1 00:00:14,200 --> 00:00:17,680 Speaker 1: Welcome to tech Stuff. This is the story. Each week 2 00:00:17,720 --> 00:00:20,360 Speaker 1: on Wednesdays, we bring you an in depth interview with 3 00:00:20,440 --> 00:00:22,479 Speaker 1: someone who has a front row seat to the most 4 00:00:22,480 --> 00:00:28,040 Speaker 1: fascinating things happening in tech today. We're joined by Heim Gingold, writer, 5 00:00:28,560 --> 00:00:32,839 Speaker 1: game designer, and author of the book building SimCity, How 6 00:00:32,880 --> 00:00:36,879 Speaker 1: to Put the World in a Machine and SimCity is 7 00:00:37,040 --> 00:00:40,320 Speaker 1: just that our modern world in the form of a 8 00:00:40,360 --> 00:00:44,680 Speaker 1: computer game. SimCity was released in nineteen eighty nine, and 9 00:00:44,720 --> 00:00:47,400 Speaker 1: it laid the foundation for the type of interactive world 10 00:00:47,400 --> 00:00:52,160 Speaker 1: building games like Minecraft that's so popular today. For those 11 00:00:52,159 --> 00:00:56,320 Speaker 1: who haven't played, it's a simulation game. Essentially, you're the 12 00:00:56,360 --> 00:00:59,520 Speaker 1: mayor of a city, and to play, you decide where 13 00:00:59,560 --> 00:01:02,880 Speaker 1: to construct buildings, where to build infrastructure like roads and 14 00:01:02,960 --> 00:01:06,319 Speaker 1: power grids. The game opens with a menu full of 15 00:01:06,360 --> 00:01:10,040 Speaker 1: scenarios to choose from a damage San Francisco that needs 16 00:01:10,080 --> 00:01:14,000 Speaker 1: to be rebuilt after an earthquake, Tokyo left in disarray 17 00:01:14,160 --> 00:01:17,600 Speaker 1: after a monster attack. From there, you have a few 18 00:01:17,640 --> 00:01:20,880 Speaker 1: years to restore your city to its former glrry. You 19 00:01:20,920 --> 00:01:23,399 Speaker 1: can decide that there needs to be more fire stations 20 00:01:23,440 --> 00:01:26,399 Speaker 1: to help with disaster cleanup, all that the best thing 21 00:01:26,440 --> 00:01:29,959 Speaker 1: to do is to repair all of those octover skyscrapers. 22 00:01:30,680 --> 00:01:34,440 Speaker 1: And while it might sound boring, it was a sensation. 23 00:01:35,160 --> 00:01:36,560 Speaker 1: Here's Heimgingold. 24 00:01:36,840 --> 00:01:39,360 Speaker 2: I mean, who would have thought that a game about 25 00:01:39,880 --> 00:01:44,039 Speaker 2: land zoning and setting tax rates? You know, I guess 26 00:01:44,040 --> 00:01:46,440 Speaker 2: building roads maybe you know, but would be a big hit. 27 00:01:46,520 --> 00:01:49,800 Speaker 2: But it was. It's in Newsweek. It was the first 28 00:01:49,960 --> 00:01:52,120 Speaker 2: time that Newsweek can ever reviewed a computer games at 29 00:01:52,160 --> 00:01:53,440 Speaker 2: very at least, it was very unusual. 30 00:01:53,720 --> 00:01:57,200 Speaker 1: In many ways, sim City's popularity has a lot to 31 00:01:57,240 --> 00:02:01,040 Speaker 1: do with how banal the concept really is. It was 32 00:02:01,360 --> 00:02:05,120 Speaker 1: a simulation of our everyday lives and you were essentially 33 00:02:05,200 --> 00:02:09,320 Speaker 1: playing god. The creator behind sim City is a man 34 00:02:09,400 --> 00:02:12,520 Speaker 1: named Will Wright, a game designer who made a career 35 00:02:12,639 --> 00:02:17,040 Speaker 1: out of creating simulation games. Following SimCity, he designed games 36 00:02:17,080 --> 00:02:21,720 Speaker 1: like sim Earth, sim Ant, and The Sims, which Wright 37 00:02:21,800 --> 00:02:26,120 Speaker 1: thought of as a virtual dollhouse and a not so 38 00:02:26,160 --> 00:02:30,440 Speaker 1: subtle satire of modern consumer culture, a satire with a 39 00:02:30,520 --> 00:02:33,959 Speaker 1: lasting impression. The Sims is about to get the movie 40 00:02:34,000 --> 00:02:37,720 Speaker 1: treatment from none other than Margo Robbie, who produced and 41 00:02:37,800 --> 00:02:42,680 Speaker 1: starred in the hit movie based off another beloved plaything, Barbie. 42 00:02:42,840 --> 00:02:46,160 Speaker 1: Our guest today, Heigeingold is no stranger to the sim 43 00:02:46,240 --> 00:02:49,440 Speaker 1: City franchise. He was an intern for Will Wright back 44 00:02:49,480 --> 00:02:52,160 Speaker 1: when he was getting his master's in digital media design. 45 00:02:52,960 --> 00:02:55,720 Speaker 1: Then in two thousand and eight, they collaborated to create 46 00:02:55,760 --> 00:02:59,280 Speaker 1: the game's spare. But Gingill's book isn't just a history 47 00:02:59,280 --> 00:03:03,760 Speaker 1: of SimCity. It also explores the deep human desire to play, 48 00:03:04,400 --> 00:03:09,119 Speaker 1: the cultural history of games and why simulation is so alluring. 49 00:03:09,600 --> 00:03:12,600 Speaker 1: After reading Building sim City, I knew that I needed 50 00:03:12,639 --> 00:03:15,520 Speaker 1: to talk to Gingol on this show because his book 51 00:03:15,560 --> 00:03:19,080 Speaker 1: illuminates how the way we use technology can say a 52 00:03:19,080 --> 00:03:22,079 Speaker 1: lot about who we are and our desire to leave 53 00:03:22,080 --> 00:03:26,200 Speaker 1: a mark on the world. So, without further ado Heim Gingold, 54 00:03:26,480 --> 00:03:29,120 Speaker 1: Welcome to tech Stuff. Thank you. So I want to 55 00:03:29,160 --> 00:03:32,720 Speaker 1: ask you, why is twenty twenty four a good year 56 00:03:33,120 --> 00:03:35,840 Speaker 1: to write a book about a game that was released 57 00:03:36,080 --> 00:03:39,120 Speaker 1: thirty five years ago, the year I was born nineteen 58 00:03:39,120 --> 00:03:39,640 Speaker 1: eighty nine. 59 00:03:39,920 --> 00:03:40,840 Speaker 2: Maybe it isn't. 60 00:03:45,760 --> 00:03:47,760 Speaker 1: That, at least a certain extent, it is, Yeah, I 61 00:03:47,760 --> 00:03:48,120 Speaker 1: think that. 62 00:03:48,480 --> 00:03:50,680 Speaker 2: Well, Look, I was interested in part and why did 63 00:03:50,720 --> 00:03:54,400 Speaker 2: this game capture so many people's imagination? Like what is 64 00:03:54,440 --> 00:03:57,240 Speaker 2: the mystique of SimCity which still persists? It's still It's 65 00:03:57,280 --> 00:03:59,560 Speaker 2: even that sim City is not a well known particularly 66 00:03:59,560 --> 00:04:02,840 Speaker 2: success full franchise at this particular moment, and not say 67 00:04:02,880 --> 00:04:06,360 Speaker 2: compared to like the sims or Minecraft or robox a Fortnite. 