WEBVTT - CLASSIC: Have dreams really predicted the future? Chapter II 0:00:00.720 --> 0:00:01.200 We're back. 0:00:01.480 --> 0:00:06.560 Happy New Year, Happy New Year, Happy New Year. No, 0:00:06.640 --> 0:00:09.920 happy New Year, Happy New Year, Tennessee. Happy New Year you, 0:00:10.240 --> 0:00:11.680 fellow conspiracy realist. 0:00:12.440 --> 0:00:17.800 Yay happen yeay? What kind of fireworks do you got 0:00:17.840 --> 0:00:19.000 going on right now? 0:00:19.040 --> 0:00:22.640 How is your dog, Dylan? That was a good woo man. 0:00:22.880 --> 0:00:26.360 Yeah, thank you. Please stop your fireworks at a respectable 0:00:26.360 --> 0:00:27.480 hour for the dog's sake. 0:00:28.920 --> 0:00:29.800 How are your dogs? 0:00:29.960 --> 0:00:30.480 Yeah? 0:00:30.800 --> 0:00:31.840 How you DAGs? 0:00:32.760 --> 0:00:36.640 So if you're gonna do fireworks, please respect everybody else's 0:00:36.680 --> 0:00:40.960 dogs and do your fireworks indoors. Just kidding like an American. 0:00:41.880 --> 0:00:46.640 So uh, this is uh the second chapter of our 0:00:46.840 --> 0:00:52.200 classic series on dreams and predicting the future. Now as 0:00:52.240 --> 0:00:56.160 we know, we talked about this in a recent weekly 0:00:56.200 --> 0:01:01.840 Strange News segment. There's a lot humans are learning about 0:01:01.880 --> 0:01:05.959 the concept of linear or experienced time, and when we 0:01:06.120 --> 0:01:09.640 first got into this idea of dreams predicting the future, 0:01:10.280 --> 0:01:13.160 we got a lot of feedback, a lot of correspondence, 0:01:13.440 --> 0:01:18.920 and we got a lot of people, I think surprisingly, gents, 0:01:19.080 --> 0:01:23.640 we had a lot of people calling in to confirm 0:01:24.200 --> 0:01:27.480 our findings, which was the most fascinating part about this 0:01:28.480 --> 0:01:28.960 for sure. 0:01:29.040 --> 0:01:31.039 So why don't we just jump right in to part 0:01:31.080 --> 0:01:33.480 two of Have Dreams Really Predicted the Future? 0:01:33.560 --> 0:01:36.160 Already in progress or you know at the beginning. 0:01:36.360 --> 0:01:40.840 From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies, history is 0:01:40.920 --> 0:01:45.240 riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or 0:01:45.319 --> 0:01:48.280 learn this stuff they don't want you to know? A 0:01:48.360 --> 0:01:50.000 production of iHeart Reading. 0:02:00.400 --> 0:02:03.240 Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt, 0:02:03.600 --> 0:02:04.600 my name is Noel. 0:02:04.880 --> 0:02:07.480 They call me Ben. We are joined as always with 0:02:07.520 --> 0:02:12.280 our super producer Paul, Mission control decand most importantly, you 0:02:12.360 --> 0:02:16.040 are you. You are here and that makes this stuff 0:02:16.240 --> 0:02:20.240 they don't want you to know. This is the second 0:02:20.240 --> 0:02:23.679 part of a two part series asking whether dreams have 0:02:23.919 --> 0:02:28.960 really predicted the future. We ended the earlier episode without 0:02:29.000 --> 0:02:34.839 getting to several things facts for one, science, although we're 0:02:34.840 --> 0:02:39.480 able to put some science in the first episode, and 0:02:39.520 --> 0:02:43.959 perhaps most importantly, questions that we had promised at the 0:02:44.000 --> 0:02:48.560 beginning of the last episode. So please listen to part 0:02:48.600 --> 0:02:52.480 one of Have Dreams Really Predicted the Future before you 0:02:52.600 --> 0:02:56.880 dive into part two. This is mostly crazy stuff in 0:02:57.000 --> 0:03:01.120 the second act, So here's where it gets crazy. 0:03:01.680 --> 0:03:04.040 Oh man, as the quickest we've gotten crazy. I think 0:03:04.080 --> 0:03:05.520 maybe ever? I love it? 0:03:06.360 --> 0:03:08.000 Do you want to do you a little quick recap 0:03:08.040 --> 0:03:10.520 of some of the hallmarks from our last episode. 0:03:11.120 --> 0:03:12.520 Some of the historical figures. 