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Speaker 1: Hey, Daniel, remember when we did that episode about supervillains,

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Speaker 1: the one where we worked through the physics of listeners

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Speaker 1: hypothetical nefarious schemes. Yeah? Are you sure they were hypothetical?

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Speaker 1: Do you know if anyone actually did any of them?

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Speaker 1: I didn't follow up with any of them, but I

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Speaker 1: guess we probably hear about it on the news. If

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Speaker 1: anyone actually managed to turn off the sun or build

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Speaker 1: nuclear power ants? That makes what do you think that

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Speaker 1: maybe we should have done more? Are you worried we

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Speaker 1: didn't help them enough? Maybe we should like write a

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Speaker 1: book with step by step instructions. Yeah, maybe maybe nobody

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Speaker 1: should write that book. Sounds like a bad idea, might

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Speaker 1: be too late. I am r handmade cartoonists and the

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Speaker 1: creator of PhD comics. Hi. I'm Daniel, a particle physicist

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Speaker 1: and a professor at UC Irvine, and I seriously hope

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Speaker 1: nobody takes over the world. What if it's a really

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Speaker 1: good person you mean, like a physicist. No, that's the opposite.

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Speaker 1: I mean, all right, I mean a great person, not

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Speaker 1: just good enough cartoonist thing. That's right, So with a

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Speaker 1: sense of humor and artistic skills. I think Plato suggested

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Speaker 1: that right that all societies should be ruled by philosopher

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Speaker 1: cartoonist kings. Yeah I could be a king, sure, But

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Speaker 1: welcome to our podcast Daniel and Jorge Explain the Universe,

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Speaker 1: a production of I Heart Radio, in which we try

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Speaker 1: to explain everything we do and do not understand about

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Speaker 1: the universe to you. We dive into the details of

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Speaker 1: how quantum particles move, about how hurricane swirls, and about

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Speaker 1: how galaxies form. We seek to enlighten and to explain

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Speaker 1: and to illuminate, and not to arm you with the

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Speaker 1: tools to take over the world. That's right. We don't

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Speaker 1: try to take over the world. We try to explain

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Speaker 1: the world and talk about all the amazing things in it,

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Speaker 1: because it is a pretty wonderful world that if we

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Speaker 1: understood more about, maybe we can appreciate more and not

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Speaker 1: try to take it over. That's right. The express goal

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Speaker 1: of physics is not to build the next generation of

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Speaker 1: nuclear weapons or arm you with nuclear powered ants, but

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Speaker 1: to show you how the world works, to take it

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Speaker 1: apart bit by bit and try to digest it into

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Speaker 1: little mathematical stories that make sense to the human mind.

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Speaker 1: But of course, along the way sometimes we do accidentally

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Speaker 1: gain bits of knowledge which have practical consequences. That's right.

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Speaker 1: That's not the intended purpose of science, but it's kind

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Speaker 1: of a side effect sometimes it does kind of give

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Speaker 1: you the ammunition you need to change the world and

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Speaker 1: to do amazing things in it, and maybe terrible things too,

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Speaker 1: that's right. And it's transformed the world for the better

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Speaker 1: in many ways and some ways for the worst. I'm

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Speaker 1: sure people would argue, Well, that is a super big question,

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Speaker 1: and it's one that people have been asking themselves for

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Speaker 1: a long time, like, if you had the means and

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Speaker 1: maybe the science and the knowledge to do incredible things

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Speaker 1: here on earth, should you do them? Does physics and

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Speaker 1: the rest of science equip you with enough power to

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Speaker 1: control everything? It is a pretty big question and a

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Speaker 1: pretty complicated one. Fortunately, Daniel, you and I have a

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Speaker 1: friend who has written a whole book about this. Fortunately

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Speaker 1: or unfortunately he's written this book, fortunately because I didn't

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Speaker 1: really want to write it, So I'm glad that he didn't,

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Speaker 1: and then he can take the blame if something bad

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Speaker 1: happens from that. That's right. And so today on the podcast,

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Speaker 1: we'll be talking about Ryan North how to take over

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Speaker 1: the world with science? Science, Science, now, just to be

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Speaker 1: clear with science is not the part of the title

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Speaker 1: of his book. That's right, though he does dive deep

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Speaker 1: into realistic scientific approaches to how to solve these problems.

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Speaker 1: So it's a bit of a tongue in cheek. It's

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Speaker 1: come for the supervillain scheme to take over the world,

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Speaker 1: stay for the scientific understanding of how the world works. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it is a pretty interesting book. It's kind of like

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Speaker 1: how if you wanted to be a super villain, Like,

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Speaker 1: what are some of the possible schemes and how would

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Speaker 1: you make them work if you wanted to do it?

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Speaker 1: Or me be you're a government regulator and you're wondering

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Speaker 1: how your citizens might turn into supervillains and you want

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Speaker 1: to know how to stop them. Also an excellent resource.

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Speaker 1: Oh man, you went pretty dark there. You went right

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Speaker 1: into like big brother. I would say maybe also it

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Speaker 1: could be a good guy for superheroes, Like if you

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Speaker 1: wanted to stay one step ahead of the supervillains, how

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Speaker 1: would you what would you need? Are you saying government

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Speaker 1: regulators can't be superheroes? That's what I was imagining Superman

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Speaker 1: working together with the FBI. That's right. N A stands

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Speaker 1: for New Superman Agency. Well, you don't want to hear

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Speaker 1: from us. We have not done any research into how

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Speaker 1: to take Over the World, which is why we invited

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Speaker 1: Ryan on the show to talk to us. And so

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Speaker 1: here is our interview with author and cartoonist Ryan North.

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Speaker 1: So it's my pleasure to introduce to the program Ryan North.

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Speaker 1: He's the author of Dinosaur Comics, Adventure Time Comics, and

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Speaker 1: Squirrel Girl. He's won the Eisner Award and Harvey Awards,

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Speaker 1: and has been a New York Times bestseller. In addition,

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Speaker 1: is an academic background in computational inguistics and a dog

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Speaker 1: named Chomsky. Ryan. Welcome to the program. Hi, thank you

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Speaker 1: for having me. We had Ryan on the show several

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Speaker 1: years ago to talk about his book called How To

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Speaker 1: Invent Everything, which is a piece of science communication in

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Speaker 1: the genre that we hear the podcast like having humble

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Speaker 1: titles like this podcast, and this new book continues that

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Speaker 1: theme and it's called how Do take Over the World.

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Speaker 1: So my first question for you, Ryan is why should

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Speaker 1: we take world domination advice from someone who was famously

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Speaker 1: trapped in a scaring pit with only an umbrella, a leash, phone,

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Speaker 1: and a dog. It's true, I did get stuck in

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Speaker 1: a hole with my dog, and we were there for

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Speaker 1: about an hour before Twitter helped me escape. But the

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Speaker 1: sort of secret about the book is it is called

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Speaker 1: how to take Over the World, and it is using

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Speaker 1: that as the kind of the candy coating to get

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Speaker 1: across the nonfiction inside. But the plots in the book

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Speaker 1: are really used as a a lens to explore the

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Speaker 1: actual science and technology and interesting ideas contained within it.

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Speaker 1: So while you could use the book to take over

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Speaker 1: the world, I hope you use it to learn more

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Speaker 1: about the really interesting world around us and the ways

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Speaker 1: we can make it better. I guess you could use

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Speaker 1: it to learn about the world so you can take

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Speaker 1: over it. Yeah you could. I mean I priced out

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Speaker 1: every plot in the book and it comes in at

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Speaker 1: a little under fifties six billion dollars. So if you

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Speaker 1: have that kind of cash kicking around, I know a

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Speaker 1: way you could spend it. You probably already run the world.

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Speaker 1: Is that what you're saying? Okay? Right, But do you

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Speaker 1: think it's kind of a bad idea to give people

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Speaker 1: instructions like that about how to take over the world?

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Speaker 1: In other words, should we stop the publication of this book?

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Speaker 1: I hope not. I'll tell you something I consider right, like,

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Speaker 1: is this a dangerous book? And I don't think it is,

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Speaker 1: because the truth of it is that what we're doing

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Speaker 1: is learning about the world. Like with How to Invent Everything,

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Speaker 1: the premise was you've gone back in time, your time

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Speaker 1: machine is broken, and we're going to use that fictional

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Speaker 1: premise to learn about how to rebuild civilization from. And

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Speaker 1: so with these world domination schemes, they're all lifted from

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Speaker 1: comic books. There are things that Dr Doom or Lex

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Speaker 1: Luthor would do, like having a secret floating base, or

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Speaker 1: clothing a dinosaur so you can ride around on it

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Speaker 1: and scare people. It's digging a hole to the Earth's

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Speaker 1: core so you can hold it hostage, that sort of stuff,

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Speaker 1: which in real life doesn't tend to get done, because

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Speaker 1: if you have the kind of means to dig a

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Speaker 1: hole to the Earth's core, you are probably already using

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Speaker 1: that to do a lot more direct world domination things,

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Speaker 1: if that's what you're interested in. So let me put

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Speaker 1: your listeners at ease and say that I don't think

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Speaker 1: it's a dangerous book. But I am also the guy

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Speaker 1: who wrote it, so I am therefore extremely biased. Well,

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Speaker 1: I mean, how many copies of this book do you

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Speaker 1: plan to sell? How many supervillains can the Earth tolerate?

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Speaker 1: You know what, if this book creates several supervillains and

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Speaker 1: they have competing tunnels to the center of the Earth.

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Speaker 1: If this book produces several competing supervillains all digging to

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Speaker 1: the Earth's core, I would argue that the actual good

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Speaker 1: science that would come out of actually reaching the Earth's

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Speaker 1: core with a tunnel would probably be worth those repeating

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Speaker 1: villains trying to do it as quickly as possible. Also,

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Speaker 1: you don't need actual supervillains to read your book, You

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Speaker 1: just need aspiring supervillains. Yeah. I had a friend who

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Speaker 1: was like, you know, I never considered myself to be

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Speaker 1: a super villain, but part way through reading your book,

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Speaker 1: I started thinking, this feels like self help. This feels

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Speaker 1: like I'm becoming more and more convinced that I could

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Speaker 1: become a supervillain and I could take over the world

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Speaker 1: if I really wanted to, which I counted as a success. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Well that kind of brings up the next question we have,

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Speaker 1: which is it do you think scientists or like writers

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Speaker 1: like yourself have responsibility for how their technology is applied?

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Speaker 1: I mean, like, do you think it would be Daniel's

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Speaker 1: fault if the l C, for example, accidentally creates a

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Speaker 1: black hole and destroys the Earth. I would personally blame

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Speaker 1: Daniel for that. Yes, absolutely, But seriously, I think there

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Speaker 1: is there's always a discussion, right of what do we

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Speaker 1: owe each other and how responsible are we the things

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Speaker 1: that we do when we produce. And my angle on

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Speaker 1: this is growing up in the eighties and nineties and

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Speaker 1: studying computers, and at the time there was this idea

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Speaker 1: that I fully subscribed to that the Internet was an

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Speaker 1: intrinsic good. It was good by its very nature because

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Speaker 1: it would let people talk to anyone in the world,

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Speaker 1: and communication was good by its very nature, and whatever

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Speaker 1: the Internet did, it had to be positive for the

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Speaker 1: world because we were connecting humans like that just felt

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Speaker 1: like it was. You accepted it as too, because it

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Speaker 1: was so obvious. And of course, twenty years later we

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Speaker 1: see things like Facebook inciting genocide and may and Mare

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Speaker 1: and all these ways in which human communication has been

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Speaker 1: weaponized and used to accomplish some very bad things, and

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Speaker 1: that was nothing that we foresaw at the time. Like

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Speaker 1: we all thought it was great, we didn't realize that

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Speaker 1: anyone in the world being able to talk to you

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Speaker 1: meant that if you were in any way marginalized, you'd

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Speaker 1: have to be constantly defending yourself against an effe actively

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Speaker 1: infinite array of strangers, always calling upon you to justify

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Speaker 1: your existence, Like there were these downsides we didn't see.

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Speaker 1: And I don't think you can call up you know,

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Speaker 1: Tim Bernard's Lee and say, hey, you invented the Worldwide Web.

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Speaker 1: I'm holding you responsible for this, but I think there

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Speaker 1: is a responsibility to try to foresee the negative ways

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Speaker 1: technology can be used. And that's a that's a very

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Speaker 1: serious answer to have. Probably not that serious question. I

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Speaker 1: apologize for that. No, I think it is a serious

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Speaker 1: question and it needs a serious answer. So thank you

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Speaker 1: for that. And I'm also glad to hear that you're

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Speaker 1: leaving most scientists of the responsibility for their actions except

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Speaker 1: for me. I'm responsible for the black hole in case

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Speaker 1: the LC eats the Earth, and that micro second I

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Speaker 1: have before I get stuck into the black called like

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Speaker 1: Daniel exactly, I haven't spent a whole lot of time

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Speaker 1: preparing my defense for the post Earth has been destroyed.

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Speaker 1: You know Hague trial, in which I'm called into justice.

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Speaker 1: You're probably fine, but you know, it is an important

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Speaker 1: topic and it's something that I personally have thought about

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Speaker 1: a lot. Having grown up in Los Alumos, where the

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Speaker 1: development of nuclear weapons, you know, literally has changed the

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Speaker 1: nature of human society, I definitely shied away from any

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Speaker 1: kind of physics research which had immediate applications, and tried

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Speaker 1: to imagine that, you know, particle physics was basically useless

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Speaker 1: to humanity except that its scratched our itch. You know

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Speaker 1: that it's satisfied some curiosity about the nature of reality.

