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

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Speaker 1: Works dot com. The thoughts of all men arise from

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Speaker 1: the darkness. If you were the movement of your soul,

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Speaker 1: and the cause of that movement procede you, then how

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Speaker 1: could you ever call your thoughts your own? How could

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Speaker 1: you be anything other than a slave to the darkness

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Speaker 1: that comes before? Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind.

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Speaker 1: My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick. In

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Speaker 1: today's episode is mostly going to be an interview with

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Speaker 1: the Canadian author are Scott Baker, best known for his

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Speaker 1: Second Apocalypse saga, Robert, how would you characterize that? Well?

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Speaker 1: I think that quote that I read there from his

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Speaker 1: first book in the series, The Darkness That Comes Before,

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Speaker 1: sums it up rather nicely. I was first turned onto

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Speaker 1: the work of our Scott Baker back in two thousand seven,

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Speaker 1: and I hadn't read anything quite like it at the time,

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Speaker 1: and I really haven't read anything quite like his work

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Speaker 1: since then. His first novel, The Darkness That Comes Before,

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Speaker 1: cast the reader into a dark fantasy world and invokes

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Speaker 1: the Holy Wars of our own world, token esque evil

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Speaker 1: factional in fighting worthy of Frank Herbert's Dune and a

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Speaker 1: deep philosophical core, And we're actually gonna be getting into

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Speaker 1: not so much his science fiction and fantasy but a

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Speaker 1: recent philosophy paper of his that sounds kind of odd,

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Speaker 1: though We will discuss his science fiction and fantasy a

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Speaker 1: fair amount. Don't don't worry about that if you're a fan,

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Speaker 1: but we're really going to be focusing on our Scott

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Speaker 1: Baker's recent paper on alien philosophy, published this year in

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Speaker 1: the Journal of Consciousness Studies. Yes, you heard that right,

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Speaker 1: alien philosophy. We will get back to that in just

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Speaker 1: a little bit. Yes, on alien philosophy. This is a

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Speaker 1: wonderful thought experiment and sort of a reverse engineering of

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Speaker 1: human philosophy via the consideration of a fictional convergeon ale

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Speaker 1: in species and what's sort of philosophical systems they might

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Speaker 1: create to make sense of their own existence. Yeah, so

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Speaker 1: in the past we've actually speculated about possible characteristics of

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Speaker 1: alien life forms. We did this in that episode Grizzly

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Speaker 1: Bears from Outer Space. Do you remember that? Yeah, like,

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Speaker 1: would aliens have eyes? Would they have hands? How large

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Speaker 1: or intelligent life forms? Generally? Where there was there was

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Speaker 1: a paper back then that tried to use some statistical

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Speaker 1: analysis to say, you know, it's really more likely, given

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Speaker 1: certain planet sizes and gravity and stuff, that aliens are

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Speaker 1: going to be pretty big. Um. But this is always

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Speaker 1: a tricky game because if you are a reasonable person,

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Speaker 1: you have to admit that if alien life exists somewhere

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Speaker 1: out there, there's every chance that it could just totally

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Speaker 1: defy your expectations. We we don't always know what to expect.

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Speaker 1: We can't be certain about much, but it is always

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Speaker 1: fun to play the game. Okay, if we just start

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Speaker 1: with a few fairly safe assumptions, what can we deduce

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Speaker 1: about what types of life are possible? And one of

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Speaker 1: those fairly safe assumptions is that whatever alien life exists,

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Speaker 1: it's going to be the product of evolution by natural selection.

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Speaker 1: I think it would be incredibly surprising if it turned

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Speaker 1: out to not be the product of evolution by natural selection,

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Speaker 1: meaning it's going to be a system that somehow incodes information,

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Speaker 1: makes copies of itself through that information, and the copies

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Speaker 1: survive and make their own copies at differential rates. And

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Speaker 1: from these humble premises you can actually start to make

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Speaker 1: a lot of interesting guesses about what types of life

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Speaker 1: are more possible or more common than others. And so

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Speaker 1: we've already tried this with biological and ecological traits in

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Speaker 1: the past. But in this new paper, Our Scott Baker

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Speaker 1: chases this this phenotype problem really deep. He goes on

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Speaker 1: to guests, what are the philosophical projects that intelligent alien

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Speaker 1: life forms would wonder about? What big questions would they

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Speaker 1: share with us? What hang up so they really likely

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Speaker 1: to dwell upon. Yeah, it's a fascinating paper and if

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Speaker 1: you want to read it in full, I'll include a

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Speaker 1: link to it on the landing page for this episode

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Speaker 1: is Stuff to Blow your Mind dot Com. And I

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Speaker 1: should also point out that the first six books in

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Speaker 1: the Second Apocalypse saga, including the first trilogy, are currently

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Speaker 1: out there and just about any reading format you desire,

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Speaker 1: and this summer Our Scott Baker brings it all home.

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Speaker 1: He's gonna follow up last year's The Great Ordeal with

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Speaker 1: the Unholy Consults, which is gonna be out July eleven

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Speaker 1: from Overlook Press. And if you're not ready to commit

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Speaker 1: to a multi book series, his standalone novels Neuropath and

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Speaker 1: Disciple of the Dog are out there as well. Robert,

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Speaker 1: I know you warned me about neuropath well, as as

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Speaker 1: we'll explore in the interview, Baker himself warns everybody about neuropaths,

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Speaker 1: so be sure to tune in for that section of

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Speaker 1: the conversation. Just a few quick notes about this episode.

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Speaker 1: First up, this is a phone interview. We're in Atlanta

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Speaker 1: and Scott chatted with us from the wilds of Canada

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Speaker 1: in the midst of a thunderstorm. So, uh, everything's not

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Speaker 1: going to be necessarily as crisp as a you reually is,

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Speaker 1: but we think the content is is definitely worth sticking

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Speaker 1: around for. Secondly, I bring up a couple of details

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Speaker 1: from the Second Apocalypse saga that I think bear quick explanation. First,

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Speaker 1: there's the ink Ai. Now, this is a hedonistic alien

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Speaker 1: species that descends upon the world in ancient times undying.

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Speaker 1: They're devoted to selfish indulgence, limitless pleasure, and a cataclysmic

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Speaker 1: scheme to shield themselves from judgment. And then there are

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Speaker 1: the non Men. This is an all male race of

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Speaker 1: humanoids that essentially serves as the waning elder race the

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Speaker 1: elves of Baker's world, only far darker and interestingly inhuman

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Speaker 1: in many respects, both in body and in mind. And finally,

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Speaker 1: there's a tiny bit of cursing in this episode, but

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Speaker 1: it's polite Canadian cursing, and we bleaped it all out

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Speaker 1: for you. All Right, Well, i'd say, without further delay,

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Speaker 1: maybe we should get into our conversation with our Scott Baker. Hey, Scott,

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Speaker 1: welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. Thanks for taking

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Speaker 1: time out of your day to talk with us here

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Speaker 1: about your new paper on alien philosophy, as well as

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Speaker 1: uh your works of fiction, which I know personally have

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Speaker 1: been a lot to me over the years. I'm I'm

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Speaker 1: a big fan of the Second Apocalypse saga. I loved

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Speaker 1: an Neuropath and Disciple the Dog as well. So we

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Speaker 1: want to welcome you to the show. And I believe

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Speaker 1: Joe has the first question here related to on alien philosophy. Well, actually,

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Speaker 1: I mean, I guess we should start just by Scott.

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Speaker 1: Is there anything you'd like to tell our audience about yourself?

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Speaker 1: Just introduce yourself and then second we'll we'll get to

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Speaker 1: the meat of the paper. I'm a farm boy who

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Speaker 1: grew up in southwestern Ontario and uh ended up falling

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Speaker 1: in love with Lord of the Rings and Conan the

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Speaker 1: Barbarian at a preposterously young age and just never grew up.

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Speaker 1: What's your opinion on the Millius movie? It has to

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Speaker 1: be the one written by alver Stone. Yeah yeah, Ernie.

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Speaker 1: All right, So we wanted to get into the idea

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Speaker 1: of your your paper about alien philosophy. Could you just

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Speaker 1: start by as succinctly as you can explaining what your

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Speaker 1: motive for writing this paper was and what your basic

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Speaker 1: conclusions are. Okay, So, I mean I kind of backed

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Speaker 1: into philosophy. Um, my original my original degree program I

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Speaker 1: took at university was languages and literature, and it quickly

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Speaker 1: became apparent to me that I was barking up the

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Speaker 1: wrong tree. And so the question for me was basically

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Speaker 1: how to transition my literature degree into something more philosophical.

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Speaker 1: So I did a critical theory graduate degree, and in

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Speaker 1: that case, I found myself knee deep and all these

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Speaker 1: philosophical traditions, ten thousand different interpretations of the same bloody thing.

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Speaker 1: I think the best way to put it is dismayed.

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Speaker 1: There's just so much confusion. It seemed like there was

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Speaker 1: so much obvious obtuscation. I so it quickly came to

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Speaker 1: the conclusion that something profoundly wrong lay at the heart

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Speaker 1: of traditional philosophy, and I just endeavored to be as

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Speaker 1: honest and as ruthlessly skeptical as I could and try

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Speaker 1: to figure out what that something wrong was. And aude

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Speaker 1: alien philosophy is basically the answer I've been able to

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Speaker 1: come up with after about twenty years of studying and

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Speaker 1: researching the topic, both informal university contexts and UH and

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Speaker 1: on my own. And the idea, in a nutshell is

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Speaker 1: simply that we human beings simply did not evolve the

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Speaker 1: capacity to reflect upon ourselves and our experience in any way,

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Speaker 1: shape or form that would allow us to answer theoretical

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Speaker 1: questions regarding our experience. And when you really look at

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Speaker 1: you know the question empirically in terms of cognitive neuroscience,

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Speaker 1: for instance, and you see the way in which the

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Speaker 1: brain constantly windows information, constantly just selects a little bit

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Speaker 1: of information from this process, a little information from that process,

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Speaker 1: a little information from that process. You discovered the brain

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Speaker 1: really is a giant bottleneck machine that is bend on

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Speaker 1: selecting only what it needs. And on alien philosophy gives

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Speaker 1: us a sort of picture of how we can understand

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Speaker 1: that bottleneck machine such that it explains the morass of

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Speaker 1: traditional philosophy of mind are you know, epical inability to

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Speaker 1: figure out what the hell is going on inside of

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Speaker 1: our own heads? So in the paper you you make

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Speaker 1: this distinction you just talked about and you you mentioned

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Speaker 1: the idea of causal cognition versus heuristic cognition, right, Uh,

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Speaker 1: basically having a true understanding of the workings of things

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Speaker 1: in in a sort of deep information way, versus having

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Speaker 1: a you know, on the fly, good enough understanding of

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Speaker 1: things that gets us through everyday life and that we're

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Speaker 1: constantly using the ladder to try to get at the former. Um.

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Speaker 1: A question I sort of wonder about. Is the former

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Speaker 1: to me, sounds like it is best executed in science.

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Speaker 1: If we're trying to get causal cognition, it's when we

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Speaker 1: you know, put these tools on our inquiries, like scientific

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Speaker 1: investigatory tools. And so does that leave any room for philosophy?

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Speaker 1: Do you think that there is really any good philosophy

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Speaker 1: to be done or really should it just be science

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Speaker 1: and everything outside of science is misapplying these heuristic models

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Speaker 1: we have. Um, yeah, I mean I think there's definitely

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Speaker 1: good philosophy. I mean, uh, Um, it's not the death

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Speaker 1: of philosophy or theoretical speculation. I mean, there's no way

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Speaker 1: to kill that. Um. What for me it signals the

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Speaker 1: end of is a certain type of philosophizing, which just

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Speaker 1: happens to be the majority of philosophizing since the ancient Greeks,

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Speaker 1: which is the idea of actually using heuristic cognition to

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Speaker 1: try to get to the truth of heuristic cognition, using

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Speaker 1: these shortcuts, these ways of actually avoiding knowledge of what's

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Speaker 1: actually going on to solve problems as a means of

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Speaker 1: getting at what's going on. And that's the philosophy that

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Speaker 1: does That is the philosophy that's caused the bulk of

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Speaker 1: our confusion today. So how much of philosophy do you

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Speaker 1: think is really just sort of backward looking ex post

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Speaker 1: facto justification for our biases. So the way I look

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Speaker 1: at it is we have this capacity to metacognize. We

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Speaker 1: have these ancestral abilities to basically pick things from the

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Speaker 1: stream of experience and think about them and change our

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Speaker 1: behavioral responses to the world on the basis of them.