0:03:12.520 --> 0:03:16.840 We've got Abraham Lincoln, who seems to have predicted his 0:03:16.880 --> 0:03:22.440 own assassination and dream. We have Samuel Clemens aka Mark Twain, 0:03:22.840 --> 0:03:26.200 who seems to have had a premonition of his brother's 0:03:26.639 --> 0:03:29.600 demise in the form of a dream where he was 0:03:29.680 --> 0:03:33.320 laid out his brother in a metal casket wearing a suit, 0:03:33.680 --> 0:03:37.960 a borrowed suit and also bedecked with like a particular 0:03:38.000 --> 0:03:40.640 spray of flowers that lined up with what he saw 0:03:40.640 --> 0:03:44.040 in his dream, my crazy dream about Bennett Moon and 0:03:44.040 --> 0:03:46.920 then that manifesting in reality in the form of her 0:03:47.040 --> 0:03:50.320 calling in to wait, wait, don't tell me what else 0:03:50.360 --> 0:03:53.760 we got. I think your great aunt's ben and in 0:03:53.880 --> 0:03:56.920 her potential obo playing or lack of in the room. 0:03:57.080 --> 0:03:59.600 No, no, I didn't want to take time in the 0:03:59.640 --> 0:04:03.760 show with my own personal anecdotes. I always think of 0:04:03.760 --> 0:04:07.680 that scene and as always sunny in Philadelphia, where Dennis 0:04:07.720 --> 0:04:12.080 Reynolds is his sister in the show, is talking about 0:04:12.120 --> 0:04:16.320 her dreams and he tells her stop. No one wants 0:04:16.360 --> 0:04:19.719 to hear about anybody else's dreams. So I think that 0:04:19.800 --> 0:04:25.120 affected me because the Great aunt Obo Portugal example is 0:04:25.320 --> 0:04:29.640 just is just made up to show the credulous, the 0:04:29.680 --> 0:04:33.640 credulous nature of dreams. But we also talked about how 0:04:34.640 --> 0:04:38.720 dreams can function as a way of problem solving. 0:04:39.160 --> 0:04:39.360 Right. 0:04:39.920 --> 0:04:45.240 Our brains as problem solvers are sometimes more effective when 0:04:45.680 --> 0:04:49.680 our consciousness is less involved. That's how the periodic table 0:04:49.760 --> 0:04:55.359 was formulated. That's how many authors discover great works like 0:04:55.600 --> 0:05:00.960 Samuel Coleridge wrote Kubla Khan after he he awoke from 0:05:02.360 --> 0:05:06.480 a dream. He wrote the poem in his sleep, kind of. 0:05:06.880 --> 0:05:09.040 He was also on a lot of opium at the time. 0:05:09.920 --> 0:05:13.000 I don't think I mentioned this earlier, but the sewing 0:05:13.080 --> 0:05:16.760 machine was also inspired by a dream. 0:05:17.240 --> 0:05:19.840 Yeah, it was a weird one too, a really violent 0:05:19.920 --> 0:05:23.240 dream where I believe the inventor was being boiled in 0:05:23.279 --> 0:05:27.720 a pot by cannibals and being stabbed with like spears. 0:05:28.200 --> 0:05:30.560 And in the dream he recognized that the spears had 0:05:30.640 --> 0:05:32.680 holes in the tips, and that's what gave him the 0:05:32.760 --> 0:05:36.680 idea for the way you thread the needle or the whatever. 0:05:36.720 --> 0:05:39.080 I'm not in a sewing expert on a sewing machine, 0:05:39.160 --> 0:05:41.960 it actually is tied to the very tip of the 0:05:42.000 --> 0:05:44.279 needle and that's what allows it to kind of continue 0:05:44.279 --> 0:05:44.840 to thread and. 0:05:44.800 --> 0:05:47.880 Hold on or whatever. But he what a weird way 0:05:47.920 --> 0:05:49.400 to come to that conclusion. 0:05:50.160 --> 0:05:53.880 Seriously, and just for a couple of other examples, Albert Einstein, 0:05:54.320 --> 0:06:00.440 by his own account, discovered the or you know, hit 0:06:00.560 --> 0:06:05.120 upon some of his own revelations in the world of dreams. 