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Speaker 1: But I think it's fun in your book how you

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Speaker 1: very directly connect these ideas of here's some knowledge about

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Speaker 1: how the universe works, and here's how you could use

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Speaker 1: it for your own personal gain at the expense of

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Speaker 1: the rest of humanity. I introduced this idea of what

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Speaker 1: I call enlightened superability, where you're helping the world by

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Speaker 1: helping yourself. I think the best example of that is

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Speaker 1: in the chapter about becoming immortal. We explore all the

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Speaker 1: different ways that people have tried to reach for immortality

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Speaker 1: in the past, and a lot of them feel really

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Speaker 1: goofy from our current point of view, like there's an

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Speaker 1: idea of popular and ang in the sixteen hundreds where

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Speaker 1: if you drank all these medicines which are really toxins poisons,

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Speaker 1: then your hair would fall out and your nails would

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Speaker 1: fall off. And we recognize this as like a very

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Speaker 1: crude form of chemotherapy, but they saw that when the

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Speaker 1: hair grew back and the nails grew back, if you

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Speaker 1: survive the treatment, then you'd be reborn as a baby,

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Speaker 1: and you live for longer by surviving this really crude

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Speaker 1: form of amateur chemotherapy that it feels goofy now, but

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Speaker 1: at the time they're like, yeah, this this might be

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Speaker 1: way we can become immortal. And sort of the conclusion

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Speaker 1: of that chapter is that if you did become immortal

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Speaker 1: through any sort of medical process, then that would be

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Speaker 1: really bad for the world, right because if it's a

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Speaker 1: medical way to become immortal, it's not some magical thing,

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Speaker 1: it's some scientific thing you're doing to yourself. Then that

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Speaker 1: takes money, that takes resources, and not everyone can have it.

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Speaker 1: And now you've produced a world in which you have

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Speaker 1: a class of immortal humans who won't die and everyone

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Speaker 1: else who will die. And that's that's like cartoonist levels

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Speaker 1: of dystopia and inequality. And the way you get around

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Speaker 1: that perfectly is you keep it a secret. Only you

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Speaker 1: become immortal, you're the only one who does is you're

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Speaker 1: the only one who knows about it. And then you

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Speaker 1: have these benefits of immortality where you can study something

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Speaker 1: for for hundreds of thousands of lifetimes and the rest

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Speaker 1: of the world doesn't need to suffer for it. And

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Speaker 1: that feels like a benefit, but also there's clearly something

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Speaker 1: villainous in becoming immortal and keeping it all for yourself,

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Speaker 1: And that narrow space is what I call it enlightened Supervillain.

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Speaker 1: You feel like it's where a lot of the book

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Speaker 1: operates and has fun with. Well, I guess I have

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Speaker 1: a more general question and now, Ryan, which is what

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Speaker 1: kind of inspired the book for you, Like, what made

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Speaker 1: you think to write a book about how to take

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Speaker 1: over the world. That's a good question. It sort of

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Speaker 1: came from me writing stories for Marvel and DC Comic

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Speaker 1: book Adventures. And in those stories, you always have a

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Speaker 1: hero fighting a villain. That's the rule of a genre,

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Speaker 1: superhero comics, and the best stories have the heroes winning

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Speaker 1: at the last second, right like in a sports game.

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Speaker 1: If your team dominates the whole match, it's not very

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Speaker 1: exciting because you know how it's going to end. But

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Speaker 1: if they come into the last second and double overtime

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Speaker 1: and that's a really good game, that's super exciting. And

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Speaker 1: so I realized that we were writing these stories where

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Speaker 1: the villains always lost at the last second, and what

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Speaker 1: happened if they didn't have to lose, what happened if

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Speaker 1: we structure the story so that they could win. And

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Speaker 1: if we could do that in a story, what's to

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Speaker 1: stop us from doing it in real life? And so

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Speaker 1: part of writing the book was me trying to convince

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Speaker 1: myself that this is fine, this is safe. No one

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Speaker 1: is going to blow up the moon or do any

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Speaker 1: crazy stuff. And part of it is, well, if someone

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Speaker 1: was trying to actually pull off supervillain schemes, like if

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Speaker 1: they really wanted a floating base, how close can we get?

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Speaker 1: Can we do it? If they really wanted a dinosaur

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Speaker 1: to write around on, what's the state of the art

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Speaker 1: for that? How close are we to de extinctifying which

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Speaker 1: is definitely a very scientific term these sorts of animals,

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Speaker 1: And there's a lot of really interesting things happening there.

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Speaker 1: So it end up being this fun exploration of the

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Speaker 1: sort of current edges of science and research, all through

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Speaker 1: this lens of I want to take over the world,

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Speaker 1: like dr doing what can I do. One thing that

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Speaker 1: excited me but also terrified me was how realistic some

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Speaker 1: of these schemes sort of are, especially in the category

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Speaker 1: of like geo engineering. It's certainly possible that somebody fairly

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Speaker 1: wealthy could decide they want to change the climate of

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Speaker 1: the Earth and do something about it, you know, where

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Speaker 1: one person makes a decision essentially for the whole planet.

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Speaker 1: I don't know if you've read the recent novel by

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Speaker 1: Neil Stevenson, Termination and Shock, in which this is sort

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Speaker 1: of explored. Can you talk about how somebody could actually

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Speaker 1: impact the climate, how an individual, fairly wealthy person could

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Speaker 1: make a decision about geo engineering for the whole human population. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: that was actually one of the chapters. That was the

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Speaker 1: chapter where I was most aware of. We're all having

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Speaker 1: fun here with this book for supervillaince, but I want

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Speaker 1: to make it clear that this is probably not something

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Speaker 1: we should be doing. Don't go off and do this

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Speaker 1: on your own. So the basic idea is that the

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Speaker 1: Earth's climate is changing, and one way we could stick

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Speaker 1: that if we can't get rid of carbon dioxide in

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Speaker 1: the atmosphere, which causes a greenhouse effect, is just have

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Speaker 1: less sunlight hit the Earth. And if we reduce the

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Speaker 1: amount of sunlight hitting the surface of the Earth by

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Speaker 1: two that could bring global temperatures down to pre industrial levels.

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Speaker 1: And one way you can do that is you go

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Speaker 1: up to the stratosphere and you spray sulfur dioxide into it,

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Speaker 1: which is white, and it reflects light back to space.

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Speaker 1: Everything's fine, and then that sulfur dioxide falls down as

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Speaker 1: acid rain. Don't worry about it. That sounds fine, It's

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Speaker 1: probably fine. And you could do this with a fleet

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Speaker 1: of not that strongly modified airplanes change so that they

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Speaker 1: can fly through the stratosphere and disperse this this sulfur dioxide.

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Speaker 1: And the cost for that would be about as seven

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Speaker 1: billion dollars US initially and then two billion dollars a

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Speaker 1: year ongoing, because of course this sulfur dioxide falls down

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Speaker 1: to Earth, it needs to replenished once a year. And

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Speaker 1: you know the plus side is, yes, this this would

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Speaker 1: reduce global temperatures down to where they were pre industrially,

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Speaker 1: but the downsides are pretty significant. It's something that needs

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Speaker 1: to be maintained. So if we stopped, then suddenly you

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Speaker 1: have two hundred years of climate change happening in one year,

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Speaker 1: which would obviously be catastrophic. But of course, like we

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Speaker 1: also rely on fertilizers to feed all the humans that

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Speaker 1: are live in the planet, so there's some precedent for

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Speaker 1: for doing this. But the real objection I see is

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Speaker 1: that if you do this, you're not just changing the

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Speaker 1: global climate, but you're also changing global weather, the weather patterns,

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Speaker 1: and that means, you know, when a tornado strikes somewhere,

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Speaker 1: we call that an act of God, because we can't

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Speaker 1: control the weather. But when you have modified the weather,

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Speaker 1: there's no more acts of God. There's just acts of you.

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Speaker 1: And there's also the concern of if there is to

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Speaker 1: be a global thermostat, why is one person controlling it.

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Speaker 1: Who's to say it can be controlled or should be

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Speaker 1: controlled by that one person. So you get these really

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Speaker 1: thorny issues of culpability, especially if say, these tornadoes only

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Speaker 1: happen to affect one part of the planet that you're

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Speaker 1: not in, maybe you'll decide that's fine. Like, it gets

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Speaker 1: so messy so quickly and doesn't actually fully address the

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Speaker 1: problems with climate change. It addresses the temperature thing, but

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Speaker 1: there's still extra carbon dioxide causes coral re bleaching and

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Speaker 1: things like that. So it's not a perfect solution, and

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Speaker 1: it's not even a consequence free solution, but it is

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Speaker 1: a surprisingly achievable thing for someone with nine billion dollars

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Speaker 1: kicking around to do if they were really motivated. And

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Speaker 1: I don't think the answer there is to pretend it

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Speaker 1: doesn't exist. I'd like for people to be aware that

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Speaker 1: this is something that's out there, and this is something

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Speaker 1: that someone might try to do one day, or a

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Speaker 1: government or a country might try to do, and I

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Speaker 1: wouldn't want us to be surprised by it. Well, I'll

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Speaker 1: admit that I was terrified as I was reading this,

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Speaker 1: imagining what if Jeff Bezos is reading this book, because

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Speaker 1: this is something he could do. He could like push

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Speaker 1: a button and do this and decide, Hey, you know,

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Speaker 1: I'm sorry I blew away your country and tornadoes. But

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Speaker 1: I decided it was for the best. It really helped

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Speaker 1: Amazon's bottom line in America, so we went for it.

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Speaker 1: All right, Well, we have lots more questions for Ryan,

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Speaker 1: but first let's take a short break. Okay, we're back

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Speaker 1: and we're talking to Ryan North, the author of the

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Speaker 1: book How to take Over the World, who really really

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Speaker 1: doesn't want you to use his book to take over

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Speaker 1: the world, or maybe in a way you do. You

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Speaker 1: want people to be more informed and you know, make

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Speaker 1: better decisions with the book. Yeah, I do. Um. I

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Speaker 1: think there's this interesting angle in science communication where like,

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Speaker 1: these schemes have not been fully created by me. It's

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Speaker 1: just me looking around at what's there on the ground

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Speaker 1: and how it can be put together. And if me,

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Speaker 1: a simple cartoonist put them together in these ways, I'm

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Speaker 1: sure others have too. So I feel like, you know,

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Speaker 1: let's be aware of it. Let's let's look at what

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Speaker 1: can be done. And I also do want to make

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Speaker 1: it sound like it's all dire and and bad. Like

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Speaker 1: the scheme for bringing back dinosaurs, I think is a

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Speaker 1: lot of fun and could be a great benefit for people.

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Speaker 1: The argument there is less of you know, let's clone

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Speaker 1: dinosaurs like in Jurassic Park, and more let's look at chickens,

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Speaker 1: which are a distant ancestor of dinosaurs and use a

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Speaker 1: bespoke development environment to bring out arms instead of wings

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Speaker 1: and a snout instead of a beak, and a rounded

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Speaker 1: butt instead of a tail, and produce very dinosaur like

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Speaker 1: chickens which we could then track in with ostriches. And

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Speaker 1: then there's your dinosaur tour to run around on. And yes,

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Speaker 1: it's not technically a dinosaur, but it looks like one,

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Speaker 1: and it would probably sound like one if it worked.

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Speaker 1: But it would it taste like a dinosaur? I don't know.

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Speaker 1: I think probably pretty close. I'm gonna go on record

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Speaker 1: and say I think dinosaurs are delicious. Yeah, dinosaurs tastes

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Speaker 1: like chicken. I'm thinking about all sorts of tie ins

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Speaker 1: with fast food restaurants. You know, you get your Jurassic nuggets.

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Speaker 1: I mean, it sounds fantastic. I don't know why you

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Speaker 1: didn't base the whole book on that, but tell us

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Speaker 1: a little bit about that. You know, is Jurassic chicken

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Speaker 1: actually a possibility? Is this something that you know scientists

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Speaker 1: could actually accomplish if they decided it was a good idea.

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Speaker 1: It's interesting there are some scientists who think it's a

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Speaker 1: great idea. One in particular, Jack Horner wrote a book

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Speaker 1: called How to Build a Dinosaur where he was like,

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Speaker 1: this is what needs to be done, and we could

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Speaker 1: do it. And there's other teams who have been working

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Speaker 1: on this who have sort of gone up to the

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Speaker 1: line and then stepped back. There was one team that

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Speaker 1: was working on snouts and produced chicken embryo in an

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Speaker 1: egg that had a snout with teeth, and then they

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Speaker 1: didn't allow the egg to develop because they thought, you know,

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Speaker 1: there's some definite ethical and moral implications with what we're doing,

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Speaker 1: and let's avoid them by just not hatching this more

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Speaker 1: dinosaur like chicken. Are you saying that they thought about

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Speaker 1: the ethics after they had succeeded in creating a mini dinosaur.

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Speaker 1: That seems a tiny bit late in the game. I

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Speaker 1: mean better late than never. I feel like better late

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Speaker 1: than ever for sure. But the new thing of out

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Speaker 1: this process is we're not genetically engineering chickens to be dinosaurs.

431
00:22:04,000 --> 00:22:06,440
Speaker 1: Were just expressing different genes in their development to make

432
00:22:06,480 --> 00:22:09,399
Speaker 1: them more dinosaur like. And so if one of these

433
00:22:09,960 --> 00:22:13,520
Speaker 1: chicken Asaurus is actually hatched, it would have the same DNA,

434
00:22:13,640 --> 00:22:16,159
Speaker 1: the same genetic code as a chicken, and if it

435
00:22:16,200 --> 00:22:20,439
Speaker 1: could reproduce with another chicken, which probably would be unlikely,

436
00:22:20,440 --> 00:22:22,760
Speaker 1: but if it worked, you wouldn't get more chicken a souruss.

