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Speaker 1: Hey, quick announcement everyone, We have just joined TikTok, So

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Speaker 1: head over there and follow us to see videos of

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Speaker 1: Daniel asking and answering science questions. All right, enjoy the pod. Hey, Kelly,

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Speaker 1: is a mosquito technically a parasite?

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Speaker 2: Well, you maybe don't realize the can of worms you've

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Speaker 2: opened up if you go to a parasitology meeting. This

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Speaker 2: is something that we actually fight about. But I'll just

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Speaker 2: cut to the chase, because I'm sure what you wanted

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Speaker 2: was a short answer. H And I would say that

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Speaker 2: they are micro predators.

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Speaker 1: What predators? You're saying that these bloodsuckers don't just make

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Speaker 1: me itch, they've turned me into their prey.

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Speaker 2: They do. And you know, unlike parasites, they don't have

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Speaker 2: like durable, long lasting interactions with your body. They just

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Speaker 2: kind of take a meal and then they run off.

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Speaker 1: Does that mean that I don't have to feel bad

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Speaker 1: when I swap one of them?

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Speaker 2: I don't think they feel bad when they're thinking your blood?

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Speaker 1: All right? Well, what if I was like going to

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Speaker 1: kill all of the mosquitoes, then should I feel bad?

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Speaker 3: Oh?

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Speaker 2: I feel like now we're getting into like philosophy. This

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Speaker 2: is like a twisted version of the trolley problem.

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Speaker 1: Well, you know, if I could pull a lever to

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Speaker 1: have that train kill every single mosquito, I would do it,

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Speaker 1: even if it saved nobody's lives, even if it just

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Speaker 1: saved us from some itches.

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Speaker 2: You don't need philosophy, you know the answers you go

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Speaker 2: with your gut.

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Speaker 1: Hi. I'm Daniel. I'm a particle physicist and a professor

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Speaker 1: at UC Irvine and a deep deep hater of mosquitoes.

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Speaker 2: I'm Kelly Wider Smith. I'm an adjunct professor at Rice University,

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Speaker 2: and you know I'm also a deep deep hater of mosquitoes.

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Speaker 1: I thought that as a parasitologist, you were like the

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Speaker 1: biggest ad of it for the most hated species on

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Speaker 1: the planet.

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Speaker 2: I'm an advocate for some parasites, but your mosquitoes kill

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Speaker 2: a lot of humans, and I don't think that we

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Speaker 2: really know what would happen if you took them out

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Speaker 2: of the ecosystems. Maybe they play a role that we

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Speaker 2: don't know about. But I feel like if you eradicated

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Speaker 2: all of them and then no one got malaria anymore,

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Speaker 2: we could probably find some way to fill in the

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Speaker 2: ecological niches that they were leaving empty. I think it

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Speaker 2: would be worth it to kill them all.

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Speaker 1: Oh, I think I know what purpose mosquitoes serve. They

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Speaker 1: serve to limit people's happiness.

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Speaker 2: You feel like there's some mechanism on this earth where

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Speaker 2: that's like a thing that needs to happen. I thought

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Speaker 2: that's what Twitter was for.

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Speaker 1: They call it X now, Kelly, they call it x Oh.

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Speaker 2: I'm sorry, I'm so behind.

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Speaker 1: Let's eliminate both of them, the mosquito of the Internet. Well,

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Speaker 1: welcome to the podcast. Daniel and Jorge explain the universe,

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Speaker 1: in which we dive deep into the joys of philosophy

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Speaker 1: and physics and cosmology and think about everything that's out

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Speaker 1: there in the universe. We want to understand how it

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Speaker 1: all works. We want to it makes sense of the universe.

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Speaker 1: We want to boil down all of those froth and

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Speaker 1: quantum particles into a story that fits into your mind,

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Speaker 1: that clicks together and goes Ah, I understand how it works.

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Speaker 2: If only all questions were that straightforward.

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Speaker 1: Well, all the physics at least has a goal to

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Speaker 1: tell you a story that makes sense to you, to

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Speaker 1: incorporate into your mind a mental model of the whole universe.

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Speaker 1: We don't dare to do that with chemistry and definitely

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Speaker 1: not with biology, but sometimes we can take a tiny

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Speaker 1: little sliver of physics and download it into your brain.

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Speaker 1: My normal friend and co host Orge can't be here today,

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Speaker 1: but I'm very excited to be here with you, Kelly.

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Speaker 2: I am super excited to be here with you. And

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Speaker 2: while I'm always super excited to be here with you,

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Speaker 2: I'm particularly excited that we're a little bit more in

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Speaker 2: my niche today talking about you know, ecology and species conservation,

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Speaker 2: and it's going to be a good time.

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Speaker 1: That's right, because we usually talk about real science on

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Speaker 1: the podcast, how the universe actually works. No, oh no,

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Speaker 1: this is not a biology slam.

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Speaker 2: I'm you are going the way in the mosquitoes, Daniel.

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Speaker 1: Oh no, no, you totally mistoo. No, no, let me finish.

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Speaker 1: I was going to say that usually we talk about

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Speaker 1: real science, but today we're talking about science fiction, not

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Speaker 1: that biology is not of real science. I think you're

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Speaker 1: a little too defensive.

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Speaker 2: Maybe I'm a little sensitive. I feel like physicists often

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Speaker 2: look down on biology. I saw a talk by Freeman

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Speaker 2: Dyson where he was certainly doing that. Anyway, I'll stop

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Speaker 2: being so sensitive no fairpoint.

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Speaker 1: Physicists have been guilty of that in the past. I

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Speaker 1: think it was Rutherford who said all science is physics

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Speaker 1: or stamp collecting, and I definitely do not agree with that.

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Speaker 1: There is glory in chemistry and wondrous questions in biology.

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Speaker 1: But today we are stepping beyond the bounds of all

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Speaker 1: kinds of science into the worlds of science fiction, because

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Speaker 1: one of the roles of science fiction is to think

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Speaker 1: about the boundaries of science, what's beyond it, What other

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Speaker 1: universes could we live in? What are the consequences of

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Speaker 1: the technology that we develop? If science keeps barreling forward,

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Speaker 1: does it change the way we live and what it's

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Speaker 1: like to be a human being and the choices that

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Speaker 1: we have to make. And I think that there's a

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Speaker 1: very close connection between the work of scientists and the

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Speaker 1: imagination of science fiction. So we have a series of

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Speaker 1: episodes on this podcast where we read a science fiction novel,

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Speaker 1: talk about the science in it, and then interview the

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Speaker 1: author about how they wrote it and why they decided

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Speaker 1: to build their science fiction universe the way they did.

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Speaker 2: And most of the episodes that you and I have

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Speaker 2: done together with sci fi writers has been about being

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Speaker 2: moved into a world that's totally unlike our own, and

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Speaker 2: so it's sort of they build this brand new universe

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Speaker 2: and you get to enjoy living in it for a while.

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Speaker 2: What what's so exciting about today is that it's more

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Speaker 2: near term and you're left thinking, oh, gosh, is this

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Speaker 2: going to be us in a few decades, And so

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Speaker 2: it's a little bit different than what we usually do,

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Speaker 2: which and I really enjoyed it.

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Speaker 1: This is a wonderful book we'll be talking about today.

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Speaker 1: It's called The Venomous Lumpsucker, a novel by Ned Bowman

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Speaker 1: and asks a really intriguing question about the nature of extinction,

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Speaker 1: what price we should have to pay to drive a

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Speaker 1: species extinct, whether we should care about species going extinct?

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Speaker 1: For example, does the mosquito deserve to live?

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Speaker 2: We think that's something that he talked about in particular.

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Speaker 2: But I did appreciate that there was a whole sort

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Speaker 2: of speech about how we should be thinking about parasites

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Speaker 2: and conservation, and that was very refreshing to me.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it was fascinating. I thought about you as I

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Speaker 1: was reading this book. Today on the podcast, we'll be

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Speaker 1: covering the science fiction universe of the venomous lumpsucker.

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Speaker 2: What a great name.

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Speaker 1: Everybody I tell about this book invariably says the what

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Speaker 1: are you serious? Who would name their book that?

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Speaker 2: But I also like totally bought it. Like when I

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Speaker 2: first read the title, I thought, ah, I thought I

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Speaker 2: knew about a lot of the weird fish, but venomous

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Speaker 2: lovesucker I can totally buy there's a fish called venomous lovesucker.

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Speaker 2: But I was wrong. But anyway, he came up with

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Speaker 2: a really glorious creature.

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Speaker 1: He really did. So let's tell people this setting the book,

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Speaker 1: and then we'll dig into what the story is. The

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Speaker 1: book is set somewhere in the near future on Earth,

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Speaker 1: and it's very much set in our universe. This is

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Speaker 1: not the kind of book where they invent all sorts

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Speaker 1: of new physics, and the universe is very different and

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Speaker 1: we have fast and light travel. This basically takes place

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Speaker 1: on Earth in Europe in about fifteen years, and it's

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Speaker 1: facing the question of how do we cope with this

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Speaker 1: massive extinction event? So many species, so many little beetles

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Speaker 1: are going extinct every day, What should we do about it?

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Speaker 1: What can we do about it? And this book paints

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Speaker 1: this specific picture about how society might handle it.

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Speaker 2: And I thought he did a really nice job of

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Speaker 2: creating a world that you could imagine, like if we

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Speaker 2: take all the wrong turns between now and like fifteen

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Speaker 2: to twenty maybe thirty years from now, we could be there.

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Speaker 2: And so you know, right now we use carbon credits,

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Speaker 2: and companies can buy carbon credits, you know, to essentially

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Speaker 2: pay for the right to release more carbon into the atmosphere.

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Speaker 2: Here he's created extinction credits, where if you're going to

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Speaker 2: start some big new project that's going to result in

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Speaker 2: the extinction of some species, you can sort of pay

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Speaker 2: for that with extinction credits. And you know, there's like

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Speaker 2: a sliding scale for how many extinction credits you need

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Speaker 2: depending on some characteristics of the animal that you're going

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Speaker 2: to have go extinct. But like I bought that this

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Speaker 2: is a path we could go down in a couple decades.

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Speaker 2: What about you, Daniel.

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Speaker 1: I thought it was both inspired, creative, and also very realistic.

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Speaker 1: We often have trouble figuring out like how do we

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Speaker 1: solve a problem, and when we can't figure out what

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Speaker 1: direction to go in, we basically just turn it over

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Speaker 1: to capitalism. We're like, can we financialize this can we

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Speaker 1: incentivize people to do the right thing by making it

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Speaker 1: expensive to do the wrong thing? And I feel like

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Speaker 1: that's sort of clever, like turn it over to the

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Speaker 1: free market, But it also feels like sort of an

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Speaker 1: abdication of our responsibility. But then again, we can never

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Speaker 1: really decide on how to do anything, so it's better

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Speaker 1: to do something than nothing, I suppose. But this was

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Speaker 1: really uncomfortable to read about. This like financialization of extinction,

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Speaker 1: It really reminds me of like putting a price on

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Speaker 1: a human life. You know, when the government has to

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Speaker 1: make decisions about like how much to spend on things,

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Speaker 1: or should a company have to install seat belts? They

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Speaker 1: do so if the price of the seatbelt is less

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Speaker 1: than the expected loss of human life, you know, you

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Speaker 1: have to calculate, like, oh, human life is ten million dollars.

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Speaker 1: Makes me wonder, like, well, if I had ten million dollars,

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Speaker 1: could I buy a murder credit to like kill somebody

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Speaker 1: and then give that money to the family and be

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Speaker 1: like I bought the right to kill your husband, right?

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Speaker 1: That seems terrible. This is just sort of the same

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Speaker 1: thing on a larger scale.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I do think humans for better or worse,

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Speaker 2: feel more comfortable doing that with non human animals, and

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Speaker 2: like we get more uncomfortable, you know, if you're talking

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Speaker 2: about like, well, this chimpanzee really made me angry, Like people, would,

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Speaker 2: you know, maybe make you pay more to take the

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Speaker 2: chimpanzee out than the like stink bug that lives on

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Speaker 2: your curtain or something. But yeah, no, I agree, these

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Speaker 2: things are complicated and uncomfortable, And I thought he also

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Speaker 2: did a really nice job of sort of like weaving

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Speaker 2: in the way that even our best intentions can get

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Speaker 2: corrupted by things like you know, the market doesn't always

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Speaker 2: do what we think it's gonna do, even though we

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Speaker 2: like maybe should have been able to anticipate the two

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Speaker 2: thousand and eight you know, financial crisis, because what were

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Speaker 2: we doing with the banking system and housing back then,

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Speaker 2: But we didn't. And so, you know, things don't go

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Speaker 2: exactly the way the characters thought they were going to

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Speaker 2: go with these extinction credits and how they're going to

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Speaker 2: pay out monetarily, and you know, this stuff doesn't always

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Speaker 2: work the way we think it will, and so this

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Speaker 2: is sort of a story about things going kind of

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Speaker 2: horribly awry.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it is sort of a cautionary tale, and I

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Speaker 1: thought it was super thoughtful and creative. There are so

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Speaker 1: many things that happened in the book that surprised me.