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Speaker 1: So think about Christmas with your relatives. You know, everyone

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Speaker 1: has that family member who says something that you jest. Oh,

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Speaker 1: you got to say something about it, but you know

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Speaker 1: if you do, it's going to ruin the whole night.

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Speaker 1: And then it's a great example of meta cognition at work.

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Speaker 1: You know you're gonna say something, and then all of

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Speaker 1: a sudden, Wait a second, Scott, he's an soul. Everyone

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Speaker 1: knows he's a whole. You don't need to tell everybody

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Speaker 1: he's in sool. If you tell everybody's, well, then the

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Speaker 1: whole night's ruined. Right, Your reproductive chances go flying out

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Speaker 1: the window. That sounds weird. It doesn't know, But meta

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Speaker 1: cognition consists of a suite of practical tools. There's no

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Speaker 1: a in the world that we evolved the meta cognitive capacity.

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Speaker 1: We needed to do much more than a handful of

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Speaker 1: practical things on the fly. And what philosophical reflection does

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Speaker 1: is it it basically takes those tools, repurposes them, and

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Speaker 1: asks them to solve questions. There's just simply no way

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Speaker 1: they could possibly solve them. But since we lack the

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Speaker 1: ability to even see how little ability we have when

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Speaker 1: it comes to man cognition, we have no sense of

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Speaker 1: constraints or limits or whatever, and so we're confunded by

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Speaker 1: this constant illusion of transparency. It seems like, yes, if

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Speaker 1: only I think hard enough on this, Yes, if only

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Speaker 1: I get my concepts arranged just right. Yes, if only

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Speaker 1: I abandoned the metaphysics a presence, Yes only I abandoned

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Speaker 1: the mirror major on and on and on it goes.

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Speaker 1: Everybody thinks that there's a way to use philosophical reflection

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Speaker 1: to solve or the problem with human experience. So, uh, Scott,

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Speaker 1: in the paper you seem and the way you just

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Speaker 1: described it now, you definitely do seem to be trying

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Speaker 1: to use this idea of imagining what alien philosophy looks

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Speaker 1: like in order to reverse engineer our own human philosophy

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Speaker 1: to better understand how we've arrived at our philosophical traditions.

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Speaker 1: But I'm also just really interested in that speculative project

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Speaker 1: trying to literally imagine what an information processing organism orbiting

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Speaker 1: a faraway star might think about, what hard problems would

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Speaker 1: they encounter and how would they deal with them? And

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Speaker 1: so I wonder if I could ask you just a

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Speaker 1: few crazy kinds of questions that you don't even address

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Speaker 1: in the paper. Uh. I started off thinking, like, you know,

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Speaker 1: would could you imagine that there would be an alien

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Speaker 1: Hagel or an alien Wittgenstein. But these are kind of

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Speaker 1: stupid questions because I think these philosophers necessarily exist in

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Speaker 1: a tradition, if you know what I mean, Like they're

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Speaker 1: reacting to all the philosophers that came before them, and

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Speaker 1: so it's sort of silly to try to imagine if

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Speaker 1: that history of philosophy would be recreated on other planets.

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Speaker 1: But you can't imagine other fields of philosophy and how

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Speaker 1: they would be created. So I'm trying to think, like,

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Speaker 1: what would alien meta ethics look like? Is there anything

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Speaker 1: that we could guess, uh that that would form the

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Speaker 1: basis of how aliens would think about, you know what,

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Speaker 1: they're where their sense of right and wrong comes from.

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Speaker 1: But this is a really hard question to ask. I mean,

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Speaker 1: part of the reason why I took so much care

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Speaker 1: to uh underscore how how really you know, plausibility of

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Speaker 1: alien philosophy was all I was after. It's just simply

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Speaker 1: because asking the question of alien philosopy earnestly, you know,

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Speaker 1: um is really difficult, simply because you've got to assume

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Speaker 1: so much convergence just to just get off the ground

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Speaker 1: I mean have to that they use language in similar

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Speaker 1: ways that we as we use language for instance. Um,

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Speaker 1: So if you grant all that, if you grant convergence,

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Speaker 1: as I call them in the paper, then I think

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Speaker 1: meta ethics would look like a giant mess the way

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Speaker 1: meta ethics looks like in contemporary philosophy, justly because when

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Speaker 1: it comes to where we stand in these various super

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Speaker 1: complicated systems that nature has us pinned in, we just

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Speaker 1: have no access to the information we need. So what

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Speaker 1: we really have to rely on is basically these blind guesses,

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Speaker 1: you know, these simple heuristics, these little tricks that have,

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Speaker 1: for whatever reason, um, preserved our ancestors in the past.

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Speaker 1: Now these tricks are just simply uh, they're literally invisible

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Speaker 1: to us, even though they actually are the foundation of

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Speaker 1: guiding our behavior through these super complicated natural natural environments. Now,

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Speaker 1: any creature like the human is stuck in the exact

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Speaker 1: same informational bind. They're stuck in a shallow information environment.

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Speaker 1: They have these tools for picking out those handles, those

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Speaker 1: features of the environment that actually help them get along

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Speaker 1: or get on or get it on, um, but they

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Speaker 1: actually have no way of isolating those simple heuristics as

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Speaker 1: simple heuristics, no way of understanding where they stand in

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Speaker 1: these superordinance systems. They're just they're blind, and even worse,

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Speaker 1: they're blind to their blindness. So every time these aliens

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Speaker 1: would attempt to solve ethical questions what is ethics, They're

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Speaker 1: going to run into the same sets of illusions and

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Speaker 1: problems that beset human philosophers. They're going to confuse the

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Speaker 1: load in scape of ethical concepts as being a sort

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Speaker 1: of autonomous system as being all there is. They're going

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Speaker 1: to think that they've actually solved something, even though all

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Speaker 1: it takes is another person to ask the exact same

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Speaker 1: question to arrive at, in some cases, radically different answer

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Speaker 1: following what seemed to be very similar intuitions. So those

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Speaker 1: two things I think they're gonna are going to strand

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Speaker 1: them as effectively as we've been stranded by meta ethics.

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Speaker 1: I can imagine a skeptical objection to what you're saying, Um,

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Speaker 1: that would be okay, you're right that we are, by

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Speaker 1: nature shallow information consumers. We don't have deep knowledge about

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Speaker 1: the world in order to get along in a natural setting.

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Speaker 1: But you can definitely look at the way we've loved

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Speaker 1: ridged the weak tools. We do have to do amazing

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Speaker 1: things in say science and technology, like we can build

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Speaker 1: an international space station, and that has nothing to do

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Speaker 1: with our ground level survival and reproduction. We've just managed

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Speaker 1: to sort of bootstrap up some very basic survival tools

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Speaker 1: into incredible products. Why would you think that we couldn't

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Speaker 1: do the same thing with these hard problems, like like

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Speaker 1: met ethics or natural philosophy or understanding the mind that

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Speaker 1: we do with science and technology. Well, I mean I

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Speaker 1: actually think that you know a lot of the say

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Speaker 1: you know norms of science. I actually see these things

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Speaker 1: as technology. I mean I see them as basically ways

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Speaker 1: of turning, you know, spinning tools out of our own

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Speaker 1: brains if you will. I mean the idea of the

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Speaker 1: idea isn't that we can't use heuristic cognition in novel ways.

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Speaker 1: I mean we literally, I think we literally evolved to

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Speaker 1: do exactly what philosophers do, which is just simply trying

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Speaker 1: to recast, repurpose that our existing cognitive capacities in order

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Speaker 1: to solve um different kinds of problems. The problem with

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Speaker 1: meta ethics in particular is it doesn't really have anything

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Speaker 1: to do with that process. So ethical thought it has

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Speaker 1: given us a lot of great ideas that we've been

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Speaker 1: able to institutionalize in ways that have been tremendously tremendously

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Speaker 1: beneficial um to humanity. But there's no way of actually

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Speaker 1: realizing that that's the case short of putting those tools

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Speaker 1: into application. I mean, I would argue that the type

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Speaker 1: of norm toolmaking that humans have just done so fantastically

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Speaker 1: well is actually a completely different process than the process

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Speaker 1: that underwrites meta ethical thought. I mean, problems get solved

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Speaker 1: when we actually discover a new simple heuristic that allows

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Speaker 1: us to get along with each other in some way,

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Speaker 1: shape or form. But when you actually ask the fundamental

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Speaker 1: nature of ethical thought, and you begin by looking at

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Speaker 1: all these terms, all this norm talk as referring to

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Speaker 1: posits that actually plays some role in some kind of

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Speaker 1: economy transcendental economy or a normative economy, or an anomalous

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Speaker 1: economy or an autonomous economy outside of the circuit of nature.

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Speaker 1: No one's gotten anywhere, no one's the through anything. I mean,

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Speaker 1: the all the dilemmas that confronted the ancient Greeks are

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Speaker 1: still confronting modern philosophers today. And that's just simply because

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Speaker 1: constitutes an attempt to apply these simple heuristics not to

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Speaker 1: practical problems in the real world of politics and social interaction,

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Speaker 1: but to the theoretical problem of ethics itself. All right,

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Speaker 1: now it's time to take a quick break, and when

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Speaker 1: we come back, more of our conversation with our Scott Baker.

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Speaker 1: So maybe I've got one more and then I'm going

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Speaker 1: to throw back to Robert here. Uh So, I wanted

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Speaker 1: to go to a footnote in your paper about alien philosophy. Um,

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Speaker 1: you say that because we evolved in ecologies that didn't

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Speaker 1: give us access to deep information, you know, we just

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Speaker 1: knew enough to get along. You write, quote, My fear

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Speaker 1: is that the provision of this information is likely to

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Speaker 1: crash the effectiveness of many of our tools. A good

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Speaker 1: deal of my fiction is devoted to exploring different crash scenarios.

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Speaker 1: So I wondered if you could explain a little bit

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Speaker 1: more what you mean about the idea of a crash

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Speaker 1: scenario and how you explored so when you understand that

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Speaker 1: the bulk of our cognition is heuristic, that it really

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Speaker 1: relies on these kinds of guesses that we're making with

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Speaker 1: the lack any sort of deep understanding of the actual

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Speaker 1: physical structure of the environment around us. You realize that

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Speaker 1: that guesswork depends upon an invariant background. So a perfect

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Speaker 1: example would be AI for instance. So human beings we

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Speaker 1: evolved to manage unbelievable amount of complexity. We we evolved

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Speaker 1: to solve the most complicated systems that we know of

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Speaker 1: in the universe, basically each other, without actually knowing the

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Speaker 1: first thing about what's going on in brains or or

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Speaker 1: ecologies or or what what have you. So heuristics solved

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Speaker 1: by taking things for granted in their environments. So that

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Speaker 1: means the only cognition can be properly function is if

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Speaker 1: those things that it takes for granted actually obtained in

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Speaker 1: its environments. So if you look at that last year,

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Speaker 1: there was the first fatality ever attributed to a self

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Speaker 1: driving car, and I think it was a Tesla Um

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Speaker 1: and the unfortunate fellow was driving on an incline and

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Speaker 1: a truck was crossing his path. He was watching Harry

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Speaker 1: Potter on his dashboard. He had his autopilot on his car.

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Speaker 1: Now the autopilot actually read forward, and the white truck

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Speaker 1: crossed what was actually white sky. This is what they

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Speaker 1: think happened, and as a result, the truck's trailer qued

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Speaker 1: open space to the computer, and so the car just

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Speaker 1: drove right underneath the truck trailer. Um, that's exactly what

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Speaker 1: happen when the environment doesn't cooperate with a heuristic problem

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Speaker 1: solving system. If that system cannot discriminate between white truck

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Speaker 1: white sky, then it just sees sky. And so that's

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Speaker 1: actually a perfect example of a crash space where you

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Speaker 1: have a cognitive system that requires the environment to be

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Speaker 1: a certain way in order to properly solve the problem.