68 00:04:06,920 --> 00:04:08,840 Speaker 2: SimCity is still a well known game, and I think 69 00:04:08,880 --> 00:04:10,880 Speaker 2: that it's trying to figure out why. It was a 70 00:04:10,880 --> 00:04:13,720 Speaker 2: big part of why I wrote this book. And for me, 71 00:04:14,440 --> 00:04:16,320 Speaker 2: what I found is that a lot of it had 72 00:04:16,320 --> 00:04:19,240 Speaker 2: to do with the mystique of simulation itself and the 73 00:04:19,279 --> 00:04:21,279 Speaker 2: mystique of computing. And I think you see that not 74 00:04:21,320 --> 00:04:24,279 Speaker 2: even with like for instance, generative AI, with chatchipt, it 75 00:04:24,400 --> 00:04:27,200 Speaker 2: is a simulation of a conversation. You know, it's like 76 00:04:27,320 --> 00:04:31,040 Speaker 2: not a real agent, not a real person, whatever it is, 77 00:04:31,040 --> 00:04:33,400 Speaker 2: but it's a simulation of a conversation. And I think 78 00:04:33,400 --> 00:04:34,799 Speaker 2: that is fundamental to computing. 79 00:04:34,960 --> 00:04:38,240 Speaker 1: But it feels like magic is cool in response. 80 00:04:38,320 --> 00:04:41,159 Speaker 2: It's totally magic, and SimCity also is totally magic, and 81 00:04:41,160 --> 00:04:42,599 Speaker 2: people were in trance by that. So I think that 82 00:04:42,640 --> 00:04:46,320 Speaker 2: there's this kind of magic holding power that simulations have 83 00:04:46,480 --> 00:04:50,440 Speaker 2: over us, and I think that SimCity was an early, widespread, 84 00:04:50,440 --> 00:04:54,360 Speaker 2: influential example of the powers of stimulation totally. 85 00:04:54,520 --> 00:04:56,000 Speaker 1: And the subtitle of the book, I guess is what 86 00:04:56,160 --> 00:04:59,520 Speaker 1: the book is called, building sim City. How to put 87 00:04:59,560 --> 00:05:02,680 Speaker 1: the world the machine, which is such a rich an 88 00:05:02,680 --> 00:05:05,320 Speaker 1: evocative phrase. What did you mean by that, like bringing 89 00:05:05,360 --> 00:05:07,440 Speaker 1: the world in the machine? I mean you just mentioned simulation. 90 00:05:08,000 --> 00:05:10,840 Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean it's a bit of a puckish title, 91 00:05:10,960 --> 00:05:13,240 Speaker 2: the sense that there's a whole tradition of people that 92 00:05:13,320 --> 00:05:16,119 Speaker 2: are building models of the world and putting them inside 93 00:05:16,160 --> 00:05:19,840 Speaker 2: of computers or pre digital computers. And so I was 94 00:05:19,920 --> 00:05:23,360 Speaker 2: very interested in how people sought to take the complex, 95 00:05:23,440 --> 00:05:26,320 Speaker 2: messy world outside of them that was bigger than anything 96 00:05:26,320 --> 00:05:29,520 Speaker 2: that they could understand, and make it into a model, 97 00:05:29,560 --> 00:05:32,000 Speaker 2: a toy almost that they can play with. So the 98 00:05:32,080 --> 00:05:35,200 Speaker 2: how tunis is more like how to do this impossible thing, 99 00:05:35,279 --> 00:05:36,880 Speaker 2: like how do you take the infinite and put it 100 00:05:36,920 --> 00:05:39,760 Speaker 2: in something very finite and limited? And so I was 101 00:05:39,800 --> 00:05:43,040 Speaker 2: trying to point out the sort of the impossibility of 102 00:05:43,080 --> 00:05:45,159 Speaker 2: putting the world in the machine. 103 00:05:45,720 --> 00:05:46,960 Speaker 1: There's the kind of hubris to it. 104 00:05:47,120 --> 00:05:48,440 Speaker 2: Totally, totally. 105 00:05:48,520 --> 00:05:50,440 Speaker 1: We'll speak to that because I was also curious about 106 00:05:50,480 --> 00:05:53,880 Speaker 1: the two epigrowths to the book, which one is we're 107 00:05:53,920 --> 00:05:57,880 Speaker 1: almost certainly living in a computer simulation and the other 108 00:05:58,000 --> 00:06:00,960 Speaker 1: is software is eating the world. Yeah, so the we're 109 00:06:01,000 --> 00:06:03,240 Speaker 1: living in a simulation thing is a very well known 110 00:06:03,279 --> 00:06:06,760 Speaker 1: and dominant sort of strand of silica value thought software 111 00:06:06,800 --> 00:06:08,920 Speaker 1: is eating the world. That's, of course Mark Andrewson, one 112 00:06:08,920 --> 00:06:12,640 Speaker 1: of the most influential venture capitalists of the last couple 113 00:06:12,640 --> 00:06:15,080 Speaker 1: of decades. That's a little harder to understand on the 114 00:06:15,080 --> 00:06:17,000 Speaker 1: face of it. What does that mean and why was 115 00:06:17,040 --> 00:06:19,280 Speaker 1: that an important epigraph to choose for the book. 116 00:06:20,040 --> 00:06:22,680 Speaker 2: I mean, perhaps it's that there are people who, by 117 00:06:22,920 --> 00:06:26,320 Speaker 2: making simulations of the whole world or exercises, are power over. 118 00:06:26,360 --> 00:06:29,720 Speaker 1: It is that kind of the experience of playing Same City, 119 00:06:29,720 --> 00:06:32,240 Speaker 1: because just very concretely, these are big and fascinating and 120 00:06:32,279 --> 00:06:35,919 Speaker 1: to your point, seductive ideas and worlds, But how do 121 00:06:35,960 --> 00:06:37,720 Speaker 1: they connect to a nineteenth computer game? 122 00:06:38,040 --> 00:06:40,920 Speaker 2: When Jack brown Will write, co founder of Maxis, saw 123 00:06:41,040 --> 00:06:43,400 Speaker 2: sim City like part of the appealing silence, this power 124 00:06:43,440 --> 00:06:46,279 Speaker 2: fantasy is incredible. This is going to appeal to the 125 00:06:46,400 --> 00:06:51,039 Speaker 2: sort of like megalomaniac impulse that I think is actually common. 126 00:06:51,080 --> 00:06:52,960 Speaker 2: I think it's fundamental, it's human. I think you see 127 00:06:52,960 --> 00:06:55,200 Speaker 2: it with children and toys and model building. It is 128 00:06:55,200 --> 00:06:56,880 Speaker 2: the seductive power of models. 129 00:06:57,839 --> 00:06:59,440 Speaker 1: Yeah, I think there's a lot of truth to that. 130 00:06:59,440 --> 00:07:04,839 Speaker 1: There's something intoxicating about taking something rights for mundane like 131 00:07:04,920 --> 00:07:09,760 Speaker 1: city planning and then taking control of it yourself, rather 132 00:07:09,760 --> 00:07:13,160 Speaker 1: than being the subject of it, being control of it. 133 00:07:13,680 --> 00:07:15,720 Speaker 1: At least that's why it looked like as an observer. 