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Speaker 1: And then as soon as I thought about I thought,

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Speaker 1: you know what, that's totally realistic, Like that's exactly what

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Speaker 1: could happen. And to me, that's the best kind of

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Speaker 1: science fiction. Somebody who's like creatively thought about the consequences

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Speaker 1: of some new technology. And you know the way in

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Speaker 1: the book, lobbyists and special interests add like loopholes and

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Speaker 1: exceptions and they end up like driving down the cost

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Speaker 1: of extinction credits to make it like horribly cheap to

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Speaker 1: send some caterpillar off to its final demise. I thought

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Speaker 1: that was very realistic. Another aspect of the book which

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Speaker 1: is super fascinating is the role of technology. He thinks

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Speaker 1: about what it really means for a species to become

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Speaker 1: extinct when you can record it, when you can record

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Speaker 1: its genome and its behavior and get samples of it,

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Speaker 1: and if it's possible to bring a species back, is

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Speaker 1: it still extinct?

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Speaker 2: And this is a topic that's like near and dear

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Speaker 2: to my heart. You know, the positive implications that we

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Speaker 2: think will happen when we create a technology. So you know,

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Speaker 2: right now people are working on de extinction, like can

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Speaker 2: you bring back the mammoth and put it back in

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Speaker 2: its and you know the permafrost habitats in Russia to

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Speaker 2: try to make the habitat what it once was, which

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Speaker 2: would be better for all of the other species that

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Speaker 2: were there. But you know, a lot of these technologies,

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Speaker 2: even if they were envisioned with only positive implications, the

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Speaker 2: way they get rolled out can often have some pretty

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Speaker 2: negative implications. So here you see they're working on, you know,

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Speaker 2: figuring out ways to store biological information so that you

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Speaker 2: cannot only bring back sort of members of a species,

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Speaker 2: but you could even bring back specific individuals. And I think,

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Speaker 2: you know, I don't know what the original plan was

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Speaker 2: in the book for the people who made these technologies,

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Speaker 2: but I can certainly imagine on Earth people having really

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Speaker 2: good intentions creating that technology, and then it makes extinction blurry,

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Speaker 2: Like is you know the beetle that you study really

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Speaker 2: extinct if everything that you need to bring it back

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Speaker 2: is in a computer and you could recreate it in

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Speaker 2: a lab at some point. So you know, these technologies

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Speaker 2: that are meant to help, but like can get used

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Speaker 2: in the wrong way and really mess up incentives is

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Speaker 2: to me a fascinating topic that I felt like he

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Speaker 2: handled really well on the book.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and lots of really interesting questions that seem initially

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Speaker 1: like they have obvious answers, like when is a species extinct?

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Speaker 1: You might say, well, when there are no more living bits, right,

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Speaker 1: and when there are no more living individuals, But then

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Speaker 1: he walks you through these arguments in a really thoughtful way, like, well,

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Speaker 1: if there's a few more living individuals but they can't

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Speaker 1: reproduce because it's too small a group where they can

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Speaker 1: only live in zoos, then is that really somehow less

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Speaker 1: extinct than another species where there are no living individuals,

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Speaker 1: but we have the capacity to make more because of

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Speaker 1: our technology and we could bring them back. Which species

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Speaker 1: really is more extinct in that case? So it's very persuasive.

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Speaker 1: It really changed my mind a lot of these tricky questions.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, at the book tackles a lot of difficult questions.

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Speaker 2: So what is the story about, Daniel?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, so it's not just like here's a future Earth

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Speaker 1: where everything is going wrong. It tells the story, and

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Speaker 1: it's from the point of view of a biologist who's

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Speaker 1: being asked to assess whether a particular species is intelligent because,

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Speaker 1: as you said, it costs more extinction credits in this

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Speaker 1: book to kill something if it's intelligent, which I guess

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Speaker 1: makes sense, but also it feels really icky. And her

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Speaker 1: job is to assess whether the venomous lumpsucker is an

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Speaker 1: intelligent species or not. And it turns out she has

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Speaker 1: her own stake in this game. She wants it to

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Speaker 1: be intelligent for her own reasons. And in the book,

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Speaker 1: some corporation comes along and accidentally kills off all of

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Speaker 1: the venomous lumpsuckers or do they And in these places

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Speaker 1: where people store these species, these biobanks then get hacked

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Speaker 1: and the whole question of whether species or extinct becomes

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Speaker 1: much more fuzzy and questionable. It's a really exciting sort

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Speaker 1: of thriller that takes you through this world.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a totally fascinating world. Can you tell me

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Speaker 2: a little bit more about some of the science that

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Speaker 2: was sort of created or forwarded for the story in particular?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I wanted to ask you about it actually, because

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Speaker 1: a lot of this stuff is biological, I mean, the

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Speaker 1: core of technological innovations that exist in this world. Are

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Speaker 1: the ability to preserve as species to imprinciple de extinctify it,

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Speaker 1: and they do, for example, genome sequencing. Of course you've

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Speaker 1: got to store the DNA, but they also do deep

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Speaker 1: scans of the animals and they watch their behaviors et cetera,

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Speaker 1: et cetera. And as you said, this is something people

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Speaker 1: are actually working on now. So it made me wonder like,

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Speaker 1: is it possible today or in the near future to

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Speaker 1: actually do this to bring a species back from extinction

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Speaker 1: or what would you need in order to make that possible.

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Speaker 2: So there are people who are way smarter than me

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Speaker 2: who would say that the answer is definitely yes, we

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Speaker 2: can bring species back from extinction. But to be honest,

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Speaker 2: I'm skeptical that we're going to bring back the exact

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Speaker 2: same thing, and maybe that doesn't matter. So, for example,

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Speaker 2: they're working on, as I mentioned, bringing back the wooly mammoth,

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Speaker 2: and different groups are doing this in different ways. So

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Speaker 2: for example, one group has was I think it's the

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Speaker 2: genome from some elephant species, and then they're taking what

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Speaker 2: they've been able to get from mammoths that have been

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Speaker 2: like frozen in permafrost. What they've been able to extract

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Speaker 2: out of their genome. They're tinkering with an elephant genome

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Speaker 2: to try to make it look like a mammoth genome.

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Speaker 2: But then there's all sorts of like you know, maternal

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Speaker 2: effects that are missing, so that mammoth would have to

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Speaker 2: be ges stated given the science that we have now

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Speaker 2: ges dated in the body of an elephant, And how

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Speaker 2: does that like hormonal environment, you know, differ. And then

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Speaker 2: I think, you know, some elephants and maybe some mammoths

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Speaker 2: like eat feces after they're born to get the right microbiome.

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Speaker 2: And so now you're not getting like a mammoth microbiome.

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Speaker 2: You're getting like an elephant microbiome. And is that enough?

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Speaker 1: Did you say eat feces?

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Speaker 2: Sure did, Yeah, this is biology, man. We get to

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Speaker 2: feces in about five minutes.

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Speaker 1: You're saying it's not a mammoth if it has been

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Speaker 1: eaten mammoth poop when it was a baby.

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Speaker 2: You know, I wouldn't say that that's the line yes

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Speaker 2: or no, but I would say that, like, you know,

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Speaker 2: so to some extent, these differences build up and like so, yes,

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Speaker 2: you have a mammoth, but the mammoth is now placed

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Speaker 2: into an ecosystem that varies dramatically from what it was

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Speaker 2: in before. It's social interactions might be different, because will

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Speaker 2: they act the same in a different environment, And is

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Speaker 2: there something about their development that's missing that's going to

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Speaker 2: change the way they interact with each other, and so like, yes,

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Speaker 2: you have a mammoth, but you don't have the mammoth

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Speaker 2: you used to have. And the extent to which that matters,

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Speaker 2: I don't know. Maybe it's enough to just have a

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Speaker 2: mammoth back in the environment and that does some good,

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Speaker 2: But I think these things are complicated. And as far

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Speaker 2: as MRI scans and like connectomes so that you can

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Speaker 2: bring back a human who is exactly the same as

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Speaker 2: the person you love to just passed away, I think

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Speaker 2: we are way more than decades away from that. But

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Speaker 2: I'm sure there are a lot of people who disagree

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Speaker 2: with me. But it seems like when we first got

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Speaker 2: the human genome, we were like, there's so much we're

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Speaker 2: gonna be able to deal with it, And then we

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Speaker 2: were like, oh, well, not really, because actually it's much

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Speaker 2: more complicated, And that always seems to be the answer.

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Speaker 1: A friend of mine just completed the connectome of life.

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Speaker 1: The fruitfly which has a tiny number of neurons compared

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Speaker 1: to the humans, and it took forever, and it seems

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Speaker 1: like we're never going to get to the connectome of

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Speaker 1: the human brain. But you raise a lot of really

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Speaker 1: interesting questions that I think touch on the deeper issue

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Speaker 1: of like what does it really mean for a species

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Speaker 1: to be extinct. It's not really just about the individuals.

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Speaker 1: It's about their entire environment and can they survive and propagate?

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Speaker 1: And that requires much more than just the actual bodies, right,

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Speaker 1: It requires the parents and the poop and everything around

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Speaker 1: them and all this kind of stuff. And I think

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Speaker 1: that's one reason why all of the efforts so far

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Speaker 1: in the real world to de extinctify have focused on

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Speaker 1: things that are near relatives to existing species, Like you

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Speaker 1: could have a mammoth baby maybe born in an elephant,

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Speaker 1: and that's giving you something that's close to a mammoth.

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Speaker 1: Or you can have like an extinct rat be born

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Speaker 1: from existing rats. These kinds of things. I don't think

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Speaker 1: it could be possible, for example, to de extinctify species

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Speaker 1: that was very distant from anything that was currently alive,

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Speaker 1: like a dinosaur, although maybe I guess you could grow

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Speaker 1: one in a big alligator.

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Speaker 2: I don't know, yeah, Like I don't know how you

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Speaker 2: de extinctify a trilobite or something, for example. And maybe

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Speaker 2: the question is, like, you know, if you could de

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Speaker 2: extinct it, but it could only live in a zoo

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Speaker 2: because you've like destroyed all of its habitat and it

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Speaker 2: just can't. The things that it needed don't exist anymore.

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Speaker 2: What kind of a life is that? And I'm sure

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Speaker 2: people would dramatically differ in their answer to that question,

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Speaker 2: And so there you go.

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Speaker 1: Well, one of the fascinating things about the book Venomous

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Speaker 1: Lumpsucker is he talks about the influence of this technology

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Speaker 1: on decision making, and if it's possible to bring species

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Speaker 1: back from the dead, then doesn't make it less bad

397
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Speaker 1: to make them extinct. That it sort of makes the

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Speaker 1: question like fuzzier now, because what is extinct really mean?

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Speaker 1: You know, It's sort of like saying, oh, I can

400
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Speaker 1: upload you to the clouds, So what does it matter

401
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Speaker 1: if I murder you? Like, well, I still don't really

402
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Speaker 1: want to get murdered, even if I'm backed up.

403
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Speaker 2: Well, I mean, I guess there's also like nobody wants

404
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Speaker 2: the physical pain of being murdered and many layers of

405
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Speaker 2: complication in all of these questions.

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Speaker 1: Many reasons to not be murdered by Kelly we Smith.

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Speaker 2: Speaking of commercialization. Let's take a quick break for word

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Speaker 2: from our sponsors, and we're back.

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Speaker 3: All right.

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Speaker 1: Well, we thoroughly enjoyed this book. We thought it was

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Speaker 1: very thoughtful, very interesting, very creative, but also very very funny.

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Speaker 1: I laughed out loud many times while reading this book.

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Speaker 2: Okay, so, without further ado, let's bring Ned Bowman onto

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Speaker 2: the show.

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Speaker 1: Well, then it's my pleasure to welcome to the program today,

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Speaker 1: Ned Bowman. Ned, thank you very much for joining us today.

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Speaker 3: Thanks for having me.

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Speaker 1: So tell us a little bit about yourself. How did

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Speaker 1: you get into science fiction writing.

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Speaker 3: Well, this is my fifth novel, but it's my first

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Speaker 3: real science fiction novel. I think it was inevitable that

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Speaker 3: I would write one eventually because I read pretty much

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Speaker 3: nothing but science fiction when I was growing up, and

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Speaker 3: then kind of moved over into more mainstream literary fiction,

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Speaker 3: but continued to read science fiction, and to be honest,

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Speaker 3: I always felt, like, you know, it was a genre

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Speaker 3: that I appreciated, but wasn't necessarily up to myself because

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Speaker 3: I think it requires quite a specific set of skills.

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Speaker 3: But eventually, you know, I tried my hand at various

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Speaker 3: other things, and I had done it. I'd published a

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Speaker 3: couple of science fiction short stories, and then with this one,

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Speaker 3: I thought, okay, I'll give it a shot, put everything

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Speaker 3: into it. Yeah, and that was how I ended up

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Speaker 3: with Venoma's Lampsyca.

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Speaker 2: So you noted that you need to have a certain

436
00:20:33,560 --> 00:20:36,520
Speaker 2: set of skills to write science fiction. How did you

437
00:20:36,800 --> 00:20:38,960
Speaker 2: get those skills yourself? So you got a lot of

438
00:20:39,000 --> 00:20:41,680
Speaker 2: the you know, the biology in this book is fantastic

439
00:20:41,800 --> 00:20:45,719
Speaker 2: as a biologist. Did you like pull out biology textbooks?