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Speaker 1: When the environment is changed or varies in a way

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Speaker 1: that it cannot accommodate, then you literally have a car

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Speaker 1: crash in that case. Now, that obtained as much for

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Speaker 1: self driving cars as it does for human social cognition.

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Speaker 1: So my big fear with AI generally is that you

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Speaker 1: and I evolved to solve each other um over literally

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Speaker 1: the history of life on this planet. We're enormously complicated,

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Speaker 1: and yet we're so finally attuned to one another that

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Speaker 1: we can make unbelievable predictions as to each other's behavior

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Speaker 1: and reliability and so forth. Now, what happens when you

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Speaker 1: take that ecology and you start injecting all these little

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Speaker 1: artificial agencies that are literally designed to cue your heuristic

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Speaker 1: social positive systems out of school, right for some sort

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Speaker 1: of commercial advantage. Now, all of a sudden, you find

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Speaker 1: human beings using these systems that are exquisitely designed to

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Speaker 1: make sense of other human beings. Now we're using these

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Speaker 1: systems to make sense of machines that have literally been

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Speaker 1: designed to mpre wallets or you know, swear our votes

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Speaker 1: or what have you. Now that's a crash space, and

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Speaker 1: it's a tremendously significant crash space because what it means

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Speaker 1: is that human beings are going to be able to

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Speaker 1: trust their social cognitive systems that suite of simple heuristics

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Speaker 1: we use to solve the monstrous complexity of each other.

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Speaker 1: We're no, we're gonna be able to trust that less

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Speaker 1: and less and less moving forward because the environment, the

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Speaker 1: invariant background that it's adapted to solve, no longer exists.

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Speaker 1: So really, what my big fear is is that we're

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Speaker 1: looking at the destruction of the human cognitive habitat, that

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Speaker 1: all this stuff that people are celebrating Mark Zuckerberg, even

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Speaker 1: President uh really is the beginning of the end of

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Speaker 1: the ability of human beings to make sense of each other,

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Speaker 1: the world themselves. What have you, Robert, I know some

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Speaker 1: of these ideas come up in some questions you had

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Speaker 1: about the fiction, right, Oh, yes, Um. At this point

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Speaker 1: I want to jump ahead to a question I had

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Speaker 1: for later, but I think it's ees in here. So

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Speaker 1: your your book Neuropath is a wonderfully scientifically disturbing thriller,

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Speaker 1: sort of near future neuroscientifically charged psychological thriller for those

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Speaker 1: who haven't read it, Well, you've just described here instantly

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Speaker 1: made me think of the semantic apocalypse. Is that the

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Speaker 1: same concept? Or is that a related concept? That's the

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Speaker 1: same concept, that's the that's the semantic apocalypse. I kind

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Speaker 1: of see it as having two stages to it. I

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Speaker 1: mean the first stage is actually on alien philosophy. I mean,

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Speaker 1: the first stage is just clearing away all these philosophical

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Speaker 1: conceptions of meaning and um coming to understand the practical

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00:28:41,160 --> 00:28:46,400
Speaker 1: nature of of intentional cognition. And then the big problem

432
00:28:46,440 --> 00:28:50,480
Speaker 1: with semantic apocalypse has to be with the slow degradation

433
00:28:50,720 --> 00:28:55,040
Speaker 1: of the environments that intentional cognition requires in order to

434
00:28:55,120 --> 00:28:59,160
Speaker 1: function reliably right, And it's the depth of meaning in

435
00:28:59,280 --> 00:29:02,760
Speaker 1: every sense. When you say the intentional environment, there you

436
00:29:02,800 --> 00:29:07,040
Speaker 1: mean reasoning on the basis of inferring the intentions of others,

437
00:29:07,080 --> 00:29:09,840
Speaker 1: sort of what Daniel Dennet would call the intentional stance.

438
00:29:10,560 --> 00:29:14,600
Speaker 1: Actually greatly enjoying uh Denna's book right now, his latest book.

439
00:29:14,960 --> 00:29:19,160
Speaker 1: There's no intentional stance in my position. Um, there's no

440
00:29:19,560 --> 00:29:25,160
Speaker 1: uh perspectives or anything like that. I mean, intentional cognition

441
00:29:25,360 --> 00:29:28,160
Speaker 1: just simply means basically all the machinery in your brain

442
00:29:28,800 --> 00:29:32,960
Speaker 1: that enables you to solve the behavior of other biological

443
00:29:33,000 --> 00:29:41,720
Speaker 1: life in your in your vicinity to like incredibly rarefied extents, right, um,

444
00:29:41,760 --> 00:29:44,000
Speaker 1: and when you look and when you look at human

445
00:29:44,000 --> 00:29:47,600
Speaker 1: behavior in particular. The problem with the intentional stance is

446
00:29:47,640 --> 00:29:50,560
Speaker 1: that it's actually an attempt to use intentional cognition to

447
00:29:50,720 --> 00:29:54,920
Speaker 1: theorize intentional cognition. And that's the big reason why Dinnett

448
00:29:54,920 --> 00:29:58,440
Speaker 1: has such a hard time actually selling his position to

449
00:29:59,120 --> 00:30:04,120
Speaker 1: h their philosophers of mine who want intentionality in meaning

450
00:30:04,120 --> 00:30:08,480
Speaker 1: to be a thing, to be something in the world. Uh,

451
00:30:09,320 --> 00:30:14,560
Speaker 1: I share much of of then it's view, but I

452
00:30:14,600 --> 00:30:18,240
Speaker 1: don't see how the intentional stance has anything to do

453
00:30:19,000 --> 00:30:22,960
Speaker 1: with the parts I share your original question had to

454
00:30:23,000 --> 00:30:27,320
Speaker 1: do with, uh, just simply what I mean by intentional cognition,

455
00:30:27,880 --> 00:30:32,040
Speaker 1: And once again, it's simply the machinery in our head.

456
00:30:33,160 --> 00:30:35,720
Speaker 1: That's you know, what gets taken out by a stroke.

457
00:30:36,560 --> 00:30:43,200
Speaker 1: That's what gets you know, pathologically attenuated in cases of autism,

458
00:30:43,240 --> 00:30:48,440
Speaker 1: that's you know what gets degraded in dementia. You know,

459
00:30:48,760 --> 00:30:53,840
Speaker 1: that's where the action is. And UM, I think that's

460
00:30:53,880 --> 00:30:57,200
Speaker 1: all we need to to really get a theoretical grasp

461
00:30:58,400 --> 00:31:01,600
Speaker 1: on what's going on with meaning. In your Second Apocalypse saga,

462
00:31:01,720 --> 00:31:04,719
Speaker 1: an alien race known as the ink Roy play a

463
00:31:04,720 --> 00:31:09,160
Speaker 1: crucial role did on alien philosophy impart stem from trying

464
00:31:09,160 --> 00:31:11,960
Speaker 1: to understand their perspective and yes or no, how does

465
00:31:12,000 --> 00:31:15,120
Speaker 1: one try to think like the people of emptiness? How

466
00:31:15,160 --> 00:31:18,760
Speaker 1: does one try to think like an Inkroy? Wow? I've

467
00:31:18,800 --> 00:31:22,720
Speaker 1: tried to actually get into their headspace on several occasions.

468
00:31:22,760 --> 00:31:25,800
Speaker 1: I find it really difficult. I mean, the problem is

469
00:31:25,800 --> 00:31:28,320
Speaker 1: is that, you know, our own sort of experience, of

470
00:31:28,360 --> 00:31:32,960
Speaker 1: our own first person is so unbelievably specific to our

471
00:31:33,000 --> 00:31:38,520
Speaker 1: biology and to our history that that, um, as soon

472
00:31:38,560 --> 00:31:41,120
Speaker 1: as you've tried to actually think of an alien way

473
00:31:41,120 --> 00:31:45,800
Speaker 1: of thought ceases to make sense. I mean on Alien

474
00:31:45,800 --> 00:31:49,959
Speaker 1: philosophy is tied to the ink roy, not not so

475
00:31:50,040 --> 00:31:56,560
Speaker 1: much as uh exploration. Okay, so the incroy not so

476
00:31:56,680 --> 00:32:00,720
Speaker 1: much you know, the object of on alien philosophy as

477
00:32:00,960 --> 00:32:08,360
Speaker 1: they are kind of uh, the cipher for the ultimate

478
00:32:08,440 --> 00:32:12,880
Speaker 1: significance of alien philosophy, because the ultimate significance of Alan

479
00:32:12,920 --> 00:32:17,760
Speaker 1: philosophy is that, you know, once we understand that thought

480
00:32:18,480 --> 00:32:23,920
Speaker 1: is ultimately material physical um uh, and just simply part

481
00:32:24,360 --> 00:32:27,640
Speaker 1: of all the natural processes going on in our environment,

482
00:32:28,320 --> 00:32:34,600
Speaker 1: nothing on theologically extraordinary, then we realize that this boundary

483
00:32:34,640 --> 00:32:37,800
Speaker 1: that we've just we're just creeping up to and are

484
00:32:37,920 --> 00:32:42,440
Speaker 1: getting ready to cross, where we have literally gained the

485
00:32:42,440 --> 00:32:50,920
Speaker 1: ability to control physical processes at unbelievably small scales, cellular scales,

486
00:32:51,920 --> 00:32:58,400
Speaker 1: at this point where our own biology is becoming technology. Um.

487
00:32:58,440 --> 00:33:05,160
Speaker 1: If on alien philosophy is right, then ink oi are

488
00:33:06,000 --> 00:33:11,560
Speaker 1: one possible consequence of us crossing this boundary. So the

489
00:33:11,600 --> 00:33:18,320
Speaker 1: ink roy could possibly be us in some respect where

490
00:33:18,360 --> 00:33:22,920
Speaker 1: you know, been up on any sort of normative ideals

491
00:33:23,000 --> 00:33:28,800
Speaker 1: of or truth or what have you, and have literally

492
00:33:28,880 --> 00:33:36,160
Speaker 1: just simply collapsed into this bioheedionism that is to our

493
00:33:36,320 --> 00:33:41,560
Speaker 1: moral sensi abilities, absolutely horrific. And that's for me. The

494
00:33:41,600 --> 00:33:47,280
Speaker 1: ink y have always kind of represented the ugly consequences

495
00:33:47,720 --> 00:33:53,440
Speaker 1: of an alien philosophy, the fact that we are going

496
00:33:53,520 --> 00:33:56,520
Speaker 1: to climb out of this dream that we've had of

497
00:33:56,640 --> 00:34:00,400
Speaker 1: being exceptional in some way and this or that we

498
00:34:00,480 --> 00:34:04,760
Speaker 1: are just simply material and that we will just simply

499
00:34:04,840 --> 00:34:09,360
Speaker 1: chase fitness indicators, you know, via our technology, to the

500
00:34:09,400 --> 00:34:14,520
Speaker 1: point where we um become something that our present belves

501
00:34:14,520 --> 00:34:17,080
Speaker 1: can only be horrified by. Well, that's excellent, that's certainly

502
00:34:17,120 --> 00:34:21,000
Speaker 1: a horrifying thought to think of ourselves as the ink roy.

503
00:34:21,520 --> 00:34:25,400
Speaker 1: So in imagining alien philosophy, you've got these convergions, who

504
00:34:25,440 --> 00:34:30,040
Speaker 1: are you know, have some amount of sufficient uh convergent

505
00:34:30,080 --> 00:34:33,080
Speaker 1: evolution with us there there's somewhat similar to how our

506
00:34:33,120 --> 00:34:37,400
Speaker 1: information processing works at least. Um, is there any reason

507
00:34:37,440 --> 00:34:41,400
Speaker 1: to assume that, even if conscious cognition exists in conversions,

508
00:34:41,520 --> 00:34:45,480
Speaker 1: that it would feel the same to them as conscious

509
00:34:45,520 --> 00:34:47,920
Speaker 1: cognition feels to us. I know, that's kind of a

510
00:34:47,960 --> 00:34:51,040
Speaker 1: strange question to ask, because you can't even be sure

511
00:34:51,560 --> 00:34:55,560
Speaker 1: that another person's you know, consciousness exists or feels the

512
00:34:55,600 --> 00:34:58,280
Speaker 1: same as yours. But we tend to assume that feeling

513
00:34:58,320 --> 00:35:01,759
Speaker 1: like a human, you know, if sort of like one thing.

