1
00:00:10,440 --> 00:00:14,040
Speaker 1: Have you ever wondered about the nature of reality? Ever

2
00:00:14,200 --> 00:00:17,520
Speaker 1: considered that the world around you might not be as

3
00:00:17,560 --> 00:00:21,560
Speaker 1: it seems that it's constructed, or that your life is

4
00:00:21,560 --> 00:00:25,360
Speaker 1: on a course outside of your own control. If so,

5
00:00:25,880 --> 00:00:29,120
Speaker 1: you've likely stumbled upon a series of questions which have

6
00:00:29,160 --> 00:00:32,600
Speaker 1: been at the core of human thinking for thousands of years,

7
00:00:33,360 --> 00:00:37,320
Speaker 1: from Plato's allegory of the Cave to Descartes's evil demon.

8
00:00:37,640 --> 00:00:42,240
Speaker 1: The nature of ontology, that is, the exact composition, veracity,

9
00:00:42,440 --> 00:00:46,360
Speaker 1: and reality of living has given rise to a multiplicity

10
00:00:46,400 --> 00:00:50,600
Speaker 1: of questions about not only our own place within the universe,

11
00:00:50,960 --> 00:00:54,920
Speaker 1: but the fabric of the universe itself. We feel it

12
00:00:54,960 --> 00:00:59,360
Speaker 1: acutely when we're sleeping, when our imaginations to borrow from

13
00:00:59,400 --> 00:01:03,800
Speaker 1: Freud become untethered from the strictures of ego, offering us

14
00:01:03,840 --> 00:01:09,839
Speaker 1: a glimpse into strange and sometimes unsettling other worlds. Dreams,

15
00:01:09,880 --> 00:01:14,680
Speaker 1: and hallucinatory visions are strange frontiers that cannot be mapped

16
00:01:14,720 --> 00:01:20,399
Speaker 1: with any certainty. Scientifically speaking, they are simply images conjured

17
00:01:20,440 --> 00:01:23,600
Speaker 1: from the depths of our subconscious a way for our

18
00:01:23,640 --> 00:01:27,600
Speaker 1: brain to process the many complex events and emotions we

19
00:01:27,760 --> 00:01:32,040
Speaker 1: experience on a daily basis. But what if, as some

20
00:01:32,280 --> 00:01:35,279
Speaker 1: might have as believe, there was more to these often

21
00:01:35,400 --> 00:01:40,960
Speaker 1: familiar but other worldly, supposedly self made moving images. What

22
00:01:41,040 --> 00:01:45,800
Speaker 1: if they weren't distorted depictions of our earthly experiences at all,

23
00:01:46,400 --> 00:01:51,720
Speaker 1: but were in fact actually glimpses into other worlds. You

24
00:01:51,760 --> 00:01:56,560
Speaker 1: may be familiar with Hugh Everett's many World's theory. Essentially,

25
00:01:56,600 --> 00:01:59,760
Speaker 1: it posits that we exist as only one in an

26
00:01:59,760 --> 00:02:04,360
Speaker 1: in series of possible worlds, so that at any given moment,

27
00:02:04,680 --> 00:02:09,000
Speaker 1: there are potentially infinite versions of ourselves busily going about

28
00:02:09,040 --> 00:02:14,400
Speaker 1: our lives in ways that might seem unimaginable to us. Somewhere,

29
00:02:14,720 --> 00:02:18,480
Speaker 1: some version of you has died in a war. Elsewhere,

30
00:02:18,880 --> 00:02:22,120
Speaker 1: you have become a famous rock star, won the lottery,

31
00:02:22,720 --> 00:02:27,160
Speaker 1: received the Field's Medal for mathematics, have three heads, or

32
00:02:27,600 --> 00:02:31,280
Speaker 1: were never even born. At a time when so much

33
00:02:31,320 --> 00:02:36,160
Speaker 1: about the world seems untethered and beyond our control or understanding,

34
00:02:36,680 --> 00:02:40,440
Speaker 1: it is hardly surprising that the many world's interpretation is

35
00:02:40,520 --> 00:02:45,440
Speaker 1: now prevalent in mainstream culture. Two of Marvel's studio's most

36
00:02:45,480 --> 00:02:50,160
Speaker 1: recent ventures, Spider Man No Way Home and Doctor Strange

37
00:02:50,400 --> 00:02:54,040
Speaker 1: in the Multiverse of Madness, secured earnings of over two

38
00:02:54,120 --> 00:02:57,840
Speaker 1: billion and one billion dollars at the box office, respectively.

39
00:02:58,880 --> 00:03:03,120
Speaker 1: In twenty twenty two, A twenty four's Everything Everywhere, All

40
00:03:03,160 --> 00:03:07,720
Speaker 1: at Once, directed by best friends Daniel Kuan and Daniel Scheinert,

41
00:03:08,280 --> 00:03:12,919
Speaker 1: took home six Academy Awards. The film was ostensibly about

42
00:03:12,960 --> 00:03:16,320
Speaker 1: a mother traveling through the many worlds of Everett's theory

43
00:03:16,800 --> 00:03:27,160
Speaker 1: to save her family. For the most part, it seems

44
00:03:27,200 --> 00:03:30,840
Speaker 1: we have latched onto Hugh Everett's Many World's idea out

45
00:03:30,880 --> 00:03:33,840
Speaker 1: of an urge to escape the uncertainty of the world,

46
00:03:34,600 --> 00:03:37,920
Speaker 1: or to appease the disappointment we might feel when life

47
00:03:37,960 --> 00:03:40,720
Speaker 1: and the world doesn't turn out the way we might

48
00:03:40,760 --> 00:03:43,960
Speaker 1: have hoped it would. There is great comfort to be

49
00:03:44,040 --> 00:03:47,960
Speaker 1: found in the possibility that out there, somewhere is a

50
00:03:48,040 --> 00:03:51,840
Speaker 1: version of our world and ourselves in which everything we

51
00:03:51,920 --> 00:03:57,360
Speaker 1: have ever hoped for actually comes true. Surely, as many

52
00:03:57,400 --> 00:04:00,800
Speaker 1: of Everett's colleagues believed when he first proposed the idea,

53
00:04:01,520 --> 00:04:04,720
Speaker 1: the notion that there might actually be infinite versions of

54
00:04:04,760 --> 00:04:10,040
Speaker 1: ourselves existing out there somewhere is an utterly ludicrous proposition.