440
00:20:45,760 --> 00:20:48,040
Speaker 2: What was the process of trying to blend science fiction

441
00:20:48,160 --> 00:20:50,520
Speaker 2: with all of the appropriate science fact.

442
00:20:50,480 --> 00:20:54,800
Speaker 3: Well, all of my books have been quite research heavy,

443
00:20:55,400 --> 00:20:58,360
Speaker 3: you know. For instance, my second book had a lot

444
00:20:58,400 --> 00:21:03,480
Speaker 3: about the Avon God Theater in the Weimar era. You know,

445
00:21:03,080 --> 00:21:08,000
Speaker 3: I don't think researching science is inherently any harder than

446
00:21:08,040 --> 00:21:10,240
Speaker 3: researching that kind of thing, at least until you get

447
00:21:10,240 --> 00:21:13,960
Speaker 3: into the really confusing stuff. When I say a specific

448
00:21:14,040 --> 00:21:18,359
Speaker 3: set of skills, I mean more trying to kind of

449
00:21:18,440 --> 00:21:27,240
Speaker 3: paint a plausible and internally consistent future world without leaving

450
00:21:28,240 --> 00:21:33,600
Speaker 3: huge gaps and blind spots. And I have always so

451
00:21:33,680 --> 00:21:36,480
Speaker 3: admired the science fiction novelists who were good at that,

452
00:21:36,840 --> 00:21:39,880
Speaker 3: And with this book, I was very conscious it's set

453
00:21:40,240 --> 00:21:43,359
Speaker 3: fifteen to twenty years in the future, and A, I

454
00:21:43,359 --> 00:21:46,560
Speaker 3: don't specify the exact date, which makes it easier, and

455
00:21:46,640 --> 00:21:49,560
Speaker 3: also B I think fifteen to twenty years is kind

456
00:21:49,600 --> 00:21:53,080
Speaker 3: of the easiest place to put it because it's not

457
00:21:53,400 --> 00:21:58,280
Speaker 3: so soon that you can get refuted in all your

458
00:21:58,320 --> 00:22:02,320
Speaker 3: predictions really quickly. But it's also not so far away

459
00:22:02,320 --> 00:22:07,000
Speaker 3: that you really have to make some big calls about

460
00:22:07,040 --> 00:22:10,120
Speaker 3: like what's going to change and where things are going

461
00:22:10,160 --> 00:22:13,520
Speaker 3: to go. So I think I was doing it sort

462
00:22:13,520 --> 00:22:16,800
Speaker 3: of on easy modes in that respect, but that was

463
00:22:16,840 --> 00:22:20,520
Speaker 3: the challenge. Whereas the science stuff, Yeah, you know, at

464
00:22:20,520 --> 00:22:22,800
Speaker 3: this point, I'm just kind of used to being at

465
00:22:22,840 --> 00:22:27,919
Speaker 3: dilettante and with each book, I stroll through some new

466
00:22:28,240 --> 00:22:31,160
Speaker 3: arab of research and I didn't really find it any

467
00:22:31,160 --> 00:22:33,919
Speaker 3: harder than any of the stuff I've researched in the past.

468
00:22:34,160 --> 00:22:36,560
Speaker 1: Well, before we dive into the details of your book,

469
00:22:36,640 --> 00:22:39,320
Speaker 1: we like to ask the same questions to every author

470
00:22:39,400 --> 00:22:42,120
Speaker 1: to sort of put them on the spectrum of science fiction.

471
00:22:42,359 --> 00:22:45,600
Speaker 1: So here's some generic science fiction questions, not specifically about

472
00:22:45,600 --> 00:22:48,480
Speaker 1: your book. So the first one is do you think

473
00:22:48,520 --> 00:22:52,840
Speaker 1: that Star Trek style transporters kill you and clone you

474
00:22:53,320 --> 00:22:56,320
Speaker 1: or do you think they actually transport your atoms somewhere else?

475
00:22:56,800 --> 00:23:03,080
Speaker 3: Well, I studied philosophis undergraduate and then later read this

476
00:23:03,119 --> 00:23:07,000
Speaker 3: book called Reasons in Persons by Derek Parfitt, which one

477
00:23:07,760 --> 00:23:12,880
Speaker 3: reviewer actually noticed as an influence on this book by coincidence,

478
00:23:12,920 --> 00:23:16,120
Speaker 3: which I hadn't really consciously thought about, but in hindsight, yeah,

479
00:23:16,160 --> 00:23:19,440
Speaker 3: I think a lot of those ideas had implanted themselves

480
00:23:20,040 --> 00:23:24,800
Speaker 3: in my head. And I think path It's answer would

481
00:23:24,880 --> 00:23:31,760
Speaker 3: be that you need to start thinking about personhood in

482
00:23:31,760 --> 00:23:36,399
Speaker 3: a way which doesn't have such strict boundaries. You have

483
00:23:36,440 --> 00:23:38,439
Speaker 3: to think about a person as being a kind of

484
00:23:39,680 --> 00:23:45,760
Speaker 3: soft entity which doesn't begin or and in a specific place.

485
00:23:46,480 --> 00:23:49,160
Speaker 3: And if you look at things that way, then it's

486
00:23:49,280 --> 00:23:53,720
Speaker 3: legitimate to say, is the person who beams down to

487
00:23:53,800 --> 00:23:59,400
Speaker 3: the planet me sort of that person is semi continuous

488
00:24:00,119 --> 00:24:03,840
Speaker 3: with me, not continuous to the extent that we normally

489
00:24:03,840 --> 00:24:07,040
Speaker 3: think of ourselves as being continuous. And yeah, I think

490
00:24:07,080 --> 00:24:09,159
Speaker 3: Parfitt would say that's okay. That doesn't have to be

491
00:24:09,200 --> 00:24:11,280
Speaker 3: a strict boinary answer to that, So I think that's

492
00:24:11,320 --> 00:24:13,800
Speaker 3: probably what I would go with because I really respect

493
00:24:14,440 --> 00:24:15,840
Speaker 3: Parfit's concept of the world.

494
00:24:16,080 --> 00:24:18,280
Speaker 1: So it is you as long as you redefine you

495
00:24:18,400 --> 00:24:20,440
Speaker 1: to be whatever you ends up on the other side

496
00:24:20,480 --> 00:24:21,440
Speaker 1: of the transporter.

497
00:24:21,680 --> 00:24:23,520
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think it's fair enough to say it's sort

498
00:24:23,560 --> 00:24:25,520
Speaker 3: of you in many ways, pretty much you.

499
00:24:25,800 --> 00:24:30,240
Speaker 2: That's a great answer. So another tech question, what tech

500
00:24:30,320 --> 00:24:33,720
Speaker 2: in science fiction would you most like to see become

501
00:24:33,720 --> 00:24:34,320
Speaker 2: a reality?

502
00:24:34,440 --> 00:24:36,199
Speaker 3: I think the science fiction story that has had the

503
00:24:36,200 --> 00:24:39,720
Speaker 3: most influence on me in terms of my sort of

504
00:24:39,800 --> 00:24:43,480
Speaker 3: personality and outlook is this story called Reasons to Be

505
00:24:43,600 --> 00:24:48,240
Speaker 3: Cheerful by Greg Egan, and that is a story about

506
00:24:48,280 --> 00:24:56,199
Speaker 3: a guy who gets a brain tumor which affects his

507
00:24:57,040 --> 00:25:00,000
Speaker 3: ability to take pleasure in things, which kind of flattened

508
00:25:00,119 --> 00:25:03,600
Speaker 3: his abilities to take pleasure in things, and well, I

509
00:25:03,640 --> 00:25:05,479
Speaker 3: have no choice but to spore the ending bride any

510
00:25:05,480 --> 00:25:08,960
Speaker 3: think it really spoils it. They eventually develop a device

511
00:25:09,600 --> 00:25:14,400
Speaker 3: which allows him to adjust how much pleasure he takes

512
00:25:14,480 --> 00:25:18,680
Speaker 3: in different things, so he's able to say, not do

513
00:25:18,760 --> 00:25:21,919
Speaker 3: I like this or do I find that beautiful? But

514
00:25:22,040 --> 00:25:24,359
Speaker 3: do I want to like this? Do I want to

515
00:25:24,400 --> 00:25:27,720
Speaker 3: find this beautiful. What is it that it would be

516
00:25:27,840 --> 00:25:34,679
Speaker 3: most convenient or positive for me to take pleasure in,

517
00:25:34,920 --> 00:25:37,920
Speaker 3: and he's able to adjust it on that basis. I've

518
00:25:37,960 --> 00:25:42,000
Speaker 3: always felt that would be so good, that would make

519
00:25:42,040 --> 00:25:44,359
Speaker 3: it so much easier for us to adjust to the world.

520
00:25:44,760 --> 00:25:47,480
Speaker 2: What would you change about your response to the world

521
00:25:47,560 --> 00:25:48,880
Speaker 2: first if you had this device.

522
00:25:49,080 --> 00:25:52,200
Speaker 3: Well, again, this kind of comes up in the novel,

523
00:25:52,760 --> 00:25:56,680
Speaker 3: and I'm sure again the novel was kind of influenced

524
00:25:56,720 --> 00:26:00,679
Speaker 3: an unconscious way by this story. But basically, one of

525
00:26:00,680 --> 00:26:03,359
Speaker 3: the two main characters of Venomous Lumpsucker is this guy

526
00:26:04,280 --> 00:26:07,639
Speaker 3: who's a real foodie, but because of the effects of

527
00:26:07,680 --> 00:26:12,320
Speaker 3: climate change in fifteen or twenty years, most foods don't

528
00:26:12,359 --> 00:26:16,880
Speaker 3: really taste of anything anymore. So he has to take

529
00:26:16,920 --> 00:26:19,840
Speaker 3: this pill, which means he doesn't care whether a meal

530
00:26:19,960 --> 00:26:24,760
Speaker 3: is good or not, which is sort of the more

531
00:26:24,880 --> 00:26:30,360
Speaker 3: destructive version of what I'm talking about. The better alternative

532
00:26:30,480 --> 00:26:33,800
Speaker 3: would be, you know, for him to go, well, what

533
00:26:34,040 --> 00:26:37,359
Speaker 3: is still available to me, I'm going to decide that

534
00:26:37,440 --> 00:26:40,600
Speaker 3: I will love that, and then I'll be perfectly adjusted

535
00:26:40,640 --> 00:26:44,000
Speaker 3: to the world that I actually have, as opposed to

536
00:26:44,440 --> 00:26:46,359
Speaker 3: the world that I would like to be in. I

537
00:26:46,359 --> 00:26:48,000
Speaker 3: mean there's probably a lot of more profound ways, so

538
00:26:48,040 --> 00:26:49,760
Speaker 3: you could use something like that. But that's probably what

539
00:26:49,840 --> 00:26:52,280
Speaker 3: I would do, at least to start off with, because

540
00:26:52,320 --> 00:26:55,080
Speaker 3: you know, I am quite a snob about like food

541
00:26:55,320 --> 00:27:00,159
Speaker 3: and fabrics and all that kind of thing. Like No,

542
00:27:00,440 --> 00:27:04,280
Speaker 3: imagine if you could just take just as much pleasure

543
00:27:04,320 --> 00:27:07,720
Speaker 3: and cheap polyester as in cashmere, or you could take

544
00:27:07,840 --> 00:27:11,760
Speaker 3: just as much pleasure and a protein bar as in

545
00:27:12,640 --> 00:27:16,200
Speaker 3: you know, a delicious meal. Oh, I mean that's another one.

546
00:27:16,280 --> 00:27:18,480
Speaker 3: Like I'm trying to be vegan, not very successfully. I

547
00:27:18,520 --> 00:27:20,639
Speaker 3: would love you know, I would just adjustice so that

548
00:27:20,680 --> 00:27:24,040
Speaker 3: I didn't even want meat anymore and enjoyed chickpeas way

549
00:27:24,119 --> 00:27:27,040
Speaker 3: more than IEVER used to enjoy procido if I can.

550
00:27:27,400 --> 00:27:28,280
Speaker 2: That's going to be tough.

551
00:27:28,760 --> 00:27:32,399
Speaker 1: Chickpeas are delicious. I'm definitely pro chickpee on this question.

552
00:27:32,560 --> 00:27:34,640
Speaker 3: I'm pro check pee. But as soon as you start

553
00:27:34,640 --> 00:27:37,600
Speaker 3: eating vegan, you find yourself eating chickpeas like seven times

554
00:27:37,600 --> 00:27:39,200
Speaker 3: a day, and it's too much.

555
00:27:40,119 --> 00:27:42,199
Speaker 1: No, there's so many kinds of beans out there. You

556
00:27:42,200 --> 00:27:45,480
Speaker 1: should get into indigenous kinds of beans. We're members of

557
00:27:45,480 --> 00:27:47,600
Speaker 1: the Rangel Gordo Bean Clubs, and we get this shipment

558
00:27:47,680 --> 00:27:50,680
Speaker 1: of heirloom beans every month. It's wonderful anyway. A big

559
00:27:50,680 --> 00:27:53,159
Speaker 1: fan of Greg Egan over here. Love his stories so

560
00:27:53,280 --> 00:27:56,080
Speaker 1: thoughtful and creative. Last genaeric question before we dive into

561
00:27:56,119 --> 00:27:59,639
Speaker 1: the book is what's your personal answer to the Fermi paradox?

