1 00:00:06,440 --> 00:00:09,799 Speaker 1: But of those unhappy ones who were ensnared by Melkor, 2 00:00:10,119 --> 00:00:13,040 Speaker 1: little is known of a certainty, for who of the 3 00:00:13,119 --> 00:00:16,600 Speaker 1: living has descended into the pits of autumno or has 4 00:00:16,640 --> 00:00:20,479 Speaker 1: explored the darkness of the councils of Melkor. Yet this 5 00:00:20,640 --> 00:00:24,080 Speaker 1: is held true by the wise of Eressia, that all 6 00:00:24,120 --> 00:00:26,720 Speaker 1: those of the KINDI who came into the hands of 7 00:00:26,760 --> 00:00:31,400 Speaker 1: Melkor errotumno was broken, were put there in prison, and 8 00:00:31,440 --> 00:00:35,639 Speaker 1: by slow arts of cruelty, were corrupted and enslaved. And 9 00:00:35,720 --> 00:00:38,840 Speaker 1: thus did Melkor breathe the hideous race of the Orcs 10 00:00:39,280 --> 00:00:42,400 Speaker 1: in envy and mockery of the elves of whom they 11 00:00:42,400 --> 00:00:46,200 Speaker 1: were afterwards the bitterest foes. For the Orcs had life 12 00:00:46,400 --> 00:00:49,720 Speaker 1: and multiplied after the manner of the children of Iluvatar, 13 00:00:50,320 --> 00:00:52,600 Speaker 1: And naught that had life of its own, nor the 14 00:00:52,680 --> 00:00:56,400 Speaker 1: semblance of life, could ever Melkor make since his rebellion 15 00:00:56,760 --> 00:01:00,480 Speaker 1: in the Aino Lundeli before the beginning, So say the wise, 16 00:01:01,120 --> 00:01:03,960 Speaker 1: and deep in their dark hearts, the Orcs loathed the 17 00:01:04,000 --> 00:01:07,680 Speaker 1: master whom they served, in fear the maker only of 18 00:01:07,720 --> 00:01:15,680 Speaker 1: their misery. Welcome to stuff to blow your mind. The 19 00:01:15,760 --> 00:01:24,920 Speaker 1: production of my heart radio hey welcome to stuff to 20 00:01:24,920 --> 00:01:27,440 Speaker 1: blow your mind. My name is Robert Land, and I'm 21 00:01:27,520 --> 00:01:29,880 Speaker 1: Joe McCormick. And man, I had to read that opening 22 00:01:29,920 --> 00:01:31,959 Speaker 1: part quite a few times. That, of course, is from 23 00:01:32,000 --> 00:01:35,399 Speaker 1: The Sill Marillion by j. R. R. Tolkien. Yeah, and 24 00:01:35,400 --> 00:01:38,760 Speaker 1: of course we're talking about Tolkien because today's publication date 25 00:01:39,319 --> 00:01:43,560 Speaker 1: is September, which also happens to be the credited birth 26 00:01:43,680 --> 00:01:47,320 Speaker 1: date of both Frodo and Bilbo Baggins, the Hobbits central 27 00:01:47,400 --> 00:01:50,680 Speaker 1: to J. R. Tolkien saga of Middle Earth. Uh. Thus 28 00:01:50,720 --> 00:01:53,400 Speaker 1: this has become known as Hobbit Day, which falls during 29 00:01:53,680 --> 00:01:57,560 Speaker 1: Tolkien Week, at least as proposed by the American Tolkien 30 00:01:57,560 --> 00:02:00,760 Speaker 1: Society in Night. So this TRD and is roughly a 31 00:02:00,760 --> 00:02:03,880 Speaker 1: month older than I am. That's funny. So it's a 32 00:02:03,920 --> 00:02:07,200 Speaker 1: week long festival then, yeah, yeah, apparently a week long 33 00:02:07,240 --> 00:02:10,959 Speaker 1: celebration of Middle Earth and all things token. I was 34 00:02:11,000 --> 00:02:14,000 Speaker 1: not aware of it until just like last month and 35 00:02:14,080 --> 00:02:17,360 Speaker 1: I realized the publication day lined up perfectly, and I'm like, oh, well, 36 00:02:17,360 --> 00:02:20,560 Speaker 1: we've already done an episode on the One Ring. We 37 00:02:20,560 --> 00:02:24,760 Speaker 1: did another one on Hobbits and how their their biology 38 00:02:24,840 --> 00:02:30,000 Speaker 1: works and how they relate to multiple meals per day 39 00:02:30,040 --> 00:02:32,160 Speaker 1: and to Sunlight, and so I thought, well, we got 40 00:02:32,160 --> 00:02:33,959 Speaker 1: to come with something else that we can talk about 41 00:02:34,040 --> 00:02:37,960 Speaker 1: on Hobbit Day itself. So you wanted to talk about orcs. 42 00:02:38,360 --> 00:02:40,360 Speaker 1: I guess you've had Token on the brain all year, right, 43 00:02:40,360 --> 00:02:42,480 Speaker 1: Are you still? Are you still reading it with the family? 44 00:02:42,960 --> 00:02:45,800 Speaker 1: No way, I haven't been reading it. We've been meaning 45 00:02:45,840 --> 00:02:48,680 Speaker 1: to come back around to Fellowship of the Rings, but 46 00:02:49,080 --> 00:02:51,720 Speaker 1: instead we just we just got into Star Wars this year, 47 00:02:51,800 --> 00:02:54,280 Speaker 1: so that's where we are. But I couldn't. I couldn't 48 00:02:54,320 --> 00:02:57,920 Speaker 1: let the stars seemed to align on this particular episode. 49 00:02:57,919 --> 00:02:59,800 Speaker 1: So I thought, well, we've got to we gotta do something. 50 00:03:00,000 --> 00:03:02,760 Speaker 1: Started looking around, I thought, well, maybe it's orcs. Orcs 51 00:03:02,760 --> 00:03:06,160 Speaker 1: are such a central part of the work and something 52 00:03:06,200 --> 00:03:10,919 Speaker 1: that has been highly influential on fantasy in general, like 53 00:03:11,520 --> 00:03:15,560 Speaker 1: generally speaking, fantasy games, fantasy books, fantasy movies. They're just 54 00:03:15,680 --> 00:03:19,360 Speaker 1: lousy with orcs, you know. I was trying to think 55 00:03:19,360 --> 00:03:22,760 Speaker 1: when I first started, when I first became aware of orcs, 56 00:03:22,800 --> 00:03:25,480 Speaker 1: and I think before I ever read any Tolkien, I 57 00:03:25,560 --> 00:03:31,040 Speaker 1: played the warcraft games which which have orcs in them, 58 00:03:31,080 --> 00:03:34,960 Speaker 1: which are essentially the palace guards at Java's Palace from 59 00:03:34,960 --> 00:03:39,200 Speaker 1: Return of the Jedi. Yeah, they're green, and they've got tusks, 60 00:03:39,240 --> 00:03:42,760 Speaker 1: and they've got kind of like a bulldog faces. Yeah, 61 00:03:42,760 --> 00:03:44,400 Speaker 1: they have that. They look a lot like those Gamorian 62 00:03:44,480 --> 00:03:48,520 Speaker 1: guards from from Jedi Um. They also of course, of course, 63 00:03:48,640 --> 00:03:52,400 Speaker 1: um that whole gaming system I think has its roots 64 00:03:52,440 --> 00:03:56,960 Speaker 1: too and being inspired by the Warhammer games as well, 65 00:03:57,480 --> 00:03:59,360 Speaker 1: which yeah, which I'll touch base on that in a 66 00:03:59,360 --> 00:04:02,280 Speaker 1: little bit, because think they're very important to the history 67 00:04:02,280 --> 00:04:06,640 Speaker 1: of how we interpret orcs. Um. I I think I've 68 00:04:06,680 --> 00:04:10,160 Speaker 1: I have always pictured the Orcs of Middle Earth in 69 00:04:10,280 --> 00:04:14,280 Speaker 1: less detail, like, you know, more abstract, brutish creatures in 70 00:04:14,320 --> 00:04:16,599 Speaker 1: the you know, in the rough semblance of human beings. 71 00:04:16,800 --> 00:04:19,560 Speaker 1: And part of that might be that I at a 72 00:04:19,640 --> 00:04:21,599 Speaker 1: very early age I saw at least parts of the 73 00:04:21,640 --> 00:04:27,200 Speaker 1: original UH animated version where all the animation is pretty 74 00:04:27,279 --> 00:04:30,120 Speaker 1: much like that. It's kind of like abstract shapes and 75 00:04:30,560 --> 00:04:33,560 Speaker 1: less detail, and the Orcs and other evil things are 76 00:04:33,600 --> 00:04:36,560 Speaker 1: often shown in kind of a silhouette. This is the 77 00:04:36,640 --> 00:04:39,520 Speaker 1: ralph back she one with the does have rhotoscoping in it. 78 00:04:39,640 --> 00:04:43,360 Speaker 1: Rotoscoping animation. I believe that's the technique they used. Yeah, 79 00:04:43,400 --> 00:04:47,360 Speaker 1: it was. It's it's interesting, it's a little bit different 80 00:04:47,400 --> 00:04:50,720 Speaker 1: from the Rank and bass uh animation that you saw 81 00:04:50,800 --> 00:04:53,440 Speaker 1: on The Hobbit and then saw on the Return of 82 00:04:53,480 --> 00:04:58,440 Speaker 1: the King, which you know basically finished what this film didn't. Oh, 83 00:04:58,480 --> 00:05:01,120 Speaker 1: this is the one where Sauma this Santa Claus, they 84 00:05:01,120 --> 00:05:04,640 Speaker 1: give him a red robe. It's been so long, I 85 00:05:04,640 --> 00:05:07,599 Speaker 1: don't even I don't even remember that honestly, but but 86 00:05:07,680 --> 00:05:10,120 Speaker 1: I I remember flashes of it. It had it had 87 00:05:10,160 --> 00:05:13,920 Speaker 1: some sort of an impact on me. Um, I'd say 88 00:05:13,960 --> 00:05:17,240 Speaker 1: that I think in hearing about Middle Earth and all um, 89 00:05:18,560 --> 00:05:20,120 Speaker 1: it probably also has a lot to do with like 90 00:05:20,160 --> 00:05:22,839 Speaker 1: the two earliest stories that I remember my dad telling 91 00:05:22,880 --> 00:05:26,120 Speaker 1: me were he would tell me about Beowulf and Grendel. 92 00:05:26,400 --> 00:05:28,760 Speaker 1: So had this like really early idea of Grendel in 93 00:05:28,839 --> 00:05:31,679 Speaker 1: my head, and then I remember him telling me about 94 00:05:31,720 --> 00:05:34,320 Speaker 1: the Battle of Hastings, so I have I think I 95 00:05:34,400 --> 00:05:37,560 Speaker 1: ended up sort of cobbling together this this Middle Earth 96 00:05:37,760 --> 00:05:40,840 Speaker 1: orc as being a combination of Norseman or Viking and 97 00:05:40,880 --> 00:05:45,680 Speaker 1: that figure of Grendel. M M. But that's just me personally, 98 00:05:46,000 --> 00:05:48,719 Speaker 1: just based on like where I came into learning about 99 00:05:48,720 --> 00:05:52,200 Speaker 1: the Hobbit and what I've been exposed to previously. UM. 100 00:05:52,240 --> 00:05:54,640 Speaker 1: And as as we're going to discuss here. There's there's 101 00:05:54,720 --> 00:05:57,840 Speaker 1: subsequently been so many different visions of orcs and what 102 00:05:58,000 --> 00:06:01,200 Speaker 1: orcs are, and we're still in the process us uh 103 00:06:01,360 --> 00:06:05,360 Speaker 1: of of defining and redefining what an orc is. For 104 00:06:05,400 --> 00:06:07,800 Speaker 1: some reason, I remember thinking that the orcs of the 105 00:06:07,839 --> 00:06:11,880 Speaker 1: Peter Jackson movies have a very dickensie and villain kind 106 00:06:11,880 --> 00:06:15,080 Speaker 1: of flare, like they've got this, you know, sinister Cockney 107 00:06:15,120 --> 00:06:20,000 Speaker 1: accent that you hear. Yeah, the Peter Jackson orcs are 108 00:06:20,240 --> 00:06:24,400 Speaker 1: are are very important in our our modern perceptions of them. 109 00:06:24,400 --> 00:06:27,680 Speaker 1: But but even those are are suitably very There are 110 00:06:27,680 --> 00:06:30,400 Speaker 1: a lot of different visions of what an orc is 111 00:06:30,440 --> 00:06:34,799 Speaker 1: in those films. They range from like big like dark 112 00:06:34,960 --> 00:06:39,520 Speaker 1: brutes to more goblin e forms. There's like one general 113 00:06:39,600 --> 00:06:41,159 Speaker 1: that shows up and I think Return of the King 114 00:06:41,240 --> 00:06:45,760 Speaker 1: that has this very like elephant man um tumorous appearance. 115 00:06:46,560 --> 00:06:48,680 Speaker 1: And then by the Hobbit films they seem to have 116 00:06:48,680 --> 00:06:51,400 Speaker 1: refined it a little bit to where you have either 117 00:06:51,480 --> 00:06:53,839 Speaker 1: refined the work in general or that, or just they've 118 00:06:53,839 --> 00:06:56,480 Speaker 1: decided to portray these sort of misty mountain orcs as 119 00:06:56,560 --> 00:07:00,719 Speaker 1: being almost kind of nos Feratu in they kind of 120 00:07:00,720 --> 00:07:02,840 Speaker 1: look like big, beefy nos Feratus in a way, in 121 00:07:02,880 --> 00:07:05,480 Speaker 1: a way that I think really works more the classic 122 00:07:05,520 --> 00:07:08,280 Speaker 1: Max shrek nos Ferrat or the klass Kinski knows Ferra 123 00:07:08,400 --> 00:07:11,560 Speaker 1: to the Max shredded nos Ferratto. That's that's what they 124 00:07:11,600 --> 00:07:16,000 Speaker 1: are like. This is very just very beefy um je Max. 125 00:07:18,480 --> 00:07:22,360 Speaker 1: Now we mentioned mentioned um Warhammer just a second ago. 126 00:07:22,440 --> 00:07:26,040 Speaker 1: I've long been a fan of of Warhammer, and Warhammer 127 00:07:26,120 --> 00:07:29,160 Speaker 1: forty thousand one is like the fantasy version one is 128 00:07:29,240 --> 00:07:31,840 Speaker 1: essentially like a sci fi version of the same universe, 129 00:07:31,920 --> 00:07:34,120 Speaker 1: and it is evolved since then. And you have orcs 130 00:07:34,120 --> 00:07:37,520 Speaker 1: in both of them, and in both games orcs are 131 00:07:37,520 --> 00:07:41,160 Speaker 1: depicted as green skinned, almost bold, dog like in their 132 00:07:41,200 --> 00:07:45,040 Speaker 1: cranial structure. And even more to the point though, these 133 00:07:45,160 --> 00:07:47,640 Speaker 1: orcs are presented in a manner that I would I 134 00:07:47,680 --> 00:07:52,880 Speaker 1: would dare describe as fun. They If orcs are often, 135 00:07:53,160 --> 00:07:55,520 Speaker 1: you know, serving to to represent a kind of dark 136 00:07:55,880 --> 00:07:59,600 Speaker 1: savagery of humanity, I'd say that the the Orc Boys 137 00:07:59,640 --> 00:08:03,040 Speaker 1: as there sometimes called this with a z uh run 138 00:08:03,080 --> 00:08:06,000 Speaker 1: counter to that, embodying the spirit that kind of celebrates 139 00:08:06,000 --> 00:08:10,080 Speaker 1: the kind of goofy primal rebellion, especially in in Warham 140 00:08:10,160 --> 00:08:13,360 Speaker 1: or forty the futuristic version which is a very dark 141 00:08:13,400 --> 00:08:16,400 Speaker 1: and nihilistic, you know, grim dark kind of fictional setting. 142 00:08:16,560 --> 00:08:19,360 Speaker 1: The Orcs are pretty much the only faction that actually 143 00:08:19,400 --> 00:08:22,960 Speaker 1: resonate with any lightness in Whimsy. Like you see are 144 00:08:23,360 --> 00:08:26,360 Speaker 1: the depictions of them or the way that the various 145 00:08:26,520 --> 00:08:28,800 Speaker 1: collectors have painted them up, and they often have bright 146 00:08:28,840 --> 00:08:31,640 Speaker 1: colors and kind of a fun goofy quality to them. 147 00:08:31,880 --> 00:08:33,680 Speaker 1: I ran across one. I think this is like a 148 00:08:33,720 --> 00:08:36,160 Speaker 1: current figure where it's like an Orc captain and he 149 00:08:36,200 --> 00:08:38,720 Speaker 1: has like a big pirate hat on and a bunch 150 00:08:38,720 --> 00:08:41,920 Speaker 1: of cool colorful iconography. They have this kind of slap 151 00:08:42,040 --> 00:08:45,400 Speaker 1: dash technology to them. Uh, they're they're a little bit 152 00:08:45,600 --> 00:08:51,440 Speaker 1: monstars in space Jam. I haven't seen space Sham, but 153 00:08:52,120 --> 00:08:54,720 Speaker 1: it's when the nerdy aliens get really big and good 154 00:08:54,720 --> 00:08:58,439 Speaker 1: at sports and then they become the mon stars. Okay, 155 00:08:58,480 --> 00:09:02,079 Speaker 1: well I'll take your word for it. Um yeah, I 156 00:09:02,440 --> 00:09:05,439 Speaker 1: guess I'm imagining from your telling of it, like sort 157 00:09:05,440 --> 00:09:10,840 Speaker 1: of lighthearted monstrosity, kind of cartoonish monstrosity. Yes, Okay. Space 158 00:09:10,920 --> 00:09:15,280 Speaker 1: Jam never gets too bleak, you know, they don't. Space 159 00:09:15,360 --> 00:09:18,600 Speaker 1: Jam doesn't go full grim dark. A grim dark Space 160 00:09:18,679 --> 00:09:21,320 Speaker 1: Jam reboot that would be That would be scot that'd 161 00:09:21,320 --> 00:09:26,959 Speaker 1: be so good. Now, this embracing of orc nature. You'll 162 00:09:27,000 --> 00:09:29,840 Speaker 1: find this elsewhere as well. Uh. In Dungeons and Dragons, 163 00:09:29,880 --> 00:09:32,280 Speaker 1: of course, one may play a half work or even 164 00:09:32,280 --> 00:09:35,040 Speaker 1: full blooded works, which allows room for that sort of thing, 165 00:09:35,240 --> 00:09:37,440 Speaker 1: and will come back to Dungeons and Dragons in a bit. 166 00:09:37,960 --> 00:09:40,079 Speaker 1: But one title, and this is one that our former 167 00:09:40,120 --> 00:09:43,200 Speaker 1: co host, Christian Uh turned me onto. Uh. There's a 168 00:09:43,200 --> 00:09:46,559 Speaker 1: comic artist by the name of James um stoke O 169 00:09:46,679 --> 00:09:49,240 Speaker 1: I believe that's s. T. O. Koe, and he has 170 00:09:49,280 --> 00:09:52,800 Speaker 1: this comic series called Orc Stain, and it presents a 171 00:09:52,920 --> 00:09:56,640 Speaker 1: delightfully crude and whimsical vision of a world just overrun 172 00:09:56,679 --> 00:10:00,720 Speaker 1: with orcs. The protagonist himself is an Orc here and 173 00:10:00,760 --> 00:10:04,120 Speaker 1: it has this kind of I would say, you know, 174 00:10:04,200 --> 00:10:10,040 Speaker 1: the art that accompanies the British musical Um Act Guerrillas. 175 00:10:10,400 --> 00:10:13,040 Speaker 1: It has kind of that Guerrillas Tank Girl kind of 176 00:10:13,120 --> 00:10:15,800 Speaker 1: vibe to it. It has this very kind of punk 177 00:10:15,880 --> 00:10:19,320 Speaker 1: rock aesthetic, which I've I've I've seen I've seen that 178 00:10:19,360 --> 00:10:22,640 Speaker 1: with orcs elsewhere where. This is kind of convergence of 179 00:10:22,679 --> 00:10:26,920 Speaker 1: like punk art culture and the embracing of the Orc. Yeah, 180 00:10:27,200 --> 00:10:30,160 Speaker 1: punk monsters. I think is actually a pretty good tradition. 181 00:10:30,160 --> 00:10:31,720 Speaker 1: I don't know how it got started, but I think 182 00:10:31,760 --> 00:10:35,079 Speaker 1: of in the old the old teenage meeting Ninja turtles, 183 00:10:35,120 --> 00:10:38,360 Speaker 1: comics like the Bebop and rock Steadier. You're not actually 184 00:10:38,559 --> 00:10:42,800 Speaker 1: punk monsters exactly. Yeah, good point. So what does all 185 00:10:42,840 --> 00:10:45,200 Speaker 1: this mean? What are orcs and and why do they 186 00:10:45,240 --> 00:10:47,640 Speaker 1: resonate with us? So why don't we continue to tell 187 00:10:47,720 --> 00:10:51,160 Speaker 1: stories about orcs and involve works in our games and 188 00:10:51,160 --> 00:10:54,520 Speaker 1: our fiction, etcetera? Um? Can can we discuss science in 189 00:10:54,559 --> 00:10:58,240 Speaker 1: relation to Orcs? And are there problematic aspects here as well? 190 00:10:58,800 --> 00:11:01,280 Speaker 1: So that's where we're gonna be talking about in this episode. 191 00:11:01,280 --> 00:11:04,040 Speaker 1: But the first step, I imagine, is to discuss what 192 00:11:04,120 --> 00:11:07,760 Speaker 1: Tolkien says in universe about the creation of the Orcs, 193 00:11:07,760 --> 00:11:11,240 Speaker 1: coming back to our cold opening, and then also discuss 194 00:11:11,440 --> 00:11:15,079 Speaker 1: where he even got the name orc itself. All right, well, 195 00:11:15,160 --> 00:11:18,480 Speaker 1: let's enlist in the Orc army, all right? Okay, So 196 00:11:18,600 --> 00:11:21,400 Speaker 1: in Tolken's writing, the Orcs are the most common evil 197 00:11:21,440 --> 00:11:24,760 Speaker 1: foot soldier. They were like the ubiquitous enemy. Um In 198 00:11:24,800 --> 00:11:27,200 Speaker 1: the Hobbit we deal more with goblins, which are often 199 00:11:27,280 --> 00:11:30,400 Speaker 1: understood to be either lesser Orcs or a particular species 200 00:11:30,480 --> 00:11:34,160 Speaker 1: or subspecies of Mountain Orc and Tolkien apparently rolled out 201 00:11:34,200 --> 00:11:38,320 Speaker 1: a few different contradictory origin stories for the Orc in 202 00:11:38,440 --> 00:11:41,480 Speaker 1: his work. But according to the Tolkein Encyclopedia, which is 203 00:11:41,520 --> 00:11:44,240 Speaker 1: a book I typically turn into for such matters, uh, 204 00:11:44,559 --> 00:11:47,640 Speaker 1: they were twisted forms of life that Melk corps spawned 205 00:11:47,720 --> 00:11:51,280 Speaker 1: in the pits of Autumno. Uh. They served as the 206 00:11:51,280 --> 00:11:53,760 Speaker 1: bulk of his armies, and then after his defeat they 207 00:11:53,800 --> 00:11:57,160 Speaker 1: served as the bulk of Saron's armies as well. Now, 208 00:11:57,240 --> 00:12:02,120 Speaker 1: was melk Or the same person Saron in an earlier incarnation? 209 00:12:02,240 --> 00:12:06,400 Speaker 1: Or was milk Or the god that Sauron served? My understanding, 210 00:12:06,520 --> 00:12:08,520 Speaker 1: and this is a good point for us to point 211 00:12:08,559 --> 00:12:12,360 Speaker 1: out that neither of us are Tolkien scholars or or 212 00:12:12,400 --> 00:12:15,679 Speaker 1: professed to be Tolkien experts. It's you're you keep wanting 213 00:12:15,679 --> 00:12:17,560 Speaker 1: to do these Tolken episodes, and then we get the 214 00:12:17,600 --> 00:12:21,000 Speaker 1: mail from people who are like, actually, I know, and 215 00:12:21,080 --> 00:12:23,000 Speaker 1: I I and I love it. I invited. I I 216 00:12:23,440 --> 00:12:27,320 Speaker 1: definitely want to hear from from people more knowledgeable in 217 00:12:27,360 --> 00:12:30,040 Speaker 1: the in Tolkien scholarship than I am, or just in 218 00:12:30,080 --> 00:12:34,000 Speaker 1: general you know, or or scholarship if you will. Uh. Now, 219 00:12:34,320 --> 00:12:38,480 Speaker 1: my understanding is that melk Or was the original fallen 220 00:12:38,559 --> 00:12:43,680 Speaker 1: god that rebelled against everything. Then he was defeated Saaron 221 00:12:43,920 --> 00:12:48,240 Speaker 1: being like a fallen Hephestus type forge god had served 222 00:12:48,360 --> 00:12:51,640 Speaker 1: melk Orp, but with milk Or destroyed or you know, 223 00:12:51,679 --> 00:12:54,120 Speaker 1: taken out of the picture permanently. Now it's time for 224 00:12:54,200 --> 00:12:58,760 Speaker 1: Saron to shine. Basically, Sawn was milk Or's VP. Okay, cool, 225 00:12:59,160 --> 00:13:01,840 Speaker 1: Now now we keep off the episode here with that 226 00:13:01,880 --> 00:13:04,920 Speaker 1: cold reading about the creation of the Orcs in the 227 00:13:05,040 --> 00:13:08,559 Speaker 1: in the pits of Autumn. No, you know, the idea 228 00:13:08,600 --> 00:13:11,320 Speaker 1: that they would have been created, you know, this sort 229 00:13:11,320 --> 00:13:16,199 Speaker 1: of blasphemous process that takes place in a fallen god's dungeons, 230 00:13:16,320 --> 00:13:19,720 Speaker 1: like it was sort of a mockery of life. Yeah, 231 00:13:19,960 --> 00:13:22,959 Speaker 1: the idea that they like captured els and twisted them 232 00:13:22,960 --> 00:13:26,120 Speaker 1: through torture into this new terrible form of life, and 233 00:13:26,160 --> 00:13:28,920 Speaker 1: that the Orcs therefore were products of pain and hate. 234 00:13:29,160 --> 00:13:32,319 Speaker 1: They lived only for pain and hate, and outwardly they 235 00:13:32,320 --> 00:13:35,920 Speaker 1: were quote and this is a from the token Encyclopedia, bent, 236 00:13:36,160 --> 00:13:39,760 Speaker 1: bow legged, and squat So they were apelike in many respects, 237 00:13:39,800 --> 00:13:43,360 Speaker 1: but cunning and cruel. Their skin looked as if burned 238 00:13:43,360 --> 00:13:46,920 Speaker 1: in their eyes were quote Crimson gashes like narrow slits 239 00:13:46,920 --> 00:13:50,760 Speaker 1: and black iron grates behind which hot coals burn. Now, 240 00:13:50,800 --> 00:13:53,320 Speaker 1: there are different varieties of orc, we're told in Middle Earth, 241 00:13:53,840 --> 00:13:56,559 Speaker 1: from the goblins of the Misty Mountains to standard works, 242 00:13:56,600 --> 00:13:59,079 Speaker 1: and then later you get these taller, more sun resistant 243 00:13:59,679 --> 00:14:02,920 Speaker 1: or a high orcs that were made by Sawing much later. 244 00:14:03,240 --> 00:14:06,840 Speaker 1: And it sounds as if the idea is that Sawin 245 00:14:06,920 --> 00:14:09,560 Speaker 1: ends up combining orc stock with human stock to create 246 00:14:09,600 --> 00:14:13,200 Speaker 1: a more human stature day tolerant trooper. Yeah, and I 247 00:14:13,200 --> 00:14:14,760 Speaker 1: think that ties into the idea that a lot of 248 00:14:14,760 --> 00:14:17,120 Speaker 1: creatures in Middle Earth or in Tolken's world, like if 249 00:14:17,120 --> 00:14:20,040 Speaker 1: you're a bad creature, you're often sort of confined to 250 00:14:20,080 --> 00:14:22,680 Speaker 1: a nighttime existence. You can't go out in the sun. 251 00:14:23,120 --> 00:14:25,560 Speaker 1: Trolls are this way, and the Hobbit trolls are turned 252 00:14:25,600 --> 00:14:29,000 Speaker 1: to stone when Gandalf Tricks came into staying up till 253 00:14:29,280 --> 00:14:31,280 Speaker 1: till the sun comes out. And I guess the the 254 00:14:31,320 --> 00:14:34,080 Speaker 1: idea is also that maybe the orcs or the goblins 255 00:14:34,160 --> 00:14:38,760 Speaker 1: just don't really like sunlight. Yeah. Now, the Token Encyclopedia 256 00:14:38,800 --> 00:14:42,920 Speaker 1: and other sources as well, it has you'll find lengthy 257 00:14:42,960 --> 00:14:45,480 Speaker 1: passages discussing the role of orcs to the history of 258 00:14:45,480 --> 00:14:49,440 Speaker 1: Middle Earth. There's there's no shortage of of of information 259 00:14:49,920 --> 00:14:53,680 Speaker 1: uh there. But basically the idea is that throughout their 260 00:14:53,720 --> 00:14:56,360 Speaker 1: history the numbers swell and shrink at times when dark 261 00:14:56,400 --> 00:14:59,840 Speaker 1: lord rise up and then fall away. Um. When they 262 00:15:00,280 --> 00:15:03,080 Speaker 1: dark Lords come back to power, the Orcs so there 263 00:15:03,080 --> 00:15:05,400 Speaker 1: to fill the ranks of the evil armies. But even 264 00:15:05,440 --> 00:15:07,600 Speaker 1: when they're defeated, they never completely go away. They kind 265 00:15:07,600 --> 00:15:10,880 Speaker 1: of shrink to the hidden corners of Middle Earth. Um. 266 00:15:11,040 --> 00:15:13,880 Speaker 1: And even with the defeat of Saron and Middle Earth's 267 00:15:13,880 --> 00:15:16,840 Speaker 1: transformation into a modern world, there's this idea that the 268 00:15:16,960 --> 00:15:19,520 Speaker 1: Orcs are out there somewhere. So that's the the in 269 00:15:19,760 --> 00:15:24,120 Speaker 1: universe explanation or as cannon and origin stories can be 270 00:15:24,160 --> 00:15:26,200 Speaker 1: cobbled together. But of course we know that J. R. 271 00:15:26,320 --> 00:15:28,920 Speaker 1: Tolkien did not create Middle Earth out of nothing. He 272 00:15:29,040 --> 00:15:33,320 Speaker 1: forged it out of existing mythological, folkloric and historic motifs. 273 00:15:33,880 --> 00:15:36,360 Speaker 1: And I would say, actually maybe more than anything out 274 00:15:36,360 --> 00:15:40,720 Speaker 1: of linguistic motifs. You know, the Tolkien loved language, and 275 00:15:40,760 --> 00:15:44,120 Speaker 1: you often get the sense that his story came out 276 00:15:44,360 --> 00:15:47,440 Speaker 1: of having a word for something, you know, like you'd 277 00:15:47,440 --> 00:15:50,040 Speaker 1: find you'd find a word for something an old Norse 278 00:15:50,120 --> 00:15:52,800 Speaker 1: that's just a great word. And and it almost feels 279 00:15:52,800 --> 00:15:55,720 Speaker 1: as if the character springs from the sound of the name. 280 00:15:57,280 --> 00:16:00,120 Speaker 1: Sorry that that makes sense, I know, no, absolutely, I 281 00:16:00,120 --> 00:16:04,120 Speaker 1: mean that you you really you can't discuss Tolkien creating 282 00:16:04,160 --> 00:16:07,680 Speaker 1: anything without without bringing in language, like clearly, like that 283 00:16:07,840 --> 00:16:12,320 Speaker 1: was his his his primary um scholarly interest, and everything 284 00:16:12,320 --> 00:16:14,320 Speaker 1: else kind of like springs out of that. And then 285 00:16:14,320 --> 00:16:16,840 Speaker 1: thus that's where a lot of these characters and species 286 00:16:16,840 --> 00:16:19,520 Speaker 1: come from as well. Yeah, so it seems that Tolkien 287 00:16:19,600 --> 00:16:23,920 Speaker 1: actually derived the term orc from a usage in Beowulf. 288 00:16:24,000 --> 00:16:27,200 Speaker 1: Beowulf is of course the great epic of Anglo Saxon. 289 00:16:27,280 --> 00:16:30,360 Speaker 1: It's an epic poem from the early Middle Ages. We 290 00:16:30,400 --> 00:16:32,840 Speaker 1: don't know exactly when it was composed. It was written 291 00:16:32,840 --> 00:16:36,040 Speaker 1: in Old English, which is the ancestor to modern English, 292 00:16:36,320 --> 00:16:39,440 Speaker 1: but also which is you know, it's so unlike Modern 293 00:16:39,440 --> 00:16:41,680 Speaker 1: English that you can't just read it, you know, it's 294 00:16:41,720 --> 00:16:45,000 Speaker 1: basically like another language. You need you need a glossary 295 00:16:45,160 --> 00:16:48,680 Speaker 1: or translation basically to understand it. Uh. And so the 296 00:16:48,800 --> 00:16:53,000 Speaker 1: term specifically that appears in Beowulf is or cane us 297 00:16:53,360 --> 00:16:56,560 Speaker 1: or cane Us. It is a creature that's mentioned during 298 00:16:56,600 --> 00:17:00,200 Speaker 1: the introduction of the monster Grendel, you know, the real 299 00:17:00,560 --> 00:17:03,920 Speaker 1: first big bad that that Beowulf has to fight. Beowulf 300 00:17:04,000 --> 00:17:07,320 Speaker 1: arrives at at Rothgar's meat hall, and the meat hall 301 00:17:07,400 --> 00:17:11,760 Speaker 1: is being terrorized by attacks from this monster Grendel. And 302 00:17:11,840 --> 00:17:13,880 Speaker 1: so I'm going to read from the J. Leslie Hall 303 00:17:14,000 --> 00:17:17,879 Speaker 1: translation of Beowulf. In the part that mentions orcs uh 304 00:17:18,080 --> 00:17:22,120 Speaker 1: so or the word or knaos at least Hall translates 305 00:17:22,760 --> 00:17:27,040 Speaker 1: for that bitter murder, the killing of able all ruling father, 306 00:17:27,320 --> 00:17:30,880 Speaker 1: the kindred of Cain crushed with his vengeance in the 307 00:17:30,920 --> 00:17:34,400 Speaker 1: feud he rejoiced, not but far away drove him from 308 00:17:34,480 --> 00:17:39,480 Speaker 1: kindred and kind that crime to atone for meter of justice. 309 00:17:39,760 --> 00:17:45,480 Speaker 1: Thence Ill favored creatures, elves and giants, monsters of ocean 310 00:17:45,960 --> 00:17:49,560 Speaker 1: came into being. And the giants that long time grappled 311 00:17:49,600 --> 00:17:53,880 Speaker 1: with God, he gave them requital. Now in the Hall 312 00:17:53,960 --> 00:17:56,399 Speaker 1: translation here there are a couple of different words that 313 00:17:56,520 --> 00:18:00,960 Speaker 1: get translated as giants. One is the old English gigantis, 314 00:18:01,359 --> 00:18:03,880 Speaker 1: and the other is a yoton s, which I think 315 00:18:03,960 --> 00:18:06,240 Speaker 1: is where we also get the word yoton like the 316 00:18:06,320 --> 00:18:10,119 Speaker 1: Norse mythology giant a couple of different kinds of monsters. 317 00:18:10,160 --> 00:18:13,440 Speaker 1: So in the line that mentions orknas it's a yotanus 318 00:18:13,520 --> 00:18:18,439 Speaker 1: and ilfa giants and elves and or canas, which I 319 00:18:18,440 --> 00:18:22,440 Speaker 1: think here is translated as monsters of ocean, but other 320 00:18:22,480 --> 00:18:26,480 Speaker 1: translations have have chosen different terms for it, sometimes calling 321 00:18:26,520 --> 00:18:30,840 Speaker 1: it a a demon or a goblin or something like that. Uh. 322 00:18:30,920 --> 00:18:34,040 Speaker 1: There's also an interesting translation note in the J. Leslie 323 00:18:34,080 --> 00:18:38,080 Speaker 1: Hall version of Beowulf which notes that when Grindel himself 324 00:18:38,200 --> 00:18:42,159 Speaker 1: is introduced, the word used to describe him could be 325 00:18:42,200 --> 00:18:46,080 Speaker 1: translated as demon and often is or could be translated 326 00:18:46,200 --> 00:18:51,880 Speaker 1: as stranger. Uh. Literary and linguistic conflation of the unfamiliar 327 00:18:51,920 --> 00:18:55,360 Speaker 1: person with the monster of hell, and J. Leslie Hall 328 00:18:55,400 --> 00:18:59,639 Speaker 1: actually chooses stranger in in this translation, making for an 329 00:18:59,680 --> 00:19:03,440 Speaker 1: interest set of lines. A foe in the whole building. 330 00:19:03,680 --> 00:19:08,600 Speaker 1: This horrible stranger was Grendel, entitled the march Stepper, famous 331 00:19:08,760 --> 00:19:12,960 Speaker 1: who dwelt in the moor, fins, the marsh and the Fastness. Oh. 332 00:19:13,119 --> 00:19:15,119 Speaker 1: I love that. So if you think of Grendel as 333 00:19:15,160 --> 00:19:18,320 Speaker 1: a stranger, it gets into some interesting territory about what 334 00:19:18,440 --> 00:19:22,119 Speaker 1: monstrosity means, and that a lot of times are our 335 00:19:22,240 --> 00:19:28,119 Speaker 1: mythical monsters are sort of ways of mentally metabolizing concepts 336 00:19:28,119 --> 00:19:31,680 Speaker 1: of people who are unfamiliar or who you worry might 337 00:19:31,720 --> 00:19:36,240 Speaker 1: be threatening to you somehow. Yeah. Absolutely, But then also 338 00:19:36,359 --> 00:19:38,360 Speaker 1: just from a surely like in that on the other hand, 339 00:19:38,400 --> 00:19:41,159 Speaker 1: like just from an imaginative perspective, like I hear that, 340 00:19:41,240 --> 00:19:43,879 Speaker 1: and I just love the idea of Grendel as this 341 00:19:44,320 --> 00:19:47,320 Speaker 1: as as the stranger, as this you know, this being 342 00:19:47,480 --> 00:19:51,520 Speaker 1: that is um that is almost from another world, you know, 343 00:19:51,640 --> 00:19:54,960 Speaker 1: because in many many respects he is well and much 344 00:19:55,000 --> 00:19:57,280 Speaker 1: like the Orc that we were just talking about. Grendel 345 00:19:57,359 --> 00:20:00,680 Speaker 1: here has given an unholy origin story. Right. They say 346 00:20:00,720 --> 00:20:03,280 Speaker 1: that he has descended from Caine, who in the biblical 347 00:20:03,400 --> 00:20:06,399 Speaker 1: story murdered his brother Abel. Caine was you know, the 348 00:20:06,480 --> 00:20:10,080 Speaker 1: third human to exist, and Able was the fourth. And Caine, 349 00:20:10,080 --> 00:20:13,880 Speaker 1: I guess, got jealous of Able having having good offerings 350 00:20:13,920 --> 00:20:15,879 Speaker 1: to God that God was very pleased with, and so 351 00:20:16,040 --> 00:20:19,600 Speaker 1: Kane murdered him. And then God comes to Caine saying, hey, 352 00:20:19,640 --> 00:20:22,320 Speaker 1: where's your brother? And Kane says, am I my brother's keeper. 353 00:20:22,400 --> 00:20:25,320 Speaker 1: So God curses Kine and sends him off wandering in 354 00:20:25,359 --> 00:20:28,399 Speaker 1: the wilderness to the land of not and Caine's offspring 355 00:20:28,840 --> 00:20:32,200 Speaker 1: apparently become the monster Grendel. So it's like there there's 356 00:20:32,240 --> 00:20:35,720 Speaker 1: a sort of there's a generational curse that has passed 357 00:20:35,720 --> 00:20:39,600 Speaker 1: down for that original crime. Now, in a nineteenth century 358 00:20:39,640 --> 00:20:43,760 Speaker 1: glossary of Anglo Saxon terms, the scholar Thomas Wright notes 359 00:20:43,840 --> 00:20:50,120 Speaker 1: that Orc means possibly hell, devil, or specter or goblin. Uh, 360 00:20:50,119 --> 00:20:53,200 Speaker 1: and he notes that it is phonetically similar to Orcus, 361 00:20:53,320 --> 00:20:56,360 Speaker 1: which was a Roman god of the underworld I think 362 00:20:56,480 --> 00:21:03,120 Speaker 1: somewhat regularly conflated with Satan during times of Christian syncratism. Yeah. Yeah, 363 00:21:03,240 --> 00:21:06,040 Speaker 1: Orcus of course has come up on the podcast before. 364 00:21:06,080 --> 00:21:09,440 Speaker 1: And this also brings to mind that that line from 365 00:21:09,480 --> 00:21:13,760 Speaker 1: William Blake, uh that of course is um is adapted 366 00:21:13,800 --> 00:21:16,760 Speaker 1: and switched around a little bit most more probably more 367 00:21:16,800 --> 00:21:20,560 Speaker 1: famously to most listeners in Blade Runner. But that line fiery, 368 00:21:20,600 --> 00:21:24,600 Speaker 1: the angels rose as they rose deep thunder rolled around 369 00:21:24,680 --> 00:21:28,480 Speaker 1: their shores, indignant, burning with the fires of Orc. Oh, yeah, 370 00:21:28,520 --> 00:21:30,680 Speaker 1: that's come up before. I know you like that one, 371 00:21:30,680 --> 00:21:32,600 Speaker 1: and that's great. I mean, Blake is always great, but 372 00:21:32,720 --> 00:21:36,360 Speaker 1: Orc there is different. Orc is not so much a monster. 373 00:21:36,440 --> 00:21:38,600 Speaker 1: There is kind of, like I don't recall exactly, some 374 00:21:38,680 --> 00:21:41,480 Speaker 1: kind of character. Yeah, yeah, you you're dealing with the 375 00:21:41,840 --> 00:21:46,280 Speaker 1: Blake um Um cinematic universe there as opposed to any 376 00:21:46,280 --> 00:21:49,760 Speaker 1: of these others. Um. I should add add one thing. 377 00:21:50,160 --> 00:21:53,120 Speaker 1: It's it's interesting that we don't have to really discuss 378 00:21:53,200 --> 00:21:56,840 Speaker 1: what a goblin is in any of this um. There's 379 00:21:56,920 --> 00:22:01,800 Speaker 1: something about the goblin in particular that I think you'll 380 00:22:01,800 --> 00:22:05,840 Speaker 1: find just about everywhere, Like we've discussed um various Chinese 381 00:22:05,880 --> 00:22:10,240 Speaker 1: folklore's and in mythologies before that involve something that is 382 00:22:10,280 --> 00:22:14,400 Speaker 1: translated as a goblin, And it does seem to suggest 383 00:22:14,400 --> 00:22:18,120 Speaker 1: that there is just sort of an intrinsic goblin nous 384 00:22:18,119 --> 00:22:22,440 Speaker 1: to the human imagination, like there is a space preserved 385 00:22:22,480 --> 00:22:25,040 Speaker 1: for the goblin that we we don't even really need 386 00:22:25,080 --> 00:22:27,920 Speaker 1: to even expand on too much. Well, yeah, I mean, 387 00:22:27,960 --> 00:22:30,640 Speaker 1: I think it's just there's a general fear of something 388 00:22:30,720 --> 00:22:34,520 Speaker 1: that is evil, that is roughly shaped like a human 389 00:22:34,560 --> 00:22:37,560 Speaker 1: and has human capabilities in a way, but cannot be 390 00:22:37,680 --> 00:22:41,760 Speaker 1: reasoned with and has no and has no like mercy 391 00:22:41,880 --> 00:22:44,879 Speaker 1: or morality, and is just sort of like meanness and 392 00:22:44,880 --> 00:22:49,000 Speaker 1: cruelty and human form or human form, Yeah, or you know, 393 00:22:49,119 --> 00:22:51,240 Speaker 1: kind of I guess sometimes with the goblin, I get 394 00:22:51,240 --> 00:22:54,760 Speaker 1: a sense of like the diminutive nature of the goblin's 395 00:22:54,880 --> 00:22:59,280 Speaker 1: suggested like a hidden supernatural element to it. And even 396 00:22:59,320 --> 00:23:02,480 Speaker 1: though the the the idea of Tolkien's orcs, they kind 397 00:23:02,480 --> 00:23:04,800 Speaker 1: of evolve out of an idea of a goblin, they 398 00:23:04,840 --> 00:23:07,720 Speaker 1: become something different, They become something more like a human 399 00:23:08,080 --> 00:23:12,040 Speaker 1: and therefore kind of divorced from like the supernatural world 400 00:23:12,040 --> 00:23:15,040 Speaker 1: of pure fairies, in the same way that Tolken's elves 401 00:23:15,119 --> 00:23:18,800 Speaker 1: are something different than like the the ideas of the 402 00:23:18,840 --> 00:23:23,080 Speaker 1: fair folk or even the Tuatha de dan and uh 403 00:23:23,160 --> 00:23:26,760 Speaker 1: that that you find in Irish mythology. Well. Yeah, another 404 00:23:26,760 --> 00:23:28,640 Speaker 1: thing that's funny is that by the time you get 405 00:23:28,640 --> 00:23:31,240 Speaker 1: to Tolkien, suddenly elves are thought of as these sort 406 00:23:31,240 --> 00:23:34,639 Speaker 1: of like superhumans. They're like humans, but they're they're like 407 00:23:34,800 --> 00:23:39,800 Speaker 1: so beautiful and so graceful and so rational and good. Um. 408 00:23:39,920 --> 00:23:43,119 Speaker 1: But but here in in Beowulf, the elves just seemed 409 00:23:43,160 --> 00:23:46,040 Speaker 1: to be another type of monster. They're listed alongside the 410 00:23:46,160 --> 00:23:49,040 Speaker 1: Yotanas and the monsters of the ocean. I mean, they're 411 00:23:49,040 --> 00:23:52,000 Speaker 1: in the same line. It's a Yotanas and Ilva and 412 00:23:52,240 --> 00:23:56,560 Speaker 1: uh an Orkneus altogether. Now, Um, speaking of the idea 413 00:23:56,600 --> 00:23:59,280 Speaker 1: of of orc is being related to sea monsters, I 414 00:23:59,520 --> 00:24:03,040 Speaker 1: of course poked up Orc in Carol Roses, Giants, Monsters 415 00:24:03,040 --> 00:24:05,880 Speaker 1: and Dragons, one of my favorite books to to look 416 00:24:05,920 --> 00:24:09,320 Speaker 1: up various creatures and just uh and and actually she 417 00:24:09,359 --> 00:24:12,080 Speaker 1: has another book related to fairies. In the Fairy Book, 418 00:24:12,320 --> 00:24:14,680 Speaker 1: she has a listing for for Orc, just saying it's 419 00:24:14,760 --> 00:24:17,840 Speaker 1: one of Tolkien's creations, very short, not much to it. 420 00:24:18,400 --> 00:24:22,400 Speaker 1: In the Monster's Book, she mentions Orc or Orco, a 421 00:24:22,440 --> 00:24:25,560 Speaker 1: monster described by Plenty of the Elder in the Natural History, 422 00:24:26,200 --> 00:24:29,560 Speaker 1: came out in sev or thereabouts, and it's described as 423 00:24:29,600 --> 00:24:32,600 Speaker 1: a very large oceanic creature, said to be larger than 424 00:24:32,600 --> 00:24:35,920 Speaker 1: a whale and capable of eating whales. It was known 425 00:24:35,960 --> 00:24:40,760 Speaker 1: as Orco later on and referenced in Orlando Furioso in 426 00:24:41,880 --> 00:24:46,280 Speaker 1: Oh Yeah, but the poet Lodovico Ariosto so Orlando Furioso. 427 00:24:46,400 --> 00:24:49,440 Speaker 1: I must, I must admit this. We were talking about 428 00:24:49,440 --> 00:24:52,240 Speaker 1: it before we started. I just figured out that this, 429 00:24:52,240 --> 00:24:55,840 Speaker 1: this epic poem is not about a guy named Orlando 430 00:24:55,920 --> 00:25:00,120 Speaker 1: furios So. It means something like Orlando's frenzy or something. 431 00:25:00,640 --> 00:25:03,320 Speaker 1: Uh So, So, Orlando is the hero of the story 432 00:25:03,359 --> 00:25:05,159 Speaker 1: and he slays I think he slays a lot of 433 00:25:05,200 --> 00:25:08,879 Speaker 1: monsters in it. Um, but I looked it up in 434 00:25:09,000 --> 00:25:13,399 Speaker 1: Orlando Furios. So it's in Canto seventeen that the the 435 00:25:13,560 --> 00:25:16,320 Speaker 1: Orco monster is mentioned, And so I want to read 436 00:25:16,359 --> 00:25:20,360 Speaker 1: from the William Stewart Rose translation. So, Uh, we get 437 00:25:20,400 --> 00:25:25,199 Speaker 1: the narration, while with much solace, seated and around we 438 00:25:25,400 --> 00:25:29,439 Speaker 1: from the chase, expect our lord's return approaching us along 439 00:25:29,440 --> 00:25:34,000 Speaker 1: the shore, astound the orc, that fearful monster we discern 440 00:25:34,600 --> 00:25:38,320 Speaker 1: God grant fair sir. He never may confound your eyesight 441 00:25:38,440 --> 00:25:41,760 Speaker 1: with his semblance, foul and stern. Better it is of 442 00:25:41,880 --> 00:25:44,639 Speaker 1: him by fame to hear than to behold him by 443 00:25:44,680 --> 00:25:50,480 Speaker 1: approaching near to calculate the grizzly monster's height, so measureless 444 00:25:50,600 --> 00:25:55,399 Speaker 1: is he exceeds all skill of fungus hue. In place 445 00:25:55,560 --> 00:25:59,320 Speaker 1: of orbs of sight, their sockets two small bones, like 446 00:25:59,480 --> 00:26:03,440 Speaker 1: berries fill towards us. As I say, he speeds out 447 00:26:03,560 --> 00:26:07,560 Speaker 1: right along the shore and seems a moving hill, tusks 448 00:26:07,640 --> 00:26:12,119 Speaker 1: jutting out like savage swine. He shows abreast with drivel, 449 00:26:12,200 --> 00:26:17,119 Speaker 1: foul and pointed nose. Okay, so what do we know 450 00:26:17,119 --> 00:26:21,040 Speaker 1: about this monster? Uh? He's too tall to calculate his height. 451 00:26:21,480 --> 00:26:24,240 Speaker 1: No one has the skill to calculate how high he is, 452 00:26:24,280 --> 00:26:26,080 Speaker 1: and that that makes it sound like he must be 453 00:26:26,160 --> 00:26:30,560 Speaker 1: like leaving the atmosphere. Um. He also has he's a 454 00:26:30,760 --> 00:26:33,680 Speaker 1: fungus hue, and I guess there are fungus is of 455 00:26:33,720 --> 00:26:37,680 Speaker 1: a lot of different hues, and he in place of eyeballs, 456 00:26:37,840 --> 00:26:42,680 Speaker 1: he has bones that are like berries. Now, up until 457 00:26:42,720 --> 00:26:46,040 Speaker 1: that point, I'm definitely picturing what I think this is. 458 00:26:46,560 --> 00:26:48,359 Speaker 1: But then the tusks kind of throw it off because 459 00:26:48,359 --> 00:26:50,840 Speaker 1: the tust sound like more something you would see oll 460 00:26:50,920 --> 00:26:53,720 Speaker 1: for seen, you know, an actual tusk see creature, but 461 00:26:53,760 --> 00:26:58,719 Speaker 1: also in the fabulous u Chi miracle uh sea monster 462 00:26:58,840 --> 00:27:01,959 Speaker 1: that you see in various maps. Oh yeah, exactly, like 463 00:27:02,000 --> 00:27:04,440 Speaker 1: the kind of like a wild boar's face on a 464 00:27:04,480 --> 00:27:08,200 Speaker 1: whale's body exactly. I think something like that might be 465 00:27:08,280 --> 00:27:10,960 Speaker 1: kind of imagined here. Except he's advancing along the shore, 466 00:27:11,080 --> 00:27:14,199 Speaker 1: so he seems to be able to leave the water. Um. 467 00:27:14,240 --> 00:27:18,680 Speaker 1: I don't know. Well it brings to mind um, and 468 00:27:18,840 --> 00:27:20,880 Speaker 1: because it does seem to be there is a connection here. 469 00:27:21,320 --> 00:27:23,399 Speaker 1: So when you read this, I could not help but 470 00:27:23,520 --> 00:27:27,720 Speaker 1: picture the orca, the killer whale, you know, because there's 471 00:27:27,760 --> 00:27:31,119 Speaker 1: something about like, you know, the fungus hue uh in 472 00:27:31,160 --> 00:27:33,680 Speaker 1: place of orbs of side imagining those big white eye 473 00:27:33,720 --> 00:27:36,520 Speaker 1: spots that are of course not their eyes, even though 474 00:27:36,520 --> 00:27:38,879 Speaker 1: it's it's almost impossible to look at a killer whale 475 00:27:38,880 --> 00:27:41,240 Speaker 1: and not think of that as their eyes. Their eyes 476 00:27:41,280 --> 00:27:44,440 Speaker 1: are actually much you know, smaller, Um, And are there 477 00:27:44,800 --> 00:27:48,000 Speaker 1: those big eye spots I think actually make killer whales 478 00:27:48,080 --> 00:27:52,119 Speaker 1: cuter than they otherwise they look less like the like 479 00:27:52,200 --> 00:27:56,120 Speaker 1: the vicious wolves of the sea that they are. Um. 480 00:27:56,160 --> 00:28:00,560 Speaker 1: But but yeah, there's this connection between orcus and or 481 00:28:00,640 --> 00:28:05,160 Speaker 1: kinnis orca that's the scientific name for killer whales, or kinness, 482 00:28:05,160 --> 00:28:10,360 Speaker 1: meaning belonging to orcas or simply the kingdom of the dead. Uh. 483 00:28:10,400 --> 00:28:15,000 Speaker 1: The Roman idea of orc orco sea monsters was or 484 00:28:15,040 --> 00:28:18,600 Speaker 1: became associated with the killer whale. Yeah. I guess that's right. 485 00:28:18,720 --> 00:28:20,000 Speaker 1: And and I want to be clear. I think a 486 00:28:20,040 --> 00:28:23,280 Speaker 1: minute ago we we describe the killer whale as vicious, 487 00:28:23,320 --> 00:28:26,119 Speaker 1: which we don't mean in a in a negative moral sense, 488 00:28:26,320 --> 00:28:29,159 Speaker 1: but we do mean in a descriptive sense about like 489 00:28:29,200 --> 00:28:34,080 Speaker 1: their behavior as they prey on sharks, which is just awesome. Uh. Yeah, 490 00:28:34,119 --> 00:28:39,600 Speaker 1: there as when concerning um orcas and their their natural prey. 491 00:28:40,200 --> 00:28:44,280 Speaker 1: I think viciousness is a well deserved adjective. Watch any 492 00:28:44,360 --> 00:28:47,760 Speaker 1: nature documentary about their their hunting of baby whales, and 493 00:28:47,840 --> 00:28:51,160 Speaker 1: you will agree. Um, But then again, hey, it's that 494 00:28:51,320 --> 00:28:53,080 Speaker 1: that's the world. They're just doing their part in it. 495 00:28:53,320 --> 00:28:57,880 Speaker 1: The blessings of milk or all right. On that note, 496 00:28:58,240 --> 00:28:59,800 Speaker 1: we're going to take a break, but when we come 497 00:29:00,640 --> 00:29:07,560 Speaker 1: we'll talk more about works than all right, we're back now. 498 00:29:07,640 --> 00:29:10,000 Speaker 1: There are certainly a number of ways to crunch the 499 00:29:10,080 --> 00:29:13,960 Speaker 1: idea of an orc that the of Tolkien's Orc a 500 00:29:14,040 --> 00:29:19,640 Speaker 1: humanoid other that is also not human. Insignificant ways. I 501 00:29:19,680 --> 00:29:22,240 Speaker 1: have to come back to something that um, that author 502 00:29:22,520 --> 00:29:26,600 Speaker 1: Terence Hawkins Um wrote about in his novel American Neolithic, 503 00:29:26,640 --> 00:29:29,040 Speaker 1: of which there's a revised edition. Now. They believe it 504 00:29:29,080 --> 00:29:33,560 Speaker 1: has to do with the Neanderthal surviving into into modern days. 505 00:29:34,080 --> 00:29:37,760 Speaker 1: But there's this wonderful line where the Neandertal character is 506 00:29:37,800 --> 00:29:41,160 Speaker 1: speaking to the reader and says, quote, you for whom 507 00:29:41,160 --> 00:29:44,080 Speaker 1: we have always been the other, our existence buried deep 508 00:29:44,080 --> 00:29:47,960 Speaker 1: in your racial memories, since the time when glaciers girdled 509 00:29:48,000 --> 00:29:50,960 Speaker 1: the world and the contest between man and animal was 510 00:29:51,040 --> 00:29:53,800 Speaker 1: yet to be decided. We haunt your legends as we 511 00:29:53,880 --> 00:29:58,520 Speaker 1: haunt your dreams, misshapen versions of yourself bad copies formally 512 00:29:58,640 --> 00:30:03,720 Speaker 1: Cobalds or Grimlin now more locks and orcs, um so, 513 00:30:03,720 --> 00:30:09,320 Speaker 1: so in this line, basically it's uh, the idea is that, uh, 514 00:30:09,440 --> 00:30:12,800 Speaker 1: there might be some connection between the idea of orcs 515 00:30:12,880 --> 00:30:16,760 Speaker 1: or more locks or other type beings and maybe the 516 00:30:17,360 --> 00:30:22,200 Speaker 1: notion that humans did live alongside Neanderthals for a period 517 00:30:22,200 --> 00:30:27,320 Speaker 1: of time and played at least some role in their destruction, well, 518 00:30:27,360 --> 00:30:29,840 Speaker 1: depending on how you define destruction, because of course we 519 00:30:30,200 --> 00:30:34,120 Speaker 1: do see the disappearance of the Neanderthal as a distinct 520 00:30:34,200 --> 00:30:36,760 Speaker 1: branch of the homogeneous but also it does appear that 521 00:30:36,800 --> 00:30:41,280 Speaker 1: Homo sapiens and Neanderthals also intermingled. Yeah, we went to 522 00:30:41,480 --> 00:30:43,440 Speaker 1: let's see, we went a good deal into this in 523 00:30:43,480 --> 00:30:46,920 Speaker 1: our Almost Cannibals episode because we're basically there was one 524 00:30:46,920 --> 00:30:51,000 Speaker 1: point we were discussing the idea of cannibalism by neander 525 00:30:51,040 --> 00:30:54,600 Speaker 1: Dolls by early humans, and you see examples of cannibalism 526 00:30:54,720 --> 00:30:57,640 Speaker 1: in both groups. But there's less evidence to suggest that, say, 527 00:30:57,880 --> 00:31:01,080 Speaker 1: humans aid all the neander dolls or the neander eight humans. 