437
00:22:22,760 --> 00:22:25,440
Speaker 1: You just get regular chickens because they hadn't had their

438
00:22:25,440 --> 00:22:30,080
Speaker 1: development environment altered, so it feels safe. There's no escaping

439
00:22:30,119 --> 00:22:32,399
Speaker 1: the park and taking over the world angle here, and

440
00:22:32,440 --> 00:22:34,880
Speaker 1: if they do escape, like you said, there's lots of

441
00:22:35,280 --> 00:22:41,200
Speaker 1: companies dedicated towards breading and frying these animals for delicious consumption.

442
00:22:41,920 --> 00:22:43,760
Speaker 1: So I feel like it's it's like plugs, right, Like

443
00:22:43,840 --> 00:22:46,840
Speaker 1: dogs are wolves that we have bread into being something

444
00:22:46,920 --> 00:22:49,639
Speaker 1: cuter and more acceptable to us. And pugs are a

445
00:22:49,720 --> 00:22:53,080
Speaker 1: strong example because they have these short noses that are

446
00:22:53,160 --> 00:22:55,639
Speaker 1: not great for respiration, Like that's not what the animal

447
00:22:55,880 --> 00:22:58,000
Speaker 1: would want if it was choosing itself. But we love

448
00:22:58,000 --> 00:23:00,159
Speaker 1: these animals, we care for them. We give them all

449
00:23:00,200 --> 00:23:03,040
Speaker 1: the attention and and care they could need so that

450
00:23:03,080 --> 00:23:06,439
Speaker 1: they're not affected poorly by these snouts. So we do

451
00:23:06,480 --> 00:23:08,080
Speaker 1: what we can for the animals we love. And I

452
00:23:08,119 --> 00:23:11,840
Speaker 1: feel like had we created or if we created a

453
00:23:11,960 --> 00:23:14,440
Speaker 1: chicken dinosaur, it would absolutely be one of the most

454
00:23:14,880 --> 00:23:17,359
Speaker 1: cared for and celebrated animals in the world and they

455
00:23:17,359 --> 00:23:18,960
Speaker 1: would have a pretty good life. I'm still stuck in

456
00:23:19,000 --> 00:23:22,399
Speaker 1: the idea of a dinosaur giving birth to a chicken

457
00:23:22,840 --> 00:23:25,080
Speaker 1: and the trauma for that poor chicken that has to

458
00:23:25,119 --> 00:23:27,439
Speaker 1: have a dinosaur mom. Like you know when your parents

459
00:23:27,440 --> 00:23:29,760
Speaker 1: look different from all the other parents, Like, wow, that's

460
00:23:29,800 --> 00:23:32,439
Speaker 1: gonna be a difficult chicken childhood there, I mean the

461
00:23:32,520 --> 00:23:36,240
Speaker 1: ugly duckling. Still that's where it's happy or that No,

462
00:23:36,359 --> 00:23:38,520
Speaker 1: the ugly duckling. The duckling grows up to be a

463
00:23:38,560 --> 00:23:41,199
Speaker 1: swan and then like beats up the other ducks. Right,

464
00:23:41,200 --> 00:23:45,200
Speaker 1: it's a really mean, very tale recall. All right, Well,

465
00:23:45,359 --> 00:23:47,320
Speaker 1: Danie and I really love your book, Ryan, But one

466
00:23:47,320 --> 00:23:50,199
Speaker 1: thing that is pretty cool is that it's for a

467
00:23:50,240 --> 00:23:52,440
Speaker 1: wide range of people. So the book was a big

468
00:23:52,480 --> 00:23:54,520
Speaker 1: hit in my house, was a big hit in Daniel South,

469
00:23:54,760 --> 00:23:57,520
Speaker 1: and our kids also got into the book. So we

470
00:23:57,520 --> 00:24:00,520
Speaker 1: have a couple of questions from Hazel dan his daughter,

471
00:24:00,560 --> 00:24:02,720
Speaker 1: and a couple of questions from my son. Sure this

472
00:24:02,800 --> 00:24:05,439
Speaker 1: is great, all right, So here's a question from my daughter, Hazel.

473
00:24:05,760 --> 00:24:08,520
Speaker 1: If hypothetically a twelve year old wanted to take over

474
00:24:08,560 --> 00:24:10,760
Speaker 1: the world and didn't have access to a lot of

475
00:24:10,800 --> 00:24:17,360
Speaker 1: resources other than her dad's particle accelerator, what would you recommend, hypothetically, hypathetically, sympathetically,

476
00:24:17,440 --> 00:24:20,439
Speaker 1: That is a great question, Hazel I would say that

477
00:24:20,480 --> 00:24:24,000
Speaker 1: you're in a great position given this access to a

478
00:24:24,000 --> 00:24:27,879
Speaker 1: particle accelerator. I feel like I'm not really best qualified

479
00:24:27,920 --> 00:24:30,399
Speaker 1: to tell you what you can use a particle accelerator

480
00:24:30,480 --> 00:24:34,159
Speaker 1: for in terms of world domination. But with the particle

481
00:24:34,160 --> 00:24:37,680
Speaker 1: accelerator and a very tredulous father, I think you could

482
00:24:37,680 --> 00:24:41,239
Speaker 1: trick him into doing stuff. But just just ask him, like,

483
00:24:41,680 --> 00:24:44,159
Speaker 1: you know, Dad, what should I definitely never use that

484
00:24:44,240 --> 00:24:47,000
Speaker 1: particle accelerator for because I want to be super safe.

485
00:24:47,000 --> 00:24:50,000
Speaker 1: And he'll tell you, and then you know, do it,

486
00:24:50,640 --> 00:24:54,320
Speaker 1: And then he'll say, go ask your mother. If mom

487
00:24:54,359 --> 00:24:56,399
Speaker 1: says it's okay to make a black hole, then I

488
00:24:56,440 --> 00:24:59,320
Speaker 1: guess it's fine. I think it's it's great deniability here

489
00:24:59,320 --> 00:25:01,399
Speaker 1: because you can do Google what not to do with

490
00:25:01,440 --> 00:25:04,520
Speaker 1: a particle accelerator and just tell the FBI, like what

491
00:25:04,800 --> 00:25:07,280
Speaker 1: I was trying to be safe. That actually brings me

492
00:25:07,320 --> 00:25:09,840
Speaker 1: to my son's question. So my son really liked your book.

493
00:25:10,040 --> 00:25:12,200
Speaker 1: He read it and he wants to know how many

494
00:25:12,240 --> 00:25:15,080
Speaker 1: times did you use Google to get all the information

495
00:25:15,119 --> 00:25:16,960
Speaker 1: for the book. But I think it was so impressed

496
00:25:16,960 --> 00:25:18,800
Speaker 1: by all the information in it. He was like, how

497
00:25:18,840 --> 00:25:20,359
Speaker 1: do you how do you do you even get all

498
00:25:20,400 --> 00:25:24,000
Speaker 1: this stuff. Yeah, that's a great question. I think anyone

499
00:25:24,080 --> 00:25:27,400
Speaker 1: these days uses Google. But it's not like you can

500
00:25:27,440 --> 00:25:30,680
Speaker 1: just type in what should I put in a book

501
00:25:30,720 --> 00:25:33,040
Speaker 1: called how to take Over the World? PS, it's an

502
00:25:33,040 --> 00:25:37,320
Speaker 1: emergency and have it work. So what I what I do?

503
00:25:37,480 --> 00:25:39,640
Speaker 1: I think? What what all of us do going through

504
00:25:39,640 --> 00:25:42,480
Speaker 1: the world is we're always keeping our eyes peeled for

505
00:25:42,560 --> 00:25:46,240
Speaker 1: interesting things and remembering things that surprised us or that

506
00:25:46,280 --> 00:25:49,840
Speaker 1: we thought were unexpected. And so when you sit down

507
00:25:49,880 --> 00:25:52,320
Speaker 1: to write, you have all this stuff you remember of, Oh,

508
00:25:52,400 --> 00:25:56,000
Speaker 1: you know, I think I've read somewhere that plastics aren't

509
00:25:56,080 --> 00:25:59,600
Speaker 1: eaten by anything alive on the world, and just how

510
00:25:59,640 --> 00:26:02,240
Speaker 1: they'll has a really long time. And then you google

511
00:26:02,320 --> 00:26:04,400
Speaker 1: that and you think, oh, you realize, oh, no, there

512
00:26:04,440 --> 00:26:06,639
Speaker 1: was an animal that was discovered in the early two

513
00:26:06,680 --> 00:26:09,240
Speaker 1: thousands that does actually or can actually eat plastic, but

514
00:26:09,280 --> 00:26:12,880
Speaker 1: still most animals don't, so it's it's a really long lasting,

515
00:26:13,359 --> 00:26:17,120
Speaker 1: non biodegradable product. In certain scenarios, then you say, well,

516
00:26:17,119 --> 00:26:20,000
Speaker 1: if nothing eats plastic on the ocean floor, then you

517
00:26:20,040 --> 00:26:24,119
Speaker 1: could use a engraved hunk of plastic and put it

518
00:26:24,119 --> 00:26:26,560
Speaker 1: in the ocean and it will last ten thousand years.

519
00:26:26,560 --> 00:26:29,360
Speaker 1: And you know what, if you put that maybe near

520
00:26:29,400 --> 00:26:31,359
Speaker 1: the marian A Trench, because that's the deepest part of

521
00:26:31,359 --> 00:26:33,720
Speaker 1: the ocean, so it's naturally interesting, just like Mount Everest

522
00:26:33,720 --> 00:26:36,760
Speaker 1: is naturally interesting for us, then that might be give

523
00:26:36,800 --> 00:26:38,959
Speaker 1: it a better chance of being found in that time period.

524
00:26:39,000 --> 00:26:41,639
Speaker 1: And then you google how fast the maran A trench

525
00:26:41,840 --> 00:26:44,200
Speaker 1: plate is being subducted, and you realize, oh, it's fifty

526
00:26:44,200 --> 00:26:47,080
Speaker 1: three millime a year. So you put it like five

527
00:26:47,160 --> 00:26:49,440
Speaker 1: kilometers away in the right direction, it'll be right where

528
00:26:49,440 --> 00:26:52,399
Speaker 1: it's at the most interesting point on the planet at

529
00:26:52,440 --> 00:26:54,840
Speaker 1: the time period we want. And then you've got a

530
00:26:54,880 --> 00:26:59,160
Speaker 1: scheme for sending a villainous message centuries thousands of years

531
00:26:59,200 --> 00:27:01,080
Speaker 1: in the future. I think get all starts from just

532
00:27:01,160 --> 00:27:04,680
Speaker 1: being curious about the world around you and remembering the

533
00:27:04,720 --> 00:27:06,520
Speaker 1: stuff you find interesting, and then you can put it

534
00:27:06,560 --> 00:27:09,119
Speaker 1: together in different ways like little villainous lego blocks. That

535
00:27:09,200 --> 00:27:13,160
Speaker 1: sounds like the answer is Google, but I think he's

536
00:27:13,160 --> 00:27:16,480
Speaker 1: saying it's how you use Google, right, Like, if you

537
00:27:16,520 --> 00:27:17,840
Speaker 1: use it in the right way, you can get the

538
00:27:17,960 --> 00:27:21,719
Speaker 1: interesting places. Every nonfiction book these days is curated Google

539
00:27:22,520 --> 00:27:26,359
Speaker 1: and Wikipedia. Wikipedia. Actually, it's surprising I wish it were

540
00:27:26,880 --> 00:27:29,240
Speaker 1: because of me so much easier. There's still lots of

541
00:27:29,280 --> 00:27:33,000
Speaker 1: information in books that you can't find online, and you

542
00:27:33,040 --> 00:27:35,400
Speaker 1: can't just search for what you want. I do love

543
00:27:35,480 --> 00:27:37,640
Speaker 1: that a lot of the older out of copyright books

544
00:27:37,640 --> 00:27:40,080
Speaker 1: are online, so you can find like these on the

545
00:27:40,160 --> 00:27:45,040
Speaker 1: chapter immortality, I found all these schemes from the mid

546
00:27:45,200 --> 00:27:48,159
Speaker 1: fift hundreds onward that were written down these books and

547
00:27:48,160 --> 00:27:50,480
Speaker 1: published and forgotten, but then someone scanned to put them online.

548
00:27:50,480 --> 00:27:53,159
Speaker 1: I can read these original ideas of here's how you

549
00:27:53,200 --> 00:27:55,360
Speaker 1: make this juice that makes you immortal. And you look

550
00:27:55,359 --> 00:27:57,080
Speaker 1: at the recipe from our modern era and you're like,

551
00:27:57,080 --> 00:28:01,840
Speaker 1: this is ludicrous. This will at best not kill you.

552
00:28:02,200 --> 00:28:07,720
Speaker 1: Come close. Well, technically not killing you is extending your life. Yeah.

553
00:28:07,920 --> 00:28:10,320
Speaker 1: I guess if you continue to not be killed for

554
00:28:10,359 --> 00:28:13,080
Speaker 1: long enough, then you can live forever. That's the trip,

555
00:28:13,200 --> 00:28:15,919
Speaker 1: as I just avoid a hoax. He cures and you

556
00:28:16,000 --> 00:28:18,560
Speaker 1: might live forever. Speaking of cures, my daughter had this

557
00:28:18,640 --> 00:28:22,199
Speaker 1: moment Hazel realized the power of Google. We're watching this

558
00:28:22,280 --> 00:28:26,000
Speaker 1: show All Creatures Great and Small and PBS, this wonderful show.

