physics? Would 0:02:29.639 --> 0:02:32.560 they be interested in the same questions we are, Would 0:02:32.560 --> 0:02:35.160 we be able to understand their science? Could it be 0:02:35.200 --> 0:02:38.640 incompatible with ours? Are we certain they would even have 0:02:38.760 --> 0:02:42.240 developed science in order to be technological To help me 0:02:42.280 --> 0:02:45.600 explore these questions, it's my pleasure to introduce today's guest 0:02:45.760 --> 0:02:49.080 Samuel Kimpton I. Samuel is a research associate at the 0:02:49.160 --> 0:02:51.799 University of Bristol. He works on issues at the intersection 0:02:51.840 --> 0:02:54.880 of metaphysics and the philosophy of science. Currently, he's working 0:02:54.919 --> 0:02:57.680 on the Meta Science Project, which seeks to unify the 0:02:57.760 --> 0:02:59.880 natural sciences, but he agreed to join me on the 0:03:00.000 --> 0:03:03.120 podcast to talk about aliens and how they think about science. 0:03:03.200 --> 0:03:05.919 Sam Welcome to the podcast. Thanks so much for having me, Daniel, 0:03:06.080 --> 0:03:08.840 So tell me first, how often does the topic of 0:03:08.880 --> 0:03:12.360 aliens and their scientific minds come up in metaphysics and 0:03:12.400 --> 0:03:15.440 philosophy of science. Is it totally fringe or is there 0:03:15.480 --> 0:03:19.160 like a whole journal devoted to this topic. Good question. 0:03:19.440 --> 0:03:21.560 Far from a whole journal, now that that would be 0:03:21.639 --> 0:03:26.280 a stretch. I mean, philosophers are very interested in thinking 0:03:26.320 --> 0:03:30.840 about wacky, far out possibilities and scenarios, so aliens do 0:03:31.000 --> 0:03:34.600 come up occasionally. There are also other monsters in there, 0:03:34.639 --> 0:03:38.480 sometimes zombies, vampires and the like. So I wasn't completely 0:03:38.480 --> 0:03:40.680 surprised that you choose to ask a philosopher to talk 0:03:40.720 --> 0:03:42.840 about this sort of thing. It seems to me exactly 0:03:42.840 --> 0:03:45.000 the kind of things philosophers might love to talk about 0:03:45.400 --> 0:03:48.680 because it's a great way to ask one specific question, 0:03:48.960 --> 0:03:52.560 you know, asking the question, how do aliens think about science? 0:03:52.560 --> 0:03:55.440 Could we understand their science? Seems to me a great 0:03:55.480 --> 0:03:59.360 way to reflect on whether or not our science is 0:03:59.520 --> 0:04:02.520 universe all or just human, you know, whether it's something 0:04:02.560 --> 0:04:05.480 we've discovered or something we've invented. So I would be 0:04:05.480 --> 0:04:09.320 a little surprised if it's not something philosophers already thinking about. Yeah, 0:04:09.360 --> 0:04:11.920 that's right. I mean, it's something that I've been thinking 0:04:11.960 --> 0:04:15.440 about recently actually in the context of the philosophy of 0:04:15.440 --> 0:04:18.080 the laws of nature and to what extent we should 0:04:18.120 --> 0:04:21.040 be kind of realist or pragmatists about these things. And 0:04:21.080 --> 0:04:22.760 maybe we can get into that in some more detail. 0:04:22.839 --> 0:04:25.839 But there's definitely some value, certainly in thinking about how 0:04:26.320 --> 0:04:29.120 just beings with very different kind of modes of cognition 0:04:29.600 --> 0:04:32.760 might explore the world and kind of systematize their experiences 0:04:32.760 --> 0:04:35.760 as well. Right, So, you know, we've got our five senses, 0:04:35.839 --> 0:04:38.640 and that seems to be completely integralt up to how 0:04:38.640 --> 0:04:40.280 we're going to explore the world, and so we're going 0:04:40.320 --> 0:04:42.400 to be systematizing the world on the basis of our 0:04:42.600 --> 0:04:46.480 sense experience. But it seems certainly imaginable that some other 0:04:46.520 --> 0:04:48.800 creatures would have very different senses, and so the way 0:04:48.839 --> 0:04:51.600 they systematize the world and do science would be would 0:04:51.600 --> 0:04:54.760 be quite different. Indeed, in senses are something that philosophers 0:04:54.760 --> 0:04:56.760 I know, to talk about a lot. Is a person 0:04:56.880 --> 0:04:58.800 isolated in a room who has never seen the color 0:04:58.880 --> 0:05:01.960 red and notion of quality. But it seems to me 0:05:02.040 --> 0:05:04.839 to be sort of a difficult topic to explore because 0:05:04.880 --> 0:05:08.920 we are limited to our senses, and so we're sort 0:05:08.920 --> 0:05:10.800 of in a box, and it's hard to imagine, like 0:05:10.880 --> 0:05:12.760 what it's like to be in a different box where 0:05:12.760 --> 0:05:16.120 you experience the universe with totally different senses. It's the 0:05:16.120 --> 0:05:18.159 goal there to think about, like what it would be 0:05:18.240 --> 0:05:22.839 like to experience the universe if you could like taste electrons, 0:05:22.960 --> 0:05:25.920 or if you had some sense for dark matter or neutrinos. 0:05:26.320 --> 0:05:28.360 Is it possible for us to really take that jump 0:05:28.360 --> 0:05:31.200 into sort of logic our way into what it's like 0:05:31.320 --> 0:05:32.640 to be a bat and you know, what it's like 0:05:32.680 --> 0:05:35.520 to be an alien? Or is that really impossible? Exactly right? 0:05:35.560 --> 0:05:37.720 I think that's the exact sort sorts of issues that 0:05:37.800 --> 0:05:40.599 people might like to wrestle within this area, right, And yeah, 0:05:40.640 --> 0:05:42.480 you've got the reference in there to what it's like 0:05:42.640 --> 0:05:46.000 to be a bat, and famously, philosopher Thomas Nagil argued 0:05:46.040 --> 0:05:47.880 that we can't possibly know what it's like to be 0:05:47.920 --> 0:05:50.240 about but while that might be the case, at least 0:05:50.279 --> 0:05:52.839 we can sort of start to think about why that's so. Right, 0:05:52.880 --> 0:05:56.039 So the bat navigates by by sonar as opposed to 0:05:56.080 --> 0:05:59.039 kind of visual experiences, and while we can kind of 0:05:59.279 --> 0:06:02.760 do some side of sonar, it seems a long step 0:06:02.839 --> 0:06:05.680 from that to actually being able to know what it's 0:06:05.720 --> 0:06:08.599 like to be that bat. And so it certainly seems 0:06:08.760 --> 0:06:12.400 imaginable that there are just other actual creatures out there, 0:06:12.520 --> 0:06:15.440 or possible alien creatures that would just experienced the world 0:06:15.480 --> 0:06:18.800 so dramatically differently to us that it would be impossible 0:06:18.880 --> 0:06:21.520 to kind of get into their perspectives and their minds. 0:06:21.600 --> 0:06:23.719 And so this is quite mind boggling to think that 0:06:23.760 --> 0:06:27.440 the way that we're experiencing the universe is potentially quite 0:06:27.640 --> 0:06:29.760 limited in a way. And we know that it's limited. 0:06:29.760 --> 0:06:32.200 I mean, physics at least has told us that most 0:06:32.240 --> 0:06:34.880 of the universe is invisible to us. You know, most 0:06:34.880 --> 0:06:37.000 of the universe is dark matter, which we don't even 0:06:37.000 --> 0:06:39.279 know what it is, and even of the matter that 0:06:39.320 --> 0:06:42.280 we are familiar with, like neutrinos are streaming in front 0:06:42.279 --> 0:06:44.680 of us all of the time, but we can't see them, 0:06:44.720 --> 0:06:46.839 And so there's a lot. We know for a fact 0:06:46.920 --> 0:06:48.680 that there's a lot going on in the universe that 0:06:48.760 --> 0:06:52.080 we do not sense, and that therefore our mental picture 0:06:52.080 --> 0:06:54.599 of the universe is a very particular one. And it 0:06:54.600 --> 0:06:57.320 seems frustrating but enticing to me at the same time. Like, 0:06:57.600 --> 0:07:00.880 if aliens are so alien that they might be impossible 0:07:00.920 --> 0:07:04.680 for us to really digest, that also suggest that they 0:07:04.680 --> 0:07:08.039 have some very valuable insight, Like the more alien they are, 0:07:08.480 --> 0:07:11.240 the more valuable it is to try to understand their minds. 0:07:11.360 --> 0:07:15.960 But then periodoxically, the more impossible it might be. Yeah, interesting, right, So, 0:07:16.080 --> 0:07:18.360 like you said, it's tantalizing because even if we were 0:07:18.360 --> 0:07:20.640 to encounter these creatures, maybe we just have no way 0:07:20.680 --> 0:07:23.760 of communicating with them, so we have no into their insights. 