0:06:05.200 --> 0:06:08.440 At this point, I'd like to recommend a fantastic book 0:06:09.080 --> 0:06:13.160 about the nature of time by a guy who I 0:06:13.200 --> 0:06:15.400 think he was an m I T an author named 0:06:15.520 --> 0:06:20.360 Alan Leitman. He wrote a book called Einstein's Dreams, and 0:06:21.120 --> 0:06:26.440 it's entirely almost an anthology or a series of vignettes 0:06:27.160 --> 0:06:33.039 of young Einstein working as a sleepy patent clerk, and 0:06:33.320 --> 0:06:40.360 every time he falls asleep he encounters another theory of time, 0:06:40.920 --> 0:06:45.120 which will also be very very important for today's show. 0:06:46.400 --> 0:06:49.880 The point is that if you're listening today, or if 0:06:49.880 --> 0:06:52.800 you're if you're if you're like many listeners who have 0:06:52.880 --> 0:06:55.599 written to us over the years and said, I love 0:06:55.640 --> 0:07:00.120 turning on this show as I fall asleep, which thank you, 0:07:00.240 --> 0:07:03.520 I still think that's a compliment. Essentially, if you have 0:07:04.240 --> 0:07:09.440 slept regularly over any period of significant time, then odds 0:07:09.480 --> 0:07:12.040 are that your brain has done the same thing. Your 0:07:12.080 --> 0:07:15.480 brain is attempting to solve problems for you. Some of 0:07:15.520 --> 0:07:18.960 those I think it's a point somebody made earlier in 0:07:19.600 --> 0:07:22.960 previous episode. Some of those may be emotional problems, you know, 0:07:23.080 --> 0:07:26.040 things with which you are grappling, and some may be 0:07:27.040 --> 0:07:32.440 scientific things. Some may be like Paul McCartney waking up 0:07:32.800 --> 0:07:35.080 and writing a song. Which song was that? 0:07:35.160 --> 0:07:36.880 Was it? Yesterday was Yesterday? 0:07:36.960 --> 0:07:40.680 Which is the most covered song of all time. It's 0:07:40.720 --> 0:07:44.160 been covered like more than three thousand times. That's a 0:07:44.200 --> 0:07:46.600 pretty cool claim to fame. But yeah, and I mentioned 0:07:46.640 --> 0:07:48.920 like even being a musical guy, I don't really remember 0:07:48.960 --> 0:07:51.400 melodies very much. But all of this stuff. The way 0:07:51.480 --> 0:07:54.400 dreams work kind of depend on the way your brain works, right, 0:07:54.440 --> 0:07:56.360 Like all of our brains work a little bit differently. 0:07:56.520 --> 0:07:59.800 We process things in the waking world differently. So how 0:08:00.120 --> 0:08:03.480 dreams function, I think is a big product of who 0:08:03.520 --> 0:08:04.440 we are as people. 0:08:04.600 --> 0:08:04.760 Right. 0:08:05.160 --> 0:08:09.640 But what if this whole idea of dream you know, 0:08:09.720 --> 0:08:17.120 sort of precognitive dreams, isn't so much our brains doing 0:08:17.160 --> 0:08:21.160 a thing as it is like a bigger picture thing 0:08:21.200 --> 0:08:25.239 that we're experiencing, something tied in with physics, something tied 0:08:25.280 --> 0:08:28.560 in with a force larger than ourselves. 0:08:29.080 --> 0:08:34.560 So how do we explain these anecdotes right? You know, 0:08:34.600 --> 0:08:38.199 many of which are unprovable, many of which are one 0:08:38.280 --> 0:08:43.000 person telling you their opinion about what happened to them. 0:08:43.840 --> 0:08:48.240 And how do we explain the robustly documented tales. 0:08:48.559 --> 0:08:48.760 Right? 0:08:49.960 --> 0:08:53.320 One idea involves exactly what you're talking about, nol, the 0:08:53.360 --> 0:08:56.160 idea of something larger. This is the science I want 0:08:56.200 --> 0:09:01.400 to bring to bear today. It involves the concept of 0:09:01.440 --> 0:09:07.680 a thing known as retro causality. Strap in. We're headed 0:09:07.720 --> 0:09:08.760 for back country here. 0:09:09.200 --> 0:09:13.600 M Yes, causality. You've heard this cause and effect. It's 0:09:13.600 --> 0:09:16.160 the thing that happens when you hold a glass out 0:09:16.200 --> 0:09:18.200 in front of you and then you drop it and 0:09:18.240 --> 0:09:20.240 it hits the ground. Why did it do that? Well, 0:09:20.480 --> 0:09:23.520 it's because gravity exists, and that's what happens when you 0:09:23.600 --> 0:09:27.720 drop something with mass, it falls to the ground because 0:09:27.760 --> 0:09:33.360 of gravity. By the way, gravity is maybe a whole 0:09:33.360 --> 0:09:36.760 episode that we could do just about what that really means, 0:09:36.800 --> 0:09:39.240 what it is. It's not like gravity doesn't want us 0:09:39.280 --> 