134 00:07:15,760 --> 00:07:18,280 Speaker 1: As I mentioned, I was born in nineteen eighty nine, 135 00:07:18,360 --> 00:07:20,560 Speaker 1: so sim City was just a bit too hard for me. 136 00:07:20,680 --> 00:07:23,880 Speaker 1: But I remember watching my dad play and just playing 137 00:07:23,880 --> 00:07:27,440 Speaker 1: around with a bit myself, and I couldn't really crack it. 138 00:07:27,960 --> 00:07:30,119 Speaker 1: But then a couple of years later, the SIMS came out, 139 00:07:30,240 --> 00:07:34,520 Speaker 1: and I was immediately obsessed because here were these people 140 00:07:34,600 --> 00:07:38,920 Speaker 1: doing all the things that I had to do, eat, sleep, socialize, 141 00:07:38,920 --> 00:07:41,400 Speaker 1: But instead of my parents being in charge of me 142 00:07:41,480 --> 00:07:44,240 Speaker 1: doing those things, I was in charge of these characters 143 00:07:44,320 --> 00:07:45,080 Speaker 1: doing those things. 144 00:07:45,320 --> 00:07:47,400 Speaker 2: I mean, I think there's a whole book written about 145 00:07:47,440 --> 00:07:49,760 Speaker 2: the SIMS. I did dig into the SIMS a lot. 146 00:07:49,840 --> 00:07:52,000 Speaker 2: In some sense, it's almost like the climax in the 147 00:07:52,040 --> 00:07:56,120 Speaker 2: book is the production of the SIMS. Because SIMP City 148 00:07:56,160 --> 00:07:58,520 Speaker 2: comes out in nineteen eighty nine, and then some earth 149 00:07:58,640 --> 00:08:00,800 Speaker 2: will where it falls up a Simmer nineteen ninety and 150 00:08:00,840 --> 00:08:03,840 Speaker 2: then Aunt in nineteen ninety one, and then and then 151 00:08:04,000 --> 00:08:06,239 Speaker 2: these sort of weird will write games sort of stop. 152 00:08:07,400 --> 00:08:12,160 Speaker 1: So talk about sim end where you essentially simulate an 153 00:08:12,160 --> 00:08:16,000 Speaker 1: ant colony, and then the journey to the sims, where 154 00:08:16,040 --> 00:08:21,240 Speaker 1: you essentially simulate a family life and control the dates 155 00:08:21,240 --> 00:08:24,640 Speaker 1: to the actions of everyone in the household. How did 156 00:08:24,640 --> 00:08:27,440 Speaker 1: the sims come into existence? And why was it almost 157 00:08:27,480 --> 00:08:29,440 Speaker 1: a decade after sim end? 158 00:08:30,120 --> 00:08:32,960 Speaker 2: Apparently one of the origin points is this wildfire that 159 00:08:33,080 --> 00:08:37,320 Speaker 2: spreads through Oakland, the Oakland Hills. It's devastating and siempsly 160 00:08:37,360 --> 00:08:39,240 Speaker 2: he like narrowly makes out of it, actually him and 161 00:08:39,280 --> 00:08:41,520 Speaker 2: his family, but they lose everything in the process. There 162 00:08:41,559 --> 00:08:46,480 Speaker 2: are all their worldly possessions and will hate shopping, and 163 00:08:46,520 --> 00:08:48,920 Speaker 2: of course he and his wife and daughter have to 164 00:08:48,960 --> 00:08:53,720 Speaker 2: now repopulate their house with stuff. And it's while filling 165 00:08:53,760 --> 00:08:56,680 Speaker 2: up their house with stuff, he's reflecting as he does. 166 00:08:56,720 --> 00:08:59,240 Speaker 2: He's thinking about what does all this stuff mean? Why 167 00:08:59,240 --> 00:09:03,199 Speaker 2: do we want it and so, And of course he's 168 00:09:03,200 --> 00:09:07,360 Speaker 2: also reading about architecture and psychology, and he starts moving 169 00:09:07,400 --> 00:09:11,560 Speaker 2: towards a model of people simulation. But also importantly he's 170 00:09:11,559 --> 00:09:13,800 Speaker 2: taking a lot of inspiration from the ants, which are 171 00:09:13,920 --> 00:09:16,400 Speaker 2: he points out, one of the only life forms that 172 00:09:16,480 --> 00:09:20,319 Speaker 2: survives this fire. And ants have very little internal cognitive state, 173 00:09:20,440 --> 00:09:23,760 Speaker 2: but they're very responsible for their environment, and yet as 174 00:09:23,800 --> 00:09:28,120 Speaker 2: a collective of the ants exhibit incredible intelligence. So ants 175 00:09:28,160 --> 00:09:32,080 Speaker 2: are very popular simulation subjects for artificial life and artificial 176 00:09:32,120 --> 00:09:36,720 Speaker 2: intelligence researchers at that time. Also and Will starts thinking 177 00:09:36,760 --> 00:09:40,160 Speaker 2: about building a model of people, also informed by this emergent, 178 00:09:40,280 --> 00:09:43,840 Speaker 2: bottom up, embodied interactionist frame. I don't think he used 179 00:09:43,880 --> 00:09:45,360 Speaker 2: those terms the time, but those are the that's the 180 00:09:45,360 --> 00:09:50,240 Speaker 2: academic terms. So he's thinking about consumerism, psychology, what is 181 00:09:50,240 --> 00:09:53,120 Speaker 2: the meaning of this stuff, architecture, thinking about this embodied 182 00:09:53,120 --> 00:09:56,240 Speaker 2: model of intelligence. But like with some City, he has 183 00:09:56,240 --> 00:09:58,600 Speaker 2: a hard time getting people to take this idea seriously. 184 00:09:59,360 --> 00:10:01,560 Speaker 2: Why would, as Jeff BoNT told me, why would you 185 00:10:01,640 --> 00:10:06,800 Speaker 2: make a game about a dollhouse? Because dollhouses are for girls, 186 00:10:06,800 --> 00:10:09,880 Speaker 2: and girls don't play computer games, of course, and the 187 00:10:09,920 --> 00:10:13,480 Speaker 2: SIMS is not released until forget exactly ninety nineteen thousand, 188 00:10:14,080 --> 00:10:16,280 Speaker 2: so it's like almost ten years of development. 189 00:10:16,760 --> 00:10:19,920 Speaker 1: You're talking about Jeff Brown, who founded Maxis with Will Wright, 190 00:10:19,960 --> 00:10:22,800 Speaker 1: which was the studio behind SimCity and its spin offs. 191 00:10:23,640 --> 00:10:26,199 Speaker 1: I'd say today it's quite shocking to hear somebody's day 192 00:10:26,559 --> 00:10:29,599 Speaker 1: girls don't play games. I guess the gaming culture was 193 00:10:29,679 --> 00:10:32,160 Speaker 1: very different by it than hyper masculine totally. 194 00:10:32,200 --> 00:10:35,240 Speaker 2: And I think the fact that SimCity appealed to not 195 00:10:35,360 --> 00:10:37,960 Speaker 2: just boys, not just men and boys, but also girls 196 00:10:37,960 --> 00:10:40,880 Speaker 2: and women is part of why the SIMS came into existence. 197 00:10:40,920 --> 00:10:43,520 Speaker 2: Because you look at the history of Maxis, access attracts 198 00:10:43,520 --> 00:10:48,240 Speaker 2: a lot of very talented women and roles of design, marketing, production, 199 00:10:48,679 --> 00:10:52,240 Speaker 2: and that sort of sets the circumstances that enable the 200 00:10:52,240 --> 00:10:54,720 Speaker 2: SIMS to come into existence and become what it becomes. 