0:07:24.040 --> 0:07:25.600 But then I guess there there might be kind of 0:07:25.760 --> 0:07:28.240 two dimensions to this issue. So what you said, they're 0:07:28.240 --> 0:07:31.640 suggested the possibility of creatures that might be able to 0:07:31.760 --> 0:07:34.160 perceive things that maybe we have some sort of knowledge 0:07:34.160 --> 0:07:36.800 of but no direct perception of, things like neutrinos and that. 0:07:37.160 --> 0:07:39.480 But I suppose another thing that we might think is 0:07:39.520 --> 0:07:41.880 just that, going back to the bad example, they kind 0:07:41.880 --> 0:07:44.640 of the mode of perceiving one's environment might just be 0:07:44.760 --> 0:07:47.160 very different for the aliens. So if they perceived by 0:07:47.600 --> 0:07:50.440 reflecting sound waves of surfaces, that would just give them 0:07:50.440 --> 0:07:53.400 a very different kind of experience. I also often think 0:07:53.440 --> 0:07:56.160 about the example of the aliens in that the Ted 0:07:56.240 --> 0:07:59.080 Chang story Stories of Your Life or the film Rival, 0:07:59.400 --> 0:08:01.520 and they have this very differently if I remember correctly 0:08:01.520 --> 0:08:03.080 as well, I guess, and so since I read the 0:08:03.120 --> 0:08:07.400 short story, but they have this very different perception of time, right, 0:08:07.440 --> 0:08:09.640 And it seems plausible to me that there could be 0:08:09.680 --> 0:08:12.240 a creature with a very different perception of time, and 0:08:12.280 --> 0:08:14.560 then that would just make the way they systematized and 0:08:14.600 --> 0:08:17.600 think about their worlds so different from us. Absolutely. I 0:08:17.600 --> 0:08:19.440 think one of the really fun things about that story 0:08:19.880 --> 0:08:23.560 and the movie is understanding and appreciating how difficult it 0:08:23.720 --> 0:08:26.480 might be to communicate with aliens, not to mention, like 0:08:26.800 --> 0:08:29.320 talk about, you know, their notions of quantum mechanics, but 0:08:29.400 --> 0:08:32.400 just like get the basics down, you know, and that's 0:08:32.440 --> 0:08:34.880 a whole other question, you know, And maybe for today 0:08:34.920 --> 0:08:36.880 we should put that aside with the question of whether 0:08:36.920 --> 0:08:40.240 we could discover alien messages, whether we could develop a 0:08:40.240 --> 0:08:43.200 common language with them. We recently had No M. Chomsky 0:08:43.360 --> 0:08:46.360 and Kareem Jabari on the podcast to talk about, you know, 0:08:46.440 --> 0:08:49.840 the universality of language, And something that comes up often 0:08:49.920 --> 0:08:54.240 in these conversations is not necessarily like could we understand 0:08:54.280 --> 0:08:57.680 their lingo and their slaying and how they communicate, but 0:08:57.800 --> 0:09:00.319 that there might be a deeper way to communicate something 0:09:00.320 --> 0:09:03.360 that's common, something that's universal. This is this I think 0:09:03.360 --> 0:09:06.199 widely held belief that we can avoid this whole question 0:09:06.240 --> 0:09:09.200 of language by focusing on the mathematics and the physics, 0:09:09.240 --> 0:09:12.680 which might be more universal. And Carl Sagan famously argued 0:09:12.720 --> 0:09:16.199 that we could use mathematics to find a common intellectual context. 0:09:16.360 --> 0:09:19.520 But how much can we say about like the universality 0:09:19.679 --> 0:09:23.000 of mathematics itself, What do we know about whether it's 0:09:23.080 --> 0:09:26.360 likely to be just the way humans think, like an abstract, 0:09:26.440 --> 0:09:29.880 sort of succinct way to describe the thought processes that 0:09:29.920 --> 0:09:33.240 we have, or something that actually reflects the objective structure 0:09:33.320 --> 0:09:36.520 of the universe. How do we probe that kind of question? Yeah, 0:09:36.520 --> 0:09:38.680 that's that's a great question. Daniel, And this is a 0:09:38.720 --> 0:09:41.679 whole area of really fruitful research and philosophy and the 0:09:41.679 --> 0:09:44.640 philosophy of of mathematics, which I certainly can't claim to 0:09:44.640 --> 0:09:46.719 be any kind of expert on, but it's it's it's 0:09:46.760 --> 0:09:50.320 tantalizing for sure. I mean, there's this problem, right that 0:09:50.360 --> 0:09:53.480 you might have encountered, a problem of the unreasonable effectiveness 0:09:53.520 --> 0:09:57.319 of mathematics. And it seems kind of surprising and really 0:09:57.360 --> 0:10:00.240 cool that mathematics turns out to be so good at 0:10:00.240 --> 0:10:03.640 describing the physical universe that we find around us, right, 0:10:03.679 --> 0:10:07.720 this abstract formal system that we've perhaps invented. You know, 0:10:07.760 --> 0:10:10.280 a lot of branches of mathematics come about just by 0:10:10.320 --> 0:10:13.160 mathematicians thinking in the abstract kind of having fun and 0:10:13.200 --> 0:10:15.560 doing puzzles, if you like, and then turn out to 0:10:15.640 --> 0:10:19.360 be applicable to real physical systems. And this this is 0:10:19.440 --> 0:10:23.120 kind of remarkable and maybe something like a hint at 0:10:23.160 --> 0:10:25.640 the fact that the universe is in a way kind 0:10:25.640 --> 0:10:28.920 of made in these mathematical terms and there's something objective 0:10:28.960 --> 0:10:31.560 going on here. So that's an interesting thought. Yeah, maybe 0:10:31.600 --> 0:10:33.880 there's some hope that that could be something of a 0:10:34.000 --> 0:10:37.800 universal that even crazy arrival type aliens might be able 0:10:37.800 --> 0:10:40.400 to communicate with us in terms of I'd love to 0:10:40.400 --> 0:10:43.200 believe that, and I'd love to think that mathematics is 0:10:43.240 --> 0:10:46.360 somehow the language of the universe itself, you know that, 0:10:46.520 --> 0:10:49.120 like if we're in a simulation and mathematics is the 0:10:49.120 --> 0:10:51.280 way that the source code has been written in some way. 0:10:51.400 --> 0:10:54.400 But it seems to me a little bit presumptuous, And 0:10:54.480 --> 0:10:57.240 let me take the devil's advocate position there and argue 0:10:57.280 --> 0:10:59.559 against it. The thing that makes me wonder about whether 0:10:59.600 --> 0:11:03.320 mathemat x really is fundamental is not that mathematics is 0:11:03.360 --> 0:11:06.520 not effective, because you're right, it absolutely is. It's incredible 0:11:06.720 --> 0:11:09.680 how well our physical theories work. And I'm a particle physicist, 0:11:09.720 --> 0:11:12.800 and we make mathematical predictions to like ten decimal places, 0:11:12.800 --> 0:11:14.120 and we go out in the universe and we do 0:11:14.160 --> 0:11:16.760 experiments and while they're banging on right, and that gives 0:11:16.800 --> 0:11:18.920 you this feeling like, wow, maybe this isn't just a 0:11:18.960 --> 0:11:21.520 description of the universe. Maybe it is the way the 0:11:21.600 --> 0:11:25.480 universe does these calculations. But the problem with that argument 0:11:25.800 --> 0:11:29.559 is that every theory that we have, every mathematical description 0:11:29.600 --> 0:11:32.400 we have of the universe, we know is an effective theory, 0:11:32.520 --> 0:11:36.719 not a fundamental theory. We know that it has domains validity. 0:11:36.920 --> 0:11:40.440 You know. For example, Newton's theory works really really well 0:11:40.920 --> 0:11:43.840 until we measured very precisely the orbit of mercury. We 0:11:43.840 --> 0:11:46.440 were like, wow, this might be the way the universe works. 0:11:46.440 --> 0:11:49.080 Maybe Newton had revealed the truth of the universe. And 0:11:49.120 --> 0:11:52.000 so there are many theories out there that only work 0:11:52.080 --> 0:11:54.800 in sort of a region, in under certain conditions or 0:11:55.040 --> 0:11:58.480 in certain systems, And can you say that they are 0:11:58.559 --> 0:12:01.160 a fundamental description of the never is a true description 0:12:01.160 --> 0:12:03.640 of the way the universe works? Definitely not right. Newton 0:12:03.800 --> 0:12:06.720 was not correct about the real nature of space and 0:12:06.840 --> 0:12:09.840 time and gravity, and yet his theory worked really well. 0:12:09.880 --> 0:12:12.040 And today we have theories that work really well, but 0:12:12.120 --> 0:12:15.520 we suspect or we are fairly confident that they aren't 0:12:15.640 --> 0:12:18.199 the devast theories of the universe. The current standard model, 0:12:18.240 --> 0:12:20.640 for example, will break down at the plank scale, where 0:12:20.640 --> 0:12:23.200 it needs a description of gravity. So how do we 0:12:23.240 --> 0:12:27.000 know that there are mathematical descriptions that are really fundamental, 0:12:27.120 --> 0:12:30.280 not just effective in some regime. Are we just looking 0:12:30.280 --> 0:12:33.480 at sort of like a patchwork of mathematical ideas, not 0:12:33.679 --> 0:12:36.640 like a true revealing of the nature of the universe. Yeah, 0:12:36.679 --> 0:12:39.360 an interesting. Dannally a very good point that it reminds 0:12:39.400 --> 0:12:42.400 me of a debate in the philosophy of science, realism 0:12:42.480 --> 0:12:45.840 versus anti realism, roughly the debate over whether or not 0:12:45.960 --> 0:12:48.120 science kind of gets that the truth of how things are. 0:12:48.320 --> 0:12:50.000 And the anti realists say that who say that it 0:12:50.000 --> 0:12:52.520 doesn't get the truth have an argument along those lines, right, 0:12:52.520 --> 0:12:55.160 They say, Look, all of these past scientific theories have 0:12:55.240 --> 0:12:57.520 proven to be false, so why could we hold out 0:12:57.520 --> 0:13:00.000 any any hope that our current theories are anywhere near 0:13:00.080 --> 0:13:02.000 the truth? But then the flip side of that is, 0:13:02.040 --> 0:13:04.400 like you say, the or perhaps you alluded to that 0:13:04.559 --> 0:13:08.120 these kind of false theories that are are mathematized as 0:13:08.160 --> 0:13:10.920 as we've mentioned before as well, nonetheless seemed to be 0:13:11.120 --> 0:13:13.640 kind of doing doing quite well, and we can we 0:13:13.679 --> 0:13:15.760 can do some good work with things like Newton's theory. 