55
00:04:11,120 --> 00:04:14,360
Speaker 1: And yet we need only look back at the history

56
00:04:14,520 --> 00:04:17,920
Speaker 1: of our scientific understanding of the universe to see a

57
00:04:17,960 --> 00:04:23,960
Speaker 1: field littered with strange, unfathomable theories, once thought ridiculous, only

58
00:04:24,040 --> 00:04:28,480
Speaker 1: to later be proven to be very real. Indeed, it

59
00:04:28,560 --> 00:04:31,960
Speaker 1: was back in nineteen oh five that Einstein published his

60
00:04:32,040 --> 00:04:36,839
Speaker 1: Special Theory of relativity, later refined in nineteen fifteen as

61
00:04:36,880 --> 00:04:40,960
Speaker 1: its General Theory of Relativity, in which he proposed that

62
00:04:41,120 --> 00:04:46,320
Speaker 1: mass and energy were essentially the same thing. Einstein's theory

63
00:04:46,720 --> 00:04:52,000
Speaker 1: also suggested that time is experienced differently between two individuals

64
00:04:52,560 --> 00:04:56,880
Speaker 1: if they are traveling at different speeds relative to each other. However,

65
00:04:57,279 --> 00:05:00,640
Speaker 1: it would be another four years before concrete proof of

66
00:05:00,680 --> 00:05:05,279
Speaker 1: this theory was actually demonstrated to be true. For every

67
00:05:05,360 --> 00:05:10,080
Speaker 1: minute of those intervening years, many continued to doubt it.

68
00:05:11,440 --> 00:05:14,320
Speaker 1: The same with no doubt have being thought of Paul

69
00:05:14,360 --> 00:05:18,800
Speaker 1: de Rack's theory on the possible existence of antimatter, which

70
00:05:18,800 --> 00:05:23,039
Speaker 1: he first proposed in nineteen twenty eight, But the doubters

71
00:05:23,240 --> 00:05:26,200
Speaker 1: would have been eating their words when it too was

72
00:05:26,279 --> 00:05:31,159
Speaker 1: finally proven correct, also four years later. And it was

73
00:05:31,279 --> 00:05:36,120
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty four when Peter Higgs theorized the possible existence

74
00:05:36,200 --> 00:05:40,039
Speaker 1: of the Higgs boson, and by extension, the existence of

75
00:05:40,160 --> 00:05:44,000
Speaker 1: the Higgs field, the field of energy that gives mass

76
00:05:44,040 --> 00:05:49,200
Speaker 1: to fundamental particles such as quarks and electrons. Many still

77
00:05:49,240 --> 00:05:53,200
Speaker 1: doubted its existence right up until the moment when, almost

78
00:05:53,400 --> 00:05:57,760
Speaker 1: fifty years later, it too was finally proved to be real.

79
00:05:59,600 --> 00:06:03,280
Speaker 1: In a space vically unstable and uncertain times, it can

80
00:06:03,320 --> 00:06:07,080
Speaker 1: also seem as though reality is tenuous, that we live

81
00:06:07,160 --> 00:06:11,120
Speaker 1: in a world not bound by strict physical laws, but

82
00:06:11,279 --> 00:06:15,679
Speaker 1: something of far more insidious design, a world in which

83
00:06:15,760 --> 00:06:19,880
Speaker 1: reality is decided for us in some other realm, that

84
00:06:19,960 --> 00:06:23,679
Speaker 1: it is merely a fiction tramped up for the gratification

85
00:06:24,080 --> 00:06:29,960
Speaker 1: of an absent audience. Take Neil Bostrom's simulation theory, for example,

86
00:06:30,520 --> 00:06:33,120
Speaker 1: the concept that we might in fact be living in

87
00:06:33,160 --> 00:06:39,080
Speaker 1: a simulation created by other beings. In the late twentieth century,

88
00:06:39,480 --> 00:06:43,040
Speaker 1: a science fiction writer from the United States took all

89
00:06:43,080 --> 00:06:46,480
Speaker 1: of these ideas and condensed them into his own brand

90
00:06:46,560 --> 00:06:51,080
Speaker 1: of paranoid fantasy. Perhaps you've read one of his stories

91
00:06:51,480 --> 00:06:54,320
Speaker 1: or seen one of the many films adapted from his

92
00:06:54,440 --> 00:07:00,400
Speaker 1: dozens of novels. I am talking, of course, about Philip K. Dick.

