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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind from how Stuff

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Speaker 1: Works dot com. Hey, you welcome to Stuff to Blow

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Speaker 1: your Mind. My name is Robert Lamb, and I'm Joe

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Speaker 1: McCormick and Robert. I hear that you went to New

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Speaker 1: York and came back with some audio goodies for us.

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Speaker 1: That's right. I went up to the two thousand and

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Speaker 1: eighteen World Science Festival in New York City. Uh, it's

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Speaker 1: a it's a festival that I go to a lot.

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Speaker 1: I don't get to go every year, but I've been,

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Speaker 1: uh several times since I believe two thousand and eleven,

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Speaker 1: and this time, I yeah, I brought back three many

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Speaker 1: interviews that I wanted to share with everybody. Uh, these

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Speaker 1: are gonna definitely state that these are essentially field recordings.

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Speaker 1: These are these are green room interviews, so they're not

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Speaker 1: gonna have the fidelity of an in studio interview or

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Speaker 1: even one of our phone interviews. Necessarily, it's going to

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Speaker 1: be a slightly new beast for long time listeners to

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Speaker 1: the show. So maybe girds your ears. But you think

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Speaker 1: we got some good stuff in there that will make

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Speaker 1: it worth the audio? Yes, I believe so, because we're

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Speaker 1: gonna you're gonna hear me chatting with physicist Brian Green, uh,

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Speaker 1: as well as physicist Max Tegmark, as well as anthropologist

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Speaker 1: Barbara ja King. Now, each one of these people you

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Speaker 1: talked to, h. Of course, Brian Green is one of

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Speaker 1: the founders of the festival, right, but each of these

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Speaker 1: people you talked to were involved with panels that took

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Speaker 1: place at the festival this year, right, correct, Yes, Green,

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Speaker 1: of course, being with the founder, he moderated uh, different

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Speaker 1: panels as well. All right, we'll give us a little

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Speaker 1: background on the World Science Festival and then maybe we

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Speaker 1: can set up one of these interviews here. Alright. So,

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Speaker 1: founded in two thousand and eight, World Science Festival has

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Speaker 1: a stated mission to cultivate a general public informed by science,

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Speaker 1: inspired by its wonder and uh, convinced of its value

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Speaker 1: and prepared to engage with its implications for the future.

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Speaker 1: And it was indeed co founded by Clem be a

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Speaker 1: University physics and mathematics professor, string theorist, author and just

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Speaker 1: overall science communicator, Brian Green, along with his wife Tracy Day.

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Speaker 1: The World Science Festival is a it's a production technically

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Speaker 1: of the World Science Foundation, which is a five oh

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Speaker 1: one nonprofit organization headquartered in New York City, and so

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Speaker 1: each year, uh they host a week long slate of

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Speaker 1: science panels, salons, performances, and even a street fair. So

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Speaker 1: it's it's the kind of thing that that really reaches

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Speaker 1: out to all levels of of science enthusiasts. You see

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Speaker 1: academics there, you see graduate students, you see younger students,

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Speaker 1: you see science communicators, children, old people. Um, the whole

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Speaker 1: nine yards. What's the street fair? Do they have funnel cake?

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Speaker 1: It's a lot of stuff for for kids, uh, as

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Speaker 1: well as adults. So just a lot of tents set up,

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Speaker 1: a lot of like cool science activities, robots, science experiments,

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Speaker 1: that sort of thing. Did you take your son? I

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Speaker 1: haven't brought him yet. So my on is just now

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Speaker 1: six years old, and I think we're at the level

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Speaker 1: now where he is he is perhaps ready to travel

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Speaker 1: to New York City and do all of the walking

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Speaker 1: that that entails. But I am looking forward to bringing

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Speaker 1: bringing him at some point because uh, my again, I've

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Speaker 1: been several times, and I've been there with my wife,

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Speaker 1: but I haven't been able to really engage in all

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Speaker 1: of the kids stuff. That is also an important part

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Speaker 1: of the festival. All right, Well, to get to your

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Speaker 1: first interview, this was with festival founder and physicist Brian Green, right,

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Speaker 1: that's right. Yeah, I got to sit down with Brian Green.

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Speaker 1: This was after he had moderated one of the opening

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Speaker 1: discussions of the festival, Darkness Visible, shedding new light on

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Speaker 1: black holes. Black Holes are fascinating and there's something that

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Speaker 1: I've wanted to go into more depth on on the

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Speaker 1: podcast before, because not only are they one of the

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Speaker 1: most strange and interesting things in the physical universe, I

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Speaker 1: think the story of how we came to know about

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Speaker 1: them and how we arrived at the modern consciousness of

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Speaker 1: black holes not just sort of as some thought experiment,

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Speaker 1: but as like a real physical reality is really interesting too. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: I I really enjoyed this particular talk, and this is

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Speaker 1: one of the talks that that was filmed and is

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Speaker 1: actually already available for everyone else to view on YouTube

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Speaker 1: for free. I'll include a link to that on the

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Speaker 1: landing page for this episode at stuff to Blow your

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Speaker 1: Mind dot com. But yeah, I I greatly enjoyed it.

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Speaker 1: It really Uh, it opened opened my mind up to

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Speaker 1: some of the certainly some of the details about about

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Speaker 1: black holes and our our sort of journey towards our

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Speaker 1: understanding black black holes, as well as just an update

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Speaker 1: on just where we are, you know, at the bleeding

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Speaker 1: edge of understanding them. Well, what's the scoop? I mean,

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Speaker 1: the basic scoop is that we have we have gone

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Speaker 1: on this journey from a black hole is just this

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Speaker 1: mathematical possibility, this thought experiment in math, and we are

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Speaker 1: at the point where they are. They are a reality.

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Speaker 1: Like experts tend to agree that, yes, there's without a

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Speaker 1: doubt there are black holes. We have black holes as

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Speaker 1: the result of of dead stars. We have massive, super

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Speaker 1: massive black holes at the center of galaxies, including our

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Speaker 1: own Milky Way galaxy, and we're on the cusp of

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Speaker 1: being able to uh to to to really learn a

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Speaker 1: great deal more about them, and in doing so, uh

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Speaker 1: we really find out what we truly know about the

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Speaker 1: fabric of the universe. So on that note, let's go

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Speaker 1: ahead and dip into the interview here, and then afterwards

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Speaker 1: Joe and I will discuss some of the concepts that

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Speaker 1: are discussed. Which world science best will offering. Are you

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Speaker 1: most excited about this year? Well, I'm biased because I'm

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Speaker 1: in a few of them, so that's probably uh, not

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Speaker 1: the completely objective answer that I might give. But we

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Speaker 1: have a program on a conversation between religion and science,

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Speaker 1: and oftentimes that conversation out there in the world is

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Speaker 1: a contentious one, with each side basically trying to say

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Speaker 1: that the other is wrong or that their approach is

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Speaker 1: the only way forward. And we're not going anywhere near

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Speaker 1: that because that's just not a productive way to have

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Speaker 1: a melding between these two ways of looking at the world. Instead,

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Speaker 1: we're looking at whether science can give us insight into

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Speaker 1: whether the behavior that we have evidence for tens of

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Speaker 1: thousands of years, which is looking for some larger stores,

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Speaker 1: some larger narratives, some bigger picture into which we could

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Speaker 1: fit Could that have had adaptive value? Could the brain

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Speaker 1: have evolved in such a way that we have a

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Speaker 1: predilection for that way of thinking about the world in

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Speaker 1: some sense? Could that perspective in the world be imprinted

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Speaker 1: in our d n A And if signs can illuminate

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Speaker 1: some key aspect of human behavior, how exciting is that?

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Speaker 1: And that's really what the focus of this conversation is

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Speaker 1: going to be. It's called the believing brain. Excellent. I'm

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Speaker 1: looking forward to that great one and I tend to

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Speaker 1: be a black hole. Oh you did great. What do

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Speaker 1: you think when you have a topic like that? You

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Speaker 1: I really admired the legwork that you kind of had

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Speaker 1: to do to bring everyone in the audience up to

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Speaker 1: speed on it, because obviously you have uh you have

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Speaker 1: academics and students and graduate students in the audience, but

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Speaker 1: then also just regular people children, even uh, yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: you're right. I mean, the goal really is to be

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Speaker 1: broadly accessible but still take people up to the cutting

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Speaker 1: edge all, you know, in that case, in the space

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Speaker 1: of two hours. Usually our programs are ninety minutes, but

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Speaker 1: I decided that one deserve the full two hours. And yeah,

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Speaker 1: talking about the observational side of black holes, talking about

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Speaker 1: the new ways of examining them with gravitational ways, gravitational radiation,

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Speaker 1: and then if you're theoretical frontiers, were really describing the

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Speaker 1: quantum nature space and time and how information could be

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Speaker 1: encoded on the surface of a black hole. It's pretty

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Speaker 1: amazing time to be thinking about these objects that now

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Speaker 1: we know with a high degree of certainty are really

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Speaker 1: out there in the universe. Now. In in the past

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Speaker 1: of various talks of incorporating some level of performance or

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Speaker 1: performance art. Do you have anything like that lined up

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Speaker 1: for this year's after Well, we do have works that

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Speaker 1: our performance oriented's. We kicked off the festival with the

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Speaker 1: Celebration of Women in Science. You may be familiar with

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Speaker 1: that program where we had Broadway stars and wonderful performers

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Speaker 1: who were telling the audience through narrative and song about

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Speaker 1: some of the greatest women scientists of the last two

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Speaker 1: hundred years. So that certainly was a melding of the two.

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Speaker 1: We also have some theater pieces that are part of

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Speaker 1: the festival this year, some film as well, and that's

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Speaker 1: the majority of the footprint that's in the art space.

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Speaker 1: We are next year going to have some original new

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Speaker 1: works that put art and science together in some pretty

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Speaker 1: compelling ways. But I'll just dangle that out there so

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Speaker 1: you'll be compelled to join us again next year. Now,

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Speaker 1: on the topic of black holes and I guess other

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Speaker 1: scientific topics that are kind of in that that same realm,

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Speaker 1: do you think mainstream media, mainstream science fiction in particular,

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Speaker 1: could be doing more to sort of prepare general audiences

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Speaker 1: for these concepts, for instance, with black holes. Uh, even

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Speaker 1: even though I come back to the topic time and

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Speaker 1: time again as a podcaster and writer, I still can't

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Speaker 1: shake the old Disney movie vision of it and all

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Speaker 1: its absurdities out of my head. What was that the

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Speaker 1: black hole or vent arizing? What was it called something

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Speaker 1: like that? Or there wasn't there was a rising, but

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Speaker 1: the Disney black hole where it was just um it

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Speaker 1: was it was? It was certainly not two thousand and

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Speaker 1: one right right, or even Interstellar. I mean, now, if

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Speaker 1: you want to see what a real black hole looks like,

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Speaker 1: just go to Interstellar. I mean the visuals they were

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Speaker 1: driven by the mathematical equations, so this is actually a

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Speaker 1: very precise rendition of what it would look like to

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Speaker 1: be in the vicinity of a black hole. But yes,

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Speaker 1: you know, I'm My view, which I think is widely shared,

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Speaker 1: is the culture needs to integrate with science in an

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Speaker 1: organic way. So that's not as a scientist some separate

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Speaker 1: subject that's out there that you take in school. Rather,

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Speaker 1: you really need to be the case that we use

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Speaker 1: all the tools and all the things that matter to

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Speaker 1: people from film and theater and science and science fiction

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Speaker 1: in order that the ideas are in the air and

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Speaker 1: the imagery is front and center when relevant and to

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Speaker 1: do it correctly. Sometimes it's more work, maybe even a

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Speaker 1: little more expensive. But if you get the real picture

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Speaker 1: of a black hole into people's minds through some wonderful story,

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Speaker 1: how great is that so that we as a culture

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Speaker 1: really being to embrace these ideas far more fully and

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Speaker 1: far more accurately. In your opinion, what's the single most

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Speaker 1: exciting research frontier in physics right now and wine, Well,

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Speaker 1: it's a tough question. Certainly one is gravitational waves, because

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Speaker 1: whenever you open up a whole new way of engaging

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Speaker 1: and observing and interacting with the universe, you're bound to

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Speaker 1: find surprises. You know, so far there have been some surprises,

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Speaker 1: but for the most part, we've been seeing the kinds

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Speaker 1: of things that we anticipated, seeing the kinds of things

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Speaker 1: that computer simulations had already given us some insight into.

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Speaker 1: And now the observations are agreeing with the computer simulations,

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Speaker 1: which is wonderful. Yeah, there are still some surprises there

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Speaker 1: as well with neutrust our collisions, But the real wondrous

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Speaker 1: moments gonna be when we get some data from the

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Speaker 1: gravitation way of observatory that fits no template, that's no

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Speaker 1: previous computer simulation and forces us to go back and

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Speaker 1: figure out what kind of exotic new structure out there

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Speaker 1: in the universe is giving rise to these very peculiar

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Speaker 1: ripples in the fabric of space and time. That's gonna

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Speaker 1: be an astounding moments. That's certainly one area. The other

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Speaker 1: area in physics, at least if I focus on that,

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Speaker 1: is trying to really understand quantum mechanics as it relates

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Speaker 1: to space and time. And there are hints that we

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Speaker 1: may be finally putting our finger on the fundamental entities,

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Speaker 1: the ingredients that may stitch together the very fabric of

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Speaker 1: space and time itself. And if that work bears fruit

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Speaker 1: and turns out to be correct, that's going to be

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Speaker 1: a real watershed moment in human kinds understanding of the universe.

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Speaker 1: So it's kind of a follow up here. If you

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Speaker 1: had limitless resources to dedicate to one future experimental physics

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Speaker 1: or cosmology project, what would it be and what would

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Speaker 1: be we'd be seeking to learn from it? Limitless resources? Wow, Well,

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Speaker 1: I think certainly one one major undertaking would be to

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Speaker 1: build a fantastically powerful accelerator. So we have been examining

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Speaker 1: the universe on scales roughly a thousand to ten thousand

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Speaker 1: times the massive a proteon. Those are the energy scales involved.