201 00:10:55,080 --> 00:10:58,040 Speaker 1: Of course, you don't just write about these games. You've 202 00:10:58,080 --> 00:11:01,319 Speaker 1: also made them. You work with will write as an intern, 203 00:11:01,360 --> 00:11:03,600 Speaker 1: and I think my favorite quote from your whole book 204 00:11:03,720 --> 00:11:07,040 Speaker 1: is quote my job was to make software toys for 205 00:11:07,080 --> 00:11:10,480 Speaker 1: the world's most talented toy maker. I was in Wonker's 206 00:11:10,520 --> 00:11:14,520 Speaker 1: chocolate factory. What were these software toys? 207 00:11:15,320 --> 00:11:17,760 Speaker 2: My job was to make prototypes. I was very good 208 00:11:17,880 --> 00:11:20,679 Speaker 2: at making bits of software like sketches in a sense, 209 00:11:21,160 --> 00:11:23,120 Speaker 2: and so I just make these sketches. When I built 210 00:11:23,240 --> 00:11:28,160 Speaker 2: models of I don't know, cultural evolution, bacteria growing in 211 00:11:28,200 --> 00:11:31,959 Speaker 2: a Putri dish, civilization spreading in the galaxy, like, it 212 00:11:32,080 --> 00:11:33,599 Speaker 2: was just all kinds of stuff that we made and 213 00:11:33,760 --> 00:11:34,720 Speaker 2: it was just really fun. 214 00:11:35,520 --> 00:11:37,720 Speaker 1: You know. It strikes me that part of building a 215 00:11:37,760 --> 00:11:41,480 Speaker 1: game is hardcore programming that the other part is coming 216 00:11:41,520 --> 00:11:45,160 Speaker 1: up with the rules. And in these simulation games, the 217 00:11:45,280 --> 00:11:47,840 Speaker 1: rules were designed to mimic life as much as possible, 218 00:11:48,280 --> 00:11:50,440 Speaker 1: So to make them you had to be thinking pretty 219 00:11:50,440 --> 00:11:54,800 Speaker 1: expansively and philosophically and critically about how culture is formed 220 00:11:54,880 --> 00:11:59,600 Speaker 1: and how it functions. I think will Wright's first interview question, 221 00:11:59,679 --> 00:12:01,640 Speaker 1: get it exactually this, that's right. 222 00:12:01,640 --> 00:12:03,280 Speaker 2: That was the interview question that he gave me over 223 00:12:03,360 --> 00:12:06,720 Speaker 2: email when I, uh what I went to work with him. 224 00:12:07,360 --> 00:12:09,680 Speaker 2: He said, yeah, here's an exercise for you to think about. 225 00:12:09,720 --> 00:12:13,319 Speaker 2: If you had to define all possible intelligent cultures, historic 226 00:12:13,360 --> 00:12:17,320 Speaker 2: and future, biological to mechanical, with less than ten parameters, 227 00:12:17,360 --> 00:12:20,240 Speaker 2: what would they be. These parameters should be high enough 228 00:12:20,480 --> 00:12:23,240 Speaker 2: to apply to any conceivable culture, yet low enough to 229 00:12:23,280 --> 00:12:28,200 Speaker 2: derive tangible assets our technology, cities, behavior. A couple of 230 00:12:28,280 --> 00:12:31,679 Speaker 2: candidates we've come up with are introverted extroverted. How much 231 00:12:31,760 --> 00:12:34,360 Speaker 2: is the culture's attention focused on itself first understanding the 232 00:12:34,360 --> 00:12:38,120 Speaker 2: outside world? And how static or expansionistic is it. I'd 233 00:12:38,160 --> 00:12:40,839 Speaker 2: be interested to hear your list of parameters. So he 234 00:12:40,960 --> 00:12:43,160 Speaker 2: sends that on March twenty fifth, two thousand and two, 235 00:12:43,880 --> 00:12:45,640 Speaker 2: and I just want to comment that it's not just 236 00:12:45,760 --> 00:12:49,720 Speaker 2: that the sort of that marvelous sense of abstraction that 237 00:12:49,960 --> 00:12:52,320 Speaker 2: Will is pointing to you here that is so beautiful. 238 00:12:52,320 --> 00:12:54,560 Speaker 2: It's also he's saying that they should be high enough 239 00:12:54,600 --> 00:12:57,440 Speaker 2: to apply any conceivable culture. So he wants this generality. 240 00:12:57,679 --> 00:12:59,880 Speaker 2: But it can't just be some thought experiment. It's got 241 00:12:59,920 --> 00:13:03,400 Speaker 2: to be conquered enough that we could derive tangible assets 242 00:13:03,400 --> 00:13:05,520 Speaker 2: for our game from it, right, Like, It's like, it's 243 00:13:05,559 --> 00:13:08,960 Speaker 2: got to be actionable in a way, there's a meaningful 244 00:13:09,000 --> 00:13:09,520 Speaker 2: to all player. 245 00:13:14,840 --> 00:13:16,520 Speaker 1: We're going to take a quick break, but when we 246 00:13:16,559 --> 00:13:19,920 Speaker 1: come back, we explore the very human need to play 247 00:13:20,440 --> 00:13:24,679 Speaker 1: and just how serious games can get. From Viking burials 248 00:13:24,880 --> 00:13:38,000 Speaker 1: to World War two. Stay with us. So, I'm your 249 00:13:38,040 --> 00:13:40,520 Speaker 1: book is as much a history of sim City as 250 00:13:40,520 --> 00:13:43,559 Speaker 1: it is a history of gaming itself. There's one part 251 00:13:43,559 --> 00:13:45,240 Speaker 1: of your book that I couldn't resist bringing up, which 252 00:13:45,280 --> 00:13:48,840 Speaker 1: is about Vikings, who it turns out were avid gamers 253 00:13:48,840 --> 00:13:50,520 Speaker 1: in their own right. Can you talk a little bit 254 00:13:50,520 --> 00:13:50,880 Speaker 1: about that? 255 00:13:51,480 --> 00:13:55,440 Speaker 2: Yeah, so, right, Vikings, we think of that. There's these 256 00:13:55,679 --> 00:13:59,000 Speaker 2: you know, I in my imagination, perhaps the cinematic imagination, 257 00:13:59,200 --> 00:14:02,760 Speaker 2: is bloodthirsty warriors, which perhaps they were bold warriors, but 258 00:14:03,240 --> 00:14:06,079 Speaker 2: they also really loved board games, apparently, and they were 259 00:14:06,080 --> 00:14:10,000 Speaker 2: buried with them. And these elite burials, they had people 260 00:14:10,000 --> 00:14:13,400 Speaker 2: in their boats with their music instruments and weapons and 261 00:14:13,440 --> 00:14:17,440 Speaker 2: their playing pieces for their games. The Anthropolis don't really 262 00:14:17,440 --> 00:14:19,640 Speaker 2: know why they're there, but they speculate that they indicate 263 00:14:20,280 --> 00:14:22,960 Speaker 2: ability to fight, the ability to think strategically, that these 264 00:14:23,040 --> 00:14:27,440 Speaker 2: represent values that Vikings treasured in their warrior life also 265 00:14:28,040 --> 00:14:29,200 Speaker 2: their playing life. 266 00:14:29,480 --> 00:14:31,080 Speaker 1: I think one of the themes of your book is 267 00:14:31,080 --> 00:14:33,600 Speaker 1: that games are a serious matter. I mean, the