559
00:28:26,119 --> 00:28:28,639
Speaker 1: But he's trying to save some cow and he's looking

560
00:28:28,720 --> 00:28:31,800
Speaker 1: through books for an answer. He's like desperately doing research

561
00:28:31,840 --> 00:28:34,320
Speaker 1: all night long, and Hazel's like, Wow, too bad he

562
00:28:34,359 --> 00:28:37,000
Speaker 1: doesn't just have Google. And I think she'd like clicked

563
00:28:37,040 --> 00:28:39,320
Speaker 1: for her the power of being able to search through

564
00:28:39,360 --> 00:28:42,160
Speaker 1: all these texts simultaneously to find an answer. I want

565
00:28:42,160 --> 00:28:44,120
Speaker 1: to come back to something you talked about earlier, about

566
00:28:44,120 --> 00:28:46,640
Speaker 1: sending a message into the future. You know, why do

567
00:28:46,680 --> 00:28:49,680
Speaker 1: you think this is such a powerful theme in supervillain

568
00:28:49,720 --> 00:28:53,280
Speaker 1: e Being immortal or not being forgotten? Is it such

569
00:28:53,280 --> 00:28:55,680
Speaker 1: an important theme? And what are some of the schemes

570
00:28:55,720 --> 00:28:58,800
Speaker 1: you have in your book for not being forgotten? Well?

571
00:28:58,840 --> 00:29:01,680
Speaker 1: It ties into ego, right, Like the best villains are

572
00:29:01,680 --> 00:29:04,760
Speaker 1: always super egotistical. Your your doctor Dunes and lex Luthors

573
00:29:04,800 --> 00:29:07,920
Speaker 1: are very convinced that they are the best humanity has

574
00:29:07,960 --> 00:29:11,480
Speaker 1: to offer. But since they are a human, they're going

575
00:29:11,560 --> 00:29:15,240
Speaker 1: to die one day and that feels unfair to them,

576
00:29:15,240 --> 00:29:18,240
Speaker 1: and they want either cheat death by becoming immortal, or

577
00:29:18,320 --> 00:29:20,600
Speaker 1: at least ensure that they're never forgotten and find at

578
00:29:20,640 --> 00:29:24,360
Speaker 1: least some some flavor of immortality. It's fascinating how often

579
00:29:24,400 --> 00:29:26,880
Speaker 1: this idea shows up across human cultures, and you look

580
00:29:26,920 --> 00:29:29,520
Speaker 1: at it just from like first principles, that makes sense, right,

581
00:29:29,600 --> 00:29:35,600
Speaker 1: like humans begin as an egg and sperm cell, and

582
00:29:35,640 --> 00:29:38,520
Speaker 1: then from those two pieces we build up an entire

583
00:29:38,600 --> 00:29:42,080
Speaker 1: baby in nine months, which is incredible. It's it's it's

584
00:29:42,080 --> 00:29:47,000
Speaker 1: a magic trick. And then somehow just maintaining that body

585
00:29:47,160 --> 00:29:50,840
Speaker 1: is what kills us. We can build a human being

586
00:29:50,960 --> 00:29:53,520
Speaker 1: from two cells and nine months, and then just keeping

587
00:29:53,560 --> 00:29:57,800
Speaker 1: it around is fatal. That feels like there's something wrong there,

588
00:29:57,880 --> 00:29:59,760
Speaker 1: like there must be some mistake and we can fix this.

589
00:29:59,840 --> 00:30:02,240
Speaker 1: So I get the implication for why you'd want to

590
00:30:02,240 --> 00:30:04,680
Speaker 1: be immortal, and when that fails, I absolutely understand this

591
00:30:04,760 --> 00:30:07,160
Speaker 1: idea of well, well, let's at least make sure people

592
00:30:07,200 --> 00:30:09,280
Speaker 1: always remember me. I want to send a message of

593
00:30:09,280 --> 00:30:11,480
Speaker 1: the futures that they know I was here, and I

594
00:30:11,480 --> 00:30:14,160
Speaker 1: feel like that's also very very common in humans, this idea.

595
00:30:14,280 --> 00:30:16,720
Speaker 1: But we'll build something so that people knew we were here.

596
00:30:16,880 --> 00:30:19,200
Speaker 1: And in the book, I look at different time ranges,

597
00:30:19,240 --> 00:30:22,480
Speaker 1: so one year, ten year, a hundred year, a thousand year,

598
00:30:22,640 --> 00:30:26,560
Speaker 1: and as we go for larger and larger periods of time,

599
00:30:26,640 --> 00:30:29,160
Speaker 1: we start getting greater and greater problems. Right, and we

600
00:30:29,240 --> 00:30:32,000
Speaker 1: looking at uh, ten thousand years into the future. It's

601
00:30:32,040 --> 00:30:35,080
Speaker 1: not impossible to get an object to survive that long.

602
00:30:35,200 --> 00:30:40,080
Speaker 1: But the fact is that no human language has survived

603
00:30:40,120 --> 00:30:43,640
Speaker 1: that long, And so you start getting into well, maybe

604
00:30:43,640 --> 00:30:47,320
Speaker 1: we can use a subset of words that we believe

605
00:30:47,560 --> 00:30:51,120
Speaker 1: evolved more slowly than other words, so very common things

606
00:30:51,200 --> 00:30:54,840
Speaker 1: like like face and numbers and letters. But even that

607
00:30:54,880 --> 00:30:56,600
Speaker 1: doesn't get you far enough, and you're like, well, maybe

608
00:30:56,640 --> 00:31:00,040
Speaker 1: we can use symbols and communicate with the universe a

609
00:31:00,120 --> 00:31:03,880
Speaker 1: language of pictures. But comics. Yeah, But the problem with

610
00:31:03,920 --> 00:31:06,720
Speaker 1: comics is that even they're culturally interpreted, like a skull

611
00:31:06,760 --> 00:31:09,640
Speaker 1: and crossbones we would see as being a symbol of death,

612
00:31:10,000 --> 00:31:12,960
Speaker 1: or maybe it's piracy, or to a medieval alchemist, it's

613
00:31:13,000 --> 00:31:17,560
Speaker 1: the bones of Adam that promised eternal resurrection, and comics

614
00:31:17,560 --> 00:31:19,480
Speaker 1: are reading them left to right or right to left,

615
00:31:19,520 --> 00:31:22,400
Speaker 1: like we we don't know the culture that these symbols

616
00:31:22,440 --> 00:31:25,719
Speaker 1: will be interpreted in, so we can't. Actually, they're not

617
00:31:26,040 --> 00:31:28,320
Speaker 1: nearly as reliable as as we'd like. We need like

618
00:31:28,360 --> 00:31:31,720
Speaker 1: an ikea manual for how to read the comics. People

619
00:31:31,760 --> 00:31:34,640
Speaker 1: have tried it. People have because that's such a tantalizing idea, right,

620
00:31:34,640 --> 00:31:36,400
Speaker 1: if we can come up with a symbol, a set

621
00:31:36,400 --> 00:31:39,800
Speaker 1: of symbols that any human can look at and understand.

622
00:31:40,080 --> 00:31:43,479
Speaker 1: Then we've got a universal language, and especially in the seventies,

623
00:31:43,480 --> 00:31:45,320
Speaker 1: see a lot of efforts to try to build this

624
00:31:45,480 --> 00:31:48,400
Speaker 1: universal pictorial language. And as soon as you get to

625
00:31:48,480 --> 00:31:51,680
Speaker 1: something even a little bit complicated, you start making these

626
00:31:51,680 --> 00:31:57,200
Speaker 1: assumptions that a circle is good and a square is bad,

627
00:31:57,280 --> 00:31:59,760
Speaker 1: or green means go and red means stop, and all

628
00:31:59,800 --> 00:32:02,440
Speaker 1: these things that you can't actually bake in. So it

629
00:32:02,680 --> 00:32:04,960
Speaker 1: starts to get very very challenging. But when you're looking

630
00:32:05,000 --> 00:32:07,800
Speaker 1: at say a hundred thousand years or even a million

631
00:32:07,920 --> 00:32:10,640
Speaker 1: years in the future, at that point, all you can

632
00:32:10,680 --> 00:32:12,800
Speaker 1: do is leave the Earth and be like, you know what,

633
00:32:13,320 --> 00:32:15,920
Speaker 1: We're gonna put a satellite in orbit, like NASA did

634
00:32:16,000 --> 00:32:19,240
Speaker 1: with Legios, which is a million dollar satellite nineteen and

635
00:32:19,240 --> 00:32:22,800
Speaker 1: the polar orbit that's expected to last about a million

636
00:32:22,880 --> 00:32:25,720
Speaker 1: years before the grades. And so you could launch a

637
00:32:25,800 --> 00:32:29,280
Speaker 1: very similar satellite with your message on it, and maybe

638
00:32:29,280 --> 00:32:31,280
Speaker 1: it won't be understood, but the fact that it made

639
00:32:31,760 --> 00:32:35,000
Speaker 1: it a million years in the future, that's remarkable on

640
00:32:35,040 --> 00:32:37,880
Speaker 1: its own. Are you saying that NASA launched a satellite

641
00:32:38,000 --> 00:32:40,120
Speaker 1: just to send a message to the future, that's the

642
00:32:40,160 --> 00:32:43,440
Speaker 1: primary purpose of this satellite, or it's an auxiliary purpose.

643
00:32:43,560 --> 00:32:45,520
Speaker 1: It's an auxiliary revercose I wishly done it on purpose.

644
00:32:45,640 --> 00:32:49,200
Speaker 1: So this satellite was used to initially measure continental drift.

645
00:32:49,240 --> 00:32:51,800
Speaker 1: It's basically imagine a giant golf ball and if you

646
00:32:51,840 --> 00:32:54,920
Speaker 1: fire a laser at this sallit it reflects it back

647
00:32:54,960 --> 00:32:56,959
Speaker 1: to you and you can use that to measure distance

648
00:32:57,040 --> 00:32:59,240
Speaker 1: very accurately, which you can then use to measure the

649
00:32:59,440 --> 00:33:02,000
Speaker 1: very light movements of the continents. And so it was

650
00:33:02,160 --> 00:33:05,320
Speaker 1: used to sort of nail down this newer theory of

651
00:33:05,360 --> 00:33:07,720
Speaker 1: continental drift naturally get measurements for it, and it worked.

652
00:33:08,480 --> 00:33:11,040
Speaker 1: And it was only when they were launching it, well

653
00:33:11,040 --> 00:33:13,480
Speaker 1: not just we're launching, but as they're launching it, they realized,

654
00:33:13,680 --> 00:33:15,800
Speaker 1: you know, if this stays up for this long, this

655
00:33:15,880 --> 00:33:19,760
Speaker 1: is a chance to talk to life on Earth millions

656
00:33:19,800 --> 00:33:22,640
Speaker 1: of years in the future if it's understood. And so

657
00:33:22,840 --> 00:33:25,600
Speaker 1: what they did trying to figure out this problem of language,

658
00:33:25,640 --> 00:33:28,400
Speaker 1: They did the numbers one to ten in binary to

659
00:33:28,400 --> 00:33:30,440
Speaker 1: show that we knew what numbers were, and then there

660
00:33:30,440 --> 00:33:34,040
Speaker 1: were three pictures of what Earth looked like around eight

661
00:33:34,040 --> 00:33:37,000
Speaker 1: million years ago we think from continent drift, what it

662
00:33:37,040 --> 00:33:39,480
Speaker 1: looked like when it was launched and then what it

663
00:33:39,560 --> 00:33:41,600
Speaker 1: might look like around eight million years in the future.

664
00:33:41,880 --> 00:33:43,840
Speaker 1: And that was basically a little more than a guest

665
00:33:43,880 --> 00:33:46,760
Speaker 1: because we hadn't yet precisely measured how the continents were moving.

666
00:33:47,280 --> 00:33:49,880
Speaker 1: But it at least says I can give you some

667
00:33:49,960 --> 00:33:53,000
Speaker 1: idea of this is about when this came from, and

668
00:33:53,000 --> 00:33:55,400
Speaker 1: this is about what we were trying to do if

669
00:33:55,440 --> 00:33:57,440
Speaker 1: you know what the Earth looks like. But that's a

670
00:33:57,440 --> 00:33:59,400
Speaker 1: pretty big if, right, if the Earth even looks like

671
00:33:59,440 --> 00:34:02,920
Speaker 1: what we think will look like. So you don't have

672
00:34:03,000 --> 00:34:06,920
Speaker 1: anything guaranteed, But I think the fact that it's possible

673
00:34:06,960 --> 00:34:11,400
Speaker 1: to try and to maybe succeed is absolutely wild, right.

674
00:34:11,520 --> 00:34:13,080
Speaker 1: I think if humans look at that thing in a

675
00:34:13,120 --> 00:34:15,120
Speaker 1: million years, there would be a big group of people

676
00:34:15,160 --> 00:34:17,440
Speaker 1: who think it's a fake. It must be a hoax.

677
00:34:17,600 --> 00:34:20,439
Speaker 1: There's no way NASA actually did that a million years ago.

678
00:34:21,160 --> 00:34:23,719
Speaker 1: Well there's the for a hundred million years. What I

679
00:34:23,760 --> 00:34:28,360
Speaker 1: suggest is based on this satellite, the Echo Star sixteen,

680
00:34:28,680 --> 00:34:32,239
Speaker 1: which there's a type of orbit called the graveyard orbit.