562
00:28:00,119 --> 00:28:03,160
Speaker 1: Why haven't aliens visited us? Or have they?

563
00:28:03,640 --> 00:28:08,600
Speaker 3: Oh? Yeah, I don't. I don't have a great answer

564
00:28:08,640 --> 00:28:12,800
Speaker 3: to that. I mean, I don't see strong reason to

565
00:28:12,960 --> 00:28:20,960
Speaker 3: believe that they have. I'm not particularly convinced by any

566
00:28:21,000 --> 00:28:26,760
Speaker 3: of those hypotheses about how they know where here and

567
00:28:26,840 --> 00:28:32,359
Speaker 3: they're watching and they've chosen not to visit us or interfere.

568
00:28:32,960 --> 00:28:37,399
Speaker 3: The answer to it that kind of grips me with

569
00:28:37,560 --> 00:28:43,160
Speaker 3: the most like cold, implacable grip as soon as I

570
00:28:43,240 --> 00:28:47,920
Speaker 3: heard it. Is just the idea that all advanced civilizations

571
00:28:48,000 --> 00:28:51,560
Speaker 3: have actually destroyed themselves one way or another, you know,

572
00:28:51,600 --> 00:28:54,200
Speaker 3: before they leave their solar systems, if not before they

573
00:28:54,320 --> 00:28:59,920
Speaker 3: leave their planets. So it could be that, But then

574
00:29:00,080 --> 00:29:04,960
Speaker 3: you'd think somebody would have got as far as you know,

575
00:29:05,160 --> 00:29:10,720
Speaker 3: self replicating probes, ornoy machines or whatever. So I really

576
00:29:10,720 --> 00:29:12,560
Speaker 3: don't know why we haven't had any of those. I

577
00:29:12,600 --> 00:29:13,640
Speaker 3: can't explain that all.

578
00:29:13,680 --> 00:29:16,720
Speaker 2: Right, so let's start jumping into venomous lumpsucker. I love

579
00:29:16,840 --> 00:29:20,120
Speaker 2: this book. So the novel like, so I'm an ecologist,

580
00:29:20,240 --> 00:29:23,400
Speaker 2: and so top like climate change in the massive extinction

581
00:29:23,440 --> 00:29:25,760
Speaker 2: event that we're living through right now, or topics that

582
00:29:25,800 --> 00:29:28,280
Speaker 2: are near and dear to my heart. What fascinates you

583
00:29:28,320 --> 00:29:30,680
Speaker 2: about these themes? Why did you decide that you wanted

584
00:29:30,680 --> 00:29:33,200
Speaker 2: to write a book around the topic of extinction.

585
00:29:33,600 --> 00:29:37,400
Speaker 3: Well, it's a combination of you know, on the one hand,

586
00:29:37,720 --> 00:29:42,200
Speaker 3: I am very concerned about the climates, and I love animals,

587
00:29:42,360 --> 00:29:46,320
Speaker 3: and a lot of the sentiments in the book about

588
00:29:46,360 --> 00:29:52,200
Speaker 3: how thinking about animals being driven extinct is so painful

589
00:29:52,240 --> 00:29:54,760
Speaker 3: you can't even bear it, Like some of that is

590
00:29:54,800 --> 00:29:57,080
Speaker 3: an exaggeration of how I feel. But then on the

591
00:29:57,120 --> 00:30:00,760
Speaker 3: other hand, like I sail a studied philosophy, and I'm

592
00:30:00,840 --> 00:30:06,840
Speaker 3: often frustrated by the way we have so many surface

593
00:30:06,920 --> 00:30:10,520
Speaker 3: level debates about things which go round and round in

594
00:30:10,600 --> 00:30:13,360
Speaker 3: circles and you never get anywhere around. I always just

595
00:30:13,360 --> 00:30:17,120
Speaker 3: think this needs some real philosophy applied to it, and

596
00:30:17,720 --> 00:30:20,760
Speaker 3: the question of extinction is really one of those, you know,

597
00:30:20,840 --> 00:30:27,600
Speaker 3: because most people basically seem to agree that it's bad.

598
00:30:27,680 --> 00:30:33,080
Speaker 3: If a species goes extinct, but obviously there's no consensus

599
00:30:33,160 --> 00:30:38,600
Speaker 3: on what we are willing to pay or sacrifice to

600
00:30:38,640 --> 00:30:42,080
Speaker 3: prevent that happening. That's not one of those questions you

601
00:30:42,120 --> 00:30:48,960
Speaker 3: can answer just by people sort of vaguely, you know,

602
00:30:49,080 --> 00:30:52,200
Speaker 3: talking past each other about how they feel about it.

603
00:30:52,240 --> 00:30:55,760
Speaker 3: I really think if we're going to talk about how

604
00:30:55,880 --> 00:30:58,400
Speaker 3: much do we really care about preventing extinction, you have

605
00:30:58,520 --> 00:31:03,000
Speaker 3: to look at it riskly and ask, well, why is

606
00:31:03,040 --> 00:31:06,320
Speaker 3: it bad if a species goes extinct? How much do

607
00:31:06,360 --> 00:31:09,600
Speaker 3: we or should we care? Why is the species valuable?

608
00:31:10,040 --> 00:31:13,600
Speaker 3: Why should we prevent it? And you have to look

609
00:31:13,640 --> 00:31:18,440
Speaker 3: at those philosophically instead of just relying on intuition and

610
00:31:18,600 --> 00:31:22,640
Speaker 3: assumptions and so on. So I thought that would be

611
00:31:22,680 --> 00:31:28,240
Speaker 3: an interesting basis for a novel to start, not offering answers,

612
00:31:28,240 --> 00:31:32,120
Speaker 3: but at least asking some questions that I felt like

613
00:31:32,320 --> 00:31:35,880
Speaker 3: needed to be asked that weren't being asked in a

614
00:31:35,920 --> 00:31:38,560
Speaker 3: more serious philosophical way about this issue.

615
00:31:38,680 --> 00:31:40,880
Speaker 1: I totally agree, and I know that in your answer

616
00:31:40,960 --> 00:31:43,840
Speaker 1: you gave sort of two questions. One was what price

617
00:31:43,920 --> 00:31:46,160
Speaker 1: are we willing to pay? And the other was how

618
00:31:46,240 --> 00:31:48,480
Speaker 1: much should we care for me? One of the most

619
00:31:48,520 --> 00:31:50,440
Speaker 1: interesting things about the book was that it seemed to

620
00:31:50,520 --> 00:31:54,000
Speaker 1: sort of sound a warning about attempts to legislate and

621
00:31:54,120 --> 00:31:58,160
Speaker 1: financialize decision making. I've often heard economists say things like

622
00:31:58,600 --> 00:32:00,479
Speaker 1: it's good to put a price on things, even if

623
00:32:00,480 --> 00:32:03,160
Speaker 1: it's the wrong price. Do you think that there's a

624
00:32:03,400 --> 00:32:07,320
Speaker 1: danger to try to assign a monetary value to moral

625
00:32:07,400 --> 00:32:11,320
Speaker 1: choices like a human life or the existence of a species.

626
00:32:11,440 --> 00:32:13,160
Speaker 1: Is that the right way for us as a society

627
00:32:13,200 --> 00:32:14,280
Speaker 1: to balance these things?

628
00:32:14,600 --> 00:32:18,480
Speaker 3: I mean, I don't think it's intrinsically immral to do that.

629
00:32:18,600 --> 00:32:21,320
Speaker 3: You know, if you work in the government, you have

630
00:32:21,360 --> 00:32:24,040
Speaker 3: to operate at least in this country on the basis

631
00:32:24,080 --> 00:32:29,280
Speaker 3: of they're called qa L wise quality adjusted life years,

632
00:32:29,320 --> 00:32:33,640
Speaker 3: and you have to decide is it worth buying this

633
00:32:33,720 --> 00:32:37,200
Speaker 3: treatment for a rare cancer, And then you have to think, well,

634
00:32:37,920 --> 00:32:43,720
Speaker 3: how many people will live how many extra years longer?

635
00:32:43,800 --> 00:32:47,440
Speaker 3: And you have to put a number on that stuff. So,

636
00:32:47,840 --> 00:32:50,200
Speaker 3: you know, I find it very frustrating when people are like,

637
00:32:50,680 --> 00:32:53,560
Speaker 3: we can't have bureaucrats putting a price on human life

638
00:32:53,640 --> 00:32:56,080
Speaker 3: or whatever, when I think you have to. That's the

639
00:32:56,080 --> 00:32:58,800
Speaker 3: only way you can make trade offs in it, you know,

640
00:33:00,120 --> 00:33:04,440
Speaker 3: relative scarcity, but on the other hand, when the reason

641
00:33:04,480 --> 00:33:07,400
Speaker 3: you're trying to put a price on something is because

642
00:33:07,440 --> 00:33:13,960
Speaker 3: you're saying, well, a price signal is the only signal

643
00:33:14,000 --> 00:33:17,200
Speaker 3: that the free market really understands. So the reason we're

644
00:33:17,200 --> 00:33:19,840
Speaker 3: putting in a price on it is so that we

645
00:33:19,880 --> 00:33:23,440
Speaker 3: can plug it into the free market and then pull

646
00:33:23,520 --> 00:33:27,840
Speaker 3: a few levers and then allow the free market to

647
00:33:27,920 --> 00:33:32,280
Speaker 3: work its magic and solve this problem for us. Again,

648
00:33:32,320 --> 00:33:34,560
Speaker 3: I don't think that's inherently a moral. Is just one

649
00:33:34,560 --> 00:33:36,200
Speaker 3: of the things I'm saying in the book is it's

650
00:33:36,240 --> 00:33:39,440
Speaker 3: not going to work because the thing that the free

651
00:33:39,440 --> 00:33:45,640
Speaker 3: market is good at is rooting around any impediments to profit,

652
00:33:46,520 --> 00:33:50,280
Speaker 3: and the free market the reason it works is it's,

653
00:33:51,720 --> 00:33:56,120
Speaker 3: you know, a collaboration of millions of very intelligent people

654
00:33:57,240 --> 00:34:02,760
Speaker 3: all working together to solve this problem. Where the problem

655
00:34:03,200 --> 00:34:06,040
Speaker 3: is someone is stopping us from making enough money. And

656
00:34:06,320 --> 00:34:10,719
Speaker 3: if opposed to them, you only have a handful of

657
00:34:10,960 --> 00:34:15,239
Speaker 3: kind of well meaning people in government, then the free

658
00:34:15,280 --> 00:34:19,640
Speaker 3: market is always going to outsmart the people in government.

659
00:34:19,880 --> 00:34:23,080
Speaker 3: So that's why it's a danger. So that's why I

660
00:34:23,120 --> 00:34:28,520
Speaker 3: think it's genius to put a price on it, because

661
00:34:29,320 --> 00:34:31,560
Speaker 3: if that price is meant to be a kind of

662
00:34:31,800 --> 00:34:36,440
Speaker 3: you know, essentially translating it into free market language. You

663
00:34:36,480 --> 00:34:38,719
Speaker 3: don't necessarily want it in that language because once you

664
00:34:38,760 --> 00:34:40,240
Speaker 3: give it to them, you never get it back.

665
00:34:40,600 --> 00:34:42,920
Speaker 2: And what is the role of the individual and how

666
00:34:42,960 --> 00:34:45,480
Speaker 2: these things all play out? You know, like I recently

667
00:34:45,520 --> 00:34:47,719
Speaker 2: purchased something like a new perse the other day made

668
00:34:47,760 --> 00:34:50,200
Speaker 2: out of billboards, and I felt so great because I'm

669
00:34:50,239 --> 00:34:53,480
Speaker 2: reusing something. But like maybe I didn't need that new

670
00:34:53,520 --> 00:34:57,160
Speaker 2: person So what extent do these like you know, credits

671
00:34:57,200 --> 00:34:59,600
Speaker 2: and these you know, telling people that your company is

672
00:34:59,640 --> 00:35:01,640
Speaker 2: greener and another like, to what extent is it's still

673
00:35:01,680 --> 00:35:04,640
Speaker 2: the individual's responsibility when we have all these ways of

674
00:35:04,640 --> 00:35:07,640
Speaker 2: making ourselves feel better that may not actually be doing anything.

675
00:35:08,480 --> 00:35:10,520
Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't know. I mean I really see by

676
00:35:10,560 --> 00:35:13,759
Speaker 3: the size of this, because on the one hand, you

677
00:35:13,840 --> 00:35:18,440
Speaker 3: often hear people saying the emphasis on individual responsibility for

678
00:35:18,520 --> 00:35:23,880
Speaker 3: climate change is just a way of distracting from the

679
00:35:23,920 --> 00:35:28,360
Speaker 3: fact that we need enormous structural changes at the level

680
00:35:28,400 --> 00:35:32,000
Speaker 3: of governments and mega corporations to make any real difference.