93
00:07:01,480 --> 00:07:04,600
Speaker 1: There are some who declare him the greatest writer of

94
00:07:04,680 --> 00:07:09,560
Speaker 1: science fiction that ever lived. Others consider him a prophet

95
00:07:10,000 --> 00:07:15,440
Speaker 1: fated like nostrodamis, and some believe he was nothing but

96
00:07:15,520 --> 00:07:21,680
Speaker 1: a complete and utter madman. You're listening to Unexplained, and

97
00:07:21,840 --> 00:07:36,960
Speaker 1: I'm Richard McLean Smith. All things considered, it was an

98
00:07:37,000 --> 00:07:41,160
Speaker 1: average day in Orange County. A tepid wind was blowing

99
00:07:41,200 --> 00:07:44,920
Speaker 1: in off Newport Beach, and Philip known as Phil to

100
00:07:45,000 --> 00:07:50,000
Speaker 1: his friends, could almost taste something in the air. Perhaps

101
00:07:50,080 --> 00:07:52,920
Speaker 1: it was the breakfast burrito he'd had that morning at

102
00:07:52,920 --> 00:07:56,000
Speaker 1: the local diner, or maybe it was the series of

103
00:07:56,040 --> 00:07:59,240
Speaker 1: stressful phone calls he'd had to feel from his ex

104
00:07:59,280 --> 00:08:05,000
Speaker 1: wife Nancy. Whatever it was, Phil felt more apprehensive than usual,

105
00:08:05,640 --> 00:08:08,000
Speaker 1: and it didn't help that he was on his way

106
00:08:08,120 --> 00:08:12,320
Speaker 1: to have his wisdom tooth removed. Despite being one of

107
00:08:12,360 --> 00:08:15,840
Speaker 1: the most well respected writers in the world, forty five

108
00:08:15,880 --> 00:08:19,640
Speaker 1: year old Philip Kindred Dick had just endured some of

109
00:08:19,680 --> 00:08:24,040
Speaker 1: the most turbulent years of his life in nineteen seventy one,

110
00:08:24,600 --> 00:08:28,520
Speaker 1: after a long standing amphetamine addiction began to derail his

111
00:08:28,600 --> 00:08:32,800
Speaker 1: domestic life. Phil's marriage to his fourth wife, Nancy Hackett,

112
00:08:33,040 --> 00:08:37,160
Speaker 1: fell apart when she moved out of their home, taking

113
00:08:37,200 --> 00:08:40,040
Speaker 1: their four year old daughter, is Old with her. Phil

114
00:08:40,200 --> 00:08:43,800
Speaker 1: began indulging in a way he never had before, he

115
00:08:43,880 --> 00:08:47,400
Speaker 1: often allowed other drug users to share his home with him.

116
00:08:48,280 --> 00:08:53,839
Speaker 1: In November, the house was ransacked and burglarized. The increasingly

117
00:08:53,960 --> 00:08:57,600
Speaker 1: paranoid Dick believed this was an attempt to undermine the

118
00:08:57,640 --> 00:09:01,600
Speaker 1: work he'd been doing. When the police police investigated, however,

119
00:09:02,080 --> 00:09:06,520
Speaker 1: finding no obvious suspects and nothing of value taken save

120
00:09:06,679 --> 00:09:11,120
Speaker 1: for some of Dick's own personal papers, they concluded the

121
00:09:11,160 --> 00:09:15,920
Speaker 1: writer had staged the robbery himself. By March of the

122
00:09:16,000 --> 00:09:20,000
Speaker 1: next year, Phil upended his life and moved to Vancouver

123
00:09:20,240 --> 00:09:24,559
Speaker 1: to pursue a relationship. When that too fell apart, he

124
00:09:24,640 --> 00:09:29,200
Speaker 1: overdosed on potassium bromite in a desperate attempt to end

125
00:09:29,240 --> 00:09:32,920
Speaker 1: his own life. It was only after being convinced by

126
00:09:32,960 --> 00:09:36,520
Speaker 1: friends to return to California that he tried to get

127
00:09:36,559 --> 00:09:40,560
Speaker 1: his life back on track. All at once. He found

128
00:09:40,640 --> 00:09:44,600
Speaker 1: himself writing again after more than three years of writer's block,

129
00:09:45,240 --> 00:09:48,160
Speaker 1: and for the first time since his divorce from Nancy,

130
00:09:48,559 --> 00:09:52,640
Speaker 1: Phil was starting to feel good. It felt like nothing

131
00:09:52,720 --> 00:09:58,040
Speaker 1: less than the universe giving him another chance. Now it

132
00:09:58,120 --> 00:10:02,960
Speaker 1: was nineteen seventy four and Phil was convalescing after recently

133
00:10:03,040 --> 00:10:08,199
Speaker 1: finishing his latest novel, A Scanner Darkly under guidance from

134
00:10:08,240 --> 00:10:12,560
Speaker 1: his psychiatrist and several trusted friends and confidants. The then

135
00:10:12,760 --> 00:10:17,520
Speaker 1: forty five year old author had recently started incorporating elements

136
00:10:17,600 --> 00:10:21,320
Speaker 1: of his own life experience with the kind of speculative

137
00:10:21,400 --> 00:10:26,480
Speaker 1: fantasy he had first become famous for. Critics were excited

138
00:10:26,600 --> 00:10:31,040
Speaker 1: by what they saw as the emerging broody, paranoid texture.