514
00:35:02,000 --> 00:35:05,080
Speaker 1: Mostly we could be wrong about that, But is it

515
00:35:05,120 --> 00:35:09,760
Speaker 1: possible to imagine radically different subjectivity is not just radically

516
00:35:09,800 --> 00:35:13,360
Speaker 1: different behavior throughout the universe. I mean, I'd argue that

517
00:35:13,360 --> 00:35:15,279
Speaker 1: it's not impossible to them that, and I think it's

518
00:35:15,280 --> 00:35:17,640
Speaker 1: just a lot more complicated than than people would give

519
00:35:17,680 --> 00:35:19,719
Speaker 1: it credence. And I think all you have to do

520
00:35:19,840 --> 00:35:22,680
Speaker 1: is look at the human case to see that um

521
00:35:23,360 --> 00:35:25,680
Speaker 1: has to be the case. Just think of the difference

522
00:35:26,000 --> 00:35:31,720
Speaker 1: between different philosophers and the phenomenological tradition like Heidegger, Myrtle, Punty,

523
00:35:32,280 --> 00:35:38,279
Speaker 1: uh Sartraum, husserl Shoots Gatamer. I mean, if you look

524
00:35:38,400 --> 00:35:42,920
Speaker 1: at all these different philosophers and all the different interpretations

525
00:35:43,239 --> 00:35:49,839
Speaker 1: they've given of the fundamental nature of experience. I mean,

526
00:35:50,160 --> 00:35:54,360
Speaker 1: some cases are similar, they certainly share similar commitments, but

527
00:35:54,400 --> 00:36:01,160
Speaker 1: there's a wild variance in how human subjective experience is describd. So,

528
00:36:01,280 --> 00:36:07,040
Speaker 1: given that we have difficulty even pinpointing what it's like

529
00:36:07,160 --> 00:36:09,839
Speaker 1: to be a human, the notion of being able to

530
00:36:10,080 --> 00:36:13,239
Speaker 1: understand what it's like to be an alien, it's got

531
00:36:13,239 --> 00:36:17,080
Speaker 1: to be that much more difficult, And so one of

532
00:36:17,080 --> 00:36:19,799
Speaker 1: the things they try to argue in that paper is

533
00:36:19,840 --> 00:36:22,320
Speaker 1: that you really, even if you can't say what it

534
00:36:22,360 --> 00:36:25,799
Speaker 1: would be like, what you could say is what kinds

535
00:36:25,800 --> 00:36:28,840
Speaker 1: of information they'd have access to, and what kinds of

536
00:36:28,880 --> 00:36:33,040
Speaker 1: information they wouldn't have access to, and what kinds of

537
00:36:33,080 --> 00:36:39,520
Speaker 1: problems they potentially might into as the ability to see

538
00:36:39,560 --> 00:36:43,280
Speaker 1: their own neglect structure, to understand what it was their neglecting.

539
00:36:44,000 --> 00:36:47,239
Speaker 1: So to give a strange answer to your question, I mean,

540
00:36:47,239 --> 00:36:51,040
Speaker 1: I think you can you can say things about the

541
00:36:51,200 --> 00:36:56,600
Speaker 1: shape of alien experience, even if you can't say much

542
00:36:56,640 --> 00:37:01,799
Speaker 1: of anything about the quality of of that experience. Yeah.

543
00:37:01,880 --> 00:37:05,600
Speaker 1: One possible idea I had here was I was wondering

544
00:37:05,640 --> 00:37:07,839
Speaker 1: if you think it would make a difference in the

545
00:37:07,920 --> 00:37:11,279
Speaker 1: evolution of an alien philosophy if it occurred in a

546
00:37:11,360 --> 00:37:15,520
Speaker 1: species that subjectively just had much less of a self

547
00:37:15,680 --> 00:37:18,360
Speaker 1: world distinction than we have. You know, we think of

548
00:37:18,400 --> 00:37:23,600
Speaker 1: ourselves as in the universe rather than being the universe.

549
00:37:23,680 --> 00:37:26,080
Speaker 1: But of course we are the universe. The universe is

550
00:37:26,440 --> 00:37:29,040
Speaker 1: in a small part, embodied in us and in the

551
00:37:29,080 --> 00:37:33,360
Speaker 1: brains that generate our consciousness. Um, we we just don't

552
00:37:33,440 --> 00:37:36,319
Speaker 1: feel that way yet. There are you know, they're meditative

553
00:37:36,360 --> 00:37:39,960
Speaker 1: exercises like you can do meditation that's specifically aimed at

554
00:37:39,960 --> 00:37:42,200
Speaker 1: trying to get you into that state of mind where

555
00:37:42,200 --> 00:37:44,480
Speaker 1: you feel like you are the universe. You just are

556
00:37:44,560 --> 00:37:51,680
Speaker 1: the world you are experience and wat right, right apprehension exactly.

557
00:37:51,920 --> 00:37:54,600
Speaker 1: Uh So, I wonder if you know, if you imagine

558
00:37:54,640 --> 00:37:59,759
Speaker 1: an alien species that doesn't naturally possess this self world distinction,

559
00:38:00,120 --> 00:38:03,640
Speaker 1: just feels that it is the universe, could we imagine

560
00:38:03,640 --> 00:38:07,520
Speaker 1: it would generate a radically different type of ontology of

561
00:38:07,560 --> 00:38:10,000
Speaker 1: the universe, of what it means to be and all

562
00:38:10,040 --> 00:38:13,800
Speaker 1: of the socially derived philosophy, the meta ethics and everything

563
00:38:13,840 --> 00:38:16,040
Speaker 1: like that. Yeah, and I think this is I mean,

564
00:38:16,040 --> 00:38:19,040
Speaker 1: I think this is actually a fascinating question. I mean

565
00:38:19,040 --> 00:38:21,399
Speaker 1: I've I've cracked my skull open against it a couple

566
00:38:21,400 --> 00:38:25,719
Speaker 1: of times now. And um, I mean what I think

567
00:38:25,920 --> 00:38:29,080
Speaker 1: is the case? I think I think meta cognition it

568
00:38:29,120 --> 00:38:32,640
Speaker 1: doesn't matter where you are in the universe. Meta cognition

569
00:38:32,800 --> 00:38:37,360
Speaker 1: is expensive. And if meta cognition is expensive everywhere and

570
00:38:37,600 --> 00:38:41,040
Speaker 1: you go in the universe, um, it is going to

571
00:38:41,160 --> 00:38:44,920
Speaker 1: be hard, very very hard for an alien species to

572
00:38:45,239 --> 00:38:50,040
Speaker 1: to it its own continuity with its own environments. So

573
00:38:51,000 --> 00:38:54,720
Speaker 1: I mean, they're going to be stuck relying on simple

574
00:38:54,719 --> 00:38:58,359
Speaker 1: heuristics in some way, shape or form. And if they

575
00:38:58,480 --> 00:39:05,160
Speaker 1: don't develop the medicoc it of capacity to be intuitively deduce,

576
00:39:05,880 --> 00:39:10,800
Speaker 1: you know, the fractioning heuristic nature of their own metacognitive capacities,

577
00:39:11,320 --> 00:39:13,880
Speaker 1: they're going to be duped the same way we've been

578
00:39:13,960 --> 00:39:17,600
Speaker 1: duped into thinking that the information they're getting is sufficient

579
00:39:17,680 --> 00:39:23,600
Speaker 1: to draw conclusions. And I think about human philosophy, how

580
00:39:23,680 --> 00:39:26,360
Speaker 1: strange it is. I mean, we've been asking the same

581
00:39:26,440 --> 00:39:33,120
Speaker 1: bloody questions for thousands of years, thousands of years, no answers,

582
00:39:33,120 --> 00:39:38,719
Speaker 1: no answers. I mean, really that's madness, isn't it. I mean,

583
00:39:38,960 --> 00:39:42,520
Speaker 1: the same thing and expecting a different result. I mean,

584
00:39:42,719 --> 00:39:45,400
Speaker 1: I mean, I know each philosopher tweaks something along the

585
00:39:45,400 --> 00:39:47,600
Speaker 1: way and they think that tweak is going to give

586
00:39:47,640 --> 00:39:52,279
Speaker 1: them a different result. But but it really is. You know,

587
00:39:52,320 --> 00:39:54,799
Speaker 1: a paradigm for madness, if you if you think about

588
00:39:54,840 --> 00:40:00,520
Speaker 1: philosophy in those terms, traditional intentional philosophy for flection on

589
00:40:00,560 --> 00:40:07,360
Speaker 1: the soul um ah. I think that yes simply follows

590
00:40:07,880 --> 00:40:13,759
Speaker 1: from the biological expense of metacognition, so that you can

591
00:40:13,800 --> 00:40:19,880
Speaker 1: have an alien species realize their continuity with nature, but

592
00:40:20,280 --> 00:40:24,279
Speaker 1: there will be some point in their past where they

593
00:40:24,320 --> 00:40:28,200
Speaker 1: assume the same kinds are similar kinds of exceptionalism as

594
00:40:28,239 --> 00:40:31,480
Speaker 1: we have, where they think that they're actually something apart,

595
00:40:31,960 --> 00:40:38,000
Speaker 1: simply because they lack the metacognition ability to actually cognize

596
00:40:38,040 --> 00:40:44,040
Speaker 1: themselves as continuous with their environments. You see, I mean

597
00:40:44,040 --> 00:40:50,400
Speaker 1: think about choice for instance, there's just nothing incredively obvious interest.

598
00:40:51,880 --> 00:40:57,680
Speaker 1: But they're just physically impossible when you consider it in

599
00:40:57,920 --> 00:41:04,240
Speaker 1: light of causal cognition. Um. Like, the reason we believe

600
00:41:04,239 --> 00:41:05,880
Speaker 1: in choices is simply that we have no way of

601
00:41:05,880 --> 00:41:09,400
Speaker 1: intuiting any causal providence for anything that happens inside of

602
00:41:09,400 --> 00:41:12,239
Speaker 1: our beings. And that will be the case for any

603
00:41:12,280 --> 00:41:15,840
Speaker 1: alien species whatsoever. So they're gonna be blind to the

604
00:41:15,880 --> 00:41:21,680
Speaker 1: causal providence that holds them continuous with the greater circuit

605
00:41:21,680 --> 00:41:24,960
Speaker 1: of nature. So and I think you know that that

606
00:41:25,040 --> 00:41:28,560
Speaker 1: first move, the move that humans made, Oh well, we

607
00:41:28,640 --> 00:41:33,239
Speaker 1: must be something apart from nature. We must be something exceptional,

608
00:41:33,680 --> 00:41:38,520
Speaker 1: something outside, transcendent, anomalous, autonymous, what have you. I think

609
00:41:38,560 --> 00:41:44,960
Speaker 1: that is going to be something Any intelligent species, working

610
00:41:45,040 --> 00:41:49,480
Speaker 1: through the bugs of its metacognitive capacities, is going to

611
00:41:50,200 --> 00:41:54,160
Speaker 1: encounter awesome. Now, as as we've been talking about the

612
00:41:54,200 --> 00:41:58,960
Speaker 1: crash scenarios alien philosophy, Uh, it's interesting to to think

613
00:41:59,000 --> 00:42:03,080
Speaker 1: back on the books of the Second Apocalypse Saga and

614
00:42:03,120 --> 00:42:07,040
Speaker 1: you know, and and see how this is utilized throughout

615
00:42:07,080 --> 00:42:11,040
Speaker 1: the books because this fantasy series has been the playground

616
00:42:11,040 --> 00:42:14,440
Speaker 1: for your ideas for so long here and it's generally

617
00:42:14,440 --> 00:42:18,080
Speaker 1: classified as as fantasy. Yourself classified as fantasy. So I

618
00:42:18,120 --> 00:42:20,560
Speaker 1: wanted to ask in your in advance of your recent

619
00:42:20,760 --> 00:42:23,600
Speaker 1: UH A m A on Reddit, you stated quote, if

620
00:42:23,640 --> 00:42:26,799
Speaker 1: God is dead, then fantasy is his grave. Can you