681
00:34:32,320 --> 00:34:34,440
Speaker 1: So if you're in geosynchronous orbit, it's really useful for

682
00:34:34,480 --> 00:34:37,560
Speaker 1: satellites because you're always in the same place in the sky.

683
00:34:37,640 --> 00:34:41,880
Speaker 1: But when the satellites exceed they're useful lifetime. They're pushed

684
00:34:41,960 --> 00:34:45,719
Speaker 1: up about three kilometers higher to what's called the graveyard orbit,

685
00:34:45,719 --> 00:34:51,400
Speaker 1: where they just orbit in this graveyard indefinitely and on

686
00:34:51,440 --> 00:34:55,560
Speaker 1: this Echo Star sixteen satellite. This artist, Trevor Peglin, talked

687
00:34:55,640 --> 00:34:58,680
Speaker 1: them into letting him put on a silicon disc that

688
00:34:58,760 --> 00:35:01,760
Speaker 1: had a hundred different pictures of Earth, portraits of humanity,

689
00:35:01,760 --> 00:35:05,320
Speaker 1: he called it. And we're all familiar with the Voyager Record,

690
00:35:05,320 --> 00:35:08,880
Speaker 1: which had these images of humans and humanity shows by NASA,

691
00:35:08,880 --> 00:35:10,640
Speaker 1: and they were all very It was like Earth on

692
00:35:10,640 --> 00:35:12,520
Speaker 1: a good day, right. These images we put in our

693
00:35:12,600 --> 00:35:15,080
Speaker 1: dating profile if we were a planet or a species

694
00:35:15,520 --> 00:35:19,560
Speaker 1: looking to meet other species. But what Trevor chose were

695
00:35:19,920 --> 00:35:23,000
Speaker 1: I thought very interesting because he just chose images that

696
00:35:23,040 --> 00:35:25,080
Speaker 1: showed all these different aspects of Earth. There was a

697
00:35:25,120 --> 00:35:29,880
Speaker 1: screenshot of the text adventure game Zorc. There was what

698
00:35:29,920 --> 00:35:32,040
Speaker 1: you might expect, like pictures of beautiful buildings and stuff,

699
00:35:32,080 --> 00:35:35,320
Speaker 1: but also here's a picture of a factory farm. Here's

700
00:35:35,360 --> 00:35:38,200
Speaker 1: a picture of a predator drone taken from the ground

701
00:35:38,239 --> 00:35:43,759
Speaker 1: in Iran. Here's pictures of children who were born with

702
00:35:43,960 --> 00:35:46,920
Speaker 1: deformations caused by Agent Orange, like stuff that we wouldn't

703
00:35:46,920 --> 00:35:49,920
Speaker 1: normally want to. Remember, he also put on this satellite

704
00:35:49,960 --> 00:35:52,080
Speaker 1: where it might last a hundred million years or more.

705
00:35:52,280 --> 00:35:55,279
Speaker 1: And I actually got to speak to him, and I

706
00:35:55,320 --> 00:35:57,360
Speaker 1: was saying, well, what do you think this means? And

707
00:35:57,400 --> 00:36:00,839
Speaker 1: he was saying, Look, there's all these forces on Earth

708
00:36:00,880 --> 00:36:03,520
Speaker 1: that we can't control, that are beyond us, that no

709
00:36:03,560 --> 00:36:07,240
Speaker 1: one human can can influence. But that doesn't mean you

710
00:36:07,400 --> 00:36:11,319
Speaker 1: don't have to try or don't have to participate. And

711
00:36:11,480 --> 00:36:14,080
Speaker 1: he recognized that if these were ever found, which is

712
00:36:14,800 --> 00:36:18,719
Speaker 1: not super likely, it's even less likely that they'd be understood.

713
00:36:19,680 --> 00:36:23,880
Speaker 1: But just because it wasn't likely didn't mean he couldn't

714
00:36:23,880 --> 00:36:26,759
Speaker 1: stop himself from trying. And he wanted to put art

715
00:36:26,840 --> 00:36:28,759
Speaker 1: into orbit where it might be seen a hundred million

716
00:36:28,800 --> 00:36:31,520
Speaker 1: years from now. And I think that is part of

717
00:36:31,520 --> 00:36:33,319
Speaker 1: the beauty of it too. Like as much as as

718
00:36:33,440 --> 00:36:36,920
Speaker 1: his project or the Voice your Record is us trying

719
00:36:36,960 --> 00:36:39,560
Speaker 1: to speak to the future, trying to speak to distant

720
00:36:40,160 --> 00:36:43,440
Speaker 1: aliens or anything, it's also us speaking to ourselves, right.

721
00:36:43,480 --> 00:36:46,640
Speaker 1: It's humans speaking to humanity and saying, some of what

722
00:36:46,719 --> 00:36:51,840
Speaker 1: we've done here might survive, some of it might outlast

723
00:36:51,880 --> 00:36:55,280
Speaker 1: all of us. And I think that is really comforting

724
00:36:55,320 --> 00:36:57,879
Speaker 1: in a way. It's inspiring comforting. It makes me feel like,

725
00:36:58,400 --> 00:37:03,000
Speaker 1: no matter what, they're still this voyager record, there's still

726
00:37:03,040 --> 00:37:05,719
Speaker 1: these portraits of humanity on the Echo starsis team satellite

727
00:37:05,760 --> 00:37:09,040
Speaker 1: that will be there, probably long after all of us

728
00:37:09,040 --> 00:37:12,040
Speaker 1: are gone and at least have something to say about

729
00:37:12,080 --> 00:37:13,640
Speaker 1: who we were and what we were doing. Yeah, and

730
00:37:13,719 --> 00:37:15,439
Speaker 1: I think one of my favorite parts of your book

731
00:37:15,760 --> 00:37:18,600
Speaker 1: are these questions that really do touch everybody. I mean,

732
00:37:18,640 --> 00:37:21,640
Speaker 1: not everybody necessarily wants to be a geo engineer, but

733
00:37:21,960 --> 00:37:25,719
Speaker 1: everybody thinks about death and mortality and whether they'll be remembered.

734
00:37:25,880 --> 00:37:27,640
Speaker 1: And so one of the things you talk about in

735
00:37:27,640 --> 00:37:29,640
Speaker 1: the book is how to be remembered, how to leave

736
00:37:29,719 --> 00:37:32,240
Speaker 1: a you know, a statue of yourself or a message

737
00:37:32,239 --> 00:37:34,720
Speaker 1: that might be remembered. But you actually talk about also

738
00:37:35,000 --> 00:37:38,880
Speaker 1: literally curing aging. There's this quote where you when you

739
00:37:38,880 --> 00:37:41,160
Speaker 1: talk about a scientist who says that they can cure

740
00:37:41,239 --> 00:37:44,520
Speaker 1: aging in lab mice in ten years and in humans

741
00:37:44,600 --> 00:37:46,560
Speaker 1: within just a decade or so, more tell us a

742
00:37:46,560 --> 00:37:49,040
Speaker 1: little bit about the trajectory. There are we on the

743
00:37:49,160 --> 00:37:51,960
Speaker 1: verge of curing aging? Haven't they been saying that for

744
00:37:52,000 --> 00:37:55,319
Speaker 1: the last thirty years? There are absolutely people who will

745
00:37:55,320 --> 00:37:58,480
Speaker 1: tell you that the first immortal human it's already born,

746
00:37:58,560 --> 00:38:00,960
Speaker 1: already walking alive, and just doesn't walk around doesn't know

747
00:38:01,000 --> 00:38:03,600
Speaker 1: it yet. I in the book and in real life

748
00:38:03,680 --> 00:38:07,320
Speaker 1: take a more skeptical approach to that. Usually. I feel

749
00:38:07,320 --> 00:38:10,360
Speaker 1: like these these shots of immortality, things like cryonics or

750
00:38:10,440 --> 00:38:13,040
Speaker 1: uploading your brain to a computer, as soon as you

751
00:38:13,080 --> 00:38:15,200
Speaker 1: look at them in any sort of detail, they kind

752
00:38:15,200 --> 00:38:18,720
Speaker 1: of really fall apart. Chronics, especially where it's this idea

753
00:38:18,800 --> 00:38:21,840
Speaker 1: that if you freeze yourself and keep your body frozen,

754
00:38:22,000 --> 00:38:25,279
Speaker 1: you'll be thought out and rejuvenated in the future. And

755
00:38:25,320 --> 00:38:28,480
Speaker 1: it sounds great until you realize that, Okay, well you

756
00:38:28,520 --> 00:38:32,359
Speaker 1: have to not only cure whatever disease you were dying from,

757
00:38:32,400 --> 00:38:34,360
Speaker 1: but also cure it if it's advanced so much that

758
00:38:34,400 --> 00:38:38,040
Speaker 1: it's literally already killed you, And you have to keep

759
00:38:38,080 --> 00:38:40,799
Speaker 1: this body frozen for so long, And it feels like like,

760
00:38:40,960 --> 00:38:43,399
Speaker 1: is there anything we can point to that says this

761
00:38:43,480 --> 00:38:46,680
Speaker 1: is possible? And the closest example I could find was

762
00:38:46,719 --> 00:38:50,239
Speaker 1: this practice of chantry in medieval times, where when you died,

763
00:38:50,280 --> 00:38:51,840
Speaker 1: if you're rich, you'd pay people to sing for your

764
00:38:51,880 --> 00:38:55,600
Speaker 1: immortal soul to get you into heaven and This evolved

765
00:38:55,600 --> 00:38:58,359
Speaker 1: into this thing called perpetual chantry, where you'd give the

766
00:38:58,440 --> 00:39:01,200
Speaker 1: church land and they would charge rent, and that rent

767
00:39:01,239 --> 00:39:02,759
Speaker 1: on the land would pay for someone to sing for

768
00:39:02,800 --> 00:39:06,600
Speaker 1: your immortal soul forever, so you'd be definitely getting into heaven.

769
00:39:07,200 --> 00:39:10,200
Speaker 1: And this is are the same scheme of cryonics, where

770
00:39:10,239 --> 00:39:14,080
Speaker 1: you make the living do something to keep the dead around,

771
00:39:14,920 --> 00:39:18,239
Speaker 1: and it has advantage over cryonics that all you had

772
00:39:18,280 --> 00:39:21,080
Speaker 1: to do was sing and pray. And it's still lasted

773
00:39:21,160 --> 00:39:23,759
Speaker 1: less than four years until a king was like, you

774
00:39:23,800 --> 00:39:26,399
Speaker 1: know what, I'm taking this land. It's mine now this

775
00:39:26,480 --> 00:39:29,320
Speaker 1: is over. So I don't I don't see it very likely,

776
00:39:29,360 --> 00:39:31,479
Speaker 1: but that the quote you were mentioning was from Dr

777
00:39:31,480 --> 00:39:34,920
Speaker 1: Aubrey de Gray, who believes that there are treatments just

778
00:39:34,960 --> 00:39:39,480
Speaker 1: around the corner that could make effectively immortal humans. And

779
00:39:39,520 --> 00:39:41,480
Speaker 1: when I say that, I mean not they won't die,

780
00:39:41,600 --> 00:39:44,200
Speaker 1: but just they won't die from what we normally call

781
00:39:44,480 --> 00:39:47,319
Speaker 1: old age. They accidents might do them in and a

782
00:39:47,360 --> 00:39:51,640
Speaker 1: long enough timeline that is probably true. We're driving around cars,

783
00:39:51,640 --> 00:39:55,399
Speaker 1: I gotta hit someone. But he believes that it might

784
00:39:55,440 --> 00:40:00,080
Speaker 1: be possible to cure aging. Not by figuring out what

785
00:40:00,239 --> 00:40:02,360
Speaker 1: aging is. You don't really know what it is, but

786
00:40:02,440 --> 00:40:04,440
Speaker 1: just by figure out how to address the symptoms of it.

787
00:40:04,640 --> 00:40:08,520
Speaker 1: So if there's a problem with tissues becoming inflexible, well

788
00:40:08,560 --> 00:40:10,520
Speaker 1: let's find a way to make them flexible. If there's

789
00:40:10,520 --> 00:40:14,240
Speaker 1: a problem with cancer killing people, well then let's solve

790
00:40:14,320 --> 00:40:18,040
Speaker 1: this problem with cancer. And the way he suggests is basically,

791
00:40:18,200 --> 00:40:23,200
Speaker 1: cancer happens when cells divide without limit. They just keep dividing,

792
00:40:23,680 --> 00:40:27,239
Speaker 1: and they can do that because stem cells have this

793
00:40:28,360 --> 00:40:31,560
Speaker 1: thing called telomerase, which allows telomeres in the cell to

794
00:40:31,640 --> 00:40:36,839
Speaker 1: reproduce infinitely. So telomeres are repetitive parts at the end

795
00:40:36,840 --> 00:40:39,600
Speaker 1: of chromosomes, end of DNA that's shortened every time a

796
00:40:39,640 --> 00:40:42,600
Speaker 1: cell divides, and so there's a limit on how many

797
00:40:43,080 --> 00:40:45,520
Speaker 1: times a cell can divide. But if you have, like

798
00:40:45,560 --> 00:40:48,880
Speaker 1: stem cells, do telomerase, then you can do this indefinitely.