681
00:35:32,120 --> 00:35:35,600
Speaker 3: And you know, I think it is literally the case

682
00:35:35,880 --> 00:35:41,400
Speaker 3: that you know, polluters, via their think tanks and lobbyists

683
00:35:41,440 --> 00:35:44,560
Speaker 3: and AstroTurf operations have tried to move the climate change

684
00:35:44,920 --> 00:35:49,920
Speaker 3: conversation towards people recycling their bottles or whatever, because it

685
00:35:50,600 --> 00:35:52,560
Speaker 3: kind of changes the terms of it, which makes it

686
00:35:52,600 --> 00:35:59,400
Speaker 3: easier for them to avoid these demands. But on the

687
00:35:59,440 --> 00:36:03,080
Speaker 3: other hand, I I'm always very conscious that my carbon footprint,

688
00:36:03,280 --> 00:36:06,719
Speaker 3: as like an affluent northern European, is many times that

689
00:36:06,880 --> 00:36:11,800
Speaker 3: of the you know, median global person, and that also

690
00:36:11,920 --> 00:36:17,239
Speaker 3: does put me in a difficult moral position. But then

691
00:36:17,280 --> 00:36:19,359
Speaker 3: also I feel relatively smug about that. The whole thing

692
00:36:19,520 --> 00:36:23,759
Speaker 3: is like I don't drive, I don't have children, I've

693
00:36:23,800 --> 00:36:26,920
Speaker 3: basically given up flying, and like I said, I'm trying

694
00:36:26,960 --> 00:36:30,320
Speaker 3: to be vegan, and I live in five hundred square feet,

695
00:36:31,239 --> 00:36:33,640
Speaker 3: so like it's pretty easy for me to look down

696
00:36:33,680 --> 00:36:37,400
Speaker 3: on other people. I also think looking down at other

697
00:36:37,440 --> 00:36:40,759
Speaker 3: people for climate reasons is bad and not helpful, But

698
00:36:42,560 --> 00:36:44,880
Speaker 3: it does make it easy for me to say that

699
00:36:44,920 --> 00:36:48,560
Speaker 3: individual responsibility is important, because if you look at my

700
00:36:48,640 --> 00:36:52,040
Speaker 3: individual responsibilities, I come out looking pretty good, I think,

701
00:36:52,080 --> 00:36:55,319
Speaker 3: although I do buy quite a lot of clothes. Of course,

702
00:36:55,360 --> 00:36:57,120
Speaker 3: the answer is we have to do both, like we

703
00:36:57,560 --> 00:37:01,839
Speaker 3: have to have governments making huge changes. Then also realistically,

704
00:37:01,880 --> 00:37:03,799
Speaker 3: in the future, all of us individually are going to

705
00:37:03,800 --> 00:37:07,560
Speaker 3: have to make changes in our lives as well, because

706
00:37:08,160 --> 00:37:12,319
Speaker 3: if all six or seven billion people on Earth live

707
00:37:12,440 --> 00:37:17,040
Speaker 3: like affluent Northern Europeans, that won't work. But we also

708
00:37:17,160 --> 00:37:21,640
Speaker 3: can't ask the majority of the global population to maintain

709
00:37:21,719 --> 00:37:25,360
Speaker 3: a lower standard living than we have because there's no

710
00:37:25,400 --> 00:37:27,960
Speaker 3: reason for that. So we are going to have to

711
00:37:28,000 --> 00:37:30,960
Speaker 3: smooth things out in some way. So I don't know,

712
00:37:31,040 --> 00:37:32,719
Speaker 3: but yeah, I think, you know, we have to do both.

713
00:37:32,719 --> 00:37:35,600
Speaker 1: Of course, I think it's really fascinating the moral implications

714
00:37:35,600 --> 00:37:38,360
Speaker 1: of turning things into costs. Though. If I'm willing to

715
00:37:38,400 --> 00:37:42,080
Speaker 1: pay more for a banana that's very environmentally expensive, does

716
00:37:42,120 --> 00:37:44,760
Speaker 1: that like make it okay that I'm eating this banana

717
00:37:44,760 --> 00:37:46,719
Speaker 1: because I've paid for it, Or like in the world

718
00:37:46,840 --> 00:37:50,000
Speaker 1: you've constructed, If I want a specific view from my condo,

719
00:37:50,080 --> 00:37:52,160
Speaker 1: and I know that building a condo there meant some

720
00:37:52,200 --> 00:37:54,520
Speaker 1: caterpillar had to go extinct, but hey, I'm willing to

721
00:37:54,520 --> 00:37:57,560
Speaker 1: pay another ten k for that condo, does that like

722
00:37:57,640 --> 00:38:00,760
Speaker 1: absolve me of responsibility? Or am I just like seeding

723
00:38:00,880 --> 00:38:04,120
Speaker 1: the responsibility for this choice to the algorithm of free

724
00:38:04,120 --> 00:38:05,080
Speaker 1: market capitalism.

725
00:38:05,600 --> 00:38:12,719
Speaker 3: So there is this attitude that offsets are dangerous because

726
00:38:13,520 --> 00:38:19,160
Speaker 3: they simply, you know, shunt the damage to someone else,

727
00:38:19,200 --> 00:38:22,800
Speaker 3: and they relieve the pressure to actually make real changes,

728
00:38:23,800 --> 00:38:28,040
Speaker 3: and we need that pressure. I don't really agree with that.

729
00:38:28,080 --> 00:38:32,640
Speaker 3: You know. Obviously, the premise of offsets is that the

730
00:38:32,680 --> 00:38:39,400
Speaker 3: free market is good at finding the most efficient method

731
00:38:39,760 --> 00:38:43,040
Speaker 3: and time and place to accomplish something. And if the

732
00:38:43,080 --> 00:38:46,400
Speaker 3: thing we want to accomplish is you know, not omit

733
00:38:46,800 --> 00:38:50,040
Speaker 3: one hundred times tons of carbon, then we might as

734
00:38:50,080 --> 00:38:52,439
Speaker 3: well do that in the most efficient time and place

735
00:38:52,480 --> 00:38:55,120
Speaker 3: and by the most efficient method. You know, I don't

736
00:38:55,160 --> 00:39:00,480
Speaker 3: think there's any reason why we can't smooth that out.

737
00:39:01,480 --> 00:39:04,560
Speaker 3: But you know, as I write about in the book,

738
00:39:04,840 --> 00:39:09,640
Speaker 3: the whole offset idea, since its inception and in every

739
00:39:09,680 --> 00:39:15,960
Speaker 3: implementation of it has been extremely be deviled by loopholes

740
00:39:16,040 --> 00:39:21,160
Speaker 3: and corruption and fraud and lies and so on. So

741
00:39:21,200 --> 00:39:24,600
Speaker 3: in practice it hasn't really worked. But in principle I

742
00:39:24,640 --> 00:39:29,960
Speaker 3: don't see anything wrong with it. You know, if the

743
00:39:30,040 --> 00:39:33,880
Speaker 3: fact that is it coldplay who were like, our tours

744
00:39:33,880 --> 00:39:36,200
Speaker 3: are going to be carbon neutral and some of the

745
00:39:36,239 --> 00:39:39,680
Speaker 3: ways we're going to do that with offsets, if the

746
00:39:39,719 --> 00:39:43,360
Speaker 3: offsets are real. But I think that's goods. I think

747
00:39:43,680 --> 00:39:45,399
Speaker 3: I was something it's good if the offsets are real.

748
00:39:45,520 --> 00:39:49,160
Speaker 3: But the problem is again, because the free market is

749
00:39:49,200 --> 00:39:52,839
Speaker 3: so nimble and devious, a fake offset is always going

750
00:39:52,880 --> 00:39:55,600
Speaker 3: to be more profitable than a real one. So most

751
00:39:55,640 --> 00:39:57,799
Speaker 3: of the offsets will turn out to be fake. But

752
00:39:58,239 --> 00:40:02,319
Speaker 3: if we could make them more real, great, But the

753
00:40:02,320 --> 00:40:04,640
Speaker 3: free market is cleverer than us, so I don't think

754
00:40:04,640 --> 00:40:05,360
Speaker 3: that will ever happen.

755
00:40:06,400 --> 00:40:08,840
Speaker 2: Yeah, these things are complicated and it all depends on

756
00:40:08,840 --> 00:40:12,040
Speaker 2: their implementation, which sort of leads to the next question.

757
00:40:12,239 --> 00:40:16,000
Speaker 2: So technology is an important feature of the book, and

758
00:40:16,360 --> 00:40:20,200
Speaker 2: in the book they're working through the technology to maybe

759
00:40:20,400 --> 00:40:23,600
Speaker 2: to be able to bring individual people back after they've died,

760
00:40:23,680 --> 00:40:27,400
Speaker 2: and then a whole species back after they've gone extinct.

761
00:40:27,520 --> 00:40:29,160
Speaker 2: And so you know, this sort of ties in with

762
00:40:29,239 --> 00:40:31,200
Speaker 2: the extinction credits. You don't have to feel quite as

763
00:40:31,239 --> 00:40:34,040
Speaker 2: bad if you think you can bring an animal back eventually. Also,

764
00:40:34,600 --> 00:40:37,720
Speaker 2: so to you, what is the thing that makes extinction

765
00:40:38,320 --> 00:40:41,319
Speaker 2: so terrible? Like if we still have it as a

766
00:40:41,360 --> 00:40:43,279
Speaker 2: backup on one of our computers and we can maybe

767
00:40:43,280 --> 00:40:45,600
Speaker 2: bring it back one data, is that make it less

768
00:40:45,680 --> 00:40:48,600
Speaker 2: bad because maybe it's not completely gone? So what do

769
00:40:48,640 --> 00:40:51,400
Speaker 2: you think about the role of technology and extinction and

770
00:40:51,440 --> 00:40:52,960
Speaker 2: when is the species really extinct?

771
00:40:53,080 --> 00:40:55,560
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's I right about on the book. In principle,

772
00:40:55,600 --> 00:40:58,879
Speaker 3: we could get to a point where we have all

773
00:40:58,880 --> 00:41:01,200
Speaker 3: of these threatened spece is in Buyo banks, and then

774
00:41:01,239 --> 00:41:04,760
Speaker 3: then the future we could bring them back. But will

775
00:41:04,840 --> 00:41:07,400
Speaker 3: we ever bring them back? I just don't think we will.

776
00:41:07,480 --> 00:41:11,800
Speaker 3: I can see us bringing back willy mammoths and stuff,

777
00:41:12,440 --> 00:41:16,399
Speaker 3: but the vorst majority of the species going extinct every

778
00:41:16,480 --> 00:41:21,240
Speaker 3: year are kind of very obscure rainforest beetles or whatever,

779
00:41:22,280 --> 00:41:24,160
Speaker 3: And I just don't think we ever will bring those

780
00:41:24,200 --> 00:41:29,440
Speaker 3: back because who is going to pay for that, and

781
00:41:29,480 --> 00:41:31,920
Speaker 3: who is going to keep them alive once they're brought back,

782
00:41:32,040 --> 00:41:34,920
Speaker 3: and you know where is that going to happen and

783
00:41:35,000 --> 00:41:37,480
Speaker 3: so on. So I think the fact that we could

784
00:41:37,600 --> 00:41:40,919
Speaker 3: doesn't mean that we will. We probably won't, which means

785
00:41:40,960 --> 00:41:44,200
Speaker 3: we shouldn't put ourselves in that position of being like, well,

786
00:41:44,239 --> 00:41:46,399
Speaker 3: we've still got them, so we could still bring them back,

787
00:41:46,400 --> 00:41:49,919
Speaker 3: so they're not really extinct. But then when you start

788
00:41:49,960 --> 00:41:58,840
Speaker 3: asking whether this kind of potential resurrected beetle is a

789
00:41:58,960 --> 00:42:01,520
Speaker 3: kind of Ersat's version the way real thing, that's when

790
00:42:01,520 --> 00:42:08,360
Speaker 3: you do start to like wander into this fazzia territory.

791
00:42:08,480 --> 00:42:13,000
Speaker 3: You know, is there something inherently valuable about a beetle

792
00:42:13,320 --> 00:42:21,839
Speaker 3: that has continuously lived in the habitat in which it evolved, and,

793
00:42:22,520 --> 00:42:29,360
Speaker 3: as it were, the kind of community and ecosystem role

794
00:42:30,200 --> 00:42:34,520
Speaker 3: of that species within the you know, broader web of

795
00:42:34,600 --> 00:42:41,680
Speaker 3: species has continually existed from the first moment it evolved.

796
00:42:42,520 --> 00:42:50,439
Speaker 3: Is that more valuable than hypothetically the species being brought

797
00:42:50,480 --> 00:42:53,360
Speaker 3: back in a zoo in the future. Well, it seems

798
00:42:53,400 --> 00:42:56,239
Speaker 3: to me that it is. But it is harder than

799
00:42:56,280 --> 00:43:01,719
Speaker 3: to say, well, why it doesn't really seem to affect anyone.

800
00:43:02,960 --> 00:43:06,719
Speaker 3: It doesn't make anyone's life better, even if we're very

801
00:43:06,760 --> 00:43:10,280
Speaker 3: invested in this beetle existing somewhere in the world, whose

802
00:43:10,360 --> 00:43:15,400
Speaker 3: life is better because this you know beetle has continuously existed.