139
00:10:31,400 --> 00:10:34,880
Speaker 1: This lent his work almost as if the author was

140
00:10:34,920 --> 00:10:38,880
Speaker 1: on the cusp of something, and Phil was satisfied that

141
00:10:39,000 --> 00:10:43,560
Speaker 1: he was producing some of the most thoughtful, philosophical, even

142
00:10:43,679 --> 00:10:56,000
Speaker 1: therapeutic writing of his career. On the afternoon of February twentieth,

143
00:10:56,200 --> 00:11:01,520
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy four, Phil underwent an excruciating bout of dental

144
00:11:01,600 --> 00:11:06,320
Speaker 1: surgery aisy from the dose of sodium pentathal. He was

145
00:11:06,360 --> 00:11:09,480
Speaker 1: advised that he'd need painkillers if he was going to

146
00:11:09,520 --> 00:11:13,280
Speaker 1: make it through the next few days. In peace, Phil

147
00:11:13,559 --> 00:11:17,520
Speaker 1: Dulye contacted his local pharmacy and requested a home delivery

148
00:11:17,600 --> 00:11:23,560
Speaker 1: of the synthetic opioid Darwin, which arrived soon after. Having

149
00:11:23,600 --> 00:11:27,480
Speaker 1: taken some of the medication, Phil had just fixed himself

150
00:11:27,520 --> 00:11:30,840
Speaker 1: an iced drink when his front doorbell began to ring

151
00:11:30,920 --> 00:11:35,319
Speaker 1: with urgency. Not expecting any visitors. He felt a pang

152
00:11:35,360 --> 00:11:38,600
Speaker 1: of anxiety at the thought of who on earth might

153
00:11:38,679 --> 00:11:42,600
Speaker 1: be calling on him at this time. With no small

154
00:11:42,640 --> 00:11:47,280
Speaker 1: degree of trepidation, Phil opened the front door to find

155
00:11:47,320 --> 00:11:51,000
Speaker 1: the striking aspect of a dark haired, young delivery woman

156
00:11:51,360 --> 00:11:55,560
Speaker 1: standing on his doorstep, a woman whom he instinctively felt

157
00:11:55,600 --> 00:11:59,000
Speaker 1: reminded him of the twin sister he had never known

158
00:11:59,400 --> 00:12:03,800
Speaker 1: who had died in childbirth. Taken in by the woman's

159
00:12:03,840 --> 00:12:07,960
Speaker 1: beauty and something ineffable he would later struggle to explain,

160
00:12:08,559 --> 00:12:12,200
Speaker 1: Phil was entranced by the golden necklace she wore over

161
00:12:12,200 --> 00:12:16,480
Speaker 1: her uniform. In fact, he couldn't take his eyes off it.

162
00:12:18,000 --> 00:12:21,440
Speaker 1: He asked the woman about its strange fish shaped design,

163
00:12:22,120 --> 00:12:26,880
Speaker 1: something which at once felt both familiar and alien to him.

164
00:12:27,360 --> 00:12:31,760
Speaker 1: What is that, he asked? The woman smiled. It's the

165
00:12:31,800 --> 00:12:35,880
Speaker 1: symbol early Christians used to signal one another, she said.

166
00:12:36,880 --> 00:12:41,679
Speaker 1: The vesicle pie SATs, or christian icthus perhaps better known

167
00:12:41,880 --> 00:12:45,560
Speaker 1: as the Jesus fish, consists of a simple fish shaped

168
00:12:45,600 --> 00:12:51,200
Speaker 1: insignia fashioned out of one continuous loop or line. As

169
00:12:51,240 --> 00:12:54,920
Speaker 1: the woman turned to leave, Phil noted that the sun

170
00:12:54,960 --> 00:12:59,520
Speaker 1: on his porch seemed to then suddenly shine brighter, that

171
00:12:59,679 --> 00:13:05,600
Speaker 1: it's energy almost seemed concentrated on the pendant as one

172
00:13:05,640 --> 00:13:09,240
Speaker 1: of the Sun's rays made contact with the Iicthus, its

173
00:13:09,280 --> 00:13:13,240
Speaker 1: glancing reflection threw off an intense beam of pink light.

174
00:13:14,200 --> 00:13:18,760
Speaker 1: It struck Phil on the forehead, leaving him momentarily mesmerized.

175
00:13:20,080 --> 00:13:26,160
Speaker 1: Moments later, the woman was gone back alone inside his house.

176
00:13:26,679 --> 00:13:29,880
Speaker 1: Phil couldn't be sure how he knew, but he felt

177
00:13:29,920 --> 00:13:32,880
Speaker 1: that in that moment he'd been gifted with a long

178
00:13:32,960 --> 00:13:37,720
Speaker 1: dormant sense of wisdom and clairvoyance, that the pink light

179
00:13:38,040 --> 00:13:43,320
Speaker 1: had been intelligent, even tangible in form. Over the next

180
00:13:43,360 --> 00:13:48,800
Speaker 1: few days, Phil later claimed to have experienced several intense visions,

181
00:13:49,600 --> 00:13:53,960
Speaker 1: visions which he at first dismissed as hallucinatory, but that

182
00:13:54,040 --> 00:13:58,480
Speaker 1: he gradually came to believe were revealing the true nature

183
00:13:58,760 --> 00:14:09,600
Speaker 1: of the universe to his Phil's visions apparently came in

184
00:14:09,640 --> 00:14:12,720
Speaker 1: the form of words that he both saw and heard,

185
00:14:13,240 --> 00:14:17,440
Speaker 1: as well as elaborate pictures, figures of people, and the

186
00:14:17,480 --> 00:14:22,480
Speaker 1: frequently repeated motif of words printed on a page. It

187
00:14:22,680 --> 00:14:26,600
Speaker 1: was as if quote sights of his brain were being

188
00:14:26,640 --> 00:14:32,600
Speaker 1: selectively stimulated by energy beams emanating from far off, perhaps

189
00:14:32,760 --> 00:14:37,200
Speaker 1: millions of miles away. He believed it was a message

190
00:14:37,560 --> 00:14:42,880
Speaker 1: coming directly from God. He remained house bound for several

191
00:14:43,000 --> 00:14:47,120
Speaker 1: days as the messages kept on coming, later telling a

192
00:14:47,200 --> 00:14:50,440
Speaker 1: journalist that it seemed to him that his mind had

193
00:14:50,480 --> 00:14:56,600
Speaker 1: been invaded by another transcendentally rational mind. He felt as

194
00:14:56,600 --> 00:14:59,720
Speaker 1: though he had been insane all his life, but was

195
00:14:59,760 --> 00:15:04,680
Speaker 1: now now finally, saying, though the frequency of the visions

196
00:15:04,920 --> 00:15:09,920
Speaker 1: gradually began to wear off, their intensity seemed only to grow,

197
00:15:10,600 --> 00:15:14,960
Speaker 1: moving from the conceptual to the physical, and several weeks

198
00:15:15,000 --> 00:15:20,160
Speaker 1: after the initial event, he still found himself at their mercy.