0:09:43.040 to know something, but it's an odd phenomenon that we 0:09:43.120 --> 0:09:46.800 don't fully grasp. It sounds weird to even say that, 0:09:46.840 --> 0:09:49.440 but it's true. But This chain of cause and effect 0:09:49.559 --> 0:09:52.679 happens in a very predictable order, right, as long as 0:09:52.679 --> 0:09:56.960 there's no other thing coming in, Like with the glass example, 0:09:57.120 --> 0:09:59.560 there isn't someone jumping to catch the glass, or there 0:09:59.600 --> 0:10:03.920 isn't a string wrapped around the glass that pulls it 0:10:03.960 --> 0:10:07.040 down and actually makes it swing or hang from another surface. 0:10:07.720 --> 0:10:11.040 But so that's cause and effect, right, that's causality. So 0:10:11.400 --> 0:10:13.679 what is retro causality? 0:10:14.200 --> 0:10:16.880 The same thing, but backwards. If you ever liked a 0:10:17.000 --> 0:10:20.040 song so much that you said, let's play it backwards, 0:10:20.280 --> 0:10:22.280 I don't know, probably not. It would have to be 0:10:22.760 --> 0:10:25.840 you know, maybe the perfect palindrome of a song to 0:10:25.920 --> 0:10:29.640 have that kind of symmetry. But you're right. Retro causality 0:10:30.200 --> 0:10:35.040 backwards causation. This is a concept of cause and effect 0:10:35.200 --> 0:10:40.760 where an effect somehow precedes its cause in what we 0:10:40.880 --> 0:10:44.360 experience as linear A to B two C one to 0:10:44.400 --> 0:10:50.120 two to three time, such that we have to walk 0:10:50.160 --> 0:10:57.880 slowly through this. Later events affect earlier events. Decisions made 0:10:58.040 --> 0:11:02.520 in the future in the lens of retro causality may 0:11:02.720 --> 0:11:08.360 affect events in the past. This means this could be 0:11:08.520 --> 0:11:13.440 huge things for science if it is ever proven or 0:11:13.679 --> 0:11:19.320 agreed upon. It could explain nagging questions about many things 0:11:19.520 --> 0:11:23.520 in the physical world. But to explain those things, we 0:11:23.600 --> 0:11:27.240 have to understand what retro causality is, and perhaps just 0:11:27.280 --> 0:11:28.839 as importantly, what it is not. 0:11:29.120 --> 0:11:33.800 So yeah, I mean, it's literally the idea of backwards causation, 0:11:34.320 --> 0:11:40.320 a reverse of cause and effect, effect preceding cause. It's 0:11:40.360 --> 0:11:44.440 a concept that is very much tied up into quantum 0:11:44.520 --> 0:11:48.920 physics and things like string theory and you know, the 0:11:48.960 --> 0:11:52.320 idea of how you know, maybe even a multiverse kind 0:11:52.320 --> 0:11:54.760 of situation, because it does sort of lay out this 0:11:54.880 --> 0:11:58.920 framework of like, how can something that happens on a 0:11:58.920 --> 0:12:01.880 certain timeline effect things that precede it in a different 0:12:01.920 --> 0:12:06.280 timeline or earlier on the same timeline. So Lisa Zeyga 0:12:06.440 --> 0:12:10.720 puts it pretty succinctly writing for fizz dot Org. 0:12:11.360 --> 0:12:14.320 She describes retrocausality as not. 0:12:14.559 --> 0:12:17.240 Meaning that signals can be communicated from the future to 0:12:17.280 --> 0:12:21.120 the past. No such signaling would be forbidden even in 0:12:21.160 --> 0:12:27.920 a retrocausal theory due to thermodynamic reason. Instead, retrocausality means 0:12:28.000 --> 0:12:32.920 that when an experimenter chooses the measurement setting with which 0:12:33.120 --> 0:12:37.360 to measure a particle, that decision can influence the properties 0:12:37.360 --> 0:12:40.800 of that particle or another particle in the past, even 0:12:40.880 --> 0:12:43.079 before the experimenter. 0:12:42.559 --> 0:12:43.720 Made their choice. 0:12:44.679 --> 0:12:47.000 In other words, a decision made in the present can 0:12:47.120 --> 0:12:48.920 influence something in the past. 0:12:49.400 --> 0:12:52.480 That is tough to wrap your head around. 