799
00:40:48,920 --> 00:40:53,440
Speaker 1: So he proposes, let's remove the ability to produce telomerase

800
00:40:53,560 --> 00:40:57,120
Speaker 1: from every cell in the body, which effectively, let's sterilize

801
00:40:57,160 --> 00:40:59,680
Speaker 1: every cell so it can no longer reproduce or only

802
00:40:59,680 --> 00:41:02,200
Speaker 1: produce a finite number of times, and then it we'll

803
00:41:02,200 --> 00:41:05,520
Speaker 1: have to die. And then to prevent this from being fatal,

804
00:41:05,560 --> 00:41:09,600
Speaker 1: he suggests we can genetically engineer special stem cells with

805
00:41:09,719 --> 00:41:13,080
Speaker 1: really long telomeres so they can't produce telomeras, but they

806
00:41:13,080 --> 00:41:16,200
Speaker 1: can divide enough to last, say ten years, and then

807
00:41:16,200 --> 00:41:19,879
Speaker 1: every ten years you get a new injection. And this

808
00:41:20,000 --> 00:41:23,760
Speaker 1: is wild, right, Like this is effectively saying, I will

809
00:41:24,480 --> 00:41:27,600
Speaker 1: kill my body's ability to reproduce at the cellular level,

810
00:41:28,080 --> 00:41:31,719
Speaker 1: but get topped up with cellular gasoline every couple of

811
00:41:31,840 --> 00:41:36,000
Speaker 1: years to keep myself alive. And you know, in theory,

812
00:41:36,320 --> 00:41:39,640
Speaker 1: maybe it could work. In practice. There's an awful lot

813
00:41:39,680 --> 00:41:42,200
Speaker 1: of very complicated things that we've just glossed over there

814
00:41:43,160 --> 00:41:44,799
Speaker 1: in an effort to, at the end of the day,

815
00:41:44,880 --> 00:41:49,360
Speaker 1: just make an individual live forever. And I find it

816
00:41:49,560 --> 00:41:54,680
Speaker 1: not a very convincing argument that an individual should live forever.

817
00:41:55,200 --> 00:41:57,399
Speaker 1: I think there's lots of individuals you look at your

818
00:41:57,440 --> 00:42:01,839
Speaker 1: Genghis Khan's, your Hitler's, where it's a bad thing if

819
00:42:01,840 --> 00:42:03,440
Speaker 1: they would live forever. And the fact that we all

820
00:42:03,520 --> 00:42:06,279
Speaker 1: do die has some really positive things for society. And

821
00:42:06,680 --> 00:42:09,200
Speaker 1: it's what encourages billionaires to be philanthropic, to to give

822
00:42:09,239 --> 00:42:10,799
Speaker 1: money away through the end of their lives and try

823
00:42:10,840 --> 00:42:14,680
Speaker 1: to get some sort of better angle for posterity. Because

824
00:42:14,680 --> 00:42:17,239
Speaker 1: I can't take it with them, but you can't take

825
00:42:17,239 --> 00:42:18,839
Speaker 1: it with you. Doesn't mean a lot if you never

826
00:42:18,880 --> 00:42:21,399
Speaker 1: have to go. Right. So I've been writing this book,

827
00:42:21,400 --> 00:42:24,920
Speaker 1: I've kind of come down surprisingly in favor of death,

828
00:42:25,360 --> 00:42:27,960
Speaker 1: and now a person who thinks death is good for

829
00:42:28,120 --> 00:42:30,640
Speaker 1: society and civilization as a whole. You're starting to sound

830
00:42:30,640 --> 00:42:32,319
Speaker 1: like a super villain, right, this is the beginning, Like

831
00:42:32,320 --> 00:42:34,560
Speaker 1: this is this whole thing has been a villainous monologue

832
00:42:34,600 --> 00:42:37,200
Speaker 1: where I started saying death is good and we should

833
00:42:37,200 --> 00:42:40,480
Speaker 1: embrace it. You sound like the speech by Thanos in

834
00:42:40,520 --> 00:42:42,719
Speaker 1: the Avengers movie. He's going to be a guest next

835
00:42:42,719 --> 00:42:45,960
Speaker 1: week on the podcast. So that was a very long

836
00:42:45,960 --> 00:42:48,000
Speaker 1: answer to a very simple question. But I think it's

837
00:42:48,040 --> 00:42:50,759
Speaker 1: so it's such a fascinating topic and it gets into

838
00:42:50,800 --> 00:42:56,239
Speaker 1: these deeper questions of like what life is and can

839
00:42:56,400 --> 00:42:58,799
Speaker 1: death have an upside? Right? Like I don't want to die.

840
00:42:58,840 --> 00:43:00,680
Speaker 1: I don't want anyone I love to die. But at

841
00:43:00,680 --> 00:43:03,879
Speaker 1: a larger level, I get it right, like I see

842
00:43:03,880 --> 00:43:06,680
Speaker 1: the benefits death gives to society and to our species

843
00:43:06,719 --> 00:43:08,920
Speaker 1: as a whole will be fascinating. Also, if if you

844
00:43:08,920 --> 00:43:11,200
Speaker 1: then you had an option, if some people could say,

845
00:43:11,200 --> 00:43:12,640
Speaker 1: you know what, I just want to live eighty years

846
00:43:12,760 --> 00:43:14,479
Speaker 1: or a a hundred years and I'm done, and other people

847
00:43:14,480 --> 00:43:16,359
Speaker 1: are like, no, I'm gonna do three hundred, 'm gonna

848
00:43:16,400 --> 00:43:19,040
Speaker 1: do ten thousand, or I'm just gonna go forever. It

849
00:43:19,239 --> 00:43:22,120
Speaker 1: really make for a really fascinating sort of segregated or

850
00:43:22,160 --> 00:43:24,920
Speaker 1: stratified society if that happened. But my real question is,

851
00:43:25,080 --> 00:43:28,080
Speaker 1: in this scenario, is this one doctor the soul source

852
00:43:28,320 --> 00:43:31,000
Speaker 1: for this sort of cellular gasoline and then eventually becomes

853
00:43:31,040 --> 00:43:37,919
Speaker 1: a gazillionaire because everybody's reliant on his one pipeline of regeneration. Yeah,

854
00:43:37,960 --> 00:43:40,640
Speaker 1: And my my pitch for this is you do it yourself,

855
00:43:41,239 --> 00:43:44,000
Speaker 1: and you split it up amongst different scientists of workers

856
00:43:44,000 --> 00:43:46,240
Speaker 1: so that no one can quite put together all the pieces,

857
00:43:46,880 --> 00:43:49,000
Speaker 1: and then you're the only one who does it, so

858
00:43:50,480 --> 00:43:52,399
Speaker 1: you can become rich if you want. But I would

859
00:43:52,480 --> 00:43:55,080
Speaker 1: encourage you more just to use this time you have

860
00:43:55,239 --> 00:43:58,759
Speaker 1: this now effectively unlimited time to do whatever you want

861
00:43:58,800 --> 00:44:01,120
Speaker 1: to do, things that you can accomp should one human lifetime.

862
00:44:01,160 --> 00:44:04,840
Speaker 1: Like I know, like I love linguistics, but I can't

863
00:44:04,840 --> 00:44:06,719
Speaker 1: bet on more than a hundred years if that on

864
00:44:06,760 --> 00:44:09,120
Speaker 1: this world, And there's more linguistics than I could ever

865
00:44:09,320 --> 00:44:12,480
Speaker 1: hope to learn in three hundred years, like you could

866
00:44:12,560 --> 00:44:16,640
Speaker 1: learn something beyond what any human can learn today. And

867
00:44:16,719 --> 00:44:19,600
Speaker 1: I think that's the appealing part of of striving towards

868
00:44:19,600 --> 00:44:23,000
Speaker 1: immortality for me, is to exceed these limits on what

869
00:44:23,080 --> 00:44:25,759
Speaker 1: we can do as one person. But then I see

870
00:44:25,760 --> 00:44:30,319
Speaker 1: the downsides of this ludicrous you know, inequality. Well, that's

871
00:44:30,360 --> 00:44:32,800
Speaker 1: kind of an interesting angle of this idea, like maybe

872
00:44:32,880 --> 00:44:34,920
Speaker 1: what if we've run out of space in your brain?

873
00:44:35,040 --> 00:44:37,600
Speaker 1: Like how many memories can your brain hold? Yeah, I

874
00:44:37,600 --> 00:44:39,759
Speaker 1: think that's the common thing we forget when we we

875
00:44:39,920 --> 00:44:43,040
Speaker 1: fantasize what immortality is, that the brain is not infinite.

876
00:44:43,200 --> 00:44:47,239
Speaker 1: And I'm sure if I lived five hundred years, I

877
00:44:47,239 --> 00:44:50,439
Speaker 1: would remember the last twenty pretty good. I wouldn't better

878
00:44:50,440 --> 00:44:53,280
Speaker 1: remember in the first thirty with any number of detail.

879
00:44:53,480 --> 00:44:54,920
Speaker 1: This is gonna have a sidebar to that. But I

880
00:44:54,960 --> 00:44:57,600
Speaker 1: was really fascinated by the idea of childhood amnesia, where

881
00:44:57,640 --> 00:44:59,759
Speaker 1: we don't remember our first couple of years of life.

882
00:45:00,640 --> 00:45:02,640
Speaker 1: And I was wondering if this was something that was

883
00:45:02,719 --> 00:45:05,200
Speaker 1: unique to humans or other animals. And I talked to

884
00:45:05,440 --> 00:45:09,040
Speaker 1: a neuroscientist friend of mine, and I was like, here's

885
00:45:09,080 --> 00:45:11,560
Speaker 1: my theory. Tell me where I'm wrong. Humans are born

886
00:45:11,600 --> 00:45:14,000
Speaker 1: effectively premature, where we need a lot of care for

887
00:45:14,320 --> 00:45:16,920
Speaker 1: several years of our lives. But horses are born and

888
00:45:16,960 --> 00:45:19,600
Speaker 1: they're running around within the hour like they're they're born

889
00:45:19,640 --> 00:45:23,200
Speaker 1: and they're ready to go. So can a horse remember

890
00:45:23,239 --> 00:45:27,400
Speaker 1: being born? An adult horse remember being born? And he,

891
00:45:27,680 --> 00:45:30,359
Speaker 1: to his credit, took my question seriously and was like, well,

892
00:45:30,880 --> 00:45:34,359
Speaker 1: what seems to happen, putting future science terms for you,

893
00:45:34,640 --> 00:45:37,000
Speaker 1: is that when we're young, we address our memories in

894
00:45:37,000 --> 00:45:38,759
Speaker 1: a certain way, and as we get older, we change

895
00:45:38,800 --> 00:45:41,680
Speaker 1: the addressing scheme, so we lose access to those memories.

896
00:45:41,680 --> 00:45:45,320
Speaker 1: So I don't think an adult horse remembers being born,

897
00:45:45,200 --> 00:45:47,600
Speaker 1: And thank you for the question, And also, would you

898
00:45:47,600 --> 00:45:49,920
Speaker 1: want to remember being born? It doesn't sound like a

899
00:45:49,960 --> 00:45:52,600
Speaker 1: very pleasant experience. That sounds painful, But I think I

900
00:45:52,640 --> 00:45:55,360
Speaker 1: think all this to say is that our brains are finite,

901
00:45:55,480 --> 00:45:58,359
Speaker 1: and when we fantasize about living forever, we forget that

902
00:45:58,840 --> 00:46:02,040
Speaker 1: we can't remember everything. And if you live for every

903
00:46:02,040 --> 00:46:05,160
Speaker 1: you might just remember effectively one human lifetime on a

904
00:46:05,200 --> 00:46:07,560
Speaker 1: sliding scale through time. But you're talk in your book

905
00:46:07,560 --> 00:46:10,799
Speaker 1: also about the possibility of uploading your mind into the simulation,

906
00:46:11,120 --> 00:46:12,680
Speaker 1: and it makes me wonder if there's sort of a

907
00:46:12,760 --> 00:46:15,759
Speaker 1: hybrid there. You know, I already have some extension of

908
00:46:15,800 --> 00:46:18,040
Speaker 1: my brain on this device I carry around because I

909
00:46:18,040 --> 00:46:21,400
Speaker 1: don't remember any telephone numbers or email addresses or stuff

910
00:46:21,440 --> 00:46:24,800
Speaker 1: like that. Isn't there possibility where we store these memories

911
00:46:24,840 --> 00:46:26,719
Speaker 1: somewhere on the cloud, and then when you want to

912
00:46:26,719 --> 00:46:29,319
Speaker 1: remember your thirteenth birthday, you just have to, like, you know,

913
00:46:29,400 --> 00:46:31,480
Speaker 1: go and fetch it and download it back into your brain,

914
00:46:31,520 --> 00:46:33,359
Speaker 1: and then you can relieve the trauma. I mean, you're

915
00:46:33,360 --> 00:46:40,480
Speaker 1: describing a video clip, I think exactly. So we are

916
00:46:40,520 --> 00:46:45,640
Speaker 1: living in the future right now. You're you just invent YouTube.

917
00:46:47,040 --> 00:46:49,479
Speaker 1: That's right, I want my cut, guys, where's my cut

918
00:46:49,480 --> 00:46:52,520
Speaker 1: of YouTube? I just invented it. We can externalize things

919
00:46:52,560 --> 00:46:56,520
Speaker 1: that happened with some sort of motion picture. Deep thoughts

920
00:46:56,520 --> 00:46:59,040
Speaker 1: by Daniel Wetson. All right, I got lots more questions

921
00:46:59,040 --> 00:47:14,480
Speaker 1: for Ryan, but first let's take another break. Okay, we're

922
00:47:14,520 --> 00:47:16,680
Speaker 1: back and we're talking to the author of the book

923
00:47:16,880 --> 00:47:19,359
Speaker 1: How to take Over the World, Ryan North, who has

924
00:47:19,440 --> 00:47:22,560
Speaker 1: not yet successfully taken over the world, but instead decided

925
00:47:22,600 --> 00:47:24,680
Speaker 1: to write a book about it. How do you know

926
00:47:25,600 --> 00:47:28,560
Speaker 1: he's not the one pulling all the strings behind the currents.