199
00:15:20,360 --> 00:15:23,000
Speaker 1: That any of this was the consequence of the high

200
00:15:23,000 --> 00:15:27,640
Speaker 1: strength medication Dick had been taking was an impossibility to him.

201
00:15:28,400 --> 00:15:32,200
Speaker 1: As something of a self proclaimed authority on casual drug use,

202
00:15:32,560 --> 00:15:35,240
Speaker 1: he knew of no drug he had taken before that

203
00:15:35,320 --> 00:15:38,440
Speaker 1: would have affected him so strongly for such a long

204
00:15:38,520 --> 00:15:44,360
Speaker 1: period of time. Dick's strange visions continued periodically into March.

205
00:15:45,080 --> 00:15:48,240
Speaker 1: He began to document them in a series of journal

206
00:15:48,360 --> 00:15:53,160
Speaker 1: entries he referred to as two three seventy four or

207
00:15:53,280 --> 00:15:58,000
Speaker 1: February to March seventy four. The visions were said to

208
00:15:58,120 --> 00:16:04,160
Speaker 1: mostly comprise of complex geometric patterns, before later becoming vivid

209
00:16:04,200 --> 00:16:08,400
Speaker 1: images of Jesus Christ, and even depictions of the plight

210
00:16:08,520 --> 00:16:12,000
Speaker 1: of the early Christians and the corruption at the heart

211
00:16:12,080 --> 00:16:16,960
Speaker 1: of the ancient Roman Empire. It was Phil's absolute conviction

212
00:16:17,440 --> 00:16:21,320
Speaker 1: that this information was wholly in origin, and thus should

213
00:16:21,360 --> 00:16:26,120
Speaker 1: be regarded as a form of scripture. One night, Phil

214
00:16:26,240 --> 00:16:29,880
Speaker 1: was apparently woken by the sudden re emergence of the

215
00:16:29,960 --> 00:16:35,000
Speaker 1: strange pink light. In that moment, he was filled with

216
00:16:35,080 --> 00:16:39,640
Speaker 1: the complete certainty that his youngest son, Christopher, was gravely ill,

217
00:16:40,320 --> 00:16:44,800
Speaker 1: and that he needed medical attention before it worsened irrevocably.

218
00:16:45,560 --> 00:16:49,240
Speaker 1: The problem he was supposedly in that moment being made

219
00:16:49,280 --> 00:16:53,840
Speaker 1: acutely aware of was something to do with an undiagnosed hernia.

220
00:16:54,880 --> 00:16:58,120
Speaker 1: After pleading with the boy's mother, Tessa that he needed

221
00:16:58,160 --> 00:17:02,120
Speaker 1: to be taken seriously, she and Phil rushed Christopher to

222
00:17:02,240 --> 00:17:06,399
Speaker 1: hospital in a panic. Unknown to Phil at the time,

223
00:17:06,920 --> 00:17:11,440
Speaker 1: the child had indeed been suffering from a vague abdominal complaint.

224
00:17:12,440 --> 00:17:15,840
Speaker 1: The doctor found nothing wrong with him, but Phil insisted

225
00:17:16,119 --> 00:17:20,400
Speaker 1: they give his son a scan, much to the doctor's astonishment.

226
00:17:20,840 --> 00:17:24,960
Speaker 1: There in the boy's bow region was a clear herniation,

227
00:17:25,560 --> 00:17:40,520
Speaker 1: for which the boy was promptly treated Throughout the nineteen seventies,

228
00:17:40,880 --> 00:17:45,400
Speaker 1: Phil's visions increased in duration and frequency, though by now

229
00:17:45,680 --> 00:17:48,760
Speaker 1: the author was so inured to their message that they

230
00:17:48,800 --> 00:17:52,760
Speaker 1: no longer frightened him. He began to regard them as

231
00:17:52,800 --> 00:17:57,320
Speaker 1: a gift. By the time nineteen eighty came around, Phil

232
00:17:57,600 --> 00:18:01,560
Speaker 1: now claimed that he was living to para lives, one

233
00:18:01,600 --> 00:18:06,680
Speaker 1: as Philip K. Dick, writer father occasional person of interest

234
00:18:06,720 --> 00:18:11,400
Speaker 1: for the FBI, the other as a man named Thomas

235
00:18:11,440 --> 00:18:16,320
Speaker 1: an icthus swearing Christian and revolutionary who was persecuted by

236
00:18:16,359 --> 00:18:21,159
Speaker 1: the Romans in the first century AD. Throughout it all,

237
00:18:21,480 --> 00:18:25,280
Speaker 1: the pink Light had continued to visit him. He was

238
00:18:25,359 --> 00:18:28,960
Speaker 1: now unequivocal in his belief that it really was some

239
00:18:29,080 --> 00:18:33,199
Speaker 1: kind of rational mind in its own right. Sometimes he