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Speaker 1: But we know that there's got to be something wondrous

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Speaker 1: happening between there and the plank scale, which is ten

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Speaker 1: to the nineteen times the mass of a proteon. So

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Speaker 1: there's fifteen orders of magnitude in there to examine. And

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Speaker 1: it's an expensive thing to build ever bigger machines to

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Speaker 1: floor ever higher energies, ever smaller distances. But I've had

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Speaker 1: unlimited resources, truly unlimited resources. Let's try to build a

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Speaker 1: plank scale accelerator and really see whether we can see

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Speaker 1: the effects of quantum gravity in this futuristic laboratory. That

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Speaker 1: would be a spectacor the thing to do excellent. So

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Speaker 1: one last question, and I apoloticiste little wenk think. But so,

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Speaker 1: as as discussed last night, black holes started out as

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Speaker 1: more more in the real thought experiment and math curiosity,

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Speaker 1: but but now we largely accept in the physical reality.

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Speaker 1: Do you think there are ideas like that out there

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Speaker 1: in physics today, Things that we are current that are

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Speaker 1: currently only a cetical math entities, etcetera, but that will

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Speaker 1: want will someday will accept a real physical objects in

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Speaker 1: the universe. Well, I certainly hope so, because otherwise I've

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Speaker 1: been barking up the wrong tree for a very long time.

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Speaker 1: So the work that I've been focused on in my

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Speaker 1: colleagues as well, coming Bathroom from last Night program to

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Speaker 1: is string theory, and it's ring theory does posit the

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Speaker 1: existence of new physical entities, really small entities down at

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Speaker 1: the playing scale tents of the mind is thirty three

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Speaker 1: centimeters and that's fantastic smallest hard to even think about

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Speaker 1: how tiny that is. And right now it is just mathematics.

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Speaker 1: It is just in the exact same template as black

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Speaker 1: Holes where it say, back in the nineteen fifties, nineteen sixties.

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Speaker 1: So the hope is that we will follow the same

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Speaker 1: trajectory and that one day we'll be sitting here having

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Speaker 1: a conversation and you'll say to me, now that strings

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Speaker 1: are accepted as real physical entities. It wasn't it, And

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Speaker 1: and that's that's where we hope that things will go

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Speaker 1: all right. So that was that was my mini interview

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Speaker 1: with Brian Green, and I appreciate him taking time out

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Speaker 1: of his state chat with me. Uh, We're definitely going

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Speaker 1: to come back to black holes on stuff to blow

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Speaker 1: your mind. It's the kind of topic that it's probably

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Speaker 1: gonna take it at least two episodes to really give

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Speaker 1: it full coverage. But I do want to touch on

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Speaker 1: some of the things that the Green is talking about here.

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Speaker 1: So the key thing that Green is describing is how

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Speaker 1: black holes began again as a mere thought experiment on

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Speaker 1: the for on the on you know, first the nature

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Speaker 1: of gravity. So we have this idea of dark stars

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Speaker 1: and the Newtonian concept of a of a star that

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Speaker 1: becomes too massive for light to escape from it, but

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Speaker 1: mostly as a byproduct of crunching spacetime in Einstein's general

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Speaker 1: theory of relativity and the calculations of German astronomer Karl

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Speaker 1: Schwartschild who died in War One. Yeah, and it's amazing

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Speaker 1: to think back that there was a time where you

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Speaker 1: could have explored black holes as a sort of thought experiment,

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Speaker 1: playing around with gravity. But a lot of people might

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Speaker 1: have laughed at you if you proposed that there were

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Speaker 1: actually black holes out there in the universe. Yeah, they

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Speaker 1: were not things that we observed. Rather, there are the

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Speaker 1: things that we expected to be there based on the math.

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Speaker 1: So for decades they were pure, purely theoretical, but now

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Speaker 1: we've reached the point where experts are pretty certain. We

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Speaker 1: know for certain that stars collapse into black holes when

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Speaker 1: they die, and the supermassive black holes lurk at the

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Speaker 1: center of the gut of our galaxies, again, including our own.

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Speaker 1: We have twenty five years of supermassive black hole studies

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Speaker 1: under our belt, and they've revealed quite a lot. So

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Speaker 1: one of the issues here is that, you know, we

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Speaker 1: create these templates for what we observe based on the map,

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Speaker 1: and then we see how the template matches up to

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Speaker 1: our observation. That's kind of how a lot of things

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Speaker 1: work in science. You know, you're you're creating expectations based

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Speaker 1: on the data you have, and then you see what

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Speaker 1: occurs when you bring that template to nature. It's a

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Speaker 1: model testing. You make a model and see is the

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Speaker 1: model right to match the data. And this is all

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Speaker 1: actually going down as we speak, as we record this,

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Speaker 1: even because we have the Event Horizon Telescope project, which

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Speaker 1: is a global network of radio telescopes that essentially turns

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Speaker 1: the Earth into a telescope large enough to observe and

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Speaker 1: measure the environment surrounding the Milky Way. Supermassive black hole

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Speaker 1: uh Sagittarius A. And in doing it, we're not only

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Speaker 1: verifying the existence of black holes, but as Green astrophysicist

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Speaker 1: Andrea Guez and astronomer Sheep Doleman pointed out, we're actually

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Speaker 1: putting Einstein's general theory of relativity to the test, and

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Speaker 1: we may be forced to move beyond it in our

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Speaker 1: understanding of the universe. That's weird because we generally think

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Speaker 1: no pun intended. We generally think of general relativity as

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Speaker 1: something that's sort of beyond dispute at this point, right, Yeah, Well,

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Speaker 1: but as they point out in this talk, it's you

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Speaker 1: have kind of a trust but verify situation with it,

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Speaker 1: Like we have to trust it because we've built so

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Speaker 1: much of how we view the universe is built upon it.

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Speaker 1: But as we learn more, we're inevitably reaching the point

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Speaker 1: where that too is a template that must be put

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Speaker 1: to tests, that we must hold up to nature as

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Speaker 1: we develop better and better ways of observing it. Well,

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Speaker 1: I mean, there are some ways in which we know

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Speaker 1: that it is at least partially right. But yeah, that's

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Speaker 1: the question of like, at the margins of our understanding,

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Speaker 1: are are there ways we need to sort of updated,

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Speaker 1: I guess right now. Another topic that Green touched on

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Speaker 1: here is quantum mechanics, and of course we recently did

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Speaker 1: a fairly deep dive into some of the properties of

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Speaker 1: quantum mechanics and our quantum immortality episode, so I don't

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Speaker 1: know that we really need to refresh a lot there.

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Speaker 1: We just say if you if you have questions about

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Speaker 1: what this whole quantum mechanics thing is about, do check

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Speaker 1: out our recent episode on quantum immortality, or again check

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Speaker 1: out this talk in full from the World Science Festival.

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Speaker 1: But I know one of the things in that arena

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Speaker 1: that Green is interested in is the idea of discovering

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Speaker 1: quantum gravity, right, like, what is what? How does gravity

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Speaker 1: apply at the quantum scale? Yeah, and a Green touches

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Speaker 1: on towards the very end of this interview. Uh, there

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Speaker 1: is of course the realm of superstring theory, and this

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Speaker 1: is certainly one of Green's core areas of studies and

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Speaker 1: core area of contribution. This is the idea that miniscule

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Speaker 1: strands of energy vibrating across multiple dimensions create every particle

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Speaker 1: enforce in the universe. So particle physicists define elementary particles

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Speaker 1: or fundamental particles as the smallest building block in the universe.

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Speaker 1: In other words, particles such as leptons and courts have

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Speaker 1: no substructure there as small as it gets. Ultimately, string

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Speaker 1: theorists are aiming to fulfill Einstein's unrealized goal of unifying

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Speaker 1: general relativity with quantum theory. And one of the interesting

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Speaker 1: points brought up in the in the talk and black

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Speaker 1: holes is that string theory actually helps us make sense

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Speaker 1: of the entropy problem with black holes. Now, what is

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Speaker 1: that problem? Okay, so the basic idea here and ultimately

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Speaker 1: Green presents us a lot better in in in the

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Speaker 1: actual world Science Festival talk, but they give us the

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Speaker 1: bad version. That the bad version, if you will, or

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Speaker 1: the rough version, is how can a black hole be

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Speaker 1: in a high entropy state if everything inside is super

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Speaker 1: crunched down to a state of less entropy than normal matter?

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Speaker 1: Where is the missing entropy? So, according to string theory,

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Speaker 1: you find that missing entropy and the six microscopic spatial

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Speaker 1: dimensions that exist in addition to the three spatial dimensions

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Speaker 1: that we can observe earve And the example Green often

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Speaker 1: uses to explain like low versus high entropy, is that

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Speaker 1: it's essentially you're talking about a high ordered state and

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Speaker 1: a low ordered state. In his frequent example is if

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Speaker 1: you do you have a book of pages without a

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Speaker 1: binding and they're in order, high order, right, throw that

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Speaker 1: in the air and then all the pages, uh fall

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Speaker 1: to the ground and now they're in disorder. Loss of

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Speaker 1: information organization. So speaking of black holes, when you talked

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Speaker 1: to Brian Green, was we're all trying to talk about

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Speaker 1: Event Horizon. The Event Horizon. Was that like sort of

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Speaker 1: coming to the surface? It did kind of, yeah, because

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Speaker 1: I brought up Disney's The black Hole, and I'm not

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Speaker 1: not sure he was familiar with or had a you

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Speaker 1: know that's necessarily remembered that film, which of course gives

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Speaker 1: us a very ridiculous notion of what a black hole

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Speaker 1: would be. It's basically just a big, you know, glowing

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Speaker 1: vortex in in in the least realistic space you could

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Speaker 1: possibly imagine. And he thought you were talking about what's

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Speaker 1: name Sam Neil, And oh, yeah, an Event Horizon, which

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Speaker 1: is a film that I really enjoyed, and now we

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Speaker 1: know Brian Green's seen it. I I can't even imagine

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Speaker 1: Brian Brian Green responding to the science of event Horizon,

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Speaker 1: which of course is a is a horror movie, a

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Speaker 1: haunted house movie set in space, with some black holy

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Speaker 1: science thrown in there, but basically the idea being that

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Speaker 1: a black hole takes you to Hell and and does

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Speaker 1: Hell raise your things to you. I want to hear

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Speaker 1: Brian Green's thoughts on the the scientific accuracy of Mortal

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Speaker 1: Kombat Annihilation. Well, you know, but I do love that

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Speaker 1: he brought up Interstellar though it's a film in which

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Speaker 1: the mathematics is is very sound. Uh. That definitely makes

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Speaker 1: me want to sit down and watch Interstellar again, which

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Speaker 1: I enjoyed the first time. But but but I do

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Speaker 1: feel like I need to give it a review. Well,

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Speaker 1: one of my favorite things about an Interstellar was the

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Speaker 1: way it took seriously the time dilation of texts of

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Speaker 1: the Unian that came a crucial plot point is is

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Speaker 1: how the passage of time changes in relation to say,

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Speaker 1: your proximity to a supermassive object or you know, travel

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Speaker 1: through space and all that. I thought that was one

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Speaker 1: of the most interesting things about the story, and I'm

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Speaker 1: glad they did that. Yeah, you don't. You really don't

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Speaker 1: see enough of it in science fiction films anyway. And

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Speaker 1: I think that's exactly what Green is talking about when

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Speaker 1: he said, you know, he says in his discussion with

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Speaker 1: you that the culture needs to integrate with science in

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Speaker 1: an organic way, right. You know, He's like, essentially, we

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Speaker 1: should work to make our current best understanding of science

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Speaker 1: not a thing separate from popular culture, but a fundamental

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Speaker 1: part of popular culture. The same way that you might

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Speaker 1: get a mostly accurate picture of what, say, well, actually,

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Speaker 1: I don't know how accurate this is, but you might

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Speaker 1: get a somewhat accurate picture of what the streets of

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Speaker 1: New York look like in two thousand and sixteen by

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Speaker 1: watching a movie shot that year. Uh. You know that

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Speaker 1: that's like cultural information is being embedded in that popular

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Speaker 1: culture media. Shouldn't we also get a sense of what

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Speaker 1: the science looks like in sixteen embedded in popular culture

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Speaker 1: and media. Yeah, which, of course brings me back to

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Speaker 1: Jurassic Park in Jurassic World, like you wouldn't You wouldn't

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Speaker 1: have a movie set in New York and and go

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Speaker 1: out of your way to represent two thousand and ten

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Speaker 1: New York or or or you know, nineteen eighty New York.