Vikings 268 00:14:33,600 --> 00:14:36,280 Speaker 1: obviously thought so enough to be buried with their board games, 269 00:14:36,800 --> 00:14:40,080 Speaker 1: and the sim franchise was in part to teach us 270 00:14:40,080 --> 00:14:43,800 Speaker 1: more about how the modern world worked. But more recently, 271 00:14:44,600 --> 00:14:48,280 Speaker 1: gaming was the backbone of another very serious matter. Last 272 00:14:48,320 --> 00:14:51,040 Speaker 1: year's Nobel Prize in Chemistry went to a team that 273 00:14:51,080 --> 00:14:54,680 Speaker 1: developed an AI program that predicts the structure of proteins 274 00:14:54,680 --> 00:14:57,960 Speaker 1: called Alpha Fold, and Alpha Fold was based off another 275 00:14:58,000 --> 00:15:01,560 Speaker 1: program called Alpha Go, which had a very different objective, 276 00:15:01,640 --> 00:15:03,680 Speaker 1: which was to beat the game Go, which is a 277 00:15:03,760 --> 00:15:07,600 Speaker 1: kind of Asian game with some similarities to chess. And 278 00:15:07,640 --> 00:15:10,080 Speaker 1: it's just part for me to get over how this 279 00:15:10,240 --> 00:15:14,520 Speaker 1: Nobel Prize winning AI program that's kind of you know, 280 00:15:14,600 --> 00:15:17,280 Speaker 1: doing the impossible, building new types of protein that could 281 00:15:17,320 --> 00:15:20,640 Speaker 1: help us fight, you know, diseases in the future. Entire 282 00:15:20,720 --> 00:15:24,960 Speaker 1: new ways is based off a program that was developed 283 00:15:25,000 --> 00:15:27,640 Speaker 1: to beat a game. And so I want to ask you, 284 00:15:27,720 --> 00:15:30,280 Speaker 1: is this kind of a one off connection or is 285 00:15:30,280 --> 00:15:34,520 Speaker 1: there a deeper connection here between advances in computing and 286 00:15:34,800 --> 00:15:35,720 Speaker 1: playing games. 287 00:15:36,080 --> 00:15:38,600 Speaker 2: So you look at the history of computing, it is 288 00:15:38,800 --> 00:15:41,240 Speaker 2: sort of games and the history of computing are inseparable, 289 00:15:41,440 --> 00:15:44,600 Speaker 2: and chess figures probably a history of artificial intelligence. Games 290 00:15:44,600 --> 00:15:47,400 Speaker 2: I've all started to do. And then Demissabas, the co 291 00:15:47,520 --> 00:15:50,560 Speaker 2: founder of DeepMind, who was one of the co winners 292 00:15:50,600 --> 00:15:53,080 Speaker 2: of the Nobel Prize. He started his career as a 293 00:15:53,120 --> 00:15:55,600 Speaker 2: game developer, worked for Peter Model and another very well 294 00:15:55,680 --> 00:15:59,600 Speaker 2: known game game creator who had one game, I believe 295 00:15:59,640 --> 00:16:04,640 Speaker 2: where you play a golden age Hollywood studio boss and 296 00:16:04,680 --> 00:16:07,080 Speaker 2: you have to like manage your stable of talent. So 297 00:16:07,160 --> 00:16:11,440 Speaker 2: Demostovas works for Peter Malnu and then the his own 298 00:16:11,520 --> 00:16:13,040 Speaker 2: game thing for a while, and then at some point 299 00:16:13,160 --> 00:16:16,360 Speaker 2: he leaves games and goes back to do a PhD. 300 00:16:16,720 --> 00:16:19,600 Speaker 2: And he starts going on this path that leads him 301 00:16:19,640 --> 00:16:22,080 Speaker 2: to doing this work with machine learning and heural networks 302 00:16:22,880 --> 00:16:24,920 Speaker 2: from from there and then but then at deep Mind 303 00:16:24,960 --> 00:16:27,800 Speaker 2: deep minds early some of its early breakthrough work was 304 00:16:27,800 --> 00:16:31,320 Speaker 2: in making artificial intelligences that could play Atari twenty six 305 00:16:31,440 --> 00:16:34,840 Speaker 2: hundred games. And part of the reason that this works 306 00:16:34,880 --> 00:16:37,520 Speaker 2: is that games are so important to AI more generally, 307 00:16:37,560 --> 00:16:42,320 Speaker 2: is that games provide these very constrained environments with clear 308 00:16:43,280 --> 00:16:46,240 Speaker 2: winning and losing conditions. So that's like, that's perfect for 309 00:16:46,880 --> 00:16:50,440 Speaker 2: an artificial intelligence to work. I mean games, life is complex, 310 00:16:50,520 --> 00:16:55,120 Speaker 2: it's messy, there is no clear winning and losing, but 311 00:16:55,240 --> 00:16:57,760 Speaker 2: a game provide gives you this illusion or this it 312 00:16:57,840 --> 00:17:02,160 Speaker 2: creates this this little fictional make believe spaces where you 313 00:17:02,200 --> 00:17:06,040 Speaker 2: can have clear agency, clear outcomes, clear moves, clear rules. 314 00:17:06,040 --> 00:17:07,320 Speaker 2: So it's perfect for computing. 315 00:17:08,400 --> 00:17:10,960 Speaker 1: I think going back to sim City specifically in this 316 00:17:11,080 --> 00:17:13,800 Speaker 1: moment in the late eighties early nineties, did sim City 317 00:17:14,040 --> 00:17:19,080 Speaker 1: contribute to the development of computing? Did it popularize it? 318 00:17:19,160 --> 00:17:22,639 Speaker 1: What is sim City's role in this incredibly rich history 319 00:17:22,640 --> 00:17:25,280 Speaker 1: of the interaction between games and developments and computing. 320 00:17:25,520 --> 00:17:27,000 Speaker 2: Well, that was one of the things that I really 321 00:17:27,000 --> 00:17:30,919 Speaker 2: got lost in writing this book was looking at the 322 00:17:31,359 --> 00:17:34,600 Speaker 2: looking at how simp City sort of starts interactslect just 323 00:17:34,600 --> 00:17:39,760 Speaker 2: with popular culture, and Nintendo's Shigaro Miomoto comes out. He 324 00:17:39,960 --> 00:17:42,479 Speaker 2: sets in motion the licensing of SimCity so that they 325 00:17:42,520 --> 00:17:45,199 Speaker 2: can put it on the Nintendo right away. But at 326 00:17:45,200 --> 00:17:49,040 Speaker 2: the same time, Access is also making deals with enterprise 327 00:17:49,359 --> 00:17:52,080 Speaker 2: firms like Chevron to create things like some refinery. And 328 00:17:52,119 --> 00:17:54,639 Speaker 2: then there's the Santa Fe Institute, which is a recently 329 00:17:54,720 --> 00:17:59,119 Speaker 2: founded research institution that's all about complexity, science and emergence, 330 00:17:59,119 --> 00:18:01,720 Speaker 2: and they established a rich set of connections with will 331 00:18:01,800 --> 00:18:04,360 Speaker 2: Right and Maxis as well. So Maxis sort of traffics 332 00:18:04,359 --> 00:18:06,840 Speaker 2: between these different computing worlds. I think that was also 333 00:18:06,880 --> 00:18:09,399 