240
00:18:33,280 --> 00:18:37,560
Speaker 1: called it Zebra, other times God, though the name he

241
00:18:37,680 --> 00:18:40,480
Speaker 1: most frequently used for it was the one he would

242
00:18:40,480 --> 00:18:47,320
Speaker 1: eventually choose for one of his most divisive and controversial novels, Vallis,

243
00:18:47,320 --> 00:18:51,600
Speaker 1: in which he presented, through his alter ego horse Lover Fat,

244
00:18:52,040 --> 00:18:57,320
Speaker 1: much of what had been occurring to him. One evening, Valis,

245
00:18:57,720 --> 00:19:02,160
Speaker 1: all Vast active living in teens eligent system told Phil

246
00:19:02,359 --> 00:19:05,680
Speaker 1: that the reason for its communication with him was simple,

247
00:19:06,560 --> 00:19:10,200
Speaker 1: the people of Earth were being silently controlled by an

248
00:19:10,320 --> 00:19:15,600
Speaker 1: underground cabal with its roots in the Roman Empire. At

249
00:19:15,600 --> 00:19:18,919
Speaker 1: the head of this cabal who had to be taken

250
00:19:19,000 --> 00:19:26,440
Speaker 1: down in order for the descendants of Vallas's true messenger,

251
00:19:27,200 --> 00:19:32,560
Speaker 1: Jesus Christ to continue their work liberating humankind from its

252
00:19:32,760 --> 00:19:38,400
Speaker 1: universal blindness. Phil would later claim that the Watergate scandal

253
00:19:38,440 --> 00:19:42,560
Speaker 1: of August nineteen seventy four, which ultimately led to the

254
00:19:42,600 --> 00:19:47,640
Speaker 1: resignation of Nixon from high office, marked the final downfall

255
00:19:47,800 --> 00:19:53,280
Speaker 1: of this hidden Roman Empire. Philip K. Dick published Vallis

256
00:19:53,400 --> 00:19:57,879
Speaker 1: in nineteen eighty one. In it, his alter ego horse

257
00:19:57,960 --> 00:20:02,959
Speaker 1: lover Fats communication with the godhead Valis ultimately leads to

258
00:20:03,000 --> 00:20:06,920
Speaker 1: an elaborate encounter with the fifth Savior of the universe,

259
00:20:07,600 --> 00:20:12,959
Speaker 1: a two year old Messiah figure named Sophia Lampton. Quite

260
00:20:13,080 --> 00:20:17,000
Speaker 1: why Dick chose to first render his apparent real life

261
00:20:17,040 --> 00:20:21,480
Speaker 1: experiences through the medium of fiction is not entirely clear,

262
00:20:22,200 --> 00:20:26,000
Speaker 1: though what we do know about his private beliefs regarding

263
00:20:26,040 --> 00:20:29,960
Speaker 1: his alleged contact with the divine was later recorded in

264
00:20:30,040 --> 00:20:36,680
Speaker 1: a nine hundred page journal known as The Exegesis. What

265
00:20:36,840 --> 00:20:40,160
Speaker 1: makes this a compelling story and not one which can

266
00:20:40,240 --> 00:20:43,760
Speaker 1: easily be dismissed as the delusions of a man plagued

267
00:20:43,800 --> 00:20:47,719
Speaker 1: by mental illness and drug addiction. Is that Dick himself

268
00:20:47,960 --> 00:20:52,439
Speaker 1: struggled with its veracity as a narrative. Using the figure

269
00:20:52,480 --> 00:20:56,640
Speaker 1: of horse lover Fat to outline his concerns, Dick not

270
00:20:56,720 --> 00:21:01,400
Speaker 1: only provided the supernatural explanation to everything that had befallen him,

271
00:21:01,800 --> 00:21:07,240
Speaker 1: but also offers up several lucid, rationalist explanations about what

272
00:21:07,480 --> 00:21:12,160
Speaker 1: may have transpired. Philip K. Dick was well aware that

273
00:21:12,320 --> 00:21:17,520
Speaker 1: visual and auditory hallucinations could sometimes seem persuasive to the sufferer,

274
00:21:18,160 --> 00:21:22,640
Speaker 1: even going so far as to question whether schizophrenia, bipolar

275
00:21:22,720 --> 00:21:29,440
Speaker 1: induced psychosis, or flashbacks could be responsible. Having spent significant

276
00:21:29,440 --> 00:21:33,400
Speaker 1: time in psychiatric hospitals over the years owing to multiple

277
00:21:33,480 --> 00:21:37,800
Speaker 1: suicide attempts, phil knew only too well about the counter

278
00:21:37,920 --> 00:21:42,879
Speaker 1: arguments in Valis. He outlined them with care and precision,

279
00:21:43,480 --> 00:21:46,760
Speaker 1: ultimately leaving the reader to make up their own mind

280
00:21:47,080 --> 00:21:50,680
Speaker 1: about whether the trials of Horse lover Fat had been

281
00:21:50,840 --> 00:21:55,240
Speaker 1: self generated or really had come from some higher power.

282
00:22:02,480 --> 00:22:05,879
Speaker 1: Perhaps what this all comes back to relates to what

283
00:22:05,920 --> 00:22:09,040
Speaker 1: we discussed at the beginning of the show. If the

284
00:22:09,200 --> 00:22:14,000
Speaker 1: universe really is as complex as quantum mechanics theorizes, and

285
00:22:14,119 --> 00:22:17,959
Speaker 1: the Many World's theory proves to be correct, then surely

286
00:22:18,000 --> 00:22:21,280
Speaker 1: it must follow that some version of Philip K. Dick

287
00:22:21,560 --> 00:22:25,159
Speaker 1: will have had these experiences somewhere, even if in this

288
00:22:25,400 --> 00:22:30,879
Speaker 1: timeline they arose simply from mental illness or drug induced psychosis.