0:12:52.840 --> 0:12:57.960 I was thinking at different examples to ground this. It's 0:12:58.000 --> 0:13:05.960 sort of like said, it's sort of it's a weird distinction, right, 0:13:06.040 --> 0:13:11.240 because a decision made in the present should not be 0:13:11.320 --> 0:13:14.480 able to alter the past from everything we know. You 0:13:14.520 --> 0:13:17.080 know what I mean. And we can put it in 0:13:17.440 --> 0:13:24.760 a whimsical in a whimsical sense by saying, if you 0:13:24.880 --> 0:13:31.400 concentrate hard enough in twenty twenty and think I never 0:13:31.640 --> 0:13:36.520 watched Police Academy for something, then that would mean in 0:13:36.559 --> 0:13:42.000 retrocausality that you might end up not watching it, right, 0:13:42.080 --> 0:13:47.040 that's kind of It's still it means that you're not 0:13:47.200 --> 0:13:51.319 telling yourself in the past to do something different. You're 0:13:51.360 --> 0:13:55.160 not communicating with yourself. The fact that you made the 0:13:55.440 --> 0:14:01.559 decision in the present means that the past is changed. 0:14:02.440 --> 0:14:05.480 Yeah, it's an odd thing. I'm just going to go 0:14:05.520 --> 0:14:10.120 back to Lisa's example here, saying that the experimenter, a 0:14:10.200 --> 0:14:14.160 scientist somewhere in a lab chooses, you know, use a 0:14:14.200 --> 0:14:18.240 dial or something to decide what wavelength they're going to 0:14:18.280 --> 0:14:20.440 be looking at these particles with. 0:14:20.680 --> 0:14:20.920 Right. 0:14:21.400 --> 0:14:25.120 So the concept is that just by making that choice 0:14:25.640 --> 0:14:28.920 to select that setting is going to affect the way 0:14:29.000 --> 0:14:33.560 those particles exist essentially. But I think more of what's 0:14:33.560 --> 0:14:38.920 happening here is that the setting to measure those particles 0:14:39.240 --> 0:14:42.520 is going to measure those particles at that wavelength or 0:14:42.560 --> 0:14:47.120 at that energy level, right, Rather than the particle actually 0:14:47.440 --> 0:14:50.120 changing the properties of the particle changing, you're just measuring 0:14:50.160 --> 0:14:56.120 different properties. So it's tough for me to maybe understand 0:14:57.240 --> 0:15:00.200 fully what Lisa is saying, just because I maybe I 0:15:00.240 --> 0:15:04.400 just don't have that particle physics degree meaning to get that. 0:15:04.440 --> 0:15:07.160 By the way, well it's related to you know, I'm 0:15:07.160 --> 0:15:10.480 being a big glib with the I'm playing fast and 0:15:10.520 --> 0:15:14.400 loose with the idea of any kind of comparison or 0:15:14.480 --> 0:15:19.200 analogy that involves a human being. That's the nature of 0:15:19.240 --> 0:15:21.560 this show, and we are going somewhere with this, fellow listeners. 0:15:21.600 --> 0:15:27.280 So I want to say, you're familiar with the uncertainty principle, right, 0:15:27.360 --> 0:15:31.640 the famous experiment where the double slit experiment, which we 0:15:31.680 --> 0:15:34.520 have talked about in the past. It's similar to that 0:15:34.640 --> 0:15:39.840 the idea that an observer affects what is being observed 0:15:39.880 --> 0:15:44.720 and to some degree may determine it by taking a measurement. 0:15:44.800 --> 0:15:49.240 I mean, this is this is fascinating stuff. But maybe 0:15:49.280 --> 0:15:53.000 we put this aside and keep building our case and 0:15:53.040 --> 0:15:56.320 then come back because to your point, Noel, we need 0:15:56.360 --> 0:16:01.480 to consider how retro causality may give us a new 0:16:01.560 --> 0:16:05.880 perspective on quantum theory. And ever a real life story 0:16:05.880 --> 0:16:06.440 about this too. 0:16:06.680 --> 0:16:09.520 Oh, I can't wait to hear it really quickly too. 0:16:09.640 --> 0:16:11.480 It is also kind of tied up in one of 0:16:11.520 --> 0:16:17.280 my favorite scientific descriptive things of all time, Einstein's concept 0:16:17.320 --> 0:16:21.760 of spooky action at a distance or quantum entanglement, which 0:16:21.800 --> 0:16:25.840 is the idea that objects can be affected by other 0:16:25.920 --> 0:16:29.200 objects without being physically touched. And that's sort of the 0:16:29.240 --> 0:16:33.120 basis for this, the idea that these completely separate things 0:16:33.160 --> 0:16:36.320 in time and space can have an effect on one another. 0:16:36.720 --> 0:16:39.280 All right, So let's dive deep into that. And to 0:16:39.320 --> 0:16:41.880 do so, we're gonna have to get out our textbooks. 0:16:42.360 --> 0:16:44.400 You don't have to, don't worry, we're gonna get ours out. 0:16:44.480 --> 0:16:47.200 You can. You can just keep listening, and we'll do that. 0:16:47.280 --> 0:16:57.520 Right after a word from our sponsor, and we're back. Okay, 0:16:57.800 --> 0:17:00.760 we're opening our textbooks now and going to talk about 0:17:00.800 --> 0:17:04.520 quantum physics. So the one we hear about in schools 0:17:04.560 --> 0:17:10.840 often is called the Copenhagen interpretation, and this version argues 0:17:10.920 --> 0:17:15.080 that until a system's properties are physically measured in some way, 0:17:15.520 --> 0:17:19.760 they can encompass essentially a myriad, a large number of 0:17:20.200 --> 0:17:22.119 different values, different properties. 0:17:22.280 --> 0:17:28.080 Right, solid matter is a conspiracy. That's kind of what 0:17:28.240 --> 0:17:30.720 the argument becomes at this level. 0:17:32.000 --> 0:17:32.320 At a. 0:17:33.880 --> 0:17:36.800 Like the closer and closer you look further and further 0:17:36.840 --> 0:17:41.439 you dive down into reality, you see that particles do 0:17:41.520 --> 0:17:46.920 not behave the way that solid matter would behave. Imagine 0:17:46.960 --> 0:17:50.600 reality is a big pool table. It's not the most 0:17:50.680 --> 0:17:52.640 creative idea, but fine. 0:17:52.480 --> 0:17:55.359 We need to like like billiards. 0:17:55.119 --> 0:17:59.840 Yes, like billiards exactly, Matt. So, So the the the 0:18:00.359 --> 0:18:04.400 every particle in the universe of this pool table is 0:18:04.560 --> 0:18:08.240 maybe a little ball, a little ball on the pool table, 0:18:08.320 --> 0:18:11.120 a six ball, and eight ball, a que ball, and 0:18:12.119 --> 0:18:17.040 they should be their solid matter rolling from one definite 0:18:17.119 --> 0:18:22.639 point in space and time to another definite point in 0:18:22.760 --> 0:18:25.800 space and time. That is not the case at a 0:18:25.840 --> 0:18:32.080 fundamental level. Instead, these particles are like this blurry, shifting 0:18:32.600 --> 0:18:36.760 cloud of possibility. You know, think of the old descriptions 0:18:36.840 --> 0:18:42.119 of angels or divine beings that were constantly like their faces. 0:18:42.240 --> 0:18:48.080 We're shifting and all this sort of stuff. Right, These particles, 0:18:48.119 --> 0:18:52.560 these billiard balls, pool balls, aren't just shifting on the table. 0:18:52.760 --> 0:18:57.280 They're like also in maybe other tables that also may exist, 0:18:57.440 --> 0:19:01.160 or there's another there in the air. They're under the floor, 0:19:01.840 --> 0:19:05.399 meaning we can be aware of the cloud of possibility. 0:19:05.880 --> 0:19:12.120 We know that a cueball could be hitting an eight ball, 0:19:12.160 --> 0:19:13.760 we know it could be missing an eight ball. At 0:19:13.760 --> 0:19:18.760 the same time, we know it could be doing any 0:19:18.840 --> 0:19:23.000 number of things, maybe especially scratching, right, especially scratching. The 0:19:23.080 --> 0:19:29.800 probability is high. Uh. And the weird thing is the 0:19:29.880 --> 0:19:33.080 spooky thing, and we do have spooky action coming up 0:19:33.080 --> 0:19:36.240 here later in the show. The weird thing is that 0:19:36.400 --> 0:19:39.320 as soon as you look at that cueball, as soon 0:19:39.320 --> 0:19:44.800 as you focus on measuring that in some way and 0:19:44.960 --> 0:19:50.080 seeing how it hits the eight ball, you will only 0:19:50.400 --> 0:19:54.320 ever see that cueball, let's say, hitting the eight ball 0:19:54.400 --> 0:19:57.720 in one place into one of four corner pockets. You'll 0:19:57.800 --> 0:20:01.480 never see those countless cueballs hitting countless eight balls into 0:20:01.720 --> 0:20:05.760 every pocket or every direction at once. Think of Schrodinger's cat, right, 0:20:05.880 --> 0:20:08.359 this is Schrodinger's cat as a pool shark. 0:20:09.160 --> 0:20:13.040 Wow, you know it reminds me of video in a way. 0:20:13.280 --> 0:20:19.520 I'm just imagining someone dancing very very fast, or dancing 0:20:19.560 --> 0:20:22.600 with lots of intensity. Right. If you're watching it on video, 0:20:22.800 --> 0:20:24.960 you get kind of the full picture. But if it's 0:20:25.000 --> 0:20:28.240 just a snapshot or just that one moment right in time, 0:20:28.800 --> 0:20:30.800 it just looks like somebody in kind of a strange 0:20:30.840 --> 0:20:34.600 position or a weird pose, right, But you wouldn't get 0:20:34.600 --> 0:20:37.920 the full picture of what's occurring. And when you're when 0:20:37.960 --> 0:20:42.280 you're thinking about video in general or life in general, 0:20:42.280 --> 0:20:45.840 and the way to capture things, we can only capture 0:20:45.880 --> 0:20:49.400 images as frames essentially, right, as the. 0:20:50.880 --> 0:20:53.120 I really like this comparison met. 0:20:53.080 --> 0:20:54.719 Right, So there's no way for us to just have, 0:20:54.880 --> 0:20:57.440 like the video that you're watching now or any video 0:20:57.440 --> 0:21:02.080 you watch online, you're seeing frames of moments, and there 0:21:02.200 --> 0:21:05.159 is no way for us to just have to just 0:21:05.280 --> 0:21:12.200 measure a constant or measure all moments at all times 0:21:12.240 --> 0:21:14.880 when you're looking at something or observing something. It's very 0:21:14.880 --> 0:21:16.040 strange to think about that. 0:21:16.119 --> 0:21:18.520 Well, And that's a really great example because that's on 0:21:18.600 --> 0:21:20.560 like sort of like a micro level, but on a 0:21:20.600 --> 0:21:24.200 macro level. It's like, think of the universe in those terms, 0:21:24.600 --> 0:21:27.440 like what would a snapshot of the universe of all 0:21:27.480 --> 0:21:31.320 points at all, Like you can observably, you know, measure 0:21:31.359 --> 0:21:33.439 these things in a person like I was doing a 0:21:33.440 --> 0:21:35.840 goofy dance when you're saying that a minute ago, and 0:21:35.840 --> 0:21:38.639 then you freeze and you might get a sense of like, Okay, 0:21:38.720 --> 0:21:42.479 I'm frozen in this horrible rictus kind of pose, but 0:21:42.600 --> 0:21:47.200 you can't understand the badassness of my dance moves surrounding 0:21:47.280 --> 0:21:50.040 it in the same way that you couldn't understand like 0:21:50.280 --> 0:21:55.879 the totality of all possible moments happening, you know, in 0:21:55.960 --> 0:21:57.440 time and space, you know what I mean. I think 0:21:57.440 --> 0:21:59.560 that's really app math. That's super cool. 0:22:00.840 --> 0:22:05.960 And this is strange because this touches on actually some 0:22:06.160 --> 0:22:12.000 concepts that are present in ancient religions. This kind of 0:22:12.040 --> 0:22:17.080 implies the idea maybe of destiny, the idea of some 0:22:17.119 --> 0:22:20.439 sort of I don't know, it would be misleading to 0:22:20.480 --> 0:22:25.000 call it predetermination. We're not being calvinist here, but and 0:22:25.119 --> 0:22:27.919 no offense to calvinist in the audience. But the point 0:22:28.000 --> 0:22:33.719 is this cloud of possible unobserved potential possibility. This cloud 0:22:33.720 --> 0:22:38.399 of unobserved possibility exists free of a fixed position in 0:22:38.520 --> 0:22:41.960 time or space. And shout out to one of my 0:22:42.000 --> 0:22:48.120 favorite pieces of listener mail. Ha ha ha remember that guy, 0:22:47.920 --> 0:22:53.040 the morphic resonance. Yes, yes, that's my favorite laugh. I 0:22:53.080 --> 0:22:57.480 hope you are still listening, but yes, time space six. 0:22:57.520 --> 0:23:01.199 On one hand, this idea of existing in more than 0:23:01.240 --> 0:23:07.080 one spot at once is commonly called superposition. It only 0:23:07.119 --> 0:23:11.800 collapses into a single state or position when the systems observed. 