803
00:43:15,600 --> 00:43:20,520
Speaker 3: It is like caring deeply about your table being a

804
00:43:20,600 --> 00:43:24,160
Speaker 3: real antique instead of a fake antique. If you're very

805
00:43:24,200 --> 00:43:26,839
Speaker 3: into antiques, then of course you care about that. But

806
00:43:26,880 --> 00:43:30,239
Speaker 3: why should anyone else care about that? In particularly, why

807
00:43:30,239 --> 00:43:34,640
Speaker 3: should anyone else pay costs or give things up because

808
00:43:34,840 --> 00:43:38,319
Speaker 3: you care about that. That's a niche interest. It does

809
00:43:38,360 --> 00:43:43,160
Speaker 3: seem to me that it would be nice not to

810
00:43:43,200 --> 00:43:46,719
Speaker 3: eradicate this beetle and simply have it in a biobank

811
00:43:46,800 --> 00:43:51,120
Speaker 3: and clone it later. But you know that's not how

812
00:43:51,160 --> 00:43:53,719
Speaker 3: politics works. You can't say to people, well, we all

813
00:43:53,760 --> 00:43:55,759
Speaker 3: have to agree to do this because I think that

814
00:43:55,800 --> 00:43:58,400
Speaker 3: would be nice. So I think that's where philosophy comes in.

815
00:43:58,440 --> 00:44:00,920
Speaker 3: That's where you have to start thinking, well, well, I

816
00:44:00,960 --> 00:44:03,520
Speaker 3: have reasons for thinking it would be nice, and once

817
00:44:03,560 --> 00:44:06,680
Speaker 3: we dig into the reasons, maybe you would start to

818
00:44:06,719 --> 00:44:08,439
Speaker 3: agree with me too. But then, of course the danger

819
00:44:08,560 --> 00:44:10,600
Speaker 3: is once you start digging into the reasons, the reverse

820
00:44:10,640 --> 00:44:12,480
Speaker 3: could happen. It could be that I start thinking, well,

821
00:44:12,480 --> 00:44:15,120
Speaker 3: actually I don't even care anymore now that I've looked

822
00:44:15,120 --> 00:44:18,960
Speaker 3: at it, you know, really harshly, I don't care. I

823
00:44:18,960 --> 00:44:21,920
Speaker 3: think there actually are more important things. The other thing

824
00:44:21,920 --> 00:44:24,200
Speaker 3: I talked about in the book is that knowing that

825
00:44:24,280 --> 00:44:29,000
Speaker 3: this technology is there sort of takes the pressure off.

826
00:44:29,040 --> 00:44:32,040
Speaker 3: It's going to make us more lackadaisical because we have

827
00:44:32,160 --> 00:44:36,319
Speaker 3: a plan B. I think there is something to that,

828
00:44:36,360 --> 00:44:38,840
Speaker 3: but I wo you know, I don't think that's the

829
00:44:38,920 --> 00:44:42,400
Speaker 3: reason not to build biobanks or whatever. Better to have

830
00:44:42,440 --> 00:44:44,960
Speaker 3: them in case we need them than not to have

831
00:44:45,040 --> 00:44:46,480
Speaker 3: them out of a fear that they would make us

832
00:44:46,520 --> 00:44:47,320
Speaker 3: lazy or whatever.

833
00:44:47,640 --> 00:44:50,759
Speaker 1: I think it's fascinating the way having biobanks or the

834
00:44:50,800 --> 00:44:54,720
Speaker 1: ability to rest the day species makes extinction itself less terrible,

835
00:44:54,760 --> 00:44:57,759
Speaker 1: because it's the irreversibility of extinction that really gives it

836
00:44:57,760 --> 00:44:59,960
Speaker 1: its moral drama. Sort of reminds me of your answered

837
00:45:00,040 --> 00:45:03,600
Speaker 1: the question about teleporters, like, if I murdered somebody, it's

838
00:45:03,640 --> 00:45:05,960
Speaker 1: actually less terrible to murder them if I knew I

839
00:45:06,000 --> 00:45:08,359
Speaker 1: could just recreate them somewhere else. And then I'd say, like, look,

840
00:45:08,400 --> 00:45:11,800
Speaker 1: according to you know, novelist Ned Bowman, you still exist

841
00:45:11,840 --> 00:45:13,719
Speaker 1: and you as you even if I murdered you and

842
00:45:13,760 --> 00:45:14,319
Speaker 1: recreated you.

843
00:45:14,719 --> 00:45:17,080
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that's a great analogy actually, because again

844
00:45:17,880 --> 00:45:20,000
Speaker 3: I talk about this in the book. Yeah, the question

845
00:45:20,040 --> 00:45:23,839
Speaker 3: of whether something is extinct or not extinct, it's simplistic

846
00:45:24,000 --> 00:45:28,080
Speaker 3: to make that a binary. You know, extinction is arguably

847
00:45:28,200 --> 00:45:31,319
Speaker 3: not a clear cut enough concept that you can use

848
00:45:31,360 --> 00:45:35,440
Speaker 3: it in that way. It might be more helpful to

849
00:45:35,520 --> 00:45:40,160
Speaker 3: start talking about species being sort of extinct ish, although

850
00:45:40,200 --> 00:45:45,560
Speaker 3: again in the book Yeah, I asked, is that gonna

851
00:45:46,440 --> 00:45:52,359
Speaker 3: sort of expand our sense of how worried we might

852
00:45:52,440 --> 00:45:54,720
Speaker 3: need to be about a species, or on the contrary,

853
00:45:55,239 --> 00:45:59,120
Speaker 3: is it gonna let us relax when we shouldn't be

854
00:46:00,520 --> 00:46:02,080
Speaker 3: relaxing about it.

855
00:46:02,880 --> 00:46:05,160
Speaker 1: Well, then let me make the philosophical game of making

856
00:46:05,160 --> 00:46:08,920
Speaker 1: it more personal. Say we could scan you and resuscitate

857
00:46:09,000 --> 00:46:11,440
Speaker 1: you or recreate you later on. Would you want that

858
00:46:11,520 --> 00:46:13,400
Speaker 1: to happen? And would that make it less bad for

859
00:46:13,440 --> 00:46:14,400
Speaker 1: somebody to murder you?

860
00:46:14,640 --> 00:46:17,600
Speaker 3: Well again, reading loads of Greg Egan when I was

861
00:46:17,600 --> 00:46:20,080
Speaker 3: younger has been a huge infert of my thinking about this,

862
00:46:20,120 --> 00:46:22,759
Speaker 3: because he writes more interestingly than anyone else I've ever

863
00:46:22,800 --> 00:46:25,160
Speaker 3: read about what it would be like to be an

864
00:46:25,239 --> 00:46:31,520
Speaker 3: uploaded consciousness. And you know, of course, if you end

865
00:46:31,600 --> 00:46:34,440
Speaker 3: up living on a computer, then you might live for

866
00:46:35,800 --> 00:46:38,399
Speaker 3: well a you might live for another million or billion

867
00:46:38,480 --> 00:46:42,800
Speaker 3: years and be at that point you have complete freedom

868
00:46:42,920 --> 00:46:49,080
Speaker 3: to alter yourself. So is the person at the end

869
00:46:49,120 --> 00:46:54,600
Speaker 3: of the Billionaires who's been radically kind of expanded and

870
00:46:54,800 --> 00:47:00,880
Speaker 3: altered and perhaps merged or split into two or whatever.

871
00:47:01,320 --> 00:47:04,799
Speaker 3: Is that the same person as the person who was uploaded?

872
00:47:06,320 --> 00:47:08,480
Speaker 3: Once again, I think it's preposterous to give a straight

873
00:47:08,600 --> 00:47:11,280
Speaker 3: yes or no answer. You have to say, well, there's

874
00:47:11,320 --> 00:47:16,600
Speaker 3: some degree of continuity in it being the sameish person,

875
00:47:17,920 --> 00:47:20,440
Speaker 3: But I don't know. So you know. That's why I

876
00:47:20,480 --> 00:47:23,560
Speaker 3: always think it's a bit kind of apid to say,

877
00:47:24,040 --> 00:47:26,320
Speaker 3: or would you want to be immortal or not, because

878
00:47:26,480 --> 00:47:29,680
Speaker 3: clearly the person who's there at the end of eternity

879
00:47:30,680 --> 00:47:34,000
Speaker 3: is only in certain ways continuous with the person who

880
00:47:34,120 --> 00:47:36,200
Speaker 3: was there at the beginning of it, Like is that

881
00:47:36,280 --> 00:47:41,799
Speaker 3: person any more similar to you than your father is

882
00:47:41,880 --> 00:47:45,000
Speaker 3: similar to you or whatever. So when I think would

883
00:47:45,000 --> 00:47:47,160
Speaker 3: I want to live forever? Would that be terrifying? I

884
00:47:47,160 --> 00:47:49,560
Speaker 3: always thinking, well, I don't think living forever is possible

885
00:47:49,600 --> 00:47:52,200
Speaker 3: because the person at the end of forever is only

886
00:47:52,280 --> 00:47:55,400
Speaker 3: partly you. All of that said, my answer basically is no,

887
00:47:55,640 --> 00:47:59,879
Speaker 3: I think seventy to ninety years is ample. I really

888
00:48:00,040 --> 00:48:03,920
Speaker 3: don't feel any need or desire to live several hundred

889
00:48:04,160 --> 00:48:07,960
Speaker 3: or several thousand more. And also, you know, one of

890
00:48:07,960 --> 00:48:10,840
Speaker 3: the things greg Igan writes about, and again there is

891
00:48:11,120 --> 00:48:13,240
Speaker 3: sort of reference in a distent way in the book,

892
00:48:13,440 --> 00:48:17,400
Speaker 3: is like, that's a lot of time to go nuts. Basically,

893
00:48:17,480 --> 00:48:21,360
Speaker 3: that's a lot of time to become obsessed with the

894
00:48:21,400 --> 00:48:28,920
Speaker 3: wrong thing or to start valuing the wrong things. And obviously,

895
00:48:29,200 --> 00:48:32,719
Speaker 3: if you're in this position way you can sort of

896
00:48:33,000 --> 00:48:36,160
Speaker 3: edit yourself, then that can really turn into a spiral.

897
00:48:36,360 --> 00:48:38,839
Speaker 3: Like if you spend a week thinking there's nothing more

898
00:48:38,840 --> 00:48:41,879
Speaker 3: important than this thing that I've just got into, then

899
00:48:41,880 --> 00:48:46,560
Speaker 3: maybe you think, well, I'm going to edit myself so

900
00:48:46,600 --> 00:48:49,800
Speaker 3: I'm more committed to this thing that I've just got into.

901
00:48:50,600 --> 00:48:54,160
Speaker 3: And then the person that you've become who's more committed

902
00:48:54,200 --> 00:48:56,000
Speaker 3: to it thinks, well, I got to become even more

903
00:48:56,000 --> 00:49:00,000
Speaker 3: committed to it. So you start editing your own conscious

904
00:49:00,200 --> 00:49:02,719
Speaker 3: so that you become more and more into this specific thing,

905
00:49:03,080 --> 00:49:05,279
Speaker 3: and then you can never get out of it, and

906
00:49:05,320 --> 00:49:10,239
Speaker 3: then you're just there for eternity, kind of shriveling up

907
00:49:10,440 --> 00:49:16,320
Speaker 3: into this monomoniacal commuter consciousness. And you know, I'm already

908
00:49:16,400 --> 00:49:20,080
Speaker 3: way too into Monster Hunter World for my Xbox, Like

909
00:49:20,200 --> 00:49:22,399
Speaker 3: I dread to think how much I could get into

910
00:49:22,440 --> 00:49:25,719
Speaker 3: it if I had complete control over my own consciousness

911
00:49:25,719 --> 00:49:28,000
Speaker 3: and was going to live a billion years. So no, basically,

912
00:49:28,040 --> 00:49:31,120
Speaker 3: I think safer to die of old age. But I

913
00:49:31,160 --> 00:49:34,400
Speaker 3: wish the best to anyone who's getting uploaded, and I

914
00:49:34,440 --> 00:49:37,239
Speaker 3: completely think that's possible and they will be the same

915
00:49:37,239 --> 00:49:39,320
Speaker 3: person at least in the short term, so I encourage

916
00:49:39,360 --> 00:49:41,520
Speaker 3: I encourage people to try it out, but not for me.

917
00:49:42,040 --> 00:49:45,400
Speaker 2: So speaking of long term planning. What are your thoughts

918
00:49:45,440 --> 00:49:49,560
Speaker 2: on are we going to eventually avert this extinction disaster

919
00:49:49,800 --> 00:49:52,280
Speaker 2: at some point? Like, what do you think our prospects

920
00:49:52,320 --> 00:49:55,480
Speaker 2: are for humanity in the next one hundred or one

921
00:49:55,520 --> 00:49:56,240
Speaker 2: thousand years?

922
00:49:56,480 --> 00:49:58,319
Speaker 3: Well, again, this is why I didn't set the book

923
00:49:58,360 --> 00:50:01,280
Speaker 3: any further in the future. I know people become furious

924
00:50:01,320 --> 00:50:04,200
Speaker 3: when this is said. I do think there is at

925
00:50:04,280 --> 00:50:08,600
Speaker 3: least a possibility that when we build an AI that's

926
00:50:08,640 --> 00:50:11,480
Speaker 3: like a million times more intelligent than any human being,

927
00:50:11,920 --> 00:50:13,919
Speaker 3: the AI will come up with something that we didn't

928
00:50:13,920 --> 00:50:17,000
Speaker 3: come up with. Like, I do think that could happen.