289
00:22:32,280 --> 00:22:36,960
Speaker 1: In his nineteen sixty nine semi autobiographical novel slaughter House Five,

290
00:22:37,560 --> 00:22:43,520
Speaker 1: Kurt Vonnegut envisioned a fourth dimensional race of beings called Trouphammadorians.

291
00:22:44,400 --> 00:22:48,359
Speaker 1: These aliens are imbued with the power to traverse the universe,

292
00:22:48,840 --> 00:22:52,520
Speaker 1: as well as the latent ability to observe all points

293
00:22:52,560 --> 00:22:57,040
Speaker 1: within the space time continuum. They treat death as barely

294
00:22:57,119 --> 00:23:02,520
Speaker 1: registrable on their infinite timeline, a non event that interrupts

295
00:23:02,760 --> 00:23:06,560
Speaker 1: rather than ends proceedings. They see the past, present, and

296
00:23:06,680 --> 00:23:12,480
Speaker 1: future simultaneously. They embody both free will and determinism, chaos

297
00:23:12,480 --> 00:23:16,480
Speaker 1: and order, and for them, death is merely the transfer

298
00:23:16,600 --> 00:23:21,520
Speaker 1: of energy from one state to another. It is comforting

299
00:23:21,600 --> 00:23:25,160
Speaker 1: to think that in some other reality the people we've

300
00:23:25,200 --> 00:23:29,560
Speaker 1: been bereaved by are still happily living their lives. It

301
00:23:29,640 --> 00:23:33,280
Speaker 1: also provides comfort to think that somewhere we are right,

302
00:23:33,800 --> 00:23:37,879
Speaker 1: even if in this universe our actions or beliefs have

303
00:23:38,000 --> 00:23:43,399
Speaker 1: proved wrong. For centuries, we lived under the presupposition that

304
00:23:43,480 --> 00:23:47,959
Speaker 1: the universe works entirely within the realm of Newtonian mechanics,

305
00:23:48,440 --> 00:23:51,360
Speaker 1: that it is a kind of giant clock, with each

306
00:23:51,400 --> 00:23:57,600
Speaker 1: of its components in perfect harmonious working order. In reality,

307
00:23:58,040 --> 00:24:02,000
Speaker 1: what quantum mechanics proves, and the many as yet still

308
00:24:02,160 --> 00:24:07,679
Speaker 1: unproven theories like Everett's Many Worlds suggest the universe is

309
00:24:07,840 --> 00:24:13,840
Speaker 1: vastly more complex. An antecedent to the many world's interpretation

310
00:24:14,320 --> 00:24:17,520
Speaker 1: developed by Hugh Everett can be found in the double

311
00:24:17,600 --> 00:24:22,720
Speaker 1: slit experiment. It is, according to Richard Feynman, the experiment

312
00:24:22,840 --> 00:24:26,280
Speaker 1: with which all of the mystery of quantum mechanics can

313
00:24:26,320 --> 00:24:31,280
Speaker 1: be found. The experiment was first devised by Thomas Young

314
00:24:31,520 --> 00:24:35,240
Speaker 1: in eighteen o one and revealed that photons of light

315
00:24:35,640 --> 00:24:40,680
Speaker 1: also behave like waves. In the experiment, photons of light

316
00:24:40,840 --> 00:24:43,960
Speaker 1: are fired at a screen with two slits cut out

317
00:24:44,000 --> 00:24:47,600
Speaker 1: of it, with another screen behind to record the pattern

318
00:24:47,640 --> 00:24:52,000
Speaker 1: they make. You might assume the resultant pattern recorded on

319
00:24:52,080 --> 00:24:55,600
Speaker 1: the back screen would mimic the shape of the slits,

320
00:24:55,640 --> 00:25:00,639
Speaker 1: creating two matching lines in the manner of a stencil. Instead,

321
00:25:01,200 --> 00:25:04,760
Speaker 1: it creates a wave interference pattern of many strips of

322
00:25:04,880 --> 00:25:11,880
Speaker 1: light interspersed with darkness. Subsequently, however, the experiment revealed something

323
00:25:12,080 --> 00:25:17,159
Speaker 1: even more staggering that when single particles, be they photons

324
00:25:17,200 --> 00:25:20,840
Speaker 1: of light or electrons, have fired one at a time

325
00:25:20,920 --> 00:25:25,480
Speaker 1: through the slits, an interference pattern is still generated behind

326
00:25:25,480 --> 00:25:32,040
Speaker 1: the screen, suggesting the single particles are somehow interfering with themselves.

327
00:25:33,160 --> 00:25:36,119
Speaker 1: As if that weren't strange enough, if you place a

328
00:25:36,160 --> 00:25:39,919
Speaker 1: device next to the slits to detect which particle go

329
00:25:40,080 --> 00:25:44,760
Speaker 1: through which slits exactly, the pattern generated behind the slits

330
00:25:45,160 --> 00:25:49,160
Speaker 1: is not one of wave interference, but rather two lines

331
00:25:49,359 --> 00:25:53,239
Speaker 1: that mimic the shape of the slits. After all. In

332
00:25:53,280 --> 00:25:57,560
Speaker 1: other words, it seems to suggest that a subatomic particle

333
00:25:58,040 --> 00:26:01,720
Speaker 1: is not one single thing, but that it exists rather

334
00:26:02,040 --> 00:26:14,240
Speaker 1: as a probability of possibilities until it is observed. Though