528 00:31:01,600 --> 00:31:05,240 Speaker 1: Um I mean it. Basically, there are a number of 529 00:31:05,240 --> 00:31:10,320 Speaker 1: open questions about what exactly happened between Neanderthals and humans. 530 00:31:10,320 --> 00:31:14,520 Speaker 1: To what extent anything happened. Um. A lot of sources 531 00:31:14,560 --> 00:31:17,200 Speaker 1: seem to indicate that there was There was probably at 532 00:31:17,240 --> 00:31:21,840 Speaker 1: least a competition for resources, if not something more you know, nefarious, uh, 533 00:31:22,000 --> 00:31:25,680 Speaker 1: with of course than the inder dolls eventually um fading away, 534 00:31:26,200 --> 00:31:29,440 Speaker 1: leaving only us. But what well, I take that back, 535 00:31:29,520 --> 00:31:33,840 Speaker 1: also some trace of Neanderthals within our own genetics. Now 536 00:31:34,040 --> 00:31:36,720 Speaker 1: it's interesting to think of a true humanoid other and 537 00:31:36,800 --> 00:31:40,920 Speaker 1: how human society would process its downfall. Uh. There's another 538 00:31:41,000 --> 00:31:42,800 Speaker 1: huge issue to consider that, and that is that that 539 00:31:42,960 --> 00:31:48,280 Speaker 1: is our tendency to dehumanize due to xenophobic, nationalistic, uh 540 00:31:48,320 --> 00:31:51,440 Speaker 1: and or racist attitudes and and this is an issue 541 00:31:51,440 --> 00:31:54,840 Speaker 1: that certainly comes up in the consideration of orcs. Yeah. 542 00:31:54,880 --> 00:31:57,160 Speaker 1: I think one of the most difficult things when you 543 00:31:57,320 --> 00:32:01,560 Speaker 1: dig into the history of ideas about monsters. As much 544 00:32:01,600 --> 00:32:03,400 Speaker 1: as we love them today and they're fun in the 545 00:32:03,520 --> 00:32:06,400 Speaker 1: in the forms we have them, they may often have 546 00:32:06,680 --> 00:32:10,479 Speaker 1: their origins in ideas that if we were fully understand them, 547 00:32:10,520 --> 00:32:13,320 Speaker 1: we would find quite repugnant. I mean, I think a 548 00:32:13,320 --> 00:32:17,480 Speaker 1: lot of the origins of monster legends are probably in 549 00:32:17,560 --> 00:32:22,200 Speaker 1: some process of dehumanizing people who are human. Yeah, it's 550 00:32:22,360 --> 00:32:24,880 Speaker 1: and it it is. It's truly heartbreaking because you want 551 00:32:24,960 --> 00:32:28,440 Speaker 1: monsters to be this pure escapism. But then yeah, when 552 00:32:28,440 --> 00:32:31,400 Speaker 1: you start pulling the various threads, you often find yourself 553 00:32:31,440 --> 00:32:34,360 Speaker 1: confronting something like this, and if nothing else, you confront 554 00:32:34,360 --> 00:32:37,760 Speaker 1: the you know, the basic idea that that these that 555 00:32:37,880 --> 00:32:41,880 Speaker 1: monsters always emerge from, if not one particular time, they 556 00:32:41,920 --> 00:32:45,520 Speaker 1: emerge out of different times. And and token's orcs especially, 557 00:32:45,560 --> 00:32:49,880 Speaker 1: I mean they're emerging out of twentieth century Europe, you know, 558 00:32:49,960 --> 00:32:53,720 Speaker 1: out of the period during which there were two devastating 559 00:32:53,800 --> 00:32:57,920 Speaker 1: world wars. Uh, certainly there's plenty of European racism and 560 00:32:58,000 --> 00:33:02,120 Speaker 1: xenophobia going around at the time, the wartime demonization of 561 00:33:02,160 --> 00:33:05,160 Speaker 1: the enemy like this, these are all elements in the soup, 562 00:33:05,240 --> 00:33:08,840 Speaker 1: no matter, no matter how much you want to focus 563 00:33:09,040 --> 00:33:12,960 Speaker 1: on these just being purely fictional beings in a you know, 564 00:33:13,080 --> 00:33:16,000 Speaker 1: in another world, or in a world that is inspired 565 00:33:16,120 --> 00:33:19,520 Speaker 1: purely out of like the scholarly consideration of myths and 566 00:33:19,520 --> 00:33:22,120 Speaker 1: and fairy tales. Right, I mean, I think at the 567 00:33:22,160 --> 00:33:24,320 Speaker 1: very least, what you can definitely say about the orc, 568 00:33:24,480 --> 00:33:26,800 Speaker 1: no matter what else we know about them, is that 569 00:33:26,880 --> 00:33:30,840 Speaker 1: they are a dehumanized form of the enemy. To be 570 00:33:30,880 --> 00:33:34,120 Speaker 1: represented in war um and in a way you know, 571 00:33:34,200 --> 00:33:37,000 Speaker 1: if if Tolkien was trying to consciously sort of recreate 572 00:33:37,080 --> 00:33:40,240 Speaker 1: something like a mythology. We see something like this in 573 00:33:40,280 --> 00:33:43,040 Speaker 1: lots of mythologies, you know it. It is of course 574 00:33:43,080 --> 00:33:47,560 Speaker 1: common for humans to to to dehumanize their enemies and 575 00:33:47,600 --> 00:33:50,520 Speaker 1: to think of them as something you know, less than 576 00:33:50,640 --> 00:33:54,000 Speaker 1: the people like us, right and and I mean we 577 00:33:54,000 --> 00:33:55,520 Speaker 1: we see this everywhere. I mean, this is one of 578 00:33:55,560 --> 00:33:58,800 Speaker 1: the reasons that arguably that zombie fiction has been so 579 00:33:58,800 --> 00:34:02,880 Speaker 1: so successful is that it presents a completely um, you know, 580 00:34:02,920 --> 00:34:06,160 Speaker 1: ethically acceptable in any that can just be eradicated without 581 00:34:06,200 --> 00:34:10,120 Speaker 1: any second consideration. Um And I think that you know, 582 00:34:10,239 --> 00:34:14,000 Speaker 1: you remember when we did um the episode about daydreaming, 583 00:34:14,120 --> 00:34:16,120 Speaker 1: and one of the studies we looked at discovered that 584 00:34:16,120 --> 00:34:18,880 Speaker 1: one of the most common things that people daydream about 585 00:34:19,120 --> 00:34:24,120 Speaker 1: is they just sort of fantasize about violent conflict that 586 00:34:24,200 --> 00:34:26,600 Speaker 1: people they think like, oh, if there was a fight, 587 00:34:26,760 --> 00:34:29,440 Speaker 1: what would I do? Uh? You know, there there's this 588 00:34:29,560 --> 00:34:32,240 Speaker 1: kind of thing, and so obviously people's brains are drawn 589 00:34:32,360 --> 00:34:35,640 Speaker 1: to this kind of scenario to fantasize about, you know, 590 00:34:35,719 --> 00:34:39,160 Speaker 1: for understandable reasons, like you like, you want to be 591 00:34:39,360 --> 00:34:41,960 Speaker 1: like that. That's where a lot of potential risk lies 592 00:34:42,080 --> 00:34:43,839 Speaker 1: and you want to imagine, like, well, what could I 593 00:34:43,840 --> 00:34:45,480 Speaker 1: do to get out of this? How could I win 594 00:34:46,120 --> 00:34:48,120 Speaker 1: that kind of thing? But then also that, you know, 595 00:34:48,200 --> 00:34:50,160 Speaker 1: I think about In The Lord of the Rings, there's 596 00:34:50,239 --> 00:34:53,279 Speaker 1: part where sam Wise gamge Uh he recognized as a 597 00:34:53,320 --> 00:34:56,560 Speaker 1: fallen soldier from the other side, from somebody who's fighting 598 00:34:56,880 --> 00:34:59,680 Speaker 1: for Saron, but is a human fighting for Saron one 599 00:34:59,680 --> 00:35:02,520 Speaker 1: of the for one of the men from Harad, And 600 00:35:02,760 --> 00:35:05,880 Speaker 1: sam Wise looks at him and he feels bad. He says, 601 00:35:06,400 --> 00:35:09,120 Speaker 1: wait a minute, you know, was this man really evil 602 00:35:09,360 --> 00:35:11,960 Speaker 1: or what kind of lies or threats brought him here 603 00:35:12,000 --> 00:35:14,520 Speaker 1: so far from home? And wouldn't he rather be living 604 00:35:14,520 --> 00:35:18,240 Speaker 1: at peace? That's interesting. It's a kind of strange moment 605 00:35:18,239 --> 00:35:22,280 Speaker 1: where suddenly, out of this otherwise kind of manicheean uh 606 00:35:22,440 --> 00:35:26,680 Speaker 1: good versus evil war fantasy war with a with a 607 00:35:26,719 --> 00:35:31,200 Speaker 1: non human enemy, suddenly there's this this breakthrough where one 608 00:35:31,200 --> 00:35:34,560 Speaker 1: of the characters on the supposed good side thinks, wait 609 00:35:34,600 --> 00:35:37,200 Speaker 1: a minute, aren't the people on the other side humans too? 610 00:35:37,239 --> 00:35:40,000 Speaker 1: Aren't they you know? Don't they have lives? Don't they 611 00:35:40,040 --> 00:35:43,840 Speaker 1: have moral complexities behind their story? This is one of 612 00:35:43,840 --> 00:35:46,120 Speaker 1: the things that you see time and time again in 613 00:35:46,120 --> 00:35:47,799 Speaker 1: in this discussion. And I do want to I want 614 00:35:47,800 --> 00:35:50,880 Speaker 1: to drive home that this is a This has been 615 00:35:50,920 --> 00:35:54,640 Speaker 1: a topic of of continual consideration by token scholars and 616 00:35:54,920 --> 00:35:58,000 Speaker 1: literary cultural scholars alike, both in reference to the original 617 00:35:58,040 --> 00:36:00,640 Speaker 1: works and you know, the original writings Jared Tolken and 618 00:36:00,719 --> 00:36:04,279 Speaker 1: these various film are incarnations because on one hand, yeah, 619 00:36:04,440 --> 00:36:07,279 Speaker 1: like there's this idea if you read um uh you know, 620 00:36:07,320 --> 00:36:09,719 Speaker 1: like in our our cold opening, this idea of the 621 00:36:09,880 --> 00:36:13,480 Speaker 1: Orcs is just this purely inhuman thing, just made out 622 00:36:13,480 --> 00:36:16,279 Speaker 1: of savagery. Uh you know that, Like that sounds more 623 00:36:16,280 --> 00:36:18,440 Speaker 1: in keeping with a zombie myth, right, just like no 624 00:36:18,560 --> 00:36:22,360 Speaker 1: ethical problems at all. But but along the lines of 625 00:36:22,400 --> 00:36:24,640 Speaker 1: this example of a human fighting for Sara, and there 626 00:36:24,640 --> 00:36:26,680 Speaker 1: are plenty of examples in the Lord of the Rings 627 00:36:26,719 --> 00:36:30,560 Speaker 1: where Tolken does engage in a certain humanization of the Orcs, 628 00:36:30,600 --> 00:36:33,960 Speaker 1: like they're given some sense of individuality. I believe they're 629 00:36:34,000 --> 00:36:36,640 Speaker 1: you know, scenes where they've been taken captives by their 630 00:36:36,640 --> 00:36:40,680 Speaker 1: works and their overhearing or conversations. Uh yeah, Maryan Pippen 631 00:36:40,960 --> 00:36:43,520 Speaker 1: when they're kidnapped by the Orcs, they sort of interact 632 00:36:43,560 --> 00:36:45,400 Speaker 1: with the orcs in a way that suggests to me 633 00:36:45,480 --> 00:36:48,520 Speaker 1: at least that the orcs are sentient. You know, they're 634 00:36:48,560 --> 00:36:51,239 Speaker 1: they're not like, they're not like robots, you know, they're 635 00:36:51,280 --> 00:36:54,480 Speaker 1: they're not just evil killing machines, like they've got motivations 636 00:36:54,560 --> 00:36:58,840 Speaker 1: of their own. So that makes everything a lot more complicated. 637 00:36:58,880 --> 00:37:00,920 Speaker 1: Everything we're about to talk about a little more complicated. 638 00:37:01,360 --> 00:37:04,840 Speaker 1: Um now, we can't possibly cover the entire discourse on 639 00:37:04,880 --> 00:37:07,600 Speaker 1: this topic. It looks like there's some very good sources 640 00:37:07,640 --> 00:37:10,239 Speaker 1: out there that you can find. I ran across a 641 00:37:10,280 --> 00:37:12,120 Speaker 1: book that I've is cited in a source that I'm 642 00:37:12,120 --> 00:37:16,319 Speaker 1: going to mention by Demitra Fimi, titled Token Race and 643 00:37:16,360 --> 00:37:20,400 Speaker 1: Cultural History, that is supposedly quite good. But some of 644 00:37:20,440 --> 00:37:22,840 Speaker 1: the key issues that are often brought up about orcs 645 00:37:22,920 --> 00:37:26,080 Speaker 1: are that orcs are clearly described as having dark skin, 646 00:37:26,840 --> 00:37:30,759 Speaker 1: Orcs are described as being quote unquote slant eyed, And 647 00:37:30,920 --> 00:37:33,840 Speaker 1: there's this sense that, yeah, orcs are human shaped and 648 00:37:33,840 --> 00:37:36,040 Speaker 1: are more or less human like, but then they are 649 00:37:36,080 --> 00:37:39,920 Speaker 1: also less than human or described as less than human. 650 00:37:40,200 --> 00:37:43,360 Speaker 1: And it is often suggested that like, you know, nothing 651 00:37:43,360 --> 00:37:47,520 Speaker 1: but brutal violence, it's against the orcs. Is is permissible 652 00:37:47,719 --> 00:37:50,479 Speaker 1: and that you know that that is that they should 653 00:37:50,520 --> 00:37:55,040 Speaker 1: just be eradicated by the higher um uh species of 654 00:37:55,080 --> 00:37:57,799 Speaker 1: Middle Earth. And I mean some of this I think 655 00:37:57,880 --> 00:38:01,640 Speaker 1: might be as getting back to the oken Um duality here. 656 00:38:01,880 --> 00:38:03,279 Speaker 1: I think part of it is just by if you 657 00:38:03,280 --> 00:38:06,239 Speaker 1: start telling stories about something, you're gonna end up humanizing it. 658 00:38:06,520 --> 00:38:08,680 Speaker 1: So I can see where you could start with your 659 00:38:09,280 --> 00:38:11,839 Speaker 1: with your you know you're just completely um, you know, 660 00:38:12,520 --> 00:38:16,080 Speaker 1: irredeemable enemy. But then you you can't help but but 661 00:38:16,080 --> 00:38:18,560 Speaker 1: but but humanize it a bit in the same way 662 00:38:18,600 --> 00:38:21,200 Speaker 1: that Um, say, like in Um in the Clone Wars, 663 00:38:21,239 --> 00:38:23,319 Speaker 1: you know, you have the Droid army. The droids are 664 00:38:23,400 --> 00:38:26,400 Speaker 1: like a great example of an enemy army that is 665 00:38:26,440 --> 00:38:32,080 Speaker 1: set up to be easily and dispatched without any ethical quandaries. 666 00:38:32,560 --> 00:38:35,880 Speaker 1: And you still see this kind of creep in Clone 667 00:38:35,880 --> 00:38:39,480 Speaker 1: Wars uh storytelling, in which you'll you'll end up sympathizing 668 00:38:39,520 --> 00:38:41,600 Speaker 1: with the droids. You know you can't help, but but 669 00:38:41,680 --> 00:38:45,120 Speaker 1: apply uh, you know, sort of human characteristics to the 670 00:38:45,200 --> 00:38:48,640 Speaker 1: droids at times. Now, one of the works I was 671 00:38:48,640 --> 00:38:51,360 Speaker 1: looking at for this is um a paper by Robert T. 672 00:38:51,520 --> 00:38:55,200 Speaker 1: Talley Jr. Uh Let us now praise famous orcs simple 673 00:38:55,280 --> 00:38:58,440 Speaker 1: humanity and tokens in human creatures. This was published in 674 00:38:58,520 --> 00:39:02,520 Speaker 1: myth lower Back in two and um he he looks 675 00:39:02,560 --> 00:39:06,600 Speaker 1: at at both sides of the of the discussion here 676 00:39:06,640 --> 00:39:11,080 Speaker 1: basically now, Tally ultimately does not himself accused Tolken of racism, 677 00:39:11,080 --> 00:39:13,359 Speaker 1: but he does outline much of the evidence that can 678 00:39:13,400 --> 00:39:16,560 Speaker 1: be cited in such a charge, admitting quote it is 679 00:39:16,600 --> 00:39:19,640 Speaker 1: true that no one can read about the quote Swart 680 00:39:19,840 --> 00:39:23,960 Speaker 1: and quote slant eyed Orc so many times without becoming offended. 681 00:39:24,400 --> 00:39:27,359 Speaker 1: And he also points out that Tolkien himself notoriously wrote 682 00:39:27,360 --> 00:39:30,040 Speaker 1: in one of his letters quote the Orcs are definitely 683 00:39:30,040 --> 00:39:32,440 Speaker 1: stated to be corruptions of the human form seen in 684 00:39:32,520 --> 00:39:36,560 Speaker 1: elves and men. They are or were squat broad, flat nosed, 685 00:39:36,880 --> 00:39:40,360 Speaker 1: sallow skin, with wide mouths and slant eyes. In fact 686 00:39:40,640 --> 00:39:44,560 Speaker 1: degraded in repulsive versions of the two Europeans least lovely 687 00:39:44,640 --> 00:39:48,799 Speaker 1: Mongol types. That is not a good sentiment. Yeah, And 688 00:39:48,920 --> 00:39:52,840 Speaker 1: according to Anderson Ririk, the third in why is the 689 00:39:52,880 --> 00:39:56,320 Speaker 1: only good orcadel Orc published in MFS Modern Fiction Studies. 690 00:39:56,680 --> 00:39:59,919 Speaker 1: UH Tolkien's friend C. S. Lewis even made passing minh 691 00:40:00,080 --> 00:40:03,360 Speaker 1: And of racism in light of the book's first publication 692 00:40:03,400 --> 00:40:06,080 Speaker 1: but again but apparently did not pursue the idea all 693 00:40:06,160 --> 00:40:08,799 Speaker 1: that much. So, you know, it seems to have been 694 00:40:08,920 --> 00:40:12,480 Speaker 1: something that was at least in the conversation concerning orcs 695 00:40:12,600 --> 00:40:15,480 Speaker 1: UH for quite some time, and maybe even on on 696 00:40:15,640 --> 00:40:18,200 Speaker 1: Tolkien's mind at least at times. I mean, I can't 697 00:40:18,200 --> 00:40:20,600 Speaker 1: help but I had forgotten that passage about the human 698 00:40:20,719 --> 00:40:25,640 Speaker 1: servants of Mordor. But that's interesting as well. I've also 699 00:40:25,680 --> 00:40:27,840 Speaker 1: seen it argued that this sort of view of the 700 00:40:28,200 --> 00:40:32,720 Speaker 1: racial enemy tied up with the orc was also readily 701 00:40:32,800 --> 00:40:36,720 Speaker 1: exhibited in World War One and World War two propaganda 702 00:40:36,800 --> 00:40:39,400 Speaker 1: against both Germans and the Japanese, where you see like 703 00:40:39,440 --> 00:40:43,600 Speaker 1: a monstrous racial version of the enemy depicted in propaganda posters. 704 00:40:44,000 --> 00:40:45,960 Speaker 1: And then on top of that, we're talking about an 705 00:40:45,960 --> 00:40:49,960 Speaker 1: era of eugenics, ideas of racial purity. Um. All that 706 00:40:50,040 --> 00:40:52,319 Speaker 1: going on in the background, and this is ultimately again 707 00:40:52,360 --> 00:40:56,960 Speaker 1: the world that these works emerge from. UM now fimi 708 00:40:57,239 --> 00:41:00,600 Speaker 1: UM concludes, according to to Tally, that that Tolkien quote 709 00:41:00,640 --> 00:41:05,120 Speaker 1: objectionable racial uh characterizations are consistent with the discourse of 710 00:41:05,160 --> 00:41:07,880 Speaker 1: his time, and in in any event, consistent with the 711 00:41:07,960 --> 00:41:13,040 Speaker 1: quote hierarchical world in which his mythic history unfolds. Now 712 00:41:13,080 --> 00:41:15,680 Speaker 1: that being said, I don't think that makes it any 713 00:41:15,760 --> 00:41:18,880 Speaker 1: easier for modern readers or viewers. You know, once you 714 00:41:18,920 --> 00:41:21,920 Speaker 1: start focusing on these these elements, once you start you know, 715 00:41:22,000 --> 00:41:24,520 Speaker 1: noticing them in your your reading of the tax or 716 00:41:24,560 --> 00:41:27,759 Speaker 1: the viewing of the movies that spawned from them, you know, 717 00:41:27,840 --> 00:41:31,920 Speaker 1: you see modern adaptations dealing with this in in almost 718 00:41:32,000 --> 00:41:36,239 Speaker 1: diametrically opposed ways, right, um, because one way you could 719 00:41:36,280 --> 00:41:39,040 Speaker 1: deal with it is to try to embrace even harder 720 00:41:40,800 --> 00:41:43,719 Speaker 1: the distinctions that would make you know, whatever kind of 721 00:41:43,760 --> 00:41:46,960 Speaker 1: like monster enemy and it is it is clearly not human. 722 00:41:47,040 --> 00:41:49,160 Speaker 1: You know, you want to go full zombie or full 723 00:41:49,320 --> 00:41:52,040 Speaker 1: robot uh, to suggest that like, no, no, no, the 724 00:41:52,120 --> 00:41:54,480 Speaker 1: orcs can't be. They're not a metaphor for like in 725 00:41:54,600 --> 00:41:57,359 Speaker 1: any people. They're just that they're not human at all. 726 00:41:57,400 --> 00:42:00,319 Speaker 1: They're like, you know, bio robots or something. And then 727 00:42:00,360 --> 00:42:02,719 Speaker 1: the other direction would be to actually try to humanize 728 00:42:02,719 --> 00:42:05,839 Speaker 1: them more and make them seem more complicated. But yeah, 729 00:42:06,040 --> 00:42:09,160 Speaker 1: it is true. I mean, like it much fantasy and 730 00:42:09,200 --> 00:42:12,400 Speaker 1: epic writing is this way. But as there they currently 731 00:42:12,440 --> 00:42:16,040 Speaker 1: exist in the story, the orcs are in this uncomfortable 732 00:42:16,120 --> 00:42:19,200 Speaker 1: middle position where they are sort of human, but they're 733 00:42:19,239 --> 00:42:22,680 Speaker 1: they're they're not treated with the fairness that we would 734 00:42:23,040 --> 00:42:26,920 Speaker 1: hope should be afforded to all sentient creatures. Yeah, and 735 00:42:26,960 --> 00:42:29,000 Speaker 1: it's I guess that's that's the ambiguity of it that 736 00:42:29,080 --> 00:42:32,520 Speaker 1: makes it difficult, and um, you know, and it's also 737 00:42:32,640 --> 00:42:34,680 Speaker 1: I would say with Tolkien it doesn't seem to be 738 00:42:34,800 --> 00:42:37,200 Speaker 1: nearly as as clear cut of situation as we have 739 00:42:37,239 --> 00:42:40,080 Speaker 1: to say with HP. Lovecraft, you know who, we have 740 00:42:40,280 --> 00:42:43,319 Speaker 1: such you know, damning examples of racist sentiment in his 741 00:42:43,480 --> 00:42:46,400 Speaker 1: in his private letters. And then and then when you 742 00:42:46,440 --> 00:42:48,719 Speaker 1: look at his works of fiction in light of those letters, 743 00:42:48,760 --> 00:42:51,160 Speaker 1: I mean, it's just it's, um, you know, you can't 744 00:42:51,200 --> 00:42:54,600 Speaker 1: ignore these elements in his work. Um, you know told 745 00:42:54,680 --> 00:42:58,320 Speaker 1: Tolkien's writings certainly have been accused of containing wrong or 746 00:42:58,440 --> 00:43:01,359 Speaker 1: outmoded attitudes to ray with the works very much at 747 00:43:01,360 --> 00:43:03,680 Speaker 1: the center of all of this. But but then you 748 00:43:03,840 --> 00:43:05,759 Speaker 1: I mean, you have defenders pointing out, well, okay, Token 749 00:43:05,840 --> 00:43:08,560 Speaker 1: himself was anti racists, both in peace time and during 750 00:43:08,560 --> 00:43:10,879 Speaker 1: the Two World Wars. I don't know, you're still left 751 00:43:10,920 --> 00:43:13,799 Speaker 1: with with what we still have is just continual discussion 752 00:43:13,840 --> 00:43:17,600 Speaker 1: of like how are we supposed to process Um, Tolkien's 753 00:43:17,640 --> 00:43:21,359 Speaker 1: work as a as a modern consumer and a modern thinker. Well, 754 00:43:21,400 --> 00:43:22,839 Speaker 1: I mean, I guess one of the ways that we're 755 00:43:22,880 --> 00:43:26,120 Speaker 1: left to deal with it is just to uh, is 756 00:43:26,160 --> 00:43:29,920 Speaker 1: to don't let yourself get lord of the rings brain, 757 00:43:30,080 --> 00:43:33,600 Speaker 1: or at least certainly don't let yourself get orc brain. Uh, 758 00:43:33,640 --> 00:43:36,680 Speaker 1: thinking outside of the fantasy of the text. You know, 759 00:43:36,760 --> 00:43:39,000 Speaker 1: the real world does not have orcs in it, Like 760 00:43:39,120 --> 00:43:41,520 Speaker 1: you know, all the people, even people you might be 761 00:43:41,560 --> 00:43:45,160 Speaker 1: in conflict against our human and that you know, and 762 00:43:45,160 --> 00:43:47,800 Speaker 1: and to maybe lean more into the sam Wise Gamge 763 00:43:47,920 --> 00:43:50,800 Speaker 1: way of thinking about things, to to always try to 764 00:43:50,840 --> 00:43:53,399 Speaker 1: remember that even somebody who you might be at war 765 00:43:53,480 --> 00:43:56,720 Speaker 1: with is still a human and they've got their own motivations. 766 00:43:56,760 --> 00:44:00,760 Speaker 1: They are morally complex in the same way that you are. Yeah, yeah, 767 00:44:00,800 --> 00:44:03,000 Speaker 1: And I mean I think it's one of Tolkien's letters. 768 00:44:03,000 --> 00:44:05,200 Speaker 1: He even said something similar where He's like, well, in 769 00:44:05,239 --> 00:44:07,120 Speaker 1: the real world you have works on both sides of 770 00:44:07,120 --> 00:44:10,440 Speaker 1: a conflict. Um, because I guess in a sense of 771 00:44:10,440 --> 00:44:14,040 Speaker 1: the works, the orcs is us, right. Uh. I want 772 00:44:14,040 --> 00:44:16,680 Speaker 1: to note too that I thought Dungeons and Dragons UM, 773 00:44:17,600 --> 00:44:20,480 Speaker 1: the game, the company behind it, they recently made mention 774 00:44:20,520 --> 00:44:23,120 Speaker 1: of something this some of this concerning works in a 775 00:44:23,160 --> 00:44:26,680 Speaker 1: diversity statement. Um, they put this out. This was this year, 776 00:44:26,760 --> 00:44:29,480 Speaker 1: they wrote, quote. Throughout the fifty year history of D 777 00:44:29,560 --> 00:44:31,880 Speaker 1: and D, some of the people's in the game, works 778 00:44:31,920 --> 00:44:35,120 Speaker 1: and drought being two prime examples, have been characterized as 779 00:44:35,200 --> 00:44:38,840 Speaker 1: monstrous and evil, using descriptions that are painfully reminiscent of 780 00:44:38,880 --> 00:44:41,680 Speaker 1: how real world ethnic groups have been and continue to 781 00:44:41,719 --> 00:44:44,640 Speaker 1: be denigrated. That's just not right, and it's not something 782 00:44:44,680 --> 00:44:47,320 Speaker 1: we believe in. Despite our conscious efforts to the contrary, 783 00:44:47,480 --> 00:44:50,400 Speaker 1: we have allowed some of those old descriptions to reappear 784 00:44:50,400 --> 00:44:53,480 Speaker 1: in the game. We recognize that to live our values, 785 00:44:53,520 --> 00:44:55,360 Speaker 1: we have to do an even better job in handling 786 00:44:55,400 --> 00:44:58,000 Speaker 1: these issues if we make mistakes our priorities to make 787 00:44:58,040 --> 00:44:59,759 Speaker 1: things right. And then they go on to stress a 788 00:44:59,840 --> 00:45:02,440 Speaker 1: far word facing commitment to betraying Orcs and drought as 789 00:45:02,520 --> 00:45:06,680 Speaker 1: quote just as morally and culturally complex as other people's, 790 00:45:06,719 --> 00:45:08,640 Speaker 1: which which I think is is a way to go, 791 00:45:08,800 --> 00:45:13,400 Speaker 1: especially considering and Orcs and drought have such a prominent 792 00:45:13,520 --> 00:45:16,879 Speaker 1: role in Duns and Dragons of storytelling, the drought being 793 00:45:16,960 --> 00:45:20,360 Speaker 1: the dark elves of the Undertark. Yeah, the more I 794 00:45:20,360 --> 00:45:23,080 Speaker 1: think about it, the more I think that the clear 795 00:45:23,160 --> 00:45:26,040 Speaker 1: dividing line, really, I guess would have to be sentience, right, 796 00:45:26,160 --> 00:45:29,600 Speaker 1: that there there was an idea here, maybe in older 797 00:45:29,719 --> 00:45:34,200 Speaker 1: versions of D and D apparently somewhat ambiguously represented in 798 00:45:34,200 --> 00:45:35,919 Speaker 1: in The Lord of the Rings, that there are some 799 00:45:36,480 --> 00:45:39,320 Speaker 1: types of people or types of creatures that are sentient 800 00:45:39,440 --> 00:45:43,320 Speaker 1: they're thinking beings like us, but they are also wholly evil, 801 00:45:44,480 --> 00:45:46,839 Speaker 1: and in a way that's just sort of that's sort 802 00:45:46,880 --> 00:45:50,080 Speaker 1: of self contradictory, right, Like, you know, a sentient being 803 00:45:50,600 --> 00:45:54,080 Speaker 1: couldn't be as an entire people wholly evil because their 804 00:45:54,080 --> 00:45:58,000 Speaker 1: sentience would sort of necessarily imply that there is you know, 805 00:45:58,320 --> 00:46:01,239 Speaker 1: that there is moral complexity to them. Yeah, I mean 806 00:46:01,239 --> 00:46:03,440 Speaker 1: it works when you're talking about and basically comes down 807 00:46:03,480 --> 00:46:06,480 Speaker 1: to the alignment system in Dungeons and Dragons, which on 808 00:46:06,520 --> 00:46:09,400 Speaker 1: an individual level doesn't really work in the real world. 809 00:46:09,440 --> 00:46:11,640 Speaker 1: Like I mean the idea that I mean I am 810 00:46:11,640 --> 00:46:14,279 Speaker 1: I am I neutral evil? Or am I and my 811 00:46:14,440 --> 00:46:18,120 Speaker 1: neutral good? Like I think in reality, we have multiple 812 00:46:18,160 --> 00:46:22,319 Speaker 1: alignments in ourselves at all times, and it's about it's 813 00:46:22,320 --> 00:46:25,600 Speaker 1: about nurturing the alignments that are the person we want 814 00:46:25,600 --> 00:46:27,839 Speaker 1: to be, you know. And then certainly when you get 815 00:46:27,880 --> 00:46:31,840 Speaker 1: into a species wide alignment, like what is humanity's alignment? 816 00:46:33,200 --> 00:46:35,520 Speaker 1: I mean, it depends on what we're doing at any 817 00:46:35,520 --> 00:46:37,600 Speaker 1: given time. It depends on what you're focusing on. I mean, 818 00:46:37,640 --> 00:46:40,800 Speaker 1: they're there aspects of humanities, um, you know, role in 819 00:46:40,840 --> 00:46:44,040 Speaker 1: the world that are that would seem you know, at 820 00:46:44,120 --> 00:46:47,120 Speaker 1: least lawful evil if or neutral evil, and there are 821 00:46:47,160 --> 00:46:49,160 Speaker 1: other things that are that are not so. So Yeah, 822 00:46:49,360 --> 00:46:51,200 Speaker 1: it's it's one of these things that when it works 823 00:46:51,239 --> 00:46:53,440 Speaker 1: well within a game context, as long as you're not 824 00:46:54,640 --> 00:46:57,719 Speaker 1: thinking too hard about it, I guess. I mean, ultimately, 825 00:46:57,760 --> 00:47:00,839 Speaker 1: I don't think it's ever gonna go away convention of 826 00:47:00,880 --> 00:47:05,120 Speaker 1: having uh, various types of fantasy storytelling in which there 827 00:47:05,200 --> 00:47:07,520 Speaker 1: is some kind of conflict and the enemy of the 828 00:47:07,560 --> 00:47:11,319 Speaker 1: heroes is an army of monsters. But I guess that 829 00:47:11,440 --> 00:47:14,840 Speaker 1: mindset has its its place within fiction as just the 830 00:47:14,880 --> 00:47:17,359 Speaker 1: same way a horror mindset does or anything like that. 831 00:47:17,400 --> 00:47:19,360 Speaker 1: You know, don't pull it out into the real world 832 00:47:19,400 --> 00:47:22,719 Speaker 1: and try to use it on humans. Yeah, alright, on 833 00:47:22,800 --> 00:47:24,960 Speaker 1: that note, we're going to take a break, but we'll 834 00:47:25,000 --> 00:47:31,440 Speaker 1: be right back. Thank thank Alright, we're back. So let's 835 00:47:31,600 --> 00:47:34,880 Speaker 1: let's move back to the in universe concept of the 836 00:47:35,000 --> 00:47:40,359 Speaker 1: Orc and consider how we might apply science to the situation. So, 837 00:47:40,680 --> 00:47:43,120 Speaker 1: first of all, I'd like to refer back to the 838 00:47:43,160 --> 00:47:45,520 Speaker 1: writings of our Scott Baker, who have mentioned on the 839 00:47:45,520 --> 00:47:47,640 Speaker 1: show before, and heck he's been on the show a 840 00:47:47,640 --> 00:47:51,040 Speaker 1: couple of times, hasn't he. But he wrote this Second 841 00:47:51,040 --> 00:47:53,920 Speaker 1: Apocalypse SOCCO, which takes a lot of inspiration from Tolkien, 842 00:47:53,960 --> 00:47:57,960 Speaker 1: but applies a different, uh philosophical and at times science 843 00:47:57,960 --> 00:48:01,920 Speaker 1: fictional limbs to everything. And in the place of orcs, 844 00:48:01,960 --> 00:48:05,080 Speaker 1: he presents these creatures that are called the Shrunk, which 845 00:48:05,120 --> 00:48:07,840 Speaker 1: are described as one of the the quote unquote weapon 846 00:48:07,960 --> 00:48:12,000 Speaker 1: races that were engineered by the big batties in this series, 847 00:48:12,080 --> 00:48:16,960 Speaker 1: the the alien in Karai. So these are depraved like 848 00:48:17,040 --> 00:48:20,839 Speaker 1: thoroughly inhuman creatures from another world that they an cry 849 00:48:20,880 --> 00:48:23,799 Speaker 1: and they've taken members of the elf like non men 850 00:48:24,520 --> 00:48:27,200 Speaker 1: uh in this world, and they've used the technique or 851 00:48:27,200 --> 00:48:30,160 Speaker 1: the old science to twist them into savage creatures of 852 00:48:30,160 --> 00:48:34,200 Speaker 1: the basest and most violent instinct often described as retaining 853 00:48:34,200 --> 00:48:37,600 Speaker 1: the beautiful faces of the non men, only twisted with 854 00:48:37,680 --> 00:48:42,120 Speaker 1: like raw violent emotion and with kind of emaciated bodies. 855 00:48:42,400 --> 00:48:45,399 Speaker 1: And so they're they're engineered to combat the non men 856 00:48:45,480 --> 00:48:49,359 Speaker 1: warriors while also consisting on next to nothing, like they 857 00:48:49,440 --> 00:48:52,080 Speaker 1: were told that, they just they live off of grubs 858 00:48:52,480 --> 00:48:56,200 Speaker 1: and insects that they find, uh on as they scavenge 859 00:48:56,239 --> 00:48:58,759 Speaker 1: other lands that are otherwise fruitless. They could otherwise not 860 00:48:58,840 --> 00:49:01,319 Speaker 1: support an army at all. And they're all part of 861 00:49:01,320 --> 00:49:04,600 Speaker 1: this scheme to you know, essentially destroy the world and 862 00:49:05,040 --> 00:49:08,440 Speaker 1: eradicate conscious beings from it. And so I think it's 863 00:49:08,440 --> 00:49:11,719 Speaker 1: an interesting take on the idea of an orc, or 864 00:49:11,719 --> 00:49:15,120 Speaker 1: at least an orc as an engineered warrior being more 865 00:49:15,200 --> 00:49:18,800 Speaker 1: or less an organic robot made for savagery and war 866 00:49:19,239 --> 00:49:22,680 Speaker 1: that is itself incapable of self reflection. Uh. And if 867 00:49:22,719 --> 00:49:24,600 Speaker 1: you were indeed the you know, the Inkari or a 868 00:49:24,719 --> 00:49:27,759 Speaker 1: dark lord of Middle Earth, it makes sense, I guess, 869 00:49:27,840 --> 00:49:31,000 Speaker 1: to create such servants. Uh. And indeed, this whole concept 870 00:49:31,280 --> 00:49:33,360 Speaker 1: it probably gets closer to the idea of like a 871 00:49:33,440 --> 00:49:37,440 Speaker 1: zombie army, or a droid army, or a subservient reanimated 872 00:49:37,440 --> 00:49:40,399 Speaker 1: skeleton army, you know, something that is just purely the 873 00:49:40,400 --> 00:49:43,600 Speaker 1: tool of the great adversary. Well, yeah, and tying into 874 00:49:43,680 --> 00:49:46,560 Speaker 1: something I was talking about earlier, it seems to me significant, 875 00:49:47,080 --> 00:49:50,279 Speaker 1: probably the most significant thing that they are imagined as 876 00:49:50,400 --> 00:49:53,480 Speaker 1: as basically being not sentient or not able to reflect 877 00:49:53,560 --> 00:49:57,080 Speaker 1: on their own behavior, which I mean at that point 878 00:49:57,080 --> 00:49:59,960 Speaker 1: it does seem like that being probably does lack whatever 879 00:50:00,040 --> 00:50:02,200 Speaker 1: it is that that we think of as most significant 880 00:50:02,239 --> 00:50:04,960 Speaker 1: to be human, right, like, if you know you're you're 881 00:50:04,960 --> 00:50:08,399 Speaker 1: not capable of reflecting on your own behavior. Yeah, And 882 00:50:08,400 --> 00:50:10,640 Speaker 1: and the with Baker's work, Yeah, there's this idea first 883 00:50:10,640 --> 00:50:13,480 Speaker 1: of all, that it is not conscious. He's you know, 884 00:50:13,560 --> 00:50:15,520 Speaker 1: he's going to tell you of a creature's conscious or not. 885 00:50:15,680 --> 00:50:18,480 Speaker 1: It's kind of his whole thing. But then also the 886 00:50:18,520 --> 00:50:21,359 Speaker 1: idea that they are definitely engineered. They're a thing that 887 00:50:21,480 --> 00:50:25,520 Speaker 1: is created. They're a a new creation based on uh, 888 00:50:25,560 --> 00:50:28,719 Speaker 1: you know, some designs or raw materials from this other species. 889 00:50:29,600 --> 00:50:33,239 Speaker 1: You know. Peter Watts in the novel Eco Praxia, I 890 00:50:33,280 --> 00:50:37,040 Speaker 1: recall imagine something like this. But it is a type 891 00:50:37,040 --> 00:50:40,480 Speaker 1: of human soldier who has had their nervous system modified 892 00:50:40,560 --> 00:50:43,799 Speaker 1: essentially so that they have the ability to at will 893 00:50:44,120 --> 00:50:48,239 Speaker 1: turn off their consciousness during combat, essentially to become a 894 00:50:48,320 --> 00:50:51,479 Speaker 1: more efficient killer. So the brain still works the same, 895 00:50:51,520 --> 00:50:54,800 Speaker 1: except it's just not conscious while it's fighting. And apparently 896 00:50:54,840 --> 00:51:00,880 Speaker 1: this makes you better at being a soldier interesting. Um. So, 897 00:51:00,880 --> 00:51:03,239 Speaker 1: so I think these these are interesting ways to think 898 00:51:03,280 --> 00:51:06,320 Speaker 1: of a particular like weapons species and a fantasy or 899 00:51:06,360 --> 00:51:09,239 Speaker 1: sci fi context. But but I was also interested to 900 00:51:09,239 --> 00:51:11,960 Speaker 1: see what else could be glean science wise from the 901 00:51:12,080 --> 00:51:15,120 Speaker 1: Orcs of Middle Earth. So I turned to the book 902 00:51:15,239 --> 00:51:17,840 Speaker 1: The Science of Middle Earth by Henry G who is 903 00:51:18,120 --> 00:51:20,480 Speaker 1: himself a long time editor at the science journal Nature 904 00:51:20,920 --> 00:51:24,759 Speaker 1: as well as a paleontologist and evolutionary biologist. And so 905 00:51:24,880 --> 00:51:27,719 Speaker 1: he covers a great deal up from Middle Earth in 906 00:51:27,760 --> 00:51:30,840 Speaker 1: this book, but beginning with the sixth chapter, he begins 907 00:51:30,840 --> 00:51:33,120 Speaker 1: to discuss works a bit, and the sixth chapter is 908 00:51:33,120 --> 00:51:36,600 Speaker 1: titled Inventing the Orcs. UM. He spends all a fair 909 00:51:36,600 --> 00:51:38,880 Speaker 1: amount of time discussing some of what we've already discussed, 910 00:51:38,920 --> 00:51:40,560 Speaker 1: like where do we get the word orc? What does 911 00:51:40,600 --> 00:51:44,719 Speaker 1: it mean? It's ties into mythology. Uh. But he also 912 00:51:44,719 --> 00:51:47,919 Speaker 1: points out, okay, let's let's talk about how how they're 913 00:51:47,960 --> 00:51:50,160 Speaker 1: made and how they reproduce. So he starts by pointing 914 00:51:50,200 --> 00:51:52,719 Speaker 1: out that there's a fair amount of incongruity concerning the 915 00:51:52,760 --> 00:51:56,239 Speaker 1: origins of Eric Orcs and Tolken's Middle Earth. Um, you 916 00:51:56,239 --> 00:52:00,239 Speaker 1: can look at various descriptions and cinematic depictions, uh that 917 00:52:00,440 --> 00:52:02,440 Speaker 1: on one hand make them look like they're bread, and 918 00:52:02,719 --> 00:52:06,200 Speaker 1: another it looks like they're created via torture. Um. And 919 00:52:06,239 --> 00:52:08,719 Speaker 1: if it's torture, are we're talking about something that is more? 920 00:52:09,719 --> 00:52:12,040 Speaker 1: Is this the way we're describing something that's being done 921 00:52:12,040 --> 00:52:15,080 Speaker 1: to the body that can't be understood, like something like 922 00:52:15,120 --> 00:52:18,759 Speaker 1: the technique, something like a sci fi genetic engineering or 923 00:52:18,800 --> 00:52:22,200 Speaker 1: is it something psychological? Right? I seem to recalling the 924 00:52:22,200 --> 00:52:24,479 Speaker 1: Peter Jackson movie that at least some of them, maybe 925 00:52:24,480 --> 00:52:26,719 Speaker 1: this was only the Rakai or or maybe it was 926 00:52:26,760 --> 00:52:31,000 Speaker 1: all of the Orcs, but somehow the servants of Saramon 927 00:52:31,120 --> 00:52:34,399 Speaker 1: were being like grown out of the earth, like they 928 00:52:34,440 --> 00:52:37,400 Speaker 1: came up out of the ground. Yeah. That that's and 929 00:52:37,440 --> 00:52:40,560 Speaker 1: that's something that the g UH discusses as well. Yeah, 930 00:52:40,640 --> 00:52:43,160 Speaker 1: that this idea that that there's something that's just like 931 00:52:43,200 --> 00:52:46,280 Speaker 1: pulled out of the earth, like this sort of primal creation. 932 00:52:46,320 --> 00:52:49,239 Speaker 1: They're just made of mud and stone. Um, or maybe 933 00:52:49,239 --> 00:52:52,360 Speaker 1: their plants or fungus. Yeah, well yeah, maybe there's some 934 00:52:52,400 --> 00:52:56,080 Speaker 1: sort of fungal element as well. Um, so he didn't 935 00:52:56,080 --> 00:52:58,000 Speaker 1: get into the fun Now now I'm thinking about the 936 00:52:58,000 --> 00:53:01,279 Speaker 1: fungal work idea. That's a whole different theory. But but 937 00:53:01,480 --> 00:53:05,080 Speaker 1: that the author here he does discuss one interesting evolutionary 938 00:53:05,120 --> 00:53:07,960 Speaker 1: aspect of Orcs in Tolkien, and that is that we 939 00:53:08,080 --> 00:53:12,440 Speaker 1: have in an orac army a collection of varying Orc subspecies, 940 00:53:12,840 --> 00:53:15,200 Speaker 1: which he says would ultimately fit well with the idea 941 00:53:15,600 --> 00:53:19,440 Speaker 1: that Orcs have, in periods of decline, withdrawn to various 942 00:53:19,480 --> 00:53:22,719 Speaker 1: corners of the world. You know, this bunch withdrawals to 943 00:53:22,760 --> 00:53:26,160 Speaker 1: the misty mountains, this one withdrawals to these waste lands 944 00:53:26,200 --> 00:53:29,920 Speaker 1: over here, et cetera. So he writes the following quote. 945 00:53:30,200 --> 00:53:32,600 Speaker 1: The enormous variety of Orcs, which is it turns out, 946 00:53:32,640 --> 00:53:34,600 Speaker 1: is crucial of the story, can be seen as a 947 00:53:34,640 --> 00:53:38,160 Speaker 1: consequence of the smallness and isolation of populations, evolving in 948 00:53:38,160 --> 00:53:42,040 Speaker 1: their own particular ways to suit local conditions, their isolation 949 00:53:42,160 --> 00:53:47,080 Speaker 1: enhanced by mutual antipathy, and incomprehension, Evolutionary theory tells us 950 00:53:47,120 --> 00:53:51,560 Speaker 1: that evolution happens faster and has more idiosyncratic results when 951 00:53:51,560 --> 00:53:54,680 Speaker 1: populations are small and isolated. So Tolkien's portrait of the 952 00:53:54,719 --> 00:53:57,919 Speaker 1: Oorcs as a collection of very diverse kindreds is biologically 953 00:53:58,000 --> 00:54:01,480 Speaker 1: very accurate, except that is, for one thing, sex you know, 954 00:54:02,719 --> 00:54:05,560 Speaker 1: one thing you could not accuse The Lord of the 955 00:54:05,640 --> 00:54:10,920 Speaker 1: Rings of is having too much sex in it. Yeah. Yeah, 956 00:54:10,960 --> 00:54:15,040 Speaker 1: apparently there have been there agievements and mentions one paper 957 00:54:15,120 --> 00:54:17,319 Speaker 1: that is like saying there's no sex in Middle Earth? Like, 958 00:54:17,360 --> 00:54:19,800 Speaker 1: what does that mean? Like if you take that literally, 959 00:54:19,800 --> 00:54:22,080 Speaker 1: does it mean like there's no They're like sex sexual 960 00:54:22,120 --> 00:54:25,160 Speaker 1: reproduction is not a thing in Middle Earth? Um, I 961 00:54:25,200 --> 00:54:27,719 Speaker 1: think that would probably be going a bit far. But 962 00:54:28,520 --> 00:54:31,319 Speaker 1: in trying to piece together exactly where it orcs come 963 00:54:31,360 --> 00:54:33,759 Speaker 1: from and how they reproduce it, it does become a 964 00:54:33,800 --> 00:54:38,480 Speaker 1: little sticky. Yeah. I mean there there is remarkably little 965 00:54:38,680 --> 00:54:40,560 Speaker 1: little sex in the Lord of the Rings. I mean 966 00:54:40,560 --> 00:54:44,520 Speaker 1: people are described as descending from parents basically, so you're 967 00:54:44,680 --> 00:54:48,880 Speaker 1: you imagine there is some sexual reproduction going on. I 968 00:54:48,920 --> 00:54:54,279 Speaker 1: remember GHIMII at some point gets very um, I don't know, 969 00:54:54,640 --> 00:54:58,520 Speaker 1: excited about the idea of how beautiful Galadriel is. But 970 00:54:58,800 --> 00:55:01,839 Speaker 1: they're just not very sex charged stories. Uh. And this 971 00:55:01,880 --> 00:55:04,040 Speaker 1: is kind of interesting if if Tolkien is in a 972 00:55:04,080 --> 00:55:08,520 Speaker 1: way trying to create a sort of epic mythology, because 973 00:55:08,640 --> 00:55:12,439 Speaker 1: I don't know, most world mythologies are pretty crammed with sex. Yeah, 974 00:55:12,840 --> 00:55:16,680 Speaker 1: I mean, people are always be getting other folks right, Um, 975 00:55:16,760 --> 00:55:19,440 Speaker 1: Whereas in the Tolkien books, like even with the Orcs, 976 00:55:19,480 --> 00:55:22,400 Speaker 1: there's occasionally like reference to one being the son of another, 977 00:55:22,880 --> 00:55:25,640 Speaker 1: you know, of of parentage, but there's not a lot 978 00:55:25,640 --> 00:55:28,400 Speaker 1: of detail there, and certainly there are no scenes depicting it. 979 00:55:28,960 --> 00:55:31,560 Speaker 1: So basically points out, well, if we're talking about evolution 980 00:55:31,719 --> 00:55:34,320 Speaker 1: and and the biology the orc like sex is obviously 981 00:55:34,320 --> 00:55:36,480 Speaker 1: an important part of the equation. But of course we 982 00:55:36,560 --> 00:55:40,720 Speaker 1: have little or no evidence of Orc sex in the books. Um, 983 00:55:40,840 --> 00:55:43,960 Speaker 1: which I don't know. This seems a little maybe nitpicky 984 00:55:44,160 --> 00:55:48,279 Speaker 1: uh to to say, uh, But but because they're I 985 00:55:48,320 --> 00:55:52,040 Speaker 1: don't know, they're apparently five references to Orc reproduction aside 986 00:55:52,160 --> 00:55:55,800 Speaker 1: from discussion of creation or breeding by others, which G 987 00:55:56,080 --> 00:55:58,440 Speaker 1: thinks is is miniscule, But to me that kind of 988 00:55:58,440 --> 00:55:59,920 Speaker 1: sounds like a lot. I would if you had to 989 00:56:00,000 --> 00:56:02,319 Speaker 1: if you asked me to guess how many references to 990 00:56:02,440 --> 00:56:04,840 Speaker 1: Orc reproduction there are in the book, I would have 991 00:56:04,920 --> 00:56:08,759 Speaker 1: guessed like maybe one. I would have just zo. I mean, 992 00:56:08,800 --> 00:56:11,160 Speaker 1: I think they're I vaguely remember a passage where one 993 00:56:11,239 --> 00:56:13,600 Speaker 1: character is talking about, well, the Orcs have been reproducing 994 00:56:13,600 --> 00:56:16,120 Speaker 1: in the mountains. There are a lot of them, um 995 00:56:16,360 --> 00:56:17,719 Speaker 1: like that would have been the only one that it 996 00:56:17,760 --> 00:56:20,239 Speaker 1: would have come to my mind. Not only is there 997 00:56:20,239 --> 00:56:23,719 Speaker 1: no mention of of of actual Orc sex, there's no 998 00:56:23,880 --> 00:56:28,160 Speaker 1: mention of female Orcs. And this is perhaps more significant now. Naturally, 999 00:56:28,160 --> 00:56:30,680 Speaker 1: this doesn't mean there were no female Orcs, nor does 1000 00:56:30,680 --> 00:56:33,440 Speaker 1: it mean that there was no Orc sex. Uh, you know, 1001 00:56:33,480 --> 00:56:35,640 Speaker 1: no more than the absence of sex from the rest 1002 00:56:35,640 --> 00:56:37,480 Speaker 1: of the books mean that sex didn't exist for other 1003 00:56:37,480 --> 00:56:41,080 Speaker 1: species of Middle Earth. But he does point out that 1004 00:56:41,160 --> 00:56:43,640 Speaker 1: the idea, you know, that we could compare this to 1005 00:56:43,680 --> 00:56:47,520 Speaker 1: the idea of a purely manufactured Orc species much in 1006 00:56:47,560 --> 00:56:49,400 Speaker 1: the same way that the you know, the clones and 1007 00:56:49,440 --> 00:56:52,480 Speaker 1: the droids and star wars are are created, and it 1008 00:56:52,560 --> 00:56:56,800 Speaker 1: would this would actually be in keeping with the industrialized 1009 00:56:56,880 --> 00:57:00,480 Speaker 1: warfare of the world wars, you know, full of cognized 1010 00:57:00,600 --> 00:57:06,080 Speaker 1: artillery and this overall degregation of the individual soldier, as 1011 00:57:06,080 --> 00:57:10,239 Speaker 1: well as the overall quote emasculating effects of industrialization in 1012 00:57:10,280 --> 00:57:13,160 Speaker 1: the world. So, in other words, perhaps there's no female 1013 00:57:13,239 --> 00:57:15,920 Speaker 1: or or male work at all. There's only just neutral 1014 00:57:16,160 --> 00:57:20,400 Speaker 1: flesh machines that served this fallen god. You know, it's 1015 00:57:20,400 --> 00:57:24,600 Speaker 1: interesting that Tolkien was was very uh, he would very 1016 00:57:24,680 --> 00:57:28,280 Speaker 1: strenuously reject the idea that Lord of the Rings was 1017 00:57:28,560 --> 00:57:32,000 Speaker 1: an allegory for any particular war. Like, I think the 1018 00:57:32,080 --> 00:57:34,919 Speaker 1: thing most often raised is like people saying like, oh, 1019 00:57:35,040 --> 00:57:37,280 Speaker 1: I see, you know, it's supposed to be about World 1020 00:57:37,280 --> 00:57:40,240 Speaker 1: War two and Hitler is Sauron and you know, the 1021 00:57:40,360 --> 00:57:42,919 Speaker 1: Orcs or the Nazis and all that, which I mean, 1022 00:57:43,160 --> 00:57:45,360 Speaker 1: obviously coming out of the World War two era, would 1023 00:57:45,400 --> 00:57:47,920 Speaker 1: probably be hard not to try to make that comparison 1024 00:57:48,040 --> 00:57:51,880 Speaker 1: in in like an epic struggle. But Tolkien always like 1025 00:57:52,160 --> 00:57:55,360 Speaker 1: he thoroughly rejected the idea that Lord of the Rings 1026 00:57:55,400 --> 00:57:58,720 Speaker 1: was an allegory for any particular historical events on Earth. 1027 00:57:58,760 --> 00:58:01,560 Speaker 1: You know, he in fact thought allegories were quite stupid 1028 00:58:01,640 --> 00:58:05,240 Speaker 1: and he did not like them. But nevertheless, this is 1029 00:58:05,280 --> 00:58:09,080 Speaker 1: one where it's like really hard to miss that what 1030 00:58:09,160 --> 00:58:13,000 Speaker 1: would seem like allegorical significance the way that the more 1031 00:58:13,120 --> 00:58:18,520 Speaker 1: door war machine in has these tones that so resemble 1032 00:58:18,720 --> 00:58:24,000 Speaker 1: the production lines of mechanized warfare going into World War Two. Yeah, yeah, indeed, 1033 00:58:24,080 --> 00:58:26,280 Speaker 1: in fact, this was interesting. I've never heard this, but 1034 00:58:26,760 --> 00:58:29,880 Speaker 1: Gia pointed out in the book as well that there's 1035 00:58:29,920 --> 00:58:33,560 Speaker 1: an earlier version of The Lost Tail, the Fall of Gondolin, 1036 00:58:34,240 --> 00:58:37,720 Speaker 1: which features a siege not by Orcs and trolls, but 1037 00:58:37,840 --> 00:58:43,320 Speaker 1: by quote vast articulated fire breathing machines. Tolkien apparently later 1038 00:58:43,360 --> 00:58:47,000 Speaker 1: abandoned this idea in favor of living creatures you know 1039 00:58:47,000 --> 00:58:49,520 Speaker 1: that works the trolls, etcetera. But at least at one 1040 00:58:49,560 --> 00:58:52,640 Speaker 1: point there was this vision of the the Armies of 1041 00:58:52,720 --> 00:58:57,360 Speaker 1: More Door being like mechanical industrial creations. Yeah, and I 1042 00:58:57,400 --> 00:58:59,840 Speaker 1: think that's it's there in the book. Still. Even though 1043 00:58:59,880 --> 00:59:04,280 Speaker 1: the Orcs are biological in some way mythological biological, the 1044 00:59:04,280 --> 00:59:06,400 Speaker 1: the Armies of More Door, I think, are very much 1045 00:59:06,400 --> 00:59:10,680 Speaker 1: seen as like a sort of an industrializing wave of 1046 00:59:10,800 --> 00:59:14,600 Speaker 1: something that destroys the natural landscape and replaces it with 1047 00:59:14,720 --> 00:59:19,480 Speaker 1: industry and machinery and ash and smoke. Yeah, yeah, I 1048 00:59:19,480 --> 00:59:22,080 Speaker 1: mean yeah, it's and certainly you look at More Door 1049 00:59:22,160 --> 00:59:24,880 Speaker 1: and what is more Door, but this sort of geologic 1050 00:59:25,040 --> 00:59:29,800 Speaker 1: vision of like pure industrial dinm right, I mean, nothing, 1051 00:59:29,880 --> 00:59:32,160 Speaker 1: no trees grow there, you know, it's just like a 1052 00:59:32,680 --> 00:59:36,800 Speaker 1: it's it's a vast asphalt parking lot full of factories 1053 00:59:36,840 --> 00:59:42,360 Speaker 1: for weapons. Yeah, it's exports are war weapons and and 1054 00:59:42,760 --> 00:59:45,880 Speaker 1: volcanic ash. That seems to be it now, um, now, 1055 00:59:46,440 --> 00:59:48,960 Speaker 1: all this being said that there are mentions to mention 1056 00:59:49,040 --> 00:59:51,560 Speaker 1: of orcs like breeding in the wild, so they still 1057 00:59:51,600 --> 00:59:54,080 Speaker 1: seem to reproduce in the wild in some manner, but 1058 00:59:54,440 --> 00:59:56,600 Speaker 1: who knows, it could be like a Jurassic Park situation 1059 00:59:56,720 --> 01:00:00,320 Speaker 1: right where there's some sort of mutation that observed that 1060 01:00:00,320 --> 01:00:03,960 Speaker 1: that occurs or something. Um, you know, he suggests that 1061 01:00:04,000 --> 01:00:09,000 Speaker 1: their own lycen. Yeah, maybe do suggests well, maybe orcs 1062 01:00:09,080 --> 01:00:12,160 Speaker 1: lay eggs. Maybe that's what it is. Uh. He ultimately says, 1063 01:00:12,200 --> 01:00:14,600 Speaker 1: you know, if if it's there are a number of 1064 01:00:14,600 --> 01:00:18,120 Speaker 1: different ideas you could propose, since there's no real discussion 1065 01:00:18,160 --> 01:00:19,440 Speaker 1: of it in the book, as long as it doesn't 1066 01:00:19,440 --> 01:00:21,320 Speaker 1: break anything else in the book. I mean, it's all 1067 01:00:21,400 --> 01:00:23,920 Speaker 1: kind of fair game. Like he has. He has some 1068 01:00:23,960 --> 01:00:26,320 Speaker 1: fun with the idea that perhaps it works our use 1069 01:00:26,400 --> 01:00:29,320 Speaker 1: social insects and there's like an unseen or queen that 1070 01:00:29,400 --> 01:00:32,280 Speaker 1: does all the egg production. Uh. And indeed he points 1071 01:00:32,320 --> 01:00:34,400 Speaker 1: out that the goblins of the Misty Mountains and the 1072 01:00:34,880 --> 01:00:38,000 Speaker 1: uh and the the Orcs of Maria behave much like 1073 01:00:38,040 --> 01:00:41,200 Speaker 1: an ant colony in some respects. That would be interesting. 1074 01:00:41,280 --> 01:00:43,960 Speaker 1: But again, I think in the few glimpses we do 1075 01:00:44,040 --> 01:00:47,680 Speaker 1: get into orc psychology, the orcs seem far too selfish 1076 01:00:47,720 --> 01:00:51,960 Speaker 1: and and individualistic to be used social uh animals, right, Like, 1077 01:00:52,080 --> 01:00:56,280 Speaker 1: I mean, the like the individual worker ants own bodily 1078 01:00:56,280 --> 01:01:00,640 Speaker 1: existence matters quite little to it compare into, you know, 1079 01:01:00,720 --> 01:01:03,840 Speaker 1: protecting the queen and the reproductive possibilities of the hive. 1080 01:01:04,320 --> 01:01:06,760 Speaker 1: Individual orcs really do seem to sort of be in 1081 01:01:06,840 --> 01:01:09,360 Speaker 1: it for themselves when they can, you know, when they 1082 01:01:09,360 --> 01:01:14,040 Speaker 1: think they can get away with something. Yeah, that's absolutely now. Now. 1083 01:01:14,080 --> 01:01:17,200 Speaker 1: Another idea that he brings up is, okay, perhaps works 1084 01:01:17,240 --> 01:01:22,040 Speaker 1: reproduced by parthenogenesis or cloning. Uh, you know. He writes 1085 01:01:22,080 --> 01:01:25,720 Speaker 1: that this could work well, especially when you're thinking about 1086 01:01:25,720 --> 01:01:29,000 Speaker 1: the shrinking habitats that works have during their times of decline. 1087 01:01:29,560 --> 01:01:32,120 Speaker 1: But this would also mean that all orcs would inherently 1088 01:01:32,160 --> 01:01:35,280 Speaker 1: need to be female, which also might work with the 1089 01:01:35,320 --> 01:01:38,480 Speaker 1: fact that there's never any mention of male and female orcs. 1090 01:01:39,120 --> 01:01:42,000 Speaker 1: Orcs are kind of presented as sexless even though they're 1091 01:01:42,040 --> 01:01:45,280 Speaker 1: you know, they're they're described with with male terminology. I mean, 1092 01:01:45,320 --> 01:01:48,720 Speaker 1: maybe we're just talking about on all female species. Maybe 1093 01:01:48,760 --> 01:01:51,960 Speaker 1: we're just getting the story told through the like paternalistic 1094 01:01:52,520 --> 01:01:55,240 Speaker 1: lens of how how the men and the elves view 1095 01:01:55,360 --> 01:01:59,360 Speaker 1: things could be. And speaking of elves, another thing that 1096 01:01:59,400 --> 01:02:00,920 Speaker 1: he brings up. Okay, if we go back to this 1097 01:02:00,960 --> 01:02:05,480 Speaker 1: other origins store, the idea that that that more goth 1098 01:02:05,600 --> 01:02:08,800 Speaker 1: or milk, or that they they basically like tortured the 1099 01:02:08,880 --> 01:02:13,040 Speaker 1: elves uh in order to make orcs. Well, he points 1100 01:02:13,040 --> 01:02:14,840 Speaker 1: out that, Okay, well if you just because you if 1101 01:02:14,880 --> 01:02:17,280 Speaker 1: you were to torture a bunch of elves and break 1102 01:02:17,320 --> 01:02:20,240 Speaker 1: them and like and so forth, and then have and 1103 01:02:20,400 --> 01:02:22,480 Speaker 1: breede them, you're still gonna You're not gonna produce orcs. 1104 01:02:22,480 --> 01:02:26,720 Speaker 1: You're gonna produce more elves, um, you know. And then 1105 01:02:27,000 --> 01:02:29,080 Speaker 1: certainly they could, you know, the the dark Lord could 1106 01:02:29,160 --> 01:02:33,080 Speaker 1: use this technique over time to you know, encourage orcs 1107 01:02:33,200 --> 01:02:35,840 Speaker 1: traits that you know, and you know, adapt to a 1108 01:02:35,880 --> 01:02:39,600 Speaker 1: hellish dungeon environment. But this would ultimately require periods of 1109 01:02:39,640 --> 01:02:43,480 Speaker 1: evolutionary time that are far beyond anything we're presented within 1110 01:02:43,600 --> 01:02:46,920 Speaker 1: the Middle Earth timeline. No, I mean, yeah, this is 1111 01:02:47,400 --> 01:02:50,720 Speaker 1: a more mythological way of imagining how traits are established 1112 01:02:50,720 --> 01:02:53,240 Speaker 1: in a species. You know, it's it's it's kind of 1113 01:02:53,280 --> 01:02:57,400 Speaker 1: a magical lamarchianism. Yeah, and any rights that ultimately, Tolkien 1114 01:02:57,800 --> 01:03:00,880 Speaker 1: was of course more concerned well, certainly with with linguistic 1115 01:03:00,920 --> 01:03:03,200 Speaker 1: aspects of everything, like what does it mean that Orcs 1116 01:03:03,200 --> 01:03:06,200 Speaker 1: have a language that orc speak while they speak in 1117 01:03:06,240 --> 01:03:08,200 Speaker 1: a more primitive tongue, you know, that sort of thing. 1118 01:03:08,400 --> 01:03:12,200 Speaker 1: But then also Tolkien was more concerned with theological ramifications 1119 01:03:12,240 --> 01:03:14,560 Speaker 1: like what happens to the soul of the elf if 1120 01:03:14,600 --> 01:03:17,200 Speaker 1: it is made into an orc? You know, So there's 1121 01:03:17,240 --> 01:03:18,880 Speaker 1: this whole line of thinking as well. So all of 1122 01:03:18,920 --> 01:03:22,760 Speaker 1: this was far more on Tolkien's brain as opposed to 1123 01:03:22,920 --> 01:03:27,920 Speaker 1: you know, evolutionary biology. But what if everything in Middle 1124 01:03:27,920 --> 01:03:31,440 Speaker 1: Earth is actually a mushroom? Like absolutely everything, even the 1125 01:03:31,480 --> 01:03:35,440 Speaker 1: ants mushrooms? It's that I'll have to carry that with 1126 01:03:35,480 --> 01:03:37,440 Speaker 1: me on the next reread. Oh, I want to come 1127 01:03:37,440 --> 01:03:39,480 Speaker 1: back to I want to come back to ants, uh 1128 01:03:39,640 --> 01:03:42,720 Speaker 1: this October because I've got a I've got almost kind 1129 01:03:42,720 --> 01:03:44,840 Speaker 1: of like an evil INNT thing I want to do. 1130 01:03:45,560 --> 01:03:48,920 Speaker 1: Oh that sounds promising to me. So let's see. At 1131 01:03:49,000 --> 01:03:51,520 Speaker 1: this point, we've talked about you know, Orcs as a 1132 01:03:51,640 --> 01:03:55,000 Speaker 1: as a problem faced by the other species of Middle Earth. 1133 01:03:55,000 --> 01:03:58,880 Speaker 1: We've talked about problematic aspects of of of the Orc 1134 01:03:58,920 --> 01:04:02,520 Speaker 1: as a fictional creation. We've talked about the problems with 1135 01:04:02,720 --> 01:04:06,760 Speaker 1: orc reproduction or figuring out exactly what ORC reproduction consists of. 1136 01:04:07,040 --> 01:04:09,440 Speaker 1: But I understand you have you have one more or 1137 01:04:09,680 --> 01:04:13,240 Speaker 1: problem for us here, Joe. Well, so this only relates 1138 01:04:13,280 --> 01:04:16,280 Speaker 1: to Hobbits and Orcs in a completely arbitrary way, but 1139 01:04:16,360 --> 01:04:18,640 Speaker 1: it's actually I think it's maybe the most delightful of 1140 01:04:18,640 --> 01:04:20,680 Speaker 1: all the things that we're going to talk about today. 1141 01:04:22,160 --> 01:04:24,480 Speaker 1: So if you're a puzzle nerd, there's actually going to 1142 01:04:24,560 --> 01:04:26,520 Speaker 1: be a puzzle that you can pause the episode to 1143 01:04:26,520 --> 01:04:29,080 Speaker 1: try to solve, and this is going to be the 1144 01:04:29,120 --> 01:04:32,880 Speaker 1: Hobbits and Orcs problem. Now, my main source here is 1145 01:04:32,920 --> 01:04:37,120 Speaker 1: a chapter in the Cambridge Handbook of Thinking and Reasoning, 1146 01:04:37,240 --> 01:04:40,480 Speaker 1: which is just the jolliest of reads, but it's actually 1147 01:04:40,760 --> 01:04:44,120 Speaker 1: more interesting than you might expect. That that sounds incredibly dry, 1148 01:04:44,160 --> 01:04:47,640 Speaker 1: it's only somewhat dry. But specifically I'm looking at a 1149 01:04:47,720 --> 01:04:51,360 Speaker 1: chapter on problem solving by Laura r. Novic who is 1150 01:04:51,400 --> 01:04:54,960 Speaker 1: at Vanderbilt University and Miriam Bassock, who is at the 1151 01:04:55,040 --> 01:04:59,480 Speaker 1: University of Washington. Both are psychology professors who study cognition 1152 01:04:59,520 --> 01:05:02,920 Speaker 1: and problem I'm solving. Now, the study of problem solving 1153 01:05:03,000 --> 01:05:06,840 Speaker 1: is actually a really fascinating field, or combination of fields. 1154 01:05:06,880 --> 01:05:09,880 Speaker 1: It's highly relevant to our lives, and I would say, 1155 01:05:09,920 --> 01:05:13,680 Speaker 1: to be fair, it encompasses. It encompasses actually at least 1156 01:05:13,720 --> 01:05:16,600 Speaker 1: two main questions that are very different from one another. 1157 01:05:17,200 --> 01:05:21,280 Speaker 1: One is a question primarily for mathematics and computer science, 1158 01:05:21,320 --> 01:05:25,160 Speaker 1: and this is the study of problem solving algorithms, such 1159 01:05:25,200 --> 01:05:28,880 Speaker 1: as those for search or sorting, and the study of 1160 01:05:28,920 --> 01:05:32,320 Speaker 1: which methods are actually the most efficient at solving different 1161 01:05:32,400 --> 01:05:36,560 Speaker 1: kinds of problems. The other question is one for psychology 1162 01:05:36,560 --> 01:05:40,680 Speaker 1: and cognitive neuroscience, which is, regardless of what methods are 1163 01:05:40,720 --> 01:05:43,760 Speaker 1: actually the most efficient, what do our brains tend to do? 1164 01:05:44,120 --> 01:05:46,080 Speaker 1: You know, when a human is faced with a problem, 1165 01:05:46,440 --> 01:05:49,680 Speaker 1: what kinds of algorithms and methods do we actually use 1166 01:05:49,800 --> 01:05:53,200 Speaker 1: in practice? So where do the orcs come in? Well, 1167 01:05:53,400 --> 01:05:56,800 Speaker 1: one puzzle that has been used to study human tendencies 1168 01:05:56,840 --> 01:06:00,920 Speaker 1: and problem solving is known as the Hobbits and Orcs problem, 1169 01:06:00,960 --> 01:06:04,320 Speaker 1: and it's a variation on the classic river crossing puzzle. Robert, 1170 01:06:04,360 --> 01:06:06,280 Speaker 1: have you ever done one of these where you know 1171 01:06:06,320 --> 01:06:08,360 Speaker 1: you've got a you've got a wolf and a sheep 1172 01:06:08,440 --> 01:06:11,200 Speaker 1: and a cabbage all together on one side of a river, 1173 01:06:11,240 --> 01:06:13,040 Speaker 1: and you've got to figure out how to get them across. 1174 01:06:13,360 --> 01:06:15,640 Speaker 1: Do you know what I'm talking about. Oh I don't. 1175 01:06:15,680 --> 01:06:18,080 Speaker 1: I don't have a strong memory of this. Now, okay, 1176 01:06:18,080 --> 01:06:21,040 Speaker 1: well here's this version. Okay, we're gonna go to the 1177 01:06:21,080 --> 01:06:24,480 Speaker 1: Brandywine River, the one that that separates I believe bree 1178 01:06:24,480 --> 01:06:28,120 Speaker 1: from Buckland. Now at the Brandywine River, on the north 1179 01:06:28,200 --> 01:06:32,280 Speaker 1: side of the river, you've got three Hobbits and three Orcs, 1180 01:06:32,640 --> 01:06:36,400 Speaker 1: and your goal is to get all six creatures across 1181 01:06:36,480 --> 01:06:39,480 Speaker 1: the river to the other side. Now there's a boat 1182 01:06:39,560 --> 01:06:41,960 Speaker 1: that you can use to ferry them across, but there 1183 01:06:42,000 --> 01:06:45,080 Speaker 1: are a couple of major limitations. First of all, the 1184 01:06:45,120 --> 01:06:48,320 Speaker 1: boat can only hold two creatures at a time, and 1185 01:06:48,440 --> 01:06:50,480 Speaker 1: there always has to be at least one creature at 1186 01:06:50,560 --> 01:06:53,200 Speaker 1: least one Hobbit or Orc in the boat in order 1187 01:06:53,240 --> 01:06:55,840 Speaker 1: to row it, So you can't send the boat across 1188 01:06:55,880 --> 01:07:00,200 Speaker 1: the river empty. Second, you can never leave hobbit in 1189 01:07:00,200 --> 01:07:03,440 Speaker 1: a place where they are outnumbered by orcs, or of course, 1190 01:07:03,480 --> 01:07:05,840 Speaker 1: the orcs will eat them. And now your goal in 1191 01:07:05,920 --> 01:07:08,160 Speaker 1: this problem is to figure out what sequence of steps 1192 01:07:08,200 --> 01:07:10,040 Speaker 1: you can use to get all the Hobbits and the 1193 01:07:10,160 --> 01:07:13,040 Speaker 1: Orcs to the other side of the river without breaking 1194 01:07:13,040 --> 01:07:15,920 Speaker 1: any of the rules. Now it's not necessary, but If 1195 01:07:15,960 --> 01:07:17,919 Speaker 1: you do want to pause the episode here and try 1196 01:07:17,920 --> 01:07:20,360 Speaker 1: to solve the puzzle yourself, go for it. I'll give 1197 01:07:20,360 --> 01:07:22,360 Speaker 1: you a hint that it can be solved in what's 1198 01:07:22,440 --> 01:07:32,800 Speaker 1: usually considered fourteen steps or fourteen stages. Okay, so I'm 1199 01:07:32,840 --> 01:07:34,520 Speaker 1: not going to read out all of the steps to 1200 01:07:34,560 --> 01:07:36,400 Speaker 1: the solution here, but you can look it up and 1201 01:07:36,440 --> 01:07:39,080 Speaker 1: find it online. If you're stumped, I'm sure just google it. 1202 01:07:39,080 --> 01:07:43,240 Speaker 1: It'll come up. Um. One reason this particular puzzle is 1203 01:07:43,360 --> 01:07:47,760 Speaker 1: useful for studying problem solving is in studying what's known 1204 01:07:47,800 --> 01:07:51,880 Speaker 1: as the hill climbing heuristic. Now Here, Novic and Basok 1205 01:07:52,040 --> 01:07:55,800 Speaker 1: described the hill climbing heuristic as a problem solving technique 1206 01:07:55,800 --> 01:08:00,080 Speaker 1: in which quote at each step, the solver applies the 1207 01:08:00,120 --> 01:08:03,680 Speaker 1: operator that yields a new state that appears to be 1208 01:08:03,920 --> 01:08:07,400 Speaker 1: the most similar to the goal state. In other words, 1209 01:08:07,640 --> 01:08:09,880 Speaker 1: you know what you're ind goal looks like, and at 1210 01:08:09,920 --> 01:08:12,600 Speaker 1: each step you do whatever it is that appears to 1211 01:08:12,640 --> 01:08:15,360 Speaker 1: get you into a state that looks more similar to 1212 01:08:15,440 --> 01:08:18,160 Speaker 1: the goal state. So if your goal is to get 1213 01:08:18,200 --> 01:08:21,360 Speaker 1: to the highest altitude, at each step you just try 1214 01:08:21,400 --> 01:08:26,120 Speaker 1: going uphill. Hence, hill climbing now studies in cognitive psychology 1215 01:08:26,160 --> 01:08:29,200 Speaker 1: show that we use the hill climbing heuristic a lot. 1216 01:08:29,800 --> 01:08:33,280 Speaker 1: Uh Novic and Bassak site the example of Chronicle McGregor 1217 01:08:33,280 --> 01:08:36,439 Speaker 1: and armor Ad in two thousand four, who found that 1218 01:08:36,479 --> 01:08:39,360 Speaker 1: people naturally use the hill climbing heuristic in a task 1219 01:08:39,479 --> 01:08:43,120 Speaker 1: that involved sorting coins into a particular order. What you 1220 01:08:43,160 --> 01:08:45,840 Speaker 1: probably do is just like keep moving the coins in 1221 01:08:45,840 --> 01:08:48,280 Speaker 1: a way that makes them look closer to the final 1222 01:08:48,400 --> 01:08:50,960 Speaker 1: order they're supposed to be in until you get there. 1223 01:08:51,520 --> 01:08:54,360 Speaker 1: In the context of the Hobbits and Orcs game, hill 1224 01:08:54,400 --> 01:08:57,439 Speaker 1: climbing would mean that at each stage you just try 1225 01:08:57,479 --> 01:09:01,280 Speaker 1: to find whatever legal move will get the most creatures 1226 01:09:01,320 --> 01:09:03,680 Speaker 1: to the goal side of the river and off of 1227 01:09:03,720 --> 01:09:06,400 Speaker 1: the starting side of the river without breaking the rules. 1228 01:09:06,960 --> 01:09:09,479 Speaker 1: And studies have found that people do use the hill 1229 01:09:09,479 --> 01:09:12,560 Speaker 1: climbing heuristic to generate steps when solving the Hobbits and 1230 01:09:12,720 --> 01:09:16,160 Speaker 1: Orcs problem, and for the most part it works. But 1231 01:09:16,560 --> 01:09:20,639 Speaker 1: also two studies by Thomas and Greeno, both in nineteen 1232 01:09:21,160 --> 01:09:25,200 Speaker 1: four found that people hit a major roadblock around step 1233 01:09:25,280 --> 01:09:28,720 Speaker 1: number seven or eight in the game because, as an 1234 01:09:28,720 --> 01:09:31,680 Speaker 1: Ovic and Bassac right quote, the correct move at this 1235 01:09:31,760 --> 01:09:35,640 Speaker 1: point in fact, the only non backtracking move is for 1236 01:09:35,720 --> 01:09:38,880 Speaker 1: one Hobbit and one orc to take the boat back 1237 01:09:39,000 --> 01:09:42,639 Speaker 1: to the original side of the river. So essentially, while 1238 01:09:42,800 --> 01:09:45,559 Speaker 1: it must be done in order to complete the puzzle, 1239 01:09:46,000 --> 01:09:49,280 Speaker 1: it looks counterproductive because the only way you can finish 1240 01:09:49,360 --> 01:09:53,040 Speaker 1: the puzzle is to cause a temporary net migration of 1241 01:09:53,080 --> 01:09:56,040 Speaker 1: creatures to the wrong side of the river. It's a 1242 01:09:56,120 --> 01:09:59,919 Speaker 1: necessary step, but it actually ends up looking less similar 1243 01:10:00,040 --> 01:10:02,479 Speaker 1: or to your goal state than the step before it did, 1244 01:10:03,120 --> 01:10:05,800 Speaker 1: and the studies by Thomas and Greeno both found that 1245 01:10:05,840 --> 01:10:08,720 Speaker 1: people really get hung up at this step. It was 1246 01:10:08,760 --> 01:10:11,880 Speaker 1: the step of the problem where both the probability of 1247 01:10:11,960 --> 01:10:14,960 Speaker 1: a of a player making an illegal move and the 1248 01:10:15,040 --> 01:10:18,559 Speaker 1: time taken to decide on the next move suddenly go 1249 01:10:18,760 --> 01:10:22,559 Speaker 1: way up compared to other steps. And Novic can Bassa 1250 01:10:22,840 --> 01:10:25,919 Speaker 1: talk about how these studies highlight one of the inherent 1251 01:10:26,000 --> 01:10:30,479 Speaker 1: weaknesses of the hill climbing heuristic. Sometimes, in all kinds 1252 01:10:30,479 --> 01:10:34,040 Speaker 1: of problem solving scenarios, you have to move backwards or 1253 01:10:34,120 --> 01:10:37,439 Speaker 1: laterally in order to reach your end goal. Like actual 1254 01:10:37,479 --> 01:10:40,040 Speaker 1: mountain climbers know this in a quite literal sense, you 1255 01:10:40,080 --> 01:10:43,599 Speaker 1: can't always reach the highest peak just by going straight up. 1256 01:10:43,640 --> 01:10:45,519 Speaker 1: A lot of times you have to go back down 1257 01:10:45,600 --> 01:10:49,080 Speaker 1: to reach a path that can actually be ascended. Other times, 1258 01:10:49,080 --> 01:10:51,879 Speaker 1: you reach what's known as false peaks, which are places 1259 01:10:51,920 --> 01:10:54,880 Speaker 1: that seem like the peak as you're ascending until you 1260 01:10:54,960 --> 01:10:57,479 Speaker 1: get there, and then you realize that you are only 1261 01:10:57,520 --> 01:11:00,679 Speaker 1: at the local highest altitude and there's actually a higher 1262 01:11:00,720 --> 01:11:03,639 Speaker 1: peak just over here. And this means that it really 1263 01:11:03,720 --> 01:11:07,799 Speaker 1: pays to think about what problem solving methods you're using 1264 01:11:07,840 --> 01:11:11,120 Speaker 1: without realizing it, whether and whether those methods are the 1265 01:11:11,160 --> 01:11:14,160 Speaker 1: best suited to the kind of problem you're facing. The 1266 01:11:14,240 --> 01:11:17,120 Speaker 1: hill climbing hereist it can be very useful for problems 1267 01:11:17,120 --> 01:11:20,200 Speaker 1: in which the solution space could be represented as a 1268 01:11:20,280 --> 01:11:23,559 Speaker 1: kind of single peak, like one mountain and an otherwise 1269 01:11:23,600 --> 01:11:27,679 Speaker 1: flat plain with an unobstructed slope. If the solution space 1270 01:11:27,800 --> 01:11:30,040 Speaker 1: is like that, then basically, yeah, you just keep trying 1271 01:11:30,040 --> 01:11:32,240 Speaker 1: to go uphill until you get to the highest point. 1272 01:11:32,880 --> 01:11:36,320 Speaker 1: But hill climbing can be ruinous for problems where the 1273 01:11:36,360 --> 01:11:39,439 Speaker 1: solution space could be represented as kind of like a 1274 01:11:39,439 --> 01:11:43,559 Speaker 1: a landscape with multiple different hills and peaks and valleys, 1275 01:11:43,960 --> 01:11:46,439 Speaker 1: because if you just keep trying to go uphill, what 1276 01:11:46,520 --> 01:11:49,160 Speaker 1: you're gonna do here is end up climbing to the 1277 01:11:49,200 --> 01:11:53,080 Speaker 1: top of whichever hill is closest to your starting position, 1278 01:11:53,560 --> 01:11:56,639 Speaker 1: and then you'll just be stuck there because even if 1279 01:11:56,680 --> 01:11:58,320 Speaker 1: you know there's a higher peak you have to get to, 1280 01:11:58,400 --> 01:12:01,160 Speaker 1: you have to go downhill to it to it. So 1281 01:12:01,280 --> 01:12:03,200 Speaker 1: I think what this means for our lives is if 1282 01:12:03,240 --> 01:12:05,839 Speaker 1: you're stuck on a task, it can be really useful 1283 01:12:05,880 --> 01:12:09,280 Speaker 1: to ask yourself, am I inappropriately trying to use the 1284 01:12:09,360 --> 01:12:13,200 Speaker 1: hill climbing heuristic? Do I actually need to temporarily move 1285 01:12:13,360 --> 01:12:16,599 Speaker 1: further away from my goal in order to actually get there? 1286 01:12:17,080 --> 01:12:20,439 Speaker 1: And in myself One thing that immediately came to mind 1287 01:12:20,840 --> 01:12:22,880 Speaker 1: as an example of where I find myself doing this 1288 01:12:23,080 --> 01:12:27,360 Speaker 1: is sometimes when I'm writing, I'm I'm working on a 1289 01:12:27,400 --> 01:12:29,840 Speaker 1: paragraph or a page or something that just does not 1290 01:12:30,120 --> 01:12:32,439 Speaker 1: feel right, Like I know it is not going right, 1291 01:12:32,880 --> 01:12:36,519 Speaker 1: and I'm trying to fix it by tinkering around with 1292 01:12:36,640 --> 01:12:40,599 Speaker 1: word choice and junk like that, when in actuality, the 1293 01:12:40,600 --> 01:12:42,439 Speaker 1: best path to my goal will be, of course, to 1294 01:12:42,560 --> 01:12:44,600 Speaker 1: just delete what I have and start over in a 1295 01:12:44,640 --> 01:12:48,599 Speaker 1: different way. Yeah, sometimes I I think I encounter this 1296 01:12:48,680 --> 01:12:51,400 Speaker 1: when I'm Then I'm when I'm painting, like if I'm 1297 01:12:51,400 --> 01:12:54,840 Speaker 1: working on a miniature, and like you reach that point 1298 01:12:54,880 --> 01:12:57,080 Speaker 1: where I mean, I guess with the miniature it's it's 1299 01:12:57,080 --> 01:13:00,160 Speaker 1: sometimes harder. I mean, yeah, you can, you can just 1300 01:13:00,200 --> 01:13:02,559 Speaker 1: paint over everything and apply a new base pay code. 1301 01:13:02,600 --> 01:13:05,360 Speaker 1: You can use something to to strip the existing paint 1302 01:13:05,400 --> 01:13:08,000 Speaker 1: off of it. But like, like sometimes you're kind of 1303 01:13:08,920 --> 01:13:11,639 Speaker 1: continuing to work with the same problems that you've created 1304 01:13:11,680 --> 01:13:13,680 Speaker 1: for yourself on a you know, as far as a 1305 01:13:13,680 --> 01:13:16,439 Speaker 1: particular detail, and the figure goes, yeah, you're stuck on 1306 01:13:16,479 --> 01:13:18,479 Speaker 1: the local hill, when what you really need to do 1307 01:13:18,560 --> 01:13:22,280 Speaker 1: is go all the way down and find a different hill. Yeah, probably, 1308 01:13:22,320 --> 01:13:25,120 Speaker 1: like get a new figure and a new copy of 1309 01:13:25,120 --> 01:13:28,080 Speaker 1: the same figure and begin again. Yeah yeah. Um. Now, 1310 01:13:28,120 --> 01:13:31,600 Speaker 1: some ways around this in computer science can involve algorithms 1311 01:13:31,600 --> 01:13:35,759 Speaker 1: that insert various kinds of random leaps or random steps 1312 01:13:35,800 --> 01:13:39,000 Speaker 1: in sampling to make sure that you're actually moving toward 1313 01:13:39,080 --> 01:13:42,760 Speaker 1: the global solution rather than the local solution. And in 1314 01:13:42,760 --> 01:13:44,720 Speaker 1: a way I think this is this is sort of 1315 01:13:44,760 --> 01:13:48,280 Speaker 1: the algorithmic way of characterizing what we would call outside 1316 01:13:48,280 --> 01:13:51,640 Speaker 1: the box thinking, you know, thinking that lands on strategies 1317 01:13:51,680 --> 01:13:54,000 Speaker 1: that may take you pretty far away from the local 1318 01:13:54,040 --> 01:13:57,120 Speaker 1: peak in order to possibly find out that there is 1319 01:13:57,160 --> 01:14:00,759 Speaker 1: a much higher peak somewhere else, and a certain amount 1320 01:14:00,800 --> 01:14:05,400 Speaker 1: of randomness or willingness to be apparently counterproductive at least 1321 01:14:05,400 --> 01:14:08,120 Speaker 1: for the moment, can go a long way, and this 1322 01:14:08,200 --> 01:14:10,640 Speaker 1: is clearly what's been found like in in these studies 1323 01:14:10,760 --> 01:14:13,639 Speaker 1: using the Hobbits and Orcs problem, because it's like people 1324 01:14:13,720 --> 01:14:15,600 Speaker 1: really get stuck at the part that the part that 1325 01:14:15,600 --> 01:14:17,479 Speaker 1: they have the hardest time figuring out is the part 1326 01:14:17,479 --> 01:14:20,160 Speaker 1: where you have to move multiple pieces away from your 1327 01:14:20,200 --> 01:14:24,240 Speaker 1: in state in order to actually get there. Coincidentally, I 1328 01:14:24,280 --> 01:14:27,320 Speaker 1: think the dangers represented by the hill climbing heuristic are 1329 01:14:27,360 --> 01:14:30,920 Speaker 1: actually played out in literal topography in The Hobbit and 1330 01:14:31,040 --> 01:14:33,640 Speaker 1: Lord of the Rings. For example, I recall in Fellowship 1331 01:14:33,640 --> 01:14:36,559 Speaker 1: of the Ring there's a lot of frustration about the 1332 01:14:36,720 --> 01:14:39,920 Speaker 1: straightest paths to more door being blocked, such as when 1333 01:14:39,960 --> 01:14:42,400 Speaker 1: they try to they try to go across the Red 1334 01:14:42,439 --> 01:14:46,080 Speaker 1: Horn pass of Kara Dress and they're blocked by bad weather, 1335 01:14:46,200 --> 01:14:49,160 Speaker 1: forcing them to backtrack and go a different way, even 1336 01:14:49,160 --> 01:14:51,400 Speaker 1: though you know they probably should have backtracked earlier, but 1337 01:14:51,439 --> 01:14:53,880 Speaker 1: they're they're stuck trying to go this way because it's 1338 01:14:53,880 --> 01:14:58,559 Speaker 1: where they already are. And I can't recall another specific passage, 1339 01:14:58,560 --> 01:15:01,599 Speaker 1: but it seems like they're more problems in the two Towers, 1340 01:15:02,000 --> 01:15:04,439 Speaker 1: you know, like uh, Frodo and Sam having to go 1341 01:15:04,680 --> 01:15:06,760 Speaker 1: down to go up, or having to go back to 1342 01:15:06,840 --> 01:15:10,640 Speaker 1: go forward and so forth. Oh yeah, yeah, I'm remembering 1343 01:15:10,680 --> 01:15:13,559 Speaker 1: that now. So anyway, keep the Hobbits and Orcs in mind. 1344 01:15:13,600 --> 01:15:16,720 Speaker 1: If you're stuck on a problem, consider are are you 1345 01:15:16,800 --> 01:15:19,560 Speaker 1: hill climbing? Are you refusing to send your Hobbit and 1346 01:15:19,680 --> 01:15:22,160 Speaker 1: Orc back across the river even though that's what you 1347 01:15:22,280 --> 01:15:24,759 Speaker 1: have to do? Yeah, that's interesting. I don't think i'd 1348 01:15:24,800 --> 01:15:27,160 Speaker 1: heard of this before. Um, but now now I guess 1349 01:15:27,520 --> 01:15:30,120 Speaker 1: I'll think of all problems in my life as being 1350 01:15:30,560 --> 01:15:34,960 Speaker 1: uh ones where it works might potentially eat me, or 1351 01:15:35,000 --> 01:15:37,000 Speaker 1: one where you're the orc and you're gonna fill up 1352 01:15:37,000 --> 01:15:40,800 Speaker 1: on Hobbit and ruin your dinner. You don't want to 1353 01:15:40,840 --> 01:15:44,519 Speaker 1: do that? All right, Well, we're gonna go ahead and 1354 01:15:44,840 --> 01:15:48,040 Speaker 1: call this, uh this episode here. Um. Obviously we didn't 1355 01:15:48,040 --> 01:15:51,000 Speaker 1: get to, you know, get into everything about orcs within 1356 01:15:51,320 --> 01:15:55,280 Speaker 1: Tolkien's creations or within creations that have you know, come 1357 01:15:55,320 --> 01:15:57,639 Speaker 1: in the wake of the Lord of the Rings. Uh. 1358 01:15:57,680 --> 01:15:59,400 Speaker 1: So we would love to hear from everyone out there 1359 01:15:59,400 --> 01:16:02,280 Speaker 1: if you have particular of thoughts on on anything here 1360 01:16:02,320 --> 01:16:05,840 Speaker 1: related to Tolkien scholarship to you know, how we use 1361 01:16:06,040 --> 01:16:11,520 Speaker 1: orcs and popular culture. You know what, why we're fascinated 1362 01:16:11,600 --> 01:16:14,360 Speaker 1: by them, what we should be doing with them, etcetera. 1363 01:16:14,920 --> 01:16:17,519 Speaker 1: We you know, we're always open to hear from everybody. Uh, 1364 01:16:17,720 --> 01:16:20,839 Speaker 1: We're always happy to be corrected as well. In the meantime, 1365 01:16:20,880 --> 01:16:22,720 Speaker 1: if you would like to listen to other episodes of 1366 01:16:22,760 --> 01:16:24,960 Speaker 1: Stuff to Blow Your Mind, you can find us wherever 1367 01:16:25,080 --> 01:16:27,760 Speaker 1: you get your podcasts and wherever that happens to be. Uh. 1368 01:16:27,920 --> 01:16:30,120 Speaker 1: Just rate, review, and subscribe. Those are great ways to 1369 01:16:30,120 --> 01:16:32,360 Speaker 1: help out the show. Huge thanks as always to our 1370 01:16:32,400 --> 01:16:35,760 Speaker 1: excellent audio producer Seth Nicholas Johnson. If you'd like to 1371 01:16:35,760 --> 01:16:38,000 Speaker 1: get in touch with us with feedback on this episode 1372 01:16:38,080 --> 01:16:40,439 Speaker 1: or any other, to suggest a topic for the future, 1373 01:16:40,600 --> 01:16:43,120 Speaker 1: just to say hello, you can email us at contact. 1374 01:16:43,240 --> 01:16:53,320 Speaker 1: That's Stuff to Blow your Mind dot com. Stuff to 1375 01:16:53,320 --> 01:16:55,880 Speaker 1: Blow Your Mind is production of I Heart Radio. For 1376 01:16:55,960 --> 01:16:58,719 Speaker 1: more podcasts for my heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app. 1377 01:16:58,920 --> 01:17:17,240 Speaker 1: Apple podcasts are wherever you're listening to your favorite shows. 1378 01:17:12,800 --> 01:17:13,360 Speaker 1: Four