621
00:42:26,840 --> 00:42:30,279
Speaker 1: expand on that for our audience? Um, yes, yes, sure,

622
00:42:30,600 --> 00:42:36,239
Speaker 1: I mean the m A organizers Um. Uh, they give

623
00:42:36,280 --> 00:42:38,160
Speaker 1: you a fact sheet. In the fact sheet, the first

624
00:42:38,160 --> 00:42:41,440
Speaker 1: thing the fact sheet recommends is that you come up

625
00:42:41,440 --> 00:42:45,239
Speaker 1: with some something jaunty and light you introduce your A

626
00:42:45,440 --> 00:42:50,160
Speaker 1: M A. And I'm just such a conturian first thing

627
00:42:50,200 --> 00:42:56,040
Speaker 1: that in my head and uh, but it was Joe

628
00:42:57,200 --> 00:43:02,279
Speaker 1: very serious. At the same time. It's serious insofar as

629
00:43:02,360 --> 00:43:05,160
Speaker 1: it makes a reference, of course to Nietzsa's famous claim

630
00:43:05,239 --> 00:43:08,520
Speaker 1: that God is dead, and that's usually taken as UH

631
00:43:09,160 --> 00:43:13,640
Speaker 1: an emblem for basically the way in which enlightenment, reason

632
00:43:14,280 --> 00:43:20,600
Speaker 1: collapses into nihilism. And uh so, in that sense that

633
00:43:20,640 --> 00:43:24,520
Speaker 1: claim is very serious. If God is dead, then fantasy

634
00:43:24,640 --> 00:43:28,120
Speaker 1: is his grave. Um. If you see the death of

635
00:43:28,160 --> 00:43:35,920
Speaker 1: God as the problem of nihilism, then fantasy actually becomes

636
00:43:35,960 --> 00:43:39,200
Speaker 1: the greatest place in the world to try to understand

637
00:43:39,360 --> 00:43:44,759
Speaker 1: what the role of nihilism in contemporary society is. Fantasy

638
00:43:45,120 --> 00:43:50,000
Speaker 1: worlds are fantasy worlds because they resemble scriptural scriptural worlds.

639
00:43:50,000 --> 00:43:52,840
Speaker 1: The more of your world looks like that a India

640
00:43:53,120 --> 00:43:59,080
Speaker 1: or biblical Israel or or Homeeric, the more readily your

641
00:43:59,120 --> 00:44:03,520
Speaker 1: world will be identify fight as fantasy. Why is that, Well,

642
00:44:04,160 --> 00:44:10,560
Speaker 1: in all worlds, meaning is objective, morality is objective. There's

643
00:44:10,600 --> 00:44:12,520
Speaker 1: a fact of the matter when it comes to right

644
00:44:12,600 --> 00:44:18,080
Speaker 1: or wrong. You know, um uh, intentions are objective. All

645
00:44:18,160 --> 00:44:24,520
Speaker 1: these things have objective existence, and that's what accused them

646
00:44:24,640 --> 00:44:29,160
Speaker 1: as being fantastic. Now that's for me, that's crazy. For me.

647
00:44:30,080 --> 00:44:34,640
Speaker 1: That makes fantasy the canary in the coal mine. Fantasy

648
00:44:34,760 --> 00:44:39,760
Speaker 1: is where we can actually see meaning die in our culture.

649
00:44:40,800 --> 00:44:47,359
Speaker 1: We see all these worlds that science has rendered factually irrelevant,

650
00:44:48,040 --> 00:44:52,239
Speaker 1: you know, recreated over and over and over again for

651
00:44:52,360 --> 00:44:58,640
Speaker 1: the enjoyment and edification of millions millions of readers worldwide,

652
00:44:59,719 --> 00:45:03,960
Speaker 1: and the um uh that statement is just simply meant

653
00:45:04,000 --> 00:45:07,440
Speaker 1: to encapsulate that that, you know, we can look at

654
00:45:07,480 --> 00:45:18,680
Speaker 1: fantasy not as a throwaway, escapist, culturally retrograde uh mode

655
00:45:18,800 --> 00:45:23,680
Speaker 1: of entertainment. You know, that's ideologically tram open, how many

656
00:45:23,680 --> 00:45:27,000
Speaker 1: waves we can look at. Fantasy is actually the very

657
00:45:27,080 --> 00:45:35,200
Speaker 1: cutting edge of where human thought, in nihilism, our own

658
00:45:35,600 --> 00:45:38,880
Speaker 1: the fact of our own material nature come into conflict.

659
00:45:39,280 --> 00:45:43,520
Speaker 1: Fantasy is the spark, you know, when when that flint

660
00:45:44,160 --> 00:45:47,759
Speaker 1: and that iron are struck. So Scott, if you see

661
00:45:47,800 --> 00:45:52,799
Speaker 1: fantasy embodying um some of the meaning structures that we

662
00:45:52,960 --> 00:45:55,400
Speaker 1: used to get from mythology and religion, I wonder if

663
00:45:55,480 --> 00:46:00,360
Speaker 1: you see a kind of parallelism in in modern asy

664
00:46:00,719 --> 00:46:05,400
Speaker 1: of the different types of meaning and ethical uh structures

665
00:46:05,400 --> 00:46:07,879
Speaker 1: that you would get from different ancient mythology. Is one

666
00:46:07,880 --> 00:46:12,240
Speaker 1: thing that I think of is like the mythological world

667
00:46:12,320 --> 00:46:15,080
Speaker 1: that has a virtue ethic versus the one that has

668
00:46:15,080 --> 00:46:18,040
Speaker 1: a moral ethic. I don't know if you might consider

669
00:46:18,080 --> 00:46:21,920
Speaker 1: this like Greek mythology versus Buddhism or something where wherein

670
00:46:22,040 --> 00:46:25,600
Speaker 1: one you have you know, an ethic that's about being great,

671
00:46:25,840 --> 00:46:28,440
Speaker 1: and then another one in ethic that's about being good.

672
00:46:28,520 --> 00:46:31,640
Speaker 1: Did you see this paralleled in modern fantasy, I mean

673
00:46:31,640 --> 00:46:37,120
Speaker 1: fantasy like any other fictional platform in which to explore ideas.

674
00:46:37,719 --> 00:46:41,760
Speaker 1: Um just really just sort of you know, UM rips

675
00:46:41,760 --> 00:46:43,920
Speaker 1: the windows out and he kicks the doors down, right.

676
00:46:44,000 --> 00:46:47,480
Speaker 1: I mean, you really can go almost any direction you want.

677
00:46:48,080 --> 00:46:53,920
Speaker 1: Stephen Shaviro, who's a uh fantastic cultural uh critic, uh

678
00:46:53,960 --> 00:46:57,439
Speaker 1: who teaches at Wayne State University. He has a book

679
00:46:57,480 --> 00:47:05,520
Speaker 1: called Discognition where he literally um argues that fiction is

680
00:47:06,760 --> 00:47:11,800
Speaker 1: or has become the primary platform for being able to

681
00:47:11,840 --> 00:47:15,920
Speaker 1: explore philosophical ideas. For this very reason, the fact that

682
00:47:15,960 --> 00:47:21,600
Speaker 1: you can actually contrast the virtue ethics to a more

683
00:47:22,520 --> 00:47:29,960
Speaker 1: authoritarian ethics, the fact that you can ah ask questions

684
00:47:30,000 --> 00:47:34,120
Speaker 1: like what is the meaning of life without it just

685
00:47:34,160 --> 00:47:39,719
Speaker 1: simply collapsing into a joke. Only what happen it's outside

686
00:47:39,760 --> 00:47:43,640
Speaker 1: of fiction, it seems, Um. I mean, either you think

687
00:47:43,640 --> 00:47:46,520
Speaker 1: of meaning of life? What part of the bookstore you

688
00:47:46,560 --> 00:47:49,319
Speaker 1: go to to discover the meaning of life? You don't

689
00:47:49,320 --> 00:47:50,960
Speaker 1: go to the science section, you don't put to the

690
00:47:50,960 --> 00:47:53,440
Speaker 1: philosophy section. You go to the new wage called section.

691
00:47:54,400 --> 00:48:02,560
Speaker 1: Um fiction gives you that freedom to actually show that no,

692
00:48:02,840 --> 00:48:07,279
Speaker 1: I don't care what your a priori intuitions tell you,

693
00:48:07,680 --> 00:48:11,839
Speaker 1: we can actually build a plausible narrative as to you know,

694
00:48:12,200 --> 00:48:18,000
Speaker 1: what would come of the depth of meaning for instance. Um,

695
00:48:18,040 --> 00:48:24,040
Speaker 1: it just provides a platform that allows you to blow

696
00:48:24,200 --> 00:48:31,400
Speaker 1: past all of these philosophical constraints and explore things without

697
00:48:32,000 --> 00:48:36,799
Speaker 1: having to worry about being lectured by pendance, you know,

698
00:48:36,960 --> 00:48:40,640
Speaker 1: on on your ignorance regarding to sort that. All right,

699
00:48:40,640 --> 00:48:42,480
Speaker 1: we're gonna take a quick break and when we come back,

700
00:48:42,520 --> 00:48:50,560
Speaker 1: we're gonna jump right back in to the conversation. Now, Scott,

701
00:48:50,600 --> 00:48:53,520
Speaker 1: you've you've mentioned that, among other works, Frank Herbert's done

702
00:48:53,760 --> 00:48:57,480
Speaker 1: influence your your fantasy fiction. What's your take on Frank's

703
00:48:57,600 --> 00:49:00,719
Speaker 1: run of Doom books and were there any essons there

704
00:49:00,760 --> 00:49:03,440
Speaker 1: that informed your own world building and approach to a

705
00:49:03,520 --> 00:49:07,759
Speaker 1: multi volume series. Yeah, and this is a very good question,

706
00:49:07,800 --> 00:49:11,040
Speaker 1: I mean, because it actually my my experience reading Dune

707
00:49:11,480 --> 00:49:16,920
Speaker 1: probably is one of the has had the biggest influence

708
00:49:17,080 --> 00:49:24,960
Speaker 1: on my UM discipline writing these books over over the

709
00:49:24,960 --> 00:49:30,080
Speaker 1: past decade. Um. I mean, so my experience reading Dune

710
00:49:30,200 --> 00:49:35,160
Speaker 1: was I read Dune blew me away, absolutely blew me away,

711
00:49:35,520 --> 00:49:37,360
Speaker 1: and so what do what do I do? I go

712
00:49:37,440 --> 00:49:39,799
Speaker 1: out and it buy Children at Dune. I quoted by

713
00:49:39,840 --> 00:49:45,240
Speaker 1: God Emperor in Dune Messiah and I read in order

714
00:49:45,680 --> 00:49:53,680
Speaker 1: and God Emperor okay, but he lost me on and yah,

715
00:49:54,239 --> 00:49:58,319
Speaker 1: And I could just feel that, Uh. I just had

716
00:49:58,320 --> 00:50:02,360
Speaker 1: a feeling that he had kind of lost focus. Uh

717
00:50:03,400 --> 00:50:07,840
Speaker 1: lost the spark that drove the original vision. And so

718
00:50:07,960 --> 00:50:11,360
Speaker 1: for me, reading Doone was sort of a process of

719
00:50:11,400 --> 00:50:14,920
Speaker 1: being disappointed in in Um what I thought was his

720
00:50:15,200 --> 00:50:18,439
Speaker 1: commitment to to the vision. And so when I set

721
00:50:18,480 --> 00:50:21,120
Speaker 1: out and started these books, I'll never forget. I mean

722
00:50:21,440 --> 00:50:24,080
Speaker 1: darkness that came before I had come out with Think

723
00:50:24,160 --> 00:50:26,800
Speaker 1: was two thousand four, two thousand three, and I found

724
00:50:26,840 --> 00:50:33,439
Speaker 1: myself having lunch with one of my idols, Uh as

725
00:50:33,680 --> 00:50:37,960
Speaker 1: a younger man. Anyways, Um guy K and we're on Uh.

726
00:50:38,560 --> 00:50:41,200
Speaker 1: We're in Greektown in Toronto, and he asked me about

727
00:50:41,280 --> 00:50:43,520
Speaker 1: my next book and I told him as a sequel,

728
00:50:43,880 --> 00:50:45,640
Speaker 1: and he said, well, how many sequels do you have planned?

729
00:50:45,680 --> 00:50:50,200
Speaker 1: And I said, well, I think nine and he literally

730
00:50:50,280 --> 00:50:58,080
Speaker 1: said the last thing. This is another multi volume epic fantasy.

731
00:50:59,360 --> 00:51:02,680
Speaker 1: And no, my my heart did not think to the

732
00:51:02,760 --> 00:51:06,040
Speaker 1: through the bottom of my shoe, I said, no, I

733
00:51:06,080 --> 00:51:10,280
Speaker 1: think that what the world really needs is a multi

734
00:51:10,360 --> 00:51:14,080
Speaker 1: volume ethics fantasy that does not lose sight of its

735
00:51:14,200 --> 00:51:21,480
Speaker 1: vision guide and hum. And so that's the thing I mean.

736
00:51:22,360 --> 00:51:24,440
Speaker 1: And I was a young writer writing The Prince of

737
00:51:24,480 --> 00:51:27,160
Speaker 1: Nothing and The Warrior Prophet, I mean, I was teaching

738
00:51:27,160 --> 00:51:31,439
Speaker 1: at the time, and uh, the thousand fol thought even

739
00:51:31,520 --> 00:51:35,320
Speaker 1: more so, I really felt the pressure to actually write

740
00:51:35,320 --> 00:51:40,560
Speaker 1: those books, um inside of my delivery dates. And uh um,

741
00:51:40,600 --> 00:51:43,400
Speaker 1: I think both those books actually suffer for it, and

742
00:51:43,440 --> 00:51:46,479
Speaker 1: I think the vision suffered for it. I still think

743
00:51:46,800 --> 00:51:49,360
Speaker 1: I still love the books, but I would love to

744
00:51:49,360 --> 00:51:52,560
Speaker 1: rewrite them as well. Um. Moving into The Aspect Emperor,

745
00:51:52,680 --> 00:51:56,600
Speaker 1: I decided, no, I mean that's a problem. I committed

746
00:51:56,640 --> 00:51:59,480
Speaker 1: to the vision in the very beginning, and that means

747
00:51:59,520 --> 00:52:01,560
Speaker 1: I just like the vision called the call the Shocks,

748
00:52:02,200 --> 00:52:05,600
Speaker 1: and so you know, with the judging Eye from the

749
00:52:05,600 --> 00:52:08,320
Speaker 1: White Luck Warrior, and then of course the final volume

750
00:52:08,360 --> 00:52:11,600
Speaker 1: of The Aspect Emperor having into two, that was just

751
00:52:11,680 --> 00:52:14,640
Speaker 1: exactly what had happened, you know. Rather than worry about

752
00:52:14,680 --> 00:52:17,160
Speaker 1: what my agent would say or what my editors would say,

753
00:52:17,360 --> 00:52:20,799
Speaker 1: and I hate to say it, my my readers, I

754
00:52:20,880 --> 00:52:24,600
Speaker 1: thought you know what, everyone will be better served if

755
00:52:24,760 --> 00:52:28,000
Speaker 1: the vision is better served, because really, that's what people

756
00:52:28,040 --> 00:52:31,280
Speaker 1: are signing on for. They want to follow this story,

757
00:52:31,600 --> 00:52:34,680
Speaker 1: one story all the way through to the conclusion. They

758
00:52:34,680 --> 00:52:37,080
Speaker 1: don't want it to turn into a different story. They

759
00:52:37,120 --> 00:52:40,160
Speaker 1: don't want it to suffer because of my you know,

760
00:52:40,360 --> 00:52:43,160
Speaker 1: I mean I spent ten thousand hours with these characters.

761
00:52:43,800 --> 00:52:47,440
Speaker 1: I hate them at times. You know, readers, readers spend

762
00:52:47,800 --> 00:52:50,359
Speaker 1: a few dozen hours with them, and they don't get

763
00:52:50,360 --> 00:52:54,800
Speaker 1: tired of them the way a writer does. And so, um,

764
00:52:54,840 --> 00:52:59,239
Speaker 1: really all along that that experience reading Dune is really

765
00:52:59,239 --> 00:53:02,799
Speaker 1: sort of informed my decision making. You know, if I'm

766
00:53:02,840 --> 00:53:06,000
Speaker 1: hating this character, I'll stop writing. I'm not going to

767
00:53:06,120 --> 00:53:08,560
Speaker 1: force it, right, I know, I love that character. I'm

768
00:53:08,600 --> 00:53:10,759
Speaker 1: just tired of that character right now. I'm not going

769
00:53:10,840 --> 00:53:14,080
Speaker 1: to invent a new character, right because I'd just be

770
00:53:14,120 --> 00:53:17,600
Speaker 1: freshening freshening things up for me, my writer, my readers,

771
00:53:17,680 --> 00:53:19,920
Speaker 1: they don't want a new character. They just want to

772
00:53:19,960 --> 00:53:22,840
Speaker 1: see what happens to this character, this beloved character or

773
00:53:22,880 --> 00:53:26,839
Speaker 1: hated character or what have you. And U um, yeah,

774
00:53:27,000 --> 00:53:30,680
Speaker 1: so my whole m o kind of became one of

775
00:53:30,800 --> 00:53:33,520
Speaker 1: sit back, let the story tell itself the way and

776
00:53:33,680 --> 00:53:36,120
Speaker 1: needs to be told, and I think that's part of

777
00:53:36,120 --> 00:53:41,400
Speaker 1: the reason why I just feel so supremely confident in

778
00:53:41,440 --> 00:53:45,000
Speaker 1: these final two books. I know these people who disagree,

779
00:53:45,040 --> 00:53:49,000
Speaker 1: there always is, but but I really feel like, I

780
00:53:49,040 --> 00:53:52,239
Speaker 1: really feel like I accomplished that the promise I made

781
00:53:52,239 --> 00:53:55,839
Speaker 1: to ay all those years back in Greek Camp, well,

782
00:53:55,960 --> 00:53:58,720
Speaker 1: I really enjoyed the most recent one, and I'm looking

783
00:53:58,960 --> 00:54:05,319
Speaker 1: forward very much to The Unholy Consult coming out the summer. Correct. Yes, yes, yes,

784
00:54:05,640 --> 00:54:08,680
Speaker 1: hopefully you agree with me. Hopefully you think it you

785
00:54:08,680 --> 00:54:11,719
Speaker 1: think it works. So the Rooky series, right, I mean

786
00:54:12,360 --> 00:54:15,680
Speaker 1: I was certainly. I always feel it's it's a risky

787
00:54:15,680 --> 00:54:18,640
Speaker 1: scenario reading one of your books, because I don't know

788
00:54:18,760 --> 00:54:21,480
Speaker 1: to what extent You're going to damage my psyche a

789
00:54:21,520 --> 00:54:24,399
Speaker 1: little bit, you know, or force me. There's so much

790
00:54:24,400 --> 00:54:28,719
Speaker 1: fantasy takes one out of oneself, you know, and uh,

791
00:54:28,760 --> 00:54:32,000
Speaker 1: and it serves as as at times just pure escapism,

792
00:54:32,080 --> 00:54:34,799
Speaker 1: but that your work always manages to sort of do

793
00:54:35,000 --> 00:54:37,239
Speaker 1: both at the same time. So I'm able to to

794
00:54:37,480 --> 00:54:41,719
Speaker 1: escape into a dark, rich imagined world, but then also

795
00:54:41,800 --> 00:54:45,400
Speaker 1: you're forcing me to ask, at times troubling questions about myself.

796
00:54:45,480 --> 00:54:49,279
Speaker 1: And about humanity in general. That's the goal. I mean,

797
00:54:49,280 --> 00:54:52,080
Speaker 1: that's just what you just said there. That's writer's gold.

798
00:54:53,640 --> 00:54:55,600
Speaker 1: That's what I'm aiming for. What I'm trying to always

799
00:54:55,640 --> 00:54:59,560
Speaker 1: trying to do, is to try to uh immerse and

800
00:55:00,160 --> 00:55:03,560
Speaker 1: and push out at the exact same time. That's stuff.

801
00:55:04,160 --> 00:55:05,959
Speaker 1: It doesn't work for a lot of readers. It's true.

802
00:55:06,560 --> 00:55:08,840
Speaker 1: Now you've mentioned in interviews before how you might have

803
00:55:08,840 --> 00:55:12,160
Speaker 1: written some aspects of neuropath differently if you've finished it

804
00:55:12,600 --> 00:55:15,520
Speaker 1: after the birth of your daughter. Has becoming a father

805
00:55:15,640 --> 00:55:19,160
Speaker 1: affected the arc of the Second Apocalypse saga? Um, well,

806
00:55:19,200 --> 00:55:23,680
Speaker 1: I certainly hope not. I mean through the Second Apocalypse saga. Uh.

807
00:55:24,239 --> 00:55:26,760
Speaker 1: The the idea came to me when I was seventeen

808
00:55:26,840 --> 00:55:31,080
Speaker 1: years old, the basic narrative idea, and it's actually remarkably unchanged.

809
00:55:31,200 --> 00:55:33,360
Speaker 1: I mean, it's given the fact that it's you know,

810
00:55:33,440 --> 00:55:38,920
Speaker 1: sort of soaked up so much of my education basically,

811
00:55:39,040 --> 00:55:42,160
Speaker 1: you know, all those years in university, you know, studying literature,

812
00:55:42,200 --> 00:55:46,759
Speaker 1: and then all those years studying uh history, philosophy, and

813
00:55:46,760 --> 00:55:52,440
Speaker 1: then all these years now soaking up cognitive science. Um,

814
00:55:52,480 --> 00:55:56,719
Speaker 1: it's still that that narrative which ends at the end

815
00:55:56,960 --> 00:56:01,360
Speaker 1: of the Unholy Consult is still the same. So I

816
00:56:01,440 --> 00:56:04,520
Speaker 1: even dug out for the for a couple of the

817
00:56:04,560 --> 00:56:07,719
Speaker 1: final scenes of Dann Holy Console. I even dug out

818
00:56:08,320 --> 00:56:13,200
Speaker 1: material that I had written almost twenty years ago to

819
00:56:13,360 --> 00:56:15,960
Speaker 1: rework to put into the end of the book, and

820
00:56:16,000 --> 00:56:17,959
Speaker 1: that was really exciting for me. I mean it, uh,

821
00:56:18,719 --> 00:56:23,319
Speaker 1: the fact that you know, when you aim at a destination,

822
00:56:23,360 --> 00:56:27,279
Speaker 1: at a far far away destination, um, and when the

823
00:56:27,360 --> 00:56:31,920
Speaker 1: journey is a sort of fraud with reversals in this direction,

824
00:56:32,160 --> 00:56:35,560
Speaker 1: as as this journey has been for me, um, when

825
00:56:35,600 --> 00:56:40,040
Speaker 1: you actually arrive at your destination, and sometimes wondered this

826
00:56:40,120 --> 00:56:42,440
Speaker 1: must be what a nuclear missile feels like when it

827
00:56:42,480 --> 00:56:48,000
Speaker 1: actually hits its target. I mean, it just doesn't seem

828
00:56:48,040 --> 00:56:50,320
Speaker 1: possible that you can actually arrive at the place you

829
00:56:50,360 --> 00:56:54,640
Speaker 1: set out to arrive. And Uh, I really feel as

830
00:56:54,640 --> 00:57:00,360
Speaker 1: though I've closed um the deal when it comes to

831
00:57:00,440 --> 00:57:04,000
Speaker 1: that first seventeen year old idea. So there's more to come.

832
00:57:04,040 --> 00:57:07,600
Speaker 1: There's more to come yet. But I'm interested in something

833
00:57:07,640 --> 00:57:10,640
Speaker 1: you mentioned briefly in the paper, which is Susan Schneider's

834
00:57:10,680 --> 00:57:15,120
Speaker 1: idea that if we encounter alien intelligence, it's less likely

835
00:57:15,280 --> 00:57:18,920
Speaker 1: to be biological intelligence and more likely to be machine

836
00:57:18,960 --> 00:57:21,800
Speaker 1: intelligence or or what you might call more broadly post

837
00:57:21,840 --> 00:57:26,680
Speaker 1: biological intelligence. UM. So I assumed, based on the way

838
00:57:26,680 --> 00:57:28,520
Speaker 1: you mentioned it that you agree with that. Would you

839
00:57:28,560 --> 00:57:31,080
Speaker 1: agree with that? And what do you think about it? Oh? Yeah, yeah, no,

840
00:57:31,200 --> 00:57:36,280
Speaker 1: I think I think the argument is pretty iron clad.

841
00:57:36,400 --> 00:57:38,600
Speaker 1: I mean, if you just look at where we stand

842
00:57:39,120 --> 00:57:42,360
Speaker 1: in terms of our ability to travel between the stars,

843
00:57:43,040 --> 00:57:46,040
Speaker 1: and where we stand in terms of our ability to

844
00:57:46,760 --> 00:57:55,800
Speaker 1: manipulate our biology and uh basically offload um cognition onto

845
00:57:57,080 --> 00:58:03,680
Speaker 1: our Machini artifacts, I think it seems pretty clear that

846
00:58:03,840 --> 00:58:10,520
Speaker 1: the transition from biology to post biology is actually something

847
00:58:10,560 --> 00:58:18,680
Speaker 1: that becomes more technically feasible um earlier than interstellar travel.

848
00:58:19,160 --> 00:58:21,160
Speaker 1: Another question that that comes to mind, and this might

849
00:58:21,200 --> 00:58:24,520
Speaker 1: be just two specific and I'm, you know, tugging at

850
00:58:24,600 --> 00:58:28,480
Speaker 1: something that's supposed to remain mysterious. But there's a there's

851
00:58:28,520 --> 00:58:31,400
Speaker 1: a scene in I believe it's The Judging I where

852
00:58:31,640 --> 00:58:34,800
Speaker 1: the characters are walking through the ruins of the non men,

853
00:58:35,440 --> 00:58:38,919
Speaker 1: and it's in and and you do a wonderful job

854
00:58:38,960 --> 00:58:42,840
Speaker 1: just explaining the their artistic style, their their use of sculpture.

855
00:58:43,240 --> 00:58:47,160
Speaker 1: And I believe it's mentioned that the non men cannot

856
00:58:47,440 --> 00:58:51,480
Speaker 1: see paintings UH, and that one of the reasons they

857
00:58:51,880 --> 00:58:55,680
Speaker 1: they depend on sculpture. UM. Can you elaborate on that

858
00:58:55,760 --> 00:58:57,240
Speaker 1: at all? Or is that meant to be sort of

859
00:58:57,280 --> 00:59:01,960
Speaker 1: a mysterious cipher You always want to distinguish your your

860
00:59:02,080 --> 00:59:07,560
Speaker 1: various UH races and species that you create in UH

861
00:59:07,920 --> 00:59:12,720
Speaker 1: specul fiction and UM. This notion of non men not

862
00:59:12,760 --> 00:59:15,840
Speaker 1: being able to see visual two dimensional visual representations is

863
00:59:16,680 --> 00:59:20,400
Speaker 1: sort of like a textured textural detail along those lines,

864
00:59:20,880 --> 00:59:24,040
Speaker 1: But it actually does have a rationale. I me the

865
00:59:24,080 --> 00:59:29,200
Speaker 1: idea is that we just think of the cavemen in

866
00:59:29,480 --> 00:59:37,400
Speaker 1: Chauvais in France actually drawing you know, their uh, charcoal

867
00:59:37,640 --> 00:59:41,040
Speaker 1: stained fingers across the cave wall for the first time

868
00:59:41,880 --> 00:59:44,880
Speaker 1: and realizing you can see shape in that in the

869
00:59:44,880 --> 00:59:49,160
Speaker 1: experiment right turns out for umans we can actually see

870
00:59:49,240 --> 00:59:56,120
Speaker 1: horses and bison and figures of humans. UH. Given very

871
00:59:56,280 --> 01:00:00,400
Speaker 1: very small amount of visual information, finger coverage in charcoal

872
01:00:01,360 --> 01:00:04,400
Speaker 1: dragged across the cave wall is enough for us to

873
01:00:04,400 --> 01:00:07,960
Speaker 1: be able to recognize a lion or a horse. UM.

874
01:00:08,400 --> 01:00:11,480
Speaker 1: Famous horses of Chauveis are are a wonderful example of

875
01:00:12,520 --> 01:00:16,360
Speaker 1: UM for non men. Their ability you know, to cue

876
01:00:17,880 --> 01:00:22,120
Speaker 1: demission of scenes. UM just simply requires a bit more information,

877
01:00:22,400 --> 01:00:26,840
Speaker 1: in particular requires um death information so they can see

878
01:00:26,880 --> 01:00:32,400
Speaker 1: representation the way weekend. They just have difficulty with two

879
01:00:32,400 --> 01:00:38,120
Speaker 1: dimensions just simply because those the amount of information that

880
01:00:38,320 --> 01:00:42,440
Speaker 1: is given in a two dimensional representation comp isn't it

881
01:00:42,560 --> 01:00:47,120
Speaker 1: enough to actually cue the cognitive systems involved in recognizing

882
01:00:47,280 --> 01:00:52,320
Speaker 1: horses and tigers and what have you. So so there's

883
01:00:53,240 --> 01:00:56,160
Speaker 1: a kind of that. I mean, it's just one of

884
01:00:56,240 --> 01:00:58,840
Speaker 1: many ways in which you know, my blind brain theory,

885
01:00:59,760 --> 01:01:05,760
Speaker 1: uh uh um has sort of nuance the background and

886
01:01:05,880 --> 01:01:09,120
Speaker 1: the landscape of of the novels and the blind brain theory.

887
01:01:09,720 --> 01:01:11,800
Speaker 1: I don't know if you want to elaborate here, but

888
01:01:11,840 --> 01:01:13,840
Speaker 1: this is basically the idea of getting down to the

889
01:01:14,240 --> 01:01:16,640
Speaker 1: idea that the brain cannot perceive itself and that's one

890
01:01:16,680 --> 01:01:20,320
Speaker 1: of the big stumbling blocks to understanding ourselves in our

891
01:01:20,320 --> 01:01:24,600
Speaker 1: place in the world. Right, Yeah, exactly. It's just basically

892
01:01:25,200 --> 01:01:30,080
Speaker 1: the description I gave earlier, this notion of of meta

893
01:01:30,160 --> 01:01:34,560
Speaker 1: cognition being largely almost utterly blind as to the brain

894
01:01:34,640 --> 01:01:39,400
Speaker 1: zone operations and UM, and more importantly being blind to

895
01:01:39,520 --> 01:01:42,760
Speaker 1: that blindness and so being convinced that it actually can

896
01:01:42,840 --> 01:01:47,240
Speaker 1: see its own operations. And then that's the explanation for why,

897
01:01:47,760 --> 01:01:51,600
Speaker 1: you know, we have this madness called philosophy where we

898
01:01:51,680 --> 01:01:55,000
Speaker 1: simply asked the same questions over and over again, assuming

899
01:01:55,000 --> 01:01:58,840
Speaker 1: there's answers and during their proves I know in past

900
01:01:58,880 --> 01:02:02,640
Speaker 1: interviews you've you've referred to the ending of Neuropath, which

901
01:02:02,880 --> 01:02:05,160
Speaker 1: no spoilers for anyone, but it's a it's a particularly

902
01:02:05,200 --> 01:02:08,600
Speaker 1: bleak ending in many ways. And you've you've you said

903
01:02:08,640 --> 01:02:11,160
Speaker 1: that you might have written that differently if you had

904
01:02:11,160 --> 01:02:14,040
Speaker 1: written it after the birth of your daughter. Yeah, I

905
01:02:14,080 --> 01:02:17,320
Speaker 1: almost certainly would have written it differently, almost certainly would have.

906
01:02:18,200 --> 01:02:21,040
Speaker 1: It's a hard book to read it. I mean I

907
01:02:21,080 --> 01:02:23,680
Speaker 1: had a fan like I don't recommend the book. Actually,

908
01:02:23,680 --> 01:02:26,720
Speaker 1: I've stopped recommending the book to people. I've had good

909
01:02:26,720 --> 01:02:29,320
Speaker 1: friends email me, you know, give waited a couple of

910
01:02:29,360 --> 01:02:31,920
Speaker 1: years before reading the book and read the book, and

911
01:02:31,960 --> 01:02:34,400
Speaker 1: they basically said, I wish I hadn't read this book.

912
01:02:35,160 --> 01:02:39,520
Speaker 1: I've been feeling depressed for weeks. I found it at

913
01:02:39,560 --> 01:02:44,000
Speaker 1: the depressing but fulfilling reading. Um. I do occasionally recommend

914
01:02:44,000 --> 01:02:46,640
Speaker 1: it to people who I think you gave me a copy.

915
01:02:46,760 --> 01:02:52,200
Speaker 1: Rob to do now the speaking of parenthood and dark stories. Uh.

916
01:02:52,600 --> 01:02:54,600
Speaker 1: I assume reading plays a big role in your household.

917
01:02:55,400 --> 01:02:58,520
Speaker 1: What's the darkest children's book you've found yourself reading to

918
01:02:58,600 --> 01:03:01,840
Speaker 1: your daughter? Uh? In, is there a particular genre book

919
01:03:02,000 --> 01:03:04,880
Speaker 1: you're looking forward to being able to read with her? Well,

920
01:03:05,000 --> 01:03:06,920
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm looking forward to being able to read

921
01:03:06,920 --> 01:03:09,120
Speaker 1: The Hobbit with her. I mean The Hobbit was a

922
01:03:09,560 --> 01:03:14,480
Speaker 1: watership read for me, and uh, the idea of actually

923
01:03:14,480 --> 01:03:16,440
Speaker 1: being able to share that with my daughter makes me

924
01:03:16,440 --> 01:03:19,600
Speaker 1: feel giddy. I mean, it's crazy about with the balloons

925
01:03:19,600 --> 01:03:23,800
Speaker 1: and streamers up or something like that. But it's a

926
01:03:23,800 --> 01:03:27,840
Speaker 1: pretty dark book. But I mean all the all the

927
01:03:27,920 --> 01:03:30,960
Speaker 1: other's grown fairy tales, mother Goose fairy tales. I mean,

928
01:03:30,960 --> 01:03:33,640
Speaker 1: we have um a couple of collections and I read

929
01:03:33,680 --> 01:03:36,360
Speaker 1: them to my daughter, and my wife would prefer that

930
01:03:36,440 --> 01:03:39,240
Speaker 1: I not read them, just simply because they're so strange

931
01:03:39,440 --> 01:03:42,960
Speaker 1: and uh and violent, right, I mean, Hunsel and Gretel,

932
01:03:43,680 --> 01:03:51,480
Speaker 1: Holy moly, what a story that is. And uh uh,

933
01:03:51,800 --> 01:03:56,080
Speaker 1: I worry that as a culture, we're really we're really

934
01:03:56,120 --> 01:04:02,600
Speaker 1: losing faith in our children's ability to deal with darkness

935
01:04:02,840 --> 01:04:07,000
Speaker 1: and unsettling thoughts. And I actually think that that's a,

936
01:04:07,680 --> 01:04:12,040
Speaker 1: that's a huge social problem moving forward. I remember yearning

937
01:04:12,120 --> 01:04:13,640
Speaker 1: for that kind of stuff when I was a kid.

938
01:04:13,680 --> 01:04:16,120
Speaker 1: I remember when I was a little kid, I wanted

939
01:04:16,320 --> 01:04:20,400
Speaker 1: more dark. I was like not satisfied with how dark

940
01:04:20,440 --> 01:04:23,560
Speaker 1: and disturbing and weird the children's stories I was supplied with.

941
01:04:23,640 --> 01:04:27,600
Speaker 1: Were asked me what my favorite Bible story is? What

942
01:04:27,800 --> 01:04:33,400
Speaker 1: is your favorite Bible story? Sodom and God mora? I

943
01:04:33,520 --> 01:04:38,480
Speaker 1: just thought that was the coolest story ever. I mean, um,

944
01:04:39,280 --> 01:04:43,960
Speaker 1: obviously it's not a cool story at all. Well yeah,

945
01:04:43,960 --> 01:04:47,240
Speaker 1: and plus they have these illustrated a daughters seducing him

946
01:04:47,240 --> 01:04:49,560
Speaker 1: in the cave afterwards. I mean to sticks down right

947
01:04:49,640 --> 01:04:53,040
Speaker 1: creepy story. But those are the kinds of things I liked,

948
01:04:53,080 --> 01:04:56,120
Speaker 1: And I mean I grew up in religious households. Those

949
01:04:56,160 --> 01:05:02,120
Speaker 1: are the things that I caught my attention held it alright.

950
01:05:02,160 --> 01:05:04,240
Speaker 1: So one last question here, and this is just an

951
01:05:04,240 --> 01:05:08,080
Speaker 1: idol curiosity here. So I've long wondered if a Wrong

952
01:05:08,160 --> 01:05:11,600
Speaker 1: and the Rocks the last living in Karoa in your books?

953
01:05:11,920 --> 01:05:14,280
Speaker 1: Are they at all a wink at Kang and Kodos

954
01:05:14,280 --> 01:05:16,920
Speaker 1: on the Simpsons, Not that they have anything to do

955
01:05:17,040 --> 01:05:19,160
Speaker 1: with each other except the fact that there are pairs

956
01:05:19,160 --> 01:05:24,960
Speaker 1: of aliens. Yeah, yeah, no they're not. But it's pretty

957
01:05:25,200 --> 01:05:32,320
Speaker 1: hard to move forward. Thanks you that a little piece

958
01:05:32,320 --> 01:05:37,560
Speaker 1: of pollution there, and mean, well, maybe it just changes

959
01:05:37,600 --> 01:05:41,960
Speaker 1: the Simpsons. It elevates the Simpsons rather than Yeah, as

960
01:05:42,000 --> 01:05:45,520
Speaker 1: if Simpsons is the only immovable object in the universe.

961
01:05:45,560 --> 01:05:52,080
Speaker 1: I think it doesn't in anyways. It's funny like I

962
01:05:52,160 --> 01:05:57,200
Speaker 1: stopped reading um uh messageward banter on my books and stuff.

963
01:05:57,640 --> 01:06:00,680
Speaker 1: It's just just simply um to keep too late clean.

964
01:06:01,080 --> 01:06:04,320
Speaker 1: I just find you know, people, people will so will

965
01:06:04,480 --> 01:06:06,880
Speaker 1: mention something to you and it'll be like, hey, that's

966
01:06:06,880 --> 01:06:14,600
Speaker 1: a great bloody idea, actually better than the idea, and uh,

967
01:06:15,320 --> 01:06:17,959
Speaker 1: I mean it may feel that way. Your own idea

968
01:06:18,040 --> 01:06:21,560
Speaker 1: is always feel old to me, right, Um. I just

969
01:06:21,680 --> 01:06:25,160
Speaker 1: try to shelter myself from that a bit so I

970
01:06:25,200 --> 01:06:28,640
Speaker 1: don't get too much interference when it comes to following

971
01:06:28,640 --> 01:06:30,920
Speaker 1: through the original vision that I went on and on about.

972
01:06:31,960 --> 01:06:33,880
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I can imagine where you definitely want to

973
01:06:33,880 --> 01:06:37,000
Speaker 1: plow ahead as much as possible towards that original vision

974
01:06:37,040 --> 01:06:41,560
Speaker 1: without polluting it in any way. Basically interaction. Yeah, I

975
01:06:41,560 --> 01:06:43,720
Speaker 1: mean the big thing is is like I say, you

976
01:06:43,760 --> 01:06:46,600
Speaker 1: spend ten thousand hours with these characters and this narrative

977
01:06:46,640 --> 01:06:52,040
Speaker 1: and stuff, and the tendency is to you make it broke, right.

978
01:06:52,120 --> 01:06:54,480
Speaker 1: I Mean, there's just so many ways in which an

979
01:06:54,480 --> 01:06:59,240
Speaker 1: author's exhaustion with the project ends up creeping into that project.

980
01:06:59,800 --> 01:07:02,560
Speaker 1: And why For me, so much of it just comes

981
01:07:02,600 --> 01:07:07,320
Speaker 1: down to U being mindful of my own exhaustion, I mean,

982
01:07:07,320 --> 01:07:10,480
Speaker 1: how I feel about my own material, and you know,

983
01:07:10,640 --> 01:07:13,880
Speaker 1: making sure I'm in the right place while I'm working

984
01:07:13,920 --> 01:07:17,720
Speaker 1: on the books so that the books actually express, you know,

985
01:07:17,760 --> 01:07:19,959
Speaker 1: what it does I wantcome to. Well, on that note,

986
01:07:20,080 --> 01:07:23,160
Speaker 1: thanks again for chatting with us, for answering our questions.

987
01:07:23,720 --> 01:07:27,000
Speaker 1: Your books are all available right now, the all the

988
01:07:27,040 --> 01:07:31,120
Speaker 1: books in the Second Apocalypse Saga, Disciple of the Dog Neuropath,

989
01:07:31,480 --> 01:07:33,320
Speaker 1: you know, for the Brave I guess based on our

990
01:07:33,360 --> 01:07:37,160
Speaker 1: discussions of it here, and the Unholy Consult. The latest

991
01:07:37,160 --> 01:07:40,880
Speaker 1: book in the Second Apocalypse Saga coming out this summer.

992
01:07:41,040 --> 01:07:46,280
Speaker 1: This summer. Yeah, and it's the culmination of what feels

993
01:07:46,320 --> 01:07:50,000
Speaker 1: like a lifelong quest for me now so basically uh

994
01:07:50,440 --> 01:07:56,400
Speaker 1: adolescent narrative that I've managed to pursue through you know,

995
01:07:56,720 --> 01:08:02,600
Speaker 1: graduate degrees and job changes. Strangely enough, the world, the

996
01:08:02,640 --> 01:08:06,959
Speaker 1: world just keeps trying to make my horrific vision come true.

997
01:08:07,000 --> 01:08:12,080
Speaker 1: So it feels like it's only become more relevant um

998
01:08:12,160 --> 01:08:14,800
Speaker 1: now than than it was back at the turn of

999
01:08:14,840 --> 01:08:18,519
Speaker 1: the millennium when I first got serious about publishing. And

1000
01:08:18,720 --> 01:08:20,559
Speaker 1: if anyone went out there wants to follow you, you're

1001
01:08:20,720 --> 01:08:23,360
Speaker 1: you're on social media, but also your blog Three Pound

1002
01:08:23,439 --> 01:08:26,120
Speaker 1: Brain correct is is a great way to sort of

1003
01:08:26,200 --> 01:08:31,000
Speaker 1: keep up with your regularly plice to to pester me

1004
01:08:31,120 --> 01:08:34,840
Speaker 1: with with questions and whatnot, or just simply shoot shoot

1005
01:08:34,840 --> 01:08:36,719
Speaker 1: me an email. You'll find my email on my blog.

1006
01:08:37,680 --> 01:08:41,720
Speaker 1: But just google three Pound Brain and Baker and you'll

1007
01:08:41,760 --> 01:08:47,400
Speaker 1: you'll find yourself at my profane doorstep soon enough. All right,

1008
01:08:47,479 --> 01:08:53,960
Speaker 1: Thanks Scott, Thanks Scott, Thank you guys. So there you

1009
01:08:54,000 --> 01:08:56,280
Speaker 1: have it. Thanks again to our Scott Baker for taking

1010
01:08:56,320 --> 01:08:58,200
Speaker 1: time out of his day to chat with us about

1011
01:08:58,200 --> 01:09:01,400
Speaker 1: alien philosophy and his dark fantasy works. It was really

1012
01:09:01,880 --> 01:09:05,160
Speaker 1: a treat for me to finally chat with our Scott

1013
01:09:05,200 --> 01:09:07,880
Speaker 1: Baker throw out a few questions here and there. I

1014
01:09:07,960 --> 01:09:11,080
Speaker 1: tried to limit my geeky questions in this interview, but

1015
01:09:11,160 --> 01:09:13,559
Speaker 1: I worked in one or two there again. The first

1016
01:09:13,560 --> 01:09:15,840
Speaker 1: six books in the Second Apocalypse Saga are out there,

1017
01:09:15,960 --> 01:09:19,559
Speaker 1: and the next one, The Unholy Consult, comes out July

1018
01:09:19,680 --> 01:09:23,120
Speaker 1: eleven from Overlook Press. If you wanna learn more about

1019
01:09:23,120 --> 01:09:26,240
Speaker 1: our Scott Baker and follow him, his blog A three

1020
01:09:26,240 --> 01:09:30,080
Speaker 1: Pound Brain is our s Baker dot WordPress dot com.

1021
01:09:30,439 --> 01:09:33,519
Speaker 1: He's also online our Scott Baker dot com and if

1022
01:09:33,560 --> 01:09:35,680
Speaker 1: you want to follow him on Twitter. He is the

1023
01:09:35,720 --> 01:09:39,160
Speaker 1: Devil's Chirp. That's just one word, of course, the Devil's chirp.

1024
01:09:39,640 --> 01:09:41,559
Speaker 1: And finally, I want to drive him again that one

1025
01:09:41,560 --> 01:09:43,400
Speaker 1: of the things that I really love about his work

1026
01:09:43,479 --> 01:09:46,559
Speaker 1: is that I'm able to, on one hand, escape into

1027
01:09:46,720 --> 01:09:50,680
Speaker 1: just this this wonderful dark fantasy world with all of

1028
01:09:50,680 --> 01:09:53,080
Speaker 1: its magic and intrigue, all of it just just so

1029
01:09:53,600 --> 01:09:57,080
Speaker 1: perfectly created for the reader. And then at the same

1030
01:09:57,120 --> 01:09:59,960
Speaker 1: time he's throwing in all of these, uh, these thought

1031
01:10:00,080 --> 01:10:04,400
Speaker 1: provoking notions about human experience and identity, motivation and cognition.

1032
01:10:04,800 --> 01:10:07,519
Speaker 1: It really, you know, challenges you and and and forces

1033
01:10:07,560 --> 01:10:10,439
Speaker 1: you to to to look hard into the mirror. And

1034
01:10:10,479 --> 01:10:12,680
Speaker 1: I wanted to just share one more quick quote from him.

1035
01:10:12,720 --> 01:10:15,040
Speaker 1: This is from his book The Judging I uh that's

1036
01:10:15,040 --> 01:10:18,000
Speaker 1: in the Dark the Second Apocalypse saga. He says, I

1037
01:10:18,040 --> 01:10:21,120
Speaker 1: remember asking a wise man once, why do men fear

1038
01:10:21,160 --> 01:10:24,599
Speaker 1: the dark? Because darkness, he told me, is ignorance made visible.

1039
01:10:24,960 --> 01:10:27,960
Speaker 1: And to men despies ignorance, I asked, no, he said,

1040
01:10:28,000 --> 01:10:31,439
Speaker 1: they prized it above all things, all things, but only

1041
01:10:31,520 --> 01:10:35,759
Speaker 1: so long as it remains invisible. All right, and uh again.

1042
01:10:35,760 --> 01:10:37,960
Speaker 1: We'll throw all those links on the landing page for

1043
01:10:38,000 --> 01:10:40,440
Speaker 1: this episode at stuff to Blow your Mind dot com.

1044
01:10:40,479 --> 01:10:42,479
Speaker 1: And if you want to check out more of our work,

1045
01:10:42,720 --> 01:10:44,960
Speaker 1: that's where you'll also find it. You'll find blog posts,

1046
01:10:44,960 --> 01:10:47,400
Speaker 1: you'll find podcasts, you'll find videos, links out to our

1047
01:10:47,479 --> 01:10:51,320
Speaker 1: various social media accounts such as Facebook, Twitter, Tumbler, Instagram.

1048
01:10:51,479 --> 01:10:53,360
Speaker 1: We're on all those things. And if you want to

1049
01:10:53,400 --> 01:10:56,080
Speaker 1: make your ignorance visible to us, you can email us

1050
01:10:56,080 --> 01:11:09,360
Speaker 1: at blow the Mind at how stuff works dot com

1051
01:11:09,400 --> 01:11:11,960
Speaker 1: for more on this and thousands of other topics. Isn't

1052
01:11:11,960 --> 01:11:24,760
Speaker 1: how stuff works dot com? They believe the differ