335
00:26:14,240 --> 00:26:17,680
Speaker 1: the true implication of the double slit experiment has yet

336
00:26:17,720 --> 00:26:21,840
Speaker 1: to be established, it has led to some interesting interpretations,

337
00:26:22,480 --> 00:26:26,119
Speaker 1: chief among them being the idea that it is consciousness

338
00:26:26,200 --> 00:26:30,440
Speaker 1: that somehow fixes what could potentially be an infinite amount

339
00:26:30,480 --> 00:26:34,639
Speaker 1: of possible realities into the one that we actually experience,

340
00:26:35,880 --> 00:26:39,600
Speaker 1: a fanciful notion, perhaps, but one that at least allows

341
00:26:39,640 --> 00:26:43,200
Speaker 1: for the poetic idea that perhaps we really do hold

342
00:26:43,240 --> 00:26:46,960
Speaker 1: the power to make our own reality, and that other

343
00:26:47,040 --> 00:26:51,920
Speaker 1: worlds are always possible and always existing side by side

344
00:26:52,320 --> 00:26:56,879
Speaker 1: in one way or another. I'll leave you with the

345
00:26:56,920 --> 00:27:02,320
Speaker 1: beautiful poem Snow by Lewis mcneie. Yes, the room was

346
00:27:02,400 --> 00:27:06,919
Speaker 1: suddenly rich, and the great bay window was spawning snow

347
00:27:07,119 --> 00:27:13,479
Speaker 1: and pink roses against it, soundlessly, collateral and incompatible. World

348
00:27:13,600 --> 00:27:18,280
Speaker 1: is suddener than we fancy it. World is crazier and

349
00:27:18,400 --> 00:27:23,080
Speaker 1: more of it than we think, encourageably plural, I peel

350
00:27:23,160 --> 00:27:27,280
Speaker 1: and portion are tangerine and spit the pips and feel

351
00:27:27,359 --> 00:27:32,200
Speaker 1: the drunkenness of things being various, and the fire flames

352
00:27:32,240 --> 00:27:36,320
Speaker 1: with a bubbling sound. For world is more spiteful and

353
00:27:36,480 --> 00:27:40,879
Speaker 1: gay than one supposes on the tongue, on the eyes,

354
00:27:41,240 --> 00:27:45,480
Speaker 1: on the ears, in the palms of one's hands. There

355
00:27:45,520 --> 00:27:49,640
Speaker 1: is more than glass between the snow and the huge roses.

356
00:27:55,440 --> 00:27:58,040
Speaker 1: Thank you, as ever for listening to the show. Please

357
00:27:58,080 --> 00:28:00,719
Speaker 1: subscribe and rate it if you haven't already done so.

358
00:28:01,359 --> 00:28:04,440
Speaker 1: In some other news, unexplained will be coming to YouTube

359
00:28:04,520 --> 00:28:07,600
Speaker 1: very shortly in video form, so please watch out for

360
00:28:07,680 --> 00:28:10,920
Speaker 1: future developments there. You can subscribe to the channel at

361
00:28:10,960 --> 00:28:14,959
Speaker 1: YouTube dot com Forward slash at Unexplained Pod. You can

362
00:28:15,000 --> 00:28:18,000
Speaker 1: also now find us on TikTok at TikTok dot com.

363
00:28:18,040 --> 00:28:22,639
Speaker 1: Forward slash at Unexplained Podcast. This week's episode was written

364
00:28:22,680 --> 00:28:27,080
Speaker 1: by James Connor Patterson and produced by me Richard McClain Smith.

365
00:28:27,720 --> 00:28:31,120
Speaker 1: James is a brilliant writer and poet. His debut collection

366
00:28:31,240 --> 00:28:35,560
Speaker 1: of poems titled Bandit Country, exploring the hinterland between the

367
00:28:35,600 --> 00:28:39,040
Speaker 1: North of Ireland and Republic, was shortlisted for the twenty

368
00:28:39,120 --> 00:28:42,400
Speaker 1: twenty two ts Eliot Prize and is out now to buy.

369
00:28:42,840 --> 00:28:47,640
Speaker 1: Do check it out Unexplained as an av Club Productions

370
00:28:47,680 --> 00:28:52,240
Speaker 1: podcast created by Richard McClain Smith. All other elements of

371
00:28:52,280 --> 00:28:55,680
Speaker 1: the podcast, including the music, are also produced by me

372
00:28:55,960 --> 00:29:00,640
Speaker 1: Richard McClain smith. Unexplained. The book and audiobook is now

373
00:29:00,640 --> 00:29:05,080
Speaker 1: available to buy worldwide. You can purchase from Amazon, Barnes

374
00:29:05,120 --> 00:29:09,760
Speaker 1: and Noble, Waterstones and other bookstores. Please subscribe to and

375
00:29:09,880 --> 00:29:13,160
Speaker 1: rate the show wherever you get your podcasts, and feel

376
00:29:13,160 --> 00:29:15,800
Speaker 1: free to get in touch with any thoughts or ideas

377
00:29:16,080 --> 00:29:19,080
Speaker 1: regarding the stories you've heard on the show. Perhaps you

378
00:29:19,160 --> 00:29:21,520
Speaker 1: have an explanation of your own you'd like to share.

379
00:29:22,160 --> 00:29:25,640
Speaker 1: You can find out more at Unexplained podcast dot com

380
00:29:25,680 --> 00:29:29,360
Speaker 1: and reach us online through Twitter at Unexplained Pod and

381
00:29:29,560 --> 00:30:01,000
Speaker 1: Facebook at Facebook dot com. Forward Slash Unexplained Podcast m