0:13:15.760 --> 0:13:19.319 We can send people into space and stuff like that. Right, Um, 0:13:19.400 --> 0:13:21.600 So although they might be strictly speaking false, they might 0:13:21.600 --> 0:13:24.560 be kind of getting at something that's kind of almost right. 0:13:24.920 --> 0:13:28.400 And we might think that the better theories nonetheless preserve 0:13:28.559 --> 0:13:31.760 something of the structure of Newton's theory. So then something 0:13:31.800 --> 0:13:34.520 that some metaphysicians and philosophers of science have said, in 0:13:34.559 --> 0:13:38.040 response to this kind of pessimistic argument for anti realism 0:13:38.040 --> 0:13:40.719 and a slightly more skeptical stances, that maybe what we're 0:13:40.760 --> 0:13:43.720 doing when we're describing the universe kind of imperfectly but 0:13:43.760 --> 0:13:45.319 in a way that kind of works and is then 0:13:45.360 --> 0:13:49.280 built on, is we're getting at some underlying deep structure. Right, 0:13:49.320 --> 0:13:52.040 So then maybe maybe our mass, maybe even something like 0:13:52.080 --> 0:13:55.800 Newton's theory is nonetheless latching onto some sort of objective 0:13:56.120 --> 0:13:59.720 structure in a much kind of broader or deeper sense 0:13:59.800 --> 0:14:02.839 than whether it's it's directly true, and so there might 0:14:02.840 --> 0:14:05.360 be some some hope there that that the maths is 0:14:05.880 --> 0:14:09.400 describing something that is fundamentally correct that's then sustained through 0:14:09.480 --> 0:14:12.800 the theory change. The idea there, I guess is maybe 0:14:12.840 --> 0:14:16.600 alien physicists also hit on Newton's approach before they hit 0:14:16.640 --> 0:14:20.600 on Einstone's approach that is not just a human description 0:14:20.760 --> 0:14:24.360 of the universe, but it really is an effective approximation 0:14:24.440 --> 0:14:26.320 of the way the universe really works. I guess that 0:14:26.440 --> 0:14:28.200 is that the argument. I think that I think that 0:14:28.280 --> 0:14:30.280 might be the idea. Yeah, right, I mean, we can 0:14:30.320 --> 0:14:33.040 also think we know that Newton's theory is false, but 0:14:33.040 --> 0:14:35.080 what we can still wonder why it's so kind of 0:14:35.120 --> 0:14:38.440 effective and useful for us, And perhaps an answer to 0:14:38.480 --> 0:14:40.240 that is that it is getting at some sort of 0:14:40.360 --> 0:14:42.840 underlying structure. In some sense, it might be kind of 0:14:42.880 --> 0:14:45.040 slightly grappling and growing in the dark at this thing, 0:14:45.040 --> 0:14:46.760 but it might be kind of getting close, you know. 0:14:47.040 --> 0:14:48.760 And so that's why we might be able to nonetheless 0:14:48.880 --> 0:14:51.680 use Newton's theory for all sorts of interests and purposes 0:14:51.720 --> 0:14:53.320 that we have. Yeah, all right, well, I have a 0:14:53.320 --> 0:14:55.880 lot more questions about how we might probe the universe 0:14:55.920 --> 0:14:58.600 and how alien scientists do as well. But first let's 0:14:58.600 --> 0:15:13.280 take a quick break. All right, we're back and we're 0:15:13.280 --> 0:15:16.520 talking to my guests, Samuel kim Deny, a philosopher of 0:15:16.600 --> 0:15:20.600 science and metaphysics, about how aliens might think about science. 0:15:20.720 --> 0:15:22.960 And when we took a break there, we were examining 0:15:22.960 --> 0:15:26.760 the question of whether our approximate theories like Newton series, 0:15:27.040 --> 0:15:29.880 whether they're just sort of like human versions of the truth, 0:15:29.960 --> 0:15:33.200 or whether they might be universal, you know, our alien 0:15:33.240 --> 0:15:36.720 physicists likely to stumble into sort of the same ideas 0:15:36.800 --> 0:15:39.520 as we are, or are these just sort of the 0:15:39.520 --> 0:15:42.120 way the humans think about the universe. And I think 0:15:42.120 --> 0:15:44.320 One way to maybe probe that is to think about 0:15:44.680 --> 0:15:47.800 why it's even possible to do what Newton did. I mean, 0:15:47.840 --> 0:15:50.720 if the universe has some fundamental theory down at the 0:15:50.800 --> 0:15:53.840 string scale, quantum gravity, whatever is going on down there, 0:15:54.080 --> 0:15:58.240 why isn't everything at the human scale totally chaotic? You know, 0:15:58.240 --> 0:16:00.800 if you try to describe a hurricane in terms of 0:16:00.800 --> 0:16:04.240 its fundamental bits, the rain drops, it's a huge difficult problem. 0:16:04.520 --> 0:16:07.200 We don't have like a simple equation that tells you 0:16:07.240 --> 0:16:10.800 where a hurricane is gonna land. It's a massively chaotic problem, 0:16:10.800 --> 0:16:13.240 and you have to model every tiny little rain drop, 0:16:13.360 --> 0:16:15.520 and rain drop moves over a meter, it could change 0:16:15.560 --> 0:16:17.760 the entire path of the hurricane. But in our world, 0:16:17.760 --> 0:16:20.280 it's possible to do what Newton did and describe the 0:16:20.320 --> 0:16:22.960 path of a ball through the air without knowing anything 0:16:23.000 --> 0:16:25.840 about quantum and gravity. Right, you can make chicken soup 0:16:26.000 --> 0:16:28.200 without knowing what the soup is really made out of. 0:16:28.800 --> 0:16:31.120 And to me that seems like the key there. If 0:16:31.200 --> 0:16:36.080 these things are emerging, these descriptions, these simplified mathematical stories 0:16:36.160 --> 0:16:39.480 the universe are universal. Everybody else should find them as well. 0:16:39.520 --> 0:16:42.840 But do we even know why they exist? Why is 0:16:42.880 --> 0:16:47.480 it possible to find these simplified mathematical stories of the universe. 0:16:47.520 --> 0:16:50.160 It seems to me key to understanding whether aliens are 0:16:50.200 --> 0:16:52.560 also going to find them. Right, Yeah, I mean again, 0:16:52.600 --> 0:16:55.640 this is a thing that trusted the science metaphysicians really 0:16:55.680 --> 0:16:58.200 puzzle over its Um, why do we need to have 0:16:58.240 --> 0:17:00.200 all of the different science is? Why can't we just 0:17:00.280 --> 0:17:03.120 have fundamental physics and maybe chemistry? Why do we need 0:17:03.160 --> 0:17:06.399 biology and psychology and economics as well? Right, that's a 0:17:06.440 --> 0:17:09.240 little bit aggressive. Why don't we need anything but physics? Really, 0:17:09.240 --> 0:17:13.879 physics is the only side It could be taken like that, 0:17:13.920 --> 0:17:17.320 but it could more be um, yeah, a puzzlement once 0:17:17.359 --> 0:17:19.560 once we kind of realize or think that, hey, it 0:17:19.600 --> 0:17:21.960 looks like everything is kind of composed out of fundamental 0:17:22.000 --> 0:17:24.320 particles or fields or something like that, Why can't we 0:17:24.359 --> 0:17:27.560 just do it all in fundamental terms? And yeah, I think, 0:17:27.680 --> 0:17:30.160 like you say, it's something of a mystery. I don't 0:17:30.160 --> 0:17:31.680 know if this is really an answer, but this is 0:17:31.720 --> 0:17:34.160 just kind of rephrasing the issue. But what what sort 0:17:34.240 --> 0:17:37.400 seems to happen is that we can effectively abstract away 0:17:37.440 --> 0:17:39.760 from from certain details. Right because when we look at 0:17:39.840 --> 0:17:42.040 the level of the weather, systems, or or the ball 0:17:42.119 --> 0:17:45.280 flying through through space. We don't need to think about 0:17:45.280 --> 0:17:47.600 certain details at the fundamental level. We can kind of 0:17:47.600 --> 0:17:50.520 coarse grain the information and then that presents a picture 0:17:50.560 --> 0:17:54.520 that's far more useful and tractable for us given our interests. Right, 0:17:54.640 --> 0:17:56.160 And this is what we do, and this is how 0:17:56.160 --> 0:17:57.840 we how we navigate the world. Like you say, we 0:17:57.840 --> 0:18:00.440 can we can make our chicken soup without worry about 0:18:00.440 --> 0:18:03.520 what the what the electrons all the fields are doing. Right, 0:18:03.720 --> 0:18:06.080 but you said something really interesting there, you said, based 0:18:06.119 --> 0:18:09.160 on what our interests are. It makes me wonder if 0:18:09.240 --> 0:18:12.119 the universe is sort of like Russiman. You know what 0:18:12.280 --> 0:18:14.439 if we look at one system and we say, oh, 0:18:14.480 --> 0:18:16.840 the interesting thing here is a ball flying through the air, 0:18:16.920 --> 0:18:19.399 and look, I can tell a simple mathematical story about it, 0:18:19.600 --> 0:18:22.160 and an alien physicists would be like ball, what even 0:18:22.280 --> 0:18:24.400 is that? I'm more interested in the flow of these 0:18:24.400 --> 0:18:26.400 particles over here, and I call that a blah blah 0:18:26.400 --> 0:18:28.720 blah And here's my equation for the blah blah blah 0:18:28.880 --> 0:18:31.199 and it's beautiful. And you know, is there there a 0:18:31.280 --> 0:18:34.840 patchwork of mathematical stories that are only interesting to us? 0:18:35.480 --> 0:18:37.919 Or are these stories likely to be universal. And I 0:18:37.960 --> 0:18:41.040 know that the real answer waits until we meet the 0:18:41.040 --> 0:18:43.200 aliens and we've talked science with them and we figure 0:18:43.200 --> 0:18:46.080 out if they've developed completely independent branches of science. But 0:18:46.119 --> 0:18:49.520 I wonder you think it's possible to approach that question, 0:18:49.560 --> 0:18:53.200 to address that question today before we've met the aliens, 0:18:53.240 --> 0:18:55.760 just by looking at the structure of our theories and 0:18:56.000 --> 0:18:58.440 looking for a hints that these things might be arbitrary 0:18:58.560 --> 0:19:01.480 or might be universal. How we possibly pull those things 0:19:01.520 --> 0:19:05.080 apart today before we get to talk to the aliens? Nice? 0:19:05.160 --> 0:19:09.760 I mean, I happened to be somewhat skeptical about the 0:19:09.800 --> 0:19:13.160 idea that there really is an objective way of kind 0:19:13.200 --> 0:19:16.040 of I guess, so if we think about the ball 0:19:16.119 --> 0:19:17.760 or the chicken, to talk of that as like a 0:19:17.760 --> 0:19:20.360 way of course graining the low the low level information 0:19:20.400 --> 0:19:22.959 to suit our interests, I'm kind of skeptical that there 0:19:23.040 --> 0:19:25.840 is an objectively right or best way to do that. 0:19:26.040 --> 0:19:27.880 And it seems kind of plausible to me that, yeah, 0:19:27.960 --> 0:19:31.080 the aliens might be interested in some very different course grainings. Right, 0:19:31.119 --> 0:19:33.640 So we're interested in the lump of matter that kind 0:19:33.640 --> 0:19:35.840 of corresponds to what we call the ball, But why 0:19:35.880 --> 0:19:38.040 not be interested in the lump of matter that we 0:19:38.119 --> 0:19:42.040 call the ball and also my nose every Tuesday. Right, 0:19:43.400 --> 0:19:45.040 this would be a very strange kind of thing to 0:19:45.040 --> 0:19:47.760 be interested in because it kind of jumps over time 0:19:47.800 --> 0:19:50.199 and space in strange sorts of ways. But look, I 0:19:50.240 --> 0:19:53.000 can I can define that object, right, this lump of 0:19:53.000 --> 0:19:55.520 matter that we call the ball and my nose on Tuesdays? 0:19:55.600 --> 0:19:58.640 And why not try and describe the behavior of that thing. 0:19:58.800 --> 0:20:00.800 Maybe that's a bit too silly, but I think that 0:20:00.880 --> 0:20:03.440 the point is, Um, it turns out to be very 0:20:03.440 --> 0:20:09.119 difficult to say why objectively we should be interested in 0:20:09.160 --> 0:20:11.479 the things that we are interested in. And and do 0:20:11.520 --> 0:20:14.159 we think that an alien species would be wrong for 0:20:14.200 --> 0:20:17.160 having some very interested in very different kind of course 0:20:17.160 --> 0:20:19.879 grainings or would it be impossible for aliens to have 0:20:20.240 --> 0:20:23.960 interests in very different kinds of course grainings? Um, I'm 0:20:24.000 --> 0:20:26.560 not sure. I don't see why it would be wrong 0:20:26.600 --> 0:20:29.280 if they had these different interests. It doesn't strike me 0:20:29.320 --> 0:20:31.639 as impossibly that if they're again, like going back to 0:20:31.640 --> 0:20:34.040 what we're saying at the beginning, if their modes of 0:20:34.119 --> 0:20:37.760 perceiving that their central sense experiences were very different to ours, 0:20:37.880 --> 0:20:40.280 or maybe if they perceived time very differently than we did. 0:20:40.680 --> 0:20:42.720 Why not? You know, right? And to me it goes 0:20:42.800 --> 0:20:45.080 to really the heart of the question of the human 0:20:45.200 --> 0:20:47.880 experience and the context of it. In the same way 0:20:47.920 --> 0:20:50.840 that we want to know are we alone? Because we 0:20:50.880 --> 0:20:54.200 want to understand, like is life rare? And we also 0:20:54.240 --> 0:20:56.600 like to know are there other kinds of life? And 0:20:56.680 --> 0:20:58.760 the biology have a lots of different options and we 0:20:58.840 --> 0:21:01.040 just got one? Or is this basically the only way 0:21:01.119 --> 0:21:03.719 it can work? Meeting aliens can answer that question, and 0:21:03.800 --> 0:21:07.800 in the same way meeting alien physicists could tell us like, oh, look, 0:21:07.920 --> 0:21:09.720 it turns out they got their own Newton and they 0:21:09.760 --> 0:21:11.879 got their own Einstein, and this is the path you 0:21:11.960 --> 0:21:14.760 take to understanding the universe and it basically everybody follows 0:21:14.760 --> 0:21:17.520 the same path, or you know, did they take a 0:21:17.560 --> 0:21:20.600 completely separate path? And I thought, experiment I'd love to 0:21:20.680 --> 0:21:24.000 do in reality is to take like a thousand earths 0:21:24.080 --> 0:21:28.280 and have humans evolve intelligently and then let science progress independently. 0:21:28.640 --> 0:21:31.520 You know, Newton almost didn't even become a scientist. What 0:21:31.560 --> 0:21:34.639 would have happened if he hadn't, if we hadn't had Einstein, 0:21:34.720 --> 0:21:37.000 or if somebody else had been even smarter? You know, 0:21:37.080 --> 0:21:39.199 it feels to me like the path of human science 0:21:39.240 --> 0:21:43.240 rests so much on these tiny moments, these tiny accidents, 0:21:43.560 --> 0:21:45.600 these tiny choices that people make, that it could have 0:21:45.720 --> 0:21:48.040 very well gone a different way, and we have really 0:21:48.080 --> 0:21:50.280 no way to probe, you know, the different paths that 0:21:50.359 --> 0:21:53.160 might have taken, because we haven't met those aliens yet. 0:21:53.240 --> 0:21:55.159 One way I thought about to probe that is to 0:21:55.280 --> 0:21:58.239 look at this sort of history of the development of 0:21:58.440 --> 0:22:01.960 intellectual scientific thought here on Earth. Do you know anything 0:22:01.960 --> 0:22:05.159 about like the history of you know, Mayan science and 0:22:05.320 --> 0:22:08.800 Chinese science and Egyptian astronomy, and whether they can tell 0:22:08.880 --> 0:22:12.800 us whether independent groups of humans tend to come to 0:22:12.840 --> 0:22:15.280 the same ways of thinking about the universe, or whether 0:22:15.520 --> 0:22:18.399 there really are divergent ways to attack this problem. I 0:22:18.480 --> 0:22:20.600 think that's the exactly the right way to kind of 0:22:20.600 --> 0:22:22.960 go about investigating this thing a bit more empirically. Yeah, 0:22:22.960 --> 0:22:25.760 that sounds like a great idea to me. Unfortunately, I 0:22:25.800 --> 0:22:28.520 don't know about any investigations along those lines, although I'm 0:22:28.560 --> 0:22:31.560 sure there are some. Something kind of similar that I 0:22:31.600 --> 0:22:35.800 have heard about in philosophy is there's a recent movement 0:22:35.880 --> 0:22:40.960 in experimental called experimental philosophy, which basically surveys the kind 0:22:41.000 --> 0:22:45.280 of philosophical intuitions of the folks on various um philosophical 0:22:45.320 --> 0:22:48.080 puzzles and things like that. So philosophy has kind of 0:22:48.280 --> 0:22:51.760 um philosophical intuition has been kind of put in the 0:22:51.800 --> 0:22:54.280 spotlight recently because it's like, hang on a minute, these 0:22:54.320 --> 0:22:57.439 are the intuitions generally seemed to the interesting intuitions of 0:22:57.680 --> 0:23:01.119 Western philosophers, and maybe they wouldn't be shared across the board, 0:23:01.520 --> 0:23:03.680 or or they wouldn't be shared even just by people 0:23:03.680 --> 0:23:06.520 who aren't kind of indoctrinated into the academy as it were. 0:23:06.640 --> 0:23:09.359 And the experimental philosophers have done some work in this area, 0:23:09.359 --> 0:23:12.879 and I think they've uncovered more divergence in kind of 0:23:12.920 --> 0:23:16.480 philosophical intuitions than the kind of Western cannon would have 0:23:16.560 --> 0:23:18.520 us believe. So I think there is some good reason 0:23:18.600 --> 0:23:21.040 to think that something similar might be the case with 0:23:21.280 --> 0:23:24.080 science as well, right, And I mean, I suppose another thing. 0:23:24.320 --> 0:23:27.440 I guess why I think this is relevant is because 0:23:27.480 --> 0:23:30.840 I think, really at the fundamental level, you can't draw 0:23:31.200 --> 0:23:35.000 sharp dividing lines between a kind of philosophical blue sky 0:23:35.080 --> 0:23:38.359 approach to thinking about the world and the scientific approach. 0:23:38.400 --> 0:23:40.560 We've all got to kind of start somewhere. And so 0:23:40.680 --> 0:23:43.000 if there's some evidence to suggest that these kind of 0:23:43.480 --> 0:23:48.879 broad philosophical intuitions on big questions are quite divergent between 0:23:48.880 --> 0:23:51.920 different people and different cultures, then I don't see why 0:23:51.960 --> 0:23:55.200 that that wouldn't maybe lead us to think that plausibly 0:23:55.920 --> 0:23:58.199 different different ways of doing science and different kind of 0:23:58.200 --> 0:24:02.880 foundational thoughts and intuitions on scientific issues might vary quite 0:24:02.960 --> 0:24:06.400 radically across people in different cultures as well. Yeah, that's 0:24:06.440 --> 0:24:09.879 the thing. Well, we'll have a scientific anthropologist on to 0:24:09.960 --> 0:24:13.120 talk about how indigenous cultures do science and the histort 0:24:13.119 --> 0:24:15.120 of history of the development there. But I think that'd 0:24:15.119 --> 0:24:16.680 be a lot of fun. I want to turn us 0:24:16.680 --> 0:24:19.240 back to the question we were discussing a moment ago, 0:24:19.320 --> 0:24:23.920 which is, you know, whether these emergent theories, these mathematical 0:24:24.000 --> 0:24:26.719 descriptions of the world that we see it our universal 0:24:27.040 --> 0:24:30.040 or whether they're just sort of culturally dependent and could 0:24:30.080 --> 0:24:33.120 be different for aliens. But let's zoom down and talk 0:24:33.160 --> 0:24:36.240 about maybe like the fundamental theory of the universe. Some 0:24:36.359 --> 0:24:38.840 listeners out there might think, well, perhaps we have different 0:24:38.880 --> 0:24:42.080 descriptions of balls versus noses, but at its heart, the 0:24:42.200 --> 0:24:45.760 universe is a certain way there are fundamental vibrating strings, 0:24:45.880 --> 0:24:48.719 or there are space pixels or something at the quantum 0:24:48.720 --> 0:24:51.080 gravity level. And what if we all zoom down there, 0:24:51.119 --> 0:24:54.600 what would we inevitably find the same description of the 0:24:54.640 --> 0:24:58.239 universe because it is one way. So Kareem Jabari from 0:24:58.280 --> 0:25:00.320 the Institute of Future Studies was on the part cast 0:25:00.320 --> 0:25:02.119 a couple of weeks ago. He made a claim that 0:25:02.119 --> 0:25:04.600 I found a bit shocking. He said that you could 0:25:04.600 --> 0:25:08.600 have two fundamental theories of the universe that both work 0:25:08.920 --> 0:25:11.720 in the sense that they succeed in describing what we see, 0:25:12.240 --> 0:25:16.359 but internally are fundamentally different pictures of the universe, or 0:25:16.400 --> 0:25:21.400 like completely different mental descriptions and mental structures telling us 0:25:21.400 --> 0:25:23.720 a story about what's happening at the deepest scale. Do 0:25:23.720 --> 0:25:25.480 you agree with that? Do you think it's possible to 0:25:25.520 --> 0:25:30.840 have multiple accurate theories of the fundamental nature of the universe? Yeah, 0:25:31.040 --> 0:25:33.680 very interesting, I think nice. I like the approach there 0:25:33.720 --> 0:25:35.719 to think, Okay, maybe maybe if we zoom down then 0:25:35.720 --> 0:25:38.159 we can then we can hope for some more objectivity. 0:25:38.320 --> 0:25:40.359 I suppose one thing that comes to my mind is 0:25:40.760 --> 0:25:43.560 that kind of approach hopes or assumes that there is 0:25:43.600 --> 0:25:47.080 such a thing as a fundamental level. For all we know, 0:25:47.280 --> 0:25:50.080 it could be infinitely infinitely divisible all the way all 0:25:50.119 --> 0:25:51.719 the way down right, And then I don't know, if 0:25:51.720 --> 0:25:53.600 we'd be in trouble. Then that might kind of scupperro 0:25:54.480 --> 0:25:57.359 our aspirations for objectivity. It might mean a lot of 0:25:57.359 --> 0:25:59.520 work for particle physicists for a long time, though we 0:25:59.640 --> 0:26:06.520 just keep building bigger and bigger Adams measures potentially good news. Then, Yeah, 0:26:06.640 --> 0:26:09.200 so that's something that I would worry a bit about. 0:26:09.320 --> 0:26:11.960 I mean, so I suppose the worry, the kind of 0:26:12.119 --> 0:26:17.120 anti objectivist or pragmatist approach or kind of worry, would 0:26:17.119 --> 0:26:19.040 be that maybe all there is to the universe is 0:26:19.119 --> 0:26:22.480 just some kind of homogeneous blob of matter, and we 0:26:22.600 --> 0:26:25.120 just kind of cut it up in ways that serve 0:26:25.200 --> 0:26:28.480 our interests. And so then you're perhaps counterproposal here is, 0:26:28.520 --> 0:26:29.720 But but what if we could just get to the 0:26:29.800 --> 0:26:33.399 very nature of the homogeneous blob matter stuff itself. Yeah, 0:26:33.520 --> 0:26:36.439 I don't know. Perhaps it depends. It depends what we 0:26:36.480 --> 0:26:39.840 mean by homogeneous exactly, I suppose, and how homogeneous this 0:26:39.840 --> 0:26:42.160 this blob stuff could be, and what they really would 0:26:42.160 --> 0:26:44.879 be to say about it, independently of how we carve 0:26:44.920 --> 0:26:47.879 it up. So I think it's it's it's the right 0:26:47.920 --> 0:26:49.879 way to go. But I think it depends on on 0:26:49.920 --> 0:26:51.560 a fair amount of kind of hope that there is 0:26:51.600 --> 0:26:54.520 going to be some fundamental structure beyond which we can't 0:26:54.560 --> 0:26:57.159 make any further subdivisions, and that it's going to be 0:26:57.240 --> 0:26:59.280 some way that we're going to be able to latch onto. 0:26:59.320 --> 0:27:01.840 And may be I think that's more likely, but I'm 0:27:01.840 --> 0:27:04.760 a little bit skeptical, as perhaps you can you can sense, well, 0:27:04.800 --> 0:27:07.880 you know, my fantasy is that aliens come and they've 0:27:07.920 --> 0:27:10.240 been thinking about physics the way we have. They're just 0:27:10.280 --> 0:27:13.040 like a million years advanced, and they can like guide 0:27:13.080 --> 0:27:15.359 us through what would have taken us a million years 0:27:15.400 --> 0:27:17.639 to figure out in just a hundred years and we 0:27:17.880 --> 0:27:20.640 zoom forwards, you know, But that relies on us having 0:27:20.640 --> 0:27:23.480 sort of the same principles. And the flip side of that, 0:27:23.560 --> 0:27:26.920 my nightmare scenario is that there is no fundamental true 0:27:26.920 --> 0:27:30.159 description of the universe, and that everything we have learned 0:27:30.600 --> 0:27:33.600 is just this like patchwork of effective theories or like 0:27:33.800 --> 0:27:36.000 a ladder of effective theories, where we have like a 0:27:36.040 --> 0:27:38.920 description at the galaxy scale, and they have a description 0:27:38.960 --> 0:27:41.240 at the solar system scale and at the human scale, 0:27:41.240 --> 0:27:43.240 and at the atom scale and at the quark scale. 0:27:43.359 --> 0:27:45.800 None of these things are like deeply true. They're just 0:27:45.880 --> 0:27:49.879 like our mathematical stories about the noses we find interesting. 0:27:50.160 --> 0:27:52.560 And aliens might have their own ladder, they might pick 0:27:52.640 --> 0:27:55.919 different scales to explore, they might tell totally different stories. 0:27:55.960 --> 0:27:59.240 And so when we go to that first interstellar physics 0:27:59.240 --> 0:28:01.840 conference to show your notes that we basically have nothing 0:28:01.880 --> 0:28:05.240 in common with these folks, and I wonder what we 0:28:05.280 --> 0:28:07.359 could learn at that point. You know, you work on 0:28:07.400 --> 0:28:11.200 this project of unifying the sciences of your metascience project. 0:28:11.440 --> 0:28:13.320 If we thought about, like what it might be possible 0:28:13.359 --> 0:28:17.760 to try to incorporate a new emergent theory that sort 0:28:17.760 --> 0:28:21.199 of straddles are various sciences into our structure, Like, how 0:28:21.240 --> 0:28:24.240 do we absorb that into our sort of mental canon 0:28:24.320 --> 0:28:27.440 and make use of it? If the aliens are fascinated 0:28:27.480 --> 0:28:29.800 in this thing that we've never even thought about, Yeah, 0:28:29.920 --> 0:28:33.960 very interesting. I mean, I certainly don't share your your 0:28:33.960 --> 0:28:37.000 concern with with the so called nightmare scenario. That doesn't 0:28:37.040 --> 0:28:39.280 necessarily seem worrying to me. I mean, for sure, it 0:28:39.280 --> 0:28:43.240 seems threatening to a certain sort of hypothesis, something along 0:28:43.280 --> 0:28:45.920 the lines of, yeah, that the sciences are all unified, 0:28:45.960 --> 0:28:48.640 and they're all kind of ultimately getting at one fundamental 0:28:48.720 --> 0:28:52.520 objective truth, and so one could think that that situation 0:28:52.560 --> 0:28:55.680 would be evidence for a kind of radical disunity of 0:28:55.680 --> 0:28:57.880 the sciences. And I take it that that that's the 0:28:57.960 --> 0:29:00.720 kind of thing that you're you're finding night Marrish, But 0:29:00.800 --> 0:29:03.120 why right like that that would be an interesting empirical 0:29:03.120 --> 0:29:05.360 discovery and its own right, And so why not just 0:29:05.560 --> 0:29:07.600 kind of wonder at that, right that that sounds that 0:29:07.640 --> 0:29:10.000 seems pretty interesting to me. That would be a nice 0:29:10.000 --> 0:29:12.360 meal for the philosophers if it would be disappointing for 0:29:12.400 --> 0:29:15.680 the physicists, right, Yeah, Well, look, I mean I'm not 0:29:15.760 --> 0:29:18.040 particularly confident about this, but I think there are a 0:29:18.080 --> 0:29:21.480 great many philosophers, maybe the majority, who probably do hold 0:29:21.480 --> 0:29:23.400 out for something like the unity that you That you 0:29:23.480 --> 0:29:26.239 sounded like you were keen on there. So then your 0:29:26.280 --> 0:29:28.200 other question was, like, Okay, if if we did find 0:29:28.240 --> 0:29:31.240 these these aliens who had this very radically way, a 0:29:31.320 --> 0:29:33.520 different way of thinking about the universe and carving things 0:29:33.560 --> 0:29:36.480 up and doing the science, what could we learn from that? Well, again, 0:29:36.480 --> 0:29:39.720 that that would strike me as a very interesting empirical 0:29:39.760 --> 0:29:43.480 discovery in its own right, and it looks like it 0:29:43.520 --> 0:29:46.120 would tell us something along the lines of, you know, 0:29:46.320 --> 0:29:49.960 what's kind of important when we're doing science is doing 0:29:50.000 --> 0:29:52.680 something and kind of carving up the world and thinking 0:29:52.680 --> 0:29:54.800 about the world in a way that that suits us. 0:29:54.920 --> 0:29:57.440 So then when we're doing science, we're kind of learning 0:29:57.440 --> 0:30:00.720 as much about ourselves as we are about the universe. 0:30:01.480 --> 0:30:03.680 And again that that seems kind of okay, so me, 0:30:03.800 --> 0:30:07.440 maybe it's not what most scientists have directly in mind 0:30:07.440 --> 0:30:09.800 when they're doing science, but that seems again like an 0:30:09.800 --> 0:30:12.560 interesting discovery on a very very worthwhile pursuit to find 0:30:12.560 --> 0:30:15.080 out about what we like as beings and how we 0:30:15.200 --> 0:30:18.720 carve up the universe just to suit our needs and interests. Absolutely, 0:30:18.760 --> 0:30:21.440 it's like if we meet the Aliens and we discover 0:30:21.560 --> 0:30:24.400 they don't like hamburgers or pizza. They've invented this other 0:30:24.440 --> 0:30:26.320 weird kind of food, and that tells us something about 0:30:26.320 --> 0:30:28.840 the aliens, and you know, that's why you go traveling 0:30:28.880 --> 0:30:31.000 to eat weird kinds of food. That tells you about 0:30:31.000 --> 0:30:33.560 what those people are like. And but their music is 0:30:33.600 --> 0:30:36.320 like it does. It's an insight into that culture. And 0:30:36.760 --> 0:30:40.120 that's only possible if we have enough in common to 0:30:40.280 --> 0:30:42.560 even really understand it, you know, to understand, Oh, this 0:30:42.640 --> 0:30:45.120 is a science question, and he raise your answer. I 0:30:45.160 --> 0:30:47.240 want to turn a little bit to that sort of question. 0:30:47.320 --> 0:30:50.680 Like we talked earlier about whether it's likely that aliens 0:30:50.720 --> 0:30:54.000 even have mathematics, and whether that's universal or not. What 0:30:54.080 --> 0:30:57.840 about the other question of whether aliens are even doing science, 0:30:58.040 --> 0:31:02.000 like a good science itself be a fundamentally human pursuit, 0:31:02.480 --> 0:31:04.080 not in the sense that we might be the only 0:31:04.240 --> 0:31:06.640 curious people about the universe, but you know, science is 0:31:06.680 --> 0:31:09.080 something we've only been doing in this form for a 0:31:09.120 --> 0:31:13.080 few hundred years. Isn't it possible to have a technological 0:31:13.120 --> 0:31:17.120 civilization that doesn't use this particular method of building internal 0:31:17.200 --> 0:31:20.200 mathematical models to describe the universe in order to make 0:31:20.240 --> 0:31:23.560 technological achievements? Do philosophers think about this question and the 0:31:23.640 --> 0:31:26.720 universality of science itself, Yeah, for sure. I mean now, 0:31:26.720 --> 0:31:30.040 I am tempted to give a very stereotypical philosopher's answer 0:31:30.080 --> 0:31:31.880 to this thing, which is like, come on, we we 0:31:31.920 --> 0:31:34.440 don't really know what science is. We can't demarcate between 0:31:34.440 --> 0:31:38.120 science and non science and so and so that would 0:31:38.120 --> 0:31:39.960 be a kind of a deflection of the of the question. 0:31:40.000 --> 0:31:43.560 I suppose. But I think ultimately the kind of the 0:31:43.640 --> 0:31:46.920 history of this topic of trying to kind of define 0:31:46.960 --> 0:31:50.480 what constitutes science shows that that that's that's hard, if 0:31:50.560 --> 0:31:53.920 not impossible, to do, right, And so given that observation, 0:31:54.000 --> 0:31:57.520 I would certainly be reluctant to rule out whatever these 0:31:57.560 --> 0:32:00.400 aliens are doing is as counting as science, because we're 0:32:00.400 --> 0:32:02.720 not really sure where to draw the line anyway, right, 0:32:02.800 --> 0:32:07.280 But perhaps more positively, I suppose the point just is, well, 0:32:07.320 --> 0:32:09.560 we should be kind of quite broad and quite permissive 0:32:09.760 --> 0:32:12.600 in what we mean by science. And it seems plausible 0:32:12.680 --> 0:32:16.840 that even if these things were radically differently kind of 0:32:16.880 --> 0:32:20.640 cognitively wired than we are, if they're going about trying 0:32:20.680 --> 0:32:23.080 to kind of you know, find their way in the universe, 0:32:23.080 --> 0:32:26.760 build machines that suit their interests, inquire into questions they 0:32:26.800 --> 0:32:30.719 find interesting and fascinating, then then why not call that science? Right? 0:32:30.960 --> 0:32:33.880 But I mean, maybe that's not quite what you're getting at. 0:32:33.880 --> 0:32:36.640 Maybe what you're getting out was more with the science 0:32:36.680 --> 0:32:40.280 that they're doing be sufficiently similar to our science for 0:32:40.320 --> 0:32:42.640 there to be any interesting points of contact between us 0:32:42.640 --> 0:32:44.880 and them. Was that more what you had in mind? Absolutely, 0:32:45.000 --> 0:32:46.760 And I want to dig into that a lot more 0:32:46.760 --> 0:33:02.320 and would first take another as ssured break. All right, 0:33:02.360 --> 0:33:06.400 we're back and we're talking to philosophers science and metaphysics. 0:33:06.640 --> 0:33:10.600 Samuel can deny about the possibility of talking to aliens 0:33:10.760 --> 0:33:13.960 about science, learning from them, or maybe just being puzzled 0:33:13.960 --> 0:33:16.040 at the way they think about the universe. And when 0:33:16.080 --> 0:33:18.160 we broke off, we were talking about whether or not 0:33:18.240 --> 0:33:21.800 aliens do something that we recognize as science. And you're right, 0:33:21.840 --> 0:33:24.000 it's not about like whether or not we can officially 0:33:24.040 --> 0:33:26.920 call what they are doing science. It's about whether what 0:33:27.000 --> 0:33:29.880 they're doing is close enough to what we're doing that 0:33:29.920 --> 0:33:32.280 we could learn from them. I guess my brain naturally 0:33:32.280 --> 0:33:35.240 goes to these nightmare scenarios where, for example, we meet 0:33:35.360 --> 0:33:39.000 starfaring aliens. They come to Earth in their spaceships that 0:33:39.240 --> 0:33:42.320 have crossed the cosmos because they've developed warp drives, and 0:33:42.320 --> 0:33:44.800 our first question is, of course, how does your warp 0:33:44.880 --> 0:33:48.040 drive work? But I imagine maybe there are species that 0:33:48.080 --> 0:33:52.960 have developed technology not through the methodical development of physical models, 0:33:53.240 --> 0:33:55.960 but just sort of by trial and error. I think about, 0:33:56.000 --> 0:33:59.080 for example, you know, the swords smiths of ancient Japan 0:33:59.360 --> 0:34:02.280 or Spain or whatever. They didn't have an understanding of 0:34:02.440 --> 0:34:06.479 why their technique made the metal extra hard. You know, 0:34:06.520 --> 0:34:08.960 they developed this technique mostly through trial and error. You 0:34:09.000 --> 0:34:10.520 dip it in this, you dip it in that, you 0:34:10.680 --> 0:34:12.680 did this temperature, then you cool it. You get a 0:34:12.719 --> 0:34:15.760 really hard sword. It's definitely a slower way to make progress, 0:34:15.800 --> 0:34:18.880 but it's possible. Isn't it possible that we need, you know, 0:34:18.960 --> 0:34:21.600 a starfaring race of aliens that have been doing this 0:34:21.640 --> 0:34:24.080 for a million years and sort of like stumbled their 0:34:24.120 --> 0:34:26.680 way into a warp drive or you know, lights be 0:34:26.880 --> 0:34:29.719 travel or something without having a deep understanding of it 0:34:29.760 --> 0:34:33.440 that they could communicate to us. Yeah. Yeah, interesting. Nice. So, 0:34:33.560 --> 0:34:35.560 like one way of kind of reading that scenarro is 0:34:35.560 --> 0:34:38.160 that these aliens needn't be any more intelligent than us 0:34:38.280 --> 0:34:40.840 or any kind of radically different to us. But they 0:34:40.880 --> 0:34:42.960 could have just been around a lot longer, right, and 0:34:43.000 --> 0:34:44.600 so they had more time to kind of do the 0:34:44.600 --> 0:34:47.120 trial and error procedure and come up with some things, 0:34:47.120 --> 0:34:50.800 but then some some great technologies and perhaps innovations that 0:34:50.960 --> 0:34:54.520 kind of get them to other star systems or something 0:34:54.560 --> 0:34:56.719 like that. But then they're not able to communicate to 0:34:56.800 --> 0:34:58.600 us how they've done it because of because of how 0:34:58.600 --> 0:35:01.040 they got there. Yeah, that that that's only seems pausible. 0:35:01.160 --> 0:35:03.040 But then I guess it's like like we were saying 0:35:03.080 --> 0:35:05.719 that that's different from this other worry, which is that 0:35:05.760 --> 0:35:08.520 they've got there in kind of more of a theoretical ways, 0:35:08.560 --> 0:35:10.239 that they do have something that we might want to 0:35:10.239 --> 0:35:13.719 call understanding of the of the underlying physical theory that's 0:35:13.880 --> 0:35:16.799 underpinning their technology, but but that it's just kind of 0:35:16.840 --> 0:35:19.359 so so different, and again they're kind of carving up 0:35:19.360 --> 0:35:21.240 and thinking about the world in a way so different 0:35:21.280 --> 0:35:23.120 from how we think about it that they're not going 0:35:23.160 --> 0:35:25.920 to be able to communicate their technologies and their their 0:35:25.960 --> 0:35:28.400 insights to us. For that kind of reason, something that 0:35:28.440 --> 0:35:31.920 I do wonder in in the kind of this vicinity 0:35:31.960 --> 0:35:35.120 and more related to the latter scenario, where the worry 0:35:35.160 --> 0:35:37.239 that these creatures might just be so radically different from 0:35:37.280 --> 0:35:39.160 us that we just can't learn anything from them. So 0:35:39.400 --> 0:35:42.880 to one source of optimism might just be that we 0:35:42.960 --> 0:35:45.960 might think that the kind of counter as an agent 0:35:46.120 --> 0:35:48.319 in the sense right where that's a very broad term, 0:35:48.360 --> 0:35:49.839 but it's a kind of a bit of a philosophical 0:35:49.920 --> 0:35:52.480 term of art, But you know, we're agents. We have 0:35:52.560 --> 0:35:55.040 some sort of some sort of aims and goals and consciousness. 0:35:55.080 --> 0:35:57.120 But to counter as an agent and to have these 0:35:57.160 --> 0:36:01.359 sorts of interests in exploration and build technology, there might 0:36:01.400 --> 0:36:03.680 have to be some sort of commonality to what it 0:36:03.760 --> 0:36:05.560 is to be an agent, right, So to be that 0:36:05.800 --> 0:36:08.440 highly evolved, to be pursuing those sorts of pursuits and 0:36:08.440 --> 0:36:11.040 building those sorts of technologies, it might just kind of 0:36:11.080 --> 0:36:13.400 be the case that they'd have to have something somewhat 0:36:13.400 --> 0:36:16.600 in common with other agents, namely us, that we could 0:36:16.600 --> 0:36:19.440 find at least some sort of common ground. And again 0:36:19.480 --> 0:36:22.000 that's a little bit speculative and hopeful, but it's something 0:36:22.000 --> 0:36:26.359 that I kind of and somewhat persuaded by sometimes, So yeah, 0:36:26.360 --> 0:36:28.480 that that might be a cause for optimism. I think 0:36:28.520 --> 0:36:31.480 that is an attractive argument, you know, to suggest like 0:36:31.920 --> 0:36:34.480 in order to develop in the universe, you have to 0:36:34.480 --> 0:36:37.799 be curious, and you have to build mental models to 0:36:37.880 --> 0:36:40.560 explain why things happen in your life, and those mental 0:36:40.600 --> 0:36:45.279 models naturally develop into you know, scientific thinking. I think 0:36:45.320 --> 0:36:47.719 that's an attractive argument, but it also feels to me 0:36:47.840 --> 0:36:51.120 a little bit too easy. You know. It's sort of 0:36:51.120 --> 0:36:53.200 like the kind of argument you make where you say, like, well, 0:36:53.239 --> 0:36:56.080 everybody drinks copy in the morning, because you know, everybody 0:36:56.080 --> 0:36:58.680 wakes up and they're tired and copy helps, so therefore 0:36:58.760 --> 0:37:01.200 all humans must drink of be right. It's sort of 0:37:01.239 --> 0:37:03.600 like in the argument you make. I don't mean to 0:37:03.600 --> 0:37:05.719 be too negative, but it's an argument from ignorance right 0:37:05.920 --> 0:37:09.520 to say I can't imagine something different, therefore this must 0:37:09.520 --> 0:37:12.439 be universal, where the whole reason we want to meet 0:37:12.440 --> 0:37:16.160 aliens is precisely to confront those boxes and understand the 0:37:16.200 --> 0:37:18.960 limits of our imagination. And so that's exactly the kind 0:37:19.000 --> 0:37:21.680 of argument that I'm very tempted by, but I reject 0:37:21.960 --> 0:37:24.080 for that reason that I want to push my way 0:37:24.120 --> 0:37:26.400 out of it and understand if there are other ways 0:37:26.719 --> 0:37:29.640 to explore this. But fundamentally, I think it's it's frustrating 0:37:29.719 --> 0:37:32.359 because I don't think we can get out of that 0:37:32.400 --> 0:37:35.799 box without meeting those aliens, the way people can't really 0:37:35.880 --> 0:37:39.280 understand other cultures without doing some traveling or being exposed 0:37:39.280 --> 0:37:41.200 to them, because sitting in your little village at home, 0:37:41.480 --> 0:37:44.920 it's probably impossible to imagine other ways humans can be. Yeah, 0:37:44.960 --> 0:37:47.600 that's right, that that that would be the best thing, 0:37:47.600 --> 0:37:49.920 wouldn't it, if if we could meet these aliens. I mean, 0:37:50.320 --> 0:37:52.920 I'm not like completely pessimistic that there are other ways 0:37:52.960 --> 0:37:54.719 of doing it, Like, like we've touched on, I think 0:37:55.080 --> 0:38:00.480 maybe maybe we could push ourselves really hard to kind 0:38:00.480 --> 0:38:02.680 of think outside the box. I mean, something that comes 0:38:02.760 --> 0:38:04.879 to mind. And no, I don't ask too many follow 0:38:04.960 --> 0:38:06.719 ups on this, because I'm by far an expert on 0:38:06.800 --> 0:38:10.600 the topic. But there's this new thing in physics constructor theory, 0:38:10.760 --> 0:38:12.640 right which we're told is supposed to be a whole 0:38:12.680 --> 0:38:15.399 new approach to the foundations of physics, which is nothing 0:38:15.440 --> 0:38:18.680 like anything anyone has ever done or thought of doing 0:38:18.800 --> 0:38:21.279 in terms of thinking about the universe before. And and 0:38:21.320 --> 0:38:23.680 if if that's all it's cracked up to be, it 0:38:23.760 --> 0:38:25.839 might be something along these lines right away of kind 0:38:25.840 --> 0:38:28.879 of thinking from first principles in a completely different way. 0:38:29.080 --> 0:38:31.480 If we think that there is the potential to really 0:38:31.480 --> 0:38:34.200 shake up our foundation or thinking in these sorts of ways, 0:38:34.239 --> 0:38:36.480 then then yeah, again, maybe we could have some optimism 0:38:36.560 --> 0:38:39.880 that if there were this radically different species of aliens 0:38:39.920 --> 0:38:42.200 that we came into contact with, that at first it 0:38:42.239 --> 0:38:44.719 looked like we had no hope of interacting with them, 0:38:44.880 --> 0:38:48.440 maybe after some work and some some reconceptualizing of our 0:38:48.480 --> 0:38:50.480 foundations we could get there, right, And so I think 0:38:50.520 --> 0:38:53.279 I think there might be some some reasons to be optimistic. 0:38:53.360 --> 0:38:57.560 But but yeah, well, if the aliens do arrive and 0:38:57.560 --> 0:39:00.319 they don't just like fry us from space, think we 0:39:00.320 --> 0:39:05.080 should send the philosophers first or the physicists. I think 0:39:05.080 --> 0:39:07.880 maybe the philosophers and the physicists should probably be working 0:39:07.880 --> 0:39:10.120 in tandem on this one. I think they've probably got 0:39:10.280 --> 0:39:12.879 strengths and weaknesses in this kind of situation that could 0:39:13.000 --> 0:39:17.719 complement each other, So send a team of both. I 0:39:17.760 --> 0:39:20.680 asked no Him Chamski if he thought that scientists would 0:39:20.680 --> 0:39:22.480 be allowed to talk to the aliens, and he was 0:39:22.520 --> 0:39:26.400 pretty cynical about whether military and political structures would allow 0:39:26.480 --> 0:39:30.600 scientists and philosophers to speak on behalf of Earth, which 0:39:30.640 --> 0:39:33.040 is a whole other reason to be pessimistic and not 0:39:33.160 --> 0:39:34.839 a road I want to go down today. I think 0:39:34.880 --> 0:39:38.200 another question people think about when they imagine speaking to 0:39:38.280 --> 0:39:41.560 aliens is putting aside all these philosophical questions and say 0:39:41.560 --> 0:39:44.120 they have similar structures, and they've thought about physics in 0:39:44.120 --> 0:39:46.320 similar ways. They're just really far advanced from us. A 0:39:46.400 --> 0:39:50.200 basic question is how could they teach us what they know? 0:39:50.360 --> 0:39:54.000 How could we possibly understand the science of a super 0:39:54.080 --> 0:39:57.440 advanced race. It's sort of like if you gave Galileo 0:39:57.800 --> 0:40:01.000 a laptop, where would you even go to explain to 0:40:01.080 --> 0:40:03.040 him how it works and what you would do with it. 0:40:03.200 --> 0:40:06.400 People think about, like, you know, how to bootstrap humanity 0:40:06.520 --> 0:40:09.840 up to the level of potential galactic aliens. Well, I 0:40:09.880 --> 0:40:12.400 think they're be inclined to be a bit more optimistic, 0:40:12.800 --> 0:40:15.800 maybe just from the kind of observation that we teach 0:40:15.880 --> 0:40:20.319 children all sorts of complicated things, and I've seen many 0:40:20.440 --> 0:40:22.879 child I mean, this is not necessarily a good thing, 0:40:22.920 --> 0:40:26.120 but you see kids these days just taking to laptops 0:40:26.120 --> 0:40:28.400 and iPads as if it was kind of innate in 0:40:28.440 --> 0:40:30.960 them to use these objects, which strikes me as kind 0:40:30.960 --> 0:40:32.880 of crazy, but then also makes me think, look, if 0:40:32.920 --> 0:40:35.799 we can teach kids to use these strange new bits 0:40:35.840 --> 0:40:38.480 of technology, and we can educate our children to do 0:40:38.520 --> 0:40:41.560 all sorts of funky things like maths and logic and 0:40:41.800 --> 0:40:44.319 art and poetry, then yeah, why couldn't the eight Why 0:40:44.320 --> 0:40:46.840 couldn't we be the children of the aliens? Why couldn't 0:40:46.880 --> 0:40:50.480 they take us under their wings and teach us their ways. 0:40:50.719 --> 0:40:53.040 I have a little bit of optimism there, I think, Yeah, 0:40:53.120 --> 0:40:55.000 let me take your optimism and turn it back into 0:40:55.000 --> 0:40:57.480 a nightmare scenario, which seems to be my role in 0:40:57.480 --> 0:41:00.719 this conversation, which is the aliens come and they have 0:41:00.800 --> 0:41:03.880 super advanced science, and us this is this who have 0:41:03.960 --> 0:41:07.239 grown up. We're thinking one way, can't rock it. But 0:41:07.520 --> 0:41:09.960 we send our children to the alien schools and you're 0:41:09.960 --> 0:41:12.319 write to them. It probably feels totally natural. Then there's 0:41:12.360 --> 0:41:15.279 this generational divide where one set of humanity is like 0:41:15.440 --> 0:41:18.360 super charged and thousands of years ahead of the old 0:41:18.400 --> 0:41:21.040 ancient of gray haired folks like me who just never 0:41:21.120 --> 0:41:25.120 really understand the modern world, right, and we've got something 0:41:25.160 --> 0:41:27.359 of a toned down version of that. It feels like 0:41:27.480 --> 0:41:31.400 today like the Internet natives, and that the technology native 0:41:31.719 --> 0:41:35.120 people growing up do seem to be somewhat separated from 0:41:35.160 --> 0:41:37.920 from the older generation. So yeah, it's it's conceivable that 0:41:37.920 --> 0:41:40.680 that that sort of divide that we actually observe could 0:41:40.760 --> 0:41:44.319 just be a lot more dramatic, right, Yes, that would 0:41:44.320 --> 0:41:46.439 be That would be nightmarish for sure. So I guess 0:41:46.440 --> 0:41:49.799 the answer is, don't give Galileo the laptop. Give Galileo's 0:41:49.920 --> 0:41:52.759 kids the laptop, and they'll be playing a word all 0:41:52.840 --> 0:41:58.800 within ten minutes. That's exactly alright, So then to wrap 0:41:58.800 --> 0:42:01.040 it up, what do you think think is something we 0:42:01.080 --> 0:42:03.719 can do to prepare? I mean, I don't know if 0:42:03.760 --> 0:42:05.600 aliens are going to come. I don't know if aliens 0:42:05.640 --> 0:42:07.279 even exist. I don't know if we will hear a 0:42:07.320 --> 0:42:10.640 message from aliens. But these are deep and important questions 0:42:10.719 --> 0:42:13.160 and we haven't really resolved any of them today. What 0:42:13.200 --> 0:42:15.400 do you think are the most sort of important directions 0:42:15.440 --> 0:42:18.360 for humanity or philosophy to sort of prepare for that 0:42:18.480 --> 0:42:20.480 moment so that when it does happen, we have a 0:42:20.520 --> 0:42:24.960 plan or a thoughtful structure in which to explore these questions. Yeah, 0:42:25.000 --> 0:42:27.279 good question. I mean I think actually one thing we 0:42:27.280 --> 0:42:30.719 could do to prepare for that scenario is to look 0:42:30.760 --> 0:42:34.600 hard at the sorts of things we take for granted. Right, So, um, 0:42:34.640 --> 0:42:38.000 I think scientists do this, but non scientists do this 0:42:38.040 --> 0:42:39.759 as well. Of course, we go about the world and 0:42:39.760 --> 0:42:42.040 we take all sorts of things for granted about the 0:42:42.120 --> 0:42:44.759 nature of our reality. And really what this is is 0:42:44.760 --> 0:42:47.279 it kind of a philosophical commitment that we have to 0:42:47.480 --> 0:42:52.160 various assumptions and premises and background kind of structures ways 0:42:52.200 --> 0:42:55.200 of thinking, but that we're not particularly aware of because 0:42:55.200 --> 0:42:57.480 we don't scrutinize them. So perhaps we could do something 0:42:57.520 --> 0:42:59.520 like that. We could think about what some of these 0:42:59.560 --> 0:43:02.560 most based stick assumptions that we take for granted in 0:43:02.560 --> 0:43:05.560 in science but also in everyday life, and see if 0:43:05.600 --> 0:43:08.440 they could possibly be questioned, because look, these aliens might 0:43:08.480 --> 0:43:11.239 have very different foundational assumptions to us, and so I 0:43:11.239 --> 0:43:15.200 think engaging in this sort of exercise could maybe come 0:43:15.200 --> 0:43:18.160 close to preparing us for this kind of encounter. Yeah, 0:43:18.160 --> 0:43:20.839 I totally agree. It's like preparing your travel. You should 0:43:20.880 --> 0:43:23.160 be asking yourself. I wonder if they do drink coffee 0:43:23.239 --> 0:43:25.520 where I'm going, or you know, if they have a 0:43:25.560 --> 0:43:27.640 totally different kind of toilet where you don't squat, or 0:43:27.640 --> 0:43:29.520 you don't sit there, you don't stand, or who knows what. 0:43:29.640 --> 0:43:32.520 Preparing your mind for the breath of possibilities. And for 0:43:32.560 --> 0:43:34.640 me at least, I totally look forward to that day 0:43:34.640 --> 0:43:37.879 when aliens blow our little minds and tell us how 0:43:37.920 --> 0:43:40.000 there are other ways to think about the universe, to 0:43:40.080 --> 0:43:43.160 explore the universe, even to ask questions. What questions are 0:43:43.200 --> 0:43:46.279 they asking? You know, not just what answers do they have, 0:43:46.360 --> 0:43:49.800 but what do they find strange and fascinating about the universe. 0:43:50.480 --> 0:43:52.080 It seems to me like a lot of what we 0:43:52.160 --> 0:43:55.839 think about as objective in science is driven by aesthetics. 0:43:56.080 --> 0:43:58.720 A lot of the questions we're asking in theoretical particle 0:43:58.760 --> 0:44:02.040 physics are driven by I like this looks weird, or 0:44:02.160 --> 0:44:05.239 I think it would be prettier that other way. Even 0:44:05.239 --> 0:44:08.000 the discovery of the Higgs boson came about because people 0:44:08.000 --> 0:44:10.360 were thinking, this theory seems kind of ugly, and it 0:44:10.400 --> 0:44:12.960 would be much prettier if we added this one other piece. 0:44:13.160 --> 0:44:15.520 And so there's a lot of you know, aesthetics and 0:44:15.760 --> 0:44:19.920 subjectivity and um, you know, personality in how we explore 0:44:19.920 --> 0:44:22.080 the universe. And so I think you're right that we 0:44:22.120 --> 0:44:24.400 need to look at that and put that under a 0:44:24.440 --> 0:44:27.239 microscope and wonder whether there are other choices that could 0:44:27.239 --> 0:44:29.080 have been made great. Yeah, So we could even spend 0:44:29.080 --> 0:44:31.120 some time in some art calories thinking about why we 0:44:31.200 --> 0:44:32.840 like what we like and dislike what we just like. 0:44:33.200 --> 0:44:35.319 I'd very much agree with that. Yeah, that sounds very 0:44:35.360 --> 0:44:37.879 sensible today. Yeah, And you know, as much as I'd 0:44:37.960 --> 0:44:40.400 like to send artists on that first contingent also to 0:44:40.440 --> 0:44:42.600 meet the aliens, I think it's almost impossible we will 0:44:42.680 --> 0:44:46.440 ever understand alien art and I don't know if that 0:44:46.480 --> 0:44:49.240 bodes well or not for alien philosophy and alien physics, 0:44:49.280 --> 0:44:52.160 but I look forward to one day finding out all right. 0:44:52.239 --> 0:44:54.920 Thanks very much Sam for joining us for this crazy 0:44:54.920 --> 0:44:58.640 and wide ranging conversation on how aliens think about science 0:44:58.680 --> 0:45:01.200 and whether we might ever be able to understand it. 0:45:01.320 --> 0:45:11.960 Thank you, Daniel, that was really fascinating. Thanks thanks for listening, 0:45:11.960 --> 0:45:14.680 and remember that Daniel and Jorge Explain the Universe is 0:45:14.719 --> 0:45:18.120 a production of I Heart Radio. For more podcast For 0:45:18.239 --> 0:45:22.000 my heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, 0:45:22.120 --> 0:45:24.480 or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.