Speaker 2: part of the magic and the mystique of some City 334 00:18:09,520 --> 00:18:13,480 Speaker 2: is how it brought these esoteric subjects that people knew 335 00:18:13,520 --> 00:18:17,960 Speaker 2: about into some into like this toy, this toy forum 336 00:18:18,000 --> 00:18:18,800 Speaker 2: that can come home. 337 00:18:19,920 --> 00:18:24,760 Speaker 1: So Maxus introduced to popularize the notion of simulation as 338 00:18:24,800 --> 00:18:28,440 Speaker 1: something which everyone could kind of understand and literally play with. 339 00:18:28,720 --> 00:18:32,439 Speaker 1: They weren't the company who then, you know, developed the 340 00:18:32,520 --> 00:18:37,320 Speaker 1: enormous commercial opportunity of simulation. But fast forward into today, 341 00:18:38,240 --> 00:18:41,359 Speaker 1: you know, what role does simulation play in all of 342 00:18:41,400 --> 00:18:44,640 Speaker 1: our lives? Versus the nineties. I mean, how how ubiquity 343 00:18:44,800 --> 00:18:48,000 Speaker 1: is computer simulation in terms of our everyday lives. 344 00:18:48,640 --> 00:18:50,760 Speaker 2: I think simulation is everywhere. I think even at the 345 00:18:50,800 --> 00:18:54,560 Speaker 2: time people were playing Nintendo games, they were playing with simulations. 346 00:18:54,560 --> 00:18:56,560 Speaker 2: I think sim City just sort of made it overt 347 00:18:56,640 --> 00:18:59,000 Speaker 2: in a sense. This is a simulation and playing with 348 00:18:59,040 --> 00:19:02,200 Speaker 2: a model of a city people witness. I think about there. 349 00:19:02,480 --> 00:19:05,040 Speaker 2: I argue that all of computing is in effect a 350 00:19:05,119 --> 00:19:07,600 Speaker 2: kind of simulation. I think that's basically what Alan Turing 351 00:19:09,200 --> 00:19:10,000 Speaker 2: how he has it. 352 00:19:10,640 --> 00:19:12,720 Speaker 1: Are you putting the world in the machine? 353 00:19:12,880 --> 00:19:14,159 Speaker 2: Are you putting the world in the machine? I mean 354 00:19:14,200 --> 00:19:16,640 Speaker 2: you look at the idea of a turning machine, which 355 00:19:16,640 --> 00:19:19,000 Speaker 2: is fundational in the computer science and computing. It's all 356 00:19:19,000 --> 00:19:21,560 Speaker 2: about how one machine can pretend to be another kind 357 00:19:21,560 --> 00:19:26,359 Speaker 2: of machine. So that this very mathematical idea has very 358 00:19:26,520 --> 00:19:30,840 Speaker 2: sort of he has a very clear narrative and philosophical resonances. 359 00:19:30,920 --> 00:19:33,200 Speaker 2: It's there from the very outset, and I think that 360 00:19:33,200 --> 00:19:37,200 Speaker 2: that's what software is. Software is a way to tell 361 00:19:37,240 --> 00:19:39,520 Speaker 2: a machine how to pretend to be another kind of machine. 362 00:19:39,560 --> 00:19:42,000 Speaker 2: That's why you can download an app on your smartphone, 363 00:19:42,080 --> 00:19:44,680 Speaker 2: and now your smartphone does something new. It can pretend 364 00:19:44,760 --> 00:19:48,040 Speaker 2: to be some other thing now, whether it's a video 365 00:19:48,080 --> 00:19:51,040 Speaker 2: player or messaging app or a particular game. 366 00:19:51,880 --> 00:19:55,320 Speaker 1: And in terms of the history of simulation, the book 367 00:19:55,400 --> 00:19:59,439 Speaker 1: suggests that basically the end of World War two was 368 00:19:59,520 --> 00:20:03,119 Speaker 1: when and of the possibilities and the reality of simulation 369 00:20:03,320 --> 00:20:05,520 Speaker 1: became a thing. Is that right? 370 00:20:06,160 --> 00:20:10,360 Speaker 2: Modern digital computing really is born in a sense in 371 00:20:10,400 --> 00:20:12,560 Speaker 2: the wake of World War two, or sort of during 372 00:20:12,600 --> 00:20:14,959 Speaker 2: and after World War Two. The reason the military had 373 00:20:14,960 --> 00:20:18,280 Speaker 2: a lot of computing hardware, not just like modern computers, 374 00:20:18,400 --> 00:20:21,439 Speaker 2: was to calculate the trajectory of bullets so that they 375 00:20:21,440 --> 00:20:23,919 Speaker 2: can make these artillery firing tables that you needed for 376 00:20:23,960 --> 00:20:26,240 Speaker 2: any new munitions you were going to deploy in the field. 377 00:20:26,280 --> 00:20:28,280 Speaker 2: So the gunners would look up at these tables like, oh, 378 00:20:28,320 --> 00:20:29,800 Speaker 2: I want to aim at this target. I need to 379 00:20:29,840 --> 00:20:31,639 Speaker 2: look what is what I need to dial in. That 380 00:20:31,720 --> 00:20:34,600 Speaker 2: requires a lot of simulation to simulate these shells. So 381 00:20:34,880 --> 00:20:36,720 Speaker 2: and these were often done by hand, you know, there 382 00:20:36,760 --> 00:20:40,000 Speaker 2: were these often women, these calculating girls. And at some 383 00:20:40,000 --> 00:20:42,720 Speaker 2: point the digital computers became faster that they can compute 384 00:20:43,080 --> 00:20:46,359 Speaker 2: the trajectory of the shell faster than that actual shell 385 00:20:46,400 --> 00:20:49,920 Speaker 2: could travel. Like that is the moment when simulations sort 386 00:20:49,920 --> 00:20:53,000 Speaker 2: of become something new, really new, where the computer can 387 00:20:53,000 --> 00:20:55,359 Speaker 2: simulate faster than real time, in this case just a 388 00:20:55,400 --> 00:20:58,560 Speaker 2: single bullet shell, and that being you know, nowadays, of 389 00:20:58,560 --> 00:21:01,600 Speaker 2: course you can simulate a gagiliar of these things, you know, 390 00:21:01,680 --> 00:21:02,520 Speaker 2: at a plank of an eye. 391 00:21:02,960 --> 00:21:05,080 Speaker 1: There's this sort of theme in the book which also 392 00:21:05,119 --> 00:21:07,320 Speaker 1: has to do with the birth of sim City, which 393 00:21:07,359 --> 00:21:11,440 Speaker 1: is all of these technologies that were developed as military 394 00:21:11,440 --> 00:21:15,399 Speaker 1: technologies then in fact became sort of city management and 395 00:21:15,480 --> 00:21:19,480 Speaker 1: behavior economics technologies, which then showed up represents in sim 396 00:21:19,480 --> 00:21:22,720 Speaker 1: City in the nineties. Can you kind of shot that frogransion. 