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Speaker 1: So why would you do that with your depiction of

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Speaker 1: these dinosaurs, Why wouldn't you give them feathers of coloration

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Speaker 1: or even you know, some symbolance of behavior that matches

433
00:23:33,320 --> 00:23:37,600
Speaker 1: up with our best understanding, our best current understanding of

434
00:23:37,760 --> 00:23:41,119
Speaker 1: what they were. Well, because you're making Jurassic World and

435
00:23:41,119 --> 00:23:45,320
Speaker 1: you don't care about life. Uh, But I totally agree

436
00:23:45,400 --> 00:23:47,959
Speaker 1: with with Green's perspective there. I think it is a

437
00:23:48,000 --> 00:23:51,400
Speaker 1: noble thing to try to do two more deeply integrate

438
00:23:51,440 --> 00:23:55,080
Speaker 1: our best picture of science with popular culture. And in fact, uh,

439
00:23:55,720 --> 00:23:57,800
Speaker 1: I'd say that's something we tried to do a lot

440
00:23:57,880 --> 00:24:00,119
Speaker 1: on the show. Right, We're constantly trying to lay a

441
00:24:00,240 --> 00:24:03,919
Speaker 1: real science and other aspects of culture like movies and

442
00:24:03,960 --> 00:24:06,760
Speaker 1: books and religion and mythology side by side so they

443
00:24:06,760 --> 00:24:09,359
Speaker 1: can sort of get wrapped up together into one world

444
00:24:09,400 --> 00:24:13,400
Speaker 1: of thought and one conversation. At least I hope that's

445
00:24:13,440 --> 00:24:16,439
Speaker 1: what we do. Yeah, that that's certainly the aim. So

446
00:24:16,480 --> 00:24:18,520
Speaker 1: what do you think about doing a science fiction film

447
00:24:18,560 --> 00:24:21,480
Speaker 1: about a plank scale accelerator. I love that idea. I

448
00:24:21,480 --> 00:24:23,840
Speaker 1: love I love him talking about the you know, the

449
00:24:23,880 --> 00:24:26,800
Speaker 1: future of particle colliders. What energy level could we get

450
00:24:26,880 --> 00:24:28,960
Speaker 1: up to? And I think that's something we could also

451
00:24:29,000 --> 00:24:31,320
Speaker 1: do an episode on someday. What what would a plank

452
00:24:31,440 --> 00:24:34,920
Speaker 1: scale accelerator look like? Uh? Is such a thing even

453
00:24:35,000 --> 00:24:38,280
Speaker 1: possible to build on Earth? Given you know we we

454
00:24:38,280 --> 00:24:42,280
Speaker 1: were asking him a hypothetical question about limitless resources, given

455
00:24:42,359 --> 00:24:45,719
Speaker 1: real resources, could you do such a thing? Alright? Well,

456
00:24:45,760 --> 00:24:47,320
Speaker 1: on that note, we're going to take a quick break,

457
00:24:47,359 --> 00:24:50,240
Speaker 1: and when we come back we will dive into another

458
00:24:50,280 --> 00:24:55,240
Speaker 1: interview and discuss what Max Tegmark had to say. Thank you,

459
00:24:55,440 --> 00:24:58,120
Speaker 1: thank you. All Right, we're back. So, Robert, you talked

460
00:24:58,160 --> 00:25:01,320
Speaker 1: to mad Max. Yes. Us. This was definitely one of

461
00:25:01,320 --> 00:25:04,119
Speaker 1: the highlights of World Science Festival two thousand and eighteen

462
00:25:04,160 --> 00:25:07,040
Speaker 1: for me getting to set down with Max tag Mark,

463
00:25:07,160 --> 00:25:10,879
Speaker 1: president of the Future of Life Institute, UH physicist advocate

464
00:25:10,920 --> 00:25:14,560
Speaker 1: for positive use of technology. He's also a professor doing

465
00:25:14,720 --> 00:25:17,479
Speaker 1: physics and AI research at m i T, author of

466
00:25:17,560 --> 00:25:21,000
Speaker 1: Our Mathematical Universe, as well as his most recent book

467
00:25:21,160 --> 00:25:23,760
Speaker 1: Life three point oh Being Human in the Age of

468
00:25:23,840 --> 00:25:26,919
Speaker 1: Artificial Intelligence. Now, I do want to warn everybody this

469
00:25:26,920 --> 00:25:29,639
Speaker 1: one is probably this one probably has the roughest audio

470
00:25:29,720 --> 00:25:32,959
Speaker 1: quality of the three that we're airing here. This was

471
00:25:33,280 --> 00:25:37,280
Speaker 1: recorded in a fairly noisy green room, but the content

472
00:25:37,359 --> 00:25:39,480
Speaker 1: is so good. I just just really, we just really

473
00:25:39,480 --> 00:25:40,800
Speaker 1: have to share it with you. You're not going to

474
00:25:40,880 --> 00:25:44,880
Speaker 1: be confused about which voices. Max's right, Max is Swedish Americans.

475
00:25:44,960 --> 00:25:48,719
Speaker 1: You'll you'll detect a slight accent here. But yeah, this

476
00:25:48,800 --> 00:25:52,280
Speaker 1: was a fabulous little talk. Max's super chill and I

477
00:25:52,320 --> 00:25:55,280
Speaker 1: really appreciate him taking time out of his day right

478
00:25:55,359 --> 00:25:58,480
Speaker 1: before he went in and participated in a panel discussion

479
00:25:58,680 --> 00:26:06,600
Speaker 1: to talk about these topics. And here we go. So

480
00:26:06,720 --> 00:26:10,920
Speaker 1: what is your most optimistic model for a post technological

481
00:26:10,960 --> 00:26:15,879
Speaker 1: singularity world? Well, everything I love about civilizations is the

482
00:26:15,960 --> 00:26:19,080
Speaker 1: product of intelligence. So if we can amplify our intelligence

483
00:26:19,080 --> 00:26:21,760
Speaker 1: with machine intelligence, you know, we have the potential to

484
00:26:21,880 --> 00:26:26,359
Speaker 1: really solve the toughest problems that are stumping us today

485
00:26:26,400 --> 00:26:30,119
Speaker 1: and tomorrow. I came. I was in the hospital recently

486
00:26:30,280 --> 00:26:33,360
Speaker 1: visiting a friend had been diagnosed with an uncurable cancer,

487
00:26:33,440 --> 00:26:38,720
Speaker 1: for example. But it's obviously not uncurable. Humans just weren't

488
00:26:38,720 --> 00:26:41,560
Speaker 1: smart enough to figure out how to cure it. This

489
00:26:41,640 --> 00:26:45,920
Speaker 1: is an example I think AI can completely transform healthcare

490
00:26:45,960 --> 00:26:51,600
Speaker 1: and medicine together with the rest of science. Similarly, the

491
00:26:51,640 --> 00:26:53,480
Speaker 1: fact that we struggle with a lot of people in

492
00:26:53,560 --> 00:26:57,800
Speaker 1: poverty is not because there really aren't enough atoms on Earth.

493
00:26:58,600 --> 00:27:04,400
Speaker 1: With more intelligence, we can have it do enough great

494
00:27:04,440 --> 00:27:07,040
Speaker 1: stuff with our resources to help life flourish like eleven

495
00:27:07,119 --> 00:27:10,320
Speaker 1: before here on Earth and throughout the cosmos too, if

496
00:27:10,320 --> 00:27:14,800
Speaker 1: you want, you know. Okay, now on the pessimistic end

497
00:27:14,840 --> 00:27:17,760
Speaker 1: of the spectrum, what are some of the negative possibilities

498
00:27:17,800 --> 00:27:24,359
Speaker 1: that we were least prepared for anticipating a well. Some

499
00:27:24,400 --> 00:27:26,959
Speaker 1: people seem to take it in an article of blind

500
00:27:27,080 --> 00:27:30,720
Speaker 1: faith that all new technology is automatically good, and then

501
00:27:30,720 --> 00:27:33,159
Speaker 1: disrepeat this over and over and again as a mantra.

502
00:27:33,320 --> 00:27:36,320
Speaker 1: But the truth is, of course, the technology isn't good,

503
00:27:36,800 --> 00:27:39,680
Speaker 1: nor is it evil. It's neutral. It's just an amplifier

504
00:27:39,760 --> 00:27:43,040
Speaker 1: of our ability to do stuff. It's fire good or

505
00:27:43,080 --> 00:27:45,639
Speaker 1: bad one it's good to heat your home within the

506
00:27:45,640 --> 00:27:49,119
Speaker 1: winter and bad to use for arson, and AI is

507
00:27:49,160 --> 00:27:54,760
Speaker 1: really no different except much more powerful. So to me,

508
00:27:54,840 --> 00:27:56,960
Speaker 1: the really interesting question is how can you win the

509
00:27:57,000 --> 00:28:02,520
Speaker 1: wisdom race between the growing power of technology and the

510
00:28:02,560 --> 00:28:09,399
Speaker 1: growing wisdom with which we manage it. I think my

511
00:28:09,480 --> 00:28:13,000
Speaker 1: concern comes from the fact that we're we haven't realized

512
00:28:13,040 --> 00:28:14,840
Speaker 1: we have to change strategies to win this race. We

513
00:28:15,000 --> 00:28:18,520
Speaker 1: used to staying ahead of the game by learning from mistakes.

514
00:28:19,160 --> 00:28:21,160
Speaker 1: You know, we invented fire and screwed up a bunch

515
00:28:21,160 --> 00:28:25,280
Speaker 1: of times and invented the fire extinguisher, but with more

516
00:28:25,320 --> 00:28:30,399
Speaker 1: powerful tech like nuclear weapons and super human AI, we

517
00:28:30,440 --> 00:28:32,800
Speaker 1: don't want to learn from mistakes. We want to plan

518
00:28:32,880 --> 00:28:35,040
Speaker 1: ahead instead and get things right the first time, which

519
00:28:35,080 --> 00:28:38,560
Speaker 1: might be the only time we have some I'm optimistic

520
00:28:38,640 --> 00:28:42,160
Speaker 1: that if we do plan ahead, we can create a

521
00:28:42,160 --> 00:28:44,800
Speaker 1: really inspiring future. But it's going to take planning and

522
00:28:44,880 --> 00:28:50,280
Speaker 1: hard work. We can't just bumble into this. That's a

523
00:28:50,320 --> 00:28:57,760
Speaker 1: lot of the culture at large, science fiction of I

524
00:28:57,840 --> 00:29:05,040
Speaker 1: didn't need to particular science fictions you potentially partially particularly helpful.

525
00:29:05,840 --> 00:29:10,840
Speaker 1: I just rewatched Kubrick's two thousand and one the other

526
00:29:10,960 --> 00:29:16,280
Speaker 1: night with my family, and I think it's not only

527
00:29:16,320 --> 00:29:18,440
Speaker 1: the one of the oldest, but also one of the best, actually,

528
00:29:18,520 --> 00:29:23,080
Speaker 1: because when Hal says I'm sorry, Dave, I can't do that,

529
00:29:24,480 --> 00:29:30,120
Speaker 1: it illustrates the point that we shouldn't worry about AI

530
00:29:30,280 --> 00:29:33,600
Speaker 1: turning evil, because how isn't evil. We should just worry

531
00:29:33,640 --> 00:29:37,120
Speaker 1: about AI turning very competent and having goals that aren't

532
00:29:37,120 --> 00:29:39,520
Speaker 1: aligned with ours, because that's exactly what we're wrong. On

533
00:29:39,600 --> 00:29:45,480
Speaker 1: that Jupiter mission. It doesn't matter so much if the

534
00:29:45,560 --> 00:29:48,479
Speaker 1: machines goals disagree with yours, if the machine is much

535
00:29:48,600 --> 00:29:50,520
Speaker 1: dumber and less powerful than you, because you just switch

536
00:29:50,600 --> 00:29:58,800
Speaker 1: it off, right. But if you have a he's taking

537
00:29:58,800 --> 00:30:01,680
Speaker 1: missile chasing after you and you feel that you don't

538
00:30:01,720 --> 00:30:04,800
Speaker 1: like its goal, it's not so easy to just switch

539
00:30:04,840 --> 00:30:08,160
Speaker 1: it off. And if we create a computer system that's

540
00:30:08,440 --> 00:30:12,680
Speaker 1: literally smarter than than humans in the future, then we

541
00:30:12,800 --> 00:30:14,760
Speaker 1: better make sure that we shared our goals, because what's

542
00:30:14,800 --> 00:30:18,800
Speaker 1: given us more power on this planet than any other species,

543
00:30:18,880 --> 00:30:24,360
Speaker 1: isn't there we have bigger biceps that were smarter. How

544
00:30:24,400 --> 00:30:29,080
Speaker 1: will digitize consciousness of play a role in humanity future?

545
00:30:30,320 --> 00:30:34,520
Speaker 1: I think we need to distinguish between digital consciousness artificial

546
00:30:34,520 --> 00:30:37,680
Speaker 1: consciousness on one hand, and artificial intelligence on the other hand,

547
00:30:37,720 --> 00:30:40,959
Speaker 1: because there are two very very different things. Artificial intelligence,

548
00:30:41,920 --> 00:30:44,760
Speaker 1: if we make it really powerful, well well beyond that,

549
00:30:44,880 --> 00:30:46,800
Speaker 1: the best thing ever, the worst thing ever, depending on

550
00:30:46,800 --> 00:30:50,520
Speaker 1: how it's used and who or what you know controls it.

551
00:30:52,000 --> 00:30:57,160
Speaker 1: Consciousness this subjective experience that you and I have when

552
00:30:57,200 --> 00:30:59,880
Speaker 1: we drive down the street. We experienced colors and sounds

553
00:31:00,040 --> 00:31:03,440
Speaker 1: someone We don't know whether self driving car experiences anything

554
00:31:03,440 --> 00:31:05,400
Speaker 1: at all, whether it feels like anything to be it,

555
00:31:06,400 --> 00:31:10,480
Speaker 1: and the world leaning experts actually argue passionately about this.

556
00:31:10,760 --> 00:31:14,800
Speaker 1: Some think, uh, the stupid question. Of course machines can't

557
00:31:14,840 --> 00:31:18,959
Speaker 1: be conscious. Others say that's a stupid questions because, of

558
00:31:19,000 --> 00:31:22,080
Speaker 1: course consciousness is the same thing as intelligence, so a

559
00:31:22,160 --> 00:31:24,520
Speaker 1: robot that talks like a human will feel like a human.

560
00:31:25,240 --> 00:31:28,520
Speaker 1: I think the answer is neither of those two. I

561
00:31:28,520 --> 00:31:30,640
Speaker 1: think it's somewhere in between. Because we know that most

562
00:31:30,680 --> 00:31:34,120
Speaker 1: of the information processing happening in your brain right now

563
00:31:34,920 --> 00:31:37,600
Speaker 1: you're actually not aware of, like your heartbeat regulation and

564
00:31:37,640 --> 00:31:41,640
Speaker 1: a gazillion other things. But consciousness, it's sort of like

565
00:31:41,680 --> 00:31:44,200
Speaker 1: the CEO of your brain, a small part of the information.

566
00:31:44,520 --> 00:31:46,920
Speaker 1: So I think it's gonna be really important to figure

567
00:31:46,920 --> 00:31:53,400
Speaker 1: out actually what information processing is conscious and what isn't.

568
00:31:54,000 --> 00:31:56,760
Speaker 1: You might want to have a home helper robot that

569
00:31:56,960 --> 00:31:59,240
Speaker 1: isn't conscious like the zombades you just so you only

570
00:31:59,240 --> 00:32:01,400
Speaker 1: need to feel guilty when switching off or giving it

571
00:32:01,480 --> 00:32:04,760
Speaker 1: boring chores. Or maybe you would want it to be

572
00:32:04,880 --> 00:32:07,520
Speaker 1: conscious so you don't feel creeped out when it acts

573
00:32:07,640 --> 00:32:14,040
Speaker 1: as if it were conscious. And either way, there's a

574
00:32:14,120 --> 00:32:19,200
Speaker 1: really tough science question here. What is consciousness, and I

575
00:32:19,240 --> 00:32:22,960
Speaker 1: think we should have been humble and realize that it's

576
00:32:23,000 --> 00:32:26,280
Speaker 1: actually not just philosophy, it's actually an unsolid science question,

577
00:32:26,320 --> 00:32:30,800
Speaker 1: and we should tackle it. We believe we will find

578
00:32:30,840 --> 00:32:34,160
Speaker 1: an answer in their future because we will have a

579
00:32:34,240 --> 00:32:36,960
Speaker 1: definite model of human conscious I'm in a small minority

580
00:32:37,480 --> 00:32:39,320
Speaker 1: actually thinks yeah, and that we are going to make

581
00:32:39,520 --> 00:32:42,320
Speaker 1: real progress. We've wondered about this for thousands of years

582
00:32:42,360 --> 00:32:44,520
Speaker 1: with very little progress because we had almost no data.

583
00:32:45,160 --> 00:32:49,360
Speaker 1: But now we're getting incredibly good data from our brains.

584
00:32:50,640 --> 00:32:54,040
Speaker 1: I can put you in our many Magneto and Pholography

585
00:32:54,080 --> 00:32:57,000
Speaker 1: machine at m I T and read out from six

586
00:32:57,360 --> 00:33:02,000
Speaker 1: three and four Superconducting Center a bunch of stuff and

587
00:33:02,040 --> 00:33:03,920
Speaker 1: tell you in real time which of a bunch of

588
00:33:03,960 --> 00:33:06,640
Speaker 1: objects you're thinking about, for instance, and and that and

589
00:33:06,720 --> 00:33:09,120
Speaker 1: opens up the possibility of doing some really cool experiments

590
00:33:09,120 --> 00:33:11,600
Speaker 1: that it mast have been done, Like if someone has

591
00:33:11,600 --> 00:33:15,480
Speaker 1: a consciousness theory that predicts which information in your brain

592
00:33:15,600 --> 00:33:18,240
Speaker 1: is conscious and which isn't, you can sit in the

593
00:33:18,280 --> 00:33:21,120
Speaker 1: machine and just test that on yourself. If it predicts

594
00:33:21,160 --> 00:33:24,000
Speaker 1: that you are conscious of things that you aren't and

595
00:33:24,200 --> 00:33:27,760
Speaker 1: rice versa, theory goes in the garbage can, right, And

596
00:33:28,040 --> 00:33:31,000
Speaker 1: once someone comes along with a theory that passes those

597
00:33:31,040 --> 00:33:34,200
Speaker 1: sorts of tests will start taking it seriously, and hospitals

598
00:33:34,240 --> 00:33:37,520
Speaker 1: will start to have consciousness detectors in the emergency room,

599
00:33:37,800 --> 00:33:40,760
Speaker 1: so when an unresponsientation comes in, the doctor knows whether

600
00:33:40,800 --> 00:33:44,640
Speaker 1: they are actually in a coma or have locked in syndrome.

601
00:33:47,160 --> 00:33:51,080
Speaker 1: And that should just add in the longer term. This is,

602
00:33:51,360 --> 00:33:56,120
Speaker 1: of course incredibly important because imagine one day if someone

603
00:33:56,160 --> 00:33:59,000
Speaker 1: like great Hurts File, who wants to upload himself into

604
00:33:59,000 --> 00:34:01,719
Speaker 1: a robot, managed to do that and it talks like

605
00:34:01,840 --> 00:34:04,120
Speaker 1: Ray and actually like Ray, and he's like, yes, awesome,

606
00:34:04,200 --> 00:34:10,160
Speaker 1: now it's okay if my biological body gives up the ghost.

607
00:34:10,640 --> 00:34:12,799
Speaker 1: If it turns out that this robot is actually just

608
00:34:12,840 --> 00:34:17,000
Speaker 1: a zombie, isn't conscious at all, he will be pretty bummed. Right.

609
00:34:17,160 --> 00:34:21,759
Speaker 1: And imagine if humanity one day has these robot descendants

610
00:34:21,800 --> 00:34:23,480
Speaker 1: were very proud of and they go on and do

611
00:34:23,560 --> 00:34:27,359
Speaker 1: all this cool stuff but they aren't conscious. Wouldn't that

612
00:34:27,400 --> 00:34:31,239
Speaker 1: be the ultimate zombie apocalypse where the whole universe just

613
00:34:31,320 --> 00:34:34,479
Speaker 1: goes back to being a play for empty benches. Well,

614
00:34:34,560 --> 00:34:37,680
Speaker 1: because I guess you're potentially creating all these zombies because

615
00:34:37,680 --> 00:34:42,839
Speaker 1: then it's also potentially we're nothing zombies as well. Well.

616
00:34:42,880 --> 00:34:45,200
Speaker 1: I think you know subjectively that you are not because

617
00:34:45,200 --> 00:34:48,600
Speaker 1: you are conscious, You are aware of these things. But

618
00:34:48,719 --> 00:34:50,560
Speaker 1: I think we have to be humble. That doesn't mean

619
00:34:50,600 --> 00:34:55,040
Speaker 1: that every system that does clever stuff is actually experiencing anything.

620
00:34:55,480 --> 00:34:58,000
Speaker 1: It's not at all clear that a self driving car

621
00:34:59,120 --> 00:35:01,480
Speaker 1: has any subject of experience it at all, and that

622
00:35:01,600 --> 00:35:06,719
Speaker 1: it feels like anything to be it. And for some devices,

623
00:35:06,760 --> 00:35:12,600
Speaker 1: again that's probably the way we wanted. But if we

624
00:35:13,239 --> 00:35:16,440
Speaker 1: create really sophisticated machines that we want to people want

625
00:35:16,440 --> 00:35:18,360
Speaker 1: to upload themselves to, or that we want to be

626
00:35:18,360 --> 00:35:25,320
Speaker 1: able to have view as beings with ethical with moral

627
00:35:25,440 --> 00:35:28,600
Speaker 1: rights and that maybe feel proud of the sentence, we

628
00:35:28,760 --> 00:35:31,920
Speaker 1: better know whether there as someone home, whether it feels

629
00:35:31,920 --> 00:35:33,960
Speaker 1: like something to be them, or whether they're just zombies.

630
00:35:36,440 --> 00:35:42,120
Speaker 1: The aims we could discuss. Then you talk about the

631
00:35:42,120 --> 00:35:45,799
Speaker 1: problems of the kind of propagation and they spreading and

632
00:35:45,920 --> 00:35:49,080
Speaker 1: it's truly every interest. It's like you can't do your

633
00:35:49,960 --> 00:35:57,239
Speaker 1: process managing an I development where the AIS do not

634
00:35:58,160 --> 00:36:01,960
Speaker 1: quote unquote want to oppligate. If they don't want to

635
00:36:02,040 --> 00:36:06,840
Speaker 1: change and evolved it, maybe they want to terminate. Certainly,

636
00:36:07,480 --> 00:36:09,840
Speaker 1: I think it's important to remember that the mind space

637
00:36:10,560 --> 00:36:14,440
Speaker 1: m kind of AI motivations you can build is vastly

638
00:36:14,520 --> 00:36:18,640
Speaker 1: larger than the mind space of evolved organisms, because all

639
00:36:18,680 --> 00:36:20,760
Speaker 1: of us, of all the organisms, have this very strong

640
00:36:20,880 --> 00:36:24,880
Speaker 1: urge to eat, to drink, to not get destroyed, to reproduce,

641
00:36:25,360 --> 00:36:31,759
Speaker 1: because that's what evolution and you know andvowed us to do, right.

642
00:36:32,160 --> 00:36:34,520
Speaker 1: Whereas if you build something, if you build a laptop,

643
00:36:34,560 --> 00:36:36,600
Speaker 1: there's no reason why you should build it, so it's

644
00:36:36,600 --> 00:36:40,000
Speaker 1: afraid of being turned off or any of those things.

645
00:36:40,800 --> 00:36:44,800
Speaker 1: So we should rather than ask what will these machines

646
00:36:44,920 --> 00:36:47,160
Speaker 1: ultimately want, we should ask what do we want them

647
00:36:47,200 --> 00:36:50,480
Speaker 1: to want? And try to understand how can we actually

648
00:36:50,920 --> 00:36:57,000
Speaker 1: put goals into machines. Anyone like me who's a parent

649
00:36:57,200 --> 00:37:01,120
Speaker 1: knows how hard it is to make children and understand

650
00:37:01,120 --> 00:37:05,400
Speaker 1: my goals and adopt my goals and then retain them right.

651
00:37:05,680 --> 00:37:08,040
Speaker 1: And we also know his parents that there's a big

652
00:37:08,080 --> 00:37:10,760
Speaker 1: difference between our kids understanding where you want to actually

653
00:37:10,800 --> 00:37:16,800
Speaker 1: doing what we want right. Yet that's exactly what the

654
00:37:16,840 --> 00:37:19,000
Speaker 1: problem we have to solve if we ever build machines

655
00:37:19,040 --> 00:37:23,400
Speaker 1: that are as smart as us or smarter, and also

656
00:37:25,600 --> 00:37:28,440
Speaker 1: if these machines keep getting ever more smart, we'd like

657
00:37:28,520 --> 00:37:30,680
Speaker 1: them to keep the goal of being nice to humans.

658
00:37:31,800 --> 00:37:34,560
Speaker 1: My sons were very excited about Legos when they were little,

659
00:37:34,920 --> 00:37:37,399
Speaker 1: and now and when they're teenagers, you know, not so much.

660
00:37:37,440 --> 00:37:40,520
Speaker 1: And we don't want arm machines to become his board

661
00:37:40,560 --> 00:37:42,560
Speaker 1: with this goal of taking be nice to humans. My

662
00:37:42,640 --> 00:37:45,160
Speaker 1: kids are with Legos either. So there are many nerdy

663
00:37:45,239 --> 00:37:51,080
Speaker 1: technical problems and AI safety research of this kind how

664
00:37:51,120 --> 00:37:54,799
Speaker 1: to make machines understand our goals, adopt them, retain them

665
00:37:54,840 --> 00:37:59,640
Speaker 1: that we really need to solve before anyone the scientists

666
00:37:59,640 --> 00:38:03,799
Speaker 1: which in a super intelligence, and those problems are so

667
00:38:03,840 --> 00:38:05,839
Speaker 1: hard it might take that case to solve them, which

668
00:38:05,880 --> 00:38:09,320
Speaker 1: is why it's so important that we actually research them now,

669
00:38:10,200 --> 00:38:13,640
Speaker 1: not the night before someone hits the on switch. I

670
00:38:13,640 --> 00:38:15,960
Speaker 1: think I probably have templed one more question here. Um.

671
00:38:16,280 --> 00:38:19,440
Speaker 1: So it seems to be the case that certainly we

672
00:38:19,440 --> 00:38:22,840
Speaker 1: can have a human level or higher intelligence that is

673
00:38:22,880 --> 00:38:27,600
Speaker 1: not conscious through computing. You would you agree or when

674
00:38:28,120 --> 00:38:30,360
Speaker 1: I think this is an open question, we don't know.

675
00:38:30,440 --> 00:38:33,080
Speaker 1: I have college to think the answer is obviously yes.

676
00:38:33,120 --> 00:38:36,520
Speaker 1: I have college to think the answer is obviously no. Um. Right,

677
00:38:36,719 --> 00:38:43,080
Speaker 1: My guess is that it could be either yes or no.

678
00:38:43,239 --> 00:38:46,879
Speaker 1: Like we have pocket calculators today. They are vastly better

679
00:38:46,920 --> 00:38:51,400
Speaker 1: than any human that multiplying numbers fast, but they're probably

680
00:38:51,440 --> 00:38:55,239
Speaker 1: not conscious at all. So there's no guarantee that just

681
00:38:55,239 --> 00:38:57,360
Speaker 1: because you're better than humans and some things, you're going

682
00:38:57,400 --> 00:39:03,560
Speaker 1: to be conscious. Okay, but how about biological intelligence do

683
00:39:03,600 --> 00:39:05,680
Speaker 1: you think? What do you think it would be possible

684
00:39:05,760 --> 00:39:09,239
Speaker 1: for a biological intelligence of human level or above to

685
00:39:09,400 --> 00:39:12,160
Speaker 1: be not to be non conscious or at least not

686
00:39:12,280 --> 00:39:15,160
Speaker 1: conscious in the same way that we think of I

687
00:39:15,200 --> 00:39:17,680
Speaker 1: think biology is a bit of a red herring here. Actually,

688
00:39:17,840 --> 00:39:24,080
Speaker 1: I have many colleagues. We think of intelligence and consciousness

689
00:39:24,160 --> 00:39:29,719
Speaker 1: is something mysterious that can only exist in biological organisms. Um,

690
00:39:29,760 --> 00:39:32,000
Speaker 1: but I feel that this is carbon chauvinism. You know,

691
00:39:32,120 --> 00:39:34,320
Speaker 1: this attitude that you can only be smart or conscious

692
00:39:34,360 --> 00:39:39,319
Speaker 1: if you're made of meat. I'm basically food rearranged, and

693
00:39:39,400 --> 00:39:42,040
Speaker 1: I'm made of exactly the same kind of electrons and

694
00:39:42,120 --> 00:39:45,279
Speaker 1: quirks as my food and as my laptop. It's all.

695
00:39:45,680 --> 00:39:48,280
Speaker 1: The only difference is the pattern and with the arrange

696
00:39:48,320 --> 00:39:54,800
Speaker 1: the information processing that happens. So I certainly don't think

697
00:39:57,680 --> 00:40:00,239
Speaker 1: it's impossible to have machines that are as intell isn't

698
00:40:00,239 --> 00:40:02,759
Speaker 1: at us as us that aren't made of meat, or

699
00:40:02,800 --> 00:40:05,279
Speaker 1: as conscious as us that aren't made of meat. But

700
00:40:05,360 --> 00:40:08,839
Speaker 1: we have to practice sized problem of what isn't specifically

701
00:40:08,920 --> 00:40:13,360
Speaker 1: about the information processing that makes it intelligent and it

702
00:40:13,440 --> 00:40:20,040
Speaker 1: makes it conscious? All right, So there you go. Max

703
00:40:20,080 --> 00:40:23,000
Speaker 1: has interesting thoughts about artificial intelligence. One of the things

704
00:40:23,120 --> 00:40:25,680
Speaker 1: is that he he says something that a lot of

705
00:40:25,680 --> 00:40:28,120
Speaker 1: the people I read on the subject would probably disagree with,

706
00:40:28,239 --> 00:40:31,880
Speaker 1: but then ends up I think in the same places them. Uh.

707
00:40:32,000 --> 00:40:35,600
Speaker 1: Max makes the technology is a neutral argument, and there

708
00:40:35,640 --> 00:40:38,439
Speaker 1: are some people who I think to really would really

709
00:40:38,480 --> 00:40:41,560
Speaker 1: disagree with that to some extent. For example, I think

710
00:40:41,560 --> 00:40:44,560
Speaker 1: about many of the critics of social media, like jarn

711
00:40:44,640 --> 00:40:47,279
Speaker 1: Lanier and Tristan Harris, who we've talked about, who I

712
00:40:47,360 --> 00:40:49,279
Speaker 1: definitely don't want to put words in their mouth, but

713
00:40:49,360 --> 00:40:52,880
Speaker 1: I think they would say something like, you know, there

714
00:40:52,920 --> 00:40:56,480
Speaker 1: are some kinds of technology that possess something like a

715
00:40:56,520 --> 00:40:58,920
Speaker 1: will of their own, not any not in any spooky

716
00:40:59,040 --> 00:41:01,440
Speaker 1: or conscious sense, but just in the sense that there

717
00:41:01,480 --> 00:41:04,600
Speaker 1: are certain applications for which they will be most easily

718
00:41:04,680 --> 00:41:09,120
Speaker 1: and eagerly deployed by humans, and that sort of technological

719
00:41:09,200 --> 00:41:12,960
Speaker 1: will often favors evil or negative applications. So there are

720
00:41:12,960 --> 00:41:17,160
Speaker 1: technologies that, you know, you can say, well, technology isn't

721
00:41:17,200 --> 00:41:21,360
Speaker 1: inherently moral or immoral, but they're definitely technologies that lend

722
00:41:21,400 --> 00:41:25,839
Speaker 1: themselves very easily to immoral or evil or destructive applications.

723
00:41:25,840 --> 00:41:29,680
Speaker 1: Wouldn't you agree, Robert? Yeah. I mean, for instance, if

724
00:41:29,680 --> 00:41:31,399
Speaker 1: you're talking about like some of the big ones we've

725
00:41:31,400 --> 00:41:38,080
Speaker 1: talked about, of course, uh, atomic energy, Um, certainly chemistry, Yeah,

726
00:41:38,120 --> 00:41:42,000
Speaker 1: the emergence of both chemical weapons and many favost lifesaving

727
00:41:42,360 --> 00:41:47,160
Speaker 1: chemicals that emerged during the twentieth century. But then other

728
00:41:47,200 --> 00:41:51,160
Speaker 1: things like I don't know, fabric science, uh, some meta materials.

729
00:41:51,200 --> 00:41:54,000
Speaker 1: You could probably make an argument that these maybe lend

730
00:41:54,040 --> 00:41:58,560
Speaker 1: themselves more for more towards non violent, non destructive uses

731
00:41:58,560 --> 00:42:01,880
Speaker 1: than others. Yeah, I mean, I definitely think about social

732
00:42:01,920 --> 00:42:04,440
Speaker 1: media algorithms being a thing that you could easily make

733
00:42:04,480 --> 00:42:07,680
Speaker 1: the argument that, oh, that's just a neutral technology. You know,

734
00:42:07,760 --> 00:42:10,040
Speaker 1: it could be used for good, could be used for evil,

735
00:42:10,080 --> 00:42:14,400
Speaker 1: and I guess that's technically true. But which way is

736
00:42:14,440 --> 00:42:17,440
Speaker 1: it most likely to be used given what it's capable

737
00:42:17,480 --> 00:42:20,200
Speaker 1: of doing. Yeah, And of course, of a lot of it,

738
00:42:20,239 --> 00:42:22,160
Speaker 1: as as Max touches on, here, is is going to

739
00:42:22,239 --> 00:42:24,279
Speaker 1: come down to human will and the humans involved in

740
00:42:24,680 --> 00:42:28,440
Speaker 1: shaping it and and sense raising it so that the

741
00:42:28,440 --> 00:42:32,919
Speaker 1: title of this particular panel discussion that Max was about

742
00:42:32,960 --> 00:42:35,640
Speaker 1: to participate in was Teacher Robots Well, and it was

743
00:42:35,680 --> 00:42:39,520
Speaker 1: about the idea of essentially, how do we prepare AI

744
00:42:39,600 --> 00:42:44,359
Speaker 1: for the potential technological singularity when they will be the

745
00:42:44,480 --> 00:42:47,880
Speaker 1: entities with the power. Yeah, and whether you think the

746
00:42:48,200 --> 00:42:50,800
Speaker 1: say the Kurt Swiley and sense of the singularity is

747
00:42:50,840 --> 00:42:53,080
Speaker 1: realistic or makes any sense at all, there is at

748
00:42:53,160 --> 00:42:55,960
Speaker 1: least another version of it you can entertain that might

749
00:42:56,000 --> 00:42:58,919
Speaker 1: be more plausible, which is just the idea that at

750
00:42:58,960 --> 00:43:04,279
Speaker 1: some point AI will surpass human intelligence in many important ways. Right.

751
00:43:04,600 --> 00:43:06,239
Speaker 1: But I do want to come back to what I

752
00:43:06,239 --> 00:43:08,359
Speaker 1: said about tech Mark because I don't want to put

753
00:43:08,440 --> 00:43:11,719
Speaker 1: him to at odds with with the other idea I

754
00:43:11,760 --> 00:43:14,560
Speaker 1: was just explaining, because ultimately I think Techmark ends up

755
00:43:14,560 --> 00:43:17,080
Speaker 1: in the same place saying that we we have to

756
00:43:17,120 --> 00:43:20,960
Speaker 1: be very careful with certain types of technology, specifically AI,

757
00:43:21,120 --> 00:43:24,160
Speaker 1: that can't be allowed to just grow in the wild. Right,

758
00:43:24,440 --> 00:43:27,120
Speaker 1: Sometimes we let technologies just grow in the wild of

759
00:43:27,160 --> 00:43:31,120
Speaker 1: the marketplace and see what happens with them AI. We

760
00:43:31,280 --> 00:43:34,720
Speaker 1: can't treat that way right certainly, And in Max Tegmark,

761
00:43:34,800 --> 00:43:38,520
Speaker 1: he did not specifically mentioned James P. Cars, the author

762
00:43:38,560 --> 00:43:41,080
Speaker 1: of Finite and Infinite Games, which we talked about recently. Yeah,

763
00:43:41,120 --> 00:43:43,560
Speaker 1: he didn't. He didn't bring that up specifically. But one

764
00:43:43,560 --> 00:43:45,360
Speaker 1: of the things that he was was pressing is the

765
00:43:45,400 --> 00:43:49,000
Speaker 1: idea that as we develop AI, we should develop it

766
00:43:49,040 --> 00:43:51,440
Speaker 1: in a way that it benefits humanity as a whole,

767
00:43:52,000 --> 00:43:57,840
Speaker 1: you know, rather than fulfilling political or national or or

768
00:43:58,360 --> 00:44:02,560
Speaker 1: or a particular social function or business function. In other words,

769
00:44:02,760 --> 00:44:06,200
Speaker 1: we need to raise AI, develop AI so that it

770
00:44:06,320 --> 00:44:09,719
Speaker 1: is playing an infinite game rather than any number of

771
00:44:09,800 --> 00:44:13,520
Speaker 1: potentially destructive finite games. Right Because, as Max talks about,

772
00:44:13,520 --> 00:44:17,000
Speaker 1: like the idea, the really scary version of how AI

773
00:44:17,080 --> 00:44:20,800
Speaker 1: could go wrong is not terminators. It's not that AI

774
00:44:20,840 --> 00:44:23,600
Speaker 1: decides I'm evil and I must kill humanity. I mean,

775
00:44:23,640 --> 00:44:26,120
Speaker 1: of course anything is possible, but that doesn't seem very likely.

776
00:44:26,160 --> 00:44:28,920
Speaker 1: What seems far more likely is that there are lots

777
00:44:28,960 --> 00:44:32,360
Speaker 1: of negative side effects that are very destructive and harmful

778
00:44:32,400 --> 00:44:36,560
Speaker 1: to us as a byproduct of it attaining some finite goal.

779
00:44:36,760 --> 00:44:39,719
Speaker 1: It's it's playing a finite game. It's trying to do

780
00:44:39,960 --> 00:44:42,560
Speaker 1: X y Z for some business purpose, and they're just

781
00:44:42,640 --> 00:44:45,759
Speaker 1: happened to be some really negative side effects to it

782
00:44:45,840 --> 00:44:48,680
Speaker 1: achieving that goal. And so anyway, I mean what this

783
00:44:49,040 --> 00:44:51,799
Speaker 1: comes back to is that we have to have a

784
00:44:51,840 --> 00:44:55,840
Speaker 1: guided type of development for AI. It it has to

785
00:44:55,880 --> 00:44:58,880
Speaker 1: be informed by our desire for AI to do good

786
00:44:58,880 --> 00:45:01,680
Speaker 1: and not evil. You could put other types of technology

787
00:45:01,840 --> 00:45:03,960
Speaker 1: in this category. As we were just talking about nuclear

788
00:45:03,960 --> 00:45:06,799
Speaker 1: fission seems like a good candidate for something that could

789
00:45:06,880 --> 00:45:08,880
Speaker 1: be used for good, could be used for evil. If

790
00:45:08,960 --> 00:45:11,920
Speaker 1: you just allow it to develop naturally in the wild,

791
00:45:12,360 --> 00:45:15,680
Speaker 1: it's probably going to be far more destructive than it

792
00:45:15,800 --> 00:45:19,239
Speaker 1: is beneficial, right. I think it's a valid argument. Yeah,

793
00:45:19,360 --> 00:45:21,360
Speaker 1: and it's one of It's another example if you if

794
00:45:21,400 --> 00:45:24,600
Speaker 1: you had definite guidelines that said this must be developed

795
00:45:24,600 --> 00:45:27,879
Speaker 1: in a way that benefits everybody, uh and and does

796
00:45:27,960 --> 00:45:32,960
Speaker 1: not further particular finite game. Uh, then it would be

797
00:45:33,080 --> 00:45:34,759
Speaker 1: we'd all be better off in the long run. Now,

798
00:45:34,760 --> 00:45:37,560
Speaker 1: I guess the big question is, so like, even if

799
00:45:37,600 --> 00:45:39,439
Speaker 1: you can get people to agree to that, say, okay,

800
00:45:39,520 --> 00:45:41,839
Speaker 1: we won't we won't develop AI in the wild. We'll

801
00:45:42,000 --> 00:45:44,000
Speaker 1: do it as some part of some part of a

802
00:45:44,040 --> 00:45:48,080
Speaker 1: global project to develop wholly beneficial AI that will treat

803
00:45:48,120 --> 00:45:50,880
Speaker 1: everyone well and be aimed towards the betterment of humanity

804
00:45:50,880 --> 00:45:53,720
Speaker 1: as a whole. How do you get people to sign

805
00:45:53,760 --> 00:45:55,880
Speaker 1: on to that? That sounds like a whole other Maybe

806
00:45:55,960 --> 00:45:58,120
Speaker 1: maybe you need an AI to solve that problem to

807
00:45:58,120 --> 00:46:01,600
Speaker 1: begin with. Yeah, you get into this hilaria than you know,

808
00:46:01,640 --> 00:46:04,279
Speaker 1: who's who's governing the AI? What are they? What are

809
00:46:04,280 --> 00:46:07,399
Speaker 1: the mechanisms in place? There's like a problem of politics

810
00:46:07,480 --> 00:46:10,600
Speaker 1: that sort of proceeds us getting to the stage where

811
00:46:10,600 --> 00:46:14,399
Speaker 1: we're ready or mature enough to develop AI. Yeah. Which

812
00:46:14,400 --> 00:46:16,160
Speaker 1: makes me glad though that we have people like Max

813
00:46:16,200 --> 00:46:19,279
Speaker 1: tech Mark out there that are participating in conversations about this,

814
00:46:19,400 --> 00:46:23,600
Speaker 1: not only with with World Science Festival attendees or with

815
00:46:24,360 --> 00:46:28,080
Speaker 1: podcast host but actively setting down, uh and having these

816
00:46:28,080 --> 00:46:31,160
Speaker 1: discussions with some of the people that are in a

817
00:46:31,200 --> 00:46:33,319
Speaker 1: position to do something about it and to and to

818
00:46:33,800 --> 00:46:36,600
Speaker 1: lay the framework for the future. Yeah. So if you're

819
00:46:36,600 --> 00:46:41,120
Speaker 1: influencing the influencers, you need to be bringing this question up. Uh.

820
00:46:41,280 --> 00:46:45,440
Speaker 1: So here's another thing. Tech Mark mentions machine consciousness as quote,

821
00:46:45,440 --> 00:46:49,560
Speaker 1: not philosophy, but an unsolved science question. And I think

822
00:46:49,560 --> 00:46:52,879
Speaker 1: this is interesting because you will definitely get a lot

823
00:46:52,880 --> 00:46:55,399
Speaker 1: of people who don't agree with that. Right, Let's say,

824
00:46:55,400 --> 00:46:57,359
Speaker 1: how could it be a science question? You can never

825
00:46:57,440 --> 00:47:00,719
Speaker 1: really know, You can never really have fully, you know,

826
00:47:00,760 --> 00:47:05,160
Speaker 1: a fool proof objective test for for detecting consciousness in

827
00:47:05,239 --> 00:47:07,880
Speaker 1: some other creature. I don't know what I think the

828
00:47:07,920 --> 00:47:10,320
Speaker 1: answer to that question is, I'm, you know, of two minds.

829
00:47:10,360 --> 00:47:12,799
Speaker 1: I see the wisdom in both camps there. But tech

830
00:47:12,840 --> 00:47:16,360
Speaker 1: Mark definitely thinks the question of detecting consciousness could be

831
00:47:16,400 --> 00:47:20,680
Speaker 1: a scientific question, and I think that's an interesting perspective. Yeah,

832
00:47:20,920 --> 00:47:23,120
Speaker 1: I should also know. You know, we discussed the work

833
00:47:23,120 --> 00:47:26,480
Speaker 1: of Susan Schneider and the AI test for consciousness. You

834
00:47:26,520 --> 00:47:29,279
Speaker 1: can hear it Susan Schneider in the background of my

835
00:47:29,320 --> 00:47:32,960
Speaker 1: conversation with with Max. Because she was on the same panel.

836
00:47:33,040 --> 00:47:34,440
Speaker 1: I thought maybe you were going to get to talk

837
00:47:34,480 --> 00:47:36,920
Speaker 1: to her. It was in the cards, but there are

838
00:47:36,960 --> 00:47:40,839
Speaker 1: a lot of moving pieces putting together a panel like that.

839
00:47:41,239 --> 00:47:43,680
Speaker 1: Ultimately ended up having only time to chat with Max.

840
00:47:43,719 --> 00:47:47,080
Speaker 1: But hey, maybe we'll get to have Susan on the

841
00:47:47,080 --> 00:47:49,439
Speaker 1: show sometimes that'd be great. Well, she I mean, she

842
00:47:50,239 --> 00:47:53,720
Speaker 1: has I think, what is a really interesting step toward

843
00:47:53,960 --> 00:47:57,520
Speaker 1: trying to come up with objective frameworks for detecting consciousness.

844
00:47:57,760 --> 00:48:01,759
Speaker 1: It's obviously, Uh, it's it's a very limited kind of step.

845
00:48:01,800 --> 00:48:04,680
Speaker 1: I mean, as we discussed in the AI Consciousness Test episode,

846
00:48:04,719 --> 00:48:07,799
Speaker 1: there are a lot of there are a lot of

847
00:48:07,800 --> 00:48:11,239
Speaker 1: limitations to to what these types of psychological test could do,

848
00:48:11,320 --> 00:48:14,520
Speaker 1: you know, like asking it asking a machine if it

849
00:48:14,600 --> 00:48:17,480
Speaker 1: understands the concept of souls, or trying to see if

850
00:48:17,480 --> 00:48:21,279
Speaker 1: it understands movies like Freaky Friday. Uh. I think that's

851
00:48:21,360 --> 00:48:23,839
Speaker 1: really clever and that's a good step, but obviously that's

852
00:48:23,880 --> 00:48:27,160
Speaker 1: not there yet to like a full understanding of where

853
00:48:27,200 --> 00:48:30,359
Speaker 1: of how we could see consciousness in an objective way

854
00:48:30,440 --> 00:48:32,759
Speaker 1: outside of ourselves. And I don't know if we'll ever

855
00:48:32,800 --> 00:48:35,480
Speaker 1: get there where, but it sounds like Max thinks we could. Yeah.

856
00:48:36,400 --> 00:48:38,400
Speaker 1: I like that. Max brought up two thousand and one

857
00:48:38,400 --> 00:48:41,120
Speaker 1: a Space Odyssey Yeah in the interview, and it just

858
00:48:41,280 --> 00:48:43,360
Speaker 1: drove home for me that since this is a landmark

859
00:48:43,480 --> 00:48:47,120
Speaker 1: year for two and one Space Odyssey film, it is

860
00:48:47,200 --> 00:48:50,719
Speaker 1: what what's the landmark? Oh, it's a fifty years, half

861
00:48:50,719 --> 00:48:55,400
Speaker 1: a century if two came out. Yeah, So given that

862
00:48:55,480 --> 00:48:58,360
Speaker 1: it is such a pivotal piece of science fiction, with

863
00:48:58,560 --> 00:49:02,239
Speaker 1: so much one a full science in it. Uh, we

864
00:49:02,280 --> 00:49:04,600
Speaker 1: really need to do a whole episode about it this year.

865
00:49:04,960 --> 00:49:07,880
Speaker 1: But where we really discuss uh the movie, perhaps the

866
00:49:07,880 --> 00:49:10,120
Speaker 1: book as well, and just why it has stood the

867
00:49:10,160 --> 00:49:12,640
Speaker 1: test of time as a work of science fiction. Yea

868
00:49:12,840 --> 00:49:16,200
Speaker 1: discussed ancient aliens. Yeah, yeah, well do you know we're

869
00:49:16,200 --> 00:49:20,440
Speaker 1: into that? So wait are we? Well, we're into exploring

870
00:49:20,480 --> 00:49:24,280
Speaker 1: the possibility we are not ancient aliens enthusiasts, not ancient

871
00:49:24,320 --> 00:49:27,680
Speaker 1: aliens advocates. No, no, no, we're at least as into

872
00:49:28,000 --> 00:49:31,440
Speaker 1: discussing the idea as Karl Sagan was into discussing the idea.

873
00:49:32,200 --> 00:49:35,719
Speaker 1: That's the good place to be. Yeah, yeah, the Sagan zone. Alright, Well,

874
00:49:35,719 --> 00:49:37,560
Speaker 1: on that note, we're going to take one more break,

875
00:49:37,600 --> 00:49:40,760
Speaker 1: and when we come back, we will feature the interview

876
00:49:40,840 --> 00:49:46,800
Speaker 1: with Barbara J. King. Thank alright, we're back. Okay, So, Robert,

877
00:49:46,800 --> 00:49:49,239
Speaker 1: you the third person you spoke to here was the

878
00:49:49,280 --> 00:49:53,000
Speaker 1: anthropologist and author Barbara J. King. What was the deal here? Okay?

879
00:49:53,040 --> 00:49:55,239
Speaker 1: So this was the third interview. These are These are

880
00:49:55,280 --> 00:49:58,440
Speaker 1: featured in order that they occurred. Um And she is

881
00:49:58,480 --> 00:50:01,160
Speaker 1: an anthropologist in Arthur author for twenty eight years. She

882
00:50:01,280 --> 00:50:05,680
Speaker 1: taught biological anthropology Primate Behavior and Human Evolution at the

883
00:50:05,719 --> 00:50:08,560
Speaker 1: College of William and Mary. She's the author of six books,

884
00:50:08,600 --> 00:50:12,759
Speaker 1: including two thousand and thirteens How Animals Grieve, and she's

885
00:50:12,800 --> 00:50:16,040
Speaker 1: the recipient of the Guggenheim Fellowship. She's also the author

886
00:50:16,120 --> 00:50:19,759
Speaker 1: of her latest book two thousand seventeens, Evolving God, a

887
00:50:19,800 --> 00:50:24,000
Speaker 1: Provocative view on the origins of religion, and she participated

888
00:50:24,000 --> 00:50:28,200
Speaker 1: in the Brian Green moderated The Believing Brain, Evolution, Neuroscience

889
00:50:28,239 --> 00:50:33,480
Speaker 1: and the Spiritual Instinct alongside Stephen Pinker, neuroscientists and psychologist

890
00:50:33,560 --> 00:50:38,040
Speaker 1: Lisa Barrett, and neuroscientist Zoron Joseph Avich. So this was

891
00:50:38,080 --> 00:50:40,600
Speaker 1: an interesting interview too. I I guess we should play

892
00:50:40,600 --> 00:50:42,880
Speaker 1: the interview and then we can talk about it all. Right,

893
00:50:42,920 --> 00:50:49,560
Speaker 1: here we go. So I'm gonna start with the pretty

894
00:50:49,680 --> 00:50:53,640
Speaker 1: broad question here, and that is our humans hardwired for belief,

895
00:50:53,719 --> 00:50:58,440
Speaker 1: as the saying sometimes goes. I think we're hardwired for connection,

896
00:50:59,120 --> 00:51:02,640
Speaker 1: for belongings, as I call it, and for mattering to

897
00:51:02,719 --> 00:51:06,640
Speaker 1: each other. In some cases this does take the form

898
00:51:06,800 --> 00:51:11,400
Speaker 1: of religion spirituality, but I don't think we're necessarily hard

899
00:51:11,440 --> 00:51:15,880
Speaker 1: wired for any specific type of religious imagination. So my

900
00:51:15,920 --> 00:51:19,240
Speaker 1: work really looks at the deep evolutionary roots of religion

901
00:51:19,400 --> 00:51:26,160
Speaker 1: and puts that right in the being wired for connection. Okay, um, Now,

902
00:51:26,200 --> 00:51:29,399
Speaker 1: I understand this question might not be going back deep

903
00:51:29,520 --> 00:51:33,239
Speaker 1: enough to really do your area of expertise, But do

904
00:51:33,280 --> 00:51:35,880
Speaker 1: you have any thoughts on what are perhaps some common

905
00:51:35,920 --> 00:51:39,799
Speaker 1: mistakes that we make and trying to understand earlier or

906
00:51:39,840 --> 00:51:44,560
Speaker 1: ancient people or even truly prehistoric people's concepts of religion. Yeah.

907
00:51:44,600 --> 00:51:48,200
Speaker 1: I think many people do focus on belief, and of

908
00:51:48,239 --> 00:51:51,279
Speaker 1: course belief doesn't fossilize, So what I try to do

909
00:51:51,320 --> 00:51:54,120
Speaker 1: is shift a little bit and talk about practice. So

910
00:51:54,160 --> 00:51:57,319
Speaker 1: I'm looking for the material culture that can get us

911
00:51:57,320 --> 00:52:01,279
Speaker 1: a window onto practice and to get your misconception part

912
00:52:01,320 --> 00:52:04,360
Speaker 1: of the question. I think there's a tendency, for example,

913
00:52:04,360 --> 00:52:08,000
Speaker 1: to equate a burial automatically with a belief in the afterlife.

914
00:52:08,239 --> 00:52:11,279
Speaker 1: We can't do that. The material culture cannot reveal to

915
00:52:11,360 --> 00:52:13,960
Speaker 1: us whether there's a belief attached to that or not.

916
00:52:14,480 --> 00:52:17,480
Speaker 1: So it's quite tricky looking at the evolution of belief.

917
00:52:17,880 --> 00:52:20,640
Speaker 1: When I speak about practice, I'm talking about some kind

918
00:52:20,640 --> 00:52:22,960
Speaker 1: of ritual that takes us beyond the here and now.

919
00:52:23,280 --> 00:52:26,160
Speaker 1: But to ascribe a particular belief to that really tough.

920
00:52:26,640 --> 00:52:31,680
Speaker 1: So you've written on how animals grieve? Are there any Now?

921
00:52:31,719 --> 00:52:35,279
Speaker 1: Obviously these are not rights, uh as you say, But

922
00:52:35,640 --> 00:52:39,320
Speaker 1: did you see any anything like the roots of religion

923
00:52:39,640 --> 00:52:43,040
Speaker 1: in the practices that if you want to lit not

924
00:52:43,120 --> 00:52:46,919
Speaker 1: practice behaviors of animals. I do, yes, I've written quite

925
00:52:46,920 --> 00:52:52,120
Speaker 1: a lot about this. I look for rule following and empathy,

926
00:52:52,160 --> 00:52:56,400
Speaker 1: compassion and imagination, all of these things I see in

927
00:52:56,480 --> 00:53:00,880
Speaker 1: our close living relatives, for example, chimpanzees, binobo, some monkeys,

928
00:53:01,480 --> 00:53:04,640
Speaker 1: and some people would like to interpret those things as

929
00:53:04,760 --> 00:53:07,919
Speaker 1: spirituality full stop, and I don't. I do see them

930
00:53:07,960 --> 00:53:13,879
Speaker 1: as the building blocks. The idea of deeply profound emotions

931
00:53:14,120 --> 00:53:18,080
Speaker 1: in other animals is coming back into science. Darwin did it,

932
00:53:18,160 --> 00:53:21,160
Speaker 1: but then it disappeared for a good long time. And

933
00:53:21,200 --> 00:53:27,600
Speaker 1: those profound emotions that are felt around social behavior, love, death,

934
00:53:28,080 --> 00:53:32,400
Speaker 1: I think do play into an understanding of deep religious roots.

