July 11, 2025 • 64 mins
Are we living in a simulation? What's the future of AI? How can humans understand the past, present, and future of the universe -- assuming, of course, that time exists? In this interview segment, Ben, Matt and Noel welcome special guest Dr. Jorge Cham, the creator of the new hit podcast ScienceStuff, and pick his brain about some of the biggest questions in all of human civilization.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn this stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of iHeart Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt,
my name is Noal.
Speaker 3 (00:29):
They call me Ben. We're joined as always with our
super producer Dylan the Tennessee pal Fagan. Most importantly, you
are you. You are here. That makes this the stuff
they don't want you to know. And guys, you know
it's been a thesis of our show for quite some
time that history and the present and the future, these
(00:52):
are riddled with unexplained events, questions that are left unanswered.
And we're in a very exciting time in civilization right
There are dangers that are unprecedented, there are questions that
have never been addressed, and at the same time, there
are astonishing breakthroughs in almost every field of science imaginable.
(01:16):
And we got together off air, as we do, and
we said, we've got a lot of questions about the
world of science. Who's the guy who could answer these
for us, or who is the genius nice enough to
humor us with questions about simulation theory AI, regrowing limbs,
(01:37):
interstellar objects, everything from the past and the way we
reevaluate it to the questions and the big breakthroughs of
the modern day. So with that we do have good news.
We found a guy to talk to us. We proudly
introduce you to the author, the engineer, the cartoonist, the roboticist,
(02:01):
the podcaster, Fello Georgia tech alum by the way, all
around science expert or Hey cham or Hey, thank you
so much for joining us today.
Speaker 4 (02:10):
Man, Hello, Hello, so happy to be here. Thanks for
having me on your show and calling me a genius.
That's probably overrated.
Speaker 5 (02:18):
No, that's something.
Speaker 6 (02:20):
A genius is a self deprecating genius.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Jorge is also an author you can check out Out
of your Mind right now and in book form. I'm
looking at a hardcover. It looks amazing, written with Dwayne Godwin.
Is that correct?
Speaker 4 (02:36):
Yeah, Duyne Godwin. He's a neuroscientist m M and dean
of a graduate studies at wake Forest University. So he's
a pretty knowledgeable guy.
Speaker 3 (02:45):
And we're big fans of your comic series PhD as well.
We're going to get into some of that. You may
recognize Orgey as the co creator and host of Daniel
and Jorge Explained the Universe, as well as your newest
podcast project, Science Stuff. Could you tell us a little
(03:05):
bit about your background and your own words and what
led you to Science Stuff.
Speaker 5 (03:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (03:11):
So I have a PhD in engineering in robotics actually
from Stanford University. But then I decided to become a cartoonist,
which is still something of a concern to my parents.
So my career took a little bit of a creative
turn there. I've done comics, I've done movies, I've done
(03:32):
TV show and my latest and books as well nonfiction books.
And my latest is this podcast with iHeart called Science
Stuff Amazing. Yeah, yeah, where we answer all kinds of
fascinating questions about science for anyone.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
And look, we're some of the original stuff guys over
here with one of these weird little stuff shows. We
are so excited that the format you've chosen for Science
Stuff includes interviews, includes all sorts of different explorations that
I don't want to downplay just conversational style shows, but
you are really putting in the work to bring in
(04:09):
other voices and explore things to their fullest. I really
love it.
Speaker 4 (04:14):
Yeah, thanks, you know, I basically have no rules on
the show. You know, whatever it takes to best explain
the whatever question we're trying to answer. You know, if
we find an expert and he's amazing and engaging or
she's amazing and engaging throughout, then that's what you'll hear.
But if it's better for me to like go to
a quantum computer lab and have you hear what a
(04:34):
quantum computer sounds like, that's that's what we'll get amazing.
Speaker 3 (04:38):
And you also, I've got to say, you're also super
into self experimentation when appropriate. I'm thinking specifically about the
hypnosis episode.
Speaker 4 (04:49):
Yeah, yeah, I try to make it as you know, experiential,
experiential as possible.
Speaker 5 (04:55):
That's a word. Yeah, I should know that.
Speaker 4 (04:57):
And can I you know, take the listener long into
whatever topic we're doing. So I did one where I
got hypnotized. I went into the computer lab. They had
quantum computers. I'm doing one coming up where we're testing
whether frog meat really tastes like chicken.
Speaker 7 (05:14):
WHOA, I'm sorry, I gotta quickly double back hypnotized. So
how did did it take? How did that go for you?
And what are your thoughts on that? From a scientific perspective.
Speaker 4 (05:24):
Yes, super fascinating. You know, I think what we all
think of hypnotism when we hear the word hypnotism is
this kind of like mystical or hoaxy, kind of hokey,
you know, entrancing people. But nowadays what people call hypnotism
is more like therapy, you know, like guided meditation, kind
of guided therapy really kind of getting you into your
(05:47):
thoughts and getting you to use your imagination to really
kind of basically simulate your life or simulate different situations
so you can get better perspective on.
Speaker 3 (05:56):
It, to live in a simulation. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (06:00):
Yeah, that's that's how they describe it.
Speaker 4 (06:01):
Yeah, that's how they describe ith.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Can we go that route?
Speaker 5 (06:07):
Guys?
Speaker 2 (06:07):
Can we go ahead and jump off that cliff.
Speaker 5 (06:13):
Or not?
Speaker 4 (06:14):
It feels like we're tittering on the brink already.
Speaker 8 (06:16):
Okay, So, so for years, the better part of a decade,
we have been fascinated with the concept of simulation theory
or hey, could you explain just in the brief baseline
what people mean when they say simulation theory.
Speaker 4 (06:34):
Yeah, Basically, it's the idea that we're not really really real,
like you're not real biological animals with brains. We're actually
just characters in a video game. So that's the basic idea.
We're all just kind of like, uh, non player characters NPCs,
and in some sort of computer program, maybe run by
some alien or advanced human civilization in the future, where
(06:56):
they have a giant computer the size of the planet maybe,
and in this computer they're simulating artificial beings, and the
idea is that maybe we're some of those artificial beings.
We're not real we're not real people, we're actually just
computer programs.
Speaker 7 (07:10):
Well, and this sounds a little out there when you
put it that way, but there's some incredibly smart people
that go all in for this, right for sure?
Speaker 2 (07:17):
For sure.
Speaker 4 (07:18):
Yeah, I think Elon Musk is pretty famous. Not our
favorite guy as for some people these days, but he's
pretty famous as being sort of all in on this theory.
Anybody else really, Yeah, Like Neil de Grassy Tyson, he's
on records saying like, oh, this is pretty This is
a pretty compelling argument for the idea that we are
(07:39):
in a simulation, and I can't think of an argument
against it.
Speaker 5 (07:43):
So it's like, you know, it's a pretty it's.
Speaker 4 (07:45):
Kind of a very intelligent, compelling argument that people who
are for the simulation theory put forth, and you know,
smart people can't really argue against it.
Speaker 7 (07:54):
It's also fund this as a thought experiment. That's how
I found it to be the most engaging personally.
Speaker 2 (08:00):
Well, you get into that in your episode Are we
living in a simulation featuring Nick Bostrom? With Nick Bostrom
because he's the guy who put forth the philosophical argument
essentially that this could be true? Right? And if it
were true, why? And I gotta tell you, going through
and listening to that, I wanted to ask you. I
(08:21):
want to ask you both, like I want to sit
down with you and Nick in that moment just say, well, guys,
what I feel like we're thinking in human terms for
a lot of these arguments, for like what we can
imagine as being possible scientifically technologically we're talking about computing
power and how you know, putting a bunch of computing
power towards one thing or another thing. I do wonder
(08:44):
if people like Nick Boscherman and you, like hyper intelligent
human beings, ever imagine that the universe entire that we
experience and believe to be the universe could be the
thing that's being simulated rather than just a planet size
simulation or something like that.
Speaker 4 (09:02):
Yeah, I mean, like the is the universe itself a simulation?
Speaker 2 (09:06):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (09:06):
Yeah, because it's very suspicious, right, because there's laws that
basically help you predict what's going to happen in the universe,
Like if you throw a baseball up in the air,
you know exactly where to catch it. And so it's
kind of weird that it almost feels like a program, right,
Like it almost feels like a video game. And so yeah,
there's some people think that maybe the universe itself, the
whole universe, is some sort of simulation. But then you
(09:28):
get to the question of what is it running on,
like right on a computer, right, yeah, well yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
Or is is what we imagine to be reality just
based on the constraints of this simulation. So what we
think is possible or even could be is in a
box that is you know, this place. I don't know.
I'm sorry, maybe that's too weird.
Speaker 3 (09:56):
Okay, yes, good question, because it's all so further to
add to that box analogy. Part of the box is
the limited the limited ways in which the human minds
can experience data. Right. We know that we were talking
earlier on ridiculous history about the concept of the observable
(10:16):
universe and or hey you were you took great care
to point out that the observable universe is not the
whole universe, not the universe entire, and therefore the things
that we can observe through a relatively limited set of
sensory inputs are not necessarily, you know, the whole pizza
(10:39):
pie is. I want to go back to something you
mentioned in your in your setup for this concept of
simulation theory, you noted, Yes, it's a coherent it's a
brilliant it's a well thought out argument. It's also sometimes
criticized as something that is impossible to disprove. Could you
(11:02):
tell us a little bit about what people mean when
they say that?
Speaker 4 (11:06):
Yeah, yeah, so well, maybe we should talk about the
argument first, in case people don't know the argument. The
argument is that that and this was put by this
person called Nick Boston. He's a philosopher, Oxford professor at
the time, and he really took this idea that's been around,
you know, basically since computers have been around. People thought, well,
if we can program little agents or little programs, maybe
(11:30):
you can program people. And then those people think they're
in the real world, but they are actually programs. But
Nick Boston put out this sort of logical argument that
said that there's really three possibilities that could be true,
or one of them only one of them can be true.
So one of them is that most civilizations really don't
(11:50):
make it very far, you know, they don't make it
to the stage in their technological development where they can
build the planet sized computer and build these massive simulations.
Possibility too, is that some civilizations can make it to
that stage, but they don't have any interest in creating
these simulations, like it's maybe they find it unethical, or
maybe they think it's just a waste of resources and
(12:11):
auction three is that, you know, there are some civilizations
that make it to this super advanced age, and some
of them love to make simulations, in which case there's
probably billions of simulations in the history of the universe.
And so the number of simulated beings outnumbers would outnumber
the number of regular, real physical beings. And so if
(12:34):
you have to make a bet whether you're real or simulated,
the rational bet, you know, if you're placing a bet
on this, it would be that you are a similant
being because you know, the odds are that you are
if you believe these arguments.
Speaker 2 (12:49):
It's amazing, so good. Uh hoor hair. Are you a father?
Speaker 5 (12:54):
I am? Yeah.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
Okay, So did you have a Minecraft phase or like
with your kids at all?
Speaker 4 (13:01):
Yeah, it's it's still lingering. It's it's surprisingly a longing's got.
Speaker 6 (13:06):
A staying power.
Speaker 7 (13:06):
Yeah, even like I mean kids you know, grow up
with it and continue to enjoy it until like adolescence.
I mean, it's just such an incredible, uh and creative platform.
Speaker 2 (13:15):
So my kids are gone starts playing Minecraft right now
as we're recording this, and they are in a procedurally
generated world where if they go out far enough and
their character via you know, as a user, can see
the next stage, right, the next chunk of data that
needs to get loaded, it gets loaded up and they
can interact with it. But it's not real until they
(13:37):
get to it. Right that that concept of procedural generation
feels uncomfortably real to me. I uh, in this world
it's but again, it doesn't mean it is. It just
feels uncomfortably like that thing when we're looking deeper and
deeper into quantum mechanics and deeper and deeper into some
(13:58):
of the stuff that makes up this world. It does
feel as though when we're actually looking at things and
studying things, we're getting a ton of data. But then
you back up just a little bit and not so much.
What are your thoughts on that?
Speaker 4 (14:14):
Yeah, No, it's an interesting thing because you know, in
this back and forth argument between people saying like, oh,
we're in a simulation, most likely, we're not likely in
a simulation, that point gets really kind of thrown around
a lot back and forth, and so some people say like, oh,
it would be it would be impossible to simulate the
whole universe, every atom of every particle of everything object
(14:35):
around us. And then the people who are for the
simulation say, oh, well, then you can use procedural algorithms
where you only simulate the things you're looking at, and
like if a scientist goes into gets on a microscope
and looks really closely at something small, then then you
simulate that little bit of with more detail. Quantum scientists
(14:57):
are now saying, well, that's fine, but even and even
if you did that, simulating quantum physics is so outrageously
expensive for computers, then you would have to have quantum computers.
But even if you had quint of computers, then you
have to simulate those, and then you even those are
super inefficient, and so it gets thrown back and forth,
(15:19):
even with this argument of like using procedural algorithms.
Speaker 3 (15:24):
It reminds me a little bit of your your recent
conversation on science stuff with the world experts on the
idea of terraforming Mars, and one of the one of
the big things that comes up for people who are
quite bullish on the concept as well as for people
who are very much against it, is the sheer amount
(15:46):
of energy, right, and the ambitious technological breakthroughs that would
have to occur. And I just want to say that
one of my favorite moments in that episode was when
you add these experts if they actually wanted to go
to Mars, and one of your experts straight up set no.
Speaker 5 (16:12):
Yeah, I know.
Speaker 4 (16:13):
It's fascinating because Mars right now is very inhospitable. You know,
it's like a desert. You went there and your your
space suit had a leak in it, you would die.
You know, there's no air, no oxygen. Your blood will
will boil, your saliva will boil. You want to survive there?