929
00:50:17,120 --> 00:50:19,520
Speaker 3: I don't think we should rely on that happening. And

930
00:50:19,640 --> 00:50:23,040
Speaker 3: if that doesn't happen, I don't think it is looking

931
00:50:23,440 --> 00:50:27,400
Speaker 3: very good. I actually listen to a different podcast recently

932
00:50:27,440 --> 00:50:31,640
Speaker 3: with Peter Watts, the Canadian science fiction novelist who's really

933
00:50:31,640 --> 00:50:36,560
Speaker 3: brilliant and also famous for his pessimism, and his take

934
00:50:36,680 --> 00:50:41,040
Speaker 3: on it is that even with a lot of geo engineering,

935
00:50:42,280 --> 00:50:47,080
Speaker 3: so much climate change has already locked into the oceans

936
00:50:47,280 --> 00:50:52,960
Speaker 3: and so forth, that we can avert the very worst. Maybe,

937
00:50:53,000 --> 00:50:56,080
Speaker 3: but we can't. It's already too late to avert the

938
00:50:57,000 --> 00:51:01,480
Speaker 3: almost as bad and the almost as bad definitely involves

939
00:51:02,040 --> 00:51:06,720
Speaker 3: a lot of ecosystems being absolutely devastated and a huge

940
00:51:06,880 --> 00:51:11,160
Speaker 3: chunk of the biodiversity of the Earth just going away,

941
00:51:11,680 --> 00:51:15,920
Speaker 3: probably before we have the opportunity to scan and preserve

942
00:51:15,960 --> 00:51:18,360
Speaker 3: it all. But then, you know, you've got to have

943
00:51:18,400 --> 00:51:21,160
Speaker 3: a certain amount of intellectual humility about this stuff. Like

944
00:51:21,320 --> 00:51:23,319
Speaker 3: every ten years you look at the grass and it's

945
00:51:23,400 --> 00:51:26,319
Speaker 3: like the graph is not where it's supposed to be,

946
00:51:26,400 --> 00:51:28,759
Speaker 3: Like sometimes it's worse or sometimes it's better, Like the

947
00:51:28,800 --> 00:51:31,560
Speaker 3: whole thing about renewable energy having gone down in price

948
00:51:31,600 --> 00:51:34,160
Speaker 3: point ninety seven percent or whatever it is over the

949
00:51:34,200 --> 00:51:38,560
Speaker 3: past decade. So I really can't say it'll be nice

950
00:51:38,560 --> 00:51:40,719
Speaker 3: if Ani saved us, But I do want to emphasize

951
00:51:41,080 --> 00:51:42,919
Speaker 3: I don't think we should like sit back and wait

952
00:51:42,960 --> 00:51:44,840
Speaker 3: for that to happen. It would be if that was

953
00:51:44,920 --> 00:51:46,959
Speaker 3: only the emergency plan and we came up with something

954
00:51:46,960 --> 00:51:47,800
Speaker 3: better in the meantime.

955
00:51:47,880 --> 00:51:50,719
Speaker 1: All Right, we have lots more hard philosophical questions for

956
00:51:50,760 --> 00:52:06,439
Speaker 1: a NED. Well, first we have to take a quick break. Okay,

957
00:52:06,480 --> 00:52:08,799
Speaker 1: we're back and we are channing with Niin Bowman, the

958
00:52:08,840 --> 00:52:11,600
Speaker 1: author of Venomous Lumpsucker. Well, I'd love to hear a

959
00:52:11,640 --> 00:52:13,960
Speaker 1: little bit more about your writing process. You said you

960
00:52:13,960 --> 00:52:16,280
Speaker 1: did a lot of research. Why did you decide to

961
00:52:16,360 --> 00:52:19,399
Speaker 1: invent a fictional species for your book whereas the rest

962
00:52:19,440 --> 00:52:21,800
Speaker 1: of it seems to follow the rules of our universe?

963
00:52:22,360 --> 00:52:27,440
Speaker 3: Well, the book had to be premised on a highly

964
00:52:27,719 --> 00:52:32,120
Speaker 3: intelligent species, and most of the highly intelligent species that

965
00:52:32,200 --> 00:52:38,840
Speaker 3: we know about are fairly well publicized, so the fact

966
00:52:39,080 --> 00:52:45,760
Speaker 3: of whether they are endangered or extinct is a fact

967
00:52:45,760 --> 00:52:47,839
Speaker 3: in the world that people know, which would have made

968
00:52:47,840 --> 00:52:52,920
Speaker 3: it very hard to fictionalize it. So I had to

969
00:52:52,960 --> 00:52:58,319
Speaker 3: come up with a fictional intelligent species that could plausibly

970
00:52:58,440 --> 00:53:04,600
Speaker 3: have remained obscure. And I didn't really feel like it

971
00:53:04,640 --> 00:53:07,239
Speaker 3: could be a mammal because if you look at the

972
00:53:07,320 --> 00:53:10,799
Speaker 3: club of mammals, there aren't actually that many, Like there

973
00:53:10,800 --> 00:53:15,239
Speaker 3: really aren't that many mammals, especially in Europe, and if

974
00:53:15,280 --> 00:53:19,200
Speaker 3: there was an intelligent mammal, we would have heard about it.

975
00:53:19,239 --> 00:53:21,120
Speaker 3: I mean, apart from the ones that we obviously already

976
00:53:21,120 --> 00:53:24,120
Speaker 3: know about. I really don't think there are any very

977
00:53:24,239 --> 00:53:27,920
Speaker 3: intelligent mammals that just nobody who's noticed yet. That didn't

978
00:53:27,920 --> 00:53:30,960
Speaker 3: feel realistic to me. So I made it a fish

979
00:53:31,040 --> 00:53:36,480
Speaker 3: because there are so many fish, and fish intelligence is

980
00:53:36,560 --> 00:53:41,560
Speaker 3: still pretty understudied, so it was just about credible to me,

981
00:53:42,080 --> 00:53:46,120
Speaker 3: and hopefully it's the reader that there could be this

982
00:53:46,320 --> 00:53:49,600
Speaker 3: fish that was really special, but just we hadn't really

983
00:53:49,600 --> 00:53:53,080
Speaker 3: been paying any attention and it had maybe gone extinct

984
00:53:53,080 --> 00:53:55,880
Speaker 3: without anyone really noticing. And the other advantage of a

985
00:53:55,920 --> 00:53:59,239
Speaker 3: fish is that fish are hard to find. Like, if

986
00:53:59,239 --> 00:54:02,280
Speaker 3: it's a bird, you can just set up cameras or whatever.

987
00:54:02,480 --> 00:54:04,080
Speaker 3: I mean, if you care enough about it, you can

988
00:54:04,080 --> 00:54:06,080
Speaker 3: just set up loads of cameras. But if something is

989
00:54:06,120 --> 00:54:10,000
Speaker 3: obviously in the ocean, then you know, it's very dark

990
00:54:10,040 --> 00:54:14,239
Speaker 3: down there, so it's easier to believe that you could

991
00:54:14,280 --> 00:54:18,400
Speaker 3: have a quest for this species that didn't just entail

992
00:54:19,480 --> 00:54:22,200
Speaker 3: well we you know, send up one hundred drones with

993
00:54:22,239 --> 00:54:23,160
Speaker 3: cameras to look for it.

994
00:54:23,360 --> 00:54:24,880
Speaker 2: So when I was reading the book, it sort of

995
00:54:24,880 --> 00:54:28,319
Speaker 2: reminded me of some George Saunders short stories that I've read,

996
00:54:28,400 --> 00:54:30,600
Speaker 2: like it's sort of like wild and out there and

997
00:54:30,640 --> 00:54:32,920
Speaker 2: oh my gosh, what are these people thinking? But at

998
00:54:32,920 --> 00:54:35,520
Speaker 2: the end you're left positing all these big questions about

999
00:54:35,520 --> 00:54:38,400
Speaker 2: society and humanity. And clearly I'm no literary critic, so

1000
00:54:38,480 --> 00:54:40,319
Speaker 2: I've done a horrible job of describing all of this.

1001
00:54:40,440 --> 00:54:44,560
Speaker 2: But who outside of like your science fiction influences, Who

1002
00:54:44,600 --> 00:54:47,920
Speaker 2: are your like straight fiction influences other than Egan?

1003
00:54:48,080 --> 00:54:50,279
Speaker 3: I mean, I love George Saunders. Well I wouldn't really

1004
00:54:50,320 --> 00:54:53,719
Speaker 3: say he's an influence on me, partly because like so

1005
00:54:53,800 --> 00:54:56,239
Speaker 3: on as I think he talks about this, ultimately he's

1006
00:54:56,280 --> 00:55:02,239
Speaker 3: like very concerned with human feeling and human kindness and

1007
00:55:02,280 --> 00:55:04,200
Speaker 3: stuff like that, and like I'm not interested in that

1008
00:55:04,280 --> 00:55:06,960
Speaker 3: kind of thing at all, Like that's that's not what

1009
00:55:07,000 --> 00:55:10,279
Speaker 3: I write Norm's about. So there's a there's a there's

1010
00:55:10,280 --> 00:55:14,080
Speaker 3: a limit to how much I can take from him.

1011
00:55:14,520 --> 00:55:19,480
Speaker 3: So influences from outside science fiction, well, yes, funny. Any

1012
00:55:19,520 --> 00:55:22,160
Speaker 3: of the names I would mention, I don't know how

1013
00:55:22,280 --> 00:55:25,800
Speaker 3: much you would see of them in this book. Well, actually,

1014
00:55:26,400 --> 00:55:31,120
Speaker 3: Graham Green is one. You know, Green's novels are all

1015
00:55:31,200 --> 00:55:39,200
Speaker 3: about putting kind of tortured people into terrible moral situations,

1016
00:55:39,440 --> 00:55:43,239
Speaker 3: and I think that was definitely an influence. And what

1017
00:55:43,320 --> 00:55:46,359
Speaker 3: happens to Rasaint in this book, and actually when now

1018
00:55:46,440 --> 00:55:50,439
Speaker 3: they think about it, when she talks about Catholics and

1019
00:55:52,680 --> 00:55:55,920
Speaker 3: you know how thorny their theology is. I think I

1020
00:55:56,080 --> 00:56:00,440
Speaker 3: almost put kind of Catholics in the Graham Green novel

1021
00:56:00,920 --> 00:56:04,719
Speaker 3: or Catholic Grand Green readers or whatever, So that's definitely

1022
00:56:04,760 --> 00:56:07,640
Speaker 3: in there. I don't know other than that, you know,

1023
00:56:07,680 --> 00:56:09,720
Speaker 3: I'm not going to say I have transcended my influencers

1024
00:56:09,840 --> 00:56:12,560
Speaker 3: or anythink, but I would say that my earlier novels

1025
00:56:13,280 --> 00:56:18,839
Speaker 3: were very much a patchwork of influences and pastiches and

1026
00:56:19,280 --> 00:56:22,560
Speaker 3: even direct quotes, and I would happily go, well, this

1027
00:56:22,600 --> 00:56:25,560
Speaker 3: bit is from this person, and this bit is from

1028
00:56:25,640 --> 00:56:30,680
Speaker 3: this person. But I don't know. By the point of

1029
00:56:30,680 --> 00:56:34,200
Speaker 3: this novel, I'm still like totally in the shadow of

1030
00:56:34,239 --> 00:56:37,479
Speaker 3: all my influences, but I think I've at least found

1031
00:56:37,520 --> 00:56:41,240
Speaker 3: my own style and preoccupations to this to the point

1032
00:56:41,239 --> 00:56:44,200
Speaker 3: that I wouldn't say about this novel, well, this novel

1033
00:56:44,280 --> 00:56:47,240
Speaker 3: is simply this writer and this writer and this writer

1034
00:56:48,800 --> 00:56:51,239
Speaker 3: mashed together in the way that I would have with

1035
00:56:51,320 --> 00:56:52,000
Speaker 3: the early ones.

1036
00:56:52,760 --> 00:56:54,640
Speaker 1: So the book is really thoughtful. But I also want

1037
00:56:54,680 --> 00:56:57,439
Speaker 1: our listeners to appreciate, like how funny it is on

1038
00:56:57,480 --> 00:57:00,120
Speaker 1: the page, and part of that just comes from you know,

1039
00:57:00,200 --> 00:57:03,359
Speaker 1: your particular terms of phrase. And as I was reading it,

1040
00:57:03,400 --> 00:57:05,200
Speaker 1: I was struck by this for one word which I

1041
00:57:05,239 --> 00:57:07,120
Speaker 1: had to look up, and I'm going to ask you

1042
00:57:07,160 --> 00:57:09,160
Speaker 1: to give us like a useful definition of it because

1043
00:57:09,160 --> 00:57:11,799
Speaker 1: I need to know it in context. What exactly is

1044
00:57:11,920 --> 00:57:12,879
Speaker 1: an rgbargie?

1045
00:57:15,040 --> 00:57:18,480
Speaker 3: Well, the thing is, as with any word like that,

1046
00:57:19,000 --> 00:57:21,680
Speaker 3: if there was an easier way of saying it than

1047
00:57:21,720 --> 00:57:24,000
Speaker 3: meant the same thing that I would have used that like.