935
00:53:33,960 --> 00:53:36,840
Speaker 1: Can I say one more thing? I mean. Part of

936
00:53:36,840 --> 00:53:40,040
Speaker 1: the reason I say that is because for me, religion

937
00:53:40,320 --> 00:53:45,160
Speaker 1: is about emotional meaning making. So when I look at religion,

938
00:53:45,640 --> 00:53:48,480
Speaker 1: I want to look at that sense of transcendence, that

939
00:53:48,640 --> 00:53:51,799
Speaker 1: sense of being suffused with emotion, and that's where I

940
00:53:51,800 --> 00:53:55,160
Speaker 1: start making the connection with other animals and how they

941
00:53:55,280 --> 00:53:59,359
Speaker 1: feel so deeply. Do you see there? Do you see

942
00:53:59,360 --> 00:54:04,600
Speaker 1: there being a distinction between religion and belief? Can one

943
00:54:04,680 --> 00:54:09,560
Speaker 1: have religion without belief? One can have religion without belief

944
00:54:09,640 --> 00:54:14,320
Speaker 1: in a particular type of God. But I think belief

945
00:54:14,360 --> 00:54:16,400
Speaker 1: has to be part of the picture when we're talking

946
00:54:16,400 --> 00:54:20,200
Speaker 1: about contemporary societies. Again, though, I want to disentangle that

947
00:54:20,320 --> 00:54:23,319
Speaker 1: when we're talking about the past. And that's what makes

948
00:54:23,360 --> 00:54:25,759
Speaker 1: it hard to draw a linear line, if you will,

949
00:54:25,800 --> 00:54:28,320
Speaker 1: between the past and the present, because at some point

950
00:54:28,360 --> 00:54:30,759
Speaker 1: we want to pick up with that belief when we

951
00:54:30,840 --> 00:54:33,160
Speaker 1: haven't necessarily been able to trace it all the way

952
00:54:33,200 --> 00:54:37,480
Speaker 1: back into the past. So, in broad strokes, where does

953
00:54:37,600 --> 00:54:42,279
Speaker 1: human religion come from? I think it comes from all

954
00:54:42,440 --> 00:54:48,280
Speaker 1: these pieces that we see in our primate relatives, the empathy,

955
00:54:48,400 --> 00:54:53,080
Speaker 1: the compassion, the need to belong, the need to follow rules,

956
00:54:53,120 --> 00:54:57,759
Speaker 1: the need to kind of cooperate, And then throughout the

957
00:54:57,920 --> 00:55:02,600
Speaker 1: hominid trajectory, our brains began to take on an ability

958
00:55:02,640 --> 00:55:05,439
Speaker 1: to see more and more beyond the here and now,

959
00:55:05,880 --> 00:55:10,520
Speaker 1: to ask questions that are hard to answer without projecting

960
00:55:10,760 --> 00:55:14,759
Speaker 1: into the supernatural. So I really do think just as

961
00:55:14,840 --> 00:55:18,399
Speaker 1: technology evolves, and language evolves and culture evolves. We can

962
00:55:18,400 --> 00:55:22,880
Speaker 1: see a process. So it doesn't come from some particular

963
00:55:22,960 --> 00:55:27,360
Speaker 1: society or some particular moment. It comes from this trajectory

964
00:55:27,400 --> 00:55:32,640
Speaker 1: of constantly exacerbated abilities to bond, to see beyond the

965
00:55:32,680 --> 00:55:35,400
Speaker 1: here and now, and then begin to attach those things

966
00:55:36,040 --> 00:55:40,640
Speaker 1: to other forms of being supernatural beings that I don't

967
00:55:40,680 --> 00:55:44,680
Speaker 1: think other animals care about or imagine at all. You

968
00:55:44,719 --> 00:55:49,759
Speaker 1: mentioned the distinction be made between your burial practices and

969
00:55:49,960 --> 00:55:53,600
Speaker 1: then actual religious rights. Uh do do we do? We

970
00:55:53,640 --> 00:55:58,879
Speaker 1: currently hold that the Neanderthals likely had religion. Yeah, that's

971
00:55:58,880 --> 00:56:01,759
Speaker 1: a fantastic quest, and I think that there's a very

972
00:56:01,760 --> 00:56:04,840
Speaker 1: good argument to be made that yes, Neanderthals did, But

973
00:56:04,880 --> 00:56:08,040
Speaker 1: it's an argument with a question mark attached. So we know,

974
00:56:08,160 --> 00:56:11,560
Speaker 1: for example, that Neanderthals not only were very smart and

975
00:56:11,600 --> 00:56:16,359
Speaker 1: hunted cooperatively, but that they hunted raptors to take their

976
00:56:16,400 --> 00:56:19,560
Speaker 1: feathers and adorn their bodies with feathers as part of

977
00:56:19,560 --> 00:56:23,520
Speaker 1: their identity. They would bury their toddlers who died with

978
00:56:24,080 --> 00:56:28,880
Speaker 1: bison skulls, rhinos skulls, or x horns elaborate sort of

979
00:56:28,960 --> 00:56:33,080
Speaker 1: funeral ceremonies. It is possible to imagine these in the

980
00:56:33,160 --> 00:56:36,880
Speaker 1: absence of any religion, to simply think about respect for

981
00:56:36,920 --> 00:56:40,319
Speaker 1: the individual who died. But I also think it's compatible

982
00:56:40,719 --> 00:56:43,360
Speaker 1: with their big brains, the way they're beginning to interact

983
00:56:43,400 --> 00:56:45,759
Speaker 1: with the world. So I think we have a very

984
00:56:45,920 --> 00:56:50,640
Speaker 1: good likelihood for yes, without a certainty for yes. UM.

985
00:56:50,920 --> 00:56:54,839
Speaker 1: So one last question, UM, and you have any thoughts

986
00:56:54,880 --> 00:57:01,200
Speaker 1: about where religion is going. Religion is still evolving, um,

987
00:57:01,320 --> 00:57:04,240
Speaker 1: if we are changing the ways we interact with religion,

988
00:57:04,840 --> 00:57:08,840
Speaker 1: I think that certainly increasing secularization is an important trend

989
00:57:08,960 --> 00:57:12,880
Speaker 1: to look at. But there is this strong need, as

990
00:57:12,920 --> 00:57:17,280
Speaker 1: I mentioned, for connection and belongingness, and so if those

991
00:57:17,360 --> 00:57:20,160
Speaker 1: needs are not being filled by religion, they need to

992
00:57:20,160 --> 00:57:22,640
Speaker 1: be filled by something else. And so it's a very

993
00:57:22,640 --> 00:57:26,360
Speaker 1: good question. I don't know where we're going, but we

994
00:57:26,400 --> 00:57:29,600
Speaker 1: need something, We need something else to fill in and

995
00:57:29,640 --> 00:57:31,760
Speaker 1: I think that that is the question that I have

996
00:57:31,880 --> 00:57:34,840
Speaker 1: as well. What is going to replace, if you will,

997
00:57:35,360 --> 00:57:39,680
Speaker 1: this community? Because religion is so much about community and practice,

998
00:57:39,680 --> 00:57:42,880
Speaker 1: and I really do think that's under estimated in our

999
00:57:42,960 --> 00:57:46,760
Speaker 1: most of our discussions about religion. I've read a little

1000
00:57:46,760 --> 00:57:51,440
Speaker 1: bit about the side of hyper real religion, where individuals

1001
00:57:51,440 --> 00:57:55,240
Speaker 1: will will take same a concept and fandom. They might

1002
00:57:55,240 --> 00:57:59,040
Speaker 1: be like Jeties or The Big Lebowski, and they will

1003
00:58:00,600 --> 00:58:03,280
Speaker 1: it times it's kind of a playful, you know, spaghetti

1004
00:58:03,320 --> 00:58:09,160
Speaker 1: monster type of international music religion. But then there's this

1005
00:58:09,280 --> 00:58:12,160
Speaker 1: argument it becomes more that it perhaps fulfills that need

1006
00:58:12,240 --> 00:58:15,360
Speaker 1: you're talking about. Right, Well, I think about this a

1007
00:58:15,400 --> 00:58:18,880
Speaker 1: lot because my particular brand of transcendence happens at a

1008
00:58:18,880 --> 00:58:21,640
Speaker 1: Springsteen concert. And you know, I'm not thinking of that

1009
00:58:21,720 --> 00:58:24,000
Speaker 1: in a particularly religious sense, but it does. It's a

1010
00:58:24,000 --> 00:58:27,800
Speaker 1: community of people who become transformed in the moment in

1011
00:58:27,920 --> 00:58:31,080
Speaker 1: concert with another being. So how is that really different

1012
00:58:31,080 --> 00:58:34,880
Speaker 1: than what we're talking about? Right? It's not something supernatural,

1013
00:58:35,400 --> 00:58:39,160
Speaker 1: So perhaps we are changing to lose part of that

1014
00:58:39,360 --> 00:58:44,080
Speaker 1: belief in things that aren't is material, that aren't, is concrete.

1015
00:58:44,400 --> 00:58:47,120
Speaker 1: We can turn to the Springsteen and the Jedi model

1016
00:58:47,200 --> 00:58:50,960
Speaker 1: in place of some of these other more supernatural beings.

1017
00:58:54,320 --> 00:58:57,200
Speaker 1: So I love this interview because this is something I

1018
00:58:57,280 --> 00:58:59,840
Speaker 1: wonder about all the time, that the actual or a

1019
00:59:00,000 --> 00:59:03,880
Speaker 1: gens of religion. Now a lot of times when religion

1020
00:59:03,920 --> 00:59:07,360
Speaker 1: and science come up together, it's like people want to

1021
00:59:07,440 --> 00:59:09,960
Speaker 1: have they want to fight out that question, like do

1022
00:59:10,120 --> 00:59:13,960
Speaker 1: religion and science conflict. Can they co exist? I'm much

1023
00:59:14,000 --> 00:59:17,480
Speaker 1: more interested in the question of the scientific investigation of

1024
00:59:17,520 --> 00:59:20,240
Speaker 1: what religion is and where did it come from? Like

1025
00:59:20,280 --> 00:59:22,600
Speaker 1: what what what were the first religions? What do they

1026
00:59:22,640 --> 00:59:25,720
Speaker 1: look like? How did this instinct arise in our brains?

1027
00:59:25,720 --> 00:59:28,480
Speaker 1: And what's happening in our brains when we practice religion?

1028
00:59:28,480 --> 00:59:31,440
Speaker 1: How do we get this way? Yeah? I think a

1029
00:59:31,480 --> 00:59:34,320
Speaker 1: lot of what she presents is uh. It really squares

1030
00:59:34,360 --> 00:59:37,080
Speaker 1: with some of our recent explorations of consciousness. For instance,

1031
00:59:37,120 --> 00:59:40,320
Speaker 1: the idea presented by Susan Schneider's test for consciousness in AI,

1032
00:59:40,560 --> 00:59:42,840
Speaker 1: the notion that anything with consciousness must be able to

1033
00:59:42,880 --> 00:59:47,720
Speaker 1: grasp concepts of the soul mind transference or or transmigration

1034
00:59:47,760 --> 00:59:50,240
Speaker 1: of the soul. Uh. And one can easily imagine the

1035
00:59:50,320 --> 00:59:54,480
Speaker 1: roots of this in animal contemplations of loss. Perhaps it's

1036
00:59:54,480 --> 00:59:58,360
Speaker 1: even unnecessary, you know, precursor for consciousness. This is something

1037
00:59:58,400 --> 01:00:02,000
Speaker 1: Susan Schneider's writing really made me think about. I guess

1038
01:00:02,040 --> 01:00:05,320
Speaker 1: I just never considered before how important the link is

1039
01:00:05,400 --> 01:00:10,080
Speaker 1: between ideas about souls and the presence of consciousness. For example,

1040
01:00:10,120 --> 01:00:12,960
Speaker 1: the whole basis of the AI consciousness test is that

1041
01:00:13,000 --> 01:00:15,400
Speaker 1: a machine that wasn't conscious, say, it knows how to

1042
01:00:15,480 --> 01:00:18,040
Speaker 1: use language, it knows how to have a conversation, But

1043
01:00:18,360 --> 01:00:22,560
Speaker 1: if it's never heard anything about disembodied souls, how would

1044
01:00:22,560 --> 01:00:26,480
Speaker 1: it even make sense of religions ideas about disembodied souls

1045
01:00:26,560 --> 01:00:30,360
Speaker 1: if it did not have something that it could imagine

1046
01:00:30,400 --> 01:00:34,280
Speaker 1: being separated from its physical substrate. You know, Yeah, And

1047
01:00:34,320 --> 01:00:36,280
Speaker 1: I mean the idea is that the Barbara J. King

1048
01:00:36,320 --> 01:00:39,600
Speaker 1: presents here, They do make me sort of rethink all that,

1049
01:00:39,680 --> 01:00:43,040
Speaker 1: and and wonder, well, if you have any species for

1050
01:00:43,080 --> 01:00:47,040
Speaker 1: which death is a reality, then to what extent is

1051
01:00:47,080 --> 01:00:50,480
Speaker 1: it inevitable that they would reach this, this point in

1052
01:00:50,520 --> 01:00:54,080
Speaker 1: their cognitive evolution, that they would develop these ideas of

1053
01:00:54,560 --> 01:00:57,560
Speaker 1: based on the question where did they go? Where is

1054
01:00:57,640 --> 01:01:00,840
Speaker 1: the where is the force that animal ated this being?

1055
01:01:01,280 --> 01:01:04,320
Speaker 1: The force that made it a thing that was of

1056
01:01:04,560 --> 01:01:07,320
Speaker 1: value to my life? Yeah, she's got a point of

1057
01:01:07,400 --> 01:01:09,880
Speaker 1: view on religion that resonates very strongly with me that

1058
01:01:10,080 --> 01:01:13,120
Speaker 1: I think it's it's got that truthiness feel. I mean,

1059
01:01:13,120 --> 01:01:15,160
Speaker 1: you know, I can't judge if it's true, but it

1060
01:01:15,280 --> 01:01:20,200
Speaker 1: seems true at least that in religion, the emotional and

1061
01:01:20,320 --> 01:01:24,600
Speaker 1: social aspects of religion precede and pre date the literal

1062
01:01:24,720 --> 01:01:29,360
Speaker 1: dogmatic beliefs of religions, and that the literal dogmatic reliefs

1063
01:01:29,400 --> 01:01:33,360
Speaker 1: of beliefs of religions are outgrowths of those social and

1064
01:01:33,400 --> 01:01:36,440
Speaker 1: emotional functions. Yeah. And and to her point, if you

1065
01:01:36,440 --> 01:01:39,480
Speaker 1: can find that at a Bruce Springsteen concert, yeah, or

1066
01:01:39,520 --> 01:01:43,240
Speaker 1: in you know, jeddi is m or Judaism, Uh, then

1067
01:01:44,160 --> 01:01:46,920
Speaker 1: you don't necessarily need these older models of religion. But

1068
01:01:47,000 --> 01:01:49,040
Speaker 1: on the same note, like that I think is one

1069
01:01:49,080 --> 01:01:53,520
Speaker 1: of the key things that people prize in their religious

1070
01:01:53,560 --> 01:01:55,800
Speaker 1: organizations that they're still a part of, or the religious

1071
01:01:55,840 --> 01:01:58,080
Speaker 1: movements that they're still a part of. Yeah. I think

1072
01:01:58,080 --> 01:02:02,280
Speaker 1: a lot about what will, if anything, what will replace

1073
01:02:02,480 --> 01:02:06,560
Speaker 1: religion in secularizing societies. So if you've got a society

1074
01:02:06,560 --> 01:02:10,760
Speaker 1: where people are losing their their literal beliefs in the

1075
01:02:11,240 --> 01:02:14,040
Speaker 1: dogmas of religion, like they stop believing, Okay, there is

1076
01:02:14,120 --> 01:02:17,360
Speaker 1: literally a God that literally created the world and all that.