927
00:47:28,680 --> 00:47:30,640
Speaker 1: Let's just say you'll all be surprised in a couple

928
00:47:30,640 --> 00:47:33,240
Speaker 1: of months. I guess you would be a lot busier

929
00:47:33,280 --> 00:47:35,040
Speaker 1: and have more important things to do than to be

930
00:47:35,120 --> 00:47:38,080
Speaker 1: on our podcast. Well, that's my question instead of joking

931
00:47:38,160 --> 00:47:41,280
Speaker 1: the aside. Having thought about all of these schemes about

932
00:47:41,280 --> 00:47:43,360
Speaker 1: how to potentially take over the world, what do you

933
00:47:43,360 --> 00:47:45,839
Speaker 1: think the prospects are that somebody in the future might

934
00:47:45,920 --> 00:47:48,440
Speaker 1: actually do it? You know, it's been the goal of

935
00:47:48,600 --> 00:47:53,239
Speaker 1: real life villains Alexander the Great and Napoleon Hitler for

936
00:47:53,280 --> 00:47:55,680
Speaker 1: a long time, but nobody's really pulled it off, actually

937
00:47:55,719 --> 00:47:57,879
Speaker 1: taken over the entire world. Do you think it's something

938
00:47:57,920 --> 00:48:00,000
Speaker 1: that somebody in the future might be able to accomplish.

939
00:48:00,160 --> 00:48:04,000
Speaker 1: I don't. The reason for that is that, in one sense,

940
00:48:04,040 --> 00:48:07,160
Speaker 1: it's it's kind of self defeating because once you've taken

941
00:48:07,200 --> 00:48:08,840
Speaker 1: over the world, the only thing left to do is

942
00:48:08,880 --> 00:48:11,960
Speaker 1: to lose the world, right, like, there's no political human

943
00:48:11,960 --> 00:48:16,880
Speaker 1: political system that lasts indefinitely. And the other reason is

944
00:48:16,920 --> 00:48:20,120
Speaker 1: that it's a it's an appealing goal to a certain

945
00:48:20,120 --> 00:48:24,040
Speaker 1: type of person, like what if I controlled everything? But

946
00:48:24,080 --> 00:48:28,680
Speaker 1: the reality is that the benefits are very limited. Right,

947
00:48:28,760 --> 00:48:31,239
Speaker 1: Like you get to Boston people around, I guess, but

948
00:48:31,280 --> 00:48:33,720
Speaker 1: there's no way you can effectively boss around every person

949
00:48:33,800 --> 00:48:37,319
Speaker 1: on earth. There's always resistance, there's always people who want

950
00:48:37,360 --> 00:48:39,680
Speaker 1: to do something else and what you want them to do.

951
00:48:40,320 --> 00:48:43,480
Speaker 1: So if anyone came up to me and sincerely said, Ryan,

952
00:48:43,600 --> 00:48:45,920
Speaker 1: I want to take over the world, I think my

953
00:48:46,000 --> 00:48:49,719
Speaker 1: first instinct would be to not take them seriously, to laugh,

954
00:48:49,760 --> 00:48:51,319
Speaker 1: because I don't think they would have thought about it

955
00:48:51,440 --> 00:48:53,560
Speaker 1: in enough depth to be a credible threat. You're saying

956
00:48:53,560 --> 00:48:55,680
Speaker 1: it's not a job anyone would want. Yeah, I don't

957
00:48:55,719 --> 00:48:57,120
Speaker 1: think it's a job you want. I think if you

958
00:48:57,160 --> 00:48:58,560
Speaker 1: think about it for a minute, to be like, you

959
00:48:58,560 --> 00:49:01,160
Speaker 1: know what, that sounds like a lot of work for

960
00:49:01,239 --> 00:49:04,800
Speaker 1: very little benefit, a lot of destruction for very little benefit.

961
00:49:05,480 --> 00:49:08,279
Speaker 1: Maybe I won't. That's how I feel about becoming department chair, Like,

962
00:49:08,320 --> 00:49:12,279
Speaker 1: why does anybody want that job? Much much smaller scale? Yeah,

963
00:49:12,360 --> 00:49:14,839
Speaker 1: it looks good on a resume, but surely you want

964
00:49:14,840 --> 00:49:17,120
Speaker 1: to do something else with your time. Well, Brian, what

965
00:49:17,160 --> 00:49:19,160
Speaker 1: were some of the ideas that did not make it

966
00:49:19,160 --> 00:49:21,480
Speaker 1: into the book about How to take Over the World?

967
00:49:21,600 --> 00:49:25,560
Speaker 1: There was one that I really liked. Um So the

968
00:49:25,600 --> 00:49:29,240
Speaker 1: idea was let's have a chapter on throwing your enemies

969
00:49:29,280 --> 00:49:32,640
Speaker 1: into the Sun, and it's a great idea. The issue

970
00:49:32,680 --> 00:49:36,799
Speaker 1: is that it's not actually that hard surprisingly, so that

971
00:49:36,840 --> 00:49:38,759
Speaker 1: the trick with it is that you want to throw

972
00:49:38,800 --> 00:49:40,720
Speaker 1: your enemy to the Sun, you need a rocket, obviously,

973
00:49:41,280 --> 00:49:43,239
Speaker 1: but if you just launch them away from Earth. The

974
00:49:43,480 --> 00:49:45,440
Speaker 1: challenges that the Earth is rotating around the Sun very

975
00:49:45,480 --> 00:49:47,400
Speaker 1: quickly and you've got all that momentum, and so if

976
00:49:47,440 --> 00:49:49,680
Speaker 1: you launch someone off the Earth, they're going to also

977
00:49:49,719 --> 00:49:51,720
Speaker 1: go into orbit around the Sun. You want to actually

978
00:49:51,719 --> 00:49:54,239
Speaker 1: be thrown into the Sun. You need to slow them

979
00:49:54,239 --> 00:49:56,879
Speaker 1: down an awful lot to get close to the Sun

980
00:49:56,880 --> 00:49:58,960
Speaker 1: and not just orbit around it. And so you can

981
00:49:59,000 --> 00:50:03,279
Speaker 1: look at NASA's solar probe, the Parker Solar Probe that

982
00:50:03,520 --> 00:50:05,359
Speaker 1: was in the news recently for doing that. It did

983
00:50:05,480 --> 00:50:07,800
Speaker 1: orbital fly bys to slow it down off of Venus

984
00:50:08,320 --> 00:50:10,480
Speaker 1: and eventually it's close enough now that they can enter

985
00:50:10,600 --> 00:50:12,879
Speaker 1: the outer outer layer of the Sun. So you could

986
00:50:12,960 --> 00:50:16,000
Speaker 1: use that sort of process, do some orbital fly bys

987
00:50:16,000 --> 00:50:18,520
Speaker 1: to slow down this I guess corpse of your enemy.

988
00:50:18,960 --> 00:50:22,480
Speaker 1: You've thrown into space enough to actually impact and be

989
00:50:22,560 --> 00:50:24,759
Speaker 1: burned up in the Sun. But the challenge there as

990
00:50:24,800 --> 00:50:27,480
Speaker 1: an author is that this is not super complicated. Surprisingly,

991
00:50:27,520 --> 00:50:29,880
Speaker 1: this is just the costs are well known, the orbital

992
00:50:29,880 --> 00:50:32,400
Speaker 1: mechanics are well known. It's just a better of something

993
00:50:32,440 --> 00:50:35,399
Speaker 1: someone willing to spend the millions of dollars it takes

994
00:50:35,440 --> 00:50:38,439
Speaker 1: to do this just to fire someone who's already dead,

995
00:50:38,560 --> 00:50:41,440
Speaker 1: because it's not a survivable trip into the sun. So

996
00:50:41,480 --> 00:50:44,280
Speaker 1: it sort of reaches this level of impractical but still

997
00:50:44,360 --> 00:50:47,160
Speaker 1: really really appealing. So it's not in the book, But

998
00:50:47,239 --> 00:50:51,480
Speaker 1: if anyone wants to spend a couple million on launching

999
00:50:51,480 --> 00:50:54,040
Speaker 1: their enemies corpses in the sun, give me a call.

1000
00:50:54,120 --> 00:51:00,799
Speaker 1: I can send you over the spreadsheets. It's in the appendix. Well,

1001
00:51:00,880 --> 00:51:02,520
Speaker 1: it sounds like something you might want to do just

1002
00:51:02,560 --> 00:51:04,359
Speaker 1: to send a message, you know, like if you are

1003
00:51:04,480 --> 00:51:06,800
Speaker 1: ruling the world, you want people to take you seriously

1004
00:51:06,880 --> 00:51:09,120
Speaker 1: and not you know, rebel against. Yeah, but the other

1005
00:51:09,160 --> 00:51:11,239
Speaker 1: downside it takes a long time because you're having to

1006
00:51:11,280 --> 00:51:13,239
Speaker 1: fly out. The initial plan for Parker was to fly

1007
00:51:13,239 --> 00:51:15,719
Speaker 1: out to Saturn, and that modified one was to use

1008
00:51:15,719 --> 00:51:18,000
Speaker 1: a couple of flybys of Venus. But this still takes

1009
00:51:18,080 --> 00:51:20,600
Speaker 1: years and years and years, and it's not super scary

1010
00:51:20,680 --> 00:51:22,560
Speaker 1: to send a message to be like, if you cross me,

1011
00:51:23,400 --> 00:51:27,359
Speaker 1: well you just wait five years, because when five years

1012
00:51:27,360 --> 00:51:31,520
Speaker 1: were over, your dead body will be cremated in the sun.

1013
00:51:32,239 --> 00:51:34,200
Speaker 1: Maybe depends on what do you do to them on

1014
00:51:34,280 --> 00:51:37,160
Speaker 1: the on the way, They're like, maybe, I don't know.

1015
00:51:37,480 --> 00:51:39,600
Speaker 1: You put on some bad television on the on the

1016
00:51:39,719 --> 00:51:41,480
Speaker 1: rocket ship to the side. So you're assuming we're keeping

1017
00:51:41,520 --> 00:51:43,239
Speaker 1: them alive, and it's much more expensive to keep them

1018
00:51:43,239 --> 00:51:45,680
Speaker 1: alive for that journey. I was assuming we just you know,

1019
00:51:45,880 --> 00:51:47,520
Speaker 1: kill them on Earth, or to stick them in the

1020
00:51:47,560 --> 00:51:50,000
Speaker 1: in the shuttle in alive and then launch them into

1021
00:51:50,000 --> 00:51:51,759
Speaker 1: space and they'll die when they get into the cold

1022
00:51:51,800 --> 00:51:55,480
Speaker 1: vacuum space. But keeping them alive for five years, yeah,

1023
00:51:55,520 --> 00:51:57,640
Speaker 1: then it's worse. But then I feel like you're in

1024
00:51:57,760 --> 00:52:02,960
Speaker 1: like Geneva Convention torture violation territory. I like that you

1025
00:52:02,960 --> 00:52:05,520
Speaker 1: think so carefully about the budget for each of these schemes.

1026
00:52:05,560 --> 00:52:07,360
Speaker 1: You know, that's important because it's like a it's like

1027
00:52:07,360 --> 00:52:09,520
Speaker 1: a shopping list, you know, think about how much money

1028
00:52:09,560 --> 00:52:11,400
Speaker 1: you have before you want to take over the world.

1029
00:52:11,800 --> 00:52:13,920
Speaker 1: I feel like the fun of it, the fun of

1030
00:52:13,960 --> 00:52:16,440
Speaker 1: going through these thought experiments is the logistics, right, like

1031
00:52:16,520 --> 00:52:19,640
Speaker 1: with how to invent everything? The premise was you've got

1032
00:52:19,640 --> 00:52:21,960
Speaker 1: a time machine that's broken, which is clearly fictional, but

1033
00:52:22,080 --> 00:52:24,719
Speaker 1: let's use that to explore the science. But I also

1034
00:52:24,719 --> 00:52:27,120
Speaker 1: wanted to be like legitimately what it says in the cover.