0:23:12.520 --> 0:23:19.600 Everyone observing, even the most accomplished physicist, can never precisely 0:23:20.560 --> 0:23:27.399 predict what state what the state will be when it collapses, 0:23:27.960 --> 0:23:32.720 and some physicists believe a very controversial idea because we 0:23:32.760 --> 0:23:34.640 have to keep in mind, when you go far enough 0:23:34.680 --> 0:23:36.600 to the edge of physics, you are in the realm 0:23:36.640 --> 0:23:43.960 of metaphysics, philosophy, and sometimes spirituality. So some physicists for 0:23:44.000 --> 0:23:48.879 a long time believed that this collapse of super position 0:23:49.160 --> 0:23:55.400 upon observation meant that consciousness, the mind itself, the software 0:23:55.440 --> 0:23:59.320 of the brain, not the hardware. The presence of an 0:23:59.359 --> 0:24:06.640 observer caused right causation caused the superposition to collapse into 0:24:06.640 --> 0:24:10.760 a single point in space, time, the universe forty two, 0:24:10.800 --> 0:24:15.600 et cetera. This is weird because it implies some very 0:24:15.640 --> 0:24:20.399 strange things about time, things that we wish Einstein was 0:24:21.480 --> 0:24:27.280 here in our franchise of time to talk about and 0:24:27.320 --> 0:24:29.560 think about, because you know, to your earlier point. Now 0:24:30.080 --> 0:24:34.840 those quirky, quirky things about quantum mechanics, spooky action at 0:24:34.880 --> 0:24:39.880 a distance, entanglement, one bit of one bit of something 0:24:40.440 --> 0:24:43.160 on one side of the universe. It's a very misleading 0:24:43.200 --> 0:24:46.320 way to describe the universe. But one bit of something 0:24:46.480 --> 0:24:50.959 very far away turns left or up or down in 0:24:51.000 --> 0:24:54.040 some direction, and then at the same time, in an 0:24:54.119 --> 0:24:59.960 immensely far away place on the other side of the universe, 0:25:00.800 --> 0:25:04.960 the same thing happens. These are connected, right, There's like 0:25:05.040 --> 0:25:11.160 a push pull symmetry. This is called spooky action because 0:25:11.200 --> 0:25:15.280 there's not a local action that can explain it. But 0:25:15.520 --> 0:25:21.080 what if it is evidence of time symmetry. What if 0:25:21.680 --> 0:25:25.359 at this level of reality, instead of flowing in one 0:25:25.400 --> 0:25:29.080 direction A to B, two C one to two to three, 0:25:30.359 --> 0:25:35.879 time flows at the same speed in multiple directions. What 0:25:35.920 --> 0:25:41.520 if what if at the quantum level, time as we 0:25:41.640 --> 0:25:46.399 understand it flows in the past, the present, the future, 0:25:46.520 --> 0:25:50.400 all possible futures, all possible presence. What if on an 0:25:50.400 --> 0:25:54.880 extraordinarily fundamental level, time becomes less like an arrow shot 0:25:55.680 --> 0:26:00.440 to a particular destination and more like the air through 0:26:00.480 --> 0:26:04.080 which that concept of an arrow moves. 0:26:04.400 --> 0:26:07.720 Yeah, I mean it seems like quantum physics in general 0:26:07.800 --> 0:26:11.840 as a discipline, it seeks to explain this kind of phenomenon. 0:26:12.160 --> 0:26:15.000 Because you know, what we heard from Lisa Zeiga at 0:26:15.000 --> 0:26:18.439 the beginning of the episode was what retro causality is 0:26:18.520 --> 0:26:21.560 not is the concept that a signal can be communicated 0:26:21.600 --> 0:26:24.199 from the future to the past. It's more about the 0:26:24.240 --> 0:26:27.439 relationship of those two events and less about like sending 0:26:27.520 --> 0:26:30.480 messages back and forth in time. Just wanted to put 0:26:30.480 --> 0:26:31.280 that out there again. 0:26:32.040 --> 0:26:34.879 Now, it's a good thing to keep in mind, but 0:26:36.080 --> 0:26:37.680