1048
00:57:24,160 --> 00:57:27,840
Speaker 3: I think I'm pretty sure I remember having to think, like,

1049
00:57:28,000 --> 00:57:34,920
Speaker 3: what is a one word or one phrase expression for

1050
00:57:35,560 --> 00:57:38,320
Speaker 3: what I am trying to talk about here? And I

1051
00:57:38,360 --> 00:57:41,080
Speaker 3: think it took me while to get to lgibargie because

1052
00:57:41,600 --> 00:57:44,000
Speaker 3: argibigi is not a word that I would normally use

1053
00:57:44,040 --> 00:57:46,840
Speaker 3: in conversation. It's probably a word that I had never

1054
00:57:47,320 --> 00:57:51,160
Speaker 3: written out in my life before. It's not a word

1055
00:57:51,160 --> 00:57:55,200
Speaker 3: that you hear come up that much, but it is

1056
00:57:55,240 --> 00:57:57,880
Speaker 3: one of those English phrases with a specific meaning that

1057
00:57:57,960 --> 00:58:10,680
Speaker 3: it's some combination of sort of fuss, commotion, disputation, hassle, argument,

1058
00:58:11,240 --> 00:58:14,560
Speaker 3: you know, all those kinds of things, but none of

1059
00:58:14,560 --> 00:58:19,919
Speaker 3: them quite capture it. And then if I remember rightly,

1060
00:58:20,120 --> 00:58:23,160
Speaker 3: it comes up when you know most of the book

1061
00:58:23,240 --> 00:58:25,919
Speaker 3: is about like Australians and Europeans in Europe, that bit

1062
00:58:26,160 --> 00:58:29,640
Speaker 3: is a English character talking about something that happened in England,

1063
00:58:30,440 --> 00:58:33,680
Speaker 3: and it's in in England, which has kind of gone backwards,

1064
00:58:34,200 --> 00:58:41,000
Speaker 3: so it felt appropriate there to use a quite old fashioned, quaint,

1065
00:58:41,360 --> 00:58:43,800
Speaker 3: very English words.

1066
00:58:45,160 --> 00:58:48,280
Speaker 1: But for example, is this something a married couple might

1067
00:58:48,400 --> 00:58:51,440
Speaker 1: do when they're, you know, disagreeing about whose turn it

1068
00:58:51,480 --> 00:58:53,960
Speaker 1: is to have to do the dishes? Or is this

1069
00:58:54,040 --> 00:58:56,840
Speaker 1: something kids? This is the description of kids arguments on

1070
00:58:56,880 --> 00:59:00,720
Speaker 1: the playground Or I'm just I'm lacking a concrete like

1071
00:59:00,880 --> 00:59:02,080
Speaker 1: understanding of what it means.

1072
00:59:02,320 --> 00:59:04,800
Speaker 3: If you said, like, oh, I had a bit of

1073
00:59:04,960 --> 00:59:08,560
Speaker 3: argie bargie with the wife or whatever, that would sound

1074
00:59:08,720 --> 00:59:17,040
Speaker 3: condescending or at least kind of inappropriately jovial, because it

1075
00:59:17,360 --> 00:59:29,160
Speaker 3: slightly implies a sort of annoying, somewhat inconsequential obstacle or

1076
00:59:30,000 --> 00:59:34,760
Speaker 3: friction that you just have to get past. You would

1077
00:59:34,760 --> 00:59:38,560
Speaker 3: have to say, like, during last night's argie bargie, my

1078
00:59:38,680 --> 00:59:42,880
Speaker 3: wife expressed some very real concerns which I listened to

1079
00:59:43,000 --> 00:59:45,920
Speaker 3: and took on boards like that simply wouldn't be compatible.

1080
00:59:48,640 --> 00:59:51,760
Speaker 2: What about your kid for the one thousandth time didn't

1081
00:59:51,800 --> 00:59:54,360
Speaker 2: put their underwear in the hamper and you had a

1082
00:59:54,360 --> 00:59:56,920
Speaker 2: bit of an argi bargie with them about it? Would

1083
00:59:56,920 --> 00:59:59,960
Speaker 2: that be appropriate, Like it is sort of inconsequence.

1084
01:00:00,400 --> 01:00:05,480
Speaker 3: Oh again, it's it's so hard to articulate why. But

1085
01:00:05,560 --> 01:00:11,480
Speaker 3: it doesn't have that sort of kind of intimate, interpersonal context.

1086
01:00:11,760 --> 01:00:14,520
Speaker 3: I think it implies more to something that happens at work,

1087
01:00:14,920 --> 01:00:18,080
Speaker 3: or I'm kind of imagining. I don't know, this is

1088
01:00:18,080 --> 01:00:27,800
Speaker 3: a random example, like if a policeman tells someone to

1089
01:00:28,000 --> 01:00:31,640
Speaker 3: move their bike or something, you know, or policemen don't

1090
01:00:31,640 --> 01:00:34,480
Speaker 3: carry guns, So I'm imagining like a slightly more benign

1091
01:00:34,560 --> 01:00:36,600
Speaker 3: version of that than might happen else are in the world.

1092
01:00:36,680 --> 01:00:39,800
Speaker 3: I mean, I do think it implies two people who

1093
01:00:39,880 --> 01:00:44,280
Speaker 3: don't really know each other kind of snapping at each other,

1094
01:00:45,240 --> 01:00:51,560
Speaker 3: not really succeeding in communicating. But ultimately it doesn't matter

1095
01:00:51,600 --> 01:00:53,920
Speaker 3: and it may as well never have happened.

1096
01:00:56,400 --> 01:00:58,000
Speaker 2: Oh so like everything on the internet.

1097
01:00:58,640 --> 01:01:03,480
Speaker 3: Yeah, but no, not really that I really am. I

1098
01:01:03,520 --> 01:01:05,880
Speaker 3: know it makes it sound like argie bargie is as

1099
01:01:06,160 --> 01:01:10,920
Speaker 3: hard a word to define as personhood or extinction. And

1100
01:01:10,960 --> 01:01:14,040
Speaker 3: when I'm thinking about personhood or extinction, I am thinking

1101
01:01:14,040 --> 01:01:18,040
Speaker 3: about like you know, vik Enstein famously said, no one

1102
01:01:18,040 --> 01:01:21,640
Speaker 3: can define a game. A game is just a kind

1103
01:01:21,680 --> 01:01:25,960
Speaker 3: of tangle of associated things. So that's why it's slightly

1104
01:01:26,040 --> 01:01:28,439
Speaker 3: upisaid whenever we try and define anyone, because any word

1105
01:01:28,480 --> 01:01:31,640
Speaker 3: basically is a tangle of associated, semi continuous things, And

1106
01:01:31,680 --> 01:01:34,640
Speaker 3: I think personhood is definitely like that, and I think, unfortunately,

1107
01:01:34,720 --> 01:01:37,160
Speaker 3: argie bargie is like that. Like that's how I'm so

1108
01:01:37,200 --> 01:01:41,320
Speaker 3: struggling to define it is. So it's so English, so contextual,

1109
01:01:42,520 --> 01:01:47,040
Speaker 3: and so hard to pin down exactly. It does have

1110
01:01:47,160 --> 01:01:54,280
Speaker 3: some implication of like bureaucracy, misunderstanding, someone trying to exert

1111
01:01:54,440 --> 01:02:00,560
Speaker 3: or authority, maybe a vague sense of impending physical scuffle,

1112
01:02:00,720 --> 01:02:02,640
Speaker 3: but the scuffle doesn't quite happen.

1113
01:02:03,280 --> 01:02:04,600
Speaker 1: This sounds like a faculty meeting.

1114
01:02:04,840 --> 01:02:07,880
Speaker 3: Yeah, but a faculty meeting would be unlikely to rise

1115
01:02:08,080 --> 01:02:10,200
Speaker 3: in RGI bargie in that way. I don't know. But

1116
01:02:10,560 --> 01:02:12,720
Speaker 3: this is also maybe why I never use this word,

1117
01:02:12,960 --> 01:02:14,480
Speaker 3: because it's so hard to grasp.

1118
01:02:14,800 --> 01:02:17,040
Speaker 1: Well. I think it's delicious how difficult it is to

1119
01:02:17,120 --> 01:02:19,760
Speaker 1: understand where the meanings of words are. Maybe we'll find

1120
01:02:19,800 --> 01:02:23,840
Speaker 1: somewhere a philosophy thesis on the topic of the rgbargie.

1121
01:02:23,880 --> 01:02:26,280
Speaker 1: But thanks very much for joining us today and digging

1122
01:02:26,320 --> 01:02:28,960
Speaker 1: into these tricky questions. We really enjoyed the book and

1123
01:02:29,000 --> 01:02:30,880
Speaker 1: we really enjoyed our conversation with you. Thank you.

1124
01:02:31,080 --> 01:02:32,720
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm trying to say thanks a lot for having me.

1125
01:02:32,920 --> 01:02:34,440
Speaker 1: And before we let you go, can you tell us

1126
01:02:34,440 --> 01:02:36,600
Speaker 1: anything about your upcoming projects or your next book.

1127
01:02:36,880 --> 01:02:43,200
Speaker 3: I have such another novel which is about how the

1128
01:02:43,240 --> 01:02:49,080
Speaker 3: most evil institution in world's history that has existed for

1129
01:02:49,320 --> 01:02:55,720
Speaker 3: hundreds of years is still in operation and thriving just

1130
01:02:56,000 --> 01:02:59,880
Speaker 3: west of London. But it is too early to reveal

1131
01:03:00,200 --> 01:03:05,000
Speaker 3: what that anician is. But people, welcome to guys.

1132
01:03:05,360 --> 01:03:08,560
Speaker 1: Wonderful sounds delicious. We look forward to seeing it. All right,

1133
01:03:08,600 --> 01:03:10,920
Speaker 1: thanks very much for coming on the program. All right,

1134
01:03:10,960 --> 01:03:14,360
Speaker 1: so that was a super fun conversation with Ned. I'm

1135
01:03:14,400 --> 01:03:17,280
Speaker 1: glad that he wouldn't consider that conversation an RG bargie.

1136
01:03:18,600 --> 01:03:21,720
Speaker 2: I cannot wait to use that word on zach And

1137
01:03:22,120 --> 01:03:26,439
Speaker 2: because he like loves old English stuff, and I can't

1138
01:03:26,440 --> 01:03:28,080
Speaker 2: wait to see if he knows what that word means.

1139
01:03:28,080 --> 01:03:30,120
Speaker 2: And I am going to use that word like five

1140
01:03:30,200 --> 01:03:32,480
Speaker 2: or six times a day until I personally feel like

1141
01:03:32,520 --> 01:03:34,200
Speaker 2: I know where it belongs in my life.

1142
01:03:34,440 --> 01:03:36,800
Speaker 1: Well, I hope it doesn't cause any RG bargies. I'm

1143
01:03:36,840 --> 01:03:39,520
Speaker 1: going to use it on my brother who moved to

1144
01:03:39,560 --> 01:03:41,560
Speaker 1: the UK and might have heard it and actually have

1145
01:03:41,800 --> 01:03:45,480
Speaker 1: like a native understanding of it while remembering his American roots.

1146
01:03:45,480 --> 01:03:47,080
Speaker 1: So perhaps he can translate it for me.

1147
01:03:47,280 --> 01:03:49,520
Speaker 2: Oh here, yeah, here's hoping. Keep me posted.

1148
01:03:50,160 --> 01:03:52,320
Speaker 1: Here's hoping. All right. Well, we had a lot of

1149
01:03:52,320 --> 01:03:54,440
Speaker 1: fun reading this book and talking to the author and

1150
01:03:54,480 --> 01:03:56,680
Speaker 1: talking to you about it, so I highly recommend the

1151
01:03:56,680 --> 01:03:59,640
Speaker 1: book A Venomous Lumpsucker by Ned Bowman. Go ahead and

1152
01:03:59,720 --> 01:04:02,040
Speaker 1: get it, read it, enjoy it. Thanks very much Kelly

1153
01:04:02,080 --> 01:04:03,920
Speaker 1: for reading this with me and talking about it.

1154
01:04:04,000 --> 01:04:05,840
Speaker 2: Thanks for having me. You were right when you said

1155
01:04:05,880 --> 01:04:07,600
Speaker 2: you read that passage and it made you think of me.

1156
01:04:08,080 --> 01:04:10,440
Speaker 2: This was the perfect book for me. I enjoyed it

1157
01:04:10,480 --> 01:04:11,800
Speaker 2: so much. Thanks for the invite.

1158
01:04:11,920 --> 01:04:14,880
Speaker 1: All right, Thanks everybody for listening, and tune in next time.

1159
01:04:20,040 --> 01:04:22,920
Speaker 1: For more science and curiosity, come find us on social

1160
01:04:22,960 --> 01:04:27,920
Speaker 1: media where we answer questions and post videos. We're on Twitter, Discord, instance,

1161
01:04:27,960 --> 01:04:31,200
Speaker 1: and now TikTok. And remember that Daniel and Jorge Explain

1162
01:04:31,280 --> 01:04:35,280
Speaker 1: the Universe is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts

1163
01:04:35,280 --> 01:04:39,920
Speaker 1: from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever

1164
01:04:40,000 --> 01:04:42,120
Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows.