PRESSURISED: 062 – Mythbusting Ai with Tyler Greenfield - The Deep-Sea Podcast

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Märvel: The Hadal Zone Express The Hadal Zone Express. (00:02):
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Thom: Hello and welcome to the Deep Sea podcast. (00:07):
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Thom: Pressurized, a short, punchy (00:09):
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Thom: version of our main feed that (00:11):
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Thom: gets right to the scientific (00:13):
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Thom: point. (00:14):
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Thom: If you like what you hear, you'd like to hear the full episode. (00:14):
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Thom: You can find it in the same feed. (00:17):
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Thom: And now to get right to the point. (00:18):
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Thom: Episode ten was one of my (00:20):
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Thom: favorite episodes, debunking (00:22):
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Thom: myths with Cryptozoologist Tyler (00:23):
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Thom: Greenfield, and a lot has (00:26):
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Thom: changed in the four years since (00:27):
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Thom: that episode. (00:29):
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Thom: It feels like a lot has changed in the last six months, really. (00:30):
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Thom: My feed is flooded with people (00:32):
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Thom: finding mermaids, giant (00:34):
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Thom: creatures from the depths, and (00:35):
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Thom: for some reason, lots of videos (00:37):
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Thom: of them getting their barnacles (00:39):
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Thom: washed off. (00:40):
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Thom: I don't know why people are into that, with a paragraph of text (00:40):
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Thom: being all that's needed to make a video believable enough to (00:43):
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Thom: fool Nana on Facebook. (00:45):
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Thom: How do any of us hope in (00:47):
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Thom: stemming the tide of (00:48):
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Thom: misinformation? (00:49):
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Thom: I am joined once again by Tyler (00:53):
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Thom: Greenfield, paleontologist and (00:56):
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Thom: cryptozoologist, whose blog (00:57):
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Thom: incertae sedis reveals the truth (00:59):
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Thom: behind some cryptozoological (01:02):
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Thom: stories and paleontological (01:03):
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Thom: mistakes. (01:05):
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Thom: To pick up where we left off, I just need to check one thing. (01:06):
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Thom: Um, could the Meg be out there? (01:09):
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Thom: I just want to check. (01:11):
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Thom: Nothing's changed. (01:12):
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Thom: Are you sure, though? (01:13):
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Tyler: Nothing has changed. (01:14):
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Thom: Nothing has changed. (01:16):
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Thom: It's less likely. (01:17):
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Thom: If anything. (01:18):
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Tyler: It's one of the few things like cryptozoology paleontologically (01:19):
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Tyler: that I can say that I'm one hundred percent certain on. (01:24):
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Tyler: I'm absolutely confident it is extinct. (01:27):
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Thom: I'm sorry, folks. (01:30):
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Thom: I know you want it to be true, and that's kind of the problem. (01:31):
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Thom: That was our thesis on the last (01:34):
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Thom: interview is it doesn't matter (01:35):
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Thom: how much evidence you can (01:37):
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Thom: produce if somebody wants it to (01:38):
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Thom: be true. (01:40):
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Thom: And it's hard to prove a negative. (01:42):
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Tyler: Yeah, you can prove a negative, (01:44):
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Tyler: but a lot of people think you (01:45):
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Tyler: can't. (01:46):
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Tyler: And then a lot of people will let their personal feelings (01:47):
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Tyler: override any sort of logic or facts just because they want it (01:49):
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Tyler: to be true. (01:53):
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Thom: And only because of that real human obsession with the (01:54):
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Thom: biggest, the tallest, the deepest, the most ferocious. (01:57):
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Thom: If we found something bigger, (02:00):
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Thom: then that would be, oh, maybe (02:02):
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Thom: that's hiding in the trenches (02:04):
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Thom: like it's obviously based on (02:05):
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Thom: wish fulfillment rather than (02:07):
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Thom: logic then. (02:08):
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Tyler: Yeah, yeah. (02:09):
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Tyler: I guarantee you, if we ever (02:10):
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Tyler: found a shark that was predatory (02:11):
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Tyler: and bigger than the megalodon, (02:13):
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Tyler: it would start to become the (02:15):
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Tyler: subject of cryptozoology (02:16):
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Tyler: speculations. (02:18):
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Tyler: People would say, well, maybe the Meg's not out there, but (02:19):
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Tyler: this new big one. (02:22):
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Tyler: Now that's a promising candidate. (02:23):
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Thom: You've got to have scale creep. (02:24):
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Thom: You've got to sort of outdo it each time. (02:26):
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Tyler: Exactly. (02:28):
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Thom: I was lucky enough to watch The Meg two on a research vessel (02:29):
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Thom: with a load of marine biologists and just, oh, the frothing. (02:32):
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Tyler: I didn't like it as much as the first one. (02:35):
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Tyler: The first one was a lot of fun. (02:37):
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Thom: I took a lot of screen grabs of their interface because that's (02:38):
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Thom: quite close to what we do. (02:43):
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Thom: And I just love the idea of (02:44):
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Thom: like, everything's hexagons and (02:45):
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Thom: has just unexplored flashing on (02:48):
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Thom: it. (02:50):
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Thom: That's how I see the world now. (02:50):
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Thom: So the rules of the game have changed since we last chatted. (02:51):
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Thom: Our work cut out for us, and it's a double edged sword as (02:55):
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Thom: well, because then when we publish something that is truly (02:58):
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Thom: remarkable and real, it's pretty much guaranteed in the comments. (03:02):
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Thom: Now we get, oh, is this just AI or nothing can live down there? (03:05):
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Thom: This is just AI. (03:08):
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Tyler: I see that all the time. (03:09):
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Tyler: Even like on videos that are (03:11):
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Tyler: like ten, twenty years old, you (03:13):
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Tyler: know, that have been known and (03:15):
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Tyler: I'm talking specifically like (03:16):
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Tyler: crypto zoological videos like (03:17):
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Tyler: Bigfoot, sea monsters, that kind (03:19):
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Tyler: of thing. (03:20):
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Tyler: Videos that have been around for decades and people have known (03:21):
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Tyler: about you always get comments if you're reposting those videos. (03:23):
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Tyler: Oh, it looks like AI looks like CGI, even though it's way before (03:27):
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Tyler: any of that. (03:30):
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Tyler: So everybody is becoming more (03:31):
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Tyler: cautious, but also less (03:33):
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Tyler: cautious. (03:34):
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Tyler: They're quicker to say AI, but they're also less quick to (03:35):
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Tyler: actually catch it when it is AI. (03:38):
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Thom: It's something we've seen coming over the last few years, but (03:40):
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Thom: there's like post-truth world where just confidence in (03:42):
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Thom: anything has been eroded. (03:46):
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Thom: How have you been managing to like stay hopeful, stay fighting (03:48):
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Thom: the good fight? (03:51):
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Tyler: I mean, I guess with some historical knowledge. (03:52):
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Tyler: At the core of it, nothing has really changed, you know? (03:55):
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Tyler: Fake news has always been around. (03:57):
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Tyler: People have always been making up stories and trying to sell (03:59):
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Tyler: things that are not real as being real, and people have (04:01):
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Tyler: fallen for it. (04:04):
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Tyler: Mass hysteria, that kind of thing. (04:05):
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Tyler: So this kind of thing has always existed. (04:07):
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Tyler: It's just that AI makes it quicker and easier to make. (04:09):
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Tyler: It's the quantity of the (04:12):
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Tyler: material that is the problem, (04:14):
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Tyler: not necessarily the content (04:16):
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Tyler: itself, because it still can be (04:18):
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Tyler: disproven. (04:19):
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Tyler: There's still lots of flaws in the AI that you can pick out. (04:20):
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Tyler: So it's it's doable, but it's (04:24):
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Tyler: just it's an ever increasing (04:25):
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Tyler: tide. (04:27):
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Tyler: The number of AI things (04:28):
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Tyler: increases with every passing (04:30):
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Tyler: month. (04:32):
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Tyler: So it's things have changed, but things also stay the same. (04:33):
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Thom: Yeah you're right. (04:36):
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Thom: Maybe I'm getting a bit too disheartened. (04:37):
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Thom: We had the crazy taxidermy back in the Victorian era with the (04:39):
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Thom: was it Fiji mermaid? (04:42):
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Thom: Yeah, yeah. (04:44):
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Thom: Fish and a. (04:44):
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Tyler: Monkey. Barnum's Fiji mermaid. (04:45):
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Tyler: Well, that's the thing about a little, uh, side tangent here, (04:47):
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Tyler: but the Fiji mermaid. (04:50):
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Tyler: The one that Barnum had was actually not even a monkey. (04:52):
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Tyler: It was a plaster sculpture of a monkey with some possible, like, (04:55):
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Tyler: animal bones mixed in with it. (05:00):
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Tyler: The fish was a real fish, but it (05:02):
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Tyler: wasn't even an actual fish and a (05:04):
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Tyler: monkey. (05:05):
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Tyler: It was a fish and a sculpture of a monkey, which makes it even (05:06):
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Tyler: worse, I guess. (05:10):
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Thom: So maybe we've actually gotten better at spotting things. (05:11):
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Thom: And the same frustration was back then, because then when the (05:13):
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Thom: first platypus was presented to the world, everyone was just (05:15):
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Thom: like, oh no, I've seen this. (05:19):
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Thom: That's just a load of animals glued together. (05:20):
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Tyler: Yeah, it's a beaver and a duck stitched together. (05:22):
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Tyler: No, it's actually a real animal. (05:25):
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Thom: Okay, that makes me more hopeful (05:27):
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Thom: that we're just in a (05:29):
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Thom: transitional period, that this (05:29):
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Thom: has always been part of human (05:31):
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Thom: nature. (05:33):
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Thom: Some new tech has come along, (05:33):
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Thom: and it's going to trick people (05:34):
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Thom: for a little while, and then (05:35):
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Thom: we'll we'll hopefully right the (05:36):
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Thom: ship. (05:38):
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Tyler: Yeah. Just just recently there was a a prominent AI hoax sort (05:39):
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Tyler: of related to cryptozoology and paleontology back in April, I (05:43):
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Tyler: think it was a living coelacanth has been discovered off the (05:46):
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Tyler: coast of Of California. (05:50):
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Thom: Yes. (05:51):
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Tyler: What? (05:52):
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Tyler: That's, like the greatest (05:53):
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Tyler: zoological discovery of the (05:54):
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Tyler: century. (05:55):
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Tyler: But alarm bells were already starting to ring in my head. (05:56):
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Tyler: Why California? (05:59):
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Tyler: That's not a particularly likely (06:01):
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Tyler: area for a coelacanth to show (06:02):
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Tyler: up. (06:05):
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Tyler: It's not the right habitat you don't get. (06:05):
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Tyler: Like the underwater caves and rocky overhangs that they like. (06:07):
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Tyler: It's a well studied area. (06:09):
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Tyler: There are tons of submersible cruise ROVs, remotely operated (06:11):
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Tyler: cameras of other types, divers, surfers, swimmers, people of all (06:15):
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Tyler: sorts that are frequenting the ocean in that area. (06:20):
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Tyler: How would it remain undetected for so long? (06:23):
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Tyler: So that already didn't make sense to me. (06:25):
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Tyler: So I you know, I'm going through (06:27):
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Tyler: all the people's posts reposting (06:28):
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Tyler: this stuff, but a lot of times (06:30):
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Tyler: they don't repost the original (06:31):
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Tyler: links. (06:32):
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Tyler: So eventually I get to the original link, click on it, and (06:32):
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Tyler: the website is a total farce. (06:35):
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Tyler: It's not a real news site. (06:37):
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Tyler: It's a blogging website called Animals Around the Globe. (06:38):
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Tyler: I've never heard of it before, and from quickly reading through (06:41):
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Tyler: the article, it is so obvious it is AI generated. (06:44):
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Tyler: It's got that classic stilted, (06:47):
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Tyler: vague text where it's clearly (06:49):
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Tyler: like trying to figure out how to (06:52):
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Tyler: say something but never actually (06:53):
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Tyler: says anything that means (06:55):
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Tyler: anything. (06:56):
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Tyler: But the big problem with this one is that it actually drug two (06:56):
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Tyler: real institutes into the mix. (07:00):
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Tyler: Because this this article was (07:02):
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Tyler: claiming that an ROV sent out (07:04):
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Tyler: into a submarine canyon off the (07:06):
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Tyler: coast of California by the (07:07):
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Tyler: Monterey Bay aquarium and the (07:09):
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Tyler: Scripps Institution was the (07:11):
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Tyler: thing that had discovered the (07:14):
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Tyler: coelacanth. (07:15):
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Tyler: And they even said that Scripps and Monterey Bay had put (07:16):
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Tyler: together like a museum exhibition with photographs and (07:19):
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Tyler: video of it. (07:23):
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Tyler: And of course, that's not true at all. (07:23):
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Tyler: I reached out to to both institutions. (07:25):
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Tyler: I didn't get a response from (07:27):
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Tyler: Monterey Bay, but Scripps (07:28):
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Tyler: actually did respond to me and (07:30):
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Tyler: they said, yes, this is not (07:31):
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Tyler: true. (07:32):
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Tyler: It never happened. (07:33):
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Tyler: So so that's really a big problem. (07:34):
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Tyler: Not only when you create (07:37):
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Tyler: something that at first feels (07:38):
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Tyler: real and that will fool a lot of (07:40):
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Tyler: people, but also something that (07:41):
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Tyler: is now dragging the real (07:43):
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Tyler: institutions into the mix and (07:44):
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Tyler: lying about them because they (07:46):
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Tyler: have a scientific reputation to (07:47):
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Tyler: protect. (07:49):
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Tyler: Yeah. (07:49):
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Tyler: They should not be involved in (07:50):
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Tyler: this kind of hoax, but (07:51):
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Tyler: fortunately, it blew over very (07:52):
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Tyler: quickly. (07:54):
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Thom: It could be malicious and sort of trying to gain credibility. (07:55):
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Thom: But I also feel like it sounds like the whole article was AI (07:57):
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Thom: generated, and it was just pulling from believable sources (08:01):
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Thom: and emulating those. (08:05):
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Thom: And so it sounds like it had very little human input at all. (08:06):
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Tyler: Yeah. My speculation is that it (08:10):
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Tyler: had pulled from a discovery a (08:11):
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Tyler: couple of years ago off the (08:13):
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Tyler: coast of California, not of a (08:13):
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Tyler: coelacanth, but I think it was (08:15):
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Tyler: of some mollusk or like smaller (08:16):
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Tyler: animal that was called like a (08:19):
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Tyler: living fossil. (08:20):
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Tyler: And I think it sort of, you (08:21):
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Tyler: know, picked up with the (08:22):
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Tyler: association between living (08:23):
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Tyler: fossils and coelacanth and then (08:24):
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Tyler: put together this article out of (08:26):
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Tyler: that. (08:27):
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Tyler: This website, animals around the globe. (08:28):
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Tyler: It hasn't stopped. (08:30):
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Tyler: They keep putting out AI generated articles. (08:31):
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Tyler: There was another one about a woolly rhinoceros mummy that was (08:33):
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Tyler: supposedly discovered in Alaska. (08:37):
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Tyler: Woolly rhinoceroses are only known from Eurasia, northern (08:39):
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Tyler: Europe, and northern Asia. (08:42):
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Tyler: So this would be a huge discovery, right? (08:43):
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Tyler: But it's again, it's another AI generated article. (08:45):
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Tyler: And again, they drug real institutions into it. (08:48):
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Tyler: They said that this was a discovery made, I think, by the (08:50):
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Tyler: University of Fairbanks, Alaska. (08:52):
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Tyler: And of course that's not true. (08:54):
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Tyler: And this was fooling people again, making the rounds. (08:55):
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Tyler: So this whole website seems to have a problem with this. (08:58):
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Tyler: And then the worst fact about it (09:01):
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Tyler: was that it wasn't just this one (09:03):
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Tyler: blogging website. (09:05):
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Tyler: They were getting picked up by MSN, which is Microsoft's news (09:05):
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Tyler: sort of outlet. (09:08):
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Tyler: For whatever reason, Microsoft has a partnership with this (09:09):
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Tyler: random blogging website and promotes all their articles, so (09:13):
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Tyler: that really helps spread it. (09:16):
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Tyler: So that kind of thing is getting to be a problem. (09:18):
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Thom: You talking about the sort of circular language as well, the (09:20):
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Thom: amount of time someone's on a page, the amount they read. (09:24):
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Thom: To be fair, writing has often been this way where you don't (09:27):
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Thom: want to give it all away in the headline, but you have to read a (09:29):
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Thom: long, long way. (09:33):
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Thom: Desperate for substance and realize it never really comes. (09:34):
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Tyler: AI is very repetitive in its (09:37):
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Tyler: language, very vague, but very (09:39):
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Tyler: repetitive. (09:41):
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Tyler: And if you know anything about how language influences people. (09:42):
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Tyler: When something is repeated, more and more and more people are (09:45):
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Tyler: more likely to believe it, even if it's not true. (09:48):
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Tyler: Yeah, I think that's a particularly insidious facet of (09:50):
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Tyler: AI, and its writing style is that it just hammers you over (09:54):
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Tyler: the head, repeating the same facts over and over again, and (09:57):
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Tyler: that makes it seem more believable to most people. (10:00):
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Tyler: With that repetition. (10:03):
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Thom: We'll touch on maybe some other aspects of it, but I think the (10:05):
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Thom: important foundation thing to get in is a lot of these things (10:07):
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Thom: that people are using are language models, and it's really (10:10):
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Thom: important to keep focused on what it is trained on and what (10:15):
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Thom: it is for, which is formulating believable human language. (10:19):
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Thom: And I'm seeing a lot of friends (10:24):
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Thom: like really over rely on it in (10:26):
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Thom: scientific publishing. (10:28):
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Thom: You know, it's spitting out really believable citations, (10:29):
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Thom: which are their real authors. (10:33):
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Thom: It's maybe even a real title, but it's a chimera of multiple (10:35):
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Thom: papers stuck together. (10:37):
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Thom: And even like, I was trying to (10:39):
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Thom: do some building in the garden (10:40):
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Thom: and someone said, you know, oh, (10:42):
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Thom: just just use AI to, to generate (10:43):
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Thom: the design. (10:45):
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Thom: And it's a language model. (10:46):
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Thom: So it produced a really (10:48):
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Thom: believable design of the tools (10:49):
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Thom: I'd need and the lengths of (10:51):
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Thom: everything. (10:52):
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Thom: But they didn't marry up. (10:52):
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Thom: It was four different tree houses that had been cobbled (10:53):
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Thom: together, and if you tried to join it up, it didn't match. (10:56):
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Thom: It looked the part, it looked (10:59):
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Thom: like it was human language (11:01):
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Thom: because that's all it's trying (11:02):
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Thom: to do. (11:03):
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Thom: It's not figuring things out, (11:04):
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Thom: it's just sticking bits (11:05):
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Thom: together. (11:06):
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Tyler: It's a language model and it's an aesthetic model. (11:08):
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Tyler: It is not an information or truth model. (11:11):
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Tyler: People would do well to remember (11:14):
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Tyler: that it is not giving you the (11:16):
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Tyler: truth, it is just predicting (11:17):
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Tyler: what is most likely to be said (11:19):
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Tyler: from the language that it has (11:20):
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Tyler: analysed. (11:22):
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Tyler: It's just a predictive algorithm. (11:23):
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Thom: Because it's such a magic box. (11:25):
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Thom: I think if there's any take home, it's it's that it is. (11:26):
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Thom: It is trying to write believably but not accurately. (11:30):
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Thom: How can we equip our listeners (11:33):
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Thom: because they are getting better (11:35):
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Thom: and better? (11:36):
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Thom: What do you look out for in an image or any other output (11:36):
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Thom: really, to figure out if it's been AI generated. (11:39):
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Tyler: Anatomy is a big one, especially (11:42):
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Tyler: when you're dealing with (11:44):
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Tyler: animals. (11:44):
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Tyler: You know, does it have the right the right number of eyes, the (11:45):
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Tyler: right number of legs, the right number of fins? (11:47):
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Tyler: Does it have the right color? (11:50):
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Tyler: Is the texture like too smooth? (11:51):
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Tyler: A lot of AI images are very smooth and almost too perfect. (11:53):
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Tyler: They don't have a lot of the the rough textures. (11:57):
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Tyler: The lighting is too good. (11:59):
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Tyler: But also oftentimes comes from (12:01):
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Tyler: multiple directions when it (12:02):
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Tyler: shouldn't shadows or (12:04):
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Tyler: inconsistent. (12:05):
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Tyler: It's difficult. (12:06):
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Tyler: It's not not an easy thing to learn, but once you see enough (12:07):
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Tyler: of it, you will start to notice, even on an intuitive level, that (12:11):
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Tyler: it just does not look right. (12:14):
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Tyler: And then you really have to look (12:16):
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Tyler: at the details to see if it (12:18):
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Tyler: actually matches the real (12:19):
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Tyler: animal. (12:20):
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Tyler: Because I've seen a lot of AI generated sharks, that's (12:21):
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Tyler: becoming a thing, especially with like megalodon videos. (12:24):
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Tyler: And and they almost always have incorrect anatomical details, (12:26):
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Tyler: the wrong number of fins, the wrong number of gill slits. (12:30):
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Tyler: The teeth are totally wrong. (12:33):
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Tyler: Sharks have very distinctive tooth patterns and shapes. (12:35):
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Tyler: AI never gets them right If you (12:38):
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Tyler: know what to look for, it just (12:40):
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Tyler: becomes a total joke because (12:41):
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Tyler: again, it's it's trying to make (12:42):
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Tyler: something that looks believable, (12:43):
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Tyler: doesn't actually care about any (12:45):
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Tyler: details that are real or (12:46):
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Tyler: anatomically correct. (12:48):
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Tyler: So you do have to really be (12:49):
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Tyler: careful, look out for the (12:50):
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Tyler: anatomical inconsistencies, look (12:52):
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Tyler: out for the texturing and (12:54):
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Tyler: lighting problems. (12:55):
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Tyler: That's what I would say would (12:57):
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Tyler: would be the main giveaways of (12:58):
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Tyler: an AI generated image of an (13:00):
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Tyler: animal. (13:02):
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Tyler: Specifically look for inconsistencies, things that (13:02):
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Tyler: don't make sense, but unfortunately, a lot of people (13:05):
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Tyler: won't even think about it. (13:08):
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Tyler: They'll just look at it, see the surface details, and be (13:10):
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Tyler: convinced by it. (13:14):
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Tyler: So you really got to look deeper, pay attention closely. (13:16):
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Thom: There's that willingness as well that I would like it to be true. (13:19):
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Thom: You know, we all have confirmation bias. (13:22):
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Thom: We all sort of approve of things that align with our (13:24):
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Thom: understanding of the world a little bit quicker. (13:26):
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Tyler: Yeah, it's it's easy even for scientists or like very (13:28):
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Tyler: knowledgeable enthusiasts or amateurs to get fooled by this (13:32):
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Tyler: kind of stuff, you know, if it's this amazing scientific (13:35):
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Tyler: discovery or photograph, and it seems at first to be (13:38):
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Tyler: anatomically sound, and it sort of lines up with pre-existing (13:41):
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Tyler: knowledge, and it's easy to fall for it first. (13:45):
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Tyler: It's not until you sit back and look at it and say, oh, there's (13:47):
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Tyler: actually a lot about this image and about this backstory, (13:50):
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Tyler: because usually images come with a backstory, which is oftentimes (13:52):
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Tyler: AI generated as well. (13:55):
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Tyler: But then you start to notice inconsistencies, things that (13:56):
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Tyler: don't make sense. (13:59):
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Tyler: You just got to take the time to look at it and think about it. (14:00):
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Thom: One of our listeners pointed out that suction cups on cephalopods (14:04):
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Thom: are like the fingers. (14:07):
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Thom: If they're not just on the (14:09):
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Thom: underside, if they're sort of (14:10):
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Thom: all over the place in places (14:11):
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Thom: that you couldn't even grab (14:13):
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Thom: anything with. (14:14):
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Thom: That's a good one to look out for with anything. (14:14):
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Thom: Tentacle. (14:16):
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Thom: If the suction cups are over, (14:17):
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Thom: too much of the tentacles and (14:18):
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Thom: arms. (14:20):
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Tyler: Or have the wrong number of rows (14:20):
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Tyler: like if it's an octopus, usually (14:22):
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Tyler: they have like one to two rows (14:23):
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Tyler: of suckers. (14:25):
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Tyler: But you know, there'll be this AI generated monstrosity of an (14:26):
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Tyler: octopus and they'll have a dozen rows of suckers on its arm. (14:29):
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Thom: It really likes repeating patterns. (14:32):
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Thom: Yes it does. (14:34):
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Thom: Can I share a link with you? (14:35):
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Thom: And I'll put this in the show notes. (14:36):
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Tyler: Oh, man. (14:38):
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Tyler: That's a that's a terrible image. (14:38):
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Thom: It's awful, isn't it? (14:40):
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Tyler: It's not even close. (14:40):
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Thom: But the press release is that (14:42):
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Thom: we've seen it for the first (14:43):
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Thom: time. (14:44):
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Thom: The whole point of the press release is here is a really high (14:45):
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Thom: quality image of this animal we've never seen alive. (14:47):
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Thom: And they stick that on it. (14:50):
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Thom: It doesn't even have a front. (14:51):
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Tyler: Wasn't this one filmed by (14:53):
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Tyler: Monterey Bay or one of the other (14:54):
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Tyler: institutions? (14:56):
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Tyler: I think they publicly released their images for. (14:56):
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Thom: Yeah. It's mid-ocean. (14:59):
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Thom: I was on it, and I know what it looks like. (15:01):
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Tyler: Yeah. I mean, if the images are free to use, just use the real (15:04):
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Tyler: the real photographs. (15:07):
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Tyler: It's almost like people are (15:08):
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Tyler: starting to expect AI generated (15:09):
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Tyler: images to be in in articles like (15:12):
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Tyler: this. (15:14):
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Thom: It's really good for generating (15:14):
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Thom: an image for your story because (15:16):
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Thom: it'll be nicely compositional, (15:18):
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Thom: and most importantly, it'll be (15:20):
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Thom: at least right now, free for (15:22):
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Thom: credit. (15:24):
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Thom: And so even legitimate stories (15:24):
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Thom: I'm seeing behind an AI (15:26):
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Thom: generated banner. (15:28):
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Thom: And if that's a bit of a cartoon (15:29):
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Thom: and a bit of an infographic, not (15:30):
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Thom: so bad. (15:32):
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Thom: But if it's sort of Misleading, (15:33):
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Thom: especially with new species (15:35):
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Thom: discoveries. (15:36):
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Thom: Like there's always an image of the organism, but then a over (15:37):
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Thom: the top, mysterious looking image is used as the clickbait (15:41):
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Thom: to get you to look at it. (15:44):
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Thom: It's a new brittle star, but (15:44):
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Thom: it's always under the heading of (15:46):
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Thom: like, snake armed deep sea (15:47):
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Thom: organism found for the first (15:49):
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Thom: time. (15:51):
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Thom: And it's like it's a new brittle (15:51):
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Thom: star, and it's cute and it's (15:52):
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Thom: pink. (15:53):
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Tyler: I'm starting to see this with paleontological discoveries, (15:54):
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Tyler: too, where they'll even have a press packet with artwork that (15:56):
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Tyler: is accurate to the animal. (16:00):
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Tyler: They'll instead use an AI generated image that looks (16:02):
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Tyler: nothing like the actual animal. (16:05):
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Tyler: So it's a problem that is growing in pretty much every (16:07):
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Tyler: scientific field when it comes to the press side of things. (16:09):
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Thom: It's certainly a tool that I'm dabbling in and trying to bear (16:13):
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Thom: in mind what it is doing and what its limitations are for (16:17):
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Thom: generating a podcast graphic. (16:20):
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Thom: It's so unbelievably easy, and (16:23):
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Thom: it would be so easy to fall into (16:25):
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Thom: that trap. (16:27):
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Thom: We did AI generate one for Edna (16:27):
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Thom: just because it's difficult to (16:30):
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Thom: show that. (16:32):
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Thom: And I really wanted, like Mr. DNA. (16:33):
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Tyler: Jurassic Park? (16:35):
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Thom: Yeah, I wanted him in a scuba kit, but for spitballing and (16:36):
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Thom: sort of designing logos and things like that, you can sort (16:39):
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Thom: of tweak a lot of things, but I would hope then we could get an (16:42):
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Thom: artist to do it properly. (16:46):
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Thom: It's just more about (16:47):
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Thom: storyboarding and throwing (16:47):
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Thom: things around. (16:49):
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Tyler: Yeah. I mean, if you're if you're using it for that kind of (16:49):
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Tyler: purpose, I don't think there's anything wrong with that. (16:51):
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Tyler: Just for preliminary. (16:54):
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Tyler: Yeah. (16:56):
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Tyler: Like you said, storyboarding (16:56):
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Tyler: kind of things, just getting (16:58):
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Tyler: ideas together. (16:59):
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Tyler: I think, though, when you do (17:00):
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Tyler: have a final version, it's best (17:01):
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Tyler: to get a real photograph or get (17:02):
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Tyler: an actual artist to do something (17:04):
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Tyler: for you. (17:06):
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Thom: We'll see through all this and it'll start to look tacky. (17:06):
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Thom: And then we'll we'll go back to having artists and something a (17:09):
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Thom: bit more human curated. (17:11):
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Tyler: I think it'll happen eventually. (17:13):
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Tyler: The bubbles got to pop sometime. (17:15):
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Thom: Usually I keep my feeds fairly locked down, but I've noticed (17:16):
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Thom: the YouTube homepage seems particularly bad for this. (17:20):
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Thom: Like there was multiple little (17:23):
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Thom: shorts and one of them was like (17:25):
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Thom: a Royal Navy officer, like (17:26):
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Thom: wrestling with this savage (17:28):
undefined

Thom: looking mermaid. (17:29):
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Thom: And for some reason loads of (17:32):
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Thom: people like videos of large (17:33):
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Thom: marine life having the barnacles (17:34):
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Thom: washed off. (17:36):
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Tyler: Yes, yes, I have seen many of those. (17:37):
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Tyler: A varying degrees of of realistic ness. (17:40):
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Tyler: Some are close, others are (17:44):
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Tyler: pretty outlandish and not very (17:46):
undefined

Tyler: convincing that they have become (17:48):
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Tyler: popular. (17:50):
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Tyler: I think they trace their lineage back to an earlier kind of (17:51):
undefined

Tyler: video, the turtle with barnacles glued to its back. (17:53):
undefined

Tyler: A lot of times they're like sort (17:57):
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Tyler: of pet turtles, you know, like (17:59):
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Tyler: tortoises. (18:00):
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Thom: So not even marine. (18:01):
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Tyler: Every once in a while there will be a marine turtle, which is (18:02):
undefined

Tyler: especially concerning, you know. (18:05):
undefined

Tyler: Then they'll scrape them off, which is terrible. (18:07):
undefined

Tyler: Turtles have a very sensitive keratin covering, you know, (18:09):
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Tyler: filled with blood vessels over the top of their shell. (18:12):
undefined

Tyler: But I think this sort of like scrubbing the barnacles off the (18:15):
undefined

Tyler: whale's AI generated videos probably can be traced back to (18:18):
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Tyler: those kinds of videos. (18:23):
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Thom: I think it was a convergence of a few things. (18:24):
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Thom: So there was also the tour guide (18:26):
undefined

Thom: who got quite a lot of criticism (18:28):
undefined

Thom: because they were taking the (18:29):
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Thom: barnacles off the chins of gray (18:31):
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Thom: whales. (18:33):
undefined

Thom: Oh, really? (18:33):
undefined

Thom: Yeah. (18:34):
undefined

Thom: And the whales did appear to be sort of coming in and almost (18:34):
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Thom: asking for this, but it did leave an open wound. (18:37):
undefined

Thom: And I think also there's it's that doctor pimple popper kind (18:39):
undefined

Thom: of thing like that. (18:43):
undefined

Thom: You've got that kind of grossness. (18:44):
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undefined

Thom: We just like, oh, that must feel so much better. (18:46):
undefined

Thom: And we get this sort of weird associated satisfaction. (18:48):
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Tyler: Yeah. Relief with it. (18:52):
undefined

Tyler: Yeah. Yeah. There's like an anthropomorphic factor to that. (18:53):
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Thom: Yeah. I bet that feels so much better to have that taken off. (18:57):
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Thom: Is there any other areas you'd like to cover? (18:59):
undefined

Thom: Because this is just so huge. (19:01):
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Thom: I feel so saturated by it. (19:03):
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Tyler: I mean, yeah, AI content is (19:05):
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Tyler: definitely getting battered in (19:07):
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Tyler: like crypto zoological related (19:08):
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Tyler: topics. (19:10):
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Tyler: I'd say more so than other other fields. (19:11):
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Tyler: A lot of AI Bigfoot if you're if (19:13):
undefined

Tyler: you're on any Bigfoot groups (19:15):
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Tyler: anywhere, which I am, because I (19:17):
undefined

Tyler: love that stuff, even though I'm (19:18):
undefined

Tyler: not a believer that the AI (19:19):
undefined

Tyler: images are increasing all the (19:21):
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Tyler: time, you get a lot of people (19:23):
undefined

Tyler: who are calling them out, but a (19:24):
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Tyler: lot of people are like, wow, (19:25):
undefined

Tyler: this is the greatest footage (19:26):
undefined

Tyler: ever. (19:28):
undefined

Tyler: And it's clearly an AI image. (19:29):
undefined

Tyler: It doesn't really have any anatomical fidelity. (19:30):
undefined

Tyler: It's blurry and and misshapen and but it's enough to fool (19:33):
undefined

Tyler: people because it looks enough like a like a real photo. (19:39):
undefined

Tyler: It's got just enough of the texture and lighting, even if (19:42):
undefined

Tyler: it's not quite right. (19:45):
undefined

Tyler: So it's becoming a bigger (19:46):
undefined

Tyler: problem in the crypto world even (19:47):
undefined

Tyler: than like the zoological or (19:49):
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Tyler: paleontological world. (19:50):
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Tyler: I also think zoologists and paleontologists are better (19:52):
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Tyler: equipped generally to handle that kind of thing. (19:55):
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Tyler: They're more skeptical, more cautious. (19:58):
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Tyler: That's not to say they're perfect and they still fall for (20:00):
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Tyler: it, but they're better equipped than most cryptozoologists are. (20:02):
undefined

Tyler: It's just the fact that a lot of (20:05):
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Tyler: Cryptozoologists don't have the (20:06):
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Tyler: background knowledge, are more (20:08):
undefined

Tyler: willing to accept evidence that (20:10):
undefined

Tyler: supports their worldview, even (20:12):
undefined

Tyler: if they take a more skeptical or (20:14):
undefined

Tyler: scientific approach. (20:15):
undefined

Tyler: There's still more of a confirmation bias there, more of (20:16):
undefined

Tyler: a willingness to accept. (20:20):
undefined

Tyler: And I guess what you'd call mainstream scientists. (20:21):
undefined

Tyler: I don't really like the term mainstream because there's a (20:23):
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Tyler: lot, a lot of mainstream scientists who do cryptozoology. (20:25):
undefined

Tyler: Sometimes they say they do, sometimes they don't, but they (20:29):
undefined

Tyler: still do it anyway. (20:31):
undefined

Tyler: Scientists who have more of a (20:32):
undefined

Tyler: critical or skeptical background (20:33):
undefined

Tyler: are generally better equipped to (20:35):
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Tyler: handle it than most (20:36):
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Tyler: cryptozoologists. (20:37):
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Thom: I saw a YouTube ad the other day. (20:39):
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Thom: I'm going into some crunchier (20:41):
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Thom: areas for some research I'm (20:43):
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Thom: doing right now, and I actually (20:44):
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Thom: like the basis of the stuff I'm (20:46):
undefined

Thom: looking at. (20:47):
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Thom: But it's interesting the adverts that come along with it, and (20:48):
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Thom: I've got a forced an ad talking about how I could cure tinnitus (20:50):
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Thom: with baking soda, basically. (20:54):
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Tyler: Yeah, there's all sorts of these fake like cure all type ads, and (20:56):
undefined

Tyler: they're usually AI generated. (20:59):
undefined

Tyler: They're usually like videos of real people talking about (21:01):
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Tyler: something else, and then they've aged over their mouths. (21:04):
undefined

Tyler: So to match the the words. (21:06):
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Thom: Oh, that was because it had an uncanny valley thing. (21:08):
undefined

Tyler: There, even like a still image. (21:11):
undefined

Tyler: But they've moved with AI. (21:13):
undefined

Tyler: There's a lot of really tricky, nasty deceptions that these fake (21:15):
undefined

Tyler: medical ads use. (21:19):
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Thom: This was really slick. (21:21):
undefined

Thom: It was a very believable AI avatar and it was a very nice (21:22):
undefined

Thom: voice, very well-spoken. (21:25):
undefined

Thom: Obviously, to keep me on the ad, (21:27):
undefined

Thom: it did that real circular (21:28):
undefined

Thom: language thing where every time (21:30):
undefined

Thom: it went round, it felt like it (21:31):
undefined

Thom: was about to tell you the thing, (21:33):
undefined

Thom: and then it went round again, (21:34):
undefined

Thom: and it was about to tell you (21:35):
undefined

Thom: something important, and it went (21:36):
undefined

Thom: round again. (21:37):
undefined

Thom: And there's the sort of classic (21:38):
undefined

Thom: like neurobiologist has (21:39):
undefined

Thom: published research that showed (21:41):
undefined

Thom: that, wait, no, you don't get to (21:43):
undefined

Thom: say that. (21:45):
undefined

Thom: Who? (21:46):
undefined

Thom: Where can I read it? (21:46):
undefined

Thom: You can't just say it. (21:48):
undefined

Thom: You have to back it up. (21:50):
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Tyler: Stick around till the end of (21:51):
undefined

Tyler: this hour or two hour long video (21:52):
undefined

Tyler: to find out my real, real (21:55):
undefined

Tyler: secret. (21:56):
undefined

Tyler: But the rest of the time, I'm (21:57):
undefined

Tyler: just going to talk at you about (21:58):
undefined

Tyler: nonsense. (21:59):
undefined

Tyler: And then at the end of the video, it's the same thing. (22:00):
undefined

Tyler: It never reveal what the secret is. (22:02):
undefined

Thom: Yeah, I think it was entirely AI generated, both the language and (22:04):
undefined

Thom: the person and the. (22:07):
undefined

Thom: It was horrifying. (22:09):
undefined

Thom: If I'm honest. (22:10):
undefined

Thom: I was upset for the rest of the day. (22:11):
undefined

Tyler: But I guess we could talk about some of my recent research and (22:13):
undefined

Tyler: my consultancy work, if you if you want to. (22:16):
undefined

Tyler: For my master's research that I'm finishing up, I've actually (22:19):
undefined

Tyler: done it on megalodon. (22:21):
undefined

Tyler: But a big surprise. (22:23):
undefined

Tyler: So last time I was on, I talked (22:24):
undefined

Tyler: a bit about how there is (22:25):
undefined

Tyler: actually skeletal material known (22:27):
undefined

Tyler: from megalodon and its (22:29):
undefined

Tyler: relatives. (22:30):
undefined

Tyler: Well, there's this very exceptionally preserved specimen (22:30):
undefined

Tyler: that came from Belgium. (22:33):
undefined

Tyler: It's a vertebral column that has (22:35):
undefined

Tyler: one hundred and forty one (22:37):
undefined

Tyler: vertebrae preserved. (22:38):
undefined

Tyler: We think that most of it is part of the Precaudal column, which (22:39):
undefined

Tyler: means the part of the vertebral column before the tail fin. (22:42):
undefined

Tyler: We think it's mostly complete. (22:45):
undefined

Tyler: It's maybe missing a few, and it (22:46):
undefined

Tyler: may include a few of the caudal (22:48):
undefined

Tyler: vertebrae, but it is a very (22:50):
undefined

Tyler: fantastic specimen, the most (22:52):
undefined

Tyler: complete that we know of, of (22:54):
undefined

Tyler: megalodon. (22:55):
undefined

Tyler: But of course, it's still missing the tail, right? (22:55):
undefined

Tyler: We don't know the exact count (22:57):
undefined

Tyler: for the number of its caudal (22:59):
undefined

Tyler: vertebrae. (23:01):
undefined

Tyler: That's what my research is (23:01):
undefined

Tyler: focused on for my master's (23:02):
undefined

Tyler: thesis. (23:04):
undefined

Tyler: It's actually estimating the total count, the precaudal plus (23:04):
undefined

Tyler: the caudal vertebrae. (23:08):
undefined

Tyler: So I've done this by taking data from modern lamniformes. (23:09):
undefined

Tyler: And that's it's an order of sharks that are commonly known (23:12):
undefined

Tyler: as the mackerel sharks. (23:14):
undefined

Tyler: They're megalodons closest relatives. (23:16):
undefined

Tyler: Megalodon itself is a lamniform, so it's part of that group. (23:18):
undefined

Tyler: So I've gathered all this data (23:21):
undefined

Tyler: from the literature on living (23:22):
undefined

Tyler: lamniformes. (23:24):
undefined

Tyler: It's been a lot of work. (23:25):
undefined

Tyler: I spent over two years just gathering references, so I've (23:26):
undefined

Tyler: managed to get together about seventy specimens from (23:29):
undefined

Tyler: Megalodons living relatives. (23:33):
undefined

Tyler: Looking at their precaudal counts, and then the (23:35):
undefined

Tyler: relationship between the precaudal counts and the number (23:37):
undefined

Tyler: of total counts. (23:40):
undefined

Tyler: And it turns out the relationship between those two (23:41):
undefined

Tyler: things is actually consistent. (23:43):
undefined

Tyler: So I've come up with this mathematical equation. (23:44):
undefined

Tyler: You can actually predict the number of total vertebrae from (23:46):
undefined

Tyler: the precaudal vertebrae. (23:49):
undefined

Tyler: So if we use the number of one (23:51):
undefined

Tyler: hundred and forty one precaudal (23:52):
undefined

Tyler: vertebrae for megalodon, I have (23:54):
undefined

Tyler: now been able to estimate that (23:56):
undefined

Tyler: megalodon would have (23:57):
undefined

Tyler: approximately two hundred and (23:58):
undefined

Tyler: thirty vertebrae. (23:59):
undefined

Tyler: And this tells us quite a bit about it. (24:00):
undefined

Tyler: This count is higher than most other lamniformes, so then I (24:02):
undefined

Tyler: have to come up with ideas on how to explain why. (24:06):
undefined

Tyler: Does it really have such a high count? (24:08):
undefined

Tyler: Unfortunately, I've hit dead ends in answering that question. (24:11):
undefined

Tyler: So I looked at two main hypotheses. (24:14):
undefined

Tyler: One is that it had a high vertebral count because it had a (24:16):
undefined

Tyler: more slender body form. (24:19):
undefined

Tyler: This has been suggested in some (24:20):
undefined

Tyler: recent papers that megalodon may (24:22):
undefined

Tyler: have been skinnier than (24:24):
undefined

Tyler: previously thought, had more of (24:25):
undefined

Tyler: an elongate body form because of (24:27):
undefined

Tyler: how big it was, but I found that (24:28):
undefined

Tyler: there was not any relationship (24:30):
undefined

Tyler: between body slenderness and the (24:32):
undefined

Tyler: vertebral count in the modern (24:34):
undefined

Tyler: lamniformes, so that can't (24:36):
undefined

Tyler: really be used as an (24:37):
undefined

Tyler: explanation. (24:38):
undefined

Tyler: Then I also tested if just (24:39):
undefined

Tyler: overall body size, the large (24:41):
undefined

Tyler: length of megalodon being the (24:44):
undefined

Tyler: largest lamniform. (24:46):
undefined

Tyler: If that could possibly explain the high vertebral count, I (24:47):
undefined

Tyler: could not find a relationship between the maximum length and (24:50):
undefined

Tyler: the total vertebral count in modern lamniformes either. (24:54):
undefined

Tyler: So we know that megalodon now had this high vertebral count. (24:57):
undefined

Tyler: We actually don't know how to explain it yet. (25:00):
undefined

Tyler: I've been able to rule out two (25:03):
undefined

Tyler: of the pre-existing hypotheses, (25:04):
undefined

Tyler: but I still need to be doing (25:06):
undefined

Tyler: some more work, and that'll (25:07):
undefined

Tyler: probably be my doctoral and (25:09):
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Tyler: later. (25:10):
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Tyler: Beyond that, I'll probably through my whole career trying (25:10):
undefined

Tyler: to figure that out. (25:12):
undefined

Tyler: One thing before we go, I should (25:14):
undefined

Tyler: give you a bit of an update on (25:15):
undefined

Tyler: some of the stuff I talked about (25:16):
undefined

Tyler: last time. (25:17):
undefined

Tyler: You know, we talked about the megalodon in cryptozoology. (25:18):
undefined

Thom: Oh yes. (25:20):
undefined

Thom: Please. (25:20):
undefined

Tyler: I have actually published some of my research on that. (25:20):
undefined

Tyler: So in twenty twenty three, I (25:23):
undefined

Tyler: finally got my butt in gear and (25:24):
undefined

Tyler: finished it. (25:26):
undefined

Tyler: I've been working on it since twenty nineteen, and I published (25:26):
undefined

Tyler: this big long paper. (25:29):
undefined

Tyler: It's like twenty pages long. (25:30):
undefined

Tyler: Half of that is references. (25:32):
undefined

Tyler: They're like one hundred and (25:33):
undefined

Tyler: fifty, one hundred and sixty (25:34):
undefined

Tyler: references and then like eight (25:35):
undefined

Tyler: thousand words of text or (25:36):
undefined

Tyler: something. (25:37):
undefined

Tyler: It's the longest thing I've ever written by far. (25:37):
undefined

Tyler: It's basically a monograph on (25:39):
undefined

Tyler: the history of megalodon and (25:41):
undefined

Tyler: cryptozoology. (25:42):
undefined

Tyler: Still pretty proud of it. (25:43):
undefined

Tyler: It's my magnum opus so far, so if you're if you're interested (25:44):
undefined

Tyler: in a more in depth exploration megalodon zoology, the major (25:47):
undefined

Tyler: sightings that are promoted by people, the history of those, an (25:52):
undefined

Tyler: attempt at a reasonable explanation for all of them. (25:55):
undefined

Tyler: Tons of references to the (25:58):
undefined

Tyler: primary cryptozoological (25:59):
undefined

Tyler: literature, but also the modern (26:01):
undefined

Tyler: zoological paleontological (26:02):
undefined

Tyler: literature. (26:03):
undefined

Tyler: I am already working on an addendum to that, though I have. (26:04):
undefined

Thom: Already. (26:07):
undefined

Tyler: Collected collected enough material to publish like a (26:08):
undefined

Tyler: proper update on that. (26:12):
undefined

Tyler: Got more sightings to talk about, more details that I (26:13):
undefined

Tyler: didn't have last time that I need to update. (26:16):
undefined

Tyler: I've discovered like some things in the original that I talked (26:18):
undefined

Tyler: about or actually like hoaxes. (26:20):
undefined

Tyler: They're plagiarized from earlier sources. (26:22):
undefined

Tyler: I found more primary accounts to add details to the originals. (26:24):
undefined

Tyler: I've got a lot of material that I need to get working on to get (26:28):
undefined

Tyler: that addendum up, so hopefully I will also have that soon. (26:31):
undefined

Tyler: I've also published some other (26:33):
undefined

Tyler: research about megalodon and the (26:35):
undefined

Tyler: history of paleontology in (26:37):
undefined

Tyler: general. (26:38):
undefined

Tyler: I've talked about this specimen (26:38):
undefined

Tyler: that I've nicknamed Mitchell's (26:40):
undefined

Tyler: Monster. (26:42):
undefined

Tyler: It was first published by a (26:43):
undefined

Tyler: naturalist named Samuel Latham (26:44):
undefined

Tyler: Mitchell in the early eighteen (26:45):
undefined

Tyler: hundreds. (26:47):
undefined

Tyler: It doesn't have a specimen number. (26:47):
undefined

Tyler: The museum it was at was (26:49):
undefined

Tyler: destroyed in a fire, (26:50):
undefined

Tyler: unfortunately. (26:51):
undefined

Tyler: So we only have historical literature to go off of. (26:51):
undefined

Tyler: And from these accounts I've worked together that it was (26:53):
undefined

Tyler: probably megalodon teeth associated with the whale (26:56):
undefined

Tyler: skeleton, the first ever discovery of that kind of thing. (26:59):
undefined

Tyler: So it is an important historical (27:02):
undefined

Tyler: thing, but I've done all sorts (27:04):
undefined

Tyler: of research on that, (27:05):
undefined

Tyler: reconstructing the story on (27:06):
undefined

Tyler: that, and it does intersect with (27:07):
undefined

Tyler: cryptozoology. (27:08):
undefined

Tyler: It's really interesting because (27:09):
undefined

Tyler: it plays into the megalodon (27:10):
undefined

Tyler: stuff. (27:11):
undefined

Tyler: Even though it was not initially identified as megalodon. (27:11):
undefined

Tyler: This this skeleton was discovered in North Carolina. (27:14):
undefined

Tyler: I think it's one of the (27:18):
undefined

Tyler: Carolinas in around eighteen (27:19):
undefined

Tyler: sixteen on a plantation there, (27:21):
undefined

Tyler: digging for some kind of (27:23):
undefined

Tyler: purpose. (27:25):
undefined

Tyler: They unearthed this this skeleton. (27:25):
undefined

Tyler: It's a vertebral column, and it's got teeth with it. (27:27):
undefined

Tyler: They don't know what it is. (27:29):
undefined

Tyler: There's speculation that it's a (27:30):
undefined

Tyler: giant shark, which is fairly (27:32):
undefined

Tyler: correct. (27:34):
undefined

Tyler: But there's also this idea that (27:35):
undefined

Tyler: it could be a sea serpent, (27:35):
undefined

Tyler: because that's a hot topic in (27:36):
undefined

Tyler: the in the eighteen tens in (27:38):
undefined

Tyler: America, there's sightings of (27:40):
undefined

Tyler: like the Gloucester Sea Serpent (27:40):
undefined

Tyler: in Massachusetts, which are (27:42):
undefined

Tyler: nationwide news. (27:43):
undefined

Tyler: It's a huge, huge topic at the time. (27:45):
undefined

Tyler: There are a lot of major people (27:46):
undefined

Tyler: taking this very, very (27:47):
undefined

Tyler: seriously. (27:48):
undefined

Tyler: So. So maybe it's a sea serpent. (27:49):
undefined

Tyler: So they send it from the (27:50):
undefined

Tyler: Carolinas up to New York to a (27:51):
undefined

Tyler: guy named Samuel Latham (27:53):
undefined

Tyler: Mitchell. (27:54):
undefined

Tyler: He's an early naturalist. (27:55):
undefined

Tyler: He's a Renaissance man, right? (27:56):
undefined

Tyler: He's, he's he does a ton of different things. (27:57):
undefined

Tyler: Like most wealthy people at that time. (27:59):
undefined

Tyler: He's like a senator, congressman of some sort, but he's also (28:01):
undefined

Tyler: involved in all sorts of like, natural history studies. (28:04):
undefined

Tyler: He's one of America's first serious paleontologists. (28:06):
undefined

Tyler: He builds up his huge personal collection, one of the first (28:09):
undefined

Tyler: large scale collections of fossils in the United States. (28:12):
undefined

Tyler: So the specimen is sent to him (28:15):
undefined

Tyler: because he's the guy to send it (28:16):
undefined

Tyler: to, right? (28:17):
undefined

Tyler: He writes up a short description of it in eighteen eighteen. (28:17):
undefined

Tyler: He keeps the original identification. (28:20):
undefined

Tyler: Maybe it's a giant shark. (28:22):
undefined

Tyler: Maybe it's a sea serpent, but (28:23):
undefined

Tyler: it's this huge vertebral column, (28:24):
undefined

Tyler: like thirty four to thirty six (28:26):
undefined

Tyler: feet long, with these big, heavy (28:27):
undefined

Tyler: like backbones, like maybe like (28:29):
undefined

Tyler: twelve pounds or more per (28:31):
undefined

Tyler: backgrounds. (28:32):
undefined

Tyler: They're dense, big bones. (28:33):
undefined

Tyler: And it's got these triangular (28:34):
undefined

Tyler: shaped teeth that are like six (28:36):
undefined

Tyler: inches long. (28:38):
undefined

Tyler: Well, what has teeth that are triangular and six inches long? (28:39):
undefined

Tyler: Nothing but the megalodon. (28:42):
undefined

Tyler: But the vertebrae are too heavy, right? (28:43):
undefined

Tyler: They're not a megalodon. (28:45):
undefined

Tyler: The vertebral column is probably from a whale. (28:46):
undefined

Tyler: Right? (28:48):
undefined

Tyler: So? (28:49):
undefined

Tyler: So they found this association of megalodon teeth and vertebrae (28:49):
undefined

Tyler: from a whale. (28:52):
undefined

Tyler: Unfortunately, the specimen is (28:52):
undefined

Tyler: donated in eighteen twenty six (28:54):
undefined

Tyler: to a museum called the Lyceum of (28:56):
undefined

Tyler: Natural History in New York (28:57):
undefined

Tyler: City. (28:59):
undefined

Tyler: This is one of the first natural (28:59):
undefined

Tyler: history museums in the United (29:01):
undefined

Tyler: States. (29:02):
undefined

Tyler: Latham is one of its first presidents. (29:03):
undefined

Tyler: He's a founding member, so he donates his fossil and rock (29:04):
undefined

Tyler: collection to them. (29:08):
undefined

Tyler: So they store it over a period of many years, but they run into (29:09):
undefined

Tyler: all sorts of financial troubles. (29:11):
undefined

Tyler: They move buildings like once every five to ten years. (29:12):
undefined

Tyler: Everything is left in storage. (29:15):
undefined

Tyler: Then in eighteen sixty six, (29:16):
undefined

Tyler: their latest building burns down (29:17):
undefined

Tyler: their entire collection that (29:19):
undefined

Tyler: they've been gathering for the (29:20):
undefined

Tyler: past fifty or sixty years, the (29:21):
undefined

Tyler: largest natural history (29:22):
undefined

Tyler: collection in the United States (29:23):
undefined

Tyler: and in North America at that (29:25):
undefined

Tyler: time. (29:26):
undefined

Tyler: Gone in a single night, in a fire. (29:27):
undefined

Tyler: And that includes Mitchell's monster. (29:29):
undefined

Tyler: This amazing megalodon and whale specimen. (29:30):
undefined

Tyler: So we only have the historical accounts to base it off of. (29:32):
undefined

Tyler: So that was my job (29:35):
undefined

Tyler: reconstructing that story, (29:36):
undefined

Tyler: because it had never been put (29:38):
undefined

Tyler: together before. (29:39):
undefined

Tyler: Mitchell's original description had been mentioned once or twice (29:39):
undefined

Tyler: in the literature. (29:42):
undefined

Tyler: And even, like in a recent blog post by paleontologist. (29:43):
undefined

Tyler: But nobody had ever put together all the historical material. (29:46):
undefined

Tyler: Oh, I should specify he only had (29:49):
undefined

Tyler: a single vertebrae in two of the (29:50):
undefined

Tyler: teeth. (29:51):
undefined

Tyler: The whole thing wasn't just part, but he still described it (29:52):
undefined

Tyler: based on, like, the oral accounts he received. (29:54):
undefined

Tyler: So all people knew was that it was sent to him. (29:56):
undefined

Tyler: And then there was nothing from there. (29:58):
undefined

Tyler: Well, I found the donation (29:59):
undefined

Tyler: catalog to the Lyceum that he (30:00):
undefined

Tyler: wrote because it was his (30:02):
undefined

Tyler: collection. (30:03):
undefined

Tyler: But then I also had to figure (30:04):
undefined

Tyler: out when and where it was (30:04):
undefined

Tyler: exactly collected. (30:06):
undefined

Tyler: Mitchell did not give a precise (30:07):
undefined

Tyler: date or time frame, and he gives (30:08):
undefined

Tyler: inconsistent details on who even (30:10):
undefined

Tyler: found it. (30:12):
undefined

Tyler: So I actually had to look through old newspaper accounts. (30:12):
undefined

Tyler: And these are some of the oldest (30:15):
undefined

Tyler: possible ones that are currently (30:16):
undefined

Tyler: digitized, right? (30:18):
undefined

Tyler: These are newspaper accounts from eighteen eighteen, eighteen (30:19):
undefined

Tyler: seventeen, eighteen sixteen. (30:21):
undefined

Tyler: And I did find newspaper notes from eighteen sixteen of him (30:22):
undefined

Tyler: receiving the specimen and actually teaching with it, (30:26):
undefined

Tyler: because he did teach a class like a natural history anatomy (30:28):
undefined

Tyler: class at a local college. (30:31):
undefined

Tyler: And there was a notice in a (30:32):
undefined

Tyler: local New York newspaper about (30:33):
undefined

Tyler: it in eighteen sixteen that he (30:35):
undefined

Tyler: had had that specimen by that (30:37):
undefined

Tyler: time and had been teaching with (30:38):
undefined

Tyler: it. (30:39):
undefined

Tyler: So that's how I was able to put (30:40):
undefined

Tyler: more of a date on what it would (30:41):
undefined

Tyler: have been found eighteen, (30:42):
undefined

Tyler: sixteen or maybe like a year or (30:43):
undefined

Tyler: two earlier. (30:44):
undefined

Tyler: But then, even though it had not (30:45):
undefined

Tyler: been initially identified as a (30:47):
undefined

Tyler: megalodon, it had been (30:48):
undefined

Tyler: identified as a giant shark or a (30:50):
undefined

Tyler: sea serpent. (30:52):
undefined

Tyler: It had actually been connected with sightings of giant sharks (30:53):
undefined

Tyler: in the eighteen thirties. (30:57):
undefined

Tyler: And there's two different (30:58):
undefined

Tyler: sightings, but they're both in (30:59):
undefined

Tyler: Southeast Asia, and they both (31:00):
undefined

Tyler: probably represent whale sharks (31:02):
undefined

Tyler: described as being this large, (31:03):
undefined

Tyler: like square headed shark with (31:05):
undefined

Tyler: sort of that, like, spotted (31:06):
undefined

Tyler: pattern. (31:07):
undefined

Tyler: Yeah, probably a probably. (31:08):
undefined

Tyler: That's what has been accepted as the explanation. (31:10):
undefined

Tyler: But there are speculations that (31:12):
undefined

Tyler: it's some sort of prehistoric (31:13):
undefined

Tyler: monster. (31:14):
undefined

Tyler: There's one sighting in, I think like eighteen thirty four and (31:14):
undefined

Tyler: another in eighteen thirty five. (31:17):
undefined

Tyler: The guy in the eighteen thirty (31:18):
undefined

Tyler: four sighting says maybe it's a (31:19):
undefined

Tyler: plesiosaur. (31:21):
undefined

Tyler: Okay. (31:21):
undefined

Tyler: Probably not. (31:22):
undefined

Tyler: That's way off. (31:22):
undefined

Tyler: But the second guy says, what if it's a giant shark? (31:24):
undefined

Tyler: So he had actually heard about Mitchell's monster. (31:26):
undefined

Tyler: He had gotten another, like a second hand account about it. (31:28):
undefined

Tyler: And he said, what if this sighting that I had of this big (31:30):
undefined

Tyler: shark is the same animal that that Mitchell described? (31:33):
undefined

Tyler: What if it's this big prehistoric shark? (31:37):
undefined

Tyler: That's crazy. (31:38):
undefined

Tyler: Right? (31:39):
undefined

Tyler: It's the eighteen thirties, and (31:39):
undefined

Tyler: people are already starting to (31:40):
undefined

Tyler: speculate about giant (31:42):
undefined

Tyler: prehistoric sharks, only known (31:43):
undefined

Tyler: from fossils as being still (31:44):
undefined

Tyler: alive and being sighted by (31:46):
undefined

Tyler: people. (31:47):
undefined

Tyler: But this is like the the origin (31:47):
undefined

Tyler: point for the megalodon thing, (31:49):
undefined

Tyler: right? (31:50):
undefined

Tyler: People have been talking about this idea since the eighteen (31:51):
undefined

Tyler: thirties, you know. (31:53):
undefined

Tyler: And unfortunately, I run into it (31:54):
undefined

Tyler: a lot of times where people are (31:55):
undefined

Tyler: too dismissive of the megalodon (31:57):
undefined

Tyler: stuff. (31:59):
undefined

Tyler: Skeptical scientists who maybe know a lot about sharks but (31:59):
undefined

Tyler: don't know a lot about the history of the megalodon thing, (32:02):
undefined

Tyler: are too quick to dismiss it. (32:04):
undefined

Tyler: They say, well, it's just a recent phenomenon, right? (32:06):
undefined

Tyler: There's not really anything to it. (32:08):
undefined

Tyler: There's not really any sightings. (32:10):
undefined

Tyler: There's not really any literature. (32:11):
undefined

Tyler: Well, no, there's actually a whole ton of literature. (32:12):
undefined

Tyler: It's an old, very complicated idea. (32:15):
undefined

Tyler: It didn't start off as anything big. (32:17):
undefined

Tyler: It snowballed over time. (32:19):
undefined

Tyler: But there's a lot of twists and (32:20):
undefined

Tyler: turns, a lot of branches on the (32:21):
undefined

Tyler: tree that some go places, some (32:22):
undefined

Tyler: don't. (32:24):
undefined

Tyler: It's a really complex, really old idea that has a lot of (32:25):
undefined

Tyler: cultural sticking power. (32:27):
undefined

Tyler: It's not sufficient to debunk it (32:28):
undefined

Tyler: by just saying, well, it's a (32:30):
undefined

Tyler: recent thing. (32:31):
undefined

Tyler: You know, the Meg movies made it (32:32):
undefined

Tyler: up or the documentary made it (32:33):
undefined

Tyler: up. (32:34):
undefined

Tyler: It's not like important. (32:34):
undefined

Tyler: We shouldn't spend time on it. (32:35):
undefined

Tyler: You got to understand the whole history behind it. (32:36):
undefined

Tyler: And that's what I've been (32:38):
undefined

Tyler: working on, publishing these (32:39):
undefined

Tyler: papers and doing all this (32:40):
undefined

Tyler: research. (32:40):
undefined

Tyler: I've still got so much more work to do on it. (32:41):
undefined

Thom: That's what I've always loved about your research is. (32:43):
undefined

Thom: And why I find it fascinating is (32:45):
undefined

Thom: even though you are saying that (32:46):
undefined

Thom: this is something untrue, you (32:49):
undefined

Thom: are researching and uncovering (32:51):
undefined

Thom: that untruth and its origins, (32:53):
undefined

Thom: which is far more informative (32:54):
undefined

Thom: than, oh, this is just a recent (32:56):
undefined

Thom: phenomenon. (32:57):
undefined

Tyler: If you want to be a good skeptical cryptozoologist, you (32:58):
undefined

Tyler: have to be a historian. (33:00):
undefined

Tyler: And I mean, the same goes for any field. (33:02):
undefined

Tyler: You should be at least a (33:04):
undefined

Tyler: competent confident historian of (33:05):
undefined

Tyler: your field. (33:06):
undefined

Tyler: It helps a lot. (33:07):
undefined

Tyler: Even in doing your modern studies in cryptozoology. (33:08):
undefined

Tyler: It's an absolute necessity to do (33:11):
undefined

Tyler: good scholarship, because these (33:13):
undefined

Tyler: ideas, I mean, and megalodon is (33:14):
undefined

Tyler: like this tiny, tiny part of (33:16):
undefined

Tyler: cryptozoology, and cryptozoology (33:17):
undefined

Tyler: itself is sometimes considered (33:19):
undefined

Tyler: like a subculture, considered a (33:20):
undefined

Tyler: fringe thing. (33:22):
undefined

Tyler: So it's a small part of a small thing, but it's actually way (33:23):
undefined

Tyler: more complex than you think. (33:26):
undefined

Tyler: And it's like being a deep sea fisherman to bring it back (33:27):
undefined

Tyler: around to the deep sea, like trawling, trawling the ocean (33:30):
undefined

Tyler: bottom, the depths of obscurity and bringing up some new, weird, (33:33):
undefined

Tyler: totally unheard of fish. (33:38):
undefined

Tyler: Every time you do research, it's it's something new. (33:39):
undefined

Thom: We will include in the show notes, hopefully almost (33:42):
undefined

Thom: everything you've spoken about. (33:45):
undefined

Thom: Thanks so much, Tyler. (33:46):
undefined

Thom: I really enjoyed that. (33:47):
undefined

Tyler: I had fun. (33:48):
undefined

Thom: I don't know if you've come across any particularly (33:51):
undefined

Thom: egregious AI stuff. (33:53):
undefined

Alan: It's not it's not necessarily AI stuff. (33:55):
undefined

Alan: But there was I think we've talked about this before, but (33:56):
undefined

Alan: the goblin shark, right. (33:59):
undefined

Alan: It's only ever been filmed twice. (34:00):
undefined

Alan: The first time, I think the (34:02):
undefined

Alan: Japanese trolled a couple and (34:03):
undefined

Alan: then managed to get them into a (34:04):
undefined

Alan: harbour so they could put a (34:05):
undefined

Alan: diver in. (34:07):
undefined

Alan: And that's where those images of (34:07):
undefined

Alan: using the snout Jotham came (34:09):
undefined

Alan: from. (34:11):
undefined

Alan: And so, yes, they were found (34:12):
undefined

Alan: alive, but not necessarily in a (34:13):
undefined

Alan: natural setting. (34:15):
undefined

Thom: And that red fish it's eating is clearly dead. (34:16):
undefined

Thom: It's clearly given that. (34:18):
undefined

Alan: Yes. And so actually just encountering one in the wild was (34:19):
undefined

Alan: actually as this time last year. (34:22):
undefined

Alan: And there's a piece of footage is about 10s long. (34:24):
undefined

Alan: It's not great, but it's certainly a goblin shark. (34:27):
undefined

Alan: And so even having goblin sharks (34:29):
undefined

Alan: die, their jaw comes out and (34:30):
undefined

Alan: they look. (34:31):
undefined

Alan: Everyone knows what they look (34:31):
undefined

Alan: like when they're relaxed, but (34:32):
undefined

Alan: in real life, they're just like (34:33):
undefined

Alan: sharks. (34:34):
undefined

Alan: But if you go online and say, give me a picture of a goblin (34:35):
undefined

Alan: shark, half of them are obviously just dead samples. (34:38):
undefined

Alan: Which makes sense, because most of the specimens, most of the (34:40):
undefined

Alan: records of this thing have come from washing up on a beach or (34:42):
undefined

Alan: bycatch or whatever it may be, but it's just completely flooded (34:46):
undefined

Alan: with AI generated or just art or interpretations of these things, (34:49):
undefined

Alan: and it makes it really difficult when you're trying to get a (34:54):
undefined

Alan: proper idea on this. (34:56):
undefined

Alan: It's like you're trying to find (34:57):
undefined

Alan: a legitimately good, (34:59):
undefined

Alan: scientifically accurate picture (35:00):
undefined

Alan: or drawing or schematic of this (35:01):
undefined

Alan: animal was really hard because (35:04):
undefined

Alan: of the volume of rubbish you (35:06):
undefined

Alan: have to punch through to get to (35:07):
undefined

Alan: it. (35:09):
undefined

Alan: That's the only time I've ever (35:09):
undefined

Alan: been sort of genuinely (35:10):
undefined

Alan: frustrated by the fluff on the (35:10):
undefined

Alan: internet. (35:12):
undefined

Thom: Some people were trying to sort of quantify that because Google (35:12):
undefined

Thom: image searches, like somebody was actually going through and (35:15):
undefined

Thom: then highlighting the images that were real. (35:17):
undefined

Thom: And as more and more of this content is getting generated, it (35:20):
undefined

Thom: becomes this feedback loop. (35:23):
undefined

Thom: So actually, your Google image results are getting less and (35:25):
undefined

Thom: less accurate because the proportions are changing. (35:28):
undefined

Thom: I think there's a little bit of something in Google image (35:31):
undefined

Thom: searches where it sort of evaluates the quality of the (35:32):
undefined

Thom: image, and because AI generated images are beautifully lit and (35:35):
undefined

Thom: really high resolution and really in focus because they're (35:40):
undefined

Thom: not real, they get sort of bumped to the top example I saw (35:42):
undefined

Thom: was for Baby Peacock, and there's loads of AI generated (35:45):
undefined

Thom: images of what we would assume a baby peacock looks like. (35:48):
undefined

Thom: But of course, that whole (35:52):
undefined

Thom: plumage thing is a sexual (35:53):
undefined

Thom: advertisement, and they don't (35:54):
undefined

Thom: have any of that when they're (35:56):
undefined

Thom: juveniles. (35:57):
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Thom: They're just little brown birds. (35:57):
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Thom: So the amount of images of baby Peacock, which looks like a (35:59):
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Thom: peacock with the big fan tail. (36:02):
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Thom: And the beautiful. (36:04):
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Thom: Blue. (36:04):
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Thom: We know those aren't real, but (36:05):
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Thom: it's the majority of hits on on (36:06):
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Thom: Google Images. (36:08):
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Alan: It's a tough world we live in. (36:08):
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Thom: Tom Tyler was a bit more optimistic. (36:10):
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Thom: We've kind of been through this before, and when the new tech (36:12):
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Thom: comes out, we fall for it for a little while, but then we sort (36:15):
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Thom: of learn to see through it. (36:18):
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Thom: I'm hoping it'll self-right again, and we haven't finally (36:19):
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Thom: invented something so convincing that we can't adapt to it. (36:22):
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Thom: But I feel like that's already happening as well. (36:25):
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Thom: They're like, I can recognize (36:27):
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Thom: the style of language when one (36:29):
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Thom: of these tools has been used and (36:31):
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Thom: that sort of cartoony style they (36:33):
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Thom: do because I enjoyed making some (36:35):
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Thom: images when it first came out, (36:37):
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Thom: but now they all start to feel (36:38):
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Thom: the same. (36:39):
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Thom: There's something about it that (36:39):
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Thom: some uncanny valley thing where (36:41):
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Thom: they still look like really good (36:42):
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Thom: images, but they all feel the (36:43):
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Thom: same. (36:45):
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Thom: That makes sense and I feel like I'm starting to. (36:45):
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Alan: See what it is is you lack all (36:47):
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Alan: the subtle, almost subconscious (36:49):
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Alan: imperfections of a real (36:51):
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Alan: photograph. (36:53):
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Alan: I feel photographs are never really perfect. (36:53):
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Alan: It's that, yeah, the uncanny valley thing is like, it's (36:55):
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Alan: almost too real. (36:58):
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Alan: You. (36:59):
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Alan: It's too perfect. (36:59):
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Alan: Yeah. (37:00):
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Alan: People don't look like that. (37:01):
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Thom: It would have a bit of mud on it. (37:02):
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Thom: It would have a scar. (37:03):
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Thom: It would have a torn feather. (37:04):
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Thom: But these, like, weird, dream like, perfect images. (37:05):
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Thom: There's. (37:09):
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Thom: It doesn't feel right. (37:09):
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Alan: Is it time we just did a control delete on the entire internet? (37:11):
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Alan: Start again. (37:13):
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Thom: Might be time for a do over. (37:14):
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Thom: We've learned our lessons. (37:15):
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Thom: We'll get it right next time. (37:16):
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Thom: And that was a pressurized (37:18):
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Thom: version of one of our longer (37:20):
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Thom: podcast episodes. (37:22):
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Thom: If you enjoyed that, and you would like to hear the full (37:23):
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Thom: length episode, just match the episode numbers and you'll be (37:26):
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Thom: able to find the full length version in the feed. (37:29):
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Thom: Thanks for listening. (37:32):
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Thom: We'll deep-sea you next time. (37:33):
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Thom: And we abyss you already. (37:34):
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Märvel: Oh, yeah. (37:41):
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PRESSURISED: 062 – Mythbusting Ai with Tyler Greenfield

Episode Transcript

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}PRESSURISED: 062 – Mythbusting Ai with Tyler Greenfield