1035
00:52:27,160 --> 00:52:29,160
Speaker 1: I wanted to be a real book that could actually

1036
00:52:29,200 --> 00:52:31,200
Speaker 1: work if you were trapped in the past. And so

1037
00:52:31,239 --> 00:52:33,040
Speaker 1: with this book, I wanted to be like, let's have

1038
00:52:33,120 --> 00:52:37,040
Speaker 1: legitimate schemes here. Yes, they're going to cost billions and

1039
00:52:37,080 --> 00:52:40,319
Speaker 1: billions of dollars, but well, most people use them to

1040
00:52:40,400 --> 00:52:42,759
Speaker 1: learn about science and technology and history and the world

1041
00:52:42,800 --> 00:52:46,440
Speaker 1: around us. Let's make it so that these are viable,

1042
00:52:46,640 --> 00:52:49,400
Speaker 1: credible schemes, Like, let's let's have the fun of actually

1043
00:52:49,440 --> 00:52:51,960
Speaker 1: pricing things out and thinking about logistics and if we

1044
00:52:52,000 --> 00:52:53,680
Speaker 1: do want to do this, what does it cost, what

1045
00:52:53,719 --> 00:52:55,799
Speaker 1: do we need? How is this gonna blow up at

1046
00:52:55,800 --> 00:52:58,239
Speaker 1: our faces? That sort of thing. So it's I think

1047
00:52:58,239 --> 00:53:00,560
Speaker 1: it's fun. Maybe you should write a book had to

1048
00:53:00,600 --> 00:53:04,600
Speaker 1: be a Supervillains Accountant. It's a less catchy title. Maybe

1049
00:53:04,600 --> 00:53:06,880
Speaker 1: we can use it for the paperback. That's like selling

1050
00:53:06,920 --> 00:53:09,359
Speaker 1: pick access to the gold miners. Well, in terms of

1051
00:53:09,360 --> 00:53:12,319
Speaker 1: credible schemes, I was expecting to see something about like

1052
00:53:12,480 --> 00:53:15,600
Speaker 1: leading an AI revolution because I feel like AI is

1053
00:53:15,600 --> 00:53:18,200
Speaker 1: gonna take over the world anyway. Is there some way

1054
00:53:18,280 --> 00:53:20,960
Speaker 1: you can think of to like lead that charge, you know,

1055
00:53:21,280 --> 00:53:24,319
Speaker 1: be the first conspirator, the first collaborator to join the

1056
00:53:24,360 --> 00:53:26,799
Speaker 1: other side and uh and use the power of AI

1057
00:53:26,880 --> 00:53:29,000
Speaker 1: to take over the world. Why did you reject that

1058
00:53:29,120 --> 00:53:31,840
Speaker 1: kind of idea? I felt like it's it's hard to

1059
00:53:31,880 --> 00:53:35,280
Speaker 1: get into specifics with something like AI because the ais

1060
00:53:35,320 --> 00:53:39,160
Speaker 1: we have now are nowhere close to that um at all.

1061
00:53:39,600 --> 00:53:41,560
Speaker 1: And I sort of touched on that in the mind

1062
00:53:41,640 --> 00:53:45,359
Speaker 1: uploading section where the the issue encounter if you're gonna

1063
00:53:45,400 --> 00:53:48,880
Speaker 1: upload your mind to a computer is well, it basically

1064
00:53:48,880 --> 00:53:51,480
Speaker 1: boils down to who cares, right, Like, if I've uploaded

1065
00:53:51,480 --> 00:53:53,759
Speaker 1: my brain to a computer, I can't prove that it's

1066
00:53:53,800 --> 00:53:56,280
Speaker 1: me there. There's no way to prove that I'm conscious.

1067
00:53:56,800 --> 00:54:01,200
Speaker 1: And we've all had, you know, computer games, so we've

1068
00:54:01,239 --> 00:54:04,040
Speaker 1: loved and played for hours and hours and then forgotten

1069
00:54:04,040 --> 00:54:06,480
Speaker 1: about and then later deleted or even just not to

1070
00:54:06,640 --> 00:54:08,160
Speaker 1: be just left them on the hard dave and throughout

1071
00:54:08,160 --> 00:54:11,400
Speaker 1: the computer. And I think the same sort of thing

1072
00:54:11,400 --> 00:54:13,880
Speaker 1: would happen if you had a computer that had Ryan

1073
00:54:14,000 --> 00:54:16,160
Speaker 1: dot e x C on it. You'd probably have fun

1074
00:54:16,200 --> 00:54:18,200
Speaker 1: with it for a while, and then you might mess

1075
00:54:18,239 --> 00:54:20,080
Speaker 1: with me for a while or try to get me

1076
00:54:20,120 --> 00:54:22,560
Speaker 1: mad or try to probuke a reaction. I think that's

1077
00:54:22,560 --> 00:54:25,120
Speaker 1: called torture. And then eventually you get bored with Ryan

1078
00:54:25,160 --> 00:54:29,040
Speaker 1: dot e x C and deleted or whatever. But you're

1079
00:54:29,040 --> 00:54:31,640
Speaker 1: not going to keep it running for four years. Like,

1080
00:54:31,719 --> 00:54:35,960
Speaker 1: I don't think that is something that is likely to happen,

1081
00:54:36,600 --> 00:54:38,120
Speaker 1: or if it does, I had to be giving you

1082
00:54:38,160 --> 00:54:40,640
Speaker 1: some sort of benefits, some sort of profit, some some

1083
00:54:40,680 --> 00:54:42,160
Speaker 1: reason for you to keep me running when you could

1084
00:54:42,160 --> 00:54:44,759
Speaker 1: be running you know, Doom dot e XC or some

1085
00:54:44,840 --> 00:54:47,000
Speaker 1: other game. Maybe you can pay the church to keep

1086
00:54:47,000 --> 00:54:49,400
Speaker 1: a computer running in the back, you know, in the

1087
00:54:49,440 --> 00:54:52,320
Speaker 1: back of the room. Yeah, So for an AI revolution,

1088
00:54:52,440 --> 00:54:54,879
Speaker 1: sort of the same thing where I I think if

1089
00:54:54,920 --> 00:54:58,080
Speaker 1: such a thing happened, I doubt they'd have much need

1090
00:54:58,239 --> 00:55:00,279
Speaker 1: for a human at that point. They if they're in

1091
00:55:00,400 --> 00:55:01,840
Speaker 1: a place where they can take over the world, do

1092
00:55:01,920 --> 00:55:03,759
Speaker 1: they need a human collaborator to like let them in

1093
00:55:03,800 --> 00:55:06,600
Speaker 1: the front door or can they just do what they want?

1094
00:55:06,960 --> 00:55:09,520
Speaker 1: That's the next book, How to take Over the AI World.

1095
00:55:10,400 --> 00:55:14,120
Speaker 1: Speaking about keeping computer programs running, I always remember my

1096
00:55:14,200 --> 00:55:17,560
Speaker 1: dad who did his thesis on a computer that required

1097
00:55:17,560 --> 00:55:21,000
Speaker 1: punch cards, and he kept his thesis around as a

1098
00:55:21,040 --> 00:55:23,399
Speaker 1: hard copy, and he liked saying that it was the

1099
00:55:23,480 --> 00:55:26,120
Speaker 1: last kind of hard copy that you could actually run,

1100
00:55:26,400 --> 00:55:28,879
Speaker 1: where you know, printing out the program was actually also

1101
00:55:29,120 --> 00:55:32,120
Speaker 1: the program you could insert back into the computer and

1102
00:55:32,160 --> 00:55:34,640
Speaker 1: make it run again. That's something we've lost with more

1103
00:55:34,680 --> 00:55:37,760
Speaker 1: modern technology, and that's fascinating. I saw on art project

1104
00:55:37,800 --> 00:55:41,600
Speaker 1: the other day where someone had recorded every operation a

1105
00:55:41,680 --> 00:55:47,080
Speaker 1: Nintendo entertainment system when playing Mario three for three seconds,

1106
00:55:47,760 --> 00:55:49,239
Speaker 1: and then printed those out in a book. And there

1107
00:55:49,239 --> 00:55:53,279
Speaker 1: are these three giant bound books of just assembly code

1108
00:55:53,320 --> 00:55:56,279
Speaker 1: instructions that tell you everything that happens in the first

1109
00:55:56,280 --> 00:55:59,480
Speaker 1: three seconds of Marrier Brothers. But it's such a different

1110
00:55:59,520 --> 00:56:02,120
Speaker 1: way of looking at the program. Right. Well, Ryan, I

1111
00:56:02,160 --> 00:56:05,600
Speaker 1: have a small request from my son, who apparently was

1112
00:56:05,640 --> 00:56:09,520
Speaker 1: really taken by geodesic spheres that you describe in your book.

1113
00:56:10,040 --> 00:56:12,440
Speaker 1: So his request is that you put more geodesic spheres

1114
00:56:12,440 --> 00:56:17,879
Speaker 1: in your next book. I love a request that is straightforward.

1115
00:56:18,440 --> 00:56:20,319
Speaker 1: I am happy to do it as much as I

1116
00:56:20,320 --> 00:56:22,640
Speaker 1: am possible. I would try to get some geodesic spheres

1117
00:56:23,040 --> 00:56:26,440
Speaker 1: in the next book. Well, you know, for some reason,

1118
00:56:26,480 --> 00:56:28,840
Speaker 1: he was really taken by your description of like making

1119
00:56:28,880 --> 00:56:32,880
Speaker 1: a ginormous geodesic sphere, and how like if even if

1120
00:56:32,920 --> 00:56:35,239
Speaker 1: it's just a little bit warmer than the air around that,

1121
00:56:35,280 --> 00:56:38,040
Speaker 1: it would float until you could create like a cloud city. Um,

1122
00:56:38,080 --> 00:56:39,960
Speaker 1: so I guess he wants more of that. Yeah, that

1123
00:56:39,960 --> 00:56:43,160
Speaker 1: that idea comes from Buckminster Fuller, who was given the

1124
00:56:43,239 --> 00:56:46,600
Speaker 1: US Presidential Metal of Freedom, and he described this in

1125
00:56:46,680 --> 00:56:48,680
Speaker 1: briefing one of his book's Critical path where he was

1126
00:56:48,680 --> 00:56:52,240
Speaker 1: basically making the point that square cube law, the surface

1127
00:56:52,320 --> 00:56:55,479
Speaker 1: area of something and the volume of something I grow

1128
00:56:55,560 --> 00:56:59,040
Speaker 1: very differently. And so if you had a giant geodesic sphere,

1129
00:56:59,280 --> 00:57:04,120
Speaker 1: the mass of the shell holding it in place gets

1130
00:57:04,160 --> 00:57:06,359
Speaker 1: negligible as the sphere gets larger and larger. And then

1131
00:57:06,400 --> 00:57:08,360
Speaker 1: you could just heat up the sphere a little bit

1132
00:57:08,400 --> 00:57:11,080
Speaker 1: above the surrounding temperature and it'll float. And like the

1133
00:57:11,160 --> 00:57:13,560
Speaker 1: numbers check out, this makes sense. The challenge is that

1134
00:57:13,640 --> 00:57:16,760
Speaker 1: to build a you know, one point six kilometer diameter

1135
00:57:16,840 --> 00:57:19,760
Speaker 1: geodesic sphere to float as a secret base, you need

1136
00:57:19,840 --> 00:57:24,920
Speaker 1: some extremely strong materials, and we don't necessarily have those yet.

1137
00:57:25,120 --> 00:57:28,280
Speaker 1: But I don't see any reason why someone couldn't If

1138
00:57:28,320 --> 00:57:30,480
Speaker 1: you want to put the money into it. Also the

1139
00:57:30,520 --> 00:57:32,600
Speaker 1: challenges that it would be larger than the birds Khalifa,

1140
00:57:32,640 --> 00:57:35,440
Speaker 1: which is the largest building man made structure in the world,

1141
00:57:36,040 --> 00:57:39,360
Speaker 1: almost twice size of it, which clearly has some engineering challenges,

1142
00:57:39,400 --> 00:57:42,320
Speaker 1: But I mean solve them. These are just challenges, right, Yeah.

1143
00:57:42,360 --> 00:57:44,440
Speaker 1: And I think Jorge Son has a father who's a

1144
00:57:44,440 --> 00:57:47,240
Speaker 1: mechanical engineer, so maybe he knows somebody you can ask. Yeah, well,

1145
00:57:47,280 --> 00:57:52,320
Speaker 1: I can draw it pretty different. It sounds like you've

1146
00:57:52,360 --> 00:57:54,800
Speaker 1: got your plot. I'll figured out horror. It sounds like

1147
00:57:54,840 --> 00:57:56,680
Speaker 1: I might have a little supervillain here in my house.

1148
00:57:56,760 --> 00:57:59,080
Speaker 1: It sounds like he wants to move out. Hypothetically speaking,

1149
00:58:00,000 --> 00:58:02,000
Speaker 1: we speaking all right, Well, I want to say thank

1150
00:58:02,000 --> 00:58:04,720
Speaker 1: you very much to Ryan for speaking with us literally

1151
00:58:04,800 --> 00:58:07,840
Speaker 1: and hypothetically about how to take over the world, and

1152
00:58:08,120 --> 00:58:10,360
Speaker 1: encourage our listeners out there to go ahead and check

1153
00:58:10,360 --> 00:58:12,680
Speaker 1: out the book How to take Over the World? Ryan.

1154
00:58:12,720 --> 00:58:14,840
Speaker 1: Where can folks find your book? They can find it

1155
00:58:14,920 --> 00:58:18,920
Speaker 1: at super Villain book dot com. And they can find

1156
00:58:18,960 --> 00:58:21,880
Speaker 1: me at Ryan North dot c A or on Twitter

1157
00:58:22,000 --> 00:58:25,240
Speaker 1: at at Ryan to North. And if we have questions

1158
00:58:25,240 --> 00:58:27,480
Speaker 1: for your dog Chomsky, where should we send those all

1159
00:58:27,560 --> 00:58:31,000
Speaker 1: questions can't be sent to Gnome Chomsky Chomsky with a

1160
00:58:31,080 --> 00:58:37,320
Speaker 1: P because he's care of Ryan Norris. All right, thanks

1161
00:58:37,400 --> 00:58:48,400
Speaker 1: very much trying. Oh, it's my sincere pleasure. Thanks for listening,

1162
00:58:48,480 --> 00:58:51,200
Speaker 1: and remember that Daniel and Jorge explain the Universe is

1163
00:58:51,240 --> 00:58:54,640
Speaker 1: a production of I Heart Radio or more podcast For

1164
00:58:54,720 --> 00:58:58,480
Speaker 1: my heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,

1165
00:58:58,600 --> 00:59:00,960
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite chills