397 00:21:22,840 --> 00:21:25,119 Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean it's almost like a cliche of the 398 00:21:25,160 --> 00:21:29,159 Speaker 2: history of technology that technologies developed for war purposes, for 399 00:21:29,240 --> 00:21:34,520 Speaker 2: military purposes, then becomes something else that becomes commonplace. And 400 00:21:34,520 --> 00:21:37,439 Speaker 2: that's definitely the case with computing and simulation. And I 401 00:21:37,480 --> 00:21:40,159 Speaker 2: think that one of the things that you know, we 402 00:21:40,240 --> 00:21:42,280 Speaker 2: can trace that. But one of the things I wanted 403 00:21:42,280 --> 00:21:44,439 Speaker 2: to do in this book was recognized that, but then 404 00:21:44,480 --> 00:21:47,720 Speaker 2: also point it the consistent sort of how play in 405 00:21:47,880 --> 00:21:50,560 Speaker 2: games is also one of these recurrent themes in these 406 00:21:50,960 --> 00:21:53,639 Speaker 2: evolition of these technologies, and in fact, for me that 407 00:21:54,240 --> 00:21:58,359 Speaker 2: turned towards some city, and modern graphical computing really comes 408 00:21:58,400 --> 00:22:01,720 Speaker 2: through this recent in the nineteen sixties wanted to take 409 00:22:01,760 --> 00:22:08,040 Speaker 2: this technology that has these strong military bureaucratic connotations and 410 00:22:08,119 --> 00:22:10,840 Speaker 2: bringing it to children, and they say, here is a 411 00:22:10,880 --> 00:22:14,639 Speaker 2: transformative technology. We should get kids to use this, and 412 00:22:14,640 --> 00:22:17,199 Speaker 2: we should get liberal arts students to use this and 413 00:22:17,200 --> 00:22:20,320 Speaker 2: see what they can do. So all these threads come together, 414 00:22:20,400 --> 00:22:25,280 Speaker 2: and so to the city management. The MIT historian Jennifer 415 00:22:25,359 --> 00:22:28,399 Speaker 2: Late has a lot of excellent work on the history 416 00:22:28,440 --> 00:22:33,280 Speaker 2: of women in computing and cities, and she talks about 417 00:22:33,280 --> 00:22:36,080 Speaker 2: how in the nineteen sixties there was a lot of 418 00:22:36,160 --> 00:22:39,080 Speaker 2: urban unrest in the United States, and there's wats riots, 419 00:22:40,600 --> 00:22:42,000 Speaker 2: there's a lot of the United States, a lot of 420 00:22:42,040 --> 00:22:47,199 Speaker 2: civil civil conflicts, and as part of the part of 421 00:22:47,200 --> 00:22:48,679 Speaker 2: the response to that was to bring in a lot 422 00:22:48,680 --> 00:22:51,400 Speaker 2: of Cold War academics to sort of study the problems 423 00:22:51,400 --> 00:22:57,000 Speaker 2: of cities, and so at mitj Forrester does work that's 424 00:22:57,080 --> 00:23:00,159 Speaker 2: very important to some city and his response to these 425 00:23:00,240 --> 00:23:04,520 Speaker 2: urban crises is to develop simulations of cities. The fact 426 00:23:04,600 --> 00:23:08,119 Speaker 2: you look at the history of wargaming and you know 427 00:23:08,600 --> 00:23:12,359 Speaker 2: the mid the mid twentieth century, during the Cold War, 428 00:23:12,720 --> 00:23:15,520 Speaker 2: the US military got really into these like live action 429 00:23:15,800 --> 00:23:17,639 Speaker 2: role playing game to the sense when they would like 430 00:23:17,760 --> 00:23:21,119 Speaker 2: role playing these wargaming scenarios, and people found these experiences 431 00:23:21,119 --> 00:23:26,480 Speaker 2: to be incredibly seductive, very compelling, just like so memorable. 432 00:23:26,880 --> 00:23:31,280 Speaker 2: And actually it's HG. Wells, the science fiction author who 433 00:23:31,760 --> 00:23:33,840 Speaker 2: has this book called Little Wars. It's like from the 434 00:23:33,880 --> 00:23:38,040 Speaker 2: early nineteen hundreds. It's about him adapting German wargaming for 435 00:23:38,240 --> 00:23:41,440 Speaker 2: military purposes as like a activity at home with little 436 00:23:41,480 --> 00:23:45,040 Speaker 2: toy soldiers, and he makes this incredible game design and 437 00:23:45,080 --> 00:23:48,239 Speaker 2: that's what leads to the whole miniature wargaming you know 438 00:23:48,440 --> 00:23:51,679 Speaker 2: of the twentieth century and dungeons and dragons. It's like 439 00:23:51,760 --> 00:23:53,480 Speaker 2: all of the stuff can be traced back to HG. 440 00:23:53,600 --> 00:23:56,439 Speaker 1: Wells. Just as we're closing, there was a review of 441 00:23:56,480 --> 00:23:58,920 Speaker 1: your book in the Los Angeles Review of Books and 442 00:23:59,200 --> 00:24:01,720 Speaker 1: kind of provoke with comparison and the second half of 443 00:24:01,800 --> 00:24:06,400 Speaker 1: the piece between SimCity and this sort of new yet 444 00:24:06,440 --> 00:24:10,639 Speaker 1: to be built city in Solano County, California, where various 445 00:24:10,720 --> 00:24:14,320 Speaker 1: tech billionaires have bought fifty two thousand acres of land, 446 00:24:14,920 --> 00:24:18,600 Speaker 1: sometimes paying five times more than market price, with this 447 00:24:18,760 --> 00:24:22,000 Speaker 1: vision of creating a new city for four hundred thousand 448 00:24:22,040 --> 00:24:25,480 Speaker 1: people in this quote unquote virgin Land, and somebody on 449 00:24:25,520 --> 00:24:30,560 Speaker 1: Reddit evidently accused these moguls of wanting to play SimCity IRL, 450 00:24:31,080 --> 00:24:33,359 Speaker 1: which was amusing. But I mean, talk a little bit 451 00:24:33,359 --> 00:24:36,280 Speaker 1: about Solano and what you thought of the comparison in 452 00:24:36,280 --> 00:24:36,760 Speaker 1: that review. 453 00:24:37,480 --> 00:24:40,280 Speaker 2: So my understanding is that there are a lot of 454 00:24:40,840 --> 00:24:44,920 Speaker 2: very powerful Silicon Valley personnalities with a lot of deep pockets, 455 00:24:45,000 --> 00:24:50,520 Speaker 2: who are very frustrated with the Pacific problems that exist 456 00:24:50,600 --> 00:24:52,760 Speaker 2: in the day area. Like a lot of parts of 457 00:24:52,760 --> 00:24:56,560 Speaker 2: the country. Actually, the cost of housing is incredibly unaffordable. 