1077
01:02:17,720 --> 01:02:20,600
Speaker 1: But if king is right and that the basis of

1078
01:02:20,640 --> 01:02:23,400
Speaker 1: religion is still all these instinctual drives we have for

1079
01:02:23,480 --> 01:02:28,840
Speaker 1: things like belonging, this connection, mattering to each other, rule following, cooperation,

1080
01:02:28,920 --> 01:02:32,480
Speaker 1: that they blend together into this kind of emotional stew

1081
01:02:32,600 --> 01:02:36,160
Speaker 1: that makes us want something like a religion. What do

1082
01:02:36,200 --> 01:02:39,560
Speaker 1: we fill that void with? Yeah, I mean, you know,

1083
01:02:39,600 --> 01:02:41,520
Speaker 1: there's a number of different directions you can go with that.

1084
01:02:42,320 --> 01:02:47,760
Speaker 1: I think some corporations kind of fulfill that purpose, either

1085
01:02:48,080 --> 01:02:50,320
Speaker 1: as an outsider to it perhaps you just really like

1086
01:02:50,400 --> 01:02:52,919
Speaker 1: apple products, or as an insider. I mean, I think

1087
01:02:52,960 --> 01:02:56,880
Speaker 1: a lot of us know somebody maybe who works at

1088
01:02:56,880 --> 01:03:00,960
Speaker 1: a at a particular business or corporation, and it's it's

1089
01:03:01,040 --> 01:03:04,160
Speaker 1: it's managed well enough where it has the right atmosphere

1090
01:03:04,280 --> 01:03:06,800
Speaker 1: or mix of benefits to where it is like a

1091
01:03:06,840 --> 01:03:09,760
Speaker 1: truly inspiring place to work and it and it perhaps

1092
01:03:09,840 --> 01:03:12,080
Speaker 1: fulfill some of the roles. You know, it's like people

1093
01:03:12,080 --> 01:03:14,919
Speaker 1: looking out for each other and an organizational structure looking

1094
01:03:14,920 --> 01:03:18,760
Speaker 1: out for them and forming informing some aspect of their identity.

1095
01:03:18,800 --> 01:03:21,919
Speaker 1: But then also I think, uh, I think that maybe

1096
01:03:21,960 --> 01:03:25,160
Speaker 1: it's sports. It's not a god that I necessarily follow,

1097
01:03:25,240 --> 01:03:28,520
Speaker 1: but perhaps it's organized sports and the fandom for particular

1098
01:03:28,640 --> 01:03:31,520
Speaker 1: organized sports teams. Can I tell you my nightmare scenario

1099
01:03:31,960 --> 01:03:35,960
Speaker 1: is that in secularizing society, is that the literal beliefs

1100
01:03:35,960 --> 01:03:39,320
Speaker 1: of religion are going to be replaced by social media religions.

1101
01:03:41,160 --> 01:03:43,400
Speaker 1: Oh I don't know what to think about that. I'm

1102
01:03:43,400 --> 01:03:45,600
Speaker 1: gonna have to sleep on that one and have a

1103
01:03:45,600 --> 01:03:49,200
Speaker 1: few nightmares. The social media app is where you get

1104
01:03:49,240 --> 01:03:52,600
Speaker 1: your use, where you fulfill your need for connection, for belongingness,

1105
01:03:52,720 --> 01:03:56,160
Speaker 1: for mattering to each other, for rule following, for cooperation.

1106
01:03:56,560 --> 01:03:59,040
Speaker 1: It all happens on there, and you can you can

1107
01:03:59,080 --> 01:04:03,480
Speaker 1: come up with with sort of like ritualistic, systematic ways

1108
01:04:03,600 --> 01:04:06,280
Speaker 1: for it to happen. Right, The programmers of the apps

1109
01:04:06,320 --> 01:04:09,920
Speaker 1: can can sort of like almost design the liturgy of

1110
01:04:10,000 --> 01:04:13,160
Speaker 1: your social media religion. Can can you see it? Yeah?

1111
01:04:13,240 --> 01:04:16,480
Speaker 1: I just wonder if they'll be able to skip ahead

1112
01:04:16,520 --> 01:04:18,040
Speaker 1: on the religion or we have to go through like

1113
01:04:18,120 --> 01:04:22,680
Speaker 1: all the dark days of a particular faith evolution through

1114
01:04:22,800 --> 01:04:25,400
Speaker 1: the social media app. Like maybe one version one point

1115
01:04:25,400 --> 01:04:28,600
Speaker 1: oh is very optimistic and individual based, and then version

1116
01:04:28,640 --> 01:04:31,960
Speaker 1: two point oh is very chaotic, Version three point oh

1117
01:04:32,160 --> 01:04:37,040
Speaker 1: and entales of crusade. Then again, I guess we all

1118
01:04:37,120 --> 01:04:39,240
Speaker 1: we also have to question our assumption. So maybe it's

1119
01:04:39,240 --> 01:04:41,360
Speaker 1: not true that something has to replace it, you know,

1120
01:04:41,680 --> 01:04:45,280
Speaker 1: Maybe it's true that you can have the literal beliefs

1121
01:04:45,320 --> 01:04:47,920
Speaker 1: of religion vanish, and so all the trappings of religion

1122
01:04:47,960 --> 01:04:50,280
Speaker 1: go along with it, and people don't necessarily need a

1123
01:04:50,400 --> 01:04:53,480
Speaker 1: thing to fill that whole. Maybe they're maybe they're just

1124
01:04:53,600 --> 01:04:58,919
Speaker 1: other ways for them to feel empathy, compassion, belonging, rule, following, cooperation,

1125
01:04:59,040 --> 01:05:01,120
Speaker 1: and all the things came to talks about. Yeah, I

1126
01:05:01,120 --> 01:05:03,200
Speaker 1: mean one thing that I you know, I've talked about

1127
01:05:03,200 --> 01:05:05,160
Speaker 1: religion on the show a lot, and I have various

1128
01:05:05,160 --> 01:05:07,600
Speaker 1: ideas about how I process it. I kind of think

1129
01:05:07,640 --> 01:05:10,160
Speaker 1: of it in terms of lenses. There are certain lenses

1130
01:05:10,200 --> 01:05:13,240
Speaker 1: I can choose to lay over my perception of reality,

1131
01:05:13,640 --> 01:05:16,080
Speaker 1: and sometimes it's helpful to use one that is the

1132
01:05:16,120 --> 01:05:19,280
Speaker 1: religious inform and other times I'm just gonna, you know,

1133
01:05:19,400 --> 01:05:22,840
Speaker 1: fall back to the base sort of scientific and skeptical

1134
01:05:23,360 --> 01:05:25,840
Speaker 1: view of the world. But on the other hand, I

1135
01:05:25,840 --> 01:05:28,760
Speaker 1: have to realize that like not you know, and everybody

1136
01:05:28,800 --> 01:05:31,280
Speaker 1: else isn't necessarily like me. We all have different minds,

1137
01:05:31,360 --> 01:05:35,480
Speaker 1: different brains, that different different backgrounds, So I can't I

1138
01:05:35,480 --> 01:05:38,360
Speaker 1: don't feel comfortable just going around saying, hey, everybody, you

1139
01:05:38,360 --> 01:05:41,080
Speaker 1: should think about religion exactly the way I think about it,

1140
01:05:41,360 --> 01:05:45,840
Speaker 1: because that's that's probably not um that's not a realistic expectation,

1141
01:05:45,920 --> 01:05:50,520
Speaker 1: either culturally or just cognitively. I think also just the

1142
01:05:50,560 --> 01:05:55,560
Speaker 1: experimental problem that King talks about is really interesting, you know, like,

1143
01:05:55,640 --> 01:05:59,120
Speaker 1: how do how do you infer from the physical remains

1144
01:05:59,160 --> 01:06:02,040
Speaker 1: of the ancient world? Old? What what kind of lens

1145
01:06:02,120 --> 01:06:05,000
Speaker 1: is they were using? Where you're talking about how minds

1146
01:06:05,000 --> 01:06:08,160
Speaker 1: can be different in process religion differently, how can you

1147
01:06:08,240 --> 01:06:12,200
Speaker 1: infer just from artifacts and paintings and burials and stuff

1148
01:06:12,240 --> 01:06:15,560
Speaker 1: like that. What the what their picture looked like? Yeah,

1149
01:06:15,640 --> 01:06:17,880
Speaker 1: it's just how similar it was to yours? Yeah, yeah,

1150
01:06:17,960 --> 01:06:22,200
Speaker 1: but but specifically her answer in the Neanderthals found very interesting. Yes, Um,

1151
01:06:22,280 --> 01:06:24,200
Speaker 1: you know, to what extent can we just look at

1152
01:06:24,240 --> 01:06:28,960
Speaker 1: these very basic remains and and and and see something

1153
01:06:29,800 --> 01:06:34,120
Speaker 1: like belief like religion in their in their activities, in

1154
01:06:34,160 --> 01:06:36,520
Speaker 1: the remains of their activities. Yeah, and all the while

1155
01:06:36,640 --> 01:06:38,720
Speaker 1: being very conscious of the fact that we could easily

1156
01:06:38,760 --> 01:06:43,280
Speaker 1: be misinterpreting things. That's what we're good at, it is,

1157
01:06:43,720 --> 01:06:45,720
Speaker 1: all right. So there you have it again. I want

1158
01:06:45,720 --> 01:06:48,959
Speaker 1: to give my thanks to to Brian Green, Max teg Mark,

1159
01:06:49,680 --> 01:06:53,160
Speaker 1: Barbara J. King, and just the World Science Festival as

1160
01:06:53,160 --> 01:06:56,680
Speaker 1: a whole. They were very accommodating of me and uh

1161
01:06:56,800 --> 01:06:59,400
Speaker 1: and uh and and allowing me to to attend these

1162
01:06:59,440 --> 01:07:03,040
Speaker 1: talks and to actually score a little interview time with

1163
01:07:03,120 --> 01:07:05,760
Speaker 1: these three individuals. And I want to remind everybody that, hey,

1164
01:07:05,760 --> 01:07:08,840
Speaker 1: if you're interested in attending the World Science Festival, this

1165
01:07:08,920 --> 01:07:10,720
Speaker 1: is something that is very open to the public. If

1166
01:07:10,760 --> 01:07:13,640
Speaker 1: you live in the New York area, you should definitely

1167
01:07:13,720 --> 01:07:16,880
Speaker 1: check out of whichever panels or activities appeal to you

1168
01:07:16,960 --> 01:07:20,320
Speaker 1: the most. Um And if you live outside of New York,

1169
01:07:20,400 --> 01:07:22,400
Speaker 1: make a trip of it. New York City is a

1170
01:07:22,440 --> 01:07:25,200
Speaker 1: place with a million things to offer, and during the

1171
01:07:25,200 --> 01:07:28,280
Speaker 1: World Science Festival, uh, science is an excellent reason to

1172
01:07:28,400 --> 01:07:31,600
Speaker 1: visit the Big Apple, New York's Great science City. Anyway. Yeah,

1173
01:07:31,640 --> 01:07:33,919
Speaker 1: you give the Museum of Natural History right there waiting

1174
01:07:33,960 --> 01:07:36,400
Speaker 1: for you. That is an American treasure. It is. If

1175
01:07:36,400 --> 01:07:38,640
Speaker 1: you've never been, you should go sometime, right And if

1176
01:07:38,680 --> 01:07:41,600
Speaker 1: you are just not going to New York City anytime soon,

1177
01:07:41,760 --> 01:07:44,880
Speaker 1: you can still check out World Science Festival dot com.

1178
01:07:44,960 --> 01:07:47,720
Speaker 1: You can. You can. You can find just years worth

1179
01:07:47,880 --> 01:07:51,760
Speaker 1: of various panels. Not everything that that goes on there

1180
01:07:51,800 --> 01:07:54,360
Speaker 1: is necessarily filmed, but a lot of it is. And

1181
01:07:54,440 --> 01:07:57,760
Speaker 1: you can go back and view these different scientific discussions.

1182
01:07:58,200 --> 01:08:00,560
Speaker 1: And as for us, well, our website Stuff to Blow

1183
01:08:00,600 --> 01:08:02,920
Speaker 1: your Mind dot com. That's where we'll find every episode

1184
01:08:02,960 --> 01:08:05,320
Speaker 1: of the podcast, and you'll find links out to our

1185
01:08:05,400 --> 01:08:08,480
Speaker 1: various social media accounts. As always, I want to remind

1186
01:08:08,480 --> 01:08:10,120
Speaker 1: you that if you want to support stuff to Blow

1187
01:08:10,160 --> 01:08:11,480
Speaker 1: your Mind, one of the best ways you can do

1188
01:08:11,520 --> 01:08:14,480
Speaker 1: it is to rate and review us wherever you get

1189
01:08:14,480 --> 01:08:17,920
Speaker 1: the podcast. Big thanks as always to our excellent audio

1190
01:08:18,000 --> 01:08:20,960
Speaker 1: producers Alex Williams and Torry Harrison. If you want to

1191
01:08:20,960 --> 01:08:22,800
Speaker 1: get in touch with this directly to let us know

1192
01:08:22,920 --> 01:08:26,439
Speaker 1: feedback about this episode or any other episode, to suggest

1193
01:08:26,520 --> 01:08:28,800
Speaker 1: a topic for a future episode, or just to say hi,

1194
01:08:28,920 --> 01:08:31,120
Speaker 1: let us know where you listen from. You can email

1195
01:08:31,200 --> 01:08:34,439
Speaker 1: us at blow the Mind at how stuff works dot

1196
01:08:34,520 --> 01:08:45,839
Speaker 1: com for more on this and thousands of other topics.

1197
01:08:46,160 --> 01:09:01,880
Speaker 1: Is it how stuff works dot com would treat with

1198
01:09:02,160 --> 01:09:03,320
Speaker 1: twenty tho