Speaker 5 (16:30):
Uh?
Speaker 4 (16:30):
And so I think one of the experts that they
wouldn't want to go there right now, first of all,
because it's uh, you know, she has a family and
it would be kind of tough call there to make.
But the other side just said that, you know, marsh
is another planet and we kind of have no rights
to it, you know, we should leave it at pristine
and untouched, the like we have national parks here in
(16:53):
the on Earth.
Speaker 6 (16:54):
Well, that's not going so well.
Speaker 4 (16:56):
The I know, it might be in the minority.
Speaker 7 (17:01):
The prevailing attitude, you know, it would seem in this
country is one of colonization, you know, one of like
everything belongs to us, everything is fair game. And that
certainly seems to be the perspective of someone like Elon Musk,
who seems really hot on colonizing Mars and keeps i
would say, over promising and under delivering in terms of
(17:21):
timeline around that. Any thoughts on that and like why
that's such a hot no pun intended kind of topic
for that kind of billionaire techie class.
Speaker 4 (17:32):
Yeah, yeah, Well, I think the main problem is that
there hasn't been a lot of research onto this topic.
You know, there were some papers back in the nineties,
maybe in the seventies and eighties, and some a few
people have wrint papers since then, but a lot of
it is kind of speculative, were kind of opinion based
or very like back of the envelope kind of calculations.
(17:54):
So it's kind of a field that right now is
very open to different opinions, you know, Like some people say, ah, yeah,
we can, well, there's not enough CO two in the
polar ice caps of Mars to really kind of fill
up the atmosphere there. And then some people say, well,
that's all right, we can just round up some comets
and the meteor and the asteroid built and have them
(18:14):
crash on Mars. And some people say, what are you
talking about. That's insane, but it's possible. And so that
that's kind of how it goes back and forth.
Speaker 7 (18:21):
Is that maybe also one of those kind of move
fast break things kind of approaches that a lot of
Silicon Valley type folks where it sort of like trot
this idea out there because it sounds on its surface
so futuristic, like the O week we should be on Mars,
like we deserve that as a human race, as a
human civilization, But then sort of sort out the details later.
Speaker 4 (18:40):
Yeah, yeah, it definitely sounds like it. And it's also
sort of something that it seems also possible in this
problem to kind of trigger something. It could run away
from you in either a good direction or a bad direction.
So for example, if you melt, let's see a little
bit of the polar ice caps that bring some into
the atmosphere, and then that creates a greenhouse effect, which
(19:03):
heats up the atmosphere and the more which melts more
water or CO two, which blocks more sunlight. And so
you know, you could maybe do something small and it
will kind of cascade into this huge change in the
in the atmosphere, possibly possibly.
Speaker 3 (19:18):
Right a wave we can't turn back.
Speaker 4 (19:20):
Yeah, yeah, And so it's sort of at some point
it feels like, oh, we could, yeah, we could totally
trigger you know, global warming on Mars. What's the worst
that could happen? And then some people say, there's a
lot of that worst that can happen.
Speaker 5 (19:33):
There.
Speaker 3 (19:34):
We'll pause for a word from our sponsors and return
with more from who Hate, And.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
We've returned a while back. We I can't remember the
name of the episode, guys, or exactly what it was on,
but we talked about potential fixes or like, let's say,
terraforming light here on Earth to address some of the
climate issues that we are now in the midst of you.
For a long time, it was this thing that was coming,
(20:06):
that might come, that could be out there, And it
does feel, at least in this moment that with things
like the flooding in Central Texas that just occurred as
we're recording this on July seventh, some of the warnings
about iceberg. There's a doomsday iceberg or ice shelf that
is essentially showing signs that we are very soon going
(20:29):
to have a lot more water flooding the oceans, and
it's making the oceans more salty, not less salty for
some reason, which is just it feels like we have
a lot of problems hanging out here on Earth that
deal specifically with climate and things that could be addressed
with some form of advanced terraforming or light terraforming, just
(20:49):
little things we could do. But when we looked at it,
Ben Nol, do you remember the concept was to in
some way blot out part of the solar energy coming through.
Speaker 7 (21:01):
Are you talking about the physicists that proposed setting off
a nuke that would potentially fill the atmosphere with soot,
and uh, you know, he claims would in some way
the climate change.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
That's what got what I wanted to bring that up.
Speaker 7 (21:18):
Maybe we'll get to that, but I just think it
it triggers me in that way. But Matt, maybe clarify
what you're talking about.
Speaker 3 (21:23):
I'm sorry if you're talking about the the proposition of
blocking the sun.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
Yes, right, but but again just as a way to
curb some of the heating, the overall you know, trend
that we're seeing in heating temperatures. It just seems like
they're maybe to somebody standing on the outside like I
am in this moment, how can we funnel more resources,
minds and just energy into that kind of thing?
Speaker 4 (21:51):
Yeah, because it seems kind of almost silly to be
thinking about, you know, terraforming Mars when we can't even
like terror anything here right.
Speaker 2 (22:02):
But here, you know, I mean, I don't know, it
makes me think about Mar the thoughts that potentially there
was life on Mars at some point in it's in
its past, you know, or at least there were there
was at least waters there and put the potential for
life maybe.
Speaker 4 (22:20):
Yeah, I don't know, yeah, I know, it's it's wild,
it's and it's interesting because here in the Solar System,
we basically have like three data points, right, we have Venus, Earth,
and Mars, three rocky planets about the same orbit, the
same amount of sun, but all three turn out super
duper different. It's almost like if you have the triplets
and a triple experiment and you see what happens to
(22:42):
each one, and you know, one of them is a
super dry desert with no atmosphere, even though they all
started about the same. Mars is a desert with no atmosphere.
Venus is the complete opposite. It has like too much atmosphere,
huge clouds of CO two that make it nine hundred
degrees fahrenheit, and the surface of Venus, and then in
the middle we have Us. And so I think, you know,
(23:05):
we have a pretty good idea of what could happen
if things go wrong either way.
Speaker 3 (23:09):
Right, Yeah, that's why they call it the Goldilock zone. Right.
And there's there's something that I was talking about some
of your work and your conversations was with some old
friends of mine from Georgia Tech. Weirdly enough, and one
of us stumbled on this point that I'd love your
reaction to, Uh, it's the idea that, yes, terraforming already exists.
(23:35):
Humans are currently terraforming Earth, just not in the best ways.
How would you how would you react to that? Does
that sound accurate or on base?
Speaker 5 (23:44):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (23:45):
For sure, I mean we are. We are definitely changing Earth.
I mean Earth has changed a lot since the beginning.
You know, we started with no atmosphere, and then it
had an atmosphere, and then it it didn't have any water,
then it had water. You know, initially it was ASCO
two than you know, uh, bacteria converted all to some
of it to oxygen and that's what we have now.
(24:06):
So it's everything. It's always changing. But the idea that
humans can affect that is definitely true. You know, we've definitely,
through our activity, are causing the atmosphere in the planet,
temperatures to change. And so that's actually one of the
kind of ideas that they have for Mars. It's like, hey,
maybe we can go to Mars and just polluted right.
Speaker 7 (24:28):
Well, you know, I brought up that, frankly pretty ridiculous
proposal by a computer scientist, not a physicist. I was
mistaken a guy named Andy Haverley, who's a Microsoft software
engineer from Washington State, and he wrote a paper in
an admittedly non peer reviewed scholarly journal or I think
it's a web based collection of non peer reviewed scholarly
(24:51):
articles that proposed sequestering thirty years worth of CO two
emissions in underwater rock by andating a nuclear bomb underground
within the Earth's crust. And he said he got the
idea from the movie Oppenheimer, which seems like a really
sound science there. Obviously, there's a lot of people saying
(25:12):
this is absurd, and I'm sure that you'll probably fall
on that side as well, but it does speak to
something that is similar to terraforming, or maybe it is
a discipline that is what sort of is the father
of terraforming. This idea of geo engineering, and it's something
that I guess been around since the forties. But the
problem is, and the critiques that are often leveled at
(25:32):
geoengineering are those knock on consequences, those domino effect, butterfly
effect things down the chain that can really happen without
proper care being taken to prevent things like that. Do
you have any thoughts about the concept of geoengineering or
you know, if burying a nuke in the Earth and
blowing it up is a smart way to be good
stewards of the planet that we've already kind of jacked
(25:53):
up beyond repair.
Speaker 4 (25:55):
Yeah, no, for sure, I think most people kind of
it's all sort of loved into the same thing. Terraform geoengineering.
You know, crazy things like exploding a nuclear bomb mat
like you said, like to cause basically a nuclear winter
to cool down the planet. Or some people talk about
like releasing special aerosols or special like little tiny needles
(26:16):
kind of that will sort of reflect the certain wavelengths
of light and things like that. I think, you know,
I was clearly pointed out in the movie Jurassic Park. Sure,
chaos is hard to predict, you know, when you have
a complex system like this, it's like it's they're basically
ruled by chaos rules, which means, you know, things can
(26:40):
take a turn for the worst really really quickly and
without us being able to predict it unless you know,
like everything, every single variable possible, which we cannot have.
Speaker 7 (26:49):
And this remulation an answer to that, running these elaborate
algorithms and these elaborate simulations that could potentially show more
of those knock on consequences, trying to maybe put a
little positive spin on some of this kind of runn
amock AI or you know, machine learning type stuff. And
I don't mean to pivot too quickly, but do you
have any thoughts around how these kind of models, you know,
(27:11):
could potentially be helpful with combating things like climate change?
Speaker 6 (27:16):
Or is the genie already too far off and out
of the bottle?
Speaker 3 (27:20):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (27:20):
No, I think modernly is the best tool we have
basically because we only have one Earth, we can't like
experiment with it. You can try something and see how
it works if it kills us all and so basically
simulations computers, huge computers, it's the only way you can
really test these things and figure out solutions.
Speaker 3 (27:40):
I want to pivot us just a little bit here,
and I think we all agree. I think we're all
on the same page and agree with that answer. But
in the course of your expiration, you've run into a
lot of what we used to call ad science, right so,
or let's be diplomatic out of the box propositions. Right
(28:01):
there we go dream big. Humanity has always been a
hold by beer species. So with that in mind, could
you tell us some of the most wildly ambitious like
scientific propositions you've run across, you know, the nuke stuff,
the blocking the sun. What's the most sci fi kind
(28:24):
of proposition you've run into that has been seriously considered,
whether in the past or the present, to address some
of these big scientific issues.
Speaker 4 (28:34):
Yeah, well, let's see. Just in the episode on terraforming Mars,
one of the ideas that's being floated out there kind
of seriously to heat up Mars because it's too cold
there is to basically create giant space mirrors, like flood
one hundred or thousands of mirrors around Mars and basically
have them point the sunlight that Mars gets to, like
(28:57):
the north or south pole, like a giant space magnifying glass.
Speaker 3 (29:02):
Yeah, what could go wrong?
Speaker 4 (29:04):
And then yeah right right, doesn't sound too too expensive.
And then then you could start melting the poles and
then that might trigger global warming, and then that might
heat up the rest of the atmosphere. That's one crazy idea.
Speaker 6 (29:17):
That's nuts.
Speaker 5 (29:19):
Oh yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4 (29:20):
Have you have you all heard of the Dyson sphere?
Speaker 1 (29:22):
Ye?
Speaker 2 (29:23):
Yes, dice swarm baby.
Speaker 4 (29:26):
That's another wild, wild idea, just like cover a star
maybe and suck up all the energy.
Speaker 2 (29:33):
You'd have all the energy you need to simulate other places.
Speaker 4 (29:37):
Probably so yeah, yeah, And people you said as maybe
a way that we could detect advanced alien civilizations out there.
And you see where there used to be a star.
If you see that it's blocked off and it only
gives you know, infrared radiation, then then maybe they invented
a Dyson sphere there, and that means there's aliens there.
Speaker 3 (30:00):
How satisfied would it be to first find an extraterrestrial
civilization and then secondly to see that one of our
crazy ideas made it off the drawing board. It's pretty inspiring.
Speaker 4 (30:15):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, it means more ontocenting, right maybe hopefully
hopefully they're nice aliens and good role models for us.
Speaker 2 (30:24):
The concept of a Dyson sphere Joree specifically reading about
that for today, thinking about some of the simulation theory stuff,
and it appears that at least the way was originally
imagined with the Kardashev scale. This concept of fully covering
a star in some kind of I don't know, a
(30:44):
literally a sphere of technology to then absorb one percent
of that star's energy wouldn't be at least to the understanding. Now,
that wouldn't be physically possible because of the gravitational forces
at hand. But this, this swarm concept, to me feels
well again, I'm using the word feel because I am
(31:05):
not smart enough to fully understand it. But I would say,
if you had some kind of grid system, satellite system,
imagine Starlink but around a star. But then imagine the
number of Starlink satellites multiplied by a thousand, then you
know that kind of conceptually, at least in my mind,
I can picture it. I do wonder if, as we've
(31:26):
got these new pieces of technology, some of the new satellites,
some of the new imaging tech that's even land based,
like Earth based, where we can see out much deeper
and much further into the universe, if we will ever
discover something that we just don't understand. Our sensors don't
understand the light kind of have you, as you're saying
(31:47):
you can only detect infrared light or something coming off
of a star. We just can't understand what that light is.
But it's just, you know, millions of satellites rolling around
a star. I don't know what I'm saying other than
that makes me very very excited.
Speaker 5 (32:01):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (32:02):
Yeah, well yeah, because you know, it seems very unlikely
because the universe is so big and it's so sparse.
Even though it's there's so many stars and plants out there,
it's it's still pretty sparse, and so I think the
chances that we'll ever meet an alien species or you know,
run into them are pretty slim. So it is super
(32:23):
interesting to think about, like, well, how else could we
detect them? How else could we know they're there? And
to think about, you know, like if they had similar
technology to us, what would be the signatures of those technologies?
You know, could we see radio waves coming out of it?
Can we hear music coming out of their Are there
radios and things like that?
Speaker 5 (32:42):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (32:43):
Or could we detect them using starlink satellites to cover
up their sun?
Speaker 3 (32:48):
You know, it's such a pickle. We've talked about it
a little bit in the past on our sister show,
just the on episodes of this show, just the problem
of time and space and while we're here conceptually in
outer space, while we're running our own simulation and model
thereof there's a question that I think has been on
(33:10):
a lot of our minds ever since the story of
a mua mua. Why are interstellar objects so rare? Like,
why is it so rare for us to encounter them?
I think there have only been check me on this
guy's three documented so far.
Speaker 2 (33:27):
Three confirmed that we've observed, right.
Speaker 4 (33:29):
Right, yeah, and the third one was very recently, basically
last week.
Speaker 3 (33:34):
So why is it if the universe is so big?
One of the first questions lay folks would have is
why is it so rare for stuff from the outside
of the Solar System to make it to this neighborhood
right right?
Speaker 4 (33:50):
Well, the first thing is that that's a good thing,
ben because you know, like you don't want stuff crashing
into your planet. You don't want to be living in
like a debris zone. Basically, we just did an episode
about what it's like to be a planet in the
center of the galaxy. Oh wow, And the analogy there
is pretty fascinating. So if you take if you make
(34:12):
a bubble around us, like around our Sun, a bubble
that's four light years big, like if you look ford
light years in all directions, all that's in that bubble
is basically Us. Most of the mass in that huge
bubble is just the Sun and Jupiter and the rest
is just like little tiny rocks like our planet. If
(34:32):
you take that same bubble and you put it in
the center of the galaxy, you would find about ten
million stars in that same bubble in addition to the
super massive black hole that's in the middle of our galaxy.
So if you live there, you're basically toast. Like like
you know, so many things can have things in crash
(34:54):
into you. Another star could be flying by and like
kick you out of your orbit, or it could steal
and you suddenly be orbiting another sun. And with so
many stars, there's like super nova's going on all the time.
Quasars from the super massive black hole would be like
basically roasting your planet. So it's sort of a good
(35:14):
thing that we're living in the suburbs of the galaxy.
Speaker 2 (35:17):
Yeah, there's probably a reason life, you know, proliferated out here,
way out here in the quiet, right.
Speaker 5 (35:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (35:27):
Okay, But let's say it's thought that this one three
I Atlas, this this most recent interstellar object, it's thought
that it's potentially a comet. We need more information on it.
Kind of the way, what was There's a second one, guys,
and I cannot remember it. It's not amua mua. It's
not this one. It was the it was the third one,
(35:49):
which is I guess officially the second one, but it was.
I think that one was proven to be a comment.
That seems like an interstellar or an object that exists
in space that is just moving. It seems like the
kind of thing that could, with its own propulsion, just
continue moving, even outside of one solar system into another.
(36:13):
Do you think it's possible that an intelligent civilization would
send something like that ever, in an attempt to get
out of their own solar system, not even really to
make contact or you know, nothing, not applying any kind
of thoughts on it as to what its purpose is,
but just sending something outside to see what's there.
Speaker 4 (36:36):
Yeah, well, I think you know, the way the physics
works is that most likely these things do come from
another solar system, because you know, to get rocks or
comments or anything that kind of complicated elements to form
like in the middle of nowhere, like just out of
a gas cloud is very unlikely. So most of these
(36:56):
things probably come from another solar system. And then probably
about happened with something knocked in and it kind of
got knocked up at door of it and then got
thrown out into space and we just happened to sort
of catch it. Yeah, but whether they're sent by.
Speaker 2 (37:12):
Well, I'm not saying this one is. Yeah, I guess
it just I mean, I'm wondering if it could be Yeah, yeah,
I'm wondering if that's a viable thing that we could
even imagine or think to look for. Almost like again,
I can only imagine some of the satellites, the early
satellites that we sent out. Was the one that had
the Golden Record on it, Voyager. Yeah, just something like that,
(37:33):
but more complicated and perhaps a little more rocky.
Speaker 3 (37:38):
I mean, use the use the materials you have right,
use the stuff that has proven to already be spaceworthy.
So it's a it's a brilliant thing to think about. Also,
to that point we brought up earlier, I believe the
the second interstellar object confirmed in recent observation is Comic
two I or Comic when it's called Borisov. Yes, but yeah,
(38:03):
confirmed to be a comet. This stuff is. This stuff
is so cool because it shows us first that it's good,
as you said, Jorge, to live in the verbs of
the galaxy where it's not always a constant peel of Quasos.
But then it also yeah, yeah, I mean I live
(38:24):
in the city, so that analogy really hits up. But
there's I think there's another aspect of this to explore,
kind of speaking to Matt's question about humanity sending stuff
out right, just sending out voyage or whatnot into the darkness.
(38:46):
What do you see right now as the future of
human space exploration in the broadest of senses.
Speaker 4 (38:55):
Yeah, I think, you know, the media future is just
to like check out our neighborhood, you know, like what's
going on in Europe by one of the moons of Jupiter.
Is there water down there? Could there be life in
that water? Or what's going on in Mars underneath the
surface of Mars? You know, was there life there at
some point? Could there still be Like technically there could
(39:15):
still be you know, little aliens living down there in
the underground pools of Mars. So I think that's I
think that basically our priority right now is just to
learn from our solar system so that we can then
know more about planets, how they form, what's going on
with different planets, not just Earth, And then I think
from there you can then start looking at exoplanets. So
(39:38):
we've detected, you know, thousands of other planets around other
Solar systems, but we know very little about them, Like
we don't know how they form, what's normal out there.
You know, there's so much we don't know yet.
Speaker 2 (39:51):
Don't We kind of know that planet nine is out there,
or there is some kind of object out there, trans
Newtonian object.
Speaker 5 (40:00):
You mean, like on the other side of the Sun.
Speaker 2 (40:02):
Or yeah, there was oh gosh, there was more rumblings
coming out of BBC Sky at Night magazine something. I
was reading a couple other things on this show. Way
back in the day, we used to call it Niberu
because that was the like fabled, you know, secret planet
that was going to destroy our Earth one day. It
was a really fun hypothetical thing that was talked about
(40:25):
on message boards and talked about for a long time.
But it does appear that there is something out there
beyond Pluto essentially, or out close to the area where
Pluto is located.
Speaker 4 (40:36):
Yeah, no, I think that's something I think that's hotly
debated right now. It's like, is there is there are
there more planets even in our Solar system that we
just haven't seen and you know some people, I know,
some folks at Caltech kind of like study everybody's orbits,
all the planets, and they from just the gravitational signature.
They're like, oh, wait, these orbits tell us that there's
(40:56):
something there, but we don't know if for.
Speaker 6 (40:58):
Something else acting on it.
Speaker 7 (41:00):
What you mean like they can detect the force the
sum of the forces includes something that isn't immediately visible.
Speaker 5 (41:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (41:08):
Yeah, Like they see the for example, the orbit of
Neptune and they see it's not as perfectly accounted for
with all the planets we know about. Maybe there's something
else tugging it out there, and that's why they think
maybe there's another planet out there. But I think it's
still hotly debated, which means it's still a possibility.
Speaker 3 (41:25):
Up for grabs. Love it, love the love that great expanse.
We're sort of any we're in that method of as
a writer, you know this, We're in that stage where
we've got a couple of paragraphs and the rest of
the book is kind of blank pages, right, so we're
(41:45):
trying to figure out this saga together.
Speaker 7 (41:49):
Hey, let's take a quick break right here, hear a
word from our sponsor, and then come back with more
or hey, and we're back.
Speaker 3 (42:01):
This is heading in the direction of science fiction. But
we had a very brief conversation in the past about
so called artificial intelligence or AI. So what do you
think about the idea that the future of space exploration
by humans doesn't involve actual humans? What if we create
(42:25):
some kind of inorganic sentience or very highly sophisticated algorithm
to be the next wave of astronauts. Is that a
possibility or how crazy? Like on a scale of one
to backcrap crazy?
Speaker 6 (42:43):
What is this?
Speaker 4 (42:44):
No, it's not crazy at all. I mean, I'm sure
whatever we're sending to space right now you probably use
this AI to some degree, you know, And even the
instruments we use and ASSAD I imagine use some AI.
It's being used more and more and even in science
and engineering. So it's not totally crazy at all. And
in fact, some scenarios that people paint are like, well,
(43:06):
maybe you can send one robot with like instructions to
land on an asteroid and make two robots and copy
the program, and then those two robots have the instructions
to go out there, look for an asteroid, mine it,
you know, get energy from it, and make two copies
of it, and then that's how you could maybe like
you know, see the whole galaxy for example, So it's
(43:29):
not not totally crazy.
Speaker 3 (43:30):
No, should we be sending people into space.
Speaker 4 (43:39):
I think if people want to go to space, they
should go. You know what, why not? I mean, you know,
if they know the risk and there's a lot of
people that want to have that experience and they like
I think that they open up volunteers to go to
Mars and thousands of people signed up, so you know,
I think it's part of human nature to be explorers
(44:00):
and to you know, want to find out what it's
like to be there.
Speaker 6 (44:03):
Well, hot take, maybe I'm interested in yours.
Speaker 7 (44:07):
The whole space tourism thing and this sort of like
upstairs downstairs of it all where it's like, you know,
a lot of folks that are going to space, like
the Katie Perrys of the world, are coming back and
acting like they've accomplished some great feat and feel as
though they should be looked at in the same way
as astronauts and scientists and folks that have trained their
whole lives to do that. And what they've done is
(44:30):
more or less taken a little joy ride out in
the space and back, and it really does seem to
kind of further drive this wedge between like folks with
lots of money and regular folks, and further maybe even
solidifies this idea of space not being.
Speaker 6 (44:47):
For everybody, and that if anyone.
Speaker 7 (44:49):
Were to colonize Mars, I don't know that folks like
you or I might get the invites. I'm just wondering about,
you know, your thoughts on the whole social aspect of
space travel, space colonization, and space tourism.
Speaker 2 (45:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (45:05):
You know, I think these days, anything that gets people
excited about space or science or exploration, I think that's
all great.
Speaker 5 (45:13):
That's good.
Speaker 4 (45:14):
You know, whether or not, you know, getting to the
edge of the atmosphere counts to space, and whether or
not it should be something that only rich people can do,
that is the thornier kind of mindfield there, you know,
But ultimately, I think anything that gets people excited about
space is good.
Speaker 7 (45:33):
I guess I would say that this whole thing that
Blue Origin did maybe had the opposite effect of that,
And I guess that's sort of maybe what I'm getting
at is this whole idea of like what maybe once
would have gotten people excited about space seems to have
blown up in the faces of the folks that sort
of staged this pr event and maybe had the opposite
effect and maybe made it seem a little bit more
(45:55):
like this sort of bougie tone death thing, and maybe
is making people look scants a little bit at folks
these private space travel companies. Just I don't know, Maybe
that's my two cents, but that is the way it
seems like people are reacting to that particular event.
Speaker 4 (46:11):
Yeah, yeah, for sure, I can totally see that too.
I guess one point of view against that sort of
downplane of those flights is that I think somebody told
me that they've only done like ten or eleven or
twelve of these things with people in it, and so
there is still kind of a significant risk for Katie.
(46:32):
There was a significant risk for Katie Perry and all
those folks to go up there. You know, Like I
don't know if I would go if I was only
the twelfth person to go on this airplane or the spaceship,
you know what I mean, Like I always always like
a thousand people have gone.
Speaker 7 (46:48):
Or you know, not that dissimilar from the folks that
got you know, imploded in that experimental deep sea you
know situation.
Speaker 5 (46:58):
Yeah, that could have been them well you know, but.
Speaker 7 (47:01):
Then that deep sea thing, a lot of people were
like almost like they were rich people but maybe deserved
it or something. I'm not saying I think that at all,
but that was sort of the internet perspective. One of
the hot takes was like it was poorly planned, it
was really expensive.
Speaker 6 (47:15):
It was sort of this like prestige thing.
Speaker 7 (47:17):
But I'm with you or hey, I think you're right
about the how few attempts have been made, and so
anyone that's that's participating in it is taking their lives
into their own hands. And the question there then becomes
is that worth you know, reverence in some way or
is it just.
Speaker 6 (47:32):
Kind of a little bit blind, you know, like risk taking.
Speaker 3 (47:37):
You got to wonder about that, right, just the conversation
you say, oh, well, how many times have we tried this?
And as you're getting into the ship, someone says eleven
of these went great, and then you say how many
and they're like, okay, well close the door.
Speaker 6 (47:55):
Jolly good.
Speaker 2 (47:58):
I am jumping and turning an to hear guys, hey, chim,
given your experience with and expertise in robotics, what do
you see as humanity's relationship with robotics, with synthetic you know,
pieces of a human with things like neulink. Where do
(48:19):
you see us going in the future.
Speaker 4 (48:24):
I see us getting more and more and meshed with robots.
You know, it seemed like a fantasy when I was
a roboticist, just because the technology wasn't there. But I
was just reflecting recently on just even things that you
don't think about, like motors, Like the technology and motors
from the time that I was a roboticist to now
(48:45):
is has jumped, you know, several generations, several huge leaps.
You know, you can make motors so much stronger and
more efficient to the point where like a human sized
robot was sort of unthinkable in my time. But now
you know, there's like one hundred companies.
Speaker 7 (49:04):
Question really quickly or robotics isn't Oh, it doesn't necessarily
have to include some kind of intelligence, and it can
just be like automated mechanized machinery that accomplishes tasks, right,
Like you know, like motors, that would be a form
of robotics if it were programmed in a way that
it would get an automated task.
Speaker 5 (49:22):
Is that right.
Speaker 7 (49:22):
I just want to make sure I'm wrapping my head
around the concept of robotics, and I'd love to hear
more about how maybe that concept has evolved since you
got started in it.
Speaker 5 (49:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (49:31):
No, you're asking a very deep philosophical existential question that
all robotics is it kind of struggle with, like what
is a robot? Like can you call your car a robot?
You know, if it was a manual gear or even
if it's automatic, would you call it a robot? Or
does it need to have sentience or some sort of
(49:52):
program on it.
Speaker 6 (49:53):
In the UK they call microwaves robot cooking.
Speaker 5 (49:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (49:57):
Yeah, and now microwas are super smart too. Now they
probably had to have AI agents like recognizing your food
and figuring it helping you figure it out.
Speaker 7 (50:06):
Do you follow one side or the other on that
argument about what makes what makes a robot? Would love
to hear your thoughts on it, and that is interesting,
the philosophical kind of quandary of it all.
Speaker 5 (50:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (50:15):
I mean I would say if it's totally remote controlled,
it's probably I wouldn't call it a robot, it would
just call it like a machine maybe, Okay, Yeah, but
if it's doing things on its own somehow, either mechanically
or through a computer program.
Speaker 5 (50:31):
And then I'm pretty lenient what you call a robot?
Speaker 3 (50:34):
Yeah, I see it. Also, I think it's also a
good time to point out the fascinating etymology of the
word robot in the beginning, which itself was a I
think it was a check play from the nineteen twenties
that was automaton.
Speaker 6 (50:52):
It was the term that was used robot was yeah, yep, sorry.
Speaker 3 (50:55):
Ben robot robot nick, right, is this term that already
entered into our language with some social baggage, right, with
some statements and some deep philosophical quandaries. So as this technology,
I love that you point out there are hundreds of
companies who are working on things that we could think
(51:17):
of as house assistant robots in some limited function. Would
you and your family ever consider acquiring one? Or like,
would you buy the twelfth one or would you wait
for a few thousands?
Speaker 4 (51:30):
If I can get one to wash the dishes for me,
I would tomorrow.
Speaker 3 (51:36):
The worst.
Speaker 4 (51:37):
Yeah, yeah, you know, if it could do yeah, things
like that. I would love to have a robot. Dude,
I guess I have a dishwasher, but they still have
to unloaded or hound my kids.
Speaker 6 (51:47):
To they basically got a free wash them.
Speaker 5 (51:50):
I mean honest, yeah, right, yeah.
Speaker 3 (51:54):
And we see it too with it seems like the
at least the current the current speculation I've been reading
about both in private industry and academia, seems to argue
that a normalization or proliferation of robots in some way
is inevitable as the economy scale kicks in, prices decrease,
(52:17):
they become more affordable, and they also seem to I
love your dishwasher example. The argument also seems to be that,
similar to the Rumba, the new home robot assistants will
be specifically geared for certain tasks, starting like in a kitchen,
(52:38):
or starting with medical assistance. You know, picture the TV
commercial I've fallen and I can't get up. Would you
agree with that? And kind of dovetail on Matt's earlier question,
how far do you think the prevalence of robotic assistants
will go?
Speaker 5 (52:59):
Oh?
Speaker 4 (52:59):
Boy, I think it probably depends on obviously your income level,
you know, and also where you live in the world.
You know, if it's much more economical for you to
hire someone down the street to wash dishes, then then
that seems like a better situation because then two people
benefit from that, right, and it's supposed to one person
and a robot.
Speaker 7 (53:21):
I do wonder though, like where, you know, a lot
of the problems that we run up against when we're
talking about mechanization and roboticization and involving you know, artificial
intelligence or machine learning in tasks, is where is that
cut off? At what point are we going to pump
the brakes and say no, no, no, we want to
replace these tasks that we have deemed to be menial
(53:42):
and not worthy of human involvement without throwing out tons
of jobs and and things that people rely on for
their economic well well being to protect and to to
you know, feed and and raise their families. Because it
seems to me like there's really no way back, because
the technogy is out there, and the nature of economics
(54:02):
and the nature of capitalism is such that if it
can be done, someone's going to do it, and someone's
going to sell it. I just I don't know, do
you have any philosophical thoughts around that?
Speaker 4 (54:13):
Yeah, I mean it's sort of the history of humanity
is always taking inside of automation and efficiency and and
you know, letting people figure out other jobs that they
can do, you know, if it's cheaper to use robots.
But you know, most of our cars are made using
robots too, and people are getting operated on sort of
(54:36):
by robots now. Yeah, and so it's all it's all coming,
and it's all I think, it's not probably not going
as fast as people maybe imagine twenty years ago.
Speaker 6 (54:45):
There's always a backlash.
Speaker 7 (54:46):
I mean even historically you've got like the luttites and stuff,
people smashing printing presses and you know, backlash against industrialization.
So it's really no different than that. And I'm not
coming down on one side or the other. I think
to your point, it is absolutely just a product of
human vanity and just the nature of progress and all
of that. But if you look back, even like people
were very upset about the idea of the synthesizer, people
(55:08):
you know, in orchestras, thought it was going to replace them.
But what ultimately happened was people figured out how to
use synthesizers to make sounds that an orchestra couldn't make.
And I think that's the neat part about all of
this stuff, is figuring out those other things.
Speaker 6 (55:21):
But it doesn't entirely get rid of the fear that
a lot of.
Speaker 7 (55:23):
Folks have about, you know, being supplanted, you know, by
these types of technologies.
Speaker 6 (55:28):
So I don't know the answer. I just it's a
tricky one.
Speaker 7 (55:30):
And I think you've you've pointed to that and everything
that you said, and I appreciate them.
Speaker 4 (55:34):
Yeah, yeah, And all those ethical concerns are one of
the reasons that know a cartoonists and a podcaster.
Speaker 3 (55:40):
Well, with that, there's so much we want to get
to that we may not be able to get to
in our time today. But I can hear some folks
in the crowd right now immediately asking a question that
I don't I don't think we've gotten to previous conversations.
(56:03):
With the rollout normalization of robots, where does society land
in its relationship to a surveillance state? You know, like
that's the reason a lot of people have the it's
the old joke about engineers, dude, you know it from
Georgia Tech too. A lot of engineers, if you go
to their house, they're going to avoid smart devices, right.
Speaker 5 (56:27):
Right, right?
Speaker 4 (56:28):
Yeah, yeah, Well, but you also don't want to be
the person wearing the tinfoil, you know, Yes.
Speaker 7 (56:34):
Yeah, that's the issue, right, there's like a fine line
between being the lutte, being the person that's getting left behind,
being the person shouting at clouds or whatever, or smashing
printing presses, and being someone that's completely blind to the
potential negative aspects of.
Speaker 6 (56:48):
A lot of this stuff.
Speaker 3 (56:49):
So my question then directly is should people be concerned
of increased surveillance with smart devices robot nicks in their
hole or is that kind of much ado about nothing?
Speaker 4 (57:07):
You know, I think if you're someone with ill intent,
you know, if you're a criminal, if you're someone who
wants to do bad things, then you probably should be worried.
My personal point of view is, you know, if you're
not doing anything that bad and you still have some
space where you have complete privacy in your home or
(57:29):
things like that, or you're able to switch these things off,
and generally I think it can be helpful. You know,
there have been several cases here in Stufn, California, if
people like going missing, but then they were sort of
found or tracked through people's ring cameras or traffic cameras,
and so those kinds of things can also be sort
of useful.
Speaker 7 (57:49):
I think that's where I fall on it. I've always said, like,
I don't really have anything to hide. I'm not that concerned.
I think the benefits outweigh the negatives for me personally.
But I know that that's not the way other people
might feel about it. But I am with you on
that one, and I think that that's a really good point,
that the triangulation, the pinging, finding folks that maybe never
would have been found otherwise. There's always a double edged
(58:10):
sword to that kind of surveillance state aspect of things.
Speaker 2 (58:14):
How is the Department of Homeland Security gonna know you're
not a threat if they can't know what alphabet ads
should be served to you? So they got to listen
in and you know what card purchases shout talent, go boundary.
It's all helpful.
Speaker 4 (58:33):
Yeah, well honestly, yeah, obviously anything can be abused, I think, right, yeah,
I definitely don't want it to be abused.
Speaker 2 (58:40):
Please please don't continue abusing it.
Speaker 3 (58:43):
Please shout out to our hapless n Essay in turn, Steve,
thanks for putting in the work man the.
Speaker 2 (58:51):
Best or Hey, we're we all love science fiction and
we assume you also appreciate it. We we love out
there things that are hilarious like Rick and Morty huge
fans of that kind of thing, but also something you know,
like Prometheus and the Alien franchise. Is there anything that
we maybe have missed in the science fiction universe that
(59:14):
you could put us onto or anything we should be watching,
like a series?
Speaker 6 (59:18):
Anything oh interesting?
Speaker 4 (59:22):
Well, you know, I can point out to the usual
things like Black Mirror or the Expands, but maybe something
your listeners have been heard about is this book called
Simbulacrum three and this was published in the sixties and
it's basically what most people think of as the first
novel with this idea that we might all be living
(59:43):
in a simulation neat So this was way way back
in the day when you know, computers were the size
of a building they could processes like ones and zeros
in a card. But even then there was this writer
who was thinking about, like, wait a minute, what if
we're all just programs? And it's a really true to
be booked because it's like about this ad executive who's
(01:00:04):
programming this simulated city as a as a kind of
a test bed for like testing out you know, marketing ideas,
slogans and things like that. I mean, little by little
he realizes that maybe he's not real himself.
Speaker 6 (01:00:19):
This is very Philip K. Dick ask I like it right.
Speaker 4 (01:00:22):
Right is sixty, very forward looking, very twisty.
Speaker 7 (01:00:27):
And speaking of four looking, y'all might have heard this
as well. But I believe finally William Gibson's Neuromancer is
getting a proper adaptation into a series. And I know
that's a big one in terms of futurists and the
idea of cyber space.
Speaker 6 (01:00:43):
I think was coined in that. And I know Ben
you're a big fan.
Speaker 7 (01:00:45):
But I did just see news the other day that
that's that got greenlit, So that'll be interesting because I
have not read the book, but I need to.
Speaker 6 (01:00:51):
But thank you for Similarchrum three.
Speaker 5 (01:00:54):
Yes, yes, wonderful three.
Speaker 3 (01:00:55):
I'm putting it on the list. That's awesome. That was
a great question, Matt, and we have we have another
question for you or hey, as we're as we're wrapping
up today, we cannot thank you enough for being so
generous with your time. Where can people learn more about you,
learn more about science stuff, and learn more about your
many other projects.
Speaker 4 (01:01:17):
Yeah, so I'm on social media and all the platforms.
Just search for PhD like the Greek comics, and then
you'll see me posting things about my uh the TV
show I have on PBS Kids, to the book series
I have for kids called Oliver's Great Big Universe, to
this awesome podcast I have with my heart now call
Science Stuff One word, and every week we answer fascinating
(01:01:39):
questions like is it a good idea to get crygentically
frozen hard?
Speaker 3 (01:01:44):
Yes?
Speaker 4 (01:01:47):
About the water, the way water expand oh no, that
there's a twister, Ben, it's not about It's not about
the water expanding. A lot of people think it's like
that's what kills you, but it's not.
Speaker 3 (01:01:58):
We have no.
Speaker 6 (01:01:59):
No, let's for the episode.
Speaker 5 (01:02:01):
Listen to the episode.
Speaker 3 (01:02:02):
There we go, Well that that is fantastic? Is or hey,
cham please check out the podcast Science Stuff. Please get
the to the website. We are not blowing smoke. We
are tremendous fans. And now we have to call it
a day because I think we have to figure out
what's going on cryogenic freezing. You know that that's going
(01:02:23):
to stick with me. I totally thought it was the water.
Speaker 7 (01:02:25):
But if you want to find out, do tune into
that episode of Science Stuff.
Speaker 4 (01:02:30):
Yeah, thanks, guys. I'm a big fan of y'all as well.
Speaker 6 (01:02:33):
Same appreciate it, brother, Thanks Lore.
Speaker 3 (01:02:38):
And that was or hey cham as We've said, not
to sound like a broken record, but we really dig
this guy. And if you want to pick his brains.
For more historical aspects of brain science, of quantum mechanics,
the history of the Big Bang, check out our two
part interview series with Orge on Ridiculous.
Speaker 6 (01:02:58):
History Indeed and meantime.
Speaker 7 (01:03:00):
If you want to check us out all over the Internet,
you can do so at the handle Conspiracy Stuff where
we exist on Facebook with our Facebook group Here's where
it gets crazy, on xfka, Twitter, and on YouTube where
we have videos for your perusing enjoyment. On Instagram and TikTok. However,
we're Conspiracy Stuff Show.
Speaker 2 (01:03:19):
We also have a phone number. It is one eight
three three st d WYTK. When you call in, give
yourself a cool nickname and let us know within the
message if we can use your name and message on
the air. If you've got words to send us, maybe links,
maybe images, whatever, why not send us an email.
Speaker 3 (01:03:40):
We are the entities that read each piece of correspondence
we receive. Be well aware, yet unafraid. Sometimes the void
rights back. Love a good book recommendation. If you've got
something really out there, send it our way. We'll meet
you a little past the light. Out here in the
dark conspiracy at iHeartRadio dot com.
Speaker 2 (01:04:17):
Stuff they Don't Want You to Know is a production
of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn this stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of iHeart Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt,
my name is Noal.
Speaker 3 (00:29):
They call me Ben. We're joined as always with our
super producer Dylan the Tennessee pal Fagan. Most importantly, you
are you. You are here. That makes this the stuff
they don't want you to know. And guys, you know
it's been a thesis of our show for quite some
time that history and the present and the future, these
(00:52):
are riddled with unexplained events, questions that are left unanswered.
And we're in a very exciting time in civilization right
There are dangers that are unprecedented, there are questions that
have never been addressed, and at the same time, there
are astonishing breakthroughs in almost every field of science imaginable.
(01:16):
And we got together off air, as we do, and
we said, we've got a lot of questions about the
world of science. Who's the guy who could answer these
for us, or who is the genius nice enough to
humor us with questions about simulation theory AI, regrowing limbs,
(01:37):
interstellar objects, everything from the past and the way we
reevaluate it to the questions and the big breakthroughs of
the modern day. So with that we do have good news.
We found a guy to talk to us. We proudly
introduce you to the author, the engineer, the cartoonist, the roboticist,
(02:01):
the podcaster, Fello Georgia tech alum by the way, all
around science expert or Hey cham or Hey, thank you
so much for joining us today.
Speaker 4 (02:10):
Man, Hello, Hello, so happy to be here. Thanks for
having me on your show and calling me a genius.
That's probably overrated.
Speaker 5 (02:18):
No, that's something.
Speaker 6 (02:20):
A genius is a self deprecating genius.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Jorge is also an author you can check out Out
of your Mind right now and in book form. I'm
looking at a hardcover. It looks amazing, written with Dwayne Godwin.
Is that correct?
Speaker 4 (02:36):
Yeah, Duyne Godwin. He's a neuroscientist m M and dean
of a graduate studies at wake Forest University. So he's
a pretty knowledgeable guy.
Speaker 3 (02:45):
And we're big fans of your comic series PhD as well.
We're going to get into some of that. You may
recognize Orgey as the co creator and host of Daniel
and Jorge Explained the Universe, as well as your newest
podcast project, Science Stuff. Could you tell us a little
(03:05):
bit about your background and your own words and what
led you to Science Stuff.
Speaker 5 (03:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (03:11):
So I have a PhD in engineering in robotics actually
from Stanford University. But then I decided to become a cartoonist,
which is still something of a concern to my parents.
So my career took a little bit of a creative
turn there. I've done comics, I've done movies, I've done
(03:32):
TV show and my latest and books as well nonfiction books.
And my latest is this podcast with iHeart called Science
Stuff Amazing. Yeah, yeah, where we answer all kinds of
fascinating questions about science for anyone.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
And look, we're some of the original stuff guys over
here with one of these weird little stuff shows. We
are so excited that the format you've chosen for Science
Stuff includes interviews, includes all sorts of different explorations that
I don't want to downplay just conversational style shows, but
you are really putting in the work to bring in
(04:09):
other voices and explore things to their fullest. I really
love it.
Speaker 4 (04:14):
Yeah, thanks, you know, I basically have no rules on
the show. You know, whatever it takes to best explain
the whatever question we're trying to answer. You know, if
we find an expert and he's amazing and engaging or
she's amazing and engaging throughout, then that's what you'll hear.
But if it's better for me to like go to
a quantum computer lab and have you hear what a
(04:34):
quantum computer sounds like, that's that's what we'll get amazing.
Speaker 3 (04:38):
And you also, I've got to say, you're also super
into self experimentation when appropriate. I'm thinking specifically about the
hypnosis episode.
Speaker 4 (04:49):
Yeah, yeah, I try to make it as you know, experiential,
experiential as possible.
Speaker 5 (04:55):
That's a word. Yeah, I should know that.
Speaker 4 (04:57):
And can I you know, take the listener long into
whatever topic we're doing. So I did one where I
got hypnotized. I went into the computer lab. They had
quantum computers. I'm doing one coming up where we're testing
whether frog meat really tastes like chicken.
Speaker 7 (05:14):
WHOA, I'm sorry, I gotta quickly double back hypnotized. So
how did did it take? How did that go for you?
And what are your thoughts on that? From a scientific perspective.
Speaker 4 (05:24):
Yes, super fascinating. You know, I think what we all
think of hypnotism when we hear the word hypnotism is
this kind of like mystical or hoaxy, kind of hokey,
you know, entrancing people. But nowadays what people call hypnotism
is more like therapy, you know, like guided meditation, kind
of guided therapy really kind of getting you into your
(05:47):
thoughts and getting you to use your imagination to really
kind of basically simulate your life or simulate different situations
so you can get better perspective on.
Speaker 3 (05:56):
It, to live in a simulation. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (06:00):
Yeah, that's that's how they describe it.
Speaker 4 (06:01):
Yeah, that's how they describe ith.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Can we go that route?
Speaker 5 (06:07):
Guys?
Speaker 2 (06:07):
Can we go ahead and jump off that cliff.
Speaker 5 (06:13):
Or not?
Speaker 4 (06:14):
It feels like we're tittering on the brink already.
Speaker 8 (06:16):
Okay, So, so for years, the better part of a decade,
we have been fascinated with the concept of simulation theory
or hey, could you explain just in the brief baseline
what people mean when they say simulation theory.
Speaker 4 (06:34):
Yeah, Basically, it's the idea that we're not really really real,
like you're not real biological animals with brains. We're actually
just characters in a video game. So that's the basic idea.
We're all just kind of like, uh, non player characters NPCs,
and in some sort of computer program, maybe run by
some alien or advanced human civilization in the future, where
(06:56):
they have a giant computer the size of the planet maybe,
and in this computer they're simulating artificial beings, and the
idea is that maybe we're some of those artificial beings.
We're not real we're not real people, we're actually just
computer programs.
Speaker 7 (07:10):
Well, and this sounds a little out there when you
put it that way, but there's some incredibly smart people
that go all in for this, right for sure?
Speaker 2 (07:17):
For sure.
Speaker 4 (07:18):
Yeah, I think Elon Musk is pretty famous. Not our
favorite guy as for some people these days, but he's
pretty famous as being sort of all in on this theory.
Anybody else really, Yeah, Like Neil de Grassy Tyson, he's
on records saying like, oh, this is pretty This is
a pretty compelling argument for the idea that we are
(07:39):
in a simulation, and I can't think of an argument
against it.
Speaker 5 (07:43):
So it's like, you know, it's a pretty it's.
Speaker 4 (07:45):
Kind of a very intelligent, compelling argument that people who
are for the simulation theory put forth, and you know,
smart people can't really argue against it.
Speaker 7 (07:54):
It's also fund this as a thought experiment. That's how
I found it to be the most engaging personally.
Speaker 2 (08:00):
Well, you get into that in your episode Are we
living in a simulation featuring Nick Bostrom? With Nick Bostrom
because he's the guy who put forth the philosophical argument
essentially that this could be true? Right? And if it
were true, why? And I gotta tell you, going through
and listening to that, I wanted to ask you. I
(08:21):
want to ask you both, like I want to sit
down with you and Nick in that moment just say, well, guys,
what I feel like we're thinking in human terms for
a lot of these arguments, for like what we can
imagine as being possible scientifically technologically we're talking about computing
power and how you know, putting a bunch of computing
power towards one thing or another thing. I do wonder
(08:44):
if people like Nick Boscherman and you, like hyper intelligent
human beings, ever imagine that the universe entire that we
experience and believe to be the universe could be the
thing that's being simulated rather than just a planet size
simulation or something like that.
Speaker 4 (09:02):
Yeah, I mean, like the is the universe itself a simulation?
Speaker 2 (09:06):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (09:06):
Yeah, because it's very suspicious, right, because there's laws that
basically help you predict what's going to happen in the universe,
Like if you throw a baseball up in the air,
you know exactly where to catch it. And so it's
kind of weird that it almost feels like a program, right,
Like it almost feels like a video game. And so yeah,
there's some people think that maybe the universe itself, the
whole universe, is some sort of simulation. But then you
(09:28):
get to the question of what is it running on,
like right on a computer, right, yeah, well yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
Or is is what we imagine to be reality just
based on the constraints of this simulation. So what we
think is possible or even could be is in a
box that is you know, this place. I don't know.
I'm sorry, maybe that's too weird.
Speaker 3 (09:56):
Okay, yes, good question, because it's all so further to
add to that box analogy. Part of the box is
the limited the limited ways in which the human minds
can experience data. Right. We know that we were talking
earlier on ridiculous history about the concept of the observable
(10:16):
universe and or hey you were you took great care
to point out that the observable universe is not the
whole universe, not the universe entire, and therefore the things
that we can observe through a relatively limited set of
sensory inputs are not necessarily, you know, the whole pizza
(10:39):
pie is. I want to go back to something you
mentioned in your in your setup for this concept of
simulation theory, you noted, Yes, it's a coherent it's a
brilliant it's a well thought out argument. It's also sometimes
criticized as something that is impossible to disprove. Could you
(11:02):
tell us a little bit about what people mean when
they say that?
Speaker 4 (11:06):
Yeah, yeah, so well, maybe we should talk about the
argument first, in case people don't know the argument. The
argument is that that and this was put by this
person called Nick Boston. He's a philosopher, Oxford professor at
the time, and he really took this idea that's been around,
you know, basically since computers have been around. People thought, well,
if we can program little agents or little programs, maybe
(11:30):
you can program people. And then those people think they're
in the real world, but they are actually programs. But
Nick Boston put out this sort of logical argument that
said that there's really three possibilities that could be true,
or one of them only one of them can be true.
So one of them is that most civilizations really don't
(11:50):
make it very far, you know, they don't make it
to the stage in their technological development where they can
build the planet sized computer and build these massive simulations.
Possibility too, is that some civilizations can make it to
that stage, but they don't have any interest in creating
these simulations, like it's maybe they find it unethical, or
maybe they think it's just a waste of resources and
(12:11):
auction three is that, you know, there are some civilizations
that make it to this super advanced age, and some
of them love to make simulations, in which case there's
probably billions of simulations in the history of the universe.
And so the number of simulated beings outnumbers would outnumber
the number of regular, real physical beings. And so if
(12:34):
you have to make a bet whether you're real or simulated,
the rational bet, you know, if you're placing a bet
on this, it would be that you are a similant
being because you know, the odds are that you are
if you believe these arguments.
Speaker 2 (12:49):
It's amazing, so good. Uh hoor hair. Are you a father?
Speaker 5 (12:54):
I am? Yeah.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
Okay, So did you have a Minecraft phase or like
with your kids at all?
Speaker 4 (13:01):
Yeah, it's it's still lingering. It's it's surprisingly a longing's got.
Speaker 6 (13:06):
A staying power.
Speaker 7 (13:06):
Yeah, even like I mean kids you know, grow up
with it and continue to enjoy it until like adolescence.
I mean, it's just such an incredible, uh and creative platform.
Speaker 2 (13:15):
So my kids are gone starts playing Minecraft right now
as we're recording this, and they are in a procedurally
generated world where if they go out far enough and
their character via you know, as a user, can see
the next stage, right, the next chunk of data that
needs to get loaded, it gets loaded up and they
can interact with it. But it's not real until they
(13:37):
get to it. Right that that concept of procedural generation
feels uncomfortably real to me. I uh, in this world
it's but again, it doesn't mean it is. It just
feels uncomfortably like that thing when we're looking deeper and
deeper into quantum mechanics and deeper and deeper into some
(13:58):
of the stuff that makes up this world. It does
feel as though when we're actually looking at things and
studying things, we're getting a ton of data. But then
you back up just a little bit and not so much.
What are your thoughts on that?
Speaker 4 (14:14):
Yeah, No, it's an interesting thing because you know, in
this back and forth argument between people saying like, oh,
we're in a simulation, most likely, we're not likely in
a simulation, that point gets really kind of thrown around
a lot back and forth, and so some people say like, oh,
it would be it would be impossible to simulate the
whole universe, every atom of every particle of everything object
(14:35):
around us. And then the people who are for the
simulation say, oh, well, then you can use procedural algorithms
where you only simulate the things you're looking at, and
like if a scientist goes into gets on a microscope
and looks really closely at something small, then then you
simulate that little bit of with more detail. Quantum scientists
(14:57):
are now saying, well, that's fine, but even and even
if you did that, simulating quantum physics is so outrageously
expensive for computers, then you would have to have quantum computers.
But even if you had quint of computers, then you
have to simulate those, and then you even those are
super inefficient, and so it gets thrown back and forth,
(15:19):
even with this argument of like using procedural algorithms.
Speaker 3 (15:24):
It reminds me a little bit of your your recent
conversation on science stuff with the world experts on the
idea of terraforming Mars, and one of the one of
the big things that comes up for people who are
quite bullish on the concept as well as for people
who are very much against it, is the sheer amount
(15:46):
of energy, right, and the ambitious technological breakthroughs that would
have to occur. And I just want to say that
one of my favorite moments in that episode was when
you add these experts if they actually wanted to go
to Mars, and one of your experts straight up set no.
Speaker 5 (16:12):
Yeah, I know.
Speaker 4 (16:13):
It's fascinating because Mars right now is very inhospitable. You know,
it's like a desert. You went there and your your
space suit had a leak in it, you would die.
You know, there's no air, no oxygen. Your blood will
will boil, your saliva will boil. You want to survive there?
Speaker 5 (16:30):
Uh?
Speaker 4 (16:30):
And so I think one of the experts that they
wouldn't want to go there right now, first of all,
because it's uh, you know, she has a family and
it would be kind of tough call there to make.
But the other side just said that, you know, marsh
is another planet and we kind of have no rights
to it, you know, we should leave it at pristine
and untouched, the like we have national parks here in
(16:53):
the on Earth.
Speaker 6 (16:54):
Well, that's not going so well.
Speaker 4 (16:56):
The I know, it might be in the minority.
Speaker 7 (17:01):
The prevailing attitude, you know, it would seem in this
country is one of colonization, you know, one of like
everything belongs to us, everything is fair game. And that
certainly seems to be the perspective of someone like Elon Musk,
who seems really hot on colonizing Mars and keeps i
would say, over promising and under delivering in terms of
(17:21):
timeline around that. Any thoughts on that and like why
that's such a hot no pun intended kind of topic
for that kind of billionaire techie class.
Speaker 4 (17:32):
Yeah, yeah, Well, I think the main problem is that
there hasn't been a lot of research onto this topic.
You know, there were some papers back in the nineties,
maybe in the seventies and eighties, and some a few
people have wrint papers since then, but a lot of
it is kind of speculative, were kind of opinion based
or very like back of the envelope kind of calculations.
(17:54):
So it's kind of a field that right now is
very open to different opinions, you know, Like some people say, ah, yeah,
we can, well, there's not enough CO two in the
polar ice caps of Mars to really kind of fill
up the atmosphere there. And then some people say, well,
that's all right, we can just round up some comets
and the meteor and the asteroid built and have them
(18:14):
crash on Mars. And some people say, what are you
talking about. That's insane, but it's possible. And so that
that's kind of how it goes back and forth.
Speaker 7 (18:21):
Is that maybe also one of those kind of move
fast break things kind of approaches that a lot of
Silicon Valley type folks where it sort of like trot
this idea out there because it sounds on its surface
so futuristic, like the O week we should be on Mars,
like we deserve that as a human race, as a
human civilization, But then sort of sort out the details later.
Speaker 4 (18:40):
Yeah, yeah, it definitely sounds like it. And it's also
sort of something that it seems also possible in this
problem to kind of trigger something. It could run away
from you in either a good direction or a bad direction.
So for example, if you melt, let's see a little
bit of the polar ice caps that bring some into
the atmosphere, and then that creates a greenhouse effect, which
(19:03):
heats up the atmosphere and the more which melts more
water or CO two, which blocks more sunlight. And so
you know, you could maybe do something small and it
will kind of cascade into this huge change in the
in the atmosphere, possibly possibly.
Speaker 3 (19:18):
Right a wave we can't turn back.
Speaker 4 (19:20):
Yeah, yeah, And so it's sort of at some point
it feels like, oh, we could, yeah, we could totally
trigger you know, global warming on Mars. What's the worst
that could happen? And then some people say, there's a
lot of that worst that can happen.
Speaker 5 (19:33):
There.
Speaker 3 (19:34):
We'll pause for a word from our sponsors and return
with more from who Hate, And.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
We've returned a while back. We I can't remember the
name of the episode, guys, or exactly what it was on,
but we talked about potential fixes or like, let's say,
terraforming light here on Earth to address some of the
climate issues that we are now in the midst of you.
For a long time, it was this thing that was coming,
(20:06):
that might come, that could be out there, And it
does feel, at least in this moment that with things
like the flooding in Central Texas that just occurred as
we're recording this on July seventh, some of the warnings
about iceberg. There's a doomsday iceberg or ice shelf that
is essentially showing signs that we are very soon going
(20:29):
to have a lot more water flooding the oceans, and
it's making the oceans more salty, not less salty for
some reason, which is just it feels like we have
a lot of problems hanging out here on Earth that
deal specifically with climate and things that could be addressed
with some form of advanced terraforming or light terraforming, just
(20:49):
little things we could do. But when we looked at it,
Ben Nol, do you remember the concept was to in
some way blot out part of the solar energy coming through.
Speaker 7 (21:01):
Are you talking about the physicists that proposed setting off
a nuke that would potentially fill the atmosphere with soot,
and uh, you know, he claims would in some way
the climate change.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
That's what got what I wanted to bring that up.
Speaker 7 (21:18):
Maybe we'll get to that, but I just think it
it triggers me in that way. But Matt, maybe clarify
what you're talking about.
Speaker 3 (21:23):
I'm sorry if you're talking about the the proposition of
blocking the sun.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
Yes, right, but but again just as a way to
curb some of the heating, the overall you know, trend
that we're seeing in heating temperatures. It just seems like
they're maybe to somebody standing on the outside like I
am in this moment, how can we funnel more resources,
minds and just energy into that kind of thing?
Speaker 4 (21:51):
Yeah, because it seems kind of almost silly to be
thinking about, you know, terraforming Mars when we can't even
like terror anything here right.
Speaker 2 (22:02):
But here, you know, I mean, I don't know, it
makes me think about Mar the thoughts that potentially there
was life on Mars at some point in it's in
its past, you know, or at least there were there
was at least waters there and put the potential for
life maybe.
Speaker 4 (22:20):
Yeah, I don't know, yeah, I know, it's it's wild,
it's and it's interesting because here in the Solar System,
we basically have like three data points, right, we have Venus, Earth,
and Mars, three rocky planets about the same orbit, the
same amount of sun, but all three turn out super
duper different. It's almost like if you have the triplets
and a triple experiment and you see what happens to
(22:42):
each one, and you know, one of them is a
super dry desert with no atmosphere, even though they all
started about the same. Mars is a desert with no atmosphere.
Venus is the complete opposite. It has like too much atmosphere,
huge clouds of CO two that make it nine hundred
degrees fahrenheit, and the surface of Venus, and then in
the middle we have Us. And so I think, you know,
(23:05):
we have a pretty good idea of what could happen
if things go wrong either way.
Speaker 3 (23:09):
Right, Yeah, that's why they call it the Goldilock zone. Right.
And there's there's something that I was talking about some
of your work and your conversations was with some old
friends of mine from Georgia Tech. Weirdly enough, and one
of us stumbled on this point that I'd love your
reaction to, Uh, it's the idea that, yes, terraforming already exists.
(23:35):
Humans are currently terraforming Earth, just not in the best ways.
How would you how would you react to that? Does
that sound accurate or on base?
Speaker 5 (23:44):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (23:45):
For sure, I mean we are. We are definitely changing Earth.
I mean Earth has changed a lot since the beginning.
You know, we started with no atmosphere, and then it
had an atmosphere, and then it it didn't have any water,
then it had water. You know, initially it was ASCO
two than you know, uh, bacteria converted all to some
of it to oxygen and that's what we have now.
(24:06):
So it's everything. It's always changing. But the idea that
humans can affect that is definitely true. You know, we've definitely,
through our activity, are causing the atmosphere in the planet,
temperatures to change. And so that's actually one of the
kind of ideas that they have for Mars. It's like, hey,
maybe we can go to Mars and just polluted right.
Speaker 7 (24:28):
Well, you know, I brought up that, frankly pretty ridiculous
proposal by a computer scientist, not a physicist. I was
mistaken a guy named Andy Haverley, who's a Microsoft software
engineer from Washington State, and he wrote a paper in
an admittedly non peer reviewed scholarly journal or I think
it's a web based collection of non peer reviewed scholarly
(24:51):
articles that proposed sequestering thirty years worth of CO two
emissions in underwater rock by andating a nuclear bomb underground
within the Earth's crust. And he said he got the
idea from the movie Oppenheimer, which seems like a really
sound science there. Obviously, there's a lot of people saying
(25:12):
this is absurd, and I'm sure that you'll probably fall
on that side as well, but it does speak to
something that is similar to terraforming, or maybe it is
a discipline that is what sort of is the father
of terraforming. This idea of geo engineering, and it's something
that I guess been around since the forties. But the
problem is, and the critiques that are often leveled at
(25:32):
geoengineering are those knock on consequences, those domino effect, butterfly
effect things down the chain that can really happen without
proper care being taken to prevent things like that. Do
you have any thoughts about the concept of geoengineering or
you know, if burying a nuke in the Earth and
blowing it up is a smart way to be good
stewards of the planet that we've already kind of jacked
(25:53):
up beyond repair.
Speaker 4 (25:55):
Yeah, no, for sure, I think most people kind of
it's all sort of loved into the same thing. Terraform geoengineering.
You know, crazy things like exploding a nuclear bomb mat
like you said, like to cause basically a nuclear winter
to cool down the planet. Or some people talk about
like releasing special aerosols or special like little tiny needles
(26:16):
kind of that will sort of reflect the certain wavelengths
of light and things like that. I think, you know,
I was clearly pointed out in the movie Jurassic Park. Sure,
chaos is hard to predict, you know, when you have
a complex system like this, it's like it's they're basically
ruled by chaos rules, which means, you know, things can
(26:40):
take a turn for the worst really really quickly and
without us being able to predict it unless you know,
like everything, every single variable possible, which we cannot have.
Speaker 7 (26:49):
And this remulation an answer to that, running these elaborate
algorithms and these elaborate simulations that could potentially show more
of those knock on consequences, trying to maybe put a
little positive spin on some of this kind of runn
amock AI or you know, machine learning type stuff. And
I don't mean to pivot too quickly, but do you
have any thoughts around how these kind of models, you know,
(27:11):
could potentially be helpful with combating things like climate change?
Speaker 6 (27:16):
Or is the genie already too far off and out
of the bottle?
Speaker 3 (27:20):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (27:20):
No, I think modernly is the best tool we have
basically because we only have one Earth, we can't like
experiment with it. You can try something and see how
it works if it kills us all and so basically
simulations computers, huge computers, it's the only way you can
really test these things and figure out solutions.
Speaker 3 (27:40):
I want to pivot us just a little bit here,
and I think we all agree. I think we're all
on the same page and agree with that answer. But
in the course of your expiration, you've run into a
lot of what we used to call ad science, right so,
or let's be diplomatic out of the box propositions. Right
(28:01):
there we go dream big. Humanity has always been a
hold by beer species. So with that in mind, could
you tell us some of the most wildly ambitious like
scientific propositions you've run across, you know, the nuke stuff,
the blocking the sun. What's the most sci fi kind
(28:24):
of proposition you've run into that has been seriously considered,
whether in the past or the present, to address some
of these big scientific issues.
Speaker 4 (28:34):
Yeah, well, let's see. Just in the episode on terraforming Mars,
one of the ideas that's being floated out there kind
of seriously to heat up Mars because it's too cold
there is to basically create giant space mirrors, like flood
one hundred or thousands of mirrors around Mars and basically
have them point the sunlight that Mars gets to, like
(28:57):
the north or south pole, like a giant space magnifying glass.
Speaker 3 (29:02):
Yeah, what could go wrong?
Speaker 4 (29:04):
And then yeah right right, doesn't sound too too expensive.
And then then you could start melting the poles and
then that might trigger global warming, and then that might
heat up the rest of the atmosphere. That's one crazy idea.
Speaker 6 (29:17):
That's nuts.
Speaker 5 (29:19):
Oh yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4 (29:20):
Have you have you all heard of the Dyson sphere?
Speaker 1 (29:22):
Ye?
Speaker 2 (29:23):
Yes, dice swarm baby.
Speaker 4 (29:26):
That's another wild, wild idea, just like cover a star
maybe and suck up all the energy.
Speaker 2 (29:33):
You'd have all the energy you need to simulate other places.
Speaker 4 (29:37):
Probably so yeah, yeah, And people you said as maybe
a way that we could detect advanced alien civilizations out there.
And you see where there used to be a star.
If you see that it's blocked off and it only
gives you know, infrared radiation, then then maybe they invented
a Dyson sphere there, and that means there's aliens there.
Speaker 3 (30:00):
How satisfied would it be to first find an extraterrestrial
civilization and then secondly to see that one of our
crazy ideas made it off the drawing board. It's pretty inspiring.
Speaker 4 (30:15):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, it means more ontocenting, right maybe hopefully
hopefully they're nice aliens and good role models for us.
Speaker 2 (30:24):
The concept of a Dyson sphere Joree specifically reading about
that for today, thinking about some of the simulation theory stuff,
and it appears that at least the way was originally
imagined with the Kardashev scale. This concept of fully covering
a star in some kind of I don't know, a
(30:44):
literally a sphere of technology to then absorb one percent
of that star's energy wouldn't be at least to the understanding. Now,
that wouldn't be physically possible because of the gravitational forces
at hand. But this, this swarm concept, to me feels
well again, I'm using the word feel because I am
(31:05):
not smart enough to fully understand it. But I would say,
if you had some kind of grid system, satellite system,
imagine Starlink but around a star. But then imagine the
number of Starlink satellites multiplied by a thousand, then you
know that kind of conceptually, at least in my mind,
I can picture it. I do wonder if, as we've
(31:26):
got these new pieces of technology, some of the new satellites,
some of the new imaging tech that's even land based,
like Earth based, where we can see out much deeper
and much further into the universe, if we will ever
discover something that we just don't understand. Our sensors don't
understand the light kind of have you, as you're saying
(31:47):
you can only detect infrared light or something coming off
of a star. We just can't understand what that light is.
But it's just, you know, millions of satellites rolling around
a star. I don't know what I'm saying other than
that makes me very very excited.
Speaker 5 (32:01):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (32:02):
Yeah, well yeah, because you know, it seems very unlikely
because the universe is so big and it's so sparse.
Even though it's there's so many stars and plants out there,
it's it's still pretty sparse, and so I think the
chances that we'll ever meet an alien species or you know,
run into them are pretty slim. So it is super
(32:23):
interesting to think about, like, well, how else could we
detect them? How else could we know they're there? And
to think about, you know, like if they had similar
technology to us, what would be the signatures of those technologies?
You know, could we see radio waves coming out of it?
Can we hear music coming out of their Are there
radios and things like that?
Speaker 5 (32:42):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (32:43):
Or could we detect them using starlink satellites to cover
up their sun?
Speaker 3 (32:48):
You know, it's such a pickle. We've talked about it
a little bit in the past on our sister show,
just the on episodes of this show, just the problem
of time and space and while we're here conceptually in
outer space, while we're running our own simulation and model
thereof there's a question that I think has been on
(33:10):
a lot of our minds ever since the story of
a mua mua. Why are interstellar objects so rare? Like,
why is it so rare for us to encounter them?
I think there have only been check me on this
guy's three documented so far.
Speaker 2 (33:27):
Three confirmed that we've observed, right.
Speaker 4 (33:29):
Right, yeah, and the third one was very recently, basically
last week.
Speaker 3 (33:34):
So why is it if the universe is so big?
One of the first questions lay folks would have is
why is it so rare for stuff from the outside
of the Solar System to make it to this neighborhood
right right?
Speaker 4 (33:50):
Well, the first thing is that that's a good thing,
ben because you know, like you don't want stuff crashing
into your planet. You don't want to be living in
like a debris zone. Basically, we just did an episode
about what it's like to be a planet in the
center of the galaxy. Oh wow, And the analogy there
is pretty fascinating. So if you take if you make
(34:12):
a bubble around us, like around our Sun, a bubble
that's four light years big, like if you look ford
light years in all directions, all that's in that bubble
is basically Us. Most of the mass in that huge
bubble is just the Sun and Jupiter and the rest
is just like little tiny rocks like our planet. If
(34:32):
you take that same bubble and you put it in
the center of the galaxy, you would find about ten
million stars in that same bubble in addition to the
super massive black hole that's in the middle of our galaxy.
So if you live there, you're basically toast. Like like
you know, so many things can have things in crash
(34:54):
into you. Another star could be flying by and like
kick you out of your orbit, or it could steal
and you suddenly be orbiting another sun. And with so
many stars, there's like super nova's going on all the time.
Quasars from the super massive black hole would be like
basically roasting your planet. So it's sort of a good
(35:14):
thing that we're living in the suburbs of the galaxy.
Speaker 2 (35:17):
Yeah, there's probably a reason life, you know, proliferated out here,
way out here in the quiet, right.
Speaker 5 (35:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (35:27):
Okay, But let's say it's thought that this one three
I Atlas, this this most recent interstellar object, it's thought
that it's potentially a comet. We need more information on it.
Kind of the way, what was There's a second one, guys,
and I cannot remember it. It's not amua mua. It's
not this one. It was the it was the third one,
(35:49):
which is I guess officially the second one, but it was.
I think that one was proven to be a comment.
That seems like an interstellar or an object that exists
in space that is just moving. It seems like the
kind of thing that could, with its own propulsion, just
continue moving, even outside of one solar system into another.
(36:13):
Do you think it's possible that an intelligent civilization would
send something like that ever, in an attempt to get
out of their own solar system, not even really to
make contact or you know, nothing, not applying any kind
of thoughts on it as to what its purpose is,
but just sending something outside to see what's there.
Speaker 4 (36:36):
Yeah, well, I think you know, the way the physics
works is that most likely these things do come from
another solar system, because you know, to get rocks or
comments or anything that kind of complicated elements to form
like in the middle of nowhere, like just out of
a gas cloud is very unlikely. So most of these
(36:56):
things probably come from another solar system. And then probably
about happened with something knocked in and it kind of
got knocked up at door of it and then got
thrown out into space and we just happened to sort
of catch it. Yeah, but whether they're sent by.
Speaker 2 (37:12):
Well, I'm not saying this one is. Yeah, I guess
it just I mean, I'm wondering if it could be Yeah, yeah,
I'm wondering if that's a viable thing that we could
even imagine or think to look for. Almost like again,
I can only imagine some of the satellites, the early
satellites that we sent out. Was the one that had
the Golden Record on it, Voyager. Yeah, just something like that,
(37:33):
but more complicated and perhaps a little more rocky.
Speaker 3 (37:38):
I mean, use the use the materials you have right,
use the stuff that has proven to already be spaceworthy.
So it's a it's a brilliant thing to think about. Also,
to that point we brought up earlier, I believe the
the second interstellar object confirmed in recent observation is Comic
two I or Comic when it's called Borisov. Yes, but yeah,
(38:03):
confirmed to be a comet. This stuff is. This stuff
is so cool because it shows us first that it's good,
as you said, Jorge, to live in the verbs of
the galaxy where it's not always a constant peel of Quasos.
But then it also yeah, yeah, I mean I live
(38:24):
in the city, so that analogy really hits up. But
there's I think there's another aspect of this to explore,
kind of speaking to Matt's question about humanity sending stuff
out right, just sending out voyage or whatnot into the darkness.
(38:46):
What do you see right now as the future of
human space exploration in the broadest of senses.
Speaker 4 (38:55):
Yeah, I think, you know, the media future is just
to like check out our neighborhood, you know, like what's
going on in Europe by one of the moons of Jupiter.
Is there water down there? Could there be life in
that water? Or what's going on in Mars underneath the
surface of Mars? You know, was there life there at
some point? Could there still be Like technically there could
(39:15):
still be you know, little aliens living down there in
the underground pools of Mars. So I think that's I
think that basically our priority right now is just to
learn from our solar system so that we can then
know more about planets, how they form, what's going on
with different planets, not just Earth, And then I think
from there you can then start looking at exoplanets. So
(39:38):
we've detected, you know, thousands of other planets around other
Solar systems, but we know very little about them, Like
we don't know how they form, what's normal out there.
You know, there's so much we don't know yet.
Speaker 2 (39:51):
Don't We kind of know that planet nine is out there,
or there is some kind of object out there, trans
Newtonian object.
Speaker 5 (40:00):
You mean, like on the other side of the Sun.
Speaker 2 (40:02):
Or yeah, there was oh gosh, there was more rumblings
coming out of BBC Sky at Night magazine something. I
was reading a couple other things on this show. Way
back in the day, we used to call it Niberu
because that was the like fabled, you know, secret planet
that was going to destroy our Earth one day. It
was a really fun hypothetical thing that was talked about
(40:25):
on message boards and talked about for a long time.
But it does appear that there is something out there
beyond Pluto essentially, or out close to the area where
Pluto is located.
Speaker 4 (40:36):
Yeah, no, I think that's something I think that's hotly
debated right now. It's like, is there is there are
there more planets even in our Solar system that we
just haven't seen and you know some people, I know,
some folks at Caltech kind of like study everybody's orbits,
all the planets, and they from just the gravitational signature.
They're like, oh, wait, these orbits tell us that there's
(40:56):
something there, but we don't know if for.
Speaker 6 (40:58):
Something else acting on it.
Speaker 7 (41:00):
What you mean like they can detect the force the
sum of the forces includes something that isn't immediately visible.
Speaker 5 (41:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (41:08):
Yeah, Like they see the for example, the orbit of
Neptune and they see it's not as perfectly accounted for
with all the planets we know about. Maybe there's something
else tugging it out there, and that's why they think
maybe there's another planet out there. But I think it's
still hotly debated, which means it's still a possibility.
Speaker 3 (41:25):
Up for grabs. Love it, love the love that great expanse.
We're sort of any we're in that method of as
a writer, you know this, We're in that stage where
we've got a couple of paragraphs and the rest of
the book is kind of blank pages, right, so we're
(41:45):
trying to figure out this saga together.
Speaker 7 (41:49):
Hey, let's take a quick break right here, hear a
word from our sponsor, and then come back with more
or hey, and we're back.
Speaker 3 (42:01):
This is heading in the direction of science fiction. But
we had a very brief conversation in the past about
so called artificial intelligence or AI. So what do you
think about the idea that the future of space exploration
by humans doesn't involve actual humans? What if we create
(42:25):
some kind of inorganic sentience or very highly sophisticated algorithm
to be the next wave of astronauts. Is that a
possibility or how crazy? Like on a scale of one
to backcrap crazy?
Speaker 6 (42:43):
What is this?
Speaker 4 (42:44):
No, it's not crazy at all. I mean, I'm sure
whatever we're sending to space right now you probably use
this AI to some degree, you know, And even the
instruments we use and ASSAD I imagine use some AI.
It's being used more and more and even in science
and engineering. So it's not totally crazy at all. And
in fact, some scenarios that people paint are like, well,
(43:06):
maybe you can send one robot with like instructions to
land on an asteroid and make two robots and copy
the program, and then those two robots have the instructions
to go out there, look for an asteroid, mine it,
you know, get energy from it, and make two copies
of it, and then that's how you could maybe like
you know, see the whole galaxy for example, So it's
(43:29):
not not totally crazy.
Speaker 3 (43:30):
No, should we be sending people into space.
Speaker 4 (43:39):
I think if people want to go to space, they
should go. You know what, why not? I mean, you know,
if they know the risk and there's a lot of
people that want to have that experience and they like
I think that they open up volunteers to go to
Mars and thousands of people signed up, so you know,
I think it's part of human nature to be explorers
(44:00):
and to you know, want to find out what it's
like to be there.
Speaker 6 (44:03):
Well, hot take, maybe I'm interested in yours.
Speaker 7 (44:07):
The whole space tourism thing and this sort of like
upstairs downstairs of it all where it's like, you know,
a lot of folks that are going to space, like
the Katie Perrys of the world, are coming back and
acting like they've accomplished some great feat and feel as
though they should be looked at in the same way
as astronauts and scientists and folks that have trained their
whole lives to do that. And what they've done is
(44:30):
more or less taken a little joy ride out in
the space and back, and it really does seem to
kind of further drive this wedge between like folks with
lots of money and regular folks, and further maybe even
solidifies this idea of space not being.
Speaker 6 (44:47):
For everybody, and that if anyone.
Speaker 7 (44:49):
Were to colonize Mars, I don't know that folks like
you or I might get the invites. I'm just wondering about,
you know, your thoughts on the whole social aspect of
space travel, space colonization, and space tourism.
Speaker 2 (45:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (45:05):
You know, I think these days, anything that gets people
excited about space or science or exploration, I think that's
all great.
Speaker 5 (45:13):
That's good.
Speaker 4 (45:14):
You know, whether or not, you know, getting to the
edge of the atmosphere counts to space, and whether or
not it should be something that only rich people can do,
that is the thornier kind of mindfield there, you know,
But ultimately, I think anything that gets people excited about
space is good.
Speaker 7 (45:33):
I guess I would say that this whole thing that
Blue Origin did maybe had the opposite effect of that,
And I guess that's sort of maybe what I'm getting
at is this whole idea of like what maybe once
would have gotten people excited about space seems to have
blown up in the faces of the folks that sort
of staged this pr event and maybe had the opposite
effect and maybe made it seem a little bit more
(45:55):
like this sort of bougie tone death thing, and maybe
is making people look scants a little bit at folks
these private space travel companies. Just I don't know, Maybe
that's my two cents, but that is the way it
seems like people are reacting to that particular event.
Speaker 4 (46:11):
Yeah, yeah, for sure, I can totally see that too.
I guess one point of view against that sort of
downplane of those flights is that I think somebody told
me that they've only done like ten or eleven or
twelve of these things with people in it, and so
there is still kind of a significant risk for Katie.
(46:32):
There was a significant risk for Katie Perry and all
those folks to go up there. You know, Like I
don't know if I would go if I was only
the twelfth person to go on this airplane or the spaceship,
you know what I mean, Like I always always like
a thousand people have gone.
Speaker 7 (46:48):
Or you know, not that dissimilar from the folks that
got you know, imploded in that experimental deep sea you
know situation.
Speaker 5 (46:58):
Yeah, that could have been them well you know, but.
Speaker 7 (47:01):
Then that deep sea thing, a lot of people were
like almost like they were rich people but maybe deserved
it or something. I'm not saying I think that at all,
but that was sort of the internet perspective. One of
the hot takes was like it was poorly planned, it
was really expensive.
Speaker 6 (47:15):
It was sort of this like prestige thing.
Speaker 7 (47:17):
But I'm with you or hey, I think you're right
about the how few attempts have been made, and so
anyone that's that's participating in it is taking their lives
into their own hands. And the question there then becomes
is that worth you know, reverence in some way or
is it just.
Speaker 6 (47:32):
Kind of a little bit blind, you know, like risk taking.
Speaker 3 (47:37):
You got to wonder about that, right, just the conversation
you say, oh, well, how many times have we tried this?
And as you're getting into the ship, someone says eleven
of these went great, and then you say how many
and they're like, okay, well close the door.
Speaker 6 (47:55):
Jolly good.
Speaker 2 (47:58):
I am jumping and turning an to hear guys, hey, chim,
given your experience with and expertise in robotics, what do
you see as humanity's relationship with robotics, with synthetic you know,
pieces of a human with things like neulink. Where do
(48:19):
you see us going in the future.
Speaker 4 (48:24):
I see us getting more and more and meshed with robots.
You know, it seemed like a fantasy when I was
a roboticist, just because the technology wasn't there. But I
was just reflecting recently on just even things that you
don't think about, like motors, Like the technology and motors
from the time that I was a roboticist to now
(48:45):
is has jumped, you know, several generations, several huge leaps.
You know, you can make motors so much stronger and
more efficient to the point where like a human sized
robot was sort of unthinkable in my time. But now
you know, there's like one hundred companies.
Speaker 7 (49:04):
Question really quickly or robotics isn't Oh, it doesn't necessarily
have to include some kind of intelligence, and it can
just be like automated mechanized machinery that accomplishes tasks, right,
Like you know, like motors, that would be a form
of robotics if it were programmed in a way that
it would get an automated task.
Speaker 5 (49:22):
Is that right.
Speaker 7 (49:22):
I just want to make sure I'm wrapping my head
around the concept of robotics, and I'd love to hear
more about how maybe that concept has evolved since you
got started in it.
Speaker 5 (49:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (49:31):
No, you're asking a very deep philosophical existential question that
all robotics is it kind of struggle with, like what
is a robot? Like can you call your car a robot?
You know, if it was a manual gear or even
if it's automatic, would you call it a robot? Or
does it need to have sentience or some sort of
(49:52):
program on it.
Speaker 6 (49:53):
In the UK they call microwaves robot cooking.
Speaker 5 (49:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (49:57):
Yeah, and now microwas are super smart too. Now they
probably had to have AI agents like recognizing your food
and figuring it helping you figure it out.
Speaker 7 (50:06):
Do you follow one side or the other on that
argument about what makes what makes a robot? Would love
to hear your thoughts on it, and that is interesting,
the philosophical kind of quandary of it all.
Speaker 5 (50:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (50:15):
I mean I would say if it's totally remote controlled,
it's probably I wouldn't call it a robot, it would
just call it like a machine maybe, Okay, Yeah, but
if it's doing things on its own somehow, either mechanically
or through a computer program.
Speaker 5 (50:31):
And then I'm pretty lenient what you call a robot?
Speaker 3 (50:34):
Yeah, I see it. Also, I think it's also a
good time to point out the fascinating etymology of the
word robot in the beginning, which itself was a I
think it was a check play from the nineteen twenties
that was automaton.
Speaker 6 (50:52):
It was the term that was used robot was yeah, yep, sorry.
Speaker 3 (50:55):
Ben robot robot nick, right, is this term that already
entered into our language with some social baggage, right, with
some statements and some deep philosophical quandaries. So as this technology,
I love that you point out there are hundreds of
companies who are working on things that we could think
(51:17):
of as house assistant robots in some limited function. Would
you and your family ever consider acquiring one? Or like,
would you buy the twelfth one or would you wait
for a few thousands?
Speaker 4 (51:30):
If I can get one to wash the dishes for me,
I would tomorrow.
Speaker 3 (51:36):
The worst.
Speaker 4 (51:37):
Yeah, yeah, you know, if it could do yeah, things
like that. I would love to have a robot. Dude,
I guess I have a dishwasher, but they still have
to unloaded or hound my kids.
Speaker 6 (51:47):
To they basically got a free wash them.
Speaker 5 (51:50):
I mean honest, yeah, right, yeah.
Speaker 3 (51:54):
And we see it too with it seems like the
at least the current the current speculation I've been reading
about both in private industry and academia, seems to argue
that a normalization or proliferation of robots in some way
is inevitable as the economy scale kicks in, prices decrease,
(52:17):
they become more affordable, and they also seem to I
love your dishwasher example. The argument also seems to be that,
similar to the Rumba, the new home robot assistants will
be specifically geared for certain tasks, starting like in a kitchen,
(52:38):
or starting with medical assistance. You know, picture the TV
commercial I've fallen and I can't get up. Would you
agree with that? And kind of dovetail on Matt's earlier question,
how far do you think the prevalence of robotic assistants
will go?
Speaker 5 (52:59):
Oh?
Speaker 4 (52:59):
Boy, I think it probably depends on obviously your income level,
you know, and also where you live in the world.
You know, if it's much more economical for you to
hire someone down the street to wash dishes, then then
that seems like a better situation because then two people
benefit from that, right, and it's supposed to one person
and a robot.
Speaker 7 (53:21):
I do wonder though, like where, you know, a lot
of the problems that we run up against when we're
talking about mechanization and roboticization and involving you know, artificial
intelligence or machine learning in tasks, is where is that
cut off? At what point are we going to pump
the brakes and say no, no, no, we want to
replace these tasks that we have deemed to be menial
(53:42):
and not worthy of human involvement without throwing out tons
of jobs and and things that people rely on for
their economic well well being to protect and to to
you know, feed and and raise their families. Because it
seems to me like there's really no way back, because
the technogy is out there, and the nature of economics
(54:02):
and the nature of capitalism is such that if it
can be done, someone's going to do it, and someone's
going to sell it. I just I don't know, do
you have any philosophical thoughts around that?
Speaker 4 (54:13):
Yeah, I mean it's sort of the history of humanity
is always taking inside of automation and efficiency and and
you know, letting people figure out other jobs that they
can do, you know, if it's cheaper to use robots.
But you know, most of our cars are made using
robots too, and people are getting operated on sort of
(54:36):
by robots now. Yeah, and so it's all it's all coming,
and it's all I think, it's not probably not going
as fast as people maybe imagine twenty years ago.
Speaker 6 (54:45):
There's always a backlash.
Speaker 7 (54:46):
I mean even historically you've got like the luttites and stuff,
people smashing printing presses and you know, backlash against industrialization.
So it's really no different than that. And I'm not
coming down on one side or the other. I think
to your point, it is absolutely just a product of
human vanity and just the nature of progress and all
of that. But if you look back, even like people
were very upset about the idea of the synthesizer, people
(55:08):
you know, in orchestras, thought it was going to replace them.
But what ultimately happened was people figured out how to
use synthesizers to make sounds that an orchestra couldn't make.
And I think that's the neat part about all of
this stuff, is figuring out those other things.
Speaker 6 (55:21):
But it doesn't entirely get rid of the fear that
a lot of.
Speaker 7 (55:23):
Folks have about, you know, being supplanted, you know, by
these types of technologies.
Speaker 6 (55:28):
So I don't know the answer. I just it's a
tricky one.
Speaker 7 (55:30):
And I think you've you've pointed to that and everything
that you said, and I appreciate them.
Speaker 4 (55:34):
Yeah, yeah, And all those ethical concerns are one of
the reasons that know a cartoonists and a podcaster.
Speaker 3 (55:40):
Well, with that, there's so much we want to get
to that we may not be able to get to
in our time today. But I can hear some folks
in the crowd right now immediately asking a question that
I don't I don't think we've gotten to previous conversations.
(56:03):
With the rollout normalization of robots, where does society land
in its relationship to a surveillance state? You know, like
that's the reason a lot of people have the it's
the old joke about engineers, dude, you know it from
Georgia Tech too. A lot of engineers, if you go
to their house, they're going to avoid smart devices, right.
Speaker 5 (56:27):
Right, right?
Speaker 4 (56:28):
Yeah, yeah, Well, but you also don't want to be
the person wearing the tinfoil, you know, Yes.
Speaker 7 (56:34):
Yeah, that's the issue, right, there's like a fine line
between being the lutte, being the person that's getting left behind,
being the person shouting at clouds or whatever, or smashing
printing presses, and being someone that's completely blind to the
potential negative aspects of.
Speaker 6 (56:48):
A lot of this stuff.
Speaker 3 (56:49):
So my question then directly is should people be concerned
of increased surveillance with smart devices robot nicks in their
hole or is that kind of much ado about nothing?
Speaker 4 (57:07):
You know, I think if you're someone with ill intent,
you know, if you're a criminal, if you're someone who
wants to do bad things, then you probably should be worried.
My personal point of view is, you know, if you're
not doing anything that bad and you still have some
space where you have complete privacy in your home or
(57:29):
things like that, or you're able to switch these things off,
and generally I think it can be helpful. You know,
there have been several cases here in Stufn, California, if
people like going missing, but then they were sort of
found or tracked through people's ring cameras or traffic cameras,
and so those kinds of things can also be sort
of useful.
Speaker 7 (57:49):
I think that's where I fall on it. I've always said, like,
I don't really have anything to hide. I'm not that concerned.
I think the benefits outweigh the negatives for me personally.
But I know that that's not the way other people
might feel about it. But I am with you on
that one, and I think that that's a really good point,
that the triangulation, the pinging, finding folks that maybe never
would have been found otherwise. There's always a double edged
(58:10):
sword to that kind of surveillance state aspect of things.
Speaker 2 (58:14):
How is the Department of Homeland Security gonna know you're
not a threat if they can't know what alphabet ads
should be served to you? So they got to listen
in and you know what card purchases shout talent, go boundary.
It's all helpful.
Speaker 4 (58:33):
Yeah, well honestly, yeah, obviously anything can be abused, I think, right, yeah,
I definitely don't want it to be abused.
Speaker 2 (58:40):
Please please don't continue abusing it.
Speaker 3 (58:43):
Please shout out to our hapless n Essay in turn, Steve,
thanks for putting in the work man the.
Speaker 2 (58:51):
Best or Hey, we're we all love science fiction and
we assume you also appreciate it. We we love out
there things that are hilarious like Rick and Morty huge
fans of that kind of thing, but also something you know,
like Prometheus and the Alien franchise. Is there anything that
we maybe have missed in the science fiction universe that
(59:14):
you could put us onto or anything we should be watching,
like a series?
Speaker 6 (59:18):
Anything oh interesting?
Speaker 4 (59:22):
Well, you know, I can point out to the usual
things like Black Mirror or the Expands, but maybe something
your listeners have been heard about is this book called
Simbulacrum three and this was published in the sixties and
it's basically what most people think of as the first
novel with this idea that we might all be living
(59:43):
in a simulation neat So this was way way back
in the day when you know, computers were the size
of a building they could processes like ones and zeros
in a card. But even then there was this writer
who was thinking about, like, wait a minute, what if
we're all just programs? And it's a really true to
be booked because it's like about this ad executive who's
(01:00:04):
programming this simulated city as a as a kind of
a test bed for like testing out you know, marketing ideas,
slogans and things like that. I mean, little by little
he realizes that maybe he's not real himself.
Speaker 6 (01:00:19):
This is very Philip K. Dick ask I like it right.
Speaker 4 (01:00:22):
Right is sixty, very forward looking, very twisty.
Speaker 7 (01:00:27):
And speaking of four looking, y'all might have heard this
as well. But I believe finally William Gibson's Neuromancer is
getting a proper adaptation into a series. And I know
that's a big one in terms of futurists and the
idea of cyber space.
Speaker 6 (01:00:43):
I think was coined in that. And I know Ben
you're a big fan.
Speaker 7 (01:00:45):
But I did just see news the other day that
that's that got greenlit, So that'll be interesting because I
have not read the book, but I need to.
Speaker 6 (01:00:51):
But thank you for Similarchrum three.
Speaker 5 (01:00:54):
Yes, yes, wonderful three.
Speaker 3 (01:00:55):
I'm putting it on the list. That's awesome. That was
a great question, Matt, and we have we have another
question for you or hey, as we're as we're wrapping
up today, we cannot thank you enough for being so
generous with your time. Where can people learn more about you,
learn more about science stuff, and learn more about your
many other projects.
Speaker 4 (01:01:17):
Yeah, so I'm on social media and all the platforms.
Just search for PhD like the Greek comics, and then
you'll see me posting things about my uh the TV
show I have on PBS Kids, to the book series
I have for kids called Oliver's Great Big Universe, to
this awesome podcast I have with my heart now call
Science Stuff One word, and every week we answer fascinating
(01:01:39):
questions like is it a good idea to get crygentically
frozen hard?
Speaker 3 (01:01:44):
Yes?
Speaker 4 (01:01:47):
About the water, the way water expand oh no, that
there's a twister, Ben, it's not about It's not about
the water expanding. A lot of people think it's like
that's what kills you, but it's not.
Speaker 3 (01:01:58):
We have no.
Speaker 6 (01:01:59):
No, let's for the episode.
Speaker 5 (01:02:01):
Listen to the episode.
Speaker 3 (01:02:02):
There we go, Well that that is fantastic? Is or hey,
cham please check out the podcast Science Stuff. Please get
the to the website. We are not blowing smoke. We
are tremendous fans. And now we have to call it
a day because I think we have to figure out
what's going on cryogenic freezing. You know that that's going
(01:02:23):
to stick with me. I totally thought it was the water.
Speaker 7 (01:02:25):
But if you want to find out, do tune into
that episode of Science Stuff.
Speaker 4 (01:02:30):
Yeah, thanks, guys. I'm a big fan of y'all as well.
Speaker 6 (01:02:33):
Same appreciate it, brother, Thanks Lore.
Speaker 3 (01:02:38):
And that was or hey cham as We've said, not
to sound like a broken record, but we really dig
this guy. And if you want to pick his brains.
For more historical aspects of brain science, of quantum mechanics,
the history of the Big Bang, check out our two
part interview series with Orge on Ridiculous.
Speaker 6 (01:02:58):
History Indeed and meantime.
Speaker 7 (01:03:00):
If you want to check us out all over the Internet,
you can do so at the handle Conspiracy Stuff where
we exist on Facebook with our Facebook group Here's where
it gets crazy, on xfka, Twitter, and on YouTube where
we have videos for your perusing enjoyment. On Instagram and TikTok. However,
we're Conspiracy Stuff Show.
Speaker 2 (01:03:19):
We also have a phone number. It is one eight
three three st d WYTK. When you call in, give
yourself a cool nickname and let us know within the
message if we can use your name and message on
the air. If you've got words to send us, maybe links,
maybe images, whatever, why not send us an email.
Speaker 3 (01:03:40):
We are the entities that read each piece of correspondence
we receive. Be well aware, yet unafraid. Sometimes the void
rights back. Love a good book recommendation. If you've got
something really out there, send it our way. We'll meet
you a little past the light. Out here in the
dark conspiracy at iHeartRadio dot com.
Speaker 2 (01:04:17):
Stuff they Don't Want You to Know is a production
of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Stuff They Don't Want You To Know News
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Matt Frederick
Ben Bowlin
Noel Brown
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