458 00:24:56,600 --> 00:24:59,760 Speaker 2: It puts pressure at all level everywhere, and they're frustrated 459 00:24:59,800 --> 00:25:03,440 Speaker 2: with the civic process, and so they have this vision 460 00:25:03,520 --> 00:25:07,000 Speaker 2: of building a new city with driven by, as Slain 461 00:25:07,080 --> 00:25:12,000 Speaker 2: points out, very new urbanist good ideas about walkable cities. Yes, 462 00:25:12,040 --> 00:25:14,320 Speaker 2: they have a lot. They're very well intentioned, I think, 463 00:25:14,440 --> 00:25:16,280 Speaker 2: but at the same time, there's a kind of hubrius 464 00:25:16,280 --> 00:25:19,280 Speaker 2: to this to sort of go and buy up this 465 00:25:19,680 --> 00:25:22,840 Speaker 2: supposedly virgin Land and just PLoP down a new city. 466 00:25:22,840 --> 00:25:25,280 Speaker 2: In that sense, it is like simsy. It is like 467 00:25:26,440 --> 00:25:28,720 Speaker 2: the weird world does not work like SimCity. I think 468 00:25:28,760 --> 00:25:32,160 Speaker 2: maybe that's the point, and SimCity gives you this sort 469 00:25:32,200 --> 00:25:34,720 Speaker 2: of present all your like a not just a city planner, 470 00:25:34,760 --> 00:25:37,000 Speaker 2: you're kind of a god. Right you can you don't 471 00:25:37,040 --> 00:25:38,840 Speaker 2: have to contend, you don't have to run for election, 472 00:25:39,400 --> 00:25:42,920 Speaker 2: you don't have to deal with different constituencies that want 473 00:25:42,920 --> 00:25:47,200 Speaker 2: different things, which is actually the meat of civic life. 474 00:25:47,640 --> 00:25:49,440 Speaker 2: And I think that's the connection here, is that the 475 00:25:49,600 --> 00:25:51,639 Speaker 2: really the real life is really not like that. But 476 00:25:51,800 --> 00:25:54,960 Speaker 2: if you are really frustrated and really powerful, you can 477 00:25:55,000 --> 00:25:56,840 Speaker 2: try to do it. But I think that that effort 478 00:25:56,840 --> 00:26:00,280 Speaker 2: has run into local opposition. And that's that's one of 479 00:26:00,280 --> 00:26:02,800 Speaker 2: the reasons that I compare to Dora and Gary Nelson 480 00:26:02,960 --> 00:26:06,760 Speaker 2: city building education work where it can also was response 481 00:26:06,840 --> 00:26:10,560 Speaker 2: to the civil rights unrest in nineteen sixties, that where 482 00:26:10,560 --> 00:26:13,760 Speaker 2: she had kids in classrooms build and role playing model cities, 483 00:26:13,800 --> 00:26:16,880 Speaker 2: and there it's all about the kids voicing their desires 484 00:26:16,920 --> 00:26:18,880 Speaker 2: and what they want and don't want, and hashing out 485 00:26:19,000 --> 00:26:22,040 Speaker 2: there with each other, you know, coming to some kind 486 00:26:22,080 --> 00:26:24,560 Speaker 2: of agreement. That's really what civic life should be like 487 00:26:24,640 --> 00:26:25,720 Speaker 2: in a democracy. 488 00:26:26,240 --> 00:26:28,120 Speaker 1: That's very interesting. It comes back to those two epigraphs, 489 00:26:28,119 --> 00:26:30,280 Speaker 1: isn't it in the sense of sulfur etin the world 490 00:26:30,320 --> 00:26:33,360 Speaker 1: and we're probably living the computer simulation and maybe more 491 00:26:33,359 --> 00:26:35,359 Speaker 1: of a hope than an analysis on the part of 492 00:26:35,359 --> 00:26:36,440 Speaker 1: some of these guys. 493 00:26:36,480 --> 00:26:38,960 Speaker 2: Software trying to eat the world. I think that's that's 494 00:26:39,040 --> 00:26:39,520 Speaker 2: very apt. 495 00:26:41,440 --> 00:26:43,800 Speaker 1: So my very very last question is actually more of 496 00:26:43,800 --> 00:26:45,600 Speaker 1: a confession, which is I totally I was obsessed with 497 00:26:45,640 --> 00:26:47,720 Speaker 1: the SIMS. But what I didn't tell you was the 498 00:26:47,720 --> 00:26:49,960 Speaker 1: way I like to play it was by using cheap 499 00:26:50,000 --> 00:26:54,119 Speaker 1: COULDE have unlimited resources to build these lacial ms for 500 00:26:54,160 --> 00:26:56,800 Speaker 1: the Sims to be endlessly happy in which I know 501 00:26:56,920 --> 00:26:59,720 Speaker 1: is a sacrilegious way of playing the game, But of 502 00:26:59,760 --> 00:27:02,159 Speaker 1: course the ten eleven, twelve year old, it's one of 503 00:27:02,200 --> 00:27:05,040 Speaker 1: those moments where you know you're on the customer adolessons 504 00:27:05,080 --> 00:27:08,280 Speaker 1: and your agency is less than your desire. How does 505 00:27:08,320 --> 00:27:11,000 Speaker 1: the way we play reflect on us? 506 00:27:11,760 --> 00:27:17,320 Speaker 2: I mean that is something that has fascinated play scholars. 507 00:27:17,320 --> 00:27:19,840 Speaker 2: Brian Son Smith one of the most influential play scholars 508 00:27:19,880 --> 00:27:22,720 Speaker 2: in the twentieth century. He does a cross cultural comparison 509 00:27:22,720 --> 00:27:26,760 Speaker 2: of games. Which societies play which games, and so certain 510 00:27:26,760 --> 00:27:29,360 Speaker 2: societies I think perhaps I forget the details, but maybe 511 00:27:29,359 --> 00:27:32,160 Speaker 2: agrarian ones or more drawn to games of luck and 512 00:27:32,240 --> 00:27:35,880 Speaker 2: sort of modern Western industrial societies tend to be more 513 00:27:35,880 --> 00:27:39,280 Speaker 2: interested in games of strategy and skill. But I just 514 00:27:39,320 --> 00:27:41,000 Speaker 2: find in my own personal life, I tend to find 515 00:27:41,000 --> 00:27:43,119 Speaker 2: that people that are more interested in gambling tend to 516 00:27:43,119 --> 00:27:45,960 Speaker 2: be business people. I don't know if this is this 517 00:27:46,040 --> 00:27:48,840 Speaker 2: is purely anecdotal, but I'm always fascinated when I meet 518 00:27:48,840 --> 00:27:50,560 Speaker 2: people say like, what do you like to play? How 519 00:27:50,600 --> 00:27:52,119 Speaker 2: do you play? I feel like I've learned a lot 520 00:27:52,160 --> 00:27:54,720 Speaker 2: about somebody by playing. 521 00:27:54,400 --> 00:28:03,159 Speaker 1: With them him. Thanks so much for being with me today. 522 00:28:03,320 --> 00:28:04,800 Speaker 2: This is really fun. Thank you. 523 00:28:28,880 --> 00:28:32,280 Speaker 1: For tech Stuff. I'm os Voloshin. This episode was produced 524 00:28:32,280 --> 00:28:36,600 Speaker 1: by Eliza Dennis, Victoria Dominguez, and Lizzie Jacobs. He was 525 00:28:36,640 --> 00:28:39,880 Speaker 1: executive produced by Me, Karen Price and Kate Osborne for 526 00:28:39,920 --> 00:28:44,800 Speaker 1: Kaleidoscope and Katrina Norvel for iHeart Podcasts. Jack Insley mixed 527 00:28:44,800 --> 00:28:48,120 Speaker 1: this episode and Kyle Murdoch wrote our theme song. Join 528 00:28:48,200 --> 00:28:51,000 Speaker 1: us on Friday for the weekend tech Karen and I 529 00:28:51,040 --> 00:28:53,480 Speaker 1: will run through the tech headlines you may have missed. 530 00:28:54,000 --> 00:28:56,800 Speaker 1: Please rate, review, and reach out to us at tech 531 00:28:56,800 --> 00:28:59,440 Speaker 1: Stuff podcast at gmail dot com. We can't wait to 532 00:28:59,440 --